Best Senior Thesis Prize

The School of Engineering recognizes the Best Senior Thesis through a prize established in the 2024-2025 academic year by an anonymous donor. The prize is given each spring after faculty select the best senior thesis in each department. The award is administered through the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Education for the School of Engineering.

Class of 2026 Recipients

Julian X. Han received the prize from the faculty of the Department of Biomedical Engineering for the thesis entitled "Signal and Structure: Developing a Platform for Flexible Microelectrode Array Monitoring of 3D Neural Networks." Advisor: Associate Professor Brian Timko.

Tarkan Ayata received the prize from the faculty of the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering for the thesis entitled "Zwitterion Effects on Ion Transport for Water-in-Salt Electrolytes." Advisor: E Ink Professor and SOE Dean of Research Matthew Panzer.

Jacob Merritt received the prize from the faculty of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering for the thesis entitled "Software Techniques for Advanced Hotspot Prediction and Mitigation." Advisor: Professor Mark Hempstead.

William Cusato received the prize from the faculty of the Department of Mechanical Engineering for the thesis entitled "Investigating the effect of deformation and stirring on pure gold surface tension measurements using a Faraday forcing technique." Advisor: Research Professor Doug Matson.

Class of 2025 Recipients

Nery A. Matias Calmo was awarded the prize from the faculty of the Department of Biomedical Engineering for the thesis entitled “AI-Based Computer Vision Analysis of Pulmonary Arterial Microvasculature in Interstitial Lung Disease using Endobronchial Optical Coherence Tomography.” Advisor: Associate Professor Srivalleesha Mallidi.

David Gillingham was awarded the prize from the faculty of the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering for the thesis entitled “Realization of Genetic Code Expansion in Display Mediated Cell-Cell Interactions.” Advisor: Associate Professor James Van Deventer.

Prithvi Singh Shahani was awarded the prize from the faculty of the Department of Computer Science for the thesis entitled “Noise Injection Systemically Degrades Large Language Model Safety Guardrails.” Advisors: Karol Family Applied Technology Professor Matthias Scheutz and Research Assistant Professor Vasanth Sarathy.

Nico Moldovean was awarded the prize from the faculty of the Department of Mechanical Engineering for the thesis entitled “It IS Rocket Science: System-Wide Sounding Rocket Optimization via Requirements Management and Engineering Design in Support of the Tufts SEDS Rocketry Team’s 2025 IREC Entry.” Advisor: Research Professor Doug Matson.