New London — Coast Guard Academy First-class cadet Erin Wright has been awarded a 2018-19 Fulbright scholarship to pursue a Master of Philosophy degree in energy engineering at Newcastle University in the United Kingdom.

The Fulbright U.S. Student Program offers research, study and teaching opportunities in more than 140 countries to graduate students, and aims to increase mutual understanding between the U.S. and other countries.

Wright is scheduled to graduate from the academy with a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering on May 23.

As a junior, Wright worked on a hybrid performance project supervised by the U.S. Department of Energy and analyzed how a fuel cell and a gas turbine operating in a symbiotic relationship can increase the energy efficiency of a power generation system. In the summer of 2017, she contributed to research in the Brayton Cycle Laboratory at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, N.M., where she helped model a system that converts solar power to electrical energy using a Supercritical CO2 Brayton Cycle.

Wright's Fulbright research project will be on the biofuel combustion process in diesel engines. She plans to explore the effects of nanoparticle additives to biodiesel as a method for decreasing emission levels and increasing engine efficiency.

Wright will be conducting her research at the Sir Joseph Swan Centre for Energy Research at Newcastle University.