Bates professor receives $582K grant from National Science Foundation
Courtesy / Bates College, Phyllis Graber Jensen
Bates College Assistant Professor Geneva Laurita (at far right) received a grant that will help study alternatives to the use of heavy metals used in everyday technology products.
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A Bates College faculty member has gotten a $581,984 grant from the National Science Foundation.
Geneva Laurita, an assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry, joined the Bates faculty in 2017.
Her field of expertise is pyrochlore oxides, which are seen as a potential replacement for lead-based materials that are widely used in phones and other technology products. Pyrochlores could potentially be used in technology as less toxic, potentially lead-free materials, Bates says.
Laurita received what is known as an NSF “career” grant, presented to faculty members who are in earlier stages of their teaching and research careers.
It’s also a significant research grant for a private, undergraduate college — as opposed to a major research university, where grants are the lifeblood of long-term research programs, keeping teams of doctoral students busy.
Bates, which is in Lewiston, is a private, liberal arts college of about 2,000 students.
“Receiving a National Science Foundation CAREER award is a milestone accomplishment, and provides clear evidence of the high-quality work that Geneva Laurita is conducting,” Malcolm Hill, dean of faculty and vice president for academic affairs, said on the Bates news service.
“Bates defines excellent teachers as individuals who are active scholars and experts in their fields, and this award is the clearest indication of both,” Hill added.
Laurita said the award “means being able to do more of what she came to Bates to do: introduce students to concepts and research work that is typically available only to graduate students and rarely seen at primarily undergraduate institutions like Bates,” the college said.
“I’ve always been passionate about undergraduate research, and this is a place where the undergraduates are doing research with faculty members, and it is high impact, high-level research at the top of the field, working on the questions that everybody is asking,” she said.
In 2019, Laurita received another NSF grant, for $193,405, also to study pyrochlore oxides.
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