Johns Hopkins University students Henry Le Chang, Roma Desai, Sameer Gabbita, and Oliver Nizet are among 454 students awarded Goldwater Scholarships—one of the oldest and most prestigious national scholarships in the United States—for the 2026-2027 academic year.
They were selected from a pool of more than 5,000 college sophomores and juniors demonstrating exceptional promise in the natural sciences, engineering, and mathematics. Each Goldwater Scholar receives up to $7,500 toward the cost of tuition, mandatory fees, books, and room and board. Sophomore recipients receive a second year of funding.
Established by Congress in 1986 to honor the legacy of soldier and statesman Barry Goldwater, it is one of the earliest significant national scholarships focusing on STEM fields. The national prestige afforded through the Goldwater Scholarship has also been known to give students a competitive edge when pursuing graduate fellowships in their fields. Many Goldwater Scholars at JHU and beyond go on to receive Rhodes Scholarships, Churchill Scholarships, Marshall Scholarships, Hertz Fellowships, Graduate Research Fellowships from the National Science Foundation, and many other prestigious awards.
More about JHU’s scholars:
Henry Le Chang (Class of 2027, Neuroscience and Applied Mathematics and Statistics) plans to pursue a PhD in biomedical sciences to prepare for a career researching the biological mechanisms underlying chronic pain and itch. He began this work in the summer after his junior year in high school at the University of California San Francisco, and he carried this experience with him to JHU where recommenders noted his work with Xinzhong Dong’s lab in the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He has contributed as second and third author on two academic essays from these experiences, and has also presented his research at academic conferences. Chang is also a University Undergraduate Research Fellow with an independent research project that analyzes the role of certain receptors in bacterial meningitis. In addition to his academic work, he is a longtime member of the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Club, the Nu Rho Psi Club in neuroscience, Immunology and Immunoengineering Club, and Dragon Boat Club.
Roma Desai (Class of 2027, Biomedical Engineering) plans to pursue a PhD in biomedical engineering to conduct translational tissue engineering research and pursue a career as a leading researcher who will contribute to safer and more reliable laboratory research models. She began researching while in high school by connecting with Bishnu Bastakoti at North Carolina A&T State University, and she has continued working with Bastakoti during the summer, ultimately contributing to three publications with one first-author essay published in the Journal of Biomedical Scientific Instrumentation. At JHU, Desai has worked since arriving with Deok-Ho Kim researching ways to develop a model that captures functional human synaptic physiology for translational drug testing. This work has resulted in an additional first-author manuscript currently under review in a scholarly journal. Desai also works with John Miller at the Johns Hopkins Lyme Disease Research Center conducting research on post-infectious Lyme disease. She has another first-author publication stemming from her research in Miller’s lab. Desai is working on another project as part of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine Summer Scholars Program in Graça Almeida-Porada’s lab, researching ways to better evaluate gene therapy toxicity. Finally, she has recently joined Nicholas Durr’s project to conduct computational research to classify immune cell types in peritoneal dialysate fluid to improve point-of-care diagnostics for dialysis-related infections. Outside of academics and research, Desai serves as committee chair for the Biomedical Engineering Society with outreach to Baltimore City schools, vice president of the Maryland Science Olympiad, vice president of Med Tech Network organizing seminars on artificial intelligence in health care, and is a member of the JHU Student Conduct Board. She is a Hodson Trust Scholar, Carson Scholar, and National Merit Scholar, and has been recognized with a President’s Volunteer Service Award for setting up STEM summer camps and won an Undergraduate Catalyst Award at JHU.
Sameer Gabbita (Class of 2027, Biomedical Engineering) plans to pursue a joint MD-PhD to analyze how gene expression variations underlie human disease. He began this work while as a high school student researching with Lucas Ferreira at Massachusetts General Hospital. This led to a recent publication in Nature Genetics and several conference presentations in the U.S. and abroad. At JHU, Sameer joined Tej Azad’s lab to research methods for applying artificial intelligence in clinical settings to neurocritical populations. This work led to his contribution as fourth author essay published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation and a presentation at the Congress of Neurological Surgeons in 2024. He has also researched with Sahin Naqvi in the Boston Children’s Hospital to examine how noncoding genetic variation shapes craniofacial development, and he more recently has worked with Marinka Zitnik in the Harvard Medical School developing artificial intelligence models to predict changes in gene expression. Outside of his academic work and research, Sameer serves as president of the Hopkins AI Society, Resource Coordinator at the Johns Hopkins Outpatient Center, Research Mentor with the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, and Crisis Hotline Volunteer at the Crisis Text Line. He also co-founded Baltimore Benefits to help underserved residents connect with crucial food and medical resources in the Baltimore community. He has also been recognized as a Susanne E. Churchill Summer Institute in Biomedical Informatics Research Fellow, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Distinguished Professor Summer Research Fellow, and won the Judge’s Award at the Pava Spark Entrepreneurship Showcase.
Oliver Nizet (Class of 2027, Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Computer Science) plans to pursue a PhD in bioengineering to prepare for a career as a researcher developing engineered therapeutics for cancer and infectious diseases. He began researching as a high school student by volunteering in Rob Knight’s lab at the University of California San Diego. He has one publication and has submitted a second manuscript for review in a scholarly journal. At JHU, Nizet connected with Vice Provost for Research Denis Wirtz to research lethal gynecologic cancer originating from precursor lesions in the fallopian tubes. He contributed to a manuscript that is currently under review for publication, and he is currently researching prostate cancer in Wirtz’s lab. In addition to academics and research, Nizet serves the JHU and Baltimore communities as a Peer Leader in the Johns Hopkins PILOT Program and as an Elementary School Tutor with the Johns Hopkins Tutorial Project. He has been inducted into the Tau Beta Pi Engineering Honor Society in 2025 and has excelled academically at Hopkins.
To learn more about the Goldwater Scholarship and other available fellowships, visit the National Fellowship Program website.
