News Americas, NEW YORK, NY, Thursday. June 8, 2017: Caribbean immigrants are making an indelible mark on every sector of the US, including science. Here are five top Caribbean-born scientists in the US you should know:
1: Dr. Camille Wardrop Alleyne
Dr. Camille Wardrop Alleyne currently serves as an assistant program scientist for the International Space Station, based at NASA’s Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Her roles as an assistant program scientist include communicating the scientific achievements of the ISS to the general public, leaders at NASA, the US Congress, and the scientific and educational communities. She is the only woman of Caribbean origin in a senior position at NASA.
Alleyne was born in the twin-island Republic of Trinidad & Tobago and left the island in 1983 at the age of 17 to study at Howard University in Washington, DC. There, she earned a Bachelor of Science in mechanical engineering with an aerospace option. She went on to pursue a Masters from Florida A&M University in mechanical engineering with a specialization in composite materials and became one of two people in her program recruited by NASA to work at the Kennedy Space Center as a flight systems engineer. She worked there for two years before attending the University of Maryland to pursue another Masters in aerospace engineering with a specialization in hypersonic aerodynamics and propulsion. After graduating with a second Master’s degree, she was recruited to work with the Missile Defense Agency under the US Department of Defense on several ballistic missile defense projects as an aerospace systems engineer. After her projects with the Department of Defense, Alleyne applied to NASA’s Astronaut Program in 2003. Out of 4,000 applicants to the elite program, Aleyne made it to the final twelve, but did not make it to the final round.
Shortly after the experience, Alleyne was hired by NASA. Her return to NASA coincided with their Constellation and Orion programs, where she worked as lead systems engineer, crew module systems engineer, and test manager.
Alleyne has won several accolades for her work. Awards from NASA include a NASA Group Achievement Award for the ISS Mission Team Benefits for Humanity in 2013. As the founder of the Brightest Stars Foundation – an organization she founded in 2007 to benefit girls in Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America by guiding them in the Fields of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) – she envisions her idea as a motivator that will empower girls in the sub-region to achieve against all odds. For this purpose, it has cooperated with the OECS Commission to achieve its goal. Together with her team of experts, they plan to visit 10 Caribbean islands by the end of the year. The goal is to host 1,500 girls on each island.
2: Prof. John Paul Clarke
Professor John-Paul Clarke is Dean’s Professor of the College of Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech), where he holds appointments in the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering and the School of Industrial and Systems Engineering, and serves as director i Air Transport Laboratory.
Dr. Clarke was born in Jamaica. He is a leading expert in aircraft trajectory prediction and optimization, particularly as it relates to the development of flight procedures that reduce aviation’s environmental impact. His research has been instrumental in changing the theory and practice of flight procedure design and has fueled global efforts to reduce the environmental impact of aviation through changes in operational procedures. He is also an expert in the development and use of stochastic models and optimization algorithms to improve the efficiency and sustainability of airline, airport and air traffic operations. His many previous honors include the AIAA/AAAE/ACC Jay Hollingsworth Speas Airport Award, the 2003 FAA Excellence in Aviation Award, the 2006 National Academy of Engineering Gilbreth Lectureship, and the 2012 AIAA/SAE William Littlewood Lectureship.
3: Prof. Cardinal Warde
Barbadian-born Caribbean scientist Professor Cardinal Warde is President of the Caribbean Diaspora for Science, Technology and Innovation (CADSTI), Interim Executive Director of the Caribbean Science Foundation and Professor of Electrical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). and a faculty advisor.
His research focuses on the development of optoelectronic neural co-processors for brain-like computing, multi-spectral-polarimetric imaging sensors, infrared projection displays and holographic displays. Professor Warde is an inventor on twelve patents and has published three book chapters in addition to over one hundred and fifty technical papers on optical materials, devices and systems. Since 1997, Professor Warde has served as Faculty Director of the MITES program at MIT (a six-week intensive program in science and engineering for gifted high school seniors of underrepresented minorities). He received the Companion of Honor Award (the second highest honor bestowed by the Government of Barbados) in 2003 and serves as a scientific advisor to the Governments of Barbados and Belize.
4: Dr. Patrick Allen
Dr. Jamaican-born Patrick Allen made history by becoming the only black scientist at the time to be awarded a $1.2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to determine the structure of the AIDS virus.
Dr. Allen is also the founder of the Black Biomedical Research Movement, (BBRM), which aims to improve the disproportionate incidence of poor health in the Black community, as well as increase Black involvement in biomedical research.
In addition, he also served as a consultant to Nexstar Pharmaceuticals, the pharmaceutical company known for its anti-HIV therapy research and is currently the founding Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Melagen Inc. and former co-founder of Annai Systems Inc. which focuses on embracing a genomic approach to the study of disease.
5: Dr. Deborah Persaud
Dr. Deborah Persaud is a virologist who works primarily on HIV/AIDS at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. Persaud was born in Guyana and moved to the US at the age of 16. She attended New York University School of Medicine and received her undergraduate degree and went on to earn a master’s degree at New York University School of Medicine. She began her Residency at New York Children’s Hospital and completed her Chief Residency at the same hospital. Persaud later was a fellow at New York University School of Medicine. She began her academic career as an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine from 1997 to 2004.
In 2005, Persaud became an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. In 2013, Dr. Persaud worked as part of a team that showed a baby was cured of HIV by giving it the anti-HIV drug. She won the Elizabeth Glaser Scientist Award for her research and appeared on Time magazine’s Top 100 Most Influential People in 2013 for her work. In 2014, Persaud’s work contributed to the recovery of a second baby from HIV.
By NAN Staff Writer
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