Three Academic Women Win Packard Fellowships

In 1988 the Packard Foundation established the Fellowships for Science and Engineering. The goal was to allow some of the nation’s most promising young scientists to pursue their work without the worry of financing their work.

Now each year 16 fellows are selected from 50 major research universities. Each fellow receives a total of $875,000 over the ensuing five years. To be eligible, faculty members must be in the first three years of their academic careers in the fields of physics, astronomy, chemistry, mathematics, biology, computer science, earth science, ocean science, or in any field of engineering. There are no restrictions on how the fellows use their funds to compliment their research. Since 1988, more than 400 faculty members have become Packard Fellows, receiving more than $230 million in grants.

Of this year’s 16 fellows, three are women:

Karine A. Gibbs is an assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology at Harvard University. Her research focuses on identifying the mechanisms underlying self-recognition in the bacterium Proteus mirabilis.

A native of Jamaica, Dr. Gibbs was raised in Baltimore. She is a graduate of Harvard University and holds a Ph.D. in microbiology and immunology from Stanford University.

Sarah M. Aciego is on the faculty of the department of earth and environmental science at the University of Michigan. She joined the faculty at the university in 2010. Her research examines ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica in an effort to understand the interaction between climate change and rising sea levels.

Dr. Aciego is a graduate of Cornell University and holds a Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley.

Tiffany A. Shaw is an assistant professor of earth and environmental science at Columbia University in New York City. Her research focuses on climate conditions and how they impact summer monsoons.

Dr. Shaw is a graduate of the University of British Columbia. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Toronto.