May 10, 2011 - Claremont, Calif. -

Harvey Mudd College (HMC) chemistry major Anna Cunningham ‘11 of Seattle, Wash., has been awarded a prestigious Fulbright scholarship for one year of study in Ireland.

Cunningham will spend the coming academic year investigating pyrrolobenzoxazepine (PBOX) compounds – chemicals that show promise as a weapon against cancer. Part of her investigation will entail spectroscopic analysis of how PBOX compounds synergistically interact with other known cancer drugs that also work by binding to tubulin. This, she hopes, will reveal possibilities for new, even more effective anticancer treatments. It’s an approach, she says, “that has the potential to revolutionize current methods of cancer therapy.”

Supervising her work will be Clive Williams, a prominent investigator of new cancer-fighting drugs, whose laboratory she will use at Trinity College in Dublin.

“I’m excited to be working at one of the leading research institutions in Ireland,” she said. “With sufficient work, this project could result in publication of a scientific paper and presentation at an international conference.”

Cunningham's travel to Ireland will mark the second time in as many years that she has traveled abroad in quest of greater knowledge. During part of her junior year at HMC, she studied at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. Her interest in cancer research was sparked last summer while participating in an internship program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. “As a chemistry major, I found it fascinating to be able to approach cancer from a chemical or biochemical perspective,” she said.

In addition to the Fulbright Scholarship, Cunningham was inducted into the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program. Her scholastic strengths also earned her recognition as an HMC President's Scholar.

During her time at HMC, Cunningham tutored freshmen in chemistry (and underprivileged local high school students in all subjects) and was active in the performing arts. As a sophomore and junior, she was a member of the school’s ballroom dance team. As a freshman, she joined the Claremont Colleges Concert Choir and, more recently, the Claremont Colleges Chamber Choir. (Adding to Anna’s excitement about the cancer research project at Trinity College is the opportunity it affords to indulge a newfound appreciation of Irish folk music.)

Cunningham credits David Vosburg, assistant professor of chemistry, with being one of the faculty members who most influenced her. “He has been so supportive, and made a huge positive impact on my experience here at Mudd,” Anna said. “His advice about classes, applying to grad schools and writing my proposals for the Fulbright Scholarship and the National Science Foundation was invaluable.”

Vosburg said that Cunningham quickly distinguished herself as an exceptional student. “Her initial project in my laboratory during her sophomore year was to screen a range of green catalysts for enantioselective and chemoselective reductions of citral, a natural fragrance from lemongrass oil. Several of the catalysts she screened were not commercial, and she showed great facility with solid-phase peptide synthesis and other procedures to prepare them.”

Cunningham’s later experiments led to her co-authorship of an article that appeared earlier this year in the Journal of Chemical Education, Vosburg noted. He said Cunningham also impressed him with her choice of senior thesis topic – mercury resistance in flavobacteria – and reports that her involvement with a research group led by Prof. Nancy Hamlett helped convince Anna to set her sights on a career in the biological sciences.

Upon her return next year from Ireland, Anna will begin postgraduate studies at an as-yet unannounced school in pursuit of a doctorate in biochemistry.

Fulbright Scholarships are awarded through the auspices of the Fulbright Program, begun in 1946 to promote international exchanges of knowledge and skills. The highly competitive, federally funded program annually selects some 8,000 of the nation’s best and brightest college seniors and provides them grants to study, research or teach overseas. Significantly, more than 40 past Fulbright recipients have gone on to receive the Nobel Prize.