LSU Ogden Honors College Students Named Astronaut Scholars by the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation

BATON ROUGE, LA – LSU students Tiernan Dautle and Peter Vallet were named 2024 Astronaut Scholars, becoming LSU’s seventeenth and eighteenth recipients.

The scholarship recognizes the best and brightest minds in STEM who show initiative, creativity, and excellence in their chosen field. Presented by the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation (ASF), the scholarship provides up to $15,000 to promising scholars while commemorating the legacy of America’s Mercury 7 astronauts—each of whom sponsored and fundraised to establish the current scholarship program. This year ASF awarded 71 scholarships to students from 48 different universities across the nation.

Dautle is a rising Ogden Honors College senior, pursuing dual degrees in Computer Engineering and Mathematics in LSU's College of Engineering and College of Science.

“In essence, nothing ventured is nothing gained,” Dautle stated. “There are so many opportunities that are available to us as LSU students, and I have been very fortunate over the years to have benefited from them. But you still have to put yourself in the running; I have found that can be the hardest part. The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation is full of scholars from so many different disciplines that dared to look into the unexplored, taking charge of their tomorrow. I am very grateful that the selection committee saw fit to include me in this remarkable community.”

Dautle has previously conducted research in the LSU Motor Behavior and Cognition Laboratory under Dr. Marc Dalecki to research the effectiveness of virtual training regimens on reaction time, hand-eye coordination, and performance retention in college-aged participants.

Currently, Dautle is working in the LSU Human Development and Daily Life Laboratory under Dr. Nicholas Fears. She is studying the upper body mechanics of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Her research involves processing 3D-motion capture data as they complete daily tasks (including but not limited to drinking from a cup and using a spoon to feed themselves) in order to identify anomalies in biomechanical movements, recording the severity and impact on task completion, and classifying various anatomical markers. 

Dautle is looking forward to this opportunity. “I am looking forward to meeting the other scholars/alumni (and some astronauts too!) and hearing about the work they are doing. It is so amazing to have the opportunity to meet so many people doing such incredible work across the STEM field. It is not very often that such a diverse group comes together!”

Vallet is a rising Ogden Honors College senior studying chemical engineering in LSU’s College of Engineering.

Vallet said, “I applied for the Astronaut Scholarship because of my love of research and engineering. In the past three years, I have had the opportunity to work in multiple labs in the fastest moving fields in our time including Computational Protein Engineering, Synthetic Biology, Large Language Models, and AI applications to Chemical Engineering. In these experiences, I developed the science and communication skills needed to be effective team member and leader.”

Vallet has worked with Dr. Jangwook P. Jung in developing pipelines for computational biology and bioinformatics research in protein engineering.

Vallet is a member of a computational chemical engineering laboratory that works closely with companies such as ExxonMobil and BASF to develop deep learning models for process engineering.  Additionally, he has been working with BASF to research implementations of large language models to improve corporate efficiency.  Additionally, Vallet works in a Computational Biology Lab studying applications of language models to tissue engineering.

Reflecting on becoming an Astronaut Scholar, Vallet remarked: “Perhaps the best thing about the Astronaut Scholarship is the affirmation that you are moving in the right direction. The delayed gratification from years of hard work will push me to continue to always improve. Astronaut is an award meant to encourage bright STEM students to go even further and advance their field. I am incredibly proud to have been recognized as one of these students and plan to take up the challenge.”

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Contact: Jordyn Martin
Communications Manager
225-578-0083
jwarr28@lsu.edu