Perry World House Announces 2026-27 Graduate Fellows
Perry World House (PWH), the University of Pennsylvania’s home for global affairs, has selected 25 graduate students to form the 2026-27 cohort of our Perry World House Graduate Fellows Program.
This year’s Graduate Fellows Program cohort has been assembled following a highly-competitive selection process with the aim of engaging graduate students from all twelve of the University’s graduate schools. The program is designed to help rising scholars bridge the academic-policy divide and translate their expertise into policy-relevant information.
“I am delighted to return to serve as director of Perry World House’s Graduate Fellows Program for a second consecutive year,” said Benjamin L. Schmitt, a University of Pennsylvania senior fellow with joint appointments between Perry World House, the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, and the Department of Physics and Astronomy. “Even a cursory glance at the headlines demonstrates just how fast geopolitical, climate, human rights, and security trends in one area of the globe can drastically impact social outcomes around the world. No Penn field of study is immune to this reality, and that’s why we continue to feel strongly about training emerging Penn leaders across a wide array of disciplines in how to both engage with and shape global issues touching on their areas of advanced study.”
Holding regular sessions with this distinguished student cohort around a single table at PWH is central to the spirit of critical academic exchange that forms the core of the Graduate Fellows Program. Throughout the academic year, fellows have the opportunity to interact directly with senior practitioners in the fields of foreign policy and international security, ranging from discussions with current and former senior diplomatic officials, law enforcement professionals, and military leaders. Program sessions aim to provide instruction in key skills that students arriving from areas of study outside of “traditional” foreign policy can use to enhance their research and engagement in their own academic pursuits, while gaining exposure to pathways to participate in foreign policy and national security analysis in their postgraduate careers.
“It is more important than ever to prepare our graduate students to have a policy-relevant career,” said PWH Deputy Director Michael Weisberg. “The Graduate Fellows Program is designed to help Penn’s graduate students bridge the gap between academic research and practical, policy-relevant application. I am delighted that Perry World House is able to support this program and look forward to seeing what is to come from this year’s cohort.”
Sessions on open-source intelligence (OSINT) analysis, foundations of international relations theory, and media training for national security topics are just some of the dynamic areas that are covered throughout the year. The program also provides fellows with the opportunity to travel to Washington, DC, for a day of substantive meetings with U.S. Congressional staffers, federal government agencies, and an array of national security and foreign policy-focused think tanks, while using Penn Washington as a base from which to conduct these meetings.
This year’s Graduate Fellows are:
Shubh Agrawal is a PhD candidate in Physics and Astronomy, deploying the next generation of instrumentation in observational astrophysics and cosmology. His research focuses on measuring fundamental properties about the origin and growth of the universe, including its expansion history, the nature of matter and energy, and star formation in early galaxies. He graduated from Caltech in 2022, where he was a Milton and Rosalind Chang Scholar studying Physics, Astronomy, and Computer Science. At Caltech, he worked on calibrating, developing new detectors, and analysis methods for telescopes at the South Pole and in Hawaii. As a John Templeton and Quad fellow at Penn, he leads the development and integration of several sub-systems of a balloon-borne spectrometer, the Terahertz Intensity Mapper, the most sensitive telescope of its kind ever built. Outside of research, he is an avid fan of music, photography, and motor sports.
Mohamad AlAbbas is a fourth-year PhD candidate in Demography and Sociology at the Population Studies Center and an MA candidate in Urban Spatial Analytics at the Weitzman School of Design. His research examines disparities in environmental exposure and climate-related disaster vulnerability, with a focus on child health and developmental outcomes across low- and middle-income countries and, more recently, the United States. Mohamad is the recipient of a Population Studies Center Pilot Award supporting dissertation research that constructs harmonized longitudinal panels linking demographic composition to environmental exposures across U.S. census waves, with particular attention to how historical patterns of segregation and exclusionary zoning have stratified not only the quantity but the nature of environmental risks borne by minority communities.
Randy Burson is an MD candidate at the Perelman School of Medicine and PhD candidate in Anthropology. His research examines how policy, specifically health policy, influences people’s everyday and embodied experiences. Through more than a decade of ethnographic and collaborative research with Mapuche Indigenous communities in Chile, Randy has studied how “intercultural” health policies have shaped ongoing efforts to promote well-being, equity, and justice. He is also an Associate Fellow at both the Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics and the Center for Global Health, and co-founder of the Penn Structural Competency Working Group, which seeks to bring an evidence-based approach to teaching healthcare professionals and students about the social drivers of illness and health care.
Pedro V. Castro is a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science. His research focuses on the political economy of deforestation, land governance, and elections in the Brazilian Amazon. He investigates the political consequences of environmental policy, in particular how it enfranchises vulnerable groups and disrupts the capacity of deforester networks to influence elections, thereby strengthening democratic participation. He also examines how land governance failures are exploited by political elites, incentivizing deforestation and violent conflicts over land distribution. He recently completed an appointment at Brazil’s Ministry of Development, where he spearheaded a project on the environmental traceability of Brazilian commodity exports. He holds a degree in Law and a master’s in political science, both from the University of São Paulo.
Joshua Claxton is a PhD student in City and Regional Planning at the Weitzman School of Design. Joshua seeks to enhance international frameworks and policies that structure how people migrate between places. His doctoral work is specifically about the ways juridical and psycho-social notions of sanctuary shape migrant urban life in Paris. His dissertation intends to use the Paris case study to identify multi-scalar policies for achieving political and social cohesion in increasingly heterogenous urban communities. Previously, Joshua was a Senior Urban Planner at the City of Austin’s Housing Department, where he led research initiatives to advance the city’s affordability and equity goals. He holds a dual master’s degree in Global and Comparative Urban Planning and Governance from Sciences Po and UCLA.
Makenna Damhorst is an accelerated master’s student studying Energy and Sustainability Engineering and Earth and Environmental Science. Through her research with the Clean Energy Conversions Laboratory, she has contributed to projects that identify pathways for sustainable aviation fuel, outline potential domestic supply chains for rare earth elements from legacy waste streams, and investigate the role of education in workforce development to scale climate technologies. With the Oceans and Climate Dynamics Lab, she researched climate change misinformation and disinformation, as well as effective climate communication. She was an undergraduate fellow for the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy and served as the 2025-2026 Ambassador for Penn Athletics for the SNF Paideia Program, hosting climate-focused dialogic events. She is also a collegiate gymnast on Penn’s gymnastics team.
Michael Gordon is a joint-degree student at The Wharton School and The Lauder Institute, where he is pursuing an MBA and an MA in International Studies with a focus on Italian language and European Studies. He hopes to build an international career across the public and private sectors, helping governments and businesses develop mutually beneficial partnerships. Prior to Wharton and Lauder, Michael worked in investment banking at Bank of America, focusing on securitization finance across aviation, shipping, and energy. He graduated from Tufts University with a bachelor’s degree in international relations and minors in finance and Italian.
Lara Kerber is a third-year JD candidate at Penn Carey Law School, where she also earned an LLM with Distinction. Raised and legally trained in both Germany and the United States, her research examines how global legal and regulatory frameworks govern transnational private actors, focusing on energy, climate, and artificial intelligence. As a Research Assistant to Professor William Burke-White, she studies how national critical minerals regulations, including export controls, investment screening, and sanctions, shape global supply chains and the energy transition. Her work on international investment law and policy draws on her internship at the World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes. She is a Salzburg Cutler Fellow, Head Executive Editor of the Journal of International Law, and Project Leader for the International Human Rights Advocacy Project. Prior to Penn, she worked at an international arbitration boutique firm in Berlin and holds a First State Examination (JD equivalent) and LLB from Humboldt University of Berlin.
Yusuf Khalil is a Thouron Scholar and Master of City Planning candidate, concentrating in spatial analytics. His research interests sit at the intersection of infrastructure finance and climate adaption, with current work focused on climate resilience and charcoal production in Zambia. He is currently a Graduate Research Fellow at the Penn Water Center, working on ecosystem services valuation and watershed-scale economic analysis. Yusuf holds a BA in Land Economy from the University of Cambridge.
Chris Larson is a PhD Candidate in Earth and Environmental Science, where he investigates melt of the Greenland Ice Sheet and the subsequent sea level rise during two past warm periods, about 100 thousand and 400 thousand years ago, to inform us about how we can expect the Greenland Ice Sheet to behave with future climate change. He has been involved in graduate student government since his first year at Penn, having served on the Executive Board of the School of Arts & Sciences Graduate Student Government (SASGov) for his full four years so far (and counting). His research interests include climate change, Arctic paleoclimate, cosmogenic nuclides, environmental justice, and climate policy advocacy. When he’s not on campus, you can find him listening to music, watching movies, going to concerts, traveling, or running on the Schuylkill River Trail. He graduated summa cum laude from Texas A&M University with a BS in Meteorology and minors in climate change and mathematics.
Lori Lickstein,MSW, LCSW-C, is a Doctor of Social Work (DSW) candidate at the School of Social Policy & Practice (SP2), an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland Graduate School of Social Work, and a licensed psychotherapist in private practice in Maryland, specializing in trauma. With over three decades of clinical and systems-level experience, her work centers on trauma, victim credibility, and how institutional systems interpret and respond to allegations of abuse. Lori previously served as the Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) Coordinator for Baltimore City, where she led multidisciplinary collaborations across law enforcement, prosecutors, and medical providers, and developed the nation’s first trauma-informed forensic interview rooms for victims of sexual violence. She also founded and led the city’s Human Trafficking Task Force, coordinating cross-sector responses to exploitation. Her current research examines how courts assign credibility in child custody cases involving sexual and child abuse allegations, with the goal of informing trauma-responsive policy and improving justice system outcomes.
Anna Lisa is a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemistry, where she studies the catalysis of methane pyrolysis, an emission-free way of producing the green fuel hydrogen. Her work is focused on improving the economic feasibility and environmental friendliness of hydrogen production. She is broadly interested in energy policy and the global renewable energy transition. She received her BSc in Chemistry with minors in Environmental Economics and Public Policy from the Ohio State University. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, gardening, and running.
Thandi Lyew is a PhD candidate in the Annenberg School for Communication, where she is also pursuing a Master of Arts in Statistics and Data Science at the Wharton School. Her research sits at the intersection of health and climate communication, learning and memory, and psychological well-being. She examines how individuals cope with uncertainty during public health and environmental crises like climate change and COVID-19. Her work focuses on how intolerance of uncertainty can shape emotional well-being and discourage constructive engagement with complex information. Building on this, she studies curiosity as an emotional mechanism that may help reduce uncertainty-related avoidance by making climate and health information more approachable, memorable, and socially transmissible. Through her research, she aims to inform communication strategies that advance public awareness, and support broader efforts to improve health, sustainability, and climate action. Thandi holds an MA in Communication from Penn and a BA in Psychology from Florida International University.
Maria Maltepes is a PhD candidate in the Biology graduate program at the School of Arts and Sciences. Her research aims to address how influenza adapts to new hosts, which can help provide evidence essential for predicting emerging pandemic threats and guiding timely public health responses. Maria is also interested in how scientists, especially those in the infectious disease space, can engage effectively with diverse communities, policymakers, and global stakeholders, including in contexts where scientific credibility and public trust are contested. Outside of lab, Maria is involved with the Penn Science Policy and Diplomacy Group. She currently holds a BSc in Data Science from Temple University.
Alexander Manduca is a PhD candidate in the department of Physics & Astronomy specializing in mechanical and cryogenic instrumentation for millimeter- and submillimeter-wave cosmology telescopes. As a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow, his research is focused on two major experimental efforts: the Simons Observatory’s Large Aperture Telescope (LAT), a flagship Cosmic Microwave Background experiment, and the Terahertz Intensity Mapper (TIM), a NASA-funded balloon-borne pathfinder mission. Alexander’s work focuses on the design, deployment, and commissioning of these experiments’ cryogenic cameras and mechanical pointing platforms. He is broadly interested in developing novel instrumentation at the frontier of observational cosmology.
Lillian Miller is a PhD student in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science. Her research focuses on ocean ecology and biogeochemistry in climate models, with an emphasis on understanding how marine ecosystems and carbon cycling will respond to climate change and evaluating how accurately current models capture these processes. She is particularly interested in marine carbon dioxide removal strategies and the policies needed to balance ocean protection with climate mitigation efforts. Beyond her research, Lillian is involved in science policy, environmental advocacy, and education. She currently serves as a Local Science Partner with the American Geophysical Union, working to communicate the importance of science and environmental protection to policymakers. At Penn, she has contributed to the Environmental Innovations Initiative Student Advisory Committee, Penn Science Policy and Diplomacy, and graduate student government. She holds bachelor’s degrees in Chemistry and Earth and Environmental Science from Penn.
Likhwa Ndlovu is a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. His research focuses on leveraging geoscience principles for the responsible deployment of carbon management solutions. Likhwa holds an MS in Applied Geosciences, an MS in International Environmental Management, and a Dual BA in Geography and Geology.
Sawyer Palsen is a third-year PhD candidate in chemistry, where he conducts research on renewable energy conversion technologies. His work exists at the intersection of chemistry and engineering, and investigates the fundamentals of systems that can use renewably generated electricity to produce chemicals for energy storage or industrial feedstocks. Sawyer has an interest in how such systems integrate at grid-scale to enable energy sovereignty and national security, and is enrolled in the Kleinman Certificate in Energy Management and Policy program. He earned his BS in chemistry from Carnegie Mellon University in 2023.
Ana Ramirez Calderon is a doctoral student in the Department of Sociology. Her research lies at the intersection of migration, gender, and Latine sociology, with a particular focus on the US South. She is especially interested in how Latine immigrant communities navigate incorporation in new destinations, and how women’s social and economic contributions shape both everyday existence and long-term community formation. More broadly, her work examines the ways that class, gender, and race intersect in structuring opportunities and constraints for immigrant families. Prior to graduate study, she lived in the Durham, North Carolina community for eight years, where she continues to conduct research and was actively involved in the civic and educational landscape, and those experiences continue to inform her commitment to engaged scholarship and to centering immigrant voices in academic conversations.
Sam Sutera is a 2Y MBA Candidate at The Wharton School. He is an Army veteran who previously served in the 10th Mountain Division as well as the 75th Ranger Regiment, the US’s premier direct action and airfield seizure force. Prior to the Army, he earned a Bachelor of Science from West Point and competed as a member of the Men’s Rugby Team. During undergrad, Sam’s academic, personal, and professional interests converged at the intersection of diplomacy and cross-sector collaboration to provide full-suite solutions to address the most complex global challenges we face today.
Hui Tian is a PhD candidate in City and Regional Planning at the Weitzman School of Design, where she also earned a Master of Urban Spatial Analytics. Her research integrates environmental planning, climate adaptation, and data science to advance urban resilience. She examines how cities can respond more effectively to climate risks through water management, resilience planning, and public policy design, including groundwater salinization vulnerability across 13 Atlantic and Gulf Coast states and the effectiveness of flood mitigation under China’s Sponge City Initiative. Originally from China, Hui holds both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in landscape architecture and brings five years of professional experience in design and planning, with a focus on improving public welfare and strengthening urban resilience.
Aline Uwase is a Chemical Engineering PhD candidate. Her research focuses on the mechanistic foundations of carbon durability and uncertainty across carbon dioxide removal (CDR) pathways. Her work aims to improve monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) approaches, reduce uncertainty in durability assessments, and inform the design of scalable CDR systems. More broadly, her research bridges fundamental materials science with the policy and market frameworks needed to support durable and effective carbon removal. On campus, Aline serves on the board of the Penn Biotech Group and is a member of the KCEP student council.
Vivian Xu is a PhD candidate in the Pharmacology graduate program at the Perelman School of Medicine. Her research investigates the adverse effects of sleep loss on metabolism in peripheral tissues. On campus, Vivian serves as the Vice President of the Penn Science Policy and Diplomacy Group, where she promotes and facilitates training for graduate students in the realms of science policy and science communication. Previously, she has worked on the Toxics team at the Natural Resources Defense Council to advocate for science policy in protection against environmental exposures. She holds a B.S. in Neuroscience from UCLA and an MS in Environmental Health Sciences from Columbia University.
Zhanxuan (Will) Yu is a fourth-year PhD candidate in philosophy. His research sits at the intersection of political philosophy, the history and theory of empire and nationalism, and the empirical study of social movements and international institutions. His dissertation develops a materialist account of the concrete conditions under which international cooperation and social transformation become feasible in a world marked by deep inequality, resurgent nationalism, and fragmenting institutions. Born and raised in Chongqing, China, Will enjoys playing tabletop RPGs and competes in strategy board game tournaments when he is not doing philosophy. He holds a BA in Philosophy and History from the University of Arizona.
Alexandra (Sasha) Zborovsky is a PhD Candidate in the History Department and a Visiting Instructor at Bryn Mawr College. Her dissertation “Should I Stay or Should I Go: Jewish Repatriation, Family Reunification, and Emigration from the USSR 1945-1995” examines the emigration of more than one million Jews from the former Soviet Union throughout the mid-to-late twentieth century. Her project is a transnational history, investigating the exigencies and experiences of Soviet Jews’ exit from the USSR, Soviet authorities’ ambivalent attitude towards the departure of the country’s Jewish citizens, and the diplomatic clashes surrounding these Jews’ emigration. Zborovsky’s work has been supported by the American Academy for Jewish Research, the Center for Jewish History, and the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies.