DBC Young Investigator Award

Four awards will be made annually, with at least one award made to a senior graduate student and one to a postdoctoral scientist. The award will consist of a $1000 honorarium and a plaque to commemorate their participation in the ACS DBC Young Investigator Symposium to be programmed annually in the Fall ACS National Meeting. Meeting registration and travel expenses with be offset to a level of $250.

The inaugural year for these awards was 2024. The second annual Young Investigator Award symposium will take place at the Fall 2025 National ACS Meeting.

Candidates must be enrolled as post-candidacy graduate students or hold positions as postdoctoral scientists (in academia, industry or a government laboratory), and be no more than two years beyond completion of the Ph.D. at the time of the nomination.

This award will recognize early career trainees that are performing mentored research in biochemistry or chemical biology in a BIOL member’s laboratory. Selection will be based on a combination of innovation and achievement in research as well as contributions to the scientific community or society at large through mentoring, outreach, leadership, professional development, science communication, or related efforts. Visiting scholars and similar titles are not eligible.

To be eligible, the candidate must be able to attend the Fall ACS meeting.

The nominator will email a nominating letter, supporting letter, and candidate CV as a single pdf to the current secretary of BIOL (information listed below). Nominations will be accepted until April 17, 2026. Both letters should be on letterhead (two-page limit, 11 point font, single-spaced). The letters can come from a single institution, e.g., the candidate’s graduate or postdoctoral institution, although this is not required.

The division encourages nominations of candidates from diverse backgrounds and identities, consistent with our division’s goal of enhancing diversity and representation in our divisional leadership and membership.

The BIOL Executive Committee will charge a four-person selection committee to administer this award, to consist of the current Chair, the Immediate Past Chair, the Secretary and a member of the Advisory Committee of the Division.

Christian Whitman
Division Secretary ‘26
University of Texas at Austin
whitman@austin.utexas.edu