Summer scholar receives research award for clustering foreign animal diseases

Ronald Page, an undergraduate summer hire last year, recently received a Sigma Xi Student Research Award for excellence in undergraduate research based upon his work at the Lab. His award-winning research, "Foreign Animal Diseases and Patterns in Cluster Analysis," is in the field of mathematics and computer science.

Page currently attends UC Berkeley, where he is majoring in applied mathematics, with an emphasis in numerical analysis, and a minor in African American studies.

He states that the importance of his project was in relation to a bigger project about the need to construct countermeasures that can effectively be used for a series of foreign animal diseases. 

"Instead of having many different diseases left with distinct countermeasures, the big picture is to be able to construct clusters of countermeasures that have similar diseases that deal with similar methods of containability, avoidability and eradicability, " Page said.

Page’s position last summer was his first assignment at LLNL.  "I hope to work at the Lab again soon," he said. "I would like to soak up more research experience before applying to graduate school."

He said that the Lab offered him opportunities to work with a broad range of professionals and experts on developing ideas and addressing problems that face the nation. He said he enjoyed his summer project since he could work with foreign animal disease (FAD) veterinarians, epidemiologists and many other experts in the National Security Engineering Division.

"I had the opportunity to present my research and receive positive feedback on the things I was studying in relation to why it was important to investigate. I believe the presentations I gave at the Lab helped me see what it’s like to be an expert in the field and participate as one."

Matt Dombroski of the Lab’s National Security Engineering Division was Page’s mentor. "Ron deserved the research award because he worked hard over the summer, showed strong interest for the work he was doing and for the Laboratory's mission, and developed and presented material on FAD pattern classification with clarity, enthusiasm and skill, which will be very helpful for him throughout his professional career," he said.

"Ron told me that his summer at the Lab was the best one of his undergraduate experience, which is a strong testament to the quality of the summer student program at LLNL and the experience it provides to promising future researchers," Dombroski added.

Page’s plans for the future are to secure a career in government, possibly conducting research, or as a professional or field agent for a government agency.  "I will be applying for graduate school in pursuit of a Ph.D. to see where that leads me; I have not ruled out academia as another pathway. I believe the following quote sums it up:  ‘All roads lead to Rome,’" he said.