Steven Jacobsen and Melina Kibbe are two of this year’s 100 recipients of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, according to a University press release.

“It’s the highest honor given by the government to scientists and engineers in the early stages of their independent research careers,” said Megan Fellman, the science and engineering editor for the department of university relations.

Jacobsen’s work focuses on the water on and beneath Earth’s surface and how that water affects the earth’s interior, the release said. Jacobsen has also been working to increase minority enrollment in advanced math and science classes at Evanston’s public schools. He is an assistant professor in the Earth and planetary sciences department.

Kibbe is an associate professor at the Feinberg School of Medicine, a vascular surgeon at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and co-chief of the vascular surgery service and director of the Vascular Laboratory at the Jesse Brown VA Medical Center. She said much of her work focuses on the role of nitric oxide in developing therapies for patients with damaged arteries. Kibbe said she knew she wanted to become a vascular surgeon after attending a particularly inspiring class when she was in medical school at the University of Chicago.

“I was in a lecture and they were talking about atherosclerosis and I realized that it was totally cool,” she said. “They showed a video of opening the artery and peeling the plaque out, and seeing that, I literally left the lecture saying, ‘I want to be a vascular surgeon.'”She said her advice to future academics is to remain focused.

“If you have a vision of what you want to do, it just takes perseverance and persistence and good things happen,” Kibbe said.

-Ali Elkin