School Notes

School of Architecture
Robert A. M. Stern, Dean
www.architecture.yale.edu

Yale on national tour of green building exhibition

An exhibition on green design and building, on view in the architecture gallery during the first half of the fall semester, demonstrated the emerging collaboration of stylish architecture, interior design, and environmental responsibility. "The Green House: New Directions in Sustainable Architecture and Design" grew out of a 2005 book by the same name and included photographs and models of 20 green houses in the United States and abroad. The show opened at the National Building Museum in Washington, DC, in May 2006, and appeared in several venues before coming to Yale in August. In a review published September 20, the New York Times declared, "The show has never looked better than at its present location, the double-height gallery at the base of the Yale Art and Architecture Building, recently restored to perfection and renamed Paul Rudolph Hall for its creator."

Celebrating the Las Vegas Studio

A pair of complementary exhibitions in the school's gallery memorialize the celebrated 1968 Las Vegas Studio at Yale and examine the influence of the studio's teachers in the intervening years. "What We Learned: The Yale Las Vegas Studio and the Work of Venturi Scott Brown & Associates" comprises two independently organized exhibitions: "The Yale Las Vegas Studio," a traveling show of more than 100 color photographs, several slide projections, and original materials from the 1968 "field trip" to Las Vegas that Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown led with 13 Yale architecture students to study the Las Vegas Strip; and "What We Learned," a Yale exhibition curated by Dean Sakamoto ’98MEnvD with David Sadighian ’10MenvD, which focuses on Venturi and Scott Brown's influential contributions to the urban landscape through selected work of their Philadelphia-based firm. It includes drawings, posters, photographs, and text as well as furniture and pieces from early buildings designed by the architects. The exhibitions are on view through February 5, 2010.

School of Art
Robert Storr, Dean
www.yale.edu/art

Alumnus named MacArthur Fellow

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation has named painter Rackstraw Downes ’63BFA, ’64MFA, one of its 2009 MacArthur Fellows. Only 24 individuals were named MacArthur Fellows this year; four of them have Yale connections.

Rackstraw Downes is a representational painter who specializes in detailed oil landscapes that "invite viewers to reconsider the intersection between the natural world and man-made objects." His subjects are often those that are overlooked or considered unappealing, and range from roadways, urban detritus, and the industrial backyards of the East Coast to the oil fields and empty terrain of Texas. He paints his canvases on site, often spending many months outdoors in order to capture details of lighting and weather. Examples of his work are in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, and the National Gallery of Art, among others. Downes's body of work also encompasses the history and thought of painting; he has written highly regarded essays on various visual and literary artists, some of which have appeared in the New York Times, Art in America, and Art Journal.

Also known as "genius grants," the MacArthur fellowships are awarded to "talented individuals who have shown extraordinary originality and dedication in their creative pursuits and a marked capacity for self-direction," according to the foundation's website. The fellowship is a "no strings attached" award that carries with it a stipend of $500,000 over five years.

Yale College
Mary E. Miller, Dean
www.yale.edu/yalecollege

Fall semester kickoff event lets students snack around the globe

At the start of the new academic year, more than 2,700 Yale College students enjoyed the chance to eat their way around the world -- all without leaving Old Campus. Coordinated by Yale Dining Services and the Yale College Council (YCC), "Fall Festival: The World Street Food Fair" featured eight tents in front of Vanderbilt Hall that served an array of international cuisines -- from carne asada and black bean flautas to kebobs, falafel, and pilaf -- prepared by Yale Dining Service chefs. For the price of one lunch swipe on their meal plan cards, students were able to sample the flavors of Japan, China, France, Spain, Colombia, Greece, and Italy, as well as American classics ranging from Chicago hot dogs to Algonquian popcorn and chocolate chip cookies. Throughout the afternoon, live musical entertainment was provided by various Yale student bands.

Traphagen Series brings documentarist to campus

The Traphagen Alumni Speakers Series, hosted by the Yale College Office of Student Affairs, recently welcomed filmmaker and philanthropist Abigail E. Disney ’82 as its inaugural guest speaker for 2009-2010. Disney -- whose documentary production, Pray the Devil Back to Hell, has received numerous accolades for its depiction of a small group of Liberian women and their struggle to restore peace to their civil war-torn country -- visited Silliman, where she had lived as an undergraduate, and spoke at a tea hosted by Master Judy Krauss. Following the master's tea, Disney was joined by the film's director, Gini Reticker, for a film screening at the Whitney Humanities Center and a question-and-answer session moderated by assistant professor of political science Christopher Blattman.

The Traphagen series invites distinguished alumni from all walks of life to share their special knowledge, talents, and experiences with members of the Yale community. The event was cosponsored by the film studies program, Films at the Whitney, and the Yale Film Study Center.

Yalies embark on Fulbright projects worldwide

Over the summer, the Institute of International Education announced the final results of the annual Fulbright Grant competition, with 16 Yale College students among the recipients of this prestigious award. Of these, 13 accepted awards. Yale's 2009-2010 Fulbright Program participants are Nathan H. Becker, Davenport College ’09 (China, economic development); Laura A. Bennett, Timothy Dwight College ’09 (Spain, journalism); Katherine L. French, Davenport College ’09 (Germany, geology); Nan Guo, Saybrook College ’09 (Finland, biology); Adam S. Horowitz, Trumbull College ’09 (Colombia, theater studies); Andrew P. Klein, Saybrook College ’09 (Uganda, chemistry); Jennifer K. Lin, Silliman College ’09 (English teaching assistantship, Macau); Patrick T. McCarthy, Morse College ’09 (China, public health); Christine Nguyen, Morse College ’09 (Vietnam, public health); Brittany Robinson, Branford College ’09 (English teaching assistantship, Hong Kong); Amy W. Rothschild, Silliman College ’09 (English teaching assistantship, Spain); Emily D. Schofield, Branford College ’09 (English teaching assistantship, Macau); and Erin York, Davenport College ’09 (Syria, Arabic language & literature). Recipients of Fulbright awards are selected on the basis of academic or professional achievement, as well as demonstrated leadership potential in their fields.

Divinity School
Harold W. Attridge, Dean
www.yale.edu/divinity

Another year, another Before the Fall Orientation

During the last week of August, entering Yale Divinity School students were treated to the traditional "Before the Fall Orientation" to life at YDS, followed by opening convocation ceremonies on September 1. BTFO was full of activities designed to introduce new students to YDS, to each other, and to returning students, faculty, and staff. At the convocation, professor of Reformation history Bruce Gordon warned a packed Marquand Chapel audience against settling for easy answers or platitudes -- which he dismissed as "verbal junk food" -- and urged them to be prepared for the many challenges that truth will present. "We shall not spare you difficulty and controversy," Gordon assured students, for, "faced with the question of truth, we find ourselves challenged on every front." This year's YDS entering class is the largest in recent years, with a total of 169 new students.

Four honored with alumni awards

A highlight of convocation and reunions, held annually in October, is always the opportunity to honor a select group of alumni who have distinguished themselves in various ways. Among the honorees this year is Nancy Taylor ’81MDiv, the first woman to serve as senior minister at historic Old South Church in Boston, who was chosen to receive the Distinction in Congregational Ministry award. At a conference, "The Future of the Congregation," held at YDS in spring 2009, Taylor argued for church services that convey some of the energy of the Gospel: "I would propose that part of what needs to happen is that it needs to be a place that is truly exciting, in which people are being connected with things that matter deeply. . . . Church can and ought to be as riveting, as enthralling, as compelling, in its own way, as is Fenway Park when the Sox are in town. . . . I think some excitement, as well as elegance and beauty and contemplation, is what's wanted." Other 2009 honorees, chosen by the YDS Alumni Board, are Bonita Grubbs ’84MAR, Lux et Veritas Award; Peter Laarman ’93MDiv, William Sloane Coffin ’56 Award for Peace and Justice; and Don Saliers ’62BD, ’67PhD, Distinction in Theological Education.

Emory University's graduate school named for YDS alumnus

The Emory University Board of Trustees has approved renaming the Emory graduate school in honor of James Laney ’50, ’54BD, ’66PhD, who led Emory from 1977 until 1993. Laney was awarded an honorary degree from Yale in 1993 and served as U.S. ambassador to South Korea in 1993-97. During a spring 2007 conference on faith and citizenship hosted by YDS, Laney described his experience as a key player in the brinksmanship between the two Koreas, recalling how during some of the tensest moments in the standoff he would go into the embassy bathroom, lock the door, and get down on his hands and knees to pray. "Now, I realize that what I was praying for was a continuation of clarity of vision, that I would not be confounded by or overwhelmed by anxiety, or just see the thing in skewed terms," said Laney. "I never told anybody in the embassy that, anybody in the government that."

School of Drama
James Bundy, Dean
www.yale.edu/drama

The Living Theatre returns to Yale

Forty-one years after the Living Theatre's infamous performance of Paradise Now at Yale, which ended in the arrest of ten performers and audience members for public indecency, the Living Theatre's co-founder and artistic director, Judith Malina, returned to New Haven for a two-day residency at the drama school. The visit included a series of classes and workshops with drama school students, screenings of two documentaries about the work of the Living Theatre, and book signings with Malina and company members.

The Living Theatre was founded in 1947 by Malina and the late Julian Beck as an "imaginative alternative to the commercial theater." Over the years it has staged nearly 100 productions in eight languages in 28 countries, and has helped to establish Off-Broadway and Off-Off-Broadway as legitimate theater venues. In 1968 the Living Theatre embarked on a national tour of Paradise Now, with Yale as its first stop. The play, which encouraged audience participation, contained a scene in which cast members removed their clothing, and some audience members followed suit. As the cast and audience members exited the University Theatre onto York Street in various states of undress, ten people -- including Beck and Malina -- were arrested by the New Haven Police Department for public indecency. The next night the audience swelled to more than three times the theater's capacity for the second performance of Paradise Now. No arrests were made.

The Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library has acquired the archives of the Living Theatre. This collection documents the administration of the theater, its stage productions, and its relationship to other avant-garde and radical cultural and political movements in the United States and Europe from the 1960s to the present. Also included are extensive diaries and journals of Judith Malina and Julian Beck, as well as their personal papers and writings.

Concentration in projection design is first in nation

A new concentration in projection design will be offered to students beginning next fall. It is the first such course of study in the United States. "The use of projection in performance is expanding exponentially," says award-winning projection designer Wendall Harrington, who has served on the design department faculty at the drama school since 2006 and will oversee the new projection concentration. "The projected image is a powerful tool. Those designers at the forefront of this medium will have the opportunity and responsibility to encourage its eloquent use." Dean James Bundy added, "The introduction of the projection design concentration continues Yale's commitment to artistic and technological innovations in the field."

Co-chaired by Ming Cho Lee and Stephen Strawbridge ’83MFA, the design department at the drama school is unique in its integration of all areas of design, providing students with a common ground of core knowledge of the field and emphasizing that all elements of design are an integral part of the whole and cannot be conceived independently.

School of Engineering & Applied Science
T. Kyle Vanderlick, Dean
www.seas.yale.edu

Providing experience beyond the lab

This fall, the School of Engineering & Applied Science launched the SEAS Graduate Leadership Program -- a competitive program designed to provide experiences and training beyond the research lab, including internships and educational opportunities in four main career tracks: academia, industry, public service, and business. The program will accept up to eight enrolled engineering doctoral students each year. The first phase of applications was announced this summer for participation in the business track. Two students, Tarek Fadel (chemical engineering) and Jason Park (biomedical engineering), were accepted to the program and granted admission to a four-class curriculum within the School of Management. Both have interest in gaining a better understanding of finance, management, entrepreneurship, and business strategy for careers in the biotech industry. In cultivating leaders whose interdisciplinary preparation is as strong as their academic credentials, Yale stands to contribute an increasing cadre of professionals whose impact will be felt across diverse disciplines.

Engineering launches digital magazine

Yale Engineering is excited to announce its first digital magazine. The Yale Engineering Magazine has the look of a high-quality magazine publication, but with features only available in an electronic format, such as video and diagram animation. The inaugural issue focuses heavily on research -- highlighting breakthroughs and innovation of the past year -- while also including student projects, a faculty spotlight, and much more. Please visit www.seas.yale.edu to subscribe.

Bulk metallic glasses have biomedical applications

Last February, we announced that Yale engineers had created a process that may revolutionize the manufacture of nanodevices -- exploiting the unique properties of bulk metallic glass (BMG). Now, the list has expanded to include important biomedical applications. As featured in the September 2009 issue of JOM, bulk metallic glasses exhibit an excellent combination of properties and processing capabilities desired for versatile implant applications, from stents to bone replacement. Jan Schroers (mechanical engineering) has teamed up with Themis Kyriakides (pathology) to put the unique processability of BMGs and their outstanding properties to the test. 

Unlike most metals, BMGs have an "amorphous" structure that yields many advantages -- high strength (three times that of steel), elasticity, corrosion resistance, and durability. Most notable, however, is their unique processability, which allows them to be molded like plastics but with nanoscale precision and complex geometries. "We knew we had a superior material over currently used implant materials and we now have found out that we can indeed put it in the human body," says Schroers. Their in vitro and in vivo study results indicated that the BMGs are compatible with cell growth and tissue function. 

School of Forestry & Environmental Studies
Peter Crane, Dean
www.environment.yale.edu

Something in the water?

Male frogs living in Greater Hartford, Connecticut, ponds are exhibiting female sex traits, and a Yale professor wants to know why. David Skelly, professor of ecology, is conducting a study on hermaphrodites, which are proliferating in Connecticut ponds. "Amphibians living in Connecticut neighborhoods show abnormal sexual development at very high frequencies," says Skelly. "Something about these environments is causing these vertebrates to develop an illness that is otherwise uncommon."

Over the past decade Skelly has been making progress in answering the many questions raised by frog deformities. (For a Yale Alumni Magazine report, see "The Frog Mystery.") Now, a two-year, $30,000 grant from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving will help fund the study of suburban and urban neighborhoods in the Hartford area, which will include the physical examination of the common green frog, Rana clamitans, and water testing for pharmaceuticals and pesticides. Area homeowners will also be surveyed about their use of chemicals.

While Skelly has not found a direct link between illness in amphibians and human health, he said, "The fact remains that they are vertebrates like us and share similar physiological and developmental pathways. Such animals can serve as sentinels for human health risks."

The plastics inside you

A new book by an environment school professor exploring the health risks to humans of some chemicals contains a lengthy chapter dealing with the impact plastics have had on our lives. John Wargo ’84PhD, professor of environmental risk analysis and policy, warns of the extraordinary pervasiveness of chemicals in our environment in Green Intelligence: Creating Environments That Protect Human Health (Yale University Press).

Products made from plastic have had considerable benefits, from safer food storage and water delivery to increases in energy efficiency and durability. But Wargo, whose career has been dedicated to investigating the effects of chemicals on women and children -- work that helped inspire the Food Quality Protection Act of 1996 -- provides a thorough review of the extensive research showing that all of us now carry molecules that started off in plastics but wound up, via a number of routes, inside our bodies. And despite the long-standing insistence by the chemical industry and federal watchdogs, such as the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, that these substances pose no risks to human health, a growing number of scientists, along with several legislators and a wide array of environmental organizations, now insist otherwise. The molecules of concern in the plastics story are known as endocrine-disrupting chemicals, and the two most-studied sources of EDCs are Bisphenol A (BPA), a basic building block of hard, polycarbonate plastics and epoxy resins, and phthalates, which are added to plastics to make them more pliable.

To be sure, in a situation reminiscent of the early days of the tobacco and health debate, there's no smoking gun -- no accepted cause-and-effect mechanism. "But the absence of that kind of evidence is not the absence of risk," says Wargo.

Graduate School of Arts & Sciences
Jon Butler, Dean
www.yale.edu/graduateschool

Alumni honored with Wilbur Cross Medals

Four alumni of the Graduate School received Wilbur Lucius Cross Medals, the Graduate School's highest honor, on October 6. This year's honorees were geneticist Michael S. Levine ’81PhD (molecular biophysics and biochemistry), art historian Richard J. Powell ’82MA (African American studies), ’88PhD (history of art), and particle physicist William J. Willis ’54BS, ’58PhD (physics). In addition, Laura L. Kiessling ’89PhD (chemistry) received her medal, which was officially awarded in 2008.

A groundbreaking researcher, Levine studies gene networks that control animal development and disease, and how DNA segments turn on and off. He heads the Division of Genetics, Genomics, and Development and is co-director of the Center for Integrative Genomics at UC-Berkeley.

Powell is considered the nation's foremost scholar on the history of African American art. He is the John Spencer Bassett Professor of Art and Art History at Duke University and editor-in-chief of Art Bulletin, published by the College Art Association.

A pioneer in the field of elementary particle physics, Bill Willis developed some of the most basic tools of high-energy elementary particle research: calorimetry and transition radiation. He is the Higgins Professor of Physics at Columbia University.

Kiessling pioneered the field of carbohydrate-mediated biology. Her research involves designing and synthesizing molecules that mimic natural molecules. She is currently the Hilldale Professor of Chemistry and the Laurens Anderson Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin.

The Yale Graduate School Alumni Association established the Wilbur Cross Medal in 1966 to honor alumni for outstanding achievement. An alumnus of Yale College and the Graduate School (PhD 1889, English), Cross was a scholar and literary critic who served as dean of the Graduate School from 1916 to 1930. Following his retirement from academia, he was elected governor of Connecticut for four terms.

Learning from Nobel laureates

Every summer since 1951, Nobel laureates in chemistry, physics, and physiology/medicine have convened in Lindau, Germany, to meet with students and young researchers from around the world. Laureates give lectures and meet informally with students. This year, Yale sent two emissaries: Brooke Rosenzweig ’11 (chemistry) and Imran Babar ’11 (molecular, cellular, developmental biology). They joined about 600 other young scientists and 20 Nobel prizewinners.

"It was great to be able to chat one-on-one with a few laureates, including Drs. Erwin Neher and Richard Ernst," said Rosenzweig. Neher began his prize-winning work on single ion channels in cells as a postdoctoral fellow at Yale. Ernst won his prize for his work on nuclear magnetic resonance.

Babar was moved by the laureates' personal stories. "They basically love science and passionately and insightfully followed their results wherever they led; winning the Nobel Prize was just a stop along the way. I appreciated the talks that included 'life lessons.' For example, Professor Richard Ernst talked about the need to have two 'legs' to stand on as a scientist. We need science as one leg and a 'passion' as another leg to keep us balanced."

Law School
Robert Post, Dean
www.law.yale.edu

Immigration and human rights specialist joins faculty

Professor Muneer I. Ahmad, a specialist in immigration law and international human rights, joined the Yale Law School faculty on July 1 as a clinical professor of law. Professor Ahmad spent the spring 2009 semester as a visiting clinical professor at Yale Law School, co-teaching in the Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic and consulting in the Immigration Legal Services Clinic. He previously taught at American University's Washington College of Law. Professor Ahmad's scholarship examines the intersections of immigration, race, and citizenship in both legal theory and legal practice. He has written and spoken widely about the impact of the September 11 attacks on Arab, Muslim, and South Asian communities.

Yale law professor's Democracy Index influences NYC

A program proposed by Yale law professor Heather Gerken to address problems in the nation's voting system is now a reality in New York City. Professor Gerken's Democracy Index is a key element in a plan Mayor Bloomberg introduced in September to improve New York City's election process. Professor Gerken, the J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law, first proposed a Democracy Index in a 2007 Legal Times commentary and has since written a book on the subject, The Democracy Index: Why Our Election System Is Failing and How to Fix It. The index would rank states based on how well their election systems perform, assessing such factors as how long people had to wait in line to vote, how many ballots got discarded, and how often voting machines broke down. Professor Gerken called the New York plan a sensational pilot project that will help uncover and solve the problems that frustrate so many voters. "A New York City Democracy Index will help the city identify problems before they happen and ensure that every New York voter can have confidence in the election system," she said. "This first-in-the-nation index is destined to become a national model for other localities and states, and perhaps even the federal government."

Supreme Court justice on campus for Alumni Weekend

A conversation with U.S. Supreme Court associate justice Sonia Sotomayor ’79JD and the return of former Yale Law dean Harold Hongju Koh to accept an award were among the highlights of Alumni Weekend 2009, October 16-18 at Yale Law School. At press time, the weekend was slated to include a series of panel discussions centering on the theme "The Regulatory Debate: Whether, What, and How?" in which alumni and faculty panelists would examine various facets of the regulatory debate -- courts and regulation, the regulatory process, and regulation in health care, the economy, and the environment. Other highlights included an All Alumni Dinner on Friday night; an interactive polling game emceed by Pamela Karlan ’84JD, Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law at Stanford Law School; and a memorial tribute to Professor Thomas I. Emerson ’31, who taught law at Yale for three decades. Former dean Koh, now legal adviser of the U.S. Department of State, was to accept the Yale Law School Association Award of Merit during a luncheon on Saturday. Koh is currently on leave from Yale Law School as the Martin R. Flug ’55 Professor of International Law and will return to teach when his service in Washington ends.

School of Management
Sharon Oster, Dean
www.mba.yale.edu

Professor wins international finance award

Robert J. Shiller, the Arthur M. Okun Professor of Economics, received the Deutsche Bank Prize in Financial Economics 2009, an international award honoring research in finance, monetary studies, and macroeconomics that has led to practice- and policy-relevant results. The prize, awarded to Shiller in September, comes with a €50,000 endowment, and specifically cited Shiller's work on irrational exuberance in capital and property markets. Shiller's empirical work on asset pricing and related macroeconomic risks is of great academic and practical value. As far back as 2000, at the height of new-economy euphoria, he foresaw the Internet market collapse. He also issued an early warning about the pending implosion of the property bubble in the U.S. and the severe financial crisis arising from this development.

Two alumnae named most powerful women in business

Indra Nooyi ’80MPPM, chairman and CEO of PepsiCo, is the top woman in world business, according to the inaugural ranking by the Financial Times. She was also named number one in Fortune's fourth Top 50 Most Powerful Women in Business list. And Nooyi joined Jane Mendillo ’80, ’84MBA, president and CEO of the Harvard Management Company, on Forbes's 100 Most Powerful Women ranking. Nooyi joined PepsiCo in 1994, where she directed global strategy and assumed the role as the company's head three years ago. Mendillo, who worked for the Harvard Management Company for 15 years before managing Wellesley College's endowment, returned to Harvard last July to direct the university's now $26 billion endowment. Both women are considered among the top executives in their respective fields.

Faculty research continues to draw attention

In a speech marking a year since the beginning of the financial crisis, Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke drew on research by Gary B. Gorton, Frederick Frank Class of 1954 Professor of Management and Finance, and Andrew Metrick ’89BA, ’89MA, Theodore Nierenberg Professor of Corporate Governance and professor of finance. Bernanke referenced a paper the two professors collaborated on in his explanation of one panic scenario that arose among lenders in the short-term sale and repurchase agreement, or "repo," market. He also mentioned a paper on the crisis written solely by Gorton. Bernanke had previously referenced another paper by Gorton in an interview with the Washington Post. Learn more about the work of Gorton, Metrick, and other SOM faculty at mba.yale.edu/facultyinsights.

School of Medicine
Robert J. Alpern, Dean
www.med.yale.edu/ysm

Stimulus funding supports research

As of August 31, Yale scientists had been awarded over 100 research grants totaling $36 million since February 2009, when the American Recovery and Revitalization Act of 2009 (ARRA) was signed into law. Some of the research projects being supported by ARRA funding at Yale involve chemotherapy in cases of ovarian cancer, pain-fighting drugs derived from the potent venom of Australian funnel-web spiders, the links between stress and addiction, and the malfunction of transfer RNAs, which are intermediaries between DNA and the cell's protein-making machinery. The ARRA grants will supplement current National Institutes of Health (NIH) spending, which totaled $341 million for Yale School of Medicine scientists this past fiscal year.

Using math to beat the flu

To prepare for outbreaks of influenza, both seasonal flu and the H1N1 ("swine flu") strain, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and its Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) have compiled mass vaccination guidelines. But in the August 20 issue of Sciencexpress, Alison P. Galvani, associate professor of epidemiology, and Clemson University's Jan Medlock published mathematical models predicting that current CDC/ACIP recommendations would produce far from optimal results in a pandemic. The team found that prioritizing vaccination for the 5-to-19 age group -- which is responsible for most flu transmissions -- and the 30-to-39 age group would be more effective than CDC/ACIP guidelines. For example, the model showed that if 40 million doses of H1N1 vaccine were distributed by ACIP guidelines in an outbreak following the pattern seen in the 1918 flu epidemic, there would be 59 million infections, 853,000 deaths, and a total cost of $939 billion. Under Medlock and Galvani's proposal, those numbers were cut to 44 million, 645,000, and $703 billion, respectively.

MD/PhD scholarships get boost from program director

Launched in 1969 and supported by competitive grants from the NIH since 1973, the School of Medicine's Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) -- known informally as the MD/PhD program -- is one of the oldest and most successful of its kind. And for nearly 29 years, professor of cell biology James D. Jamieson has been the program's director. "I believe I have the distinction of being the oldest living MD/PhD program director in the world," says Jamieson, who recently added to his legacy of leadership a $1 million gift to fund scholarships for Yale MD/PhD students and to help defray some administrative expenses. Jamieson's gift comes at a time when Dean Robert J. Alpern hopes to increase the size of the program's yearly enrollment -- now about 12 -- to 20 students, a number comparable to that at other major medical schools. The aim of Yale's MD/PhD program, one of 40 nationwide funded by the NIH, is to prepare students for careers and leadership in academic medicine.

School of Music
Robert Blocker, Dean
http://music.yale.edu

Program fosters community involvement

A new project at the school, the Community Engagement Think Tank, is encouraging students to explore new ways to become involved in the cultural life of their communities. In a series of Saturday seminars, students attend lectures by distinguished guests and then hold small-group discussions on relevant topics. The lectures and discussions will be streamed live as well as recorded and posted online. Participating students will be able to apply for community engagement grants to help develop projects of their own. The ultimate aim of the program is to develop a series of principles for community engagement and shape policy statements that will guide the School of Music and, it is hoped, the classical music community in this pursuit.

Digital portfolios for YSM students

The School of Music now provides an online service for students to showcase their music, performances, press kits, resumes, and research. Powered by a company called Digication, the service allows students to create their own web pages without the need for any web programming experience. Pages are customizable so that in addition to essential materials such as biographies and photographs, students can post recordings, samples of compositions, and feeds from social networking sites such as Twitter.

East Coast premiere of Kernis work

The Yale Philharmonia will join with the Yale Camerata, Glee Club, and Schola Cantorum to present the East Coast premiere of Aaron Jay Kernis's Symphony of Meditations. Shinik Hahm will conduct the concert, which will take place on November 6. The choral symphony is based on texts by the eleventh-century Andalucian poet Solomon ibn Gabirol, as translated by Peter Cole. Kernis, a member of the composition faculty and an alumnus of the School of Music, wrote the work as an exploration of issues of spirituality and Judaism.

School of Nursing
Margaret Grey, Dean
www.nursing.yale.edu

Study aims to improve HIV treatment in China

Improving patients' adherence to HIV/AIDS medication schedules and preventing drug-resistant strains of the virus are the goals of a new study being conducted by YSN professor Ann Williams and colleagues at the Central South University School of Nursing in Changsha, China. Funded by a grant from the National Institutes of Health, the new study will adapt a nursing intervention that was proven to increase the ability of AIDS patients in New Haven to take their medication correctly. (If AIDS patients fail to take their medications correctly, the virus may develop resistance to the medications, making them ineffective in the future and for other patients subsequently infected by the drug-resistant strain.) The project builds on a long-term collaboration in HIV/AIDS treatment and care among the Yale-China Association, YSN, and partners in Changsha, Hunan province. More details may be found at http://nursing.yale.edu/News/Features/williams_china_hiv.html.

Professor receives international psycho-oncology award

YSN professor Ruth McCorkle received the Bernard Fox Memorial Award at the International Psycho-Oncology Society 11th World Congress in Vienna, Austria. She was honored for outstanding contributions to the field of psycho-oncology, which focuses on the psychosocial and behavioral aspects of cancer. McCorkle, who is the first nurse to receive this award, commented, "Very few nurses participate in this area; most experts come mainly from psychiatry, psychology, and social work." A pioneer in oncology nursing, McCorkle has spent 25 years researching the role of nurses in improving clinical outcomes in psychosocial oncology, and is the first Florence Schorske Wald Professor at YSN, named for the former dean and founder of hospice in the United States. For more information, please visit http://nursing.yale.edu/News/Features/mccorkle-ipos.html.

School of Public Health
Paul D. Cleary, Dean
http://publichealth.yale.edu

Overdose deaths widespread in Connecticut

More than 2,200 people have died in Connecticut from opioid overdoses in the past 11 years -- an average of more than one every other day -- according to a survey of state medical records by the Yale School of Public Health (YSPH). The study results show that even in an affluent state like Connecticut, death from opioid overdose is a widespread problem that is not limited to inner cities.

Scrutiny of records at the office of the chief medical examiner found that only 22 of Connecticut's 169 towns did not have a reported overdose death during this period and that there was a surprisingly high prevalence of overdose deaths in parts of Litchfield, Middlesex, and Windham counties, as well as in the state's major urban centers. "The findings illustrate the need for educational programs and active intervention to prevent and respond to opioid overdoses," said Robert Heimer ’88PhD, a YSPH professor and the study's lead investigator.

Health map of New Haven neighborhoods created

In an effort to battle chronic diseases in New Haven, six of the Elm City's neighborhoods were mapped last summer to identify factors that are healthy or unhealthy in the city. The "asset mapping" is the first phase of a larger, long-term research project, spearheaded locally by CARE: Community Alliance for Research and Engagement at Yale University, to reverse chronic disease trends and promote a healthier city. CARE's director is YSPH professor Jeannette Ickovics. The mapping project pinpoints healthy neighborhood resources -- such as parks, certain food vendors, and fitness centers -- as well as unhealthy features like fast food restaurants and polluted sites. Once the health map is complete, city residents in the same neighborhoods will be surveyed about their existing health and health habits, and proposals will be suggested to reverse disease trends.

Lyme bacterium, once nearly eradicated, rebounded with forests

In post-colonial America, Lyme disease was isolated to a few islands along the Northeast coast and pockets in Wisconsin and Minnesota. But a new genetic analysis of the Lyme bacterium by Yale researchers shows that the tick-borne disease roared back after reforestation in this part of the country.

The findings, reported recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, show that Lyme spread from the Northeast to the Midwest thousands of years ago. Deforestation eliminated the deer that host Lyme-carrying ticks, and the range of the disease was dramatically decreased. "The current epidemic of Lyme disease is the result of infected ticks expanding their range independently from these isolated refuges," said Durland Fish, professor of epidemiology and the paper's senior author.