UCSD - University of California - San Diego

04/27/2026 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 04/27/2026 13:03

Seven Scholars Honored for Academic Excellence and Advocacy

Published Date

April 27, 2026

Article Content

With research spanning galaxies, environmental impacts on health, cancer cell development and Indigenous media, five Ph.D. students and two postdoctoral scholars from UC San Diego have joined a national network of researchers through the Edward Alexander Bouchet Graduate Honor Society. The society recognizes scholars who exemplify academic and personal excellence, foster environments of support and serve as examples of scholarship, leadership, character, service and advocacy for students in academia.

"These seven visionaries exemplify UC San Diego at its core - they are scholars whose work transforms humanity and leaders who are committed to the communities around them," said Graduate Education and Postdoctoral Affairs Dean Judy Kim. "They engage with purpose and compassion and we are proud to have these remarkable role models in our Triton community."

The Bouchet Graduate Honor Society was co-founded in 2005 by Yale and Howard Universities and named for Edward Alexander Bouchet, the first African American doctoral recipient in the United States.

Meet the Scholars

Devontae Baxter is a dual National Science Foundation (NSF) Astronomy and Astrophysics and UC Chancellor's Postdoctoral Fellow. An extragalactic astrophysicist, he researches why galaxies evolved differently in sparsely versus densely populated regions of the cosmos. He addresses this by applying data-intensive methods to large extragalactic surveys and petabyte-scale simulations to constrain the physics driving galaxy growth and transformation across cosmic time and galactic environments. Baxter leads the Computational Astrophysics Research Preparation program, an initiative that hosts coding and mentorship workshops tailored for aspiring community college transfer students.

Kristina Brandveen is a Ph.D. candidate in the UC San Diego - San Diego State University Joint Doctoral Program in Public Health on the global health track. Her research explores health disparities experienced by African American farmers and farmworkers who are exposed to chemicals used in agriculture. Brandveen uses social epidemiology, environmental epidemiology and qualitative research methods to measure burdens of disease and explore perceptions of health risks that are propelled by unequal exposure to chemicals. She was a 2024 Merkin Graduate Fellow and is currently an American Public Health Association and Kaiser Permanente Community Health Fellow.

Manuel Carrión-Lira is a Ph.D. candidate in UC San Diego's Department of Literature. A native of Quillota, Chile, he explores the role of Indigenous media as a tool for cultural revitalization and world-making. His research focuses on how contemporary media creators from the southern Andean region use video to reclaim ancestral epistemologies and maintain continuity with the land. At UC San Diego, he has organized cultural platforms, such as the Chileyem and Screening Pachacuti film programs. A first-generation Indigenous scholar, he approaches his work with a commitment to relational accountability, ensuring his research honors the protocols and consent of the communities he serves.

Christian Cazares is a postdoctoral research scholar focused on cognitive science. An interdisciplinary neuroscientist, he is interested in identifying electrophysiological biomarkers of symptom severity in patients with neurodevelopmental disorders. Cazares uses these biomarkers as a clinical anchor to bridge human scalp EEG with neural tissue and mouse model recordings to understand the neurobiological mechanisms that give rise to sensory and cognitive impairments in these conditions. In 2016, Cazares co-founded Colors of the Brain, a grassroots, trainee-led mentorship initiative at UC San Diego that aims to improve access to STEM graduate education. The program was recently awarded a $25,000 grant from the International Brain Research Organization and Dana Foundation.

Ilyse Clark is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics. She studies star formation regions in local galaxies and photodissociation regions in the Small Magellanic Cloud, our dwarf galaxy neighbor. Clark uses the James Webb Telescope and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array to probe the gas and dust in mid-infrared regions in high resolution. Clark has served as co-president of the Astronomy Graduate Council and has led undergraduate and graduate peer-to-peer mentoring programs. She currently leads the Graduate & Postdoctoral Mentoring Program, organizing mentorship and community events across departments.

Robin Glefke is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Physics and an NSF Graduate Research Fellow at UC San Diego. She studies quantum materials to develop brain-inspired approaches to more energy-efficient machine learning hardware, motivated by the growing energy demands of AI. Glefke also served as president of UC San Diego's Physics Graduate Council and Graduate Women in Physics, co-chaired the American Physical Society Conference for Undergraduate Women and Gender Minorities in Physics at UC San Diego and founded the STEM Girl Summer camp to support high school students exploring STEM pathways.

Eric Jordahl is a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Biological Sciences. His work aims to understand the mechanisms that underlie pancreatic cancer cell growth and survival, both with and without therapeutic intervention. Jordahl investigates how pancreatic cancer cells use stress-relieving processes, like endoplasmic reticulum protein quality control pathways, to avoid internal cellular stress. This work will impact our understanding of how pancreatic cancer cells regulate their internal stress and open therapeutic avenues by targeting these stress-relieving processes. Jordahl is a 2025 Gilliam Fellow, recognized by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

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