Year: 2008

  • Campus & Community

    Chemistry Department creates Fieser Fellowship

    Harvard University’s Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology (CCB) has announced the creation of the Mary Fieser Postdoctoral Fellowships Program to promote the recruitment, development, and mentorship of women and underrepresented groups in areas across the chemical sciences.

  • Campus & Community

    Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation awards fellowships

    The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation has named three Harvard affiliates among its 17 new fellows. The recipients of this prestigious, three-year award are outstanding postdoctoral scientists conducting basic and translational cancer research in the laboratories of leading senior investigators across the country.

  • Campus & Community

    Scientist, educator Ehrenreich dies at 79

    A pioneer in semiconductor materials and a Harvard professor for more than four decades, Henry Ehrenreich, Clowes Professor of Science Emeritus, died on Jan. 20, a few months before his 80th birthday. Ehrenreich served as the University’s first ombudsman and extended his academic interests to government and public policy, spending a year working with the…

  • Health

    Drug helps certain brain tumor patients live longer

    People who receive high doses of the chemotherapy drug methotrexate to treat a certain type of brain tumor appear to live longer than people receiving other treatments, according to research published in the Jan. 29 issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

  • Health

    Chimpanzees have ‘top guns’ on hunts

    While hunting among chimpanzees is a group effort, key males known as “impact hunters” are highly influential within the group. They are more likely to initiate a hunt, and hunts rarely occur in their absence, according to a new study. The findings, which appear in the current issue of Animal Behaviour, shed light on how…

  • Health

    Suicide risk factors consistent globally

    Risk factors for suicidal thoughts, plans, and attempts are consistent across countries, and include having a mental disorder and being female, younger, less educated, and unmarried. So says new research from Harvard University and World Health Organization (WHO) World Mental Health Survey Initiative. The study examined both the prevalence and the risk factors for suicide…

  • Health

    ‘Where do I come from?’

    Harvard graduates often return to the University to let their professors know what they’ve been up to since they finished their degree.

  • Campus & Community

    Australia-Harvard Fellowships named

    A biologist, a geologist, and a statistician are among the winners of the 2008 Australia-Harvard Fellowship, the Harvard Club of Australia Foundation has announced. Diversities of career stage and profession characterize this year’s list of seven new fellows.

  • Nation & World

    Brazilian Studies welcomes ambassador

    The Brazilian ambassador to the United States, Antonio Patriota, will visit Harvard on Feb. 13 to participate in the University’s new and dynamic Brazil Studies Program’s spring 2008 calendar of events. The ambassador will speak about relations between Brazil and the United States and the new role of Brazil in the global economy and in…

  • Nation & World

    KSG launches new program in Greece

    A new Harvard program intended to address the needs of nongovernmental organization (NGO) leaders will debut in Greece March 25 through 29 at the Athens Information Technology institute (AIT). The “Strategic Management for Leaders of Non-Governmental Organizations” executive education program is designed for NGO leaders in Southeastern and Eastern Europe, the Eastern Mediterranean, and the…

  • Nation & World

    New exhibit traces women in business at Harvard

    In its earliest years, the opening of business courses to women was dubbed a “daring experiment” by one Harvard faculty member. It turned out to be a successful experiment as well, one that slowly evolved into the mainstream at Harvard Business School (HBS).

  • Nation & World

    ‘Power session’ for women held at the Business School

    “You guys are going to rule the world, mark my words,” Janet Hanson told a captivated audience in the Harvard Business School’s Burden Auditorium. “I’m so bullish on your generation, it’s not funny.”

  • Nation & World

    War and changing concepts of masculinity

    The Vietnam War cost the United States just over 58,000 dead — less than 5 percent of the 1.4 million Vietnamese, French, and other military personnel killed in Indochina combat going back to 1950.

  • Nation & World

    Royal talks politics with students

    On the eve of Super Tuesday, Harvard students gathered to discuss politics — French politics, that is — with the first woman in French history to run as a major presidential candidate.

  • Arts & Culture

    Exploring tangled legacy of slavery

    Certain adages exist about historical repetition: those who don’t remember the past are doomed to repeat it, for example, or history doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme. Walter Johnson doesn’t necessary believe in these old chestnuts, but he does see how the past and the present can illuminate one another in order to provide…

  • Campus & Community

    Cancer research pioneer Judah Folkman dies suddenly at 74

    Cancer research pioneer Judah Folkman, the Andrus Professor of Pediatric Surgery and professor of cell biology at Harvard Medical School (HMS), died on Jan. 14 of a heart attack. Folkman, who was also the director of the Vascular Biology Program at Children’s Hospital Boston, was 74.

  • Campus & Community

    Hasty Pudding picks Man and Woman of the Year

    This year’s choices for the Hasty Pudding Man and Woman of the Year awards join the stellar company of a constellation of talent that includes Ella Fitzgerald, Katharine Hepburn, Jack Lemmon, and Mikhail Baryshnikov. The 2008 recipients of the coveted honor are Christopher Walken and Charlize Theron.

  • Nation & World

    ‘A good start’

    Late in January, a delegation from Chile visited Harvard to discuss “Un Buen Comienzo” (“A Good Start”), an early childhood education program undertaken in 2006 by the Harvard Graduate School of Education (HGSE), Harvard Medical School (HMS), and the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS), with the Chilean Ministries of Education and Health…

  • Campus & Community

    A record applicant pool for the College

    In the first year without early action, more than 27,000 students have applied to Harvard for entrance next September, shattering the previous record of 22,955 set this past year. Harvard eliminated its early action program starting with the Class of 2012 because early admission programs tend to disadvantage students from modest economic backgrounds and often…

  • Campus & Community

    J.K. Rowling to speak at Commencement

    J.K. Rowling, author of the world-renowned “Harry Potter” novels, will be the principal speaker during the Afternoon Exercises of Harvard University’s 357th Commencement on June 5, 2008.

  • Science & Tech

    Compact, wavelength-on-demand Quantum Cascade Laser chip created

    Engineers at Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences have demonstrated a highly versatile, compact and portable Quantum Cascade Laser sensor for the fast detection of a large number of…

  • Health

    Grapefruit compound may help combat hepatitis C infection

    A compound that naturally occurs in grapefruit and other citrus fruits may be able to block the secretion of hepatitis C virus (HCV) from infected cells, a process required to…

  • Health

    Drug based on MGH discovery may significantly improve treatment of dangerous blood disorder

    Two clinical trials of the novel drug romiplostim (Nplate) show that it significantly improved platelet levels in patients with chronic immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP), a hematologic disorder that can cause uncontrolled…

  • Arts & Culture

    Gamelan rings out at Harvard

    The hypnotic, orotund tones of Gamelan, a venerable musical tradition from Indonesia that employs gongs, drums and metallophones, now resonates in University seminar rooms.

  • Health

    Stem cell lines created from discarded IVF embryos

    Human embryos that are discarded every day as medical waste from in vitro fertilization (IVF) clinics could be an important source of stem cells for research, according to a team…

  • Campus & Community

    Sutton Island statement

    After years of consideration and subsidizing their costs, Harvard sold the two Sutton Island properties in 2007.

  • Health

    Cancer drug activates adult stem cells

    The use of a drug used in cancer treatment activates stem cells that differentiate into bone appears to cause regeneration of bone tissue and be may be a potential treatment…

  • Health

    HOPE in African HIV/AIDS fight

    It was close to midnight one day this week in Durban, South Africa, when Harvard AIDS researcher Bruce D. Walker switched on his computer and made a visit to 104…

  • Health

    Harvard researchers receive $14 million TB study grant

    Harvard researchers at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Partners In Health (PIH) have received a grant of $14 million…

  • Science & Tech

    HarvardScience website wins top awards in two categories

    The Interactive Media Council has named the HarvardScience website “Best in Class” in both the medicine and science categories of its annual Interactive Media Awards competition. In notifying HarvardScience of…