Student develops new LED, wins $30,000 Lemelson-Rensselaer Prize

Schubert joins last year’s winner of the Lemelson-Rensselaer student prize, doctoral student Brian Schulkin. Schulkin, who invented the first portable terahertz sensing device, the “Mini-Z”, is currently working on an even smaller device and was recently named to the 2007 Scientific American 50 — the magazine’s prestigious annual list recognizing leadership in science and technology.

The $30,000 Lemelson-Rensselaer Student Prize is funded through a partnership with the Lemelson-MIT Program, which has awarded the $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize to outstanding student inventors at MIT since 1995. More information can be found at http://web.mit.edu/invent/.

Timothy Lu, a graduate student in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, is the 2008 winner for the $30,000 Lemelson-MIT Student Prize. Lu has invented processes that promise to enhance the effectiveness of antibiotics and help eradicate layers of bacteria known as biofilms, in order to combat bacterial infections, such as those caused by Escherichia coli biofilms and MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus). More information is available on http://web.mit.edu/invent/n-pressreleases/n-press-08SP.html.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign also joined Rensselaer as a new partner institution last year with the announcement of the $30,000 Lemelson-Illinois Student Prize. The winner of the 2008 Lemelson-Illinois Student Prize will be announced during a formal award ceremony on Feb. 28, 2008.

On May 26, the winners of all three student prizes will join together at MIT for a discussion and ceremony to honor all of the winners. In June, the winners will take part in the Lemelson-MIT Program’s second annual EurekaFest, a multiday event to celebrate the inventive spirit in Boston and Cambridge, Mass.

About the Lemelson-MIT Program

The Lemelson-MIT Program recognizes outstanding inventors, encourages sustainable new solutions to real-world problems, and enables and inspires young people to pursue creative lives and careers through invention. Jerome H. Lemelson, one of the world’s most prolific inventors, and his wife, Dorothy, founded the nonprofit Lemelson-MIT Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1994. More information is online at http://web.mit.edu/invent/.

About Rensselaer

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, founded in 1824, is the nation’s oldest technological university. The university offers bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees in engineering, the sciences, information technology, architecture, management, and the humanities and social sciences. Institute programs serve undergraduates, graduate students, and working professionals around the world. Rensselaer faculty are known for pre-eminence in research conducted in a wide range of fields, with particular emphasis in biotechnology, nanotechnology, information technology, and the media arts and technology. The Institute is well known for its success in the transfer of technology from the laboratory to the marketplace so that new discoveries and inventions benefit human life, protect the environment, and strengthen economic development.