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Matthew Behrend, right, winner of two prestigious engineering awards, demonstrates an electric pulse generator used to study cell death, while Martin Gundersen, professor of electrical engineering, looks on. Photo: Diane Ainsworth |
Behrend, who graduates in May, was one of only two electrical engineering undergraduates nationwide to receive the prestigious Hertz fellowship award and one of only 19 recipients nationally in science and engineering.
The fellowship is based on merit and pays for tuition and a personal support stipend for up to five years. Behrend will combine the Hertz award with the NDSE award to cover the costs of his graduate training in electrical engineering at the university of his choice.
“I’m very thankful for these awards,” he said. “They afford me the much-needed freedom to choose my projects and the scope of my research.”
Behrend, who has been admitted to both USC’s and MIT’s graduate electrical engineering
programs, is interested in retinal prosthetics to help blind people see.
He has been active in multidisciplinary research in electrical and biomedical
engineering, has published an article in IEEE Transactions on electric field exposure
of biological cells and tissues, and co-authored six conference publications.
In May, the new USC graduate will participate in several presentations at the international IEEE Power Modulator Conference, to be held in San Francisco.
