Two Pharmacy Doctoral Students Awarded Fellowship Funding

Two doctoral students in the James L. Winkle College of Pharmacy, Terri La Count and Shoná Burkes, are the recipients of fellowship awards by the American Foundation for Pharmaceutical Education (AFPE).

The mission of the AFPE is to advance and support pharmaceutical sciences education at U.S. schools and colleges. Each student received $6,500. Both are pursuing their PhD in pharmaceutical sciences with an emphasis on cosmetic science.

Burkes, who earned her undergraduate degree in chemistry at Texas A&M University (‘03), came to UC as an Albert C. Yates fellow in (‘08) and works as a research assistant at the college.

"The award is very essential to my research and I am very grateful to the fellowship committee,” says Burkes, who is studying the effects of drug therapy on infantile hemangiomas (protruding non-cancerous tumors, mostly found on the head and neck, which commonly occur in up to 10 percent of all infants).

That same grateful sentiment was relayed by La Count, who holds a bachelor of science in chemical engineering from West Virginia University (‘82) and attends UC’s cosmetic sciences doctoral program as a National Science Foundation IGERT fellow. La Count’s research focuses on developing a mathematical model to predict skin absorption of hydrophilic materials, specifically nickel and chromium compounds.

"I was very happy to learn that I received it, and if all goes well I should graduate next year,” she says.