The Center for Health and Wellbeing (CHW) at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs has selected ten undergraduates as the 2011 Adel Mahmoud Global Health Scholars. The scholars, all juniors, will receive financial support for travel and research to pursue global health-related internships and senior thesis research.

Created in honor of Adel Mahmoud M.D., Ph.D., for his pioneering work in global health, the Scholars program was established in 2007, through a grant from The Merck Company Foundation, to foster new opportunities to engage Princeton undergraduates in global health policy.

  “This program presents a unique opportunity for self-directed exploration of critical health and health policy issues, and it offers an excellent foundation for future global health leaders,” said Christina Paxson, dean of the Woodrow Wilson School.   “Through the financial support of The Merck Company Foundation, these ten exceptional students will be able to conduct independent research on some of the most compelling global health questions.”    

The ten 2011 Adel Mahmoud Global Health Scholars are:

Wynne Callon ’13 is a Woodrow Wilson School major pursuing certificates in global health and health policy and in Chinese language and culture. She intends to study diabetes treatment and prevention efforts in community health centers in China, exploring reasons for lack of adherence to diabetes treatments and recommended lifestyle changes.

Courtney Crumpler ’13 is an anthropology major pursuing certificates in global health and health policy, Latin American studies and dance. Her independent work asks critical questions about evidence-making practices and systems of accountability in global health. She is exploring how particular approaches to monitoring and evaluation impact programmatic activity and local agencies, focusing on Mozambique and Brazil.  

Raphael Frankfurter ’13, also an anthropology major, is pursuing a certificate in global health and health policy. Focusing on a recently-implemented campaign in rural Sierra Leone that has trained traditional healers and birth attendants to identify high-risk pregnancies, he plans to investigate models for community-based maternal healthcare campaigns and the ways maternal mortality outcomes are measured in extremely resource-poor settings.

Marla Jalbut ’13 is a chemistry major pursuing a certificate in global health and health policy. She is interested in the prevention of chronic non-communicable diseases and the development of policies to cost-effectively decrease disease burden. She intends to work on an epidemiologic study of breast cancer to determine the reproductive variables that could contribute to the risk of the disease.

Theodora Karagounis ’13, also a chemistry major, is currently studying the disease mechanism of cholera and methods of inhibiting this mechanism without encouraging the evolution of resistant strains. In order to understand how the resistant strains originally developed, Karagounis intends to travel to India, where cholera continues to be an issue, to examine the current status of the disease and policies on cholera treatment.

Radomir Kratchmarov ’13 is a molecular biology major pursuing certificates in global health and health policy as well as neuroscience. He will expand his current research on the molecular biology of infectious diseases by exploring the process of vaccine design and clinical trials currently underway for tuberculosis.

Mark Pavlyukovskyy ’13, also a molecular biology major, is interested in innovative ways to address health education in developing countries. He hopes to implement an innovative game-based, decentralized approach in Ghana to engage schoolchildren in learning about health while playing with peers. He will document the results of this program in his thesis for the certificate at the Woodrow Wilson School.

Deesha Sarma ’13 is a Woodrow Wilson School major enrolled in the global health and health policy certificate program. For her senior independent project, she intends to build off of her junior independent research on child malnutrition in South Africa and explore the relationship between malnutrition and infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis among children in the Western Cape.

Joongyu (Daniel) Song ’13 is a Woodrow Wilson School major pursuing a certificate in global health and health policy. He plans to study the relationship between the presence of boundary institutions, such as tribe, religion, and socioeconomic class, and provision of HIV/AIDS services in Kenya and Tanzania.

Charlotte Weisberg ’13 is an anthropology major pursuing a global health and health policy certificate. Her thesis research will explore how home and clinic-based maternity care systems are integrated in French Guiana, and will investigate mothers’ attitudes toward birth and their support networks.

This past summer the 2010 Scholars conducted research on the following topics: characteristics of identity formation at U.S. fertility clinics; a portable cervical cancer detection and lesion ablation technology in India; disparities in reproductive health care for Muslims and non-Muslims in Kenya; intimate partner violence against women in East Africa; psychosocial aspects of HIV/AIDS treatment in Guatemala; mental illness and its relation to natural disasters; HPV infection and cancer prevention strategies in Sri Lanka; policy and biology aspects of antibiotic resistance and disease management; and violence, health, and urban development in Rio de Janeiro. These students are currently integrating their summer research into their senior theses.

The Mahmoud Global Health Scholars program also features a lecture series, which brings a leading researcher and/or practitioner in global health policy to Princeton annually.

The Center for Health and Wellbeing is an interdisciplinary center within the Woodrow Wilson School, which seeks to foster research and teaching on the multiple aspects of health and wellbeing in both developed and developing countries.

About The Merck Company Foundation

The Merck Company Foundation is a U.S.-based, private charitable foundation. Established in 1957 by Merck, a global healthcare leader, the Foundation is funded entirely by the company and is Merck's chief source of funding support to qualified non-profit, charitable organizations. Since its inception, The Merck Company Foundation has contributed more than $600 million to support important initiatives that address societal needs and are consistent with Merck's overall mission to help the world be well. For more information, visit www.merckgiving.com.