Featured series 
Tag: Harvard
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Nation & World
The motivation to move
Using an unusual decision-making study, Harvard researchers exploring the question of motivation found that rats will perform a task faster or slower depending on the size of the benefit they receive, suggesting they maintain a long-term estimate of whether it’s worthwhile for them to invest the energy.
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Nation & World
Writing as discovery
Professor Jill Lepore delivered the third and final presentation in Harvard College Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds’ book talks in the Widener Library rotunda. The series was designed to bring students and faculty together outside of the classroom.
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Nation & World
Two named Hill-Stephens Scholars
Sophomores Alexander Moore and Joshua Scott have been selected as the 2013 Hill-Stephens Scholars, an honor awarded annually to two African-American sophomores or juniors at Harvard College who display exceptional commitment to academic achievement and community involvement.
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Nation & World
Fine-tuning online education
Andrew Ho, research director of HarvardX and an assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, spoke with the Gazette about a recent study that found that interspersing online lectures with short tests improved student performance.
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Nation & World
Online learning: It’s different
By interspersing online lectures with short tests, student mind-wandering decreased by half, note-taking tripled, and overall retention of the material improved, said Daniel Schacter, the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Psychology, and Karl Szpunar, a postdoctoral fellow in psychology.
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Nation & World
Humanities in the digital age
A panel of experts discussed the study of humanities in the digital age, and how humanists’ skill set is well-suited for careers in this advancing world of technology. The discussion was part of a series supported by the FAS Office of Career Services.
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Nation & World
Major weight loss tied to microbes
In a study conducted by Harvard and MGH researchers, gut microbes of mice underwent drastic changes following gastric bypass surgery, and transfer of the microbes into sterile mice resulted in rapid weight loss.
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Nation & World
Sharper view of matter
In a breakthrough that could one day yield important clues about the nature of matter itself, a team of Harvard scientists has measured the magnetic charge of single particles of matter and antimatter with unprecedented precision.
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Nation & World
When timing is everything
In a new paper, Christopher Marx, associate professor of organismic and evolutionary biology, says that beneficial mutations may occur more often than first thought, but many never emerge as “winners” because they don’t fall within the narrow set of circumstances required for them to dominate a population.
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Nation & World
One gene, many mutations
In a new paper, Harvard researchers show that changes in coat color in mice are the result not of a single mutation, but of many mutations, all in a single gene. The results start to answer one of the fundamental questions about evolution: Does it proceed by huge leaps — single mutations that result in…
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Nation & World
Q&A with Matthew Nock
Professor of Psychology Matthew Nock is the author of a new paper, co-authored with other Harvard faculty, which examines suicidal thoughts and behaviors among adolescents. In a recent conversation with the Gazette, Nock discussed his research, and the resources available at Harvard for students and others in the community.
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Nation & World
Recognizing outstanding staff
Fifty-seven FAS employees were honored at the fourth annual Dean’s Distinction awards ceremony and reception, held March 6 in the Faculty Room of University Hall.
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Nation & World
First Santiago Ramón y Cajal Professor is named
Jeff Lichtman, the Jeremy R. Knowles Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology, has been appointed as the first Ramón y Cajal Professor of Arts and Sciences.
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Nation & World
Higher education on the move
In online education, the future is now. That was an overriding message Harvard and MIT hosted a summit on March 3 and 4 titled “Online Learning and the Future of Residential Education.”
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Nation & World
Five win Sloan Research Fellowships
Five Harvard faculty members are among the 126 scholars selected to receive Sloan Research Fellowships from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
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Nation & World
A fireside chat with the dean
Harvard College Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds hosted a fireside chat at her home with Professor Henry Louis Gates and about 25 student participants who had been selected through a lottery system. The chat was part of a series of events designed to foster interaction between undergraduates and faculty outside the classroom.
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Nation & World
Linking insulin to learning
Work led by Yun Zhang, associate professor of organismic and evolutionary biology, shows how the pathway of insulin and insulinlike peptides plays a critical role in helping to regulate learning and memory.
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Nation & World
New leader in teaching, learning
Robert A. Lue has been named the Richard L. Menschel Faculty Director of the Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning, placing him at the forefront of efforts to rethink teaching and learning, both on campus and off.
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Nation & World
Weather warning
A report co-authored by Professor Michael McElroy and D. James Baker, a former administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, connects global climate change, extreme weather, and national security.
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Nation & World
Go with your gut
Peter Turnbaugh and co-authors Corinne Ferrier Maurice and Henry Joseph Haiser show that as drugs are administered, the activity of human gut microbes can change dramatically. Understanding how those changes affect drug chemistry could help researchers to design drugs that work more effectively and antibiotics that more specifically target pathogens.
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Nation & World
Robots with lift
Using small explosions produced by a mix of methane and oxygen, researchers at Harvard have designed a soft robot that can leap as much as a foot in the air. That ability to jump could one day prove critical in allowing the robots to avoid obstacles during search and rescue operations.
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Nation & World
Faculty author series at Widener
Harvard College Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds is sponsoring a book talk series featuring Professors John Dowling, Jennifer Hochschild, and Jill Lepore.
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Nation & World
Competition that computes
It might appear that evacuating a major city following a natural disaster and playing foosball have little, if anything, in common. For students participating in the IACS Computational Challenge, however, both are problems that can be tackled with some clever coding.
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Nation & World
When fairness prevails
Using computer simulations designed to play a simple economic “game,” researchers at Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics showed that uncertainty is a key ingredient behind fairness. Their work is described in a Jan. 21 paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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Nation & World
On the nature of difference
Harvard College Dean Evelynn M. Hammonds discussed her book “The Nature of Difference: Sciences of Race in the United States from Jefferson to Genomics” before 50 students as part of Wintersession activities.
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Nation & World
Multimedia immersion
During Wintersession, the Harvard College Library hosted a multimedia authoring “boot camp,” reflecting the increasingly essential use of media in academic work.
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Nation & World
Watching teeth grow
For more than two decades, scientists have relied on studies linking tooth development in juvenile primates with their weaning as a rough proxy for understanding similar landmarks in the evolution of early humans. New research from Harvard, however, challenges that thinking by showing that tooth development and weaning aren’t as closely related as previously thought.
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Nation & World
A hidden genetic code
For decades, scientists wondered whether there was some subtle difference between parts of the genetic code that, while different, appear to encode the same amino acid. Harvard researchers now have the answer.
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Nation & World
Digging yields clues
As described in a Jan. 16 paper in Nature, a team of researchers led by Hopi Hoekstra, professor of organismic and evolutionary biology and molecular and cellular biology, studied two species of mice – oldfield mice and deer mice – and identified four regions in their genome that appear to influence the way they dig…
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Nation & World
New life for Old Quincy
The first House renewal test project, Old Quincy, is nearly halfway through its 15-month renovation.
