3 undergraduates win Goldwater scholarships for science, mathematics
By David Brand
Three Cornell undergraduates, all juniors in the College of Arts
and Sciences, are winners of the prestigious Barry M. Goldwater
Scholarship for science and mathematics.
The students are Joshua Goldman, from South Lake Tahoe, Calif.,
majoring in physics; Justin Kinney, from Pittsburgh, majoring in physics
and mathematics; and Jeffrey M. Vinocur, from Bryn Mawr, Pa., majoring
in computer science.
Since 1992, 25 Cornell undergraduates have won Goldwater
scholarships. This is the sixth year in a row that
the university has had three or more Goldwater winners.
The Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in
Education Foundation was established by act of Congress in 1986 in recognition of
the long government service of U.S. Sen. Barry Goldwater and to foster
and encourage excellence in mathematics, science and engineering. This
year, the foundation trustees awarded 302 scholarships, out of 1,164
nominees, to undergraduate sophomores and juniors from every state and Puerto
Rico. Of the winners, 25 are mathematics majors, 198 are
science majors, 26 are majoring in engineering, six in
computer science, and 47 have dual majors. The scholarships
cover the cost of tuition, fees, books and room and board, up to
a maximum of $7,500 a year.
Goldman, a Cornell Presidential Research Scholar,
plans to earn his doctorate in physics and then pursue a career
in scientific research in either academia or industry. His
current research at Cornell, supervised by Robert Thorne, professor
of physics, is the investigation of electronic and structural
properties of quasi-one-dimensional conductors. He hopes
to describe charge-density waves, a phenomenon bearing
similarities to superconductivity. He also has worked
with simulations and hardware on the CLEO particle detector
at Cornell's Wilson Synchrotron Laboratory. His other
research at Cornell has involved using
ground-penetrating radar for archaeological exploration, including surveys
in Mexico, Italy and Honduras.
This is Goldman's fourth semester as a tutor in the
physics program at Cornell's Learning Strategies Center. He
also performs in the Cornell Percussion Ensemble and plays
the piano. He attended South Tahoe High School, where he
was a National Merit finalist, an AP National Scholar and
a member of the 1998 U.S. Physics Team.
"I am grateful to have been afforded such exciting
research opportunities at Cornell and to have faculty who are not
only open to but very enthusiastic about serious
undergraduate involvement in research," said Goldman.
Kinney expects to take his Ph.D. in theoretical physics.
At Cornell, he has done research in atmospheric science
at Arecibo Observatory, Puerto Rico, which is managed by
the university for the National Science Foundation. This
summer he will work at Hanford, Wash., on the Laser
Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory, an international effort
to detect gravitational waves. At Cornell's Wilson Lab he
has programmed software for the CLEO detector, working
with his supervisor, David Cassel, professor of physics.
Apart from his research, he takes karate classes and
participates in Habitat for Humanity. He graduated from
Taylor Allderdice High School in Pittsburgh, where he designed
and built robots for a national robotics competition.
"I love the physics education I am receiving at
Cornell," said Kinney. "The professors are always happy to talk to
the students outside of class and help them understand
the material on a deeper level."
Vinocur is applying to medical school and, in
addition, hopes to earn his master's or doctorate and then pursue a
career in research and clinical medicine, making use of his
computer science education. At Cornell, he has worked under
Gregory Morrisett, assistant professor of computer science, on
type-safe programming languages, with the goal of providing
a framework for designing crash-proof computers. He also
has worked in the Neonatal-Physiology Research Laboratory
at the MCP Hahnemann University School of Medicine
in Philadelphia, investigating the biochemical mechanisms
of injury to the developing brain. He will be presenting
an abstract on his research at the Pediatric Academic
Societies' 2001 annual meeting in Baltimore later this month.
A teaching assistant in the Cornell Department of
Computer Science, Vinocur also plays clarinet in the
Cornell marching band. He graduated from Haverford High
School, where he won the Rensselaer Medal.
"My education at Cornell has been nothing but
amazing in terms of faculty. I've had several classes from
people who are world-renowned in their fields. My first
semester here I had Roald Hoffmann, the Nobel laureate, as
a professor," Vinocur said of Cornell's Frank H.T.
Rhodes Professor in Humane Letters. In 1997, Vinocur and
Kinney were among 90 high school students selected for the
Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Sciences, a
summer program at Carnegie-Mellon University.
In the last five years, three Goldwater Scholars
from Cornell have gone on to win Marshall Scholarships,
one has won a Rhodes Scholarship and three have won
Churchill Scholarships.
Cornell's Goldwater Scholarship endorsement
committee this year consisted of Barbara Bedford, a senior
researcher in the Department of Natural Resources;
David Cassel, professor of physics; and Donald
Farley, professor of electrical and computer engineering.
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