The Amgen Scholars Program has named Addie Dung Nguyen ’27 as part of their 2025 cohort. As part of the eight-week summer program, Nguyen will join the Department of Neurochemistry within the Graduate School of Medicine at The University of Tokyo, Hongo Campus. Each scholar in the program will be paired with a faculty member as a mentor and a postdoc, technician, or graduate student will be assigned to train the scholar in the lab.
Supported by the Amgen Foundation, this program offers undergraduate students the chance to engage in hands-on research at 25 prestigious universities and research institutions worldwide. Participants work closely with leading faculty while also attending seminars, networking sessions, and symposia alongside fellow scholars and renowned scientists. The program covers tuition, housing, meals, airfare, and includes a living stipend.
“I think the most exciting part for me is just the prospect of learning new techniques,” Addie said “The lab that I'm going to work with has some of the most advanced equipment and technologies in terms of neuroscience, especially with neuronal imaging.”
“So I think that it's like a once in a lifetime chance, but also I think just also the thought of going to Japan for the first time and exploring Japanese culture (is exciting to me), and also I think one of the more important things is that I want to engage with the aging care facilities and infrastructure in japan, which just fascinates me, because I feel like they have really a lot of like like best center of care for like old people,” he said.
In his first two years at NYU Shanghai, Addie has been active on campus in activities and clubs related to his academic interests. He organizes events for Medical Minds, a newly established club for pre-med students, and is assistant director of the Health and Wellness Committee for student government.
Last summer, he received a grant from the Dean’s Undergraduate Research Fund to carry out research in his home country of Vietnam on risk factors associated with postpartum mental health wellness and childbirth outcomes. Assistant Professor of Practice in Global Public Health Etienne Jaime, who guided him through the research, said it was no surprise that he was selected as an Amgen Scholar.
“He is an outstanding and very hard working student. I am truly impressed by the work he accomplished in his DURF project including developing the study, adapting the measurements tools, conducting the data analysis, and presenting it during last fall’s Undergraduate Symposium,” he said. “He should be extremely proud of his accomplishments.” eyond researching depression and PTSD symptoms, Nguyen also wants to work with patients with neural degenerative diseases, like Alzheimer's and Parkinson’s Disease.
In high school, Addie was interested in art and fashion. That all changed when he spent a gap year volunteering in Vietnam with Operation Smile and Resurge International supporting patients who were receiving cleft palate and cleft lip surgery. “I was the one standing in the surgery room,” he recalled, “trying to translate everything the American doctors were saying to the Vietnamese nurse and the Vietnamese doctor, so they could understand each other.” It was his first experience in a medical setting and it left a deep impression. “There was a profound sense of purpose that suddenly hit me in the operating room and the post-op room, one that was entirely different from what I was getting from the arts,” he said. Since then, he said, his focus switched to studying pre-medicine.
Nguyen, whose family members struggled with late stage cancer, said watching them also influenced him to pursue medicine. “I’ve witnessed them struggling a lot in terms of changes to their personalities, and it feels like you’re facing a different person in a way,” he said. “That's why I'm really interested in neurobiology and behaviors.”
After his participation in the Amgen Scholars Program, Nguyen will head off to New York for two semesters to study away at NYU. “I’m just really excited about the prospects of diving deeper into my current interests and exploring how those interests become future career paths that I genuinely enjoy,” he said. He’s looking forward to experiencing life in New York, including New York is a vibrant cities with limitless options, and I can’t help myself but feel hopeful about what I’ll discover in New York.” He added continuing research on neural degenerative diseases and volunteering at state hospitals and psychiatric wards.