Eight CUNY undergraduate STEM students have been selected to receive the Jonas E. Salk Award, which is an annual scholarship granted to those accepted into medical schools or graduate programs in the biomedical sciences.

The winners were Miguel Chavez, Mathiu Perez, Tzippora Chwat, Silva Baburyan, Soham Ghoshal, Elise Wang, Daniela Yakobashvili and Naomi Shohet. Each will be given $8,000 to go toward the tuition costs of their graduate studies or medical training over four years.

“These future physicians and scientists have continued their research despite challenges that have underscored how much humanity needs students of this caliber,” Chancellor Félix Matos Rodríguez said. “In honoring these outstanding students, we also honor the memory of our revered alumnus Jonas Salk, whose historic work remains essential to this day.”

Chavez is a first-generation City College student who will attend Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences to pursue an M.D./Ph.D. degree. He is interested in studying stem cells to help those who suffer from heart disease and lupus, both of which are diseases he’s witnessed his family members and mentor battle.

“He aims to help underserved communities and be ‘at the forefront of the scientists who help improve their quality of life,’” a CUNY press release reported.

Perez is a Spanish-speaking immigrant and City College student who will attend Oxford University and the University of California, San Francisco, where he will be pursuing an M.D./Ph.D. degree as a National Institutes of Health Oxford-Cambridge Scholar.

“In research he was ‘captivated by the intricacies of molecular machinery, protein-protein interactions, and their implications in human diseases,’” the CUNY press release said.

Chwat is a Macaulay Honors College at City College student who will attend Weill Cornell Graduate School of Medical Sciences to pursue a Ph.D. in biology.

“As an eighth-grader, she prepared for a science fair by covering a table in her family’s home with flatworms to study regeneration and has wanted to be a biologist ever since,” according to the CUNY press release.

Baburyan is a Hunter College student who will attend Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University to pursue an M.D.

According to the CUNY press release, several experiences moved her toward medicine. These experiences included participating in a medical research program at Memorial Sloan Kettering and volunteering for a cardiovascular outreach program for underserved communities where she helped a patient recover.

Ghoshal is a Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College student who will attend Harvard Medical School to pursue an M.D.

While Ghoshal was a volunteer at Mount Sinai Hospital and was a research fellow at the National Institute on Drug Abuse, “he felt ‘an ethical responsibility’ to help patients,” the CUNY press release reported.

Wang is a Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College student who will attend the University of Rochester School of Medicine to pursue an M.D.

“She has spent time learning about mild depression in patients in a primary care clinic in the Asian-American community and about the need for such patients to seek help before their symptoms intensify,” according to the CUNY press release.

Yakobashvili is a Macaulay Honors College at Hunter College student who will attend Rutgers New Jersey Medical School to pursue an M.D.

“After experiencing a wide array of clinical environments, she has decided to focus on preventative treatment rather than ‘the illness-based system’ too often favored in underprivileged communities,” the CUNY press release said.

Lastly, Shohet is a Macaulay Honors at Queens College student who will attend SUNY Downstate Medical School to pursue an M.D.

The CUNY press release reported that she became a caregiver of her grandmother who was diagnosed with dementia, and that experience motivated her to go after a career as a geriatrician.

CUNY’s Jonas E. Salk Award is named in honor of Jonas Salk, a City College alumnus who developed the first polio vaccine in 1955.

Following his discovery, he asked to have the money be used for scholarships instead of a ticker tape parade, an honor typically given to those who have made significant achievements.

Each year, eight CUNY students are selected based on original research papers composed under the mentorship of CUNY professors and mentors.

“These students have demonstrated sound character, outstanding scholarship and the promise of significant contribution to medicine and medical research,” Director of the Salk Scholarship Program Ian James said, according to the CUNY press release. “It gives me great pleasure to congratulate this year’s Salk Scholars and to pay tribute to their accomplishments and celebrate their futures.”