The Health Physics Society (HPS) has awarded fellowships for continuing graduate studies in health physics to BME graduate students Michelle Sands and Heather Petroccia. In addition to receiving $5,000 for the purpose of supporting their graduate work at the University of Florida for the 2015-2016 academic year, they are provided with a travel grant to attend the 2016 HPS Annual Meeting in Spokane, Washington.

Michelle Sands is currently a PhD student in Biomedical Engineering with a concentration in medical physics. Michelle is a graduate assistant working with BME Professor, Dr. Welsey Bolch, and Dr. Rowan Milner.  Her research interests include developing hybrid computational phantoms of canines to support preclinical dosimetry for radionuclide therapy of osteosarcoma. This research has an overarching goal of developing and validating new cancer treatments for children who have been diagnosed with bone cancer.

Heather Petroccia is also a PhD student in Biomedical Engineering with a concentration in medical physics.  She is currently reconstructing organ dose for patients who were treated historically Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (HL) at the University of Florida under the supervision of BME Professor, Dr. Wesley Bolch, and Dr. Nancy Mendenhall.  Since the majority of patients are diagnosed with HL as children or young adults, patients survive many years after diagnosis, and future complications from treatment must be minimized to ensure length and quality of life.

 

Congratulations Michelle and Heather!