Senior Kenneth Hoehn, a biology major who is also completing a minor in computational biology and bioinformatics, was chosen as a Marshall Scholar Thursday.
Hoehn, an A.B. Duke Scholar, will spend the next two years at Oxford University’s Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics in the fully funded program, where he plans to focus on human and pathogen genomics.
During his time at Duke, Hoehn has worked in the lab of Mohamed Noor, Earl D. McClean professor of biology, where he contributes to evolutionary genomics projects, focusing on codon mutation in fruit flies. He is also a member of associate professor of biology Louise Roth’s lab, studying mass extinction of coral.
The Canton, Ga. native said he was attracted to the Marshall Scholarship because Oxford and Cambridge universities are world centers for biology, with particular prowess in genomics. He also noted that the program will give him the unique opportunity to obtain a fast-tracked terminal degree.
After working on his Marshall Scholarship application all summer, Hoehn said he was both surprised and relieved when the scholarship committee informed him he had been chosen.
“I asked them if they had the wrong number first,” he said. “When it was clear that they had in fact called my number to tell Kenneth Hoehn he had won a Marshall Scholarship, I spent the rest of the day running around campus telling my recommenders and professors.”
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