A student from Center Harbor has been awarded the prestigious Fulbright Scholarship for her study of diabetes in Mexico.

Chelsea Graham, a senior at Simmons College in Boston, received the award as one of the 151 Fulbright award recipients for 2008-2009 in the Western Hemisphere.

A Fulbright award — one of the world's most prestigious academic research scholarships — was established in 1946 as part of the Fulbright Program to foster international research, understanding and collaboration. Scholarship winners use the award to conduct research during a year of foreign study

Graham, the daughter of David and Debbie Graham of Center Harbor, will graduate from Simmons College in May with degrees in Biochemistry and Spanish and will use the award to study maternal diabetes in Mexico City.

Diabetes is the number one killer of women in Mexico. Graham developed her study project and proposal during her junior and senior years.

Graham's study will analyze self-care practices of women with gestational diabetes in the nutrition therapy program at the Instituto Nacional de Perinatologia in Mexico City. She will follow women before and after pregnancy to determine why they do or do not follow their self-care regime, with the goal of helping to contribute to the improvement of intervention methods.

Graham said she was inspired to do research on the topic after traveling to Nicaragua during a Simmons College service-learning course. She has also worked with Latino/a patients with type 2 diabetes in the Latino Initiative Program at the Joslin Diabetes Center in Boston.

"We love and are proud of all of our children," Debbie and David Graham said in a joint statement.

Simmons College is a nationally recognized private university in Boston. It includes an undergraduate college for women and graduate programs for women and men in social work, health studies, management, library and information science and the liberal arts.