In a remarkable achievement that highlights the global reach of early-career scientific talent, Antiguan biomedical engineering scholar Keondre Herbert has earned a spot in the U.S. National Science Foundation’s highly competitive Graduate Research Fellowship Program – one of the most coveted honors for emerging graduate researchers in science and engineering fields across the nation.
This year’s selection process drew more than 14,000 applicants from across the United States, with only 2,500 top candidates advancing to receive the award. Beyond the national recognition that comes with this honor, the fellowship provides three full years of financial support to fuel promising early-career researchers as they pursue advanced graduate work.
Herbert, who completed his undergraduate degree in Biomedical Engineering with a specialized neuroengineering concentration at Columbia University in 2024, cut his research teeth working in Dr. Barclay Morrison’s campus laboratory, where he investigated the underlying biological mechanisms that drive damage from traumatic brain injury. Following his graduation, he took on a role as a research associate at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, working in the lab of Dr. Peter Rudebeck. There, his current research leverages macaque electrophysiology and advanced neuroimaging to explore how deep brain stimulation can be adapted to treat common, debilitating psychiatric conditions, including obsessive-compulsive disorder and major depressive disorder.
This coming fall, Herbert will move to Baltimore to begin his doctoral studies in Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, where he will continue building his research portfolio focused on translational neuroengineering. His NSF fellowship will provide critical financial backing for his PhD work, which centers on advancing clinical neuromodulation therapies. Herbert’s long-term research goals include deepening scientific understanding of how these treatments alter brain function, and refining the technologies to make them more effective and widely accessible to patients who need them.
The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program is designed to identify and uplift graduate students who show extraordinary potential to make transformative contributions to scientific research. Applicants are evaluated on two core criteria: their demonstrated intellectual merit, and their existing contributions to active scientific inquiry. For the 2024 award cycle, Herbert was one of just six current and graduating students from Columbia University’s Biomedical Engineering department to earn this prestigious honor.