Year: 2008

  • Campus & Community

    Sports briefs

    Women’s golf whizzes by Lions, Tigers to land Ivy title; Men’s lacrosse finale approaching; Ski team honors past and future; Stone selected to mentor U.S. at Four Nations Cup

    2 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Organic matters: The Yard returns to its roots with help of GSD

    On April 16, seeding began with a healthy dose of “compost tea” — a liquid biological amendment — from the brewing vat located just past the entrance to the Yard across from the Science Center.

    4 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Cronin takes long view of Boston schools, from busing to the MCAS

    Joseph Cronin ’56, MAT ’57, came to Harvard on April 16 to examine the Boston Public Schools system’s struggles and successes over the past 76 years, detailed in his new book, “Reforming Boston Schools, 1930-2006: Overcoming Corruption and Racial Segregation” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008).

    4 minutes
  • Science & Tech

    Humanities: From deconstruction to digitization

    Malcolm Hyman, a research associate at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin, addressed a group of 20 listeners at the Barker Center about the theoretical challenges ahead for humanities computing — a fast-growing corner of scholarship in the classics, modern literature, and the arts that looks to computer science for…

    5 minutes
  • Health

    Exercise changes structure of heart

    Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators, in collaboration with Harvard University Health Services, have found that 90 days of vigorous athletic training produces significant changes in cardiac structure and function, and that the type of change varies with the type of exercise performed.

    3 minutes
  • Health

    First targeted therapy for melanoma brings hope

    In a demonstration that even some of the most hard-to-treat tumors may one day succumb to therapies aimed at molecular “weak points,” researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute report the first instance in which metastatic melanoma has been driven into remission by a targeted therapy.

    3 minutes
  • Health

    Life expectancy worsening or stagnating

    One of the major aims of the U.S. health system is improving the health of all people, particularly those segments of the population at greater risk of health disparities. In fact, overall life expectancy in the United States increased more than seven years for men and more than six years for women between 1960 and…

    1 minute
  • Health

    ‘Father of Aerobics,’ HSPH alumnus, receives Healthy Cup Award

    The Nutrition Round Table of the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) honored Kenneth Cooper, groundbreaking author of the best-selling book “Aerobics,” with its Healthy Cup Award this past Tuesday (April 22).

    2 minutes
  • Arts & Culture

    Houghton exhibit features Islamic sciences

    If scholarship is the only reliable means of time travel, the Houghton Library offers up Harvard’s latest time machine: “Windows into Early Science,” an exhibit of scientific manuscripts, maps, and illustrated books on display through May 23.

    5 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Ho-Am Prize, ‘Korea’s Nobel,’ is awarded to BWH’s Charles Lee

    Assistant Professor of Pathology Charles Lee of Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) has been named the recipient of the 2008 Ho-Am Prize in Medicine.

    2 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Ash Institute announces system reform semifinalists

    Earlier this month, the Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) announced eight semifinalists for the 2008 Annie E. Casey Innovations Award in Children and Family System Reform.

    4 minutes
  • Science & Tech

    Markey addresses ‘Future of Energy’

    The chair of the U.S. House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming struck an optimistic tone about the planet’s climate crisis Monday (April 21), saying that an energy revolution is in the offing if government can just get the policy right.

    4 minutes
  • Arts & Culture

    Revitalizing Shanghai’s waterfront is challenging task

    Alex Krieger, who teaches the GSD Urban Design Proseminar as well as design studios such as last spring’s “Reconnecting City & River: Vienna, Austria & the Danube,” also leads a class in the College’s Core curriculum on the design of the American city.

    4 minutes
  • Arts & Culture

    The complex legacy of slavery in Brazil

    On Thursday (April 17), Lilia Moritz Schwarcz joined Zephyr Frank, assistant professor of Latin American history at Stanford University, for a lunchtime conversation about race in Brazil in both the era of the slave trade and today. The event, titled “Slavery, Abolition and Race in Brazil,” was part of an ongoing series in the Brazil…

    6 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Stephen Kosslyn named divisional dean for the social sciences

    Stephen M. Kosslyn, John Lindsley Professor of Psychology and chair of the Department of Psychology in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), has been named divisional dean for the social sciences, effective July 1.

    2 minutes
  • Nation & World

    Kim Dae-jung has ‘sunny’ advice for U.S.

    Former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung told an audience at Harvard Kennedy School’s John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum Tuesday night (April 22) that the United States should allow the sun to shine on its relations with the world’s fastest growing economic power.

    2 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Yings play Harvard swan song

    After more than 30 appearances in the concert halls, libraries, and Houses of the University, the familiar familial group the Ying Quartet will conclude its residency at the Department of Music. On April 18, the quartet will play their final concert as Blogdett Artists-in-Residence, for which they were chosen in 2001. The farewell concert takes…

    3 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Steering Committee Members

    Steering committee to enhance spaces on Harvard’s Cambridge campus.

    2 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    20 faculty members named to 2008 class of AAAS fellows

    The American Academy of Arts & Sciences (AAAS), one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honorary societies and independent policy research centers, today (April 28) announced the election of 20 Harvard University faculty members and affiliates to its new class of members.

    3 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    David Rockefeller gives $100 million for Harvard undergraduate programs

    David Rockefeller, a member of the Harvard College Class of 1936 and longtime University benefactor, has pledged $100 million to increase learning opportunities dramatically for Harvard undergraduates through international experiences and participation in the arts.

    8 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    President Faust announces committee to enhance spaces on Harvard’s Cambridge campus

    Harvard University President Drew Faust today announced the formation of a University-wide steering committee to explore ways to enhance Harvard’s Cambridge campus to ensure that the physical environment better supports the intellectual and social vitality of the University.

    4 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Partners HealthCare to assume management of Harvard Medical International

    Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Harvard University today announced that they have finalized an agreement with Partners HealthCare under which Partners will assume responsibility for business operations and management of Harvard Medical International. The new entity will be known as Partners Harvard Medical International (PHMI).

    4 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Barbara Grosz named dean of Radcliffe Institute

    Barbara J. Grosz, Higgins Professor of Natural Sciences in Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, has been appointed the dean of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, President Drew Faust announced today.

    6 minutes
  • Health

    Molecular analysis confirms T. Rex’s evolutionary link to birds

    Putting more meat on the theory that dinosaurs’ closest living relatives are modern-day birds, molecular analysis of a shred of 68-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex protein — along with that of 21…

    3 minutes
  • Science & Tech

    Policy can empower technological climate change solution

    The chair of the U.S. House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming struck an optimistic tone about the planet’s climate crisis last night, saying that an energy revolution…

    4 minutes
  • Health

    Life expectancy stagnating, worsening, for large segment of U.S. population

    A new, long-term study of mortality trends in U.S. counties from 1960 to 2000 finds that an overall average life expectancy increase of 6.5 years for men and women is…

    3 minutes
  • Nation & World

    South Africa: Edendale Hospital

    On a hill in South Africa’s KwaZulu Natal province, near the hall where Nelson Mandela delivered his last speech before prison and the station where Mahatma Gandhi was tossed off a train to begin his life’s work, stands Edendale Hospital.

    1 minute
  • Arts & Culture

    The literary roots of human rights

    The aim was determining the truth and the technique was torture. Pain was administered in secret, under strict guidelines, often with a judge and doctor present. Once a suspect confessed, the confession would have to be repeated in court.

    4 minutes
  • Campus & Community

    Journalist forum focuses on climate change, cities

    Harvard’s Nieman Foundation for Journalism, the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD), and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, a Cambridge, Mass.-based research foundation, recently brought together 45 print, radio, and television journalists from across the country to discuss the emerging connection between climate change and cities.

    1 minute
  • Nation & World

    Scholarly journal reveals precious gems; marks major milestone

    One of the oldest scholarly theological journals in the country, the HTR celebrated its 100th anniversary last Friday (April 11) at the Harvard Divinity School (HDS) with a day of talks by several HDS scholars.

    4 minutes