National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowships have been awarded to 17 students at Cornell University.

The fellowships, which provide students with an $18,000 annual stipend for three years and a cost-of-education allowance to the university, in lieu of tuition, of $10,500 per student, per year, are among approximately 900 awarded during this year on a competitive basis to outstanding graduate students in mathematics, engineering and the physical, biological, behavioral and social sciences.

In addition to the 17 fellowships to currently enrolled graduate students, the NSF awarded fellowships to seven others who have applied for admission to graduate programs at Cornell in the fall of 2001 or later. Here are the currently enrolled students receiving NSF Graduate Research Fellowships:

• Alex R. Barron is studying the role of aluminum in tropical forest nutrient cycles in Cornell's Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the Program in Biogeochemistry and Environmental Change. Originally from Flint, Mich., Barron graduated from Cranbrook Kingswood High School in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., in 1996 and earned a B.A. in chemistry at Carleton College in 2000.
• Sean H. Breheny will enter the Ph.D. program in the Cornell School of Electrical and Computer Engineering this fall to study techniques for designing autonomous vehicles for ecological surveys. A 1997 graduate of Scranton Preparatory School in Pennsylvania, Breheny will receive a B.S. in electrical engineering from Cornell in May 2001.
• Christina Chan is a first-year master's degree student in international studies in the Department of City and Regional Planning. She is studying the effect of participatory planning policies on the social and economic conditions in Mongolia and expects to apply to the Ph.D. program in planning at Cornell. Chan, who is from River Vale, N.J., graduated from Pascack Valley High School in 1994 and earned a B.A. in human biology from Stanford University in 1998.
• Michael Clarkson studies programming languages, security in distributed systems and formal analysis of software in the Department of Computer Science. Originally from Whiteland, Ind., he graduated from the Indiana Academy for Science, Mathematics and Humanities in 1995. .Clarkson earned both a B.S. degree in computer science and a B.M. degree in music performance from Miami University in 1999.
• Erin Fineout studies the application of proteomics to the characterization of Alzheimer's disease in the School of Chemical Engineering. She earned a B.S. degree in chemical engineering from University of Delaware in 2000.
• Kathryn McQuilkin Flinn studies effects of land-use history on the demography of forest understory plants in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. She graduated from Pennsylvania's Indiana High School and earned a B.S. degree, summa cum laude, in biology and English from the College of William and Mary in 2000.
• Amy M. Kwiatkowski studies seismic reflection profiling in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences' Institute for the Study of the Continents. From Greeneville, Tenn., she graduated from Greeneville High School in 1996 and earned a B.S. degree in geology at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville in 2000.
• Joshua Ladau studies handedness and ambidexterity of cricket and katydid wings in the Department of Neurobiology and Behavior. Originally from Eugene, Ore., he graduated in 1997 from South Eugene High School and earned a B.S. degree, summa cum laude with distinction in research, in entomology at Cornell in 2000.
• Sara H. Lubkin works on revisions to the phylogeny of theColeopteran suborder Archostemata , a beetle rarely seen today but with a fossil record extending back 250 million years, in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. She graduated from Casey County High School in Liberty, Ky., in 1986 and earned a B.S. degree in geology, with a paleobiology emphasis, at the University of California-Santa Barbara in 1999.
• Katherine Nalani Maloney studies biosynthesis of the Guanacastane family of natural products in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology. Originally from University Place, Wash., she graduated from Curtis High School in 1996 and earned a B.S. degree in chemistry from Pacific Lutheran University in 2000.
• Timothy McConnochie 's research in the Department of Astronomy involves thermal emission spectroscopy of asteroids. He graduated from Sutherland High School in Pittsford, N.Y., in 1994 and earned a B.A. in astrophysics and in economics at Williams College in 1998.
• Jami Alisa Meteer studies the incorporation of gain cells in infrared photodetectors in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering. She graduated from State College Area High School in Pennsylvania in 1996 and earned a B.S. degree in electrical engineering at University of Notre Dame in 2000.
• Katherine Porter studies platinum-group element characteristics of ocean island basalts in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. Originally from Hillsboro, N.H., she graduated from Hillsboro-Deering High School in 1996 and received a B.S. degree in geology from the University of Delaware in 2000.
• Mathew Salganik studies mathematical sociology, social networks and education in the Department of Sociology. He earned a B.A. degree in mathematics at Emory University in 1998.
• Joie Taylor 's research in the Department of Agricultural and Biological Engineering focuses on watershed management in the Volta River basin of Ghana. She graduated in 1995 from the Lanier Academic Motivational Program at Sidney High School, Montgomery, Ala., and earned a B.S. degree in civil engineering at Clark Atlanta University.
• John R. Teifel studies asynchronous VLSI and computer architecture in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering's Computer Systems laboratory. He graduated from Westview High School in Portland, Ore., and earned a B.S. degree in electrical engineering at the California Institute of Technology in 2000.
• Hannah Wittman studies tenure, extension and agricultural stability in the Brazilian Amazon through the Department of Rural Sociology's development sociology program. She earned a B.A. degree in international studies at the University of Washington-Seattle in 1996.