Harvey Mudd College 2025 Astronaut Scholars

Harvey Mudd College students Kavi Dey ’26 and Nora O’Connor ’25 have been selected by the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation (ASF) as 2025–2026 Astronaut Scholars. They join an elite cohort of undergraduate students recognized for exceptional academic performance, research potential and commitment to STEM fields.

The Astronaut Scholarship is among the most prestigious STEM scholarships in the U.S., offering up to $15,000 in funding. Scholars also receive professional development support, mentorship and the opportunity to present their work during ASF’s Innovators Week and Gala. 

Kavi Dey ’26

Dey, a physics major, has contributed to multiple research efforts spanning machine learning, computational physics, audio information retrieval and neuroimaging. Since summer 2024, he has contributed to several research projects. With computer science professor Gabe Hope, Dey and other student researchers are investigating structured variational autoencoders for modeling system dynamics from limited observational data. Dey is also working with physics professor Jorge Tamayo to apply machine learning to identify optimal coordinate systems for modeling exoplanetary dynamics, combining advanced physics concepts such as action-angle variables and Lie series transformations. In the Music Information Retrieval Lab with engineering professor TJ Tsai, Dey contributed to published research on three-way audio alignment, resulting in a 2025 International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing paper. Dey also worked at the National University of Singapore on fMRI-based brain decoding models, developing improved training methods and interpretability tools.

On campus, he serves as head proctor and teaching assistant for engineering and CS courses and has developed instructional labs for embedded systems. Dey plans to pursue a PhD in computational physics or computer science. This is the second year Dey has received the Astronaut Scholarship.

“All of the most memorable experiences I’ve had have been collaborations with my peers,” said Dey. “Working with other passionate students to solve problems and do cool projects has been the highlight of my time at Mudd.”

Nora O’Connor ’26

A chemistry major, O’Connor is interested in organic synthesis and green chemistry. At Harvey Mudd, she conducts research in the Vosburg lab, where her senior thesis explores nitrogen insertion chemistry to develop novel compounds with potential medicinal relevance. Her earlier work in the lab contributed to identifying safer, more sustainable solvents for instructional labs. O’Connor has also conducted polymer synthesis research as part of the Lamb Research Group at the University of Minnesota and previously studied commensal bacteria in the Brucks Research Group at HMC. She serves as West Dorm president, is a tutor for chemistry courses and works as a DJ for the student-run radio station KSPC. O’Connor plans to work in industry before pursuing a PhD in organic chemistry with a focus on sustainable synthesis.

“I’m really excited about this opportunity,” O’Connor said. “I think presenting at the Astronaut Scholars Innovators Symposium and Gala in August will be a great learning experience, and I also really enjoy meeting new people. I hope to make some friends that are also doing interesting chemistry!”

About the Astronaut Scholarship
The ASF is a nonprofit organization established in 1984 by the six surviving members of America’s original Mercury astronauts. The Astronaut Scholarship is the nation’s largest, merit-based monetary award given to science and engineering undergraduate students. Harvey Mudd College is one of 41 institutions, and the only non-doctorate granti