May 29, 2010 - Claremont, Calif. -

Harvey Mudd College juniors Matthew Keeter ‘11 and Alicia Schep ‘11 have been awarded Goldwater Scholarships, it was announced by the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship and Excellence in Education Foundation.

The one- and two-year scholarships will cover the cost of tuition, fees, books, and room and board up to a maximum of $7,500 per year.

Schep, a chemical biology major, plans to earn a Ph.D. in molecular biology and conduct research in that field then teach at the university level. She is currently doing research in the lab of chemistry Professor Robert Drewell on the transcriptional regulation of the TERT gene in human cells. The TERT gene encodes for the catalytic subunit of Telomerase, which contributes significantly to the ability of stem cells and cancer cells to divide indefinitely. “Understanding the regulation of telomerase is important for understanding how cells become cancerous,” Schep said.

“I am spending a few weeks at Mudd wrapping up my research in the Drewell lab, but I will then be spending most of the summer at NYU doing research in a lab that focuses on post-transcriptional regulation in breast cancer cells,” she said.

Keeter, an engineering major, intends to earn a master's or Ph.D. in some facet of electrical or computer engineering. He looks forward to working on cutting-edge research in industry or academia.

During the spring semester, Keeter worked on hardware multipliers, which involved a set of different designs, and used various programs to automatically optimize them for a fair comparison. The project was funded by the Clay-Wolkin Fellowship which provides students opportunities to pursue basic and applied research initiatives in VLSI Design within the context of the engineering program at Harvey Mudd College.

Keeter said, "Over the summer, I will be working with Maddy Ong ’11 on designing a new course for Mudd freshmen. The course is about autonomous vehicles- small robots, powered by some kind of renewable energy, probably fuel cells or solar power."

Keeter, a member of the Claremont Colleges Ballroom Dance Company, says he looks forward to teaching an evening lab section during the fall semester.

The Goldwater Scholars were selected on the basis of academic merit from a field of 1,111 mathematics, science, and engineering students who were nominated by the faculties of colleges and universities nationwide. One hundred fifty-six of the Scholars are men, 122 are women, and virtually all intend to obtain a Ph.D. as their degree objective. Seventeen Scholars are mathematics majors, 199 are science and related majors, 53 are majoring in engineering, and nine are computer science majors. Many of the Scholars have dual majors in a variety of mathematics, science, engineering and computer disciplines.

The Goldwater Foundation is a federally-endowed agency, established by Public Law 99-661 on November 14, 1986. The scholarship program honoring Senator Barry M. Goldwater was designed to foster and encourage outstanding students to pursue careers in the fields of mathematics, the natural sciences and engineering. The Goldwater Scholarship is the premier undergraduate award of its type in these fields.