Year: 2004

The Danish professor of medicine Ole Worm (1588-1654) believed, as did his more enlightened contemporaries, that learning comes about through the observation of nature – through empiricism and experiment – and not just through the study of texts. Worm firmly believed that vision was the most trustworthy sense for natural history investigations.

Its a stunning late-October day in Bostons Jamaica Plain neighborhood, and the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University is putting on a show. Alive with walkers, joggers, cyclists, and pups straining at leashes, even on a weekday, the Arboretum dazzles visitors with an explosion of fiery foliage and a myriad of scenic vistas that showcase the…

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) – the worlds largest general scientific society and publisher of the journal Science – has awarded five Harvard professors the distinction of AAAS fellow. Election as a fellow is an honor bestowed on society members by their peers.

Ruth Sager should be remembered above all as a gifted, original and imaginative scientist who loved her life of exploring nature and in her later years brought her gifts and passion to investigating the scourge of breast cancer.

In 1607, about a year after Shakespeares Macbeth premiered in London, poet Alessandro Striggio and composer Claudio Monteverdi presented a new play at the court of Mantua in Italy.

Harvard Law School (HLS) will kick off four performances of David Auburns Pulitzer Prize-winning play Proof on Friday (Nov. 5). Professor of Law Bruce Hay will direct a cast of four in the play that tells the story of a young woman who drops out of school to care for her father, a once-brilliant mathematician…

At the Dia de los Muertos performance at the Peabody Museum on Nov. 2, Ciria Gomez plays the part of Death with a frightening plausibility.

Among the most ambitious of the eight ambitious goals adopted at the United Nations Millennium Summit was the establishment of universal primary education for all children by 2015. The initiative currently has the support of 182 countries, yet its implementation faces numerous obstacles, particularly in developing countries.

In the keynote speech to the annual College Board Forum in Chicago on Monday (Nov. 1), Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers issued a call to action to educational leaders to help restore education to its proper role as a pathway to equal opportunity and excellence in our society.

HGSEs Fisher Professor Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot speaks with Cambridge school leaders and city officials about her research, which investigates the culture of schools, socialization within families and communities, and the relationship between culture and learning styles. The seminar was hosted by the Office of Community Affairs and took place at the Faculty Club.

The Interdisciplinary Training in Genetics and Complex Diseases at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) program has received $2.2 million over the next five years as part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Roadmap for Medical Research. The new training program will focus on gene-environment interactions and complex diseases. Successful applicants to the…

Two veterans of Russias human rights movement, Elena Bonner and Sergei Kovalev, visited Harvard Nov. 1. But despite all they have risked and suffered since their struggle began in the 1960s, neither was optimistic about the prospects for human rights in Russia today.

Nancy M. Cline, the Roy E. Larsen Librarian of Harvard College, and Professor Cheng Huan-wen, director of Sun Yat-Sen University Library in Guangzhou, China, have signed a formal agreement to transfer a significant selection of Harvards Hilles Library collection to Sun Yat-Sen University in June 2005.

Harvard sneaks by Big Green, 13-12 The Harvard defense denied a go-ahead two-point conversion with 2:15 remaining in the fourth quarter to slip past host Dartmouth, 13-12, this past Saturday…

Richard Holbrooke, the premier architect of the 1995 peace agreement that ended the war in Bosnia and a skillful negotiator credited with resolving the bitter dispute over dues owed in arrears by the United States to the United Nations, has won the 2004 Great Negotiator Award. The former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations received…

Study of cancer trials finds significant safety improvement The chance that patients participating in early-stage cancer research studies will die from the experimental treatments has dropped dramatically over the past…

A John F. Kennedy School of Government researcher has cast doubt on the widely held belief that terrorism stems from poverty, finding instead that terrorist violence is related to a nations level of political freedom.

Summer Urban Program (SUP) seeks directors The Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA) is seeking to fill 12 SUP director positions. Located throughout Greater Boston and Cambridge, SUP consists of 11…

Kalow to accept HMS community service award Bruce Kalow, a pediatrician at Broadway Health Center in Somerville, Mass., will receive a Dean’s Community Service Award from Harvard Medical School (HMS)…

Effective Feb. 1, 2005, Jennifer Leaning, professor of international health at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), and assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School (HMS), will be affiliated with the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study as a senior adviser in international and policy studies. Leaning will retain her positions at HSPH and…

Like the amorphous Chinese monster Taowu, whose 5,000-year history has been marked by shape-shifting and reinventions, Henderson Professor of Chinese Literature David Der-Wei Wang has undergone transformations and permutations throughout his academic career.

Once again, the staff of the University is pulling together to embark on a succesful campaign to help surrounding communities. This November, as in Novembers past, the Community Gifts Through Harvard Campaign is being launched with an ambitious objective. This years campaign has set its sights on a fundraising goal of $1 million. Harvards campaign…

President Lawrence H. Summers will hold office hours for students in his Massachusetts Hall office on the following dates:

Following are some of the incidents reported to the Harvard University Police Department for the week ending Nov. 1. The official log is located at 1033 Massachusetts Ave., sixth floor.

A memorial service in honor of John E. Mack, professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School since 1972 and founding chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Cambridge Hospital, will be held at the Memorial Church on Nov. 13 at noon. Mack was struck by a car and killed on Sept. 27 in London. He…

Nov. 6, 1770 – Rumblings of Revolution: Joseph Avery, Class of 1771, orates on “Oppression and Tyranny” before the Speaking Club. Nov. 1791 – A writer in the Boston press…

Harvard University Health Services (HUHS) transferred 2,000 doses of the flu vaccine Fluzone to the Boston Public Health Commission Friday (Oct. 29), announced HUHS Director David Rosenthal. The additional doses will help local communities ensure that their most at-risk residents are vaccinated against influenza.

A voter passes in front of other participants in the democratic process at Gund Hall, which served as a polling location for the city of Cambridge during the presidential election on Tuesday (Nov. 2).

The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics is revealing deep spaces globular clusters, nebulas, and galaxies to the general public, opening the galactic skies with a new 25-inch outreach telescope that promises to bring smaller instruments distant blurs into astonishing clarity.

Atoms do weird things when they crowd together and get very cold.