NRI US Scholar, triple- major wins prestigious UK scholarship

Arizona, Dec. 16, 2005
Ramwsh Parikh
NRI press

NRI, (non-resident Indian), Flinn Scholar Ajit Divakaruni was named one of 40 recipients of the Marshall Scholarship. Marshall Scholarships finance young Americans of high ability to study for a degree in the United Kingdom. At least forty Scholars are selected each year to study either at graduate or occasionally undergraduate level at an UK institution in any field of study. Each scholarship is held for two years. Divakaruni is Arizona's only Marshall Scholar this year and the first Arizonan to receive it in three years.

Divakaruni, 22-year-old senior is a mathematics, biochemistry and molecular and cellular biology triple major at the UA and is set to become the university's first student ever to finish an honors thesis in three majors. He will graduate from University of Arizona with degrees in biochemistry, mathematics, and molecular and cellular biology, will use the Marshall to pursue a doctorate in biochemistry at University of Cambridge

Two years ago Flinn Scholar Ajit Divakaruni, a University of Arizona undergraduate, went out on a whim and contacted a world-renowned biochemist, asking him for a spot in his lab.

Dr. Martin Brand, a leading expert in mitochondria and energy regulation at the University of Cambridge, granted Divakaruni's request and brought him on to work for six months as a full-time research student.

Next year Divakaruni will return to Brand's lab to continue his work in the biosciences. But this time he will not only have the support of Brand but also the backing of one of the country's most prestigious scholarships--the Marshall Scholarship.

For Divakaruni, who is triple-majoring in biochemistry, mathematics, and molecular and cellular biology, the opportunity to pursue a doctorate in biochemistry at University of Cambridge will be invaluable preparation for a future career in developing treatments for diabetes and obesity.

"Estimates have placed the number of individuals that will be affected by diabetes and obesity at close to 300 million worldwide in the next twenty years," he said. "There is so much potential for people entering this area of research."

Specifically, under Brand, Divakaruni will take an interdisciplinary approach to studying proteins that have the potential, if altered, to treat diabetes and obesity. Divakaruni will incorporate experimental chemistry, protein design techniques, and mathematical modeling into his doctoral program.

Leading into this research are projects Divakaruni has already done. For over two years he worked to construct a mathematical model of tumor metabolism. After studying UCP activation for six months in Brand's lab, Divakaruni moved on to Yale University where he studied under another leading bioscientist, Lynne Regan, an authority on protein design.

In Regan's lab, Divakaruni worked individually on a bioinformatics project among eight postdoctoral researchers. Bioinformatics is the management and analysis of data using advanced computing techniques for biological research.

Divakaruni spent two years researching in the physiology lab of UA professor Tim Secomb before he left for Cambridge, where he joined the lab of biochemist Martin Brand.

There he studied regulatory proteins in the body's pathways where food is turned into energy. The proteins are attractive therapeutic targets for diseases such as diabetes and obesity. Scientists are starting to understand what the proteins do but haven't yet unraveled how they work.

The proteins may also have an impact on harmful free radicals created in the body as part of the conversion of glucose to energy.

Divakaruni calls his experience in Regan's lab one of the "single greatest challenges" of his academic life. He is currently preparing a single-author manuscript under her supervision.

Divakaruni's ultimate goal is to continue his research at a large state university. The Flinn Scholar, who kept a cactus on his desk while working in Cambridge last year, has his sights set on returning to Arizona.

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• Divakaruni has proved himself with some of the world's leaders in his area of research, said Karna Walter, the UA's director of national and competitive scholarships.
  "He has a very strong academic and intellectual track record, but he also is the kind of person who's not in it just for that," she said. "He looks outside himself and sees his works as something that is for the greater good."
  The UA usually nominates one or two students for the Marshall Scholarship, and over the years, several have been finalists, but the university hasn't had a Marshall Scholar since 1996, when Ian Larkin won.
  "To me the most lasting part of the Marshall experience was being part of a real congregation of amazing postgraduates from all over the world," said Larkin, now a doctoral student at the University of California-Berkeley Haas School of Business.
  Divakaruni's selection in the "furiously competitive" scholarship is encouraging, both for other students and faculty members, Likins said.
  "This guy has really covered the territory," Likins said. "His intellectual distinction just shouts at you."

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