Matt Niepielko, a Ph.D. candidate in Center for Computational and Integrative Biology, has been selected as the 2013 recipient of the Lansbury Prize for Academic Excellence. This award recognizes outstanding performance by a graduate student. This prize is named in memory of Dr. Coral Lansbury, the first dean of the Graduate School of Rutgers-Camden. Matt was awarded this prize based on his exceptional scholarship achievements. These include publication of three papers in high profile journals; he is the first author on two of them. He is in the process of writing two additional manuscripts on patterning and morphogenesis of a novel structure found on the Drosophila eggshell. In the past five years, Matt presented his work in the Annual Drosophila conference, and two years ago his abstract was selected for an oral presentation. These presentations are highly competitive and only 10% of the abstracts are selected for a talk. Matt has been mentoring six undergraduate students, and three of them are co-authors on his manuscripts. Matt has been conducting his research in the Yakoby Fly Lab at the Biology Department, Rutgers-Camden. The Graduate School recognizes his outstanding scholarship achievements with this prize.