Soros, Luce awards go to two seniors

Two Brown seniors recently learned that they are the recipients of awards from two prestigious programs. Elena Lesley received a Luce Scholarship to live and work in Asia; Mikhail Shapiro received a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans to continue his studies.

Elena Lesley heading to Asian newspaper

When the news editor quit at the tiny weekly newspaper in Oregon where Brown student Elena Lesley worked one summer, she took over the responsibility for writing and editing articles, snapping photos, and piecing it all together on the pages.

During another summer break, Lesley worked for the flagship paper The Oregonian, read by more than a half-million people each day, and dabbled in writing for nearly every section.

So when Lesley graduates in May with plans to use her recently won Luce Scholarship to practice journalism in the Far East, the "anything and everything" she'll be writing does not faze her.

"I like learning about people," said Lesley, 22, a political science concentrator. "I just like sitting and talking to people for hours."

The scholarship program run by the Henry Luce Foundation provides funds for 15 Americans each year to live and work in Asia. Although the competition is open to everyone younger than 29, the award is rarely granted to graduating seniors.

"This is extremely exciting and a real testament to Elena," said Linda Dunleavy, associate dean of the College. "The average age of Luce recipients is 25."

After graduation, Lesley will intern briefly at the Sacramento Bee in California before taking part in the Luce orientation at Princeton University in mid-August. Following the orientation, all of the Luce scholars will depart for a year in Asia.

Lesley is considering a job at the English-language Phnom Penh Post, the oldest independent newspaper in Cambodia. A recent online edition of the Phnom Penh Post headlined such stories as "Ban on cars highlights latest city bus plan," "Sex workers threaten to block Bill Gates HIV study" and "Street kids help in arrest of German tourist."

The semi-monthly Cambodian newspaper may function more like the smaller papers - such as the weekly Madras Pioneer - than the large papers - such as the Pulitzer Prize-winning Oregonian - Lesley has worked for.

The Portland native sought such experiences in her home state during the summer and worked at the student-run Brown Daily Herald during the academic year. At the Daily Herald, she alternately held the titles of staff writer, arts and culture editor, news editor and editor-in-chief.

It was by happenstance Lesley stumbled into newspaper writing. Although she always liked writing - her parents Craig and Kathy Lesley are authors of fiction - she did not intend to enter journalism when she came to Brown.

"I thought I had pre-registered for an abnormal psychology class but my schedule had intro to journalism," said Lesley. "The first story I did was really awful - it was a profile of a student and it was everything youÕre not supposed to do."

If her love for writing comes from her parents, Lesley attributes her wanderlust to grandmother Hazel Seavey. Throughout her lifetime, Seavey has checked off on a map each town and settlement in Oregon she has visited.

"She says there are just two more to go," said Lesley. - Kristen Cole

Mikhail Shapiro named Soros Fellow

Mikhail Shapiro will be in an enviable position when he graduates from Brown this spring: He's one of 30 students nationwide awarded a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans to continue his studies.

The fellowship was founded in 1997 by Paul and Daisy Soros of New York as a $50 million charitable trust to support the graduate work of new American citizens, both immigrants and the children of immigrants. Shapiro, who was born in Kolomna, Russia, 22 years ago, emigrated from Russia in 1992 and became a U.S. citizen in 2002. As a Fellow, he'll receive a stipend of up to $20,000 plus half-tuition for two years of graduate study at any American college of his choosing.

"I feel very happy to be part of this - and the group of people selected," he said. "It's very humbling."

Shapiro hasn't chosen a graduate school from the four he's considering, but he is clear about the direction of his studies. He'll pursue a Ph.D. in bioengineering and neuroscience, and plans to continue his undergraduate work pursuing the development of more sophisticated and useful technology to probe the human brain and its functions.

Shapiro already has some impressive credentials. He was the primary author of an abstract presented at last year's annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, and he was the business manager and co-founder of Cyberkinetics, Inc., a start-up medical technology company developing brain-computer interfaces. He's worked with Professor John Donoghue, who's made his mark in the field by developing electrodes that when implanted in a human brain may one day soon enable people with spinal cord injuries and Parkinson's disease to become more independent.

Instead of using electrodes, Shapiro hopes to develop nanomaterials that can be injected into the bloodstream to attach to neurons to show brain activity - "essentially, very small molecular-scale devices that will sense the electrical activity of neurons... (and) convert that into optical signals. We have to try to find an agent that will emit light that's different when a neuron is active and inactive," he explained.

"In the long term, I'd like to be able to look at the activity of a large area of the brain at a high resolution," Shapiro said. Current technology, such as an fMRI, provides a large-scale view of the brain, "but only with crude activity (and) very poor spatial resolution.

"With the microelectrodes you get very precise information about single neurons, but only in a very tiny area," he added. "I want both - the single neuron resolution of a large area of the brain."

Shapiro believes such technology could ultimately aid scientists and physicians in their understanding and treatment of epilepsy, as well as other neurological disorders. On a personal level, however, he conceded he's more interested in the science side of his work. He plans to study the neurological basis of consciousness.

"Neural activity is widely spread out, and it's very subtle," he said. "This needs to be studied in humans. I want to look at the activity of the human brain - and really understand it." - Mary Jo Curtis