Antonia Tolson

PROMISE: Maryland's AGEP
University of Maryland, Baltimore


Antonia Tolson has a grant to finish her doctoral research in pharmaceutical sciences at the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy. The grant is part of the $13 billion set aside for the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. (Baltimore Sun photo by Kim Hairston / May 19, 2009)

Antonia, a third-year graduate student at Maryland's pharmacy school, has already secured a small share of the NIH stimulus money.

She found out last month that her grant was approved to study the interaction between methadone and drugs to treat illnesses such as HIV and Hepatitis C. The 26-year-old Silver Spring native will get $25,000 annually for the next two years, money that will help her earn her doctorate.

Her proposal was highly rated by the NIH, but she didn't expect the government to have enough money to fund it. She was thrilled to learn she was wrong.

"It's definitely important to find your own funding," she said. "It's something that you have to do if you're going to go into academia. It's how scientists live."

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