October 5, 2011
UW Graduate School recognizes outstanding dissertations, thesis
The UW Graduate School has awarded its 2011 Graduate School Distinguished Dissertation and Thesis Awards to Aurelia Honerkamp-Smith and Maria Grigoryeva respectively. These yearly awards recognize outstanding and exceptional research and scholarship at the doctoral and master’s level by graduate students throughout the UW. The dissertation award winner receives $1,000, while the thesis award winner receives $500.
Honerkamp-Smith earned her master’s and doctoral degrees in chemistry from the UW and is now a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Cambridge. Her dissertation was titled “Static and Dynamic Properties of Critical Concentration Fluctuations in Lipid Bilayers.” Grigoryeva recently received her master of arts degree in sociology from the UW and is pursuing her doctorate here. “Parenting, Child Disclosure, and Delinquency: A Structural Equation Panel Model” was the title of her thesis.
The Graduate School also recognized John Hoekman with its 6th Chapter Award for his dissertation, “The Impact of Enhanced Olfactory Deposition and Retention on Direct Nose-to-Brain Drug Delivery.” The 6th Chapter Award recognizes outstanding and exceptional doctoral scholarship and research that encourages commercial enterprise, technology transfer models, pedagogical innovations or work that translates basic scholarly and scientific insights into policy, program or practice initiatives. The award includes an honorarium of $1,000 and recognition by the Graduate School.
Based on his research that revealed the limitations of nose-to-brain drug delivery methods, such as nasal sprays, Hoekman co-founded Impel NeuroPharma, a company that is developing a device that will more rapidly deliver drugs to the brain through nasal passages. Hoekman earned his doctorate in pharmaceutics from the UW and, along with a graduate student in business, won the Foster School of Business’ business plan competition in 2008.
The Graduate School nominates the dissertation award winner each year to the Council of Graduate Schools/University Microfilms International Distinguished Dissertation Award competition, and nominates the thesis award winner each year to the Western Association of Graduate Schools/University Microfilms International Distinguished Master’s Thesis Award competition.
