Emily Buck
B.S./M.S. student Emily Buck (advisor: Caroline Schauer) has been awarded a 2013 Barry Goldwater Scholarship. The Barry Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Program seeks to "provide a continuing source of highly qualified scientists, mathematicians, and engineers by awarding scholarships to college students who intend to pursue careers in these fields.”
The Goldwater scholarship is given to 300 students nationally, and each University is allowed to nominate four candidates. This year all four Drexel nominees were awarded scholarships. Emily is the first Drexel Materials Science and Engineering student to receive the scholarship.
Emily has chosen a research path, getting involved in the lab very early in her undergraduate career. She is currently working with Professor Caroline Schauer’s Natural Polymers and Photonics Group to develop an economic filter from crab shells that is able to remove select contaminants from polluted water sources, such as arsenic and mercury. The filter is composed of electrospun nanofibers from the crab shells which are post-processed through chemical functionalization. In the coming years, Emily plans to continue to pursue the ways in which electrospun polymer nanofibers can be used for water filtration applications. After completing the B.S./M.S. program, she plans to obtain a Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering in order to prepare herself for a career in research.