Columbia Students Take Top Honors at Science Competition

Columbia University students have earned top honors at the Sara and Frank McKnight Prize in Undergraduate Sciences competition. Anish Shah (CC'10), a biochemistry and economics major, won first place in the chemistry portion and Noam Prywes (CC'10), a chemistry major, earned second place in the biophysics and computational biology section. The two were among 15 finalists who traveled last November to the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, which administers the prizes, to present posters on their research. The national competition honors top research projects submitted by college seniors. Steven McKnight, chairman of biochemistry at UT Southwestern, created the prize to honor his parents. Winners were chosen in three categories—biochemistry, chemistry and biophysics/computational biology—for the significance of their work and for the quality of their presentation. First-place winners received $2,000; second-place winners $1,000; and third-place winners $500.