MSU celebrates researchers, innovators with annual universitywide research awards
Contact: Mary Kathryn Kight
STARKVILLE, Miss.—Mississippi State is celebrating the researchers, innovators and professionals advancing knowledge and addressing real-world challenges with its annual Research Awards Celebration this week.
MSU President Mark E. Keenum, Interim Vice President for Research and Economic Development Scott Willard and Vice President for the Division of Agriculture, Forestry and Veterinary Medicine Keith Coble recognized honorees strengthening the university’s research enterprise and land-grant mission.
“Research matters because of the truly positive difference it makes in the lives of people in our state, across our nation and around the world,” said Keenum. “I’m proud of the work our faculty, staff and students are doing and grateful for the impact they are making.”
The university’s highest research honor, the 2026 Ralph E. Powe Research Excellence Award, was presented to Michael Nadorff, professor of psychology and director of MSU’s Behavioral Health Clinic.
Selected from universitywide nominations submitted by the MSU community, the Powe Award is a memorial to the MSU alumnus and longtime research vice president who died in 1996.
Nadorff’s research examines sleep problems and nightmares and their relationship to suicide risk. He has published more than 120 peer-reviewed papers and secured more than $20 million in external research funding, most of it supporting behavioral healthcare for young people in communities with limited access to services.
Finalists for the Powe Award were Sead Sabanadzovic, professor of plant pathology, and Amelia Woolums, professor of pathobiology and population medicine and a large animal internal medicine specialist.
Chosen from a competitive pool of nominations, 2026 research award winners include:
—Whitley Alford, director, Research Business and Operations Center within MSU’s Applied Research Collaboratory, Research Support Award
—Merrilee Thoresen, research scientist and lab manager, Department of Pathobiology and Population Medicine, Research Professional Award
—Beth Baker, associate extension professor, Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Aquaculture; MSU Extension assistant director of Environmental Stewardship, Innovation and Entrepreneurship Award
—Lorin Harvey, assistant professor and MSU Extension sweet potato specialist, North Mississippi Research and Extension Center, Emerging Research Scholar Award
—Amy Dapper, associate professor, Department of Biological Sciences, Mid-Career Research Scholar Award.
The award ceremony also highlighted the next generation of researchers through Graduate Student Research Ambassadors representing each of MSU’s eight academic colleges. The students shared their research throughout the program, demonstrating the important role graduate students play in MSU’s research enterprise.
Additionally, the Office of Technology Management recognized university researchers for patents received in 2026:
—Keun Seok Seo, “Vaccine Composition Comprising Recombinant Protein of
Staphylococcus Aureus Attenuated Enterotoxin and Cytotoxin”
—David Saucier, Carver Middleton, Caden Teer and Chris White, “Mobile Markerless
Motion Capture for Movement Data Collection in All Environments”
—Amelia Woolums, “Methods for Treating or Preventing Respiratory Diseases in Cattle
Using Polymers and Polyplexes for mRNA Delivery and mRNA Therapy”
—Nicholas Fitzkee, “Nanoparticles and Method for Targeting the Nanoparticles to
Bacterial Biofilms Using Bacterial Surface Proteins”
—Dongmao Zhang, “Methods and Systems for Integrating-Sphere-Assisted Resonance
Synchronous (ISARS) Spectroscopy”
—Rani Sullivan, “Stitched Polymer Matrix Composites Using Barrier Layers for Cryogenic Applications and Methods of Making the Same.”
As Mississippi’s leading research university, MSU holds the Carnegie R1: Very High Research Activity designation and a research enterprise spanning disciplines from agriculture and engineering to aerospace, behavioral health and the sciences, and humanities.
The awards are cosponsored by the offices of the vice presidents for Research and Economic Development and Division of Agriculture, Forestry and Veterinary Medicine.
Mississippi State University is taking care of what matters.