This article appeared in Catalyst Magazine, Spring 2024
This fall, Dell will attend Cambridge University in the UK to study antibiotic resistant urinary tract infections.
CBE undergraduate student Luisa Dell is among just 25 students in the nation—and the only studying chemical engineering—to receive a Gates Cambridge Scholarship. The award will cover the full cost of attendance for the University of Cambridge, UK, where Dell plans to study antibiotic-resistant urinary tract infections, a growing public health threat.
"I feel incredibly honored to receive this scholarship," says Dell. "I'm a Latina and a transfer student. These extra barriers can make it harder to achieve things like this and so I hope I can show other students with similar backgrounds that they can do it too."
Dell grew up in Monterey, CA, and attended Monterey Peninsula College before transferring to Berkeley between her sophomore and junior year. She always liked science and math but didn't have a clear idea of what she wanted to study until a chemistry professor showed her the fascinating research going on at the intersection of chemistry, biology and engineering.
At Berkeley, Dell has carried out research in the Keasling Lab, which uses synthetic biology approaches to engineer microbes to produce drugs, chemicals and fuels. Dell's work in the lab focused specifically on engineering yeast to make cancer drugs normally made in plants. Dell has also worked in the Zhang Lab and participated in summer research programs at Johns Hopkins University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology— work which was honored with a national "Future Leaders in Chemical Engineering" award.
Dell was aided in her Gates Cambridge application by the Office of Undergraduate Research & Scholarships (OURS), which works individually with undergraduates to pursue competitive scholarships.
"We help students think about how to present themselves in a way that highlights the best of their accomplishments," says Alicia Hayes, Associate Director of National Scholarships and Experiential Fellowships at OURS. "We have so many fabulous students like Luisa and we want them to get recognized."
For the Gates Cambridge Scholarship, Dell had to not only present her past experiences and participate in interviews, but also propose a research project for her time at Cambridge. She had recently learned that there was a shortage of treatments for urinary tract infections (UTI) and thought her experiences working in synthetic biology and natural products discovery labs at Berkeley could help her tackle this issue. So she developed a research proposal to discover new, alternative antibiotics for UTIs.
Dell becomes the 25th Berkeley student to receive a Gates Cambridge Scholarship in the 23 years of the program's existence.
In recent months, Dell also won a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship in recognition of her achievements as an undergraduate.
"I think Berkeley has taught me to be a more resilient researcher and make me more determined to reach my goals," says Dell. "I've had immense support from mentors, people in the Keasling lab, and the OURS office, helping me become a more competitive applicant for these awards."