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This summer, graduate student Lesli O. Mark is one of only 70 students nationwide selected for the Department of Energy’s Office of Science Graduate Student Research Program, earning a prestigious opportunity to study and work at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, New York.

Each year, the Department of Energy selects outstanding graduate students in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics to help prepare them for their careers in advancing the fields important to the DOE Office of Science’s mission. These elite students get the opportunity to conduct thesis research at one of the DOE’s world-class laboratories, including Brookhaven.

Mark was chosen for this program in recognition of her unique academic achievements, her proposed research and her potential as she completes her PhD studies — all of which the DOE found relevant to its Office of Science mission.

“I will be spending four months at Brookhaven National Laboratory over the summer,” Mark said. “I will be utilizing BNL’s vast array of surface sensitive techniques — Nano-IR, AP-XPS, PM-IRRAS, LEEM — to better understand surface-confined catalytic surfaces.”

Mark has had a strong interest in renewable energy and resources since her time as an undergraduate studying chemical engineering at Notre Dame.

“I worked in Joan Brennecke’s Ionic Liquids Lab where I learned about the efforts being made to release less carbon into the atmosphere, as well as the research geared towards developing technology to capture carbon,” she said. “Biomass upgrading to usable fuels and high-value chemicals takes a carbon neutral approach for the products that we need. We have excess biomass in the forms of food waste, forest waste and municipal waste that could be converted into jet fuels and feedstocks for fine chemicals.”

As her time at Notre Dame drew to a close, Mark had a choice between several graduate schools where she could pursue her PhD.

“CU Boulder stood out because of the research and the resources,” she said. “I was very interested in Will Medlin’s lab. Also, I liked the collaborative aspect of the department. There is a lot of internal collaboration between CU professors, but also a lot of external collaborations, such as this one with BNL.”

Mark points to this unique, collaborative research culture of the ChBE department that helped her develop the background knowledge that earned her the time at Brookhaven National Laboratory. While conducting her research, Mark will remain in contact with the department through Denver Business Challenge Endowed Professor Will Medlin, her primary research advisor.

“He is one of the PI’s on the project and I will continue to report back to him about my findings at BNL,” she said. “I would also like to say that I wouldn’t have been able to be a competitive candidate for this DOE award without the help of Will and Sam Tenney, my BNL advisor. With their mentorship and creativity, I was able to successfully win the award.”