In 1994, the MCB Program established the Byron Prize in honor of Dr. Fred Byron, Vice Chancellor for Research at UMass Amherst. Dr. Byron was instrumental in establishing the MCB program and showed great vision and support of both research and graduate education throughout his career at UMass. Each summer, students who received PhD degrees in the previous year can be nominated for the prize by their dissertation advisors. The winner presents a talk at the MCB Retreat and receives a cash prize of $1,000. Prize selection is made by the MCB Steering Committee, which has established the following criteria:
- Originality and creativity of the research
- Impact: significance in the field
- Scope of the research project
- Scope of techniques used to solve the problem
- Quality of writing
- Contributions to the MCB program
Previous Prize Winners
| Year | Name | Degree |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 |
Samar Mahmoud (Chien Lab) R&D Senior Scientist at BD
|
Ph.D 2022 |
| 2023 |
Can Özden (Stratton Lab) Scientist II, Biophysics & Protein Sciences - Jnana Therapeutics |
Ph.D 2022 |
| 2022 | Ben Adams (Hebert Lab) Postdoctoral Associate with Susan Shao and Wade Harper, Harvard Medical School benjamin.adams34@gmail.com |
Ph.D. 2021 |
| 2022 | Alam García Heredia (Siegrist Lab) Postdoctoral Associate with Alan Grossman, MIT agarciah@mit.edu |
Ph.D. 2021 |
| 2021 | Nils Pilotte (Williams Lab) Assistant Professor of Biology, Quinnipiac University Nils.Pilotte@quinnipiac.edu |
Ph.D. 2020 |
| 2021 | Archit Rastogi (Timme-Laragy Lab) Assistant Director, Preclinical Development, Ionis Pharmaceuticals rastogia@pm.me |
Ph.D. 2020 |
| 2021 | Rilee Zeinert (Chien Lab) Postdoctoral Associate, Storz Lab, NIH rilee.zeinert@nih.gov |
Ph.D. 2020 |
| 2020 | Katherine Zabala Sanidad (Zhang Lab) Postdoctoral Associate, Zeng Lab, Weill Cornell Medicine kzs4001@med.cornell.edu |
Ph.D. 2019 |
| 2020 | Alex Wells (Pobezinsky Lab) Postoctoral Fellow, Belkaid Lab, NIAID/NIH alex.wells@nih.gov |
Ph.D. 2019 |
| 2019 | Emrah Ilker Ozay (Minter/Tew Labs) Scientist, SQZ Biotechnologies emrah.ozay@sqzbiotech.com |
Ph.D. 2018 |
| 2018 | Monifa Fahie (M. Chen Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, Lee Lab, Brandeis monifahie@brandeis.edu |
Ph.D. 2017 |
| 2018 | Kamal Joshi (Chien Lab) Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Roche/Genentech kkj143@gmail.com |
Ph.D. 2017 |
| 2018 | Anna Ye (Maresca Lab) Postdoctoral Scholar, Drubin/Barnes Lab at UC Berkeley yeanna@berkeley.edu |
Ph.D. 2017 |
| 2017 | Karan Hingorani (Gierasch Lab) MD/PhD program, BU School of Medicine karansh@bu.edu |
Ph.D. 2016 |
| 2016 | Genevieve Abbruzzese (Alfandari Lab) Postdoctoral Researcher, Hynes Lab at MIT, Cambridge, MA gabbruzz@MIT.EDU |
Ph.D. 2015 |
| 2015 | Anushka Dongre (Osborne Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, MA |
Ph.D. 2014 |
| 2014 | Leslie Conway (Ross Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, Tufts/Astra-Zeneca |
Ph.D. 2013 |
| 2013 | Nathaniel E. Clark (Garman Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio clarkn@uthscsa.edu |
Ph.D. 2012 |
| 2012 | David F. Bruhn (Klingbeil Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, St. Jude Children's Hospital - Memphis, TN David.Bruhn@StJude.org |
Ph.D. 2011 |
| 2011 | Julian Sosnik (Visconti Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Irvine jsosnik@UCI.edu |
Ph.D. 2010 |
| 2010 | Bradley Pearse (Hebert Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard Medical School brad.pearse@gmail.com |
Ph.D. 2009 |
| 2009 | David Sharlin (Zoeller Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, NIDDK, NIH sharlind@mail.nih.gov |
Ph.D. 2008 |
| 2008 | Robert Daniels (Hebert Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden |
Ph.D. 2007 |
| 2007 | Kelly Gauger (Zoeller Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, PVLSI (Baystate) kelly.gauger@bhs.org |
Ph.D. 2006 |
| 2006 | Nasser Rusan (Wadsworth Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, UNC Chapel Hill nasser@email.unc.edu |
Ph.D. 2005 |
| 2005 | Jeremy Smyth (Fissore Lab) Postdoctoral Fellow, NIEHS, NIH smythj@niehs.nih.gov |
Ph.D. 2004 |
| 2004 | Heather Thompson (Scordilis Lab) | Ph.D. 2003 |
| 2003 | Thomas King (Fournier Lab) Sequitur, Inc |
Ph.D. 2002 |
| 2002 | John Wing (Nambu Lab) Principal Research Investigator, OSE Eyetech |
Ph.D. 2000 |
| 2001 | Amy Dowling (Zoeller Lab) | Ph.D. 2000 |
| 2000 | Kevin Keith (Fitzgerald-Hayes Lab) | Ph.D. 1999 |
| 1999 | Marie (Sanchirico) Comeaux (Mason Lab) | Ph.D. 1998 |
| 1998 | Rebecca (Bryant) Roberts (Hansen Lab) Assistant Professor, Ursinus College |
Ph.D. 1998 |
| 1997 | Wen-Qing Liang (Fournier Lab) | Ph.D. 1997 |
| 1996 | Sam Stoler (Fitzgerald-Hayes Lab) | Ph.D. 1995 |
| 1995 | Chin Pan (Mason Lab) | Ph.D. 1994 |
| 1994 | My Mahoney (Gross & Slakey Labs) Professor, Thomas Jefferson University |
Ph.D. 1993 |
| 1994 | William Payne (Fitzgerald-Hayes Lab) | Ph.D. 1993 |
