All articles


  • Health

    Survey: Many Americans protecting themselves against H1N1

    As part of a series about Americans’ response to the H1N1 flu outbreak, the Harvard Opinion Research Program (HORP) at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) has released a…

  • Arts & Culture

    Writers at risk talk about their lives

    For some, words are both a way of life and a way of risking life. Last year, 877 writers and journalists around the world were killed, jailed, or attacked.

  • Arts & Culture

    Family of ‘Doc Burr’ donates ‘treasure trove of American cinema’ to HFA

    It began as a childhood hobby, but for Howard Burr, collecting films became a lifelong passion. A dentist by trade, Burr amassed a collection that would make most cinephiles envious: nearly 3,000 films, including many rare prints, B films, and vintage Technicolor prints.

  • Arts & Culture

    The ‘art’ of retirement

    “May I have your attention!” yells Bill Boone, director of the Frances Addelson Shakespeare Players at the Harvard Institute of Learning in Retirement (HILR). “Frances is in Harvard Square!”

  • Arts & Culture

    Arts Medalist Ashbery ’49 charms audience

    Before John Ashbery ’49 was one of the most influential and celebrated poets of modern times, he moonlighted as an English translator of French detective novels under the pseudonym “Jonas Berry.” But the self-dubbed “hair-brained, homegrown, Surrealist” poet bestowed his fitting absurdist style to these books, including adding the sex scenes the publisher requested to…

  • Campus & Community

    This month in Harvard history

    May 12, 1638 — By order of the Great and General Court, “Newetowne” is renamed “Cambrige” (Cambridge).

  • Campus & Community

    Police reports

    Following are some of the incidents reported to the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD) for the week ending May 4. The official log is located at 1033 Massachusetts Ave., sixth floor, and is available online at http://www.hupd.harvard.edu/.

  • Campus & Community

    Jain and Vafa honored by NAS

    Rakesh K. Jain, the A. Werk Cook Professor of Radiation Oncology for Tumor Biology at Massachusetts General Hospital and a member of the affiliated faculty of the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, and Cumrun Vafa, the Donner Professor of Science in the Department of Physics, have been recently elected into the National Academy…

  • Nation & World

    Sandel to Deliver BBC’s prestigious Reith Lectures

    Michael Sandel, the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Government, has been chosen by the BBC to deliver its Reith Lectures for 2009. Sandel’s lectures, titled “A New Citizenship,” will address the prospect for a new politics of the common good.

  • Arts & Culture

    Art for sale!

    Harvard gave Christie’s and Sotheby’s a run for their money at the first Harvard Student Art Show on Monday (May 4). The exhibit and sale, held in a bright yellow tent on the Science Center Lawn, featured 160 works of painting, sculpture, photography, and other media such as jewelry and clothing. Students from across the…

  • Campus & Community

    Deadline May 21 for Dunlop thesis prize

    The Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government (M-RCBG) at the Harvard Kennedy School is accepting papers for the John T. Dunlop Thesis Prize in Business and Government, awarded to the graduating senior who writes the best thesis on a challenging public policy issue at the interface of business and government.

  • Campus & Community

    Harvard Magazine names 2009-10 Ledecky Fellows

    Harvard Magazine’s Berta Greenwald Ledecky Undergraduate Fellows for the 2009-10 academic year will be Spencer Lenfield ’12 and Melanie Long ’10, who were selected after a competitive evaluation of writing submitted by student applicants. The fellows, who join the editorial staff during the year, contribute to the magazine as undergraduate columnists and initiate story ideas,…

  • Arts & Culture

    Rockefeller grants open up world for undergrads

    Nearly 500 Harvard undergraduates will learn about other cultures by participating in high-quality international experiences this summer, thanks to the generosity of David Rockefeller, longtime University benefactor and member of the Harvard College Class of 1936.

  • Campus & Community

    A special notice regarding Commencement Exercises

    Morning Exercises To accommodate the increasing number of those wishing to attend Harvard’s Commencement Exercises, the following guidelines are proposed to facilitate admission into Tercentenary Theatre on Commencement Morning (June 4):

  • Campus & Community

    New A.L.M. concentrations announced for 2009-10

    The Harvard Extension School has announced four new concentrations in its Master of Liberal Arts (A.L.M.) Program beginning with the 2009-10 academic year. The new concentrations are international relations, legal studies, visual arts, and clinical psychology. The concentrations were selected upon careful consideration of Extension School course offerings, the number of Harvard instructors teaching these…

  • Campus & Community

    Harvard prepares for NEASC reaccreditation

    As part of the University’s 10-year reaccreditation by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC), the University is preparing a self-study report addressing NEASC’s 11 standards (chapters) for accreditation. These standards each focus on a particular dimension of the University, ranging from academics and the libraries to governance and finance.

  • Campus & Community

    Clayton and Ko receive Player of the Year honors

    The Ivy League has recently announced that both Chris Clayton ’09 of the Harvard men’s tennis team and Beier Ko ’09 of the Harvard women’s tennis team have been honored as the 2009 recipients of the Ivy League Player of the Year award.

  • Arts & Culture

    Talent takes to the street

    Behind a large white tent in front of the Science Center, Harvard University Dining Services staff members worked over sizzling grills, cooking hot dogs and hamburgers to feed a large crowd of staff, students, and Greater Cambridge residents.

  • Campus & Community

    Community Gifts raises money for 400-plus charities

    The annual Community Gifts Through Harvard campaign has raised more than $600,000 via personal contributions from Harvard faculty, staff, and retirees. Over 400 charities, most in Massachusetts, were recipients of these funds.

  • Campus & Community

    HRES installs solar arrays on buildings

    Harvard students can do a lot of things, but hovering five stories in the air is not one of them.

  • Campus & Community

    Jerry Mitrovica named geophysics professor

    Theoretical geophysicist Jerry X. Mitrovica, whose studies of the Earth’s structure and evolution have important implications for our understanding of climate and sea-level changes throughout Earth’s history, has been named professor of geophysics in Harvard University’s Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, effective July 1.

  • Campus & Community

    Mark Kisin joins Harvard as professor of mathematics

    Mark Kisin, one of the world’s most promising young number theorists, has been named professor of mathematics in Harvard University’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), effective July 1.

  • Science & Tech

    Molecular secrets in atomic nuclei

    For Navin Khaneja, spinning nuclei are like atomic spies. With a little coaxing, they will tell the secrets of the molecules in which they sit.

  • Science & Tech

    Nectar nurtures pitcher plant’s eating habits

    New research from the Harvard Forest shows that carnivorous pitcher plants use sweet nectar to attract ants and flies to their water-filled traps, not color, as earlier research had indicated.

  • Science & Tech

    Vocal mimicking, sense of rhythm tied

    Researchers at Harvard University have found that humans aren’t the only ones who can groove to a beat — some other species can dance, too. The capability was previously believed to be specific to humans. The research team found that only species that can mimic sound seem to be able to keep a beat, implying…

  • Health

    Lack of sleep is easier on older adults than others

    In a recent sleep study testing alertness and performance in sleep-deprived adults, researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) determined that healthy older adults handle sleep deprivation better than younger adults. The findings appeared online on May 3, in an advance online edition of the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

  • Health

    Lessons from past explored to expedite future research

    People, knowledge, communication, and capitalism were front and center last week as authorities on innovation sought to shed light on ways to speed up the development of new medical treatments from discoveries in the lab.

  • Science & Tech

    Life in the universe? Almost certainly. Intelligence? Maybe not

    We are likely not alone in the universe, though it may feel like it, since life on other planets is probably dominated by microbes or other nonspeaking creatures, according to scientists who gave their take on extraterrestrial life at Harvard last week.

  • Nation & World

    Nieman presents Louis M. Lyons Award to Fatima Tlisova

    The Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard will present the Louis M. Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism to current Nieman Fellow Fatima Tlisova Thursday (May 7).

  • Nation & World

    ‘Paging God: Religion in the Halls of Medicine’

    What happens when a Buddhist monk visiting the United States is hospitalized, terminally ill with liver cancer? Does religion interfere with his medical care? What about his Buddhist brethren, unable to join him bedside? Who will provide the appropriate services and ceremonies? Well, says Wendy Cadge, that’s where hospital chaplains come in.