Following closely on the heels of Harvard students' triumph racking up Rhodes Scholarships, yesterday eight Harvard students won British Marshall Scholarships for 1998.

The winners are Sewell Chan '98 of Quincy House, Rhiju Das '98 of Lowell House, Matthew F. Lima '98 of Winthrop House, Joshua H. McDermott '98 of Leverett House, Ramesh O. Johari '98 of Leverett House, Geoffrey C. Rapp '98 of Leverett House, Brian J. Saccente '98 of Lowell House and Eric G. Sheu '98 of Kirkland House.

Paul A. Bohlmann, fellowships director at the Office of Career Services, said he was extremely pleased with the results. "It's a really neat group of people," Bohlmann said. "It's a great day for Harvard."

Harvard yielded the highest number of Marshall Scholars among U.S. colleges this year.

Chan, a social studies concentrator and a native New Yorker, plans to obtain either a masters or a doctorate in European politics at Oxford. Chan, who is also a Crimson executive, said he has a particular interest in urban poverty.

"I hope to become a newspaper reporter, writing about contemporary social problems in American cities and maybe overseas one day," he said.

Chan has also served as a co-president of the Asian American Association and volunteers as an English as a Second Language tutor with the Phillips Brooks House Association Chinatown Committee.

Das, a physics concentrator from Bartlesville, Okla, will conduct radio astronomy research at Cambridge. After studying particle physics, Das said he wanted to conduct experiments in cosmology for a change.

"[Studying] radio waves left over from the Big Bang is the best way to do it," Das said. "And Cambridge has the best program."

Das is a teaching fellow for Physics 11b and is planning a career as a physicist.

Lima, a music concentrator from New York City, plans to study music composition at the Royal Academy of Music in London, with a focus on Renaissance instruments.

"It's just really cool to be able to do what I want to do," Lima said.

In the long term, Lima said he hopes to become a composer of concert music. He also plans to teach and found an arts consulting firm.

McDermott, from Arlington, Va., created a special concentration in brain and cognitive science. Currently taking a semester off, he plans to go to University College London to study math and statistics, which he said will help him in his study of neuroscience.

"I don't know if I want to be on the theory or experimental end," McDermott said. "But I definitely want to be a professor of neuroscience one day."

A mathematics concentrator from Elk Grove Village, Ill., Johari will be enrolling in a one-year masters program in mathematics at Cambridge. Primarily interested in the interactions between pure and applied mathematics, he said that he hopes to use his experience in England to learn to shape university mathematics education.