Recent News
Death of Renowned Penn Chemist Ralph F. Hirschmann, 1922-2009. June 2009. Hirschmann, the Rao Makineni Professor of Bioorganic Chemistry at Penn and former head of research at Merck, passed away peacefully on June 20.
Shelley L. Berger is appointed Penn Integrates Knowledge Professor. June 2009. Berger, a world-renowned genetics researcher, is to be the Daniel S. Och University Professor with an appointment shared between the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology in the School of Medicine and the Department of Biology in SAS.
Wolf Visiting Associate Professor in Television Studies Wins Katherine S. Kovacs Book Award. June 2009. Victoria E. Johnson is the 2009 recipient of the Katherine S. Kovacs Book Award.
Jack Nagel Appointed Associate Dean for the Social Sciences. June 2009. In this capacity Nagel will oversee the Departments of Anthropology, Criminology, Economics, History and Sociology of Science, Political Science, and Sociology; several research centers with ties to these departments; and the Fels Institute of Government.
Arjun Yodh Named Director of the Laboratory for Research on the Structure of Matter. May 2009. Yodh has pioneered the use of diffuse optics as a tool for medical diagnostics.
David Stern Named Moritz and Josephine Berg Professor. May 2009. Stern's fields of specialization include classical Jewish literature and religion, as well as the history of the Jewish book.
SAS Teaching Awards. April 2009. Recipients of the School of Arts and Sciences 2009 teaching awards have been named.
Three SAS Faculty Win 2009 Guggenheim Fellowship Awards. April 2009. Judith Rodin Professor of English David J. Wallace, Professor of Sociology Susan Cotts Watkins, and Associate Professor of Music Anna Weesner were recognized on the basis of stellar achievement and exceptional promise for continued accomplishment.
Richard Schultz to Receive 2009 Research Award from the Society for the Study of Reproduction. April 2009. The award recognizes an active SSR member for outstanding research published during the previous six years.
College Announces 2009 Graduation Student Speaker. April 2009. Sarah-Jane Littleford, C'09, is pursuing an individualized major in sustainable development and a major in environmental studies, with a concentration in psychology.
SAS and the Economy. March 2009. SAS has created this page to communicate information regarding its continuing response to the economic downturn and global financial crisis.
The School of Arts and Sciences Names 2009 Dean's Scholars. March 2009. This honor is presented annually to SAS students who exhibit exceptional academic performance and intellectual promise.
Biology Professor Joshua Plotkin Named Inaugural Martin Meyerson Assistant Professor in Interdisciplinary Studies. March 2009. Plotkin uses mathematics and computation to study questions in evolutionary biology and ecology.
Andrea Liu Named Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Professor in the Natural Sciences. March 2009. Dr. Liu's ongoing research concerns theoretical problems in soft matter physics, including jamming in glass-forming liquids, foams and granular materials, and biophysical self-assembly in actin structures and other systems.
R&B Singer and Songwriter John Legend, C'99, to be 2009 College Graduation Speaker. March 2009. Legend is a six-time Grammy winner, starting with the Best New Artist award in 2005.
Rohm and Haas Gift to Create a Program in Sustainable Development in Organizational Dynamics. March 2009. The gift will provide funding for three years of course development and marketing.
Joshua Plotkin Awarded Sloan Research Fellowship. February 2009. Plotkin's research focuses on population genetics, with the goal of understanding how organisms evolve at the molecular level.
Global Health Program of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Announces $1.7 million Grant to Two Penn Professors. February 2009. E. Otis Kendall Professor of Biology David Roos is the principal investigator on this project expanding pathogen genome databases.
Paul Guyer Elected Vice President of the American Society for Aesthetics. February 2009. Guyer is the Florence R.C. Murray Professor in the Humanities.
Penn Student Wins 2009 Gates Cambridge Scholarship. February 2009. Senior Alexander Jacobs becomes the 16th Penn student to win the award since it was established in 2001.
Cristina Bicchieri Receives Italian Knighthood. February 2009. This is one of the highest honors conferred by the Italian government for contributions in the field of arts and sciences.
Mark Liberman Wins Lingustics Award. February 2009. Liberman, Trustee Professor of Phonetics, accepted the 2009 Linguistics, Language and the Public Award from the Linguistic Society of America.
Penn's Center for the Advanced Study of India Receives MacArthur Foundation Grant to Study Diasporas. January 2009. The project will investigate the increased importance of diaspora networks to home economies.
Penn Students John O'Malley and Will Son Take Top Honors in National Competition for Best Video. January 2009. The contest was run by Facing Up, a non-partisan project exploring long-term challenges of the federal budget.
Roger Allen Elected President of the Middle East Studies Association. January 2009. Allen is Professor of Arabic and Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Penn.
Music Professor Timothy Rommen Wins Alan Merriam Prize. December 2008. The award honors Rommen's first book, Mek Some Noise: Gospel Music and the Ethics of Style in Trinidad.
Anthropology Major Abigail Seldin Wins Rhodes Scholarship. November 2008. Seldin plans to study anthropology at Oxford's Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology.
Gates Foundation Grant Will Support Study to Develop an Indian Healthcare Ratings System. November 2008. Devesh Kapur, director of Penn's Center for the Advanced Study of India and Madan Lal Sobti Professor for the Study of Contemporary India at Penn, is the principal investigator on the project.
Penn Physicist Phil Nelson to Receive 2009 Emily M. Gray Award From Biophysical Society. November 2008. The award is the international professional organization's top honor for education and outreach.
Mellon Foundation Awards $6-Million Grant to Support Graduate Education in the Humanities. November 2008. This endowment gift will significantly enhance financial aid for SAS graduate students in the humanities through fellowships as well as a new award program.
Economics Professor Jere Behrman Awarded Carlos Díaz-Alejandro Prize. October 2008. New hires join the faculty at the junior and senior levels across the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities.
SAS Welcomes 32 New Faculty Members. September 2008. New hires join the faculty at the junior and senior levels across the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities.
Penn College of General Studies Changes Name to College of Liberal and Professional Studies, Offers New Programs. September 2008. LPS is redefining and expanding its mission and vision in response to changing global and national trends in higher education.
Penn Physicist Fay Ajzenberg-Selove Among Eight Scientists to Receive the 2007 National Medal of Science. August 2008. The Medal is the United States' highest honor for science.
Biology Professor Michael Lampson Named Searle Scholar. August 2008. Lampson's research, focused on cell division and intracellular signaling, will receive $300,000 during the next three years.
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