2002 Calit2 Undergraduate Scholar Wins Jacobs School Student Award
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5.19.03 - On May 16, Stephanie Culler picked up the Undergraduate Leadership Award of UCSD's Jacobs School of Engineering. The chemical engineering senior was cited for her pursuit of excellence in academics, community service and research - including a stint as a Calit² undergraduate scholar last summer. [To watch a streaming video profile of Culler, click here.]
Culler is headed for graduate school at Caltech in chemical engineering, but says she has already been doing graduate-level research - thanks in part, to her 2002 research scholarship from the UCSD division of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology.
"It provided me a lot of opportunities to meet other students and also get out and talk and have poster sessions and to present my research," says Culler. "It gave me that opportunity, and I liked that we got to get together more, and talked with different professors to see what they were doing in their research. It was interdisciplinary, and I enjoyed that aspect of it."
As a Calit² undergraduate scholar in the institute's Digitally Enabled Genomic Medicine layer, Culler worked in the lab of UCSD chemical engineering professor Pao Chau. She did statistical analysis of the regions where antibodies and antigens touch: "The goal of that research was basically to help antibody engineers improve the contacts between antigens to make better antibodies to eventually cure diseases."
What began last summer is continuing. Culler has worked in Chau's lab during her senior year, and presented her research at several regional conferences and poster sessions. She is now readying an article with Professor Chau, based on her research, for the Journal of Molecular Biology. "I am actually going to publish soon, and I've had experiences with three different professors on long-term research projects," says Culler. "So these things can happen as an undergrad."
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The daughter of a fashion designer mother and human resources specialist father, Culler's interest in research and engineering is most surprising, because she could have been a professional musician instead. Growing up in Orange County, she picked up her first violin in fourth grade, and was one of only 300 students selected from 18,000 applicants to attend the prestigious Interlochen arts camp. She went, but then opted for a career in engineering -- even over becoming a doctor. Why? "Strictly because I could impact a lot more people's lives than just a couple at a time," admits Culler. "With bioengineering, I could impact virtually millions of people with a drug that I might help make."
Culler juggles research and classes with a full schedule of extracurricular activities. She is the president of the UCSD chapter of Tau Beta Pi, the professional engineering fraternity, and visits area schools to talk with fourth and fifth graders. "We currently visit them three times a week, and we have an hour or two-hour session and go through science experiments," says Culler. "We also introduce ourselves, 'this is my major' and this is, for instance, what a chemical engineer does, or an electrical engineer, so they learn about that early on."
Culler has also contributed hundreds of hours of service to the American Red Cross, American Cancer Society, and more than half a dozen other organizations. Meanwhile, as she finishes out her senior year, she is making more time for music -- playing with the La Jolla Symphony and several quartets, and teaching violin students.