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Eileen Brandes Achieves High Honors in Academia and Athletics

Eileen Brandes, a member of the Simmons Lab, has achieved outstanding achievements in both academia and athletics. In this past year, Brandes completed a research thesis sponsored by Dr. Lyle Simmons entitled "RecO couples the assembly of RecA-mediated DNA repair complexes to replication forks in Bacillus subtilis." Her thesis won the Christine Psujek Memorial Award, an award given to the graduating senior who submits the best honors thesis in any of the biology concentrations.


Brandes' work also won the inaugural Marshall Nirenberg Award in Life Sciences, a Goldstein prize for Honors seniors given by the Honors College. This award is given to a single student chosen by the Honors directors and Honors faculty advisory council following nomination for the award.

When Brandes decided to pursue a thesis, she approached Professor Lyle Simmons, her former professor in Biology 207. Brandes was officially enrolled in the Simmons Lab in Winter 2011. "The project had focus from the start," said Eileen. "I found the right fit with my mentor."

In addition to her studies in the lab, Brandes is also a highly accomplished athlete.

Brandes was co-captain of the women's field hockey team in Fall 2011, leading the team to a regular season Big Ten title and an Elite Eight finish in the NCAA tournament. Brandes is a five-time Academic All American and received this year's Player's Player award which is given to the single athlete who represents what it means to be a UM field hockey player.

While carrying a heavy academic workload, Brandes still always found time for field hockey. "I had the captain responsibility to the team," said Brandes. In order to fit in her field hockey work, she did double workouts, the first of which sometimes started as early as 5:00 a.m.

Brandes had great support from the Simmons Lab regarding her athletics, mentioning that her lab would attend about 80% of her games. Working at least forty hours a week in the lab, Brandes says the lab was flexible with her lab hours. Even when she was out of town for an away game, her fellow researchers were supportive. "Nick Bolz helped me a lot by streaking out my strains on Sunday evenings so I could get right to work Monday mornings with my experiments and not have to waste a day."





Brandes graduated with a Biology major and a minor in French and Francophone Studies. She also took three seminars of Spanish for "fun and practical use." This September, following her love of languages, Brandes plans to spend eight months abroad in France, teaching English.

She also plans on going to graduate school and staying in academia.

For Brandes, this past year was "very hard and very rewarding." She thanks her mom, her teammates, and the Simmons Lab for allowing her to reach her high athletic and academic achievements.