Students

On her own terms

Susan Glairon — Fri, 01 May 2026 19:01:47 +0000

On her own terms Susan Glairon Fri, 05/01/2026 - 13:01

Susan Glairon

Arianna McCarty brings excellence to everything she does, from everyday tasks to her highest pursuits.

In 2021, Arianna McCarty was a high school junior taking calculus 3 and planning a future in medicine. When the pandemic hit, she turned an unexpected setback into a new direction — one that led her to engineering and launched a fast-rising career in research.

On Saturday, McCarty graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder summa cum laude with honors in chemical and biological engineering and as the Outstanding Graduate of the College of Engineering and Applied Science, along with some of the nation’s most competitive undergraduate awards and scholarships.

Her awards include a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship (GRFP); a scholarship from the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation; a Churchill Scholarship, which includes one year of master’s study at Cambridge University; and a Goldwater Scholarship.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, McCarty’s classes at Centaurus High School in Lafayette quickly moved fully online, and she soon found herself unchallenged and wanting more.

“Because I wasn't yet 18, I couldn't volunteer in a clinical role,” McCarty said. “So I started thinking about research. It was something I’d planned to pursue in college, and it became a ‘why not start now?’ kind of thing.”

Encouraged by her older brother and his girlfriend, McCarty contacted 91��ý professors about computational research opportunities, as in-person lab work was rare during the pandemic.

She soon began working with the Layer Lab at 91��ý’s BioFrontiers Institute in partnership with Colorado Children's Hospital, analyzing genomic sequences from patients with a range of conditions. At the same time, she enrolled in Colorado Early Colleges, where she took college classes concurrently at Front Range Community College.

Upon graduation, McCarty was awarded the Boettcher Scholarship, a highly competitive merit-based award for Colorado high school seniors.

Turning point

Arianna McCarty in a lab.

McCarty says she loved computational research, but soon realized she also wanted a hands-on lab experience.

The summer after her freshman year, she joined the Clark Lab at CU Anschutz through the Vetter Foundation, where she studied the respiratory microbiome and investigated how native bacteria in the respiratory tract can protect against pathogens.

Still thinking about a career in medicine, she drove daily to the Anschutz campus for full days of research, then attended classes several evenings a week at Denver Health to earn her Emergency Medical Technician certificate.

In the fall of her sophomore year, she worked as an emergency room (ER) technician at a level one trauma center at UCHealth Medical Center of the Rockies and on the medical surgery floor at Boulder Community Health. As a technician, she wheeled patients into the emergency room, collected vital signs, placed IVs and performed EKGs. On the medical-surgery floor, she provided ongoing patient care, including post-surgery support, monitoring vitals and responding to call lights.

At that point, she was working roughly 40 hours a week on night shifts while also managing her college classes, several part-time jobs and research. The demanding experience prompted a turning point and set her on a new path.

“I bit off more than I could chew,” McCarty said. “I didn’t have time for my friends. I wasn’t as engaged in my coursework, especially after having been awake for 36 hours.

“I enjoyed patient care and working in a hospital, but I eventually decided it wasn't worth doing night shifts for a decade,” she continued. “The work was a very structured, systematic, flowchart-like process. It didn’t engage me as much as research does. It was difficult emotionally to leave my medical plan behind, but it felt easy to pivot to research, which I find very gratifying.”

Road to research

McCarty is interested in tissue engineering—the process of building biological tissues in the lab—and regenerative medicine, which focuses on repairing damaged tissues. To gain research experience in those areas before attending graduate school, she joined the Burdick Biomaterials and Biofabrication Laboratory through the Young Scholars Summer Research Program and has continued her work with that lab.

Arianna McCarty presenting her research at the 2024 American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) annual meeting in San Diego.

This fall, one of her academic awards, the Churchill Scholarship, will take her to the University of Cambridge for a one-year Master of Philosophy in biological sciences. During that time, she will work under Dr. Sam Bajati at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, a world-renowned genomics research center, conducting computational research to study genetic information from individual cells while engaging with an international research community.

McCarty’s focus will be on the adolescent immune system. Her goal is to better understand why pediatric blood cancers such as leukemia arise and to help inform potential therapies, McCarty said.

“More broadly, this experience will strengthen my computational skill set as I prepare to pursue a PhD in the United States,” she said.

Passion unearthed

Although McCarty entered 91��ý with a significant number of college credits, she remained enrolled at 91��ý for the traditional four years, completing her degree requirements as a junior, then spending her senior year taking graduate courses and exploring subjects that interested her.

“I discovered a love for philosophy,” said McCarty. “CU offers uniquely strong programs that introduce engineers to these ideas through the Herbst Program for Engineering, Ethics & Society and the Engineering Leadership Program (ENLP). The Engineering Honors Program offers a freshman critical encounters course that introduces more philosophical readings. I've been able to take advantage of all these opportunities.”

Arianna McCarty receives the Undergraduate Student Employee of the Year in the leadership category from the National Student Employment Association. Standing to the right is Professor Rob Davis, who nominated McCarty for the Award.

While winning numerous awards and scholarships for her academic and research pursuits, McCarty also received national and campus teaching awards, including the Undergraduate Student Employee of the Year from the National Student Employment Association for her work as a course assistant and mentor.

McCarty said her new-found passion for teaching surprised her. Since her sophomore year, she's held office hours, assisted in grading papers and given several lectures.

“I've had a blast with it,” she said. “I've been the teaching assistant for a group of students and have watched them grow from taking the introductory material and energy balances course to being a course assistant for their senior design class. It's been an unexpected, gratifying experience to be a part of that journey and community.

“The student employee awards have been more meaningful than some of the big-name awards,” she continued. “There’s something powerful about feeling that the people around me—within my department and among those I look up to—hold my work in high regard.”

She fondly remembers giving a brief lecture on leadership and having students come up afterward to share how much they enjoyed it.

“Those experiences made it clear to me that what I’m doing can have a direct, positive impact. A lot of what’s been motivating me towards being a professor outside of research is that I have enjoyed teaching and mentoring. I hope that as I progress through my career, I can continue mentoring, formally or informally and directly impact students' lives.”

Future plans

McCarty hopes to integrate all of her previous lab experiences in tissue engineering, immunology and computation into a unified research focus. She plans to become a professor and establish her own regenerative medicine lab.

Her top choice is to pursue her PhD at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. Although she was accepted, the program could not defer her admission until after she completed her master’s at the University of Cambridge. Instead of choosing one of the numerous other PhD programs she was accepted to, she plans to reapply to Johns Hopkins after finishing her year at Cambridge.

In many ways, McCarty has come full circle, hoping her research will help heal patients in the same way she once hoped to work with them directly.

“In terms of research, the ultimate goal is human health impact,” she said. “At the end of the day it would be fantastic to figure out some way to make organs in a lab and how to heal different types of wounds.

“But those are more lofty pies in the sky. A lot of progress in science comes from small, incremental steps that eventually lead to big end goals. I’m interested in how research moves from the lab into the real world and makes an impact, rather than just staying in academic papers that never get used.

“It’s my ultimate goal — for my research to help improve patient care.”

A conversation with Arianna McCarty

It seems you are on the go all the time. How do you stay grounded?

I spend time with my people. I like having my few close friends, and I stick to them. I am not someone who texts 100 friends. I couldn't keep that up. My sanity check is to spend time with my friends or my partner, have random late-night conversations, cook dinner together and enjoy the little in-between moments of life.

What could students do to stand out?

If you are not the most hardworking person, intelligence doesn't mean much. At the end of the day, you need to put in long hours even when you don't want to. Be the person who organizes a club's Google Drive and who stays after a club meeting to clean up pizza boxes and close the door. No one wants to do it, but it will be helpful.

Over time, this will set you apart and make it clear how engaged and caring you are, to the point that others start asking for your opinions. Before long, you’ll find yourself in a leadership position with the opportunity to contribute even more.

How do you stay motivated when you are doing those less exciting tasks?

I am someone who gets it. I really enjoyed the ER. It's a 12-hour night shift, and those shifts are not for the faint of heart. But there's a sense of triumph and success in doing it, and also a strong sense of community with everyone around you going through the same thing.

It was similar in Professor Jason Burdick’s Lab. When we were there late at night, we'd start playing random fun music, and we'd dance. It’s nice to feel like you're all in it together.

Is there anything else that you would like to add?

A big thank you goes to my brother, Brian McCarty, and Dr. Jessica Stelzel, his fiancée. Both have been mentors for me since high school.

It's the same with Professor Jason Burdick, Assistant Professor Ryan Layer, and a huge shout out to Assistant Professor Sarah Clark at CU Anschutz. She was the first to let me go wild with my scientific curiosities. I would send her the things I was curious about and how I wanted to test them, and she was game. She gave me a lot of advice and mentorship on the way.

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Honoring our 2026 department awardees

Susan Glairon — Fri, 01 May 2026 16:57:12 +0000

Honoring our 2026 department awardees Susan Glairon Fri, 05/01/2026 - 10:57

Susan Glairon

Ten undergraduate students won 11 awards from the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering. Please click on their names to read more about our students' accomplishments.

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Honoring our 2026 undergraduate college awardees

Susan Glairon — Tue, 14 Apr 2026 20:44:16 +0000

Honoring our 2026 undergraduate college awardees Susan Glairon Tue, 04/14/2026 - 14:44

Thirteen chemical and biological engineering undergraduate students won 18 awards from the College of Engineering and Applied Science. Please click on their names to read more about our students' accomplishments.

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ChBE senior earns national and campus Student Employee of the Year honors

Susan Glairon — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 16:16:18 +0000

ChBE senior earns national and campus Student Employee of the Year honors Susan Glairon Wed, 04/08/2026 - 10:16

McCarty was selected as the leadership category winner at the national and campus levels. She was recognized for her leadership as a course assistant and lead course assistant for multiple core engineering courses, as well as for her professionalism and academic excellence.

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91��ý's Chem-E-Car team takes home first place

Susan Glairon — Tue, 22 Apr 2025 01:54:13 +0000

91��ý's Chem-E-Car team takes home first place Susan Glairon Mon, 04/21/2025 - 19:54

Susan Glairon

In an impressive comeback, 91��ý students won the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Chem-E-Car competition at the Rocky Mountain regional. The event was held in Bozeman, Montana from April 11-12.

91��ý's Chem-E-Club club dissolved during the COVID-19 pandemic but was revived in 2021 by five students, said Claire Ely, a senior majoring in chemical engineering and one of the students who helped bring it back. Since then, it has grown to a team of about 20 members.

"This year's success is unbelievably exciting," Ely said. "The four seniors in the club feel like proud parents."

One of their cars, "Don't Zinc and Drive," took first place in both the car competition and the poster presentation; the team's second car, "Ralphie," placed third in the car competition. The first-place win secured 91��ý a spot at the national AIChE competition in Boston this November.

The competition's goal is to design a shoebox-sized car powered by chemical reactions— such as a battery or an internal combustion engine — that

stops at a specified distance using a time-dependent chemical reaction. The target distance is revealed just before the competition, and the team whose car stops closest to that distance wins.

Throughout the year, 91��ý students designed, built and tested their car ideas in the chemical engineering undergraduate teaching lab, supported by Assistant Teaching Professor Ehsan Keyvani.

"Don't Zinc and Drive" is powered by zinc-air batteries and stopped using an acid-base neutralization. "Ralphie," is powered by a hydrogen fuel cell and stopped using an enzyme-catalyzed digestion.

"The club is a fun and low-stakes way to reinforce engineering principles hands-on, regardless of experience," Ely said. "Students, not just chemical engineering majors, develop a ton of skills, including electronics, mechanical design CAD prototyping, reaction engineering and experimental design.”

"We look forward to what Chem-E-Car brings next!," she said.

The club is supported by funding from the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering and has received Engineering Excellence Fund support in the past.

Students interested in joining 91��ý's Chem-E-Club can send an email to chemecar@colorado.edu. The club can also be followed on Instagram at @boulderchemecar.

91��ý took home first place in the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Chem-E-Car competition, securing 91��ý a spot at the national AIChE competition in Boston this November.

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The winning team holding their Don't Zinc and Drive car.

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Senior capstone design course marks 25 years of real-world problem solving with industry partners

Anonymous — Mon, 28 Feb 2022 07:00:00 +0000

Senior capstone design course marks 25 years of real-world problem solving with industry partners Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 02/28/2022 - 00:00

Jonathan Raab

Chris Stanton, Sara Horton and Sherri Zeller presented their findings from the 1999 course.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the revamped and retooled Chemical Engineering Design Project course — a class (re)designed to provide seniors with practical problem-solving experience and foster stronger ties to industry.

Industry liaisons — often department alumni — work with seniors on chemical process, design and economic analysis in the context of real-world projects. Students provide bi-weekly letter reports, two midterm oral presentations, a final 45-minute presentation at the liaison’s facility and a written final design report based on their experience.

“When we started, the course was in disarray and many students were apparently complaining – enough that the external advisory committee recommended that the department do an about-face and move away from the standard AIChE capstone problem,” Melvin E. and Virginia M. Clark Professor Alan Weimer said. “They recommended bringing in industry projects. In all honesty, this had a lot to do with hiring me on as a professor after I spent 16 years in industry.”

Weimer — who still teaches the course — saw an opportunity to modify the existing class, opting to connect students with industry professionals and to provide assignments that would lead to real-world outcomes that students could draw upon in job interviews. Since the course’s conversion to an industry-facing model, over 100 organizations have participated, including private companies and government laboratories.

“We were the first department in the college to use external liaisons and industry projects, providing students with relevant learning opportunities,” Weimer said. “Most of the industry liaisons are now past students. It was difficult getting started in 1997, but now we routinely have alumni volunteering to give back to the department and to be involved in our students' education. We have had as many as 35 different projects in one semester.”

New vision, new opportunities (and new software)

The first industry liaison, Dena Lund (ChemEngr’89), now the president of Anvil Corporation, collaborated with Professor Weimer in the spring 1997 course. Lund recalled her own senior design project as a difficult, confusing experience. When Weimer approached her to develop a new, industry-focused, project-based approach, she was excited to participate.

Weimer had recently received brand-new, Windows-based thermodynamic modeling software, which he had laying around his office. Lund had a burst of inspiration.

“’How about if I design a project around the software and a couple of student teams can learn how to use it and make a recommendation back to the department on its value?’” she asked. Weimer approved the idea, and the student recommendations led to the department adopting the software.

“Seeing students work in teams on real-life projects with industry professionals is energizing,” Lund said of her time as a liaison. “They get to be creative, apply all their skills, collaborate and gain experience with real-world work. The presentation sessions prepare them to showcase their efforts and respond to live questions. The other students get exposure to all the different projects and learn about a variety of engineering applications.”

Because Lund has such confidence in the course’s efficacy, she has sought out and hired several department graduates who have completed the class.

“By the time these students graduate, they are prepared to contribute,” she said.

Lund’s involvement with the program was her way of giving back.

“I was an engineer because of the department, and I have enjoyed a successful career and raised a family,” she said. “Helping students with that extra effort, by being a liaison and giving some guidance and reinforcement of skills was my way of helping students transition to a career in engineering in a way that was better than my experience.”

Megan Glenn and Sarah Spaustat during student presentations for the 2000 course sponsored by Roche Colorado.

Course graduates to industry liaisons

Ann Colwell (ChemEngr’97) is a former student who transitioned to industry partner. She now works as a venture executive at ExxonMobil.

“Over the course of my career, the tools and valuable insights that I was able to develop through this course provided me the foundation for success and a passion to stay involved as an industry project sponsor,” Colwell said. “While engineering students go on to many different types of careers, it is inspiring to see the students innovate solutions that exceed the design basis for their projects, including opportunities to apply concepts for safety and energy efficiency.”

Colwell said that within the course’s project teams, she sees emerging engineers developing an attention for detail and a desire to test boundaries in a process that connects them to the industries of which they will soon be a part.

"Courses like the senior capstone design class provide a foundation that ensures the students entering our industries today are equipped to transform and evolve sustainable energy solutions for the next 100 years,” she said.

Bill Perry (ChemEngr’98) is the owner and operator of Myrmix Pharma Solutions. Perry completed the course as a student and returned to teach a section after extensive project management experience in industry.

“Every year, I am impressed by the students’ ability to prepare effective slides and present in a clean, polished manner,” Perry said. “Their presentation skills reflect the experiences they have had not only in the senior design course, but throughout the department’s curriculum.”

Perry said one of the course's strengths is how it encourages students to make critical decisions on whether or how to limit the scope of their projects.

“Deciding where to make simplifying assumptions and where to dive deeply into a technical assessment is a real-life challenge they will face in their careers as engineers,” he said. “This is the most valuable project management skill the students learn from the senior design course.”

Jake Carrier (ChemEngr’13) is a senior process engineer at DCP Midstream.

John Ritchie, John Brown and Melissa Haugum from the course in April of 2001.

“The course exposed me to real-world design considerations and made the academic concepts less abstract,” Carrier said. “Through the networking opportunities afforded by the course, I was able to get my first job in consulting, which was a career path I had no knowledge of and had not considered. This ended up being a great jumping off point for me that could not have happened without this course.”

As a liaison for the course on behalf of DCP Midstream, Carrier gets to provide industry connections and mentorship to current students.

“Engineering is an apprenticeship, and my goal is to provide the students with some of the skills needed to transfer their academic knowledge into the practical,” he said. “In an increasingly lean profession, it is incredibly important to provide this mentorship to young engineers to ensure that the knowledge gained over many years is not lost.”

Carrier’s focus is on helping students break complex problems down to first principles of chemical engineering, encouraging creativity and cleverness in how they approach their projects.

“Congratulations to Professor Weimer on 25 years of helping to better prepare young engineers for a career in industry,” Carrier said. “I wouldn’t be where I am today without your help and guidance – truly.”

Tunkie Saunders (ChemBioEngr’18) is a senior chemical engineering manager at Redwood Materials.

“Senior design was fundamental to my growth and career trajectory as an engineer,” Saunders said. “Before the class, chemical engineering was a collection of theories and textbook problems. Going through the class ties the curriculum together.”

Saunders said that practical problems — the design of a plant or a new process, for example — forces students to deal with real-world design implications.

“The hardest engineering decisions take place at a higher level, where the interconnectedness of a unit operation, plant and the world around us takes shape,” he said. “The open-ended nature of the class is a significant shift from solving textbook problems, where only one answer exists and is the sole source of truth. You are now pitted against the unknown and must integrate creativity, decision-making and all you’ve learned.”

After Saunders completed the course at the end of his senior year, he found himself with a stark choice: join an established company or a startup.

“Thanks to senior design, I knew I had the foundation to make the jump and join a startup, where dealing with open-endedness and fast timelines is part of the job,” he said.

Adriana Robinson (ChemEngr'21) is an associate process design engineer with Chevron's TEMA Branch.

"Professor Weimer's senior design capstone class allowed me to network with a great company, learn directly from industry professionals and get exposure to design topics that I hadn't had much experience with in my classes," Robinson said.

"It challenged me to gain new skills, learn how to align with client-company expectations and lead a team successfully from project start to completion — something that has prepared me to face my new career path with confidence."

Alison Peters (ChemBioEngr’21) is a research associate at KBI Biopharma, Inc. Peters said that alongside internships, the Chemical Engineering Design Project course is the best way for students to gain perspective and experience on industry.

Professor Weimer

“The soft skills I picked up in the class have proven to be invaluable,” Peters said. “In my role as a research associate for a contract pharmaceutical lab, my daily tasks involve performing independent research, collaborating with teammates, seeking advice from supervisors, presenting progress to clients and writing and reviewing technical reports. Design was intentionally set up to give students real-life experience performing these kinds of tasks in cooperation with real-life chemical engineering companies, while reinforcing the chemical engineering curriculum.”

Peters said that her course experiences were invaluable in job interviews and helped prepare her for her first industry position.

“When I was asked to provide the department with feedback to improve the course, my only answer was: ‘I wish courses like this were available to underclassmen, too!'”

"I want to thank all of the hundreds of liaisons who have given their time over these 25 years to a unique capstone experience for our students," Weimer said. "The development of this course required getting over a high activation energy back in 1997, but it was well worth it as I see these graduates leave with valuable professional skills. I know that they put in an incredible amount of work and I am really proud of what they achieve.”

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