Shana Stoddard, associate professor of chemistry at Rhodes College in Memphis, has been selected to receive the 2024 Ruth Kirschstein Diversity in Science Award from the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.
The Ruth Kirschstein Diversity in Science Award honors an outstanding scientist who has demonstrated a sustained commitment to the encouragement of scientists from historically marginalized groups. Dr. Stoddard will receive the award at the ASBMB Annual Meeting in March 2024, where she also will present a lecture.
In 2017, Stoddard founded the STEM Cohort Mentoring Program, and she has led multiple initiatives dedicated to making the STEM training experience and workforce more diverse and inclusive. The program boasts a 96 percent graduation rate, and many scholars from the program have gone on to pursue graduate degrees. Dr. Stoddard’s Molecular Immunotherapeutics Research lab is made up of a diverse group of students who use a combination of computational chemistry, biochemistry, and cell-based assays to conduct research focused on improving patient outcomes with autoimmune disorders, cancers, neurological disorders, and coronaviruses.
Dr. Stoddard is a graduate of Prairie View A&M University in Texas, where she majored in chemistry. She holds a master’s degree in curriculum and instruction from Freed-Hardeman University in Henderson, Tennessee, and a Ph.D. in chemistry and biochemistry from the Univerity of Mississippi.
