3 August 2007
Santiago Herrera
Universidad de los Andes
Bogotá, Colombia
Dear Representatives of the Alice Eve Kennington Internship Endowment,
My Research Training
Program (RTP) participation, an incredibly rewarding experience which
has had a tremendous impact on my professional growth, was sponsored
through the Alice Eve Kennington Internship Endowment. During my summer
RTP internship, I learned from the world authorities in various fields
of the natural sciences, and worked in one of the most prestigious scientific
institutions in the world, and I thank you for the chance to have had
this experience.
Undoubtedly for
me, the most important aspect of this program was the opportunity to
learn how to develop my own formal scientific research. My project was
on the diversity of a very unique species of freshwater jellyfish named
Craspedacusta sowerbii. For my research, I used molecular DNA
techniques to determine the species status of this organism throughout
the world. This jellyfish is quite common in almost every continent
of the world (except Antarctica) but little is known about them.. With
this project I was able to obtain very useful information about the
evolutionary history of this jellyfish, which could be important for
the conservation of many freshwater ecosystems and probably the species
itself.
This RTP constituted
a unique and invaluable chance to enrich my undergraduate studies on
systematics, biology, and conservation. It also gave me a solid base,
and inspiration, for achieving a doctoral degree and a successful scientific
research career. This is especially true considering the deficit of
these opportunities in my home country of Colombia due to the current
economic and social problems.
This research would
not be possible without your generous support. I would like to thank
you for providing me with this experience, and know that this endowment
will continue to fund inspired students that might become the next generation
of scientists through this extraordinary program.
Sincerely,
Santiago Herrera
Research Training Program
Class of '07