Houghton Library has seen a 200% rise in demand for object-based teaching with its special collections since 2000, a trend that is mirrored to some degree across the University and educational institutions around the country. “Teachers and students are hungry for the experience of working with objects, touching them, handling them, seeing their markings,” said…

Günther Fink, a health economist with expertise in child health and development, thinks that all countries should aim to reduce neonatal mortality by 70 percent by the year 2030. In a recent paper for the Copenhagen Consensus, he argues that this goal should be part of the new UN Sustainable Development Goals, which will be set…

In the spring of 2014 HarvardX and the Harvard Alumni Association launched HarvardX for Alumni. If HarvardX is new to you, as it was to many of our alumni, it is a University-wide strategic initiative to enable our faculty to build and create online learning experiences that would also transform residential learning and enable groundbreaking research in online…

Consuming a healthy diet was associated with reduced risk for type 2 diabetes among women in all racial and ethnic groups but conferred an even greater benefit for Asian, Hispanic, and black women, according to a new study by researchers at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “This study…

Eating more whole grains is associated with up to 15% lower mortality—particularly cardiovascular disease (CVD)-related mortality, according to a large new long-term study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The study also found that bran, a component of whole grain foods, was associated with similar beneficial effects. Bran intake was linked with up to 6% lower overall…

Between 1,500 and 2,100 U.S. Air Force reservists who trained and worked on C-123 cargo planes that were used during the Vietnam War to spread the toxic defoliant Agent Orange may have been exposed to potentially dangerous levels of the carcinogenic chemical, according to a new Institute of Medicine (IOM) report. The IOM’s findings may…

This spring, alumni can vote for a new group of Harvard Overseers and Harvard Alumni Association (HAA) elected directors. Ballots will be mailed no later than April 1 and must be received in Cambridge by noon on May 22 to be counted. Results of the election will be announced at HAA’s annual meeting on May…

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the 2015 Crafoord Prize in Biosciences to Richard Lewontin, professor of biology, emeritus, and Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology in the Museum of Comparative Zoology, Emeritus. The award was given for his pioneering analysis and fundamental contributions to the understanding of genetic polymorphism. Lewontin shares the prize with Tomoko Ohta…

Michael Mitzenmacher and Stuart Shieber, faculty members at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), are among 47 leading computer scientists named 2014 fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). The 2014 ACM fellows have been selected by their peers on the basis of their contributions to key computing fields, including database…

The Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School is pleased to announce the appointment of their spring 2015 fellows. “The line-up of Shorenstein Fellows for the spring semester is a group of all-stars – every one of them,” said Alex S. Jones, the center’s director. Shorenstein Center Fellows spend the…

The Gary Michelson Found Animals Foundation has awarded Harvard bioengineer David Mooney a three-year grant totaling more than $700,000 to pursue development of a vaccine technology that would provide a nonsurgical method for spaying and neutering dogs and cats. Mooney is the Robert P. Pinkas Family Professor of Bioengineering at the Harvard School of Engineering…

In the largest and most comprehensive study of heat-related illness to date, Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers have identified a handful of potentially serious disorders—including fluid and electrolyte disorders, renal failure, urinary tract infections, sepsis, and heat stroke—that put older Americans at significantly increased risk of winding up in the hospital during periods…

Richard McCullough, Harvard’s vice provost for research and a professor of materials science and engineering in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS), has been named a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, along with two of his Harvard colleagues. David A. Evans, a research professor and former chairman of the University’s Department…

Women with post-traumatic stress disorder are nearly twice as likely to develop type 2 diabetes compared with women who don’t have PTSD, according to researchers at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University. The longitudinal cohort study provides the strongest evidence to date of a causal…

Women exposed to high levels of fine particulate matter specifically during pregnancy—particularly during the third trimester—may face up to twice the risk of having a child with autism than mothers living in areas with low particulate matter, according to a new study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). The greater the exposure, the greater…

Radhika Nagpal, the Harvard computer scientist whose self-organizing swarm robotics are today’s state of the art in collective artificial intelligence, has been named among Nature’s 10, the ten scientists and engineers who “made a difference” in 2014. Nagpal is the Fred Kavli Professor of Computer Science at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences…

Numerous studies since the 1960s have linked consumption of red meat to an increased risk of breast and colon cancer, type 2 diabetes,cardiovascular disease, and other conditions, Walter Willett, Fredrick John Stare professor of epidemiology and nutrition and chair of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), said in a webinar…

Following a successful program launch this year, the Harvard Library will welcome its second cohort of Pforzheimer Fellows in the summer of 2015. The program, which seeks to foster intellectual and professional partnerships between professional librarians and graduate students in the humanities, is named in honor of Carl H. Pforzheimer III and his generous contributions…

There is an arsenal of cost-effective tools available to combat malaria but getting people to adhere to treatment regimens can be challenging, said Jessica Cohen, assistant professor of global health, at a symposium focused on “The Last Mile to Malaria Eradication,” held December 4, 2014 in Kresge G3. It was sponsored by the Department of…

Harvard has released the latest version of its Green Building Standards, aimed at building healthier, more efficient buildings across campus. The Standards, which apply to all capital projects, are a key tool for helping the University meet its Greenhouse Gas Reduction Goal through the design and construction of sustainable building spaces. An associated Life Cycle Cost policy ensures…

The Office of the Vice Provost for Advances in Learning is sponsoring a program called the Faculty Academy to enable full-time Harvard faculty to get hands-on assistance with some of the techniques and concepts used in online learning experiences (such as those created through HarvardX) and in blended or flipped classrooms. Topics covered include: Video…

As the deadly infection rages through West Africa, faculty, students, and alumni are waging a counterattack: on the ground, in the lab, on the humanitarian front, and in the political sphere. A special report by Harvard Public Health editor Madeline Drexler. The first Ebola case that Mosoka Fallah saw with his own eyes was in…

Nieman Fellows in the class of 2015 have selected prominent Turkish journalist and writer Hasan Cemal as this year’s recipient of the Louis M. Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism. Cemal was chosen in recognition of a long career dedicated to championing freedom of the press in Turkey and as a representative of…

Pardis Sabeti, associate professor in the Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), and Mosoka Fallah, M.P.H. ’12, were among the Ebola fighters — doctors, nurses, caregivers, scientists, and directors — named Time’s 2014 “Person of the Year.” Sabeti, who also is a senior associate member at the Broad…

Students and faculty convened to honor and celebrate the recipients of this year’s Tazuko Ajiro-Monane Award and Noma-Reichauer Prizes in Japanese Studies. The event, co-sponsored by the Japanese Language Program and the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies (with support from the Tazuko Ajiro Monane Memorial Fund), was well attended, with appearances from Jenni Ting, last…

Julio Frenk is dean of the Faculty at the Harvard School of Public Health and T & G Angelopoulos Professor of Public Health and International Development, a joint appointment with the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. What does it take to develop a successful universal health coverage program in a state or a country? When…

The rush to contain the Ebola outbreak in West Africa in the last few months has generated years’ worth of new information about the previously little understood infectious disease, including simple but effective prevention measures, according to Lindsey Baden, deputy editor of the New England Journal of Medicine and member of the Harvard-MIT Division of…

New research by Alkes Price, associate professor of Statistical Genetics at Harvard School of Public Health, and colleagues focuses on new approaches to characterizing and identifying genetic factors in complex disease. HSPH: What’s the basic finding of your new research? PRICE: Our study could help scientists determine the best way to search for genetic risk factors…

The Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT is now “the world’s most powerful factory for analyzing genes from people and viruses,” according to an article in the New York Times, published December 1, 2014. The article highlighted the work of Pardis Sabeti, a senior associate member at the Broad, associate professor in the Department of…

Dimitrios Trichopoulos, who was Vincent L. Gregory Professor of Cancer Prevention and Professor of Epidemiology, and a past chair of the Department of Epidemiology, died on December 1, 2014. He was 75. Dimitrios was an outstanding scientist and teacher for more than four decades in the field of cancer epidemiology and prevention. He published more…