Could Cancer Genes Be Used to Harness Stem Cell Therapies?
On a visit to Bangalore in 1998, Robert A. Weinberg ’64, one of America’s leading cancer researchers, met a voraciously curious young doctoral student from a South Indian village so remote that he grew up without phones or television, studying by kerosene lamp. He had no Western-style last name, only a first — Mani.
At NW35, Fall Community Picnic Toasts New Dorm, Dean Colombo
Despite the long trek from main campus to NW35, turnout for last Monday’s fall Community Picnic was far greater than organizers had anticipated, said Gayle M. Gallagher, senior director of Institute events.
Police Log
<i>The following incidents were reported to the MIT Police between Aug. 25, 2008 and Sept. 3, 2008. This summary does not include incidents such as false alarms, general service calls, or medical shuttles.</i>
Fall 2008 UA Election Candidates
Voting online requires Web certificates. Candidate platforms and photos are available at elections.scripts.mit.edu/candidates.
Senate Seats
Residence Seats Candidates NW35 1 Samuel Rodarte ’12 East Campus 2 Harrison L. Bralower ’11, Donald B. Guy ’12, Ciara M. Lomax ’12, Vrajesh Y. Modi ’11 McCormick 2 Kristina N. Cibor ’11, Mengjie Ding ’12, Eleni Orphanides ’10, Ye Yao ’11 Next House 2 Timothy J. Stumbaugh ’12 New House 2 Shin Nee S Wong ’12, Richard A. Dahan ’12 Burton-Conner 2 Zachary D. Tribbett ’12, Caryn E. Krakauer ’11 Baker 2 Cyril Lan ’11, Andy Wu ’12, Daniel L. Katz ’12 Simmons 2 Daniel D. Hawkins ’12, Vinay Tripuraneni ’11, David S. Zhu ’12 Random 1 Ekaterina Kuznetsova ’09 IFC 5 William G. Near ’10, Sun Kim ’11 Panhel 1 None Bexley 1 None MacGregor 2 None Senior Haus 1 None Off Campus 1 None LGC 1 None
Aafia Siddiqui’s Son Released; DOJ Hints At Conspiracy Charges
The young boy arrested with Aafia Siddiqui ’95 on July 17 has been released to Pakistani custody to be turned over to Siddiqui’s relatives, The Associated Press reported yesterday.
Hockfield Asks Gov’t To Triple Energy Funding
President Susan Hockfield testified before a House of Representatives committee on energy on Wednesday, making the case for tripling federal funding of energy research.
MIT Class of ’08 Earns $65,324 On Average, According to Career Survey
The MIT students receiving Bachelor of Science degrees in June 2008 were offered a mean salary of $65,324, a 6.9 percent increase over last year, according to data from the preliminary version of the MIT Careers Office’s 2008 Graduating Student Survey. The consumer price index rose about 6.2 percent over the same period of time, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Obama Proposes Panoply of Education Programs
Senator Barack Obama learned how hard it can be to solve America’s public education problems when he headed a philanthropic drive here a decade ago that spent $150 million on Chicago’s troubled schools and barely made a dent.
Film Based on MIT Employee’s Book Shown in Toronto
On Tuesday night Scott Campbell watched the characters in his novel walk and talk, frown and dance, paint and make love on a movie screen at a major international film festival. That’s stuff you can see people do at any film festival. For Campbell, it was astounding, since he needed subtitles to figure out what had happened to his book.
Colleges Defend Rising Tuition In Round Table With Senators
Two dozen college presidents and policy experts defended the rising costs of tuition on Monday and argued against forcing colleges to spend more of their endowments.
Panel Studies MIT’s Divestment Process
A five-person panel is in the process of reconsidering how the Advisory Committee on Shareholder Responsibility “can be most helpful to the Corporation and the community in general,” Kirk D. Kolenbrander, Vice President of Institute Affairs and Secretary of the Corporation, said on Tuesday.
Siddiqui Diagnosed With Chronic Depression
Aafia Siddiqui ’95 was diagnosed with chronic depressive type psychosis, according to court documents released today. Siddiqui is the MIT alum and Brandeis PhD who disappeared mysteriously in Pakistan in 2003, and is married to alleged terrorist Amar Al-Baluchi, who is being held at Guantanamo Bay.
News Briefs
Five-hundred forty students have enrolled in 7.012, Introductory Biology, this fall, forcing lectures to take place in 26-100 instead of 10-250, as originally planned.
Visiting Professor Discusses ’08 Election
<i>From Northwestern University, to Stanford, to MIT, Professor Marc Meredith of the Political Science Department is truly a traveling scholar. Earning masters degrees in both economics and political science, Marc examines today’s political scene with the eye of an economist. He currently teaches Quantitative Research Methods I (17.800), a graduate class where students apply statistical techniques to politics in order to better understand and predict social trends. When it comes time to predict the next president, Marc will be one step ahead, applying game theory to the society in which we live. While his field is rigorous, Marc also finds time to enjoy his many hobbies including running, football, poker, and ping-pong.</i>
YouTomb Takes Stock Of YouTube Takedowns
On April 6, 2008, a clip of an Oklahoma police officer assaulting a man appeared on the popular video-sharing site YouTube. Tagged with “police,” “brutality” and “beat up,” it received over 20,000 views in the ten brief days that it was available.
Lucian W. Pye
Retired MIT political science professor Lucian W. Pye, one of America’s leading China scholars, died Sept. 5 in Boston after a long illness. He was 86.
Michael Hammer ’68
Michael Hammer ’68, a research affiliate with MIT’s Engineering Systems Division who also previously taught as a professor of computer science and was a lecturer in the MIT Sloan School of Management, died Wednesday after collapsing from apparent cranial bleeding last month. He was 60.
$12 Laptop Featured at Int’l Dev. Design Summit
Goodbye $100 laptop, hello $12 laptop. Well technically, it’s only a keyboard, but it just needs to be plugged into a TV.