Four Comets Awarded NSF Graduate Research Fellowships

From studying the vastness of galaxies to the tiniest molecules on Earth, four alumni have been awarded 2025 National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowships to help further the understanding of the cosmos and discover cures for diseases.

Two of the recipients — Varun Gunda BS’25 and Zachary Lee BS’25 — worked in Dr. Shalini Prasad’s Biomedical Microdevices and Nanotechnology Laboratory.

“I want students to recognize UTD provides a phenomenal environment,” said Prasad, professor and department head of bioengineering. She is also a Cecil H. and Ida Green Professor in Systems Biology Science in the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science.

“We’re teaching them a mindset that, despite any challenge, they’re able to take this training and apply it. These are two phenomenal examples; if they can do it, other students can do it. UTD gives you the environment to shine,” she said.

With 1,000 fellowships awarded this year, the program provides tuition support and a three-year stipend totaling approximately $159,000 for students pursuing graduate studies in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Varun Gunda BS’25

As a child, Gunda was teased by his family for being a “question bank.”

Curious about how cellphones worked, he grilled his grandfather about them constantly. Later, in a biology class, he began drawing parallels — seeing the nucleus as the cell’s processor and mitochondria as its battery, much like in a cellphone. “I started to see biological systems as something exciting that could be engineered just like a cellphone,” said Gunda, who earned his degree in biomedical engineering.

He plans to pursue his PhD at Rice University in Houston, where he will explore how human tissue can be regenerated in the body to cure diseases. With the NSF fellowship, he will devote his time to a lab focused on tissue engineering.

“When I got it, I was just shocked,” he said of the award. “I was very happy that I was able to get it during a more competitive year for the fellowship.”

Gunda’s interest in tissue regeneration started his sophomore year, when he began working in Prasad’s lab to detect early signs of chronic kidney disease and recurrent urinary tract infections. Using biomarkers — molecules found in bodily fluids or tissue that signal how the body is functioning — Gunda explored how to develop a detection system for early disease intervention that could be accessible to low-income communities.

“Working on that project was incredibly exciting for me,” Gunda said. “Gradually, I realized that these are problems that I really wanted to focus on in the future.”

He credited Prasad and other mentors with encouraging him to discover his passion and pursue the fellowship.

“It was only with their support I was able to do that,” he said.

Soon, instead of figuring out how to detect diseases, Gunda will focus on finding treatments.

“The main thing I see in tissue engineering is a real chance to cure a lot of these chronic conditions I was previously focused on detecting,” he said.

Zachary Lee BS’25

Growing up in East Austin, Lee first recognized how disparities in education and lack of resources can affect people.

Now, he is working on making medical care more accessible. Lee, who graduated with a degree in biomedical engineering, plans to pursue a PhD in his field at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta.

“Working on combating disease in underdeveloped countries is something that’s very meaningful to me,” Lee said. “Seeing similar trends in the medical field, I was very inspired. I always wanted to be an engineer. I think that pushed me to be a biomedical engineer.”

Though Lee, a Goldwater Scholar, initially was interested in learning how cells work to combat disease, his graduate studies will combine his love of chemistry, physics and electrical engineering to push the limits of how to develop medical devices.

Lee’s early education experience drove him to a two-year biotechnology program in high school where he learned DNA sequencing and other skills. That helped him land a yearlong internship with a biotechnology company and then a spot in Prasad’s lab as a UTD freshman.

With the guidance of his mentor, research scientist Dr. Sasya Madhurantakam, Lee helped develop biosensors to predict which COVID-19 patients would end up in intensive care as well as sensors to detect sepsis and melioidosis, a hard-to-diagnose, tropical bacterial disease.

“Dr. Prasad is good about giving students experience,” he said. “And my postdoctoral mentor is a massive reason I’m here now.

“There are a lot of awards they guided me toward. Every moment they could have lifted me up, they took that and ran with it. That’s a very special environment to be in.”

Brandon Sike BS’23

Sike was first captivated by the universe in elementary school when he saw the Millennium Simulation, a computer re-creation of the universe. That’s when he said he realized he wanted to become an astrophysicist.

“I thought it was so cool we could have the best idea of the universe on a computer,” Sike said.

Now, he examines the galaxy’s evolution through computer simulations. His research specialties — galactic and extragalactic cosmology and computational astrophysics — aim to further the understanding of our galaxy and others.

An Academic Excellence Scholarship recipient, Sike, a Houston native, said he chose UTD because he was drawn to its physics program, its proximity to home and the campus culture.

Sike is two years into his doctoral degree program at the University of Michigan, an institution that his undergraduate research mentor, Dr. Lindsay King, associate professor of physics at UTD, recommended to him.

When he was a junior at UTD, he took King’s computing class and worked as a researcher for her, studying galaxy cluster mergers, which contribute to understanding dark matter and the physics of hot, diffuse plasma, he said.

Besides being an NSF grant recipient, Sike is charting other new territory — he is not only a first-generation PhD student, but also a first-generation college student.

“A lot of my outreach goals are uplifting first-generation college students,” said Sike, who wants others to feel like they can identify with becoming a scientist. “I don’t feel like that should be an exclusive identity.”

Harish Suryadevara BS’24

For Suryadevara, chemistry is a catalyst to creativity.

“Chemistry incorporates a lot of elements of creativity,” said Suryadevara, who earned his degree in biochemistry last fall. “There’s no one right way to go about building something.”

The National Merit Scholar and Goldwater Scholar plans to apply that approach as he pursues his PhD at the University of California, Berkeley with the help of the NSF fellowship.

“It will definitely allow me to have more focus on my research,” said Suryadevara, who plans to further explore how he can help create organic molecules. “This financial support is really, really incredible, and I’m really fortunate to have it.”

He credits his interest in chemistry to his acceptance as a teen into the Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science, an early college program at the University of North Texas for gifted high school-age students. Through that experience, he fell in love with organic chemistry, or the study of molecules produced naturally in the environment.

That also led him to Dr. Filippo Romiti, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry in the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics and a Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas Scholar. Suryadevara said Romiti took a chance on him by accepting him as an undergraduate in his lab, where Suryadevara now works as a research assistant.

“I’m fortunate to have him as a mentor,” Suryadevara said. “He’s given me a lot of independence in this project. I’ve learned a lot about chemistry and have grown a lot as a chemist in his lab.”

Romiti said that Suryadevara is passionate about his work and approaches it with an insatiable curiosity he feeds by constantly reading new chemistry papers.

“He’s going to become a very important academic in the future,” Romiti said. “He has all the potential to do that. He has the passion.”

After Suryadevara earns a PhD, his goal is to become a professor and start his own research lab.

“I want to figure out efficient and useful ways to make molecules that have a positive impact on human health.”