Eng Phys student named 2011 Science Co-op Student of the Year
Engineering Physics student Gurpal Bisra was awarded the 2011 Science Co-op Student of the Year Award during the Engineering Physics Program Graduation Reception.
It is not difficult to spot the enthusiasm in Gurpal's eyes. Inspired by his Science teacher in grade 10, Gurpal entered the Science Co-op program a few years later with the goal to study nanotechnology. His first work term took him to Germany to work at the University of Wurzburg for 8 months on nanotecnology, producing results that were published in highly ranked scientific journals. To expand his scope of understanding in other disciplines, he took his second work term with Dr. Joanne Fox at the Michael Smith Laboratories at UBC, and joined the iGEM team. iGEM is an international research competition where teams of undergraduate students carry out synthetic biology research programs of their own design. While Gurpal did not start out with a strong biology background, he caught up quickly and became responsible for the modeling component of the program. His peers chose him to represent the UBC iGEM team at the competition; the team received a gold medal at the iGEM Americas Regionals, as well as a special award for Best Model. This is the best showing UBC has ever achieved for this competition.
The momentum from the Co-op program pushed Gurpal to go further. After completing the program, he started a company with a few other students and became the Industry Liason for the Intellectual Property Club at UBC. In addition, he has been conducting research with the MiNa Research Group (UBC) after getting interested in microfluidics. His academic successes, work experiences, together with his truly global perspective - having lived abroad and traveled across 14 countries - make us believe that he will continue to make significant contributions in the future.
Congratulations to Gurpal Bisra for receiving this award!
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