Indian American student Ajit Divakaruni, specialising in three subjects at The University of Arizona, has been named a 2006 Marshall Scholar.
He is one of 40 students chosen in a nationwide competition and the scholarship, worth about $60,000, will fund his tuition and living expenses during his time studying in the United Kingdom.
Divakaruni, 22, a senior honours student in the College of Science and also a Flinn Scholar who attended Saguaro High School in Scottsdale, Arizona, has won this coveted scholarship, the first at the University of Arizona in eight years.
He has sustained a strong academic track record at the University of Arizona (UA), with excellent grades and a triple major in biochemistry, mathematics and molecular and cellular biology. He expects to complete an honours thesis in each of his three majors, a feat never before accomplished by a UA Honours student.
He's worked as an undergraduate researcher in Professor Tim Secomb's lab at the UA, and in labs at Cambridge University and Yale University. At Cambridge he hopes to pursue an interdisciplinary understanding of metabolic regulation and the biochemistry of uncoupling proteins. This research may be an important catalyst in understanding how to regulate diabetes and obesity.
Born in Minnesota, Divakaruni grew up in Scottsdale, graduating from Saguaro High School in 2001. His brother is studying for a PhD in biochemistry at UCLA, his father is an electrical engineer, and his mother is an accountant.
{{/usCountry}}Born in Minnesota, Divakaruni grew up in Scottsdale, graduating from Saguaro High School in 2001. His brother is studying for a PhD in biochemistry at UCLA, his father is an electrical engineer, and his mother is an accountant.
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