On Thursday, May 8, Richard Vega, former undergraduate and soon-to-be graduate student of nuclear engineering, received Outstanding Thesis Award for the Undergraduate Research Scholars program as representation of the best undergraduate research thesis in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math at Texas A&M.
"It has been a struggle to make the U.S. aware of the precarious situation we are in when it comes to the availability of radioisotopes for medicine. I have two grants from the D.O.E. on radionuclide production directed at solving some of our research problems here at A & M. When I opened this research subject to the undergraduate students in nuclear engineering, there were only a few capable of understanding the paradigm. Richard was the one with the courage and leadership to tackle this significant problem. Richard is an exceptional student who goes beyond the expected. I envision Richard becoming a research leader for our nation," said Dr. Gamal Akabani, associate professor in the Department of Nuclear Engineering and research advisor to Vega.
Vega's thesis was titled "Design of a Subcritical Aqueous Target System for Medical Isotope Production." The attending audience was made up of about 200 graduating Honors and Undergraduate Research students, as well as their families and friends.