University Pharmacy Scholarship Recalls Renowned Space Scientist, Chemist & Educator

March is observed as Women’s History Month – often a time to highlight remarkable stories that are within arm’s length but somehow not quite within reach.  One such story unfolded in West Hartford, and beyond, yet is not widely known (except in scientific circles).

The University of Saint Joseph (USJ) announced this week that in celebration of the 90th Anniversary of  the founding of the University and in honor of the memory and legacy of the late Professor of Chemistry Mary Ellen Murphy, RSM, ’50, H’12, Ph.D., USJ is offering a $10,000 scholarship toward the first year at USJ for students who submit a deposit to USJ’s Pharmacy School.

Over the years, Sister Mary Ellen, who died in 2015, built a formidable career as a scientist and scholar in the fields of space research and chemistry. She was one of the first women to analyze the moon rocks brought back from the historic Apollo 11 space flight in 1969. (Apollo 11 being the first flight to land people on the lunar surface.) She later served as a NASA consultant for the Viking Lander on Mars and was a member of NASA’s Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous team.

Decades after Apollo 11, she completed two years as a visiting senior scientist in the Astrochemistry Branch at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, where she was a member of the Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) science team  preparing a meteorite database for the NEAR Shoemaker spacecraft that met the asteroid Eros on February 14, 2000, and a year later made a historic soft landing on the surface of Eros.

The National Science Foundation sponsored her sabbatical research on petroleum source rocks from the Markham Delta in Indonesia while at the University of Strasbourg, France, with Pierre Albrecht and Guy Ourisson, and on the petroleum and source rocks from the Four Corners Area of the southwestern part of the United States with George Claypool at the US Geological Survey in Denver, Colorado. Her research interests included lunar rocks, meteorites, oil shale and petroleum source rocks, asteroids, and global warming.

Sister Mary Ellen served as a professor of Chemistry at USJ from 1965-83, spent many years as a Dean at Saint Joseph’s College of Maine, and then returned to USJ as a visiting professor. At USJ, she taught Planetary and Environmental Geochemistry to graduate students and General Chemistry and Environmental Science to undergraduates. Sister Mary Ellen next served as academic dean, and then vice president and academic dean, at Saint Joseph’s College in Maine from 1983 to 1997.  She later returned to USJ, serving on the Board of Trustees as an officer, committee chair, member of the Executive Committee, and Scholar in Residence.

She was a 1950 alumna of the University of Saint Joseph (then Saint Joseph College), received her master’s degree from Wesleyan University, and earned her PhD from Fordham University. Her doctoral research was sponsored by NASA at the University of California-San Diego under Bartholomew Nagy and Harold Urey, a Nobel Prize winner and at Glasgow University in Scotland.

She was named an International Scientist (2005) and was elected to the Connecticut Academy of Science; engaged in pioneering research in geo-chemistry and space exploration, and held two US patents for work in her field. She was the recipient of two honorary degrees, one at the University of Saint Joseph a decade ago in 2012. In addition, she authored many peer-reviewed journal articles in high-profile chemistry publications, and presented the results of her research at numerous geochemistry societies and lectured on space research to civic, scientific and educational groups throughout the United States and Canada.

The University of Saint Joseph’s Doctor of Pharmacy program enables students to earn a Pharm.D. degree in just three years. The program promotes the emergence of competent and compassionate pharmacists who can advance pharmacy practice models, engage in community service, and foster the advancement of research and scholarship. 

Emphasizing real-world application, USJ’s Pharm.D. program prepares graduates to sit for the North American Pharmacist Licensure Examination® (NAPLEX) exam and pursue careers in clinical research, medical sales, pharmacology, product/process development, and beyond. For the 2022 graduation year, USJ’s pharmacy graduates are above the national average and have the best pass rate in Connecticut for first-time test takers of the NAPLEX exam, according to school officials.