Featured series 
Tag: Research
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Science & Tech
Florida: The far side of paradise
It was near midnight. Gnarly oak trees and sandy pines draped with Spanish moss encroached upon the narrow road. Warm air sweetened by the scent of orange blossoms wafted through the windows as the van lurched to a stop. The headlights illuminated a metal sign pinned to a gate that read “Archbold Research Station.” We…
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Science & Tech
Saving lives, saving money
Seguro Popular, a Mexican health care program instituted in 2003, has already reduced crippling health care costs among poorer households, according to an evaluation conducted by researchers at Harvard University in collaboration with researchers in Mexico.
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Science & Tech
Expedition: Blue Planet 2009 explores water
When environmental advocate Alexandra Cousteau left in February on a nonstop, 100-day expedition to critical water sites across five continents, she brought with her a writer, a photographer, an editor, and a support team of more than 60 researchers, all Harvard Extension School students. But the students needed no airline tickets. From their desktops in…
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Health
Study shows waist size predictor of heart failure in men and women
Adding to the growing evidence that a person’s waist size is an important indicator of heart health, a study led by investigators at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) has found that larger waist circumference is associated with increased risk of heart failure in middle-aged and older populations of men and women.
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Health
Study: Key to happiness is listen to others
Want to know what will make you happy? Then ask a total stranger — or so says a new study from Harvard University, which shows that another person’s experience is often more informative than your own best guess.
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Campus & Community
Harvard Catalyst grants encourage greater faculty collaboration
Scientists from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics are measuring how patients’ posture affects MRI imaging of their breathing.
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Health
Development of ‘the pill’ examined
The birth control pill, which revolutionized contraception and sparked a cultural reassessment of the purpose of sex and the sanctity of life, was developed by a Harvard fertility doctor who believed people should have children early in life — and as many as they could afford.
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Science & Tech
A mother’s criticism strikes nerve
Formerly depressed women show patterns of brain activity when they are criticized by their mothers that are distinctly different from the patterns shown by never-depressed controls, according to a new study from Harvard University. The participants reported being completely well and fully recovered, yet their neural activity resembled that which has been observed in depressed…
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Health
Five named Early Career Scientists
Five Harvard researchers are among 50 young scientists nationwide who will have their work supported for the next six years by a new initiative from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI).
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Campus & Community
Joint Center accepting research and design prize applications
The Joint Center for Housing Studies (JCHS) is accepting applications for the Outstanding Student Research and Design Prize through May 1. The annual prize is offered for the best graduate-level research or design projects on housing that advance the field of housing studies as an academic endeavor. To be considered for either award the projects…
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Health
Study IDs human genes required for hepatitis C viral replicating
Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers are investigating a new way to block reproduction of the hepatitis C virus (HCV) — targeting not the virus itself but the human genes the virus exploits in its life cycle. In the March 19 Cell Host & Microbe, they report finding nearly 100 genes that support the replication of…
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Nation & World
An attempt to define ‘academic excellence’
Michèle Lamont, Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies and professor of sociology and of African and African American studies, analyzes the system of peer review in her new book “How Professors Think: Inside the Curious World of Academic Judgment.”
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Health
Training the talent in trouble spots
The Harvard Initiative for Global Health (HIGH) has begun a fellowship program with the aim of identifying and helping train bright young developing-world health professionals in remote regions of the world with the greatest global health challenges.
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Campus & Community
Concentration in human development, regenerative biology added
Inviting a new generation of scientists into the study of human development, disease, and aging, Harvard University will offer a new undergraduate concentration in Human Developmental and Regenerative Biology (HDRB) starting this fall.
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Health
Scientists create cell protein machinery
Harvard scientists have cleared a key hurdle in the creation of synthetic life, assembling a cell’s critical protein-making machinery in an advance that has practical, industrial applications and that enhances our basic understanding of life’s workings.
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Nation & World
New Web site aids researchers seeking funding
With literally tens of billions of dollars in federal research funding suddenly available — and application deadlines for proposals extraordinarily short — Harvard’s Provost’s Office has established a new Web site to aid faculty members seeking grants.
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Health
Blood types indicate greater risk for cancer
Offering a novel clue about the basic biology of pancreatic cancer, researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have confirmed a decades-old discovery of a link between blood type and the risk of developing the disease.
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Health
The third chapter can be the best in the book
There may be something to the adage about growing older and wiser. A lot, in fact, according to the new book by Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, “The Third Chapter: Passion, Risk, and Adventure in the 25 Years After 50,” (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009). The work explores the trend of learning and development for adults who are…
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Nation & World
Harvard, ETS to study diversity at predominantly white colleges
Henry Louis Gates Jr., the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research, has announced a collaboration with the Educational Testing Service (ETS) on a study of the experience of undergraduate members of racial and ethnic minorities on predominantly white college campuses.
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Campus & Community
Joint Center to offer the Meyer Dissertation Fellowship
The Joint Center for Housing Studies (JCHS) is accepting applications for the John R. Meyer Dissertation Fellowship, a yearlong fellowship award for doctoral candidates who are engaged in writing a dissertation on a housing-related topic consistent with the center’s research agenda.
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Campus & Community
Gieve named senior fellow at Belfer Center
Sir John Gieve, former deputy governor of Bank of England, was recently announced as the new Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) research fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.
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Health
Runyon Foundation names fellows from Harvard
The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation has named six Harvard affiliates among its 13 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.
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Health
Capillary formation’s mechanical determinants
Harvard researchers have established a link between the growth of blood vessels and the mechanical stresses caused by the environment within which the vessels grow, a new understanding that researchers hope can lead to novel disease treatments based on manipulating blood flow to living tissues.
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Campus & Community
Center for European Studies names spring fellows
The Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, dedicated to fostering the study of European history, politics, culture, and society, has recently announced the arrival of its 2009 spring fellows.
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Health
Patients untapped resource for improving care
As the United States transitions to a new administration, and as the health care crisis mounts, the debate about how to buttress primary care delivery with information technology is getting louder. While much of the attention — and controversy — is focused on how to better equip physicians, little focus appears to be aimed at…
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Health
Low-income diabetic women at increased risk for postpartum depression
Researchers at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the University of Minnesota have found that living just above the poverty line and having diabetes increases by 50 percent a woman’s chance of developing postpartum depression — a serious illness that affects about one in 10 new mothers.
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Health
Calorie reduction key to weight loss, not food type
Many popular diets emphasize either carbohydrate, protein, or fat as the best way to lose weight. However, there have been few studies lasting more than a year that evaluate the effect on weight loss of diets with different compositions of those nutrients.
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Campus & Community
M-RCBG names spring fellows, scholars
A Korean Trade official, a member of the Northern Ireland civil service, a founder of AllWorld Network, and a British public policy scholar are among the incoming visitors being welcomed this spring at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS).
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Campus & Community
Gazette conducts first readership survey
In an attempt to gauge how well the Harvard Gazette addresses the needs, tastes, and desires of its readers, the paper is conducting its first-ever readership survey.