March 9, 2021

The Board of Directors of The McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience (MEFN) is pleased to announce it has selected four neuroscientists to receive funding to mentor a college student from a community under-represented in the neuroscience field.

The Fellowship is named in honor of our friend and colleague, Matthew Pecot, who died in 2019. Matthew was a brilliant neuroscientist at Harvard Medical School and a 2017 McKnight Scholar Awardee. He received his McKnight award for his work on identifying molecular principles underlying synaptic specificity. Matthew’s McKnight work has contributed to identifying defects in neural connectivity, which underlie many neural psychiatric diseases.

“The MEFN board developed the McKnight Pecot Fellowship to address the lack of opportunities for AHN college students in the pipeline to neuroscience graduate programs,” noted MEFN Board Member, Leslie Vosshall, “we were thrilled to support these five young women as they exemplify the excellence that the McKnight Neuroscience program is known for.” For the purposes of the McKnight Pecot Fellowship, AHN includes, but is not limited to: African American; Hispanic/Latino (a); and Native Americans/Pacific Islanders/Alaska Natives.

Additionally, this Fellowship is aligned with the McKnight Foundation’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion as core values.

The 2021 McKnight Pecot Fellowships: