2007

Physicists make ripples with their 'magic carpet'

L. Mahadevan and colleagues study the "aerodynamics of a flexible, rippling sheet moving through a fluid." (Nature)

Jackie Stenson '08 named 'most interesting'

The Crimson named ES concentrator as one of the 15 most interesting seniors in the class of 2008 (Crimson)

Howard A. Stone wins G. K. Batchelor prize

Microfluidics expert is the first winner of the prize for fluid mechanics for research published over the past ten years

Moving from industry to academia

Shriram Ramanathan and others discuss making the transition from corporate life to the halls of academia (C&EN)

Compact, wavelength-on-demand Quantum Cascade Laser chip offers ultra-sensitive chemical sensing

Potential range of applications is huge

SEAS faculty and students win IEEE conference awards

Honored at conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems

A big lab for small-scale science

Harvard’s nanotechnology research finds a new home in the Laboratory for Integrated Science and Engineering (Crimson)

Shayak Sarkar '07 and Sammy K. Sambu '08 named among Rhodes Scholars

Prestigious scholarship goes to a graduate and two seniors

Forging new relationships with industry partners

How members of SEAS are furthering research with technological and commercial promise (C&EN)

From Cambridge to Bangalore

The Harvard-Bangalore Science Initiative aims to foster collaboration in the natural sciences with several academic institutions in India

Engineered weathering process might mitigate climate change

New technology might accelerate Earth's own solution to greenhouse gas accumulation

Harvard, Japanese science organization sign memorandum of understanding

Harvard and RIKEN, Japan's national energy laboratories, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to encourage and facilitate research collaborations

Business smarts

FAS Dean Smith, SEAS Dean Narayanamurti, and former Assoc. Dean Seltzer explain the business sense needed to be a good administrator (Crimson)

Magic microbes

Colleen Hansel's studies of microbial interactions with metals is part of the Microbial Sciences Initiative (Harvard Magazine).

Ramanathan named Air Force Young Investigator

Shriram Ramanathan is among the recipients of the program to foster creative basic research

BASF and Harvard University announce extensive research collaboration to drive new frontiers of innovation and knowledge

Initiative will foster an interdisciplinary research network of faculty and students in labs throughout Harvard University

Harvard University engineers demonstrate quantum cascade laser nanoantenna

New laser could lead to ultrahigh resolution microscopes for chemical imaging in biology and medicine

One culture

Bioengineer David Edwards writes in Nature about his Le Laboratoire project, the first experiment-driven art and science incubator opening in Paris (Nature)

SEAS faculty among participants of the IPCC report

Daniel Jacob and Steven Wofsy helped to author assessment of climate change research, for which the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded

Solid start

SiEnergy, a spin-off co-founded by Shriram Ramanathan received $500k in funding from Allied Minds

Two alumni share 2007 Nobel Prize in Economics

Eric S. Maskin '72 '76 Ph.D. (Applied Math), Roger B. Myerson '73 '76 Ph.D. (Applied Math), and Leonid Hurwicz honored for developing mechanism design theory

Harvard scientists predict the future of the past tense

Mathematicians apply evolutionary models to linguistic standardization

Legal power

A Harvard Law School professor is using grid computing to analyze the often hidden complexity of redistricting (iSTGW)

Good fun

L. Mahadevan was presented with an Ig Nobel award for the study of wrinkle patterns on sheets, saying, "there's no reason good science can't be fun."

Visually arresting

Grad student Adam C. Siegel and his colleagues received honorable mention in Science's Visualization Challenge for their entry "Tiny Metal Pathways"

Superheroes

Bioengineers David Edwards and graduate student are Ling Wong among the superheroes fighting global disease (Newsweek)

Staying ahead

Bioengineer and Army Reservist Kit Parker provides first-hand knowledge and technical expertise about head trauma injuries on the battlefield (ABC News)

Virtual hours

Besides being cool David Malan's use of virtual office hours in CS50 is convenient (Inside Higher Ed)

Next generation

Assistant Professor of Bioengineering Debra Auguste's talks about her decision to move to Harvard (Science)

Biohybrid of elastic film and muscle cells packs a punch

Depending on shape, biohybrids can generate force to grip, pump, walk, or swim

Brain’s timing linked with timescales of the natural visual world

Extreme precision needed to accurately represent the slowly changing visual world

Ice breakthrough

Alexander Wissner-Gross and Efthimios Kaxiras' uses nanoscale "warm ice" to make diamond toughened medical implants more biocompatible (New Scientist)

Researchers aim to make Internet bandwidth a global currency

Proposed model for the future of e-commerce exploits a novel peer-to-peer video sharing application

Nine for nano

Harvard is among the participants of the National Institute for Nano-Engineering (NINE), a partnership among industry, the federal government and U.S. universities (EE Times)

Aizenberg receives Ronald Breslow Award

Materials scientist Joanna Aizenberg recognized for achievement in biomimetic chemistry

Doing the math

Computer scientist Barbara Grosz was told as a child that girls couldn’t do math (Nature Network)

Morrisett named Area Dean for Computer Science and Electrical Engineering

Allen B. Cutting Professor of Computer Science, Greg Morrisett, will assume post on 9/7

Best & brightest

Computer scientist Radhika Nagpal received air time in a Microsoft Research video about their New Faculty Fellowship program

Come fly away

A life-size, robotic fly has taken flight at Harvard University thanks to the work of Robert Wood

Beautiful mind

A teaching lesson from applied physicist Eric Mazur

Hanspeter Pfister appointed Professor of the Practice

Innovator in visualization will also be Director of Visual Computing at the IIC

Lifesavers

Collaborative research on nanoparticle drug delivery methods (Princeton's EQUAD News)

Speed racer Jacomo Corbo

Learn how F1 racing and game theory garnered the checkered flag (Boston Globe)

Summer hours

Congrats to the 2007 undergraduate PRISE Fellows and Weismann Interns in engineering and applied sciences

James R. Rice awarded the 2007 Maurice A. Biot Medal for Poromechanics

Expert in theoretical mechanics lauded for "originality, thoroughness, clarity and elegance"

High above

Stephanie Wilson '88 elected to the Harvard Board of Overseers

Feel the force

Unwrapping the mystery of the Casimir force (Nature)

Cheerful engineer

Engineering sciences concentrator Jarred Brown '07 is known for his colorful support of Harvard athletics (and for the art of goatskinning)

Helping hand

Medicine in Need (MEND), founded at SEAS, has entered into a licensing agreement to bring innovative vaccine and drug products to people in developing countries

New FAS dean is SEAS computer scientist

Michael D. Smith, the Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering and Associate Dean for Computer Science and Engineering, will become Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Vadhan, Vlassak appointed tenure

Salil Vadhan was named Gordon McKay Professor of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics and Joost Vlassak was named Gordon McKay Professor of Materials Engineering

Bloxham, Rabin appointed to Royal Society

Jeremy Bloxham, who holds a joint FAS/SEAS appointment, was appointed as a New Fellow and computer scientist Michael O. Rabin was appointed as a Foreign Member of the Royal Society

Bioengineer Maurice Smith named 2007 McKnight Scholar

$225,000 award will support research on motor learning

Barbara J. Grosz will serve as interim dean of Radcliffe

Computer scientist and dean of science at the Radcliffe Institute will serve as interim dean of Radcliffe, effective July 1, 2007, President-elect Drew G. Faust announced on May 11

Just breathe

The debut issue highlights bioengineer David Edwards and graduate student Ling Wong in the article "To Prevent Tuberculosis, Breathe In" (BIOTECH 360)

Food engineering

Joanne Chang '91, owner of Flour Bakery, bested Food TV's Bobby Flay in a sticky bun throw down (Crimson)

A+ teaching

CS graduate student Kelly Heffner was honored with the Derek C. Bok Award for Excellence in Graduate Student Teaching of Undergraduates

Clean sweep

Michael McElroy and colleagues found that a temporary traffic ban in Beijing, China temporarily, and unexpectedly reduced levels of a harmful smog component

Highest honors

Michigan Tech has named faculty member David A. Edwards the winner of its highest honor, the Melvin Calvin Medal of Distinction

Fond farewell

David Turnbull, whose last appointment was Gordon McKay Professor of Applied Physics, died on April 28th. Since 1992, the Materials Research Society has awarded a lectureship prize in his name

Narayanamurti elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Dean Venkatesh "Venky" Narayanamurti is among the 203 fellows elected to the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Chock-full

The May/June issue of Harvard Magazine is chock-full of SEAS news

Glass works

Jonathan Kamler '07, a physics student in ES 147, Idea Translation, has been awarded a special commendation by the Harvard College Entrepreneurship Forum for his intelligent glass concept

Radhika Nagpal Wins Prestigious NSF CAREER Award

$400,000 grant will support research on self-organizing systems

Guggenheim fellow

Computer scientist Salil Vadhan is among the the 189 artists, scholars, and scientists bestowed with a Guggenheim Fellowship

Cambridge to host first city-wide wireless sensor net

Computer scientists collaborate to create open-source research network

Beautiful music

Patrick Wolfe provided expertise on all things audio for a PRX radio piece about Igor Stravinsky's recording of compositions in the American Legion Hall.

Joanna Aizenberg appointed Gordon McKay Professor of Materials Science

Leader in the analysis of unique biomaterials will start on July 1

Bill Gates to speak at Commencement

William H. (Bill) Gates, a member of the class of 1977, will be the principal speaker at the Afternoon Exercises during Harvard's 356th Commencement on June 7

Auguste and Ramanathan named Office of Naval Research Young Investigators

 

Q&A with Lene Hau

Applied physicist Lene Vestergaard Hau sheds some light on what she calls a "new territory, a new regime of nature" (Boston Globe)

Tech Review named optical antenna as one of its 'Top 10 Emerging Technologies'

Device, designed by the Capasso and Crozier groups, could lead to DVDs that hold hundreds of movies

Personal genome

Exploring the work of Jene Golovchenko and Daniel Branton and their Nanopore Group (Harvard Magazine)

Wood, Wei, and Brooks awarded Young Faculty Awards from DARPA

Rob Wood, Gu-Yeon Wei, and David Brooks are among 24 rising stars in university microsystems research to receive $150k

Maurice Smith awarded Sloan Fellowship

Selection procedures for the Fellowships are designed to identify those who show the most outstanding promise of making fundamental contributions to new knowledge

Jared D. Brown '07 wins 2006 SAME Award

Engineering Sciences concentrator J for winning the 2006 Colonel and Mrs. S.S. Dennis, III Scholarship on behalf of the Society of American Military Engineers

Spray-dry vaccine for TB developed

New delivery system may be used for HIV as well as TB

Kudos

Nan Sun, a graduate student in the Donhee Ham lab, is the 2007 recipient of the Analog Devices Outstanding Student Designer Award

In tiny supercooled clouds, physicists exchange light and matter

Technique may give scientists a new degree of control over fiber-optic communication and quantum information processing

Key finding

New study by Rachna Dhamija of the Center for Research on Computation and Society exposes some potential faults with site keys, a secondary security measure often used by banks (New York Times)

Bug bots

Electrical engineer Rob Wood's quest to build tiny bug-like robots that will take to the skies (Crimson)

Computer Science and Mathematical Sciences offered has secondary fields

Harvard undergraduates may now pursue Computer Science and Mathematical Sciences (including Applied Math) as optional secondary fields (akin to minors)

University-wide committee on science and engineering created

The Harvard Corporation has authorized the establishment of a new, University-wide standing committee on science and engineering to guide the University into a new era of collaborative, cross- disciplinary science initiatives

Applied scientists create wrinkled 'skin' on polymers

Method offers potential applications for microfluidics and tissue engineering