An Oxford biologist has received the country’s highest honor for scientists and engineers who are beginning their careers.

Wendell Haag was among nearly 70 scientists and engineers to receive the Presidential Early Career Award during a recent White House ceremony.

Haag is a biologist for the U.S. Forest Service’s Southern Research Station Center for Bottomland Hardwoods Research work unit in Oxford. He won the award for his research of problems facing freshwater mussel populations in the South.

Haag will receive $125,000 in research funds over a five-year period.

Haag, a native of Lexington, Ky., received his doctorate in biology in 2002 at the University of Mississippi.