With the installation of the first computers and a ribbon cutting, Friday’s opening event marked an important step in Harvard’s groundbreaking collaboration with four leading research universities, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Cisco, and EMC on the development of the Massachusetts Green High Power Computing Center (MGHPCC). The MGHPCC (www.mghpcc.org) is a first-of-its-kind facility and collaboration…

New York Times columnist David Brooks reflected upon the changing nature of the American political landscape during the annual Theodore H. White Lecture delivered Thursday night (Nov. 15) at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum. “The big takeaway from the election was that it marks a social transition,” Brooks said. “The 2012 election was a shift…

Policy makers, development experts and academics gathered at the Harvard Kennedy School in late October to develop “Trillion Dollar Ideas to Build Prosperity,” which was the theme for this year’s Global Empowerment Meeting (GEM12), sponsored by the Center for International Development (CID). The fifth in a series, GEM12 continued last year’s discussions on new strategies for…

The Library Lab Showcase—held November 14—displayed 28 projects by Harvard library staff, faculty, and graduate students developed to enhance libraries. Organized by Harvard’s Office for Scholarly Communication (OSC), the Library Lab supports projects with funding from the Arcadia Fund. “The idea behind the Library Lab is to have the opportunity to create library innovations,” said…

Indoor gardens have been shown to improve air quality, increase productivity and reduce stress and noise—so where better to install them than in a library? The Harvard Graduate School of Education’s (HGSE) Gutman Library recently underwent a first-floor renovation that included the installation of four “living walls”—or ceiling-to-floor panels covered entirely with foliage. The idea was…

The music of Pulitzer-winning American composer Roger Reynolds is the subject of a concert at Harvard’s John Knowles Paine Concert Hall on Thursday, Dec. 6, at 8 p.m. Reynolds is the Fromm Visiting Professor in the University’s music department, where he teaches composition (Reynolds is a professor of composition at the University of California, San…

The Chinese Poetry Recitation Competition, organized by the Chinese Language Program of Harvard’s Department of East Languages and Civilizations (EALC), began last Friday (11/9) at 3:30 when two student MCs, donning East Asian Studies t-shirts, performed a brief comedic skit and then instructed the audience to turn off its cellphones in Chinese. The event’s brochure…

First-year College students eat their meals in the historic Annenberg Dining Hall, immersing them in the Harvard’s history from day one. A reusable mug program and efforts to cut down on food waste also greet those same students on day one, introducing them to Harvard’s commitment to sustainability. The hard work of students and staff…

The difficult but transforming experience of facing and surviving cancer takes center stage in the personal and professional saga, Beauty Without the Breast, by Felicia Marie Knaul (Harvard University Press, 2012). An economist who has lived and worked on health and social development in Latin America for 20 years, Knaul is director of the Harvard…

Sandy Close, executive editor and director of Pacific News Service (PNS), has been selected as winner of the 2012 I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence. The Nieman Foundation for Journalism will present the award at Lippmann House on Dec. 6, 2012. Close will receive the honor in recognition of her many achievements in journalism and…

Once upon a time, Anne Newland wanted to go to film school. But because life unfolds with its own logic, she instead became a doctor with the federal Indian Health Service (IHS). And shaped by her experience working with Native Americans and the unique system that serves them, she realized the importance of focusing on…

At a Nov. 8 talk at Harvard Law School, Rep. John Sarbanes ’88 (D-MD) advocated for “grassroots democracy” funded by the people rather than by Political Action Committees and other large donors. Sarbanes is a co-sponsor of the Grassroots Democracy Act, intended to empower small donors and to free lawmakers from their dependency on big…

According to U.S. Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr., the defining feature of his job—the most challenging, rewarding aspect—is grappling with what the position of the United States should be on an issue. Verrilli explained that this task is harder than it might seem, involving a balancing of interests and making considered decisions on whether…

Harvard Law School graduates across the country won political victories in the 2012 elections. In addition to a victory by President Barack Obama ’91 in a close race with Republican candidate Mitt Romney J.D./M.B.A ’75.  A Harvard Law School Professor and two HLS alumni won seats in the Senate, and 15 alumni are going to…

Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Warren—bankruptcy expert, Wall Street reformer and consumer watch dog—has won a hard-fought race for the U.S. Senate. The Democratic nominee defeated her Republican opponent, incumbent Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown. Said HLS Dean Martha Minow: “I congratulate my colleague and friend Elizabeth Warren on her election to the Senate. Through her…

It’s not enough to refrain from harm. We must take positive action. This is the core message of The Cost of Inaction: Case Studies from Rwanda and Angola, a new book published by the François-Xavier Bagnoud Center for Health and Human Rights that introduces a method to determine the true costs of failing to help…

Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) was crowned the most social media friendly school of public health in the first-ever ranking by the website MPHProgramsList.com. The site scored 57 schools on their social media activity, awarding points for the number of followers and posts on popular platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn. The…

The Harvard Library  plans to share several collections with the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA)—becoming the first DPLA content hub. The Harvard Library is dedicated to providing open access to them, where possible, through digitization and online dissemination. Through its collaboration with the DPLA, Harvard will contribute to global access to knowledge. Robert Darnton,…

Most Harvard School of Public Health employees got an unexpected day off when Hurricane Sandy barreled into the Eastern seaboard on October 29, 2012. But for a dedicated crew of operations, security, and other core staff, it was just another – very windy and rainy – day at work. Thanks to their careful preparations beginning…

Ensuring that patients who see various health care providers in different locations have “integrated” care—in which their care process is thoughtfully planned and designed—is crucial for improving patient safety and the efficiency of the United States health care system, according to a new report from the Lucian Leape Institute at the National Patient Safety Foundation.…

Rarely has a presidential race been so hard to call, said David Gergen ’67, during a talk on Oct. 26 at Harvard Law School Fall Reunions. A former adviser to four presidents, a regular contributor to CNN, and a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School, Gergen put the race between fellow HLS graduates Mitt Romney…

The growing trade in exploits of software security has become a “market in digital weapons,” leaving people in the U.S. and abroad vulnerable to cyberattack, said Christopher Soghoian, principal technologist and senior policy analyst at the ACLU, in an Oct. 24 talk at Harvard Law School. “The entire industry, while it’s been in existence hasn’t…

Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow and John Levi ’72, LL.M. ‘73, the chairman of the Legal Services Corporation, presented the report of the Corporation’s Pro Bono Task Force in in HLS’s Wasserstein Hall on Oct. 3, at an event hosted by HLS Professor David Wilkins ‘80, director of the Law School’s Program on Legal…

At a packed Harvard Law School event co-sponsored by the Human Rights Program and the Harvard National Security and Law Association, Ben Emmerson, United Nations special rapporteur on counterterrorism and human rights, announced plans to launch an investigation into the use of drone attacks which have caused civilian deaths—including those carried out by the U.S. “I will…

Scientists have created new kinds of particles, 1/100th the diameter of a human hair, that spontaneously assemble themselves into structures resembling molecules made from atoms. These new particles come together, or “self-assemble,” to form structures in patterns that were previously impossible to make, and hold promise for manufacturing advanced optical materials and ceramics. The method,…

Sally Falk Moore, the Victor S. Thomas Professor of Anthropology, Emerita, has had a distinguished and multifaceted career: as a staff attorney at the Nuremberg Trials; as the author of important studies of property and power among the Incas, and of land law and economic and political change in Tanzania; as a professor of anthropology…

The Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Foreign Policy magazine have announced the winners and runners-up of the “Lessons of the Cuban Missile Crisis Contest,” held to mark the 50th anniversary of the crisis that narrowly averted nuclear war in October 1962. The three winners are: 16-year-old Eden Rose Niles, a high-school junior…

The 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade may be fast approaching, but there’s no denying the dramatic increase in attacks on reproductive choice. “Little by little, the right to abortion has been chipped away—and that chipping has turned into a sledgehammer in the last two years,” Susan Yanow told the audience gathered at the Radcliffe Institute’s Schlesinger Library…

Tucked away in one of Harvard’s most historic properties is a team of employees embarking on an effort to make event planning, often a big challenge at Harvard, easier. The Campus Services Events Management office is now a resource for anyone planning events on campus, whether you simply need advice on finding a venue or…

The World Technology Network (WTN) announced Oct. 24 that both the Wyss Institute at Harvard University and Wyss founding Director Don Ingber won awards in the biotechnology category. The awards honor the world’s most significant innovators in science and technology who are “creating the 21st century” — and the Wyss Institute made an impressive showing,…