Two recent recipients of Ph.D.’s in bioengineering (BIOE) from Rice University have received Richard R. Dickason, Jr., M.D., Ph.D. Outstanding Physician Scientist Awards, the most prestigious honor given to students in the dual M.D./Ph.D. degree program at Baylor College of Medicine (BCM).
Eric Molina earned his Ph.D. from Rice in 2019, received the Dickason Award for 2021 and addressed the M.D./Ph.D. graduation ceremony on May 26. Emma Watson earned her Ph.D. in 2020 and will receive the Dickason Award in 2022. She will speak at next year’s graduation ceremony.
Students in the program receive an M.D. from BCM and a Ph.D. from any of the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences Programs at BCM or the Department of BIOE at Rice. During the first two years in the joint BCM/Rice program, students complete the pre-clinical basic science curriculum at BCM prior to the Ph.D. course of study at Rice. After successfully defending their thesis and receiving their Ph.D., students return to BCM to complete the clinical curriculum.
While at Rice, Molina and Watson both worked in the lab of Antonios Mikos, the Louis Calder Professor of BIOE and of chemical and biomolecular engineering; and director of the National Institutes of Health Center for Engineering Complex Tissues, the Center for Excellence in Tissue Engineering, and the J.W. Cox Laboratory for Biomedical Engineering at Rice.