Somerville Engineering Science and Zoology post-graduate student, Grace Young (2014) has been named as one of 14 global Emerging Explorers by National Geographic.
Every year, National Geographic recognises and supports uniquely gifted and inspiring scientists, conservationist, storytellers and innovators who are changing the world – awarding each of them $10,000 for research and exploration.
The 2017 class of Emerging Explorers will be honoured at the National Geographic Explorers symposium in Washington D.C., taking place next month, where they will also have chance to talk about future opportunities of partnering with National Geographic on expeditions and initiatives.
‘Each of the Emerging Explorers have completely different specialties and are from all corners of the globe,’ says Grace. ‘I’m really excited to meet everyone and learn from them.’
To further this achievement, Grace has also been asked to work for NASA for eight weeks this summer in an artificial intelligence research accelerator – based in Silicon Valley, California. Grace’s core team will be working on 3D shape modelling near-earth objects, which mirrors her thesis on 3D modelling underwater objects.
‘It’s a fantastic opportunity to develop my skills and learn from NASA in ways that will further develop our underwater 3D modelling techniques,’ says Grace. ‘It’s also great to work on an outside project that’s extremely related to my thesis.’
Grace Young is an ocean engineer, an aquanaut and a Somerville DPhil student whose research is focused on marine robotics and underwater imaging. She came to Oxford as a Marshall Scholar after graduating from MIT, where she worked on numerous research topics in mechanical and ocean engineering. In 2014 she lived underwater for 15 days as a mission scientist on Fabien Cousteau’s Mission 31.
To find out more about National Geographic’s 2017 class of Emerging Explorers please follow this link.