Josh Walters, a student of Dr. Jeremy Mercuri, has been selected for a Graduate Research Assistantship by the South Carolina Space Grant Consortium. Josh will be investigating the effects of prolonged spaceflight on intervertebral disc health using an explant culture model.
My interest in STEM originated from the occupational training I received during my high school welding and metalworking courses, which was my first exposure to engineering and science outside of the classroom. This interest led me to study engineering at the University of South Carolina, where I partook in friction-stir welding research on USC’s campus and at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology through an NSF:REU internship.
Through various seminars, I learned of the tissue engineering research being conducted by the biomedical engineering department, and I became fascinated with the application of engineering principles to biological systems. Consequently, I began working with functionalized polymers for orthopaedic tissue engineering, where I helped to develop novel scaffold fabrication methods for critical-size bone defects.
Before graduate school, I worked for two years as an Organic Extractions Chemist at an EPA-affiliated laboratory until deciding to transition to a career in biomedical research. I am now a second year Ph.D. student in bioengineering. I am interested in the biomedical effects of prolonged space flight on astronaut health, and I aspire to work at NASA as a research scientist studying space-induced changes to physiological and biological systems. Outside of school, I enjoy many different hobbies, such as hiking, hanging out with my brothers (and seeing who can quote the most ‘90s movies), performing house renovations, and building PCs.
The South Carolina Space Grant Consortium’s Graduate Research Assistantship (GRA) is designed to help meet the continuing needs of the aeronautics and space effort by increasing the number of highly trained scientists and engineers in aerospace, space science, space applications and space technology. The GRA Program awards assistantships for graduate study leading to research-based masters or doctoral degrees in the fields of science, mathematics, and engineering.
