UA Student Receives Prestigious Goldwater Scholarship

TUSCALOOSA, Ala.– A University of Alabama student is one of 302 students nationwide to receive a two-year Goldwater Scholarship.

Sarah Adair of Hartselle, a microbiology major and sophomore in UA’s College of Arts and Sciences, will receive up to $7,500 per year for tuition, books, and expenses.

Adair is one of only two students in the state to receive the award. The Goldwater Scholarship is the nation’s premier undergraduate award for the study in the fields of mathematics, the natural sciences, and engineering. Established by Congress in 1986 to honor U.S. Senator Barry M. Goldwater, the scholarship is designed to encourage outstanding students to develop careers in the sciences.

Adair is the 16th student from The University of Alabama to be selected for the scholarship. The last UA Goldwater Scholar was Jessica Kidd, of Coker, in 2000. Adair was selected based on academic merit from a nationwide field that included more than 1,100 students from 524 colleges and universities.

Adair was part of a research group working on amyloid precursor protein (APP) genes that are responsible for brain disorders associated with Alzheimer’s disease.”Ms. Adair is an outstanding, focused and goal-oriented student,” said Dr. David

Oppenheimer, UA assistant professor of biology. “I am pleased to see that an exceptional undergraduate has received national recognition for her hard work at The University of Alabama.”

Adair is the recipient of the Howard Hughes Scholarship, a UA Presidential

Cabinet Scholarship, an Arts & Sciences Collegiate Fund Endowed Scholarship, a Wolverine Tube Inc. Freshmen Scholarship, and a Kiwanis Club of Hartselle Freshmen Scholarship.

Adair is a member of the first class of the Blount Undergraduate Initiative in the College of Arts & Sciences as well as a member of the Alabama Environmental Council and Good Samaritan Clinic.Adair plans to pursue a career in biomedical research with an emphasis on gene therapy in neurological disorders.

Another UA student, Michael Stoltz of Pleasant Grove, a chemical engineering major in the College of Engineering, received honorable mention by the Goldwater Foundation. He participated in a research group headed by Dr. Christopher Brazel, a UA professor of chemical engineering, working to separate a molecule into three different solutes in a three-stage process.