Researchers win grants supporting women in the sciences
Two Yale researchers -- Beth Anne V. Bennett, associate research scientist and lecturer in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, and Terri A. Williams, research scientist in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology -- are among 22 women nationally who were named ADVANCE Fellows by the National Science Foundation (NSF).
The honor is accompanied by a multi-year research grant.
ADVANCE grants are intended to increase the number of women in the scientific and engineering workforce by acknowledging that childrearing, eldercare or relocation of a spouse extend women's postdoctoral status and limit their career advancement. ADVANCE fellowships are awarded to women who experience such limitations yet show high potential for full-time, independent science or engineering careers at institutions of higher learning in a field supported by NSF.
Bennett, who earned her Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Yale, will use her three-year $300,000 grant to do research on how to adapt a computational method called Local Rectangular Refinement (LRR), which uses adaptive grids to model physical systems in two dimensions, into a gridding method than can simulate practical three-dimensional systems. Bennett plans to use LRR-3D to create simulations that will allow her to predict the formation of microscopic features that affect macroscopic properties, such as the strength and hardness, of aluminum alloy parts.
Williams, who received her Ph.D. in zoology from the University of Washington in 1990, plans to use her three-year $400,000 grant to explore the evolution of animal design by studying arthropods (such as spiders, lobsters and ants), which have a body plan that is built from repeated units called segments. Typically, each segment has one pair of legs (for walking, swimming, feeding, etc.), and the combination of segments defines the lifestyles of different arthropods. Williams is studying how these segments became specialized in order to advance understanding about how arthropods evolved into such diverse life forms.
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