Year: 2004

  • Nation & World

    Study suggests obesity has lesser financial impact on African-Americans

    The study published in the January 2005 issue of the American Journal of Public Health is among the first to examine how patient demographic factors affect the relationship between body…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Faulty gene signaling could lead to development of Crohn’s disease

    According to the study’s lead author, Brigham Women’s Hospital’s Derek W. Abbott, “The discovery of this faulty signaling process is a first step in helping us understand and ultimately address the underlying mechanism that causes Crohn’s disease to develop.

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Study finds that both weight and exercise are key to longevity

    Over 115,000 participants who were free of cardiovascular disease or cancer, who were between the ages of 30 and 55 and had filled out biennial health and lifestyle questionnaires between…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Protein reverses engineering of chromosome structure

    An enzyme, a histone demethylase, removes methyl groups appended to histones, nuclear proteins that organize DNA and regulate gene activity. Methyl groups and other chemical tags on histones regulate how…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    DNA splicing enzyme observed in action

    Researchers in the lab of Tom Ellenberger, the Hsien Wu and Daisy Yen Wu professor of biological chemistry and molecular pharmacology at Harvard Medical School, reported the doughnut shape of…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Molecule implicated in transcription termination

    When a protein is made its DNA code must first be rewritten as messenger RNA (mRNA). This process of transcription requires a large enzyme complex, RNA polymerase, to begin at…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Annemarie Schimmel

    At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences November 16, 2004, the following Minute was placed upon the records.

    6 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Dr. Edward Peirson Richardson, Jr.

    Dr. Edward Peirson Richardson, Jr., Harvard Medical School Bullard Professor of Neuropathology, Emeritus, died November 30, 1998 after a long battle with lymphoma. EP, as he was known to generations of trainees and colleagues, was a gentleman and scholar of the highest standing. He was born at the Massachusetts General Hospital on April 3, 1918,…

    8 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Nathan Marsh Pusey

    At a Meeting of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences December 14, 2004, the following Minute was placed upon the records.

    5 minutes
  • Nation & World

    How did Internet affect election?

    From Howard Deans fundraising to the technology of voting, the Internet and online technology took a starring role in the 2004 election. But once the votes were tallied, did the Internet matter? Last week (Dec. 9 – 11), the Votes, Bits & Bytes conference at Harvard Law Schools (HLS) Berkman Center for Internet and Society…

    5 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Monane prize winners honored

    Anna Franekova 05 and Cora Tsang 05 share the 2004-2005 Tazuko Ajiro Monane Prize, which is awarded each year to an outstanding student of Japanese who has completed at least two years of Japanese language study at Harvard. Tsang (above center) takes photos with friends at the ceremony honoring the winners.

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    In brief

    Scholars at Risk Fellowship nominations sought The Harvard Scholars at Risk committee is now accepting nominations from Harvard faculty, staff, and students for its fellowship for persecuted scholars. The fellowship…

    2 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Newsmakers

    Five seniors receive traveling Rockefeller Fellowships Concluding its annual meeting and interviews at Harvard on Dec. 10 and 11, the Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Fellowships Administrative Board has awarded fellowships…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Lead raises risk for cataracts

    Despite an ongoing national effort to limit exposure to lead, most adults in the United States have accumulated a substantial amount of this noxious metal in their bones. A new Harvard study ties this lurking danger to an increased risk of cataracts, the leading cause of age-related blindness in the world.

    4 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Research in brief

    DEAS researchers model how brain encodes information By mining direct recordings of neuronal activity in live animals as they viewed natural scenes, researchers in the Division of Engineering and Applied…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Zinni describes ‘way forward’

    Resuming the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians is the single most important step the United States can take to regain its stature in the world, Gen. Anthony Zinni told a packed house Dec. 8 at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum.

    3 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Reclaiming the mines of America

    The average wedding ring contains about two-tenths of an ounce of gold, or $88 worth, according to the latest market prices. It almost seems like a bargain when you consider that in order to produce that much gold, 60 tons of ore must be gouged out of the ground, crushed into small pieces, then leached…

    5 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Mexico honors Carrasco as ‘a man of our time’

    Davíd Carrasco, Neil L. Rudenstine Professor for the Study of Latin America at Harvard Divinity School (HDS) and director of the Moses Mesoamerican Archive and Research Project, has received the highest decoration the Mexican government can bestow on a foreign national, the Orden Mexicana del Aguila Azteca (Order of the Aztec Eagle). Calling Carrasco a…

    4 minutes
  • Nation & World

    The many aspects of Islamic design

    Mention the words European architecture, and what comes to mind is likely to be a broad survey of periods and styles ranging from the temples of ancient Greece to the latest buildings of Rem Koolhaas or Frank Gehry.

    4 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Future flu epidemic ‘controllable’ through rapid vaccination

    If a flu pandemic similar to the deadly one that spread in 1918 occurs, it may be possible to keep the pandemic in check through vaccinations, a new study suggests. The infamous 1918 pandemic killed up to 40 million people worldwide, but the virus strain was not unusually contagious compared with other infectious diseases such…

    2 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Holiday stylin’

    Dickens redux: In a scene that looks like it could have come from A Christmas Carol, Richard Masters 49, M.D. 53, Ph.D. 64, plays Beethovens Moonlight Sonata at the Faculty Club.

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    McKenna new professor of Celtic languages, literatures

    Catherine McKenna, a medievalist who has written engagingly on Welsh poetry and prose and Irish saga and hagiography, has been appointed Margaret Brooks Robinson Professor of Celtic Languages and Literatures at Harvard University, effective July 1, 2005.

    2 minutes
  • Nation & World

    KSG’s Stuart shares findings on Boston race trends

    Boston is whiter than most U.S. metropolitan areas – 81 percent compared with a national average of 66 percent – and in many of the regions suburbs, whites have little chance of encountering others different from themselves, a situation that Guy Stuart finds troubling.

    3 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Making case for concept of ‘implicit prejudice’

    It sounds like a bad joke: What happens when two psychologists and a lawyer join forces?

    6 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Conservation fund doubles

    Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers announced Monday that the University will double the dollars available for campus conservation projects through the Green Campus Loan Fund – to $6 million – with the aim of financing greater energy efficiency, water conservation, and waste reduction across Harvard.

    2 minutes
  • Nation & World

    New findings on charter schools

    Nationwide, a higher percentage of students in charter schools are judged proficient on state reading and math exams than their peers in the nearest traditional school, according to a new study by Professor of Economics Caroline Hoxby. If a charter school has been operating for more than nine years, she found, 10 percent more students…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Sports in brief

    Icers back off Bears, 4-1, land league praise The host Harvard men’s hockey team defeated Hockey East foe Maine, 4-1, on Dec. 11 to collect its fifth straight victory of…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Devil/dog split for women’s hoops

    A tattered Harvard womens basketball team dug deep this past Saturday (Dec. 11) to hold off the feisty Central Connecticut State University (CCSU) Blue Devils at Lavietes Pavilion, 70-55. With league-leading scorer Reka Cserny 05 out with a sprained ankle, junior forward Kate Mannering – sporting a bandage all her own above her lip (concealing…

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Rabin awarded 2004 EMET Prize

    The A.M.N. Foundation for the Advancement of Science, Art and Culture in Israel has recently awarded Michael O. Rabin, Thomas J. Watson Sr. Professor of Computer Science, the 2004 EMET Prize in the exact sciences (computer sciences).

    2 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Abbate named professor of music

    Carolyn Abbate, a wide-ranging humanist who ranks among the worlds foremost authorities on opera, has been appointed professor of music in Harvard Universitys Faculty of Arts and Sciences, effective Sept. 1, 2005.

    3 minutes