Named for Robert Wells \u201939, who felt strongly that an engineer needed the balance of the humanities, the award celebrates the unexpected connections and synergies that emerge across disciplines.<\/p>\n
This year\u2019s Wells Prize recipients are:<\/p>\n
- \n
- Allie Jia Hui Tay, a\u00a0biomedical engineering<\/a> major with a minor in journalism<\/a><\/li>\n
- Kaela Brunner, a <\/span>geomechanics<\/a> major with a minor in <\/span>American Sign Language<\/a><\/li>\n
- Sarah Mammen, a double major in <\/span>computer science<\/a> and <\/span>philosophy<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Allie Jia Hui Tay: Taking chances on new opportunities<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"Crop](\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Tay_round-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\nSince arriving on campus, Allie Jia Hui Tay \u201925 has thrived on good conversation. As a first-year student chatting with friends, she\u2019d ask to look over the homework of those studying biomedical engineering. Intrigued, she switched her major from neuroscience during sophomore year.<\/p>\n
\u201cEngineering requires you to think deeply about how to apply the concepts you are learning,\u201d she says, \u201cand it really changed my mindset. I realized that learning how to learn would ensure that I could always succeed in problem-solving.\u201d<\/p>\n
To keep ideas flowing, she joined the Campus Times<\/a><\/em>, the University\u2019s student newspaper, as a writer for the opinion section. \u201cJournalism felt like a creative outlet that also drew me out of my comfort zone,\u201d she says. \u201cI slowly got more comfortable with news reporting: interviewing people, writing their stories. I thought it was cool that I could walk up to anyone I thought was interesting and start a conversation.\u201d Courses in reporting, poetry, narrative, and feature writing rounded out her skills. This year, she serves as the Times\u2019<\/em> editor-in-chief and vice president of the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society.<\/p>\n
Tay is also a research assistant at the Center for Musculoskeletal Research under Chao Xie<\/a>, an associate professor in the Department of Orthopaedics at the Medical Center. Last summer, she took part in the Discover Grant for Undergraduate Summer Research<\/a> Scholars Program, applying her biomedical knowledge to investigations in femur models. Tay had the chance to perform confocal microscopy and biomechanical analysis as she assisted in procedures.<\/p>\n
Tay was even a member of the Rochester team that participated in the 2023 International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition<\/a>, an event in which student-led teams from around the globe compete to solve real-world problems using synthetic biology.<\/p>\n
- Kaela Brunner, a <\/span>geomechanics<\/a> major with a minor in <\/span>American Sign Language<\/a><\/li>\n