This year's winners are Bowdoin College, Fairleigh Dickinson University, Furman University, Harvey Mudd College, Hope College, McNeese State University, North Central College, Northern Kentucky University, Oakland University, Otterbein College, Seattle University, St. Olaf College, University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, Ursinus College, and Vassar College.
The Merck/AAAS Undergraduate Science Research Program (USRP) is a national competitive awards program available in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Fifteen awards are made annually, and each award provides up to $60,000, paid over three years at $20,000 per year, for joint use by the biology and chemistry departments at each recipient institution. The funding supports research stipends for undergraduate students and ancillary programs that foster interactions between these departments.
Launched in 2000 as a national competition, awards will be made through 2009. This ten-year, $9 million initiative is funded by The Merck Company Foundation and administered by AAAS. The program goals are to:
- enhance undergraduate education through research experiences that emphasize the interrelationship between chemistry and biology;
- encourage students to pursue graduate education in chemistry and life sciences; and
- foster undergraduate programs and activities that bridge chemistry and biology.
The program is open to qualified institutions in the United States and Puerto Rico that offer an American Chemical Society-certified program in chemistry and confer 10 or fewer graduate degrees annually in biology and chemistry combined. For additional information, send questions to merck@aaas.org or visit the web site at www.merckaaasusrp.org.
The Merck Company Foundation is an US-based, private, charitable foundation. Established in 1957 by Merck & Co., Inc. and funded entirely by the Company, the Foundation serves as Merck's chief source of funding support to qualified non-profit, charitable organizations. The mission of the Foundation is to help address important societal needs in our local, national, and international communities with a focus on improving access to health care; advancing biomedical science training; promoting innovation and economic growth in an ethical business environment; and helping to strengthen communities. Since its inception, the Foundation has given more than US$350 million to improve health care, advance biomedical education, as well as support social services, arts and cultural, environmental, civic, and other charitable organizations.
The winners of this program were announced during the 2005 AAAS Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. (See www.aaas.org/meetings.) Reporters -- Press registration is located in the AAAS Press Center in the Taft Room of the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the world's largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal, Science (www.sciencemag.org). AAAS was founded in 1848, and serves some 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, including 10 million individuals. Science has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of one million. The non-profit AAAS (www.aaas.org) is open to all and fulfills its mission to "advance science and serve society" through initiatives in science policy; international programs; science education; and more. For the latest research news, log onto EurekAlert!, www.eurekalert.org, the premier science-news Web site, a service of AAAS.