0 Traditional bonfire sparks Princeton spirit

Flames from a bonfire on Cannon Green rise skyward on Saturday night, Nov. 17, as Princetonians celebrated dual football victories over Harvard and Yale. Supervised by firefighters, students assembled a pyre of wood pallets and topped it with an outhouse, all of which was torched as students, alumni and friends cheered.

?

Photo by John Jameson

? Posted November 18, 2012; 05:00 p.m.by Emily Aronson, Office of Communications

Princeton students, faculty, staff and alumni celebrated the University's achievement in football this fall with a traditional bonfire on Cannon Green on Saturday, Nov. 17.

The bonfire, a campus custom dating to the late 1800s, is now observed when Princeton sweeps Harvard and Yale in football. This year, the University celebrated Tiger football's come-from-behind 39-34 victory over Harvard on Oct. 20 and its 29-7 defeat of Yale on Nov. 10.

"I want to thank everyone who is part of Princeton football. This is a great tradition and this year this team gave us a game that will go down in the history books," President Shirley M. Tilghman said before the start of the bonfire, referring to Princeton's fourth quarter stunner against Harvard.

Prior to Saturday, Tigers last gathered around a campus bonfire in 2006. Before that, the flame was last kindled in 1994.

The Undergraduate Student Government and four undergraduate class governments sponsored this year's bonfire. In addition to raising the spirits of the University community, the event also raised money for victims of Hurricane Sandy, which devastated parts of the Northeast last month. Student government leaders plan to donate all proceeds from the sale of commemorative bonfire T-shifts and posters to hurricane relief efforts.

According to University lore, the first reported instances of sanctioned bonfires at Princeton were to celebrate victories in baseball, not football. As football gained in popularity and as games with Harvard and Yale started taking place each year, the bonfire came to symbolize the capture of the mythical award, The Big Three title. The first year Princeton beat both Harvard and Yale was 1878, according to "A Princeton Companion."

Photos and videos of bonfire revelry through the years are available online through University Archives at Mudd Manuscript Library.

Preparations for the 2012 bonfire began early Saturday morning, as the freshman, sophomore, junior and senior classes worked in shifts to build a tower of wood pallets in the middle of Cannon Green. Student groups also made effigies of John Harvard and a Yale bulldog, as well as a traditional wooden outhouse, to be burned with the blaze. The University fire marshal, carpentry shop and the Princeton Fire Deparment oversaw construction.

As night fell, crowds gathered around the pyre for remarks from Tilghman, Bob Surace, the Charles W. Caldwell Jr. '25 Head Coach of Football, as well representatives from the football team and student government. And then, with the help of the Princeton Fire Department, the flame was lit and the dark sky set aglow.

After enjoying the warmth of the fire, the music of the Princeton University Band and camaraderie of the gathering, the large group sang "Old Nassau" before the fire department extinguished the flames.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 'Family' dinner brings University and community together

Princeton resident Joanne Rogers passes a bowl of salad to Princeton University junior Christina Healy during a recent community dinner, dubbed D?ner Inn Blanc, on Oct. 25. More than 350 white-clad University students and local residents attended the event outside Robertson Hall as a way to bring "town" and "gown" together informally over a meal. The dinner's name was an homage to outdoor dining events started in Paris and Forbes College's previous incarnation as the Princeton Inn.

?

Photos by Denise Applewhite

?

?

? Posted November 8, 2012; 12:00 p.m.by Emily Aronson, Office of Communications

On a recent fall evening illuminated by soft lights strung across Scudder Plaza, more than 350 Princeton University students and community members wearing white sat around long, linen-covered tables outside Robertson Hall. The gathering's purpose was simple: to bring "town" and "gown" together over dinner.

The Oct. 25 event, dubbed "D?ner Inn Blanc," was sponsored by the University's Office of Community and Regional Affairs, Forbes College, Dining Services and Facilities Organization, in partnership with Corner House, a nonprofit prevention, education and substance abuse treatment center in Princeton.

"The idea is to get the campus and community to sit down and have a common meal," Director of Community and Regional Affairs Kristin Appelget said.

While the links between the University and its neighbors are many, such as the annual Communiversity festival and student groups who volunteer locally, D?ner Inn Blanc was an informal way for people of different backgrounds to strike up conversations and get to know each other.

"The evening was a more intimate atmosphere. This was an intentional and personal way for students to meet people in town and vice versa," Appelget said. "We hope it also was an opportunity to create new connections between students and local families."

The event was an extension of Corner House's family dinner initiative, with the center opening registration to residents on a first come, first served basis. The name D?ner Inn Blanc was an homage to outdoor dinners en masse started in Paris and Forbes College's previous incarnation as the Princeton Inn.

Part feast and part flash mob, attendees were notified of the meal's location just a few hours beforehand by email and text message. The Forbes College dining hall closed for the night, and as the clock neared 6 p.m., students from the residential college and community members streamed into the plaza by foot to mingle and eat alfresco as the sun set.

Bainy Suri, who has lived in Princeton for two years, said she loves being in a college town and wishes she had more opportunities to meet students.

"Princeton University attracts some of the brightest young people in the country and there is a wonderful youthful energy here," Suri said. "I loved the evening. It was a win-win situation to come and eat dinner and talk with some of the leaders of our future. The Princeton students are as charming as I thought they would be."

A few tables away, sophomores Hanna Kim and Sam Lichtenberg shared laughs with Jack, 10, Andrew, 9, and Zander, 7. The group talked about their favorite school subjects, favorite vegetables and love for "The Magic School Bus" children's book series.

"This is a really great University initiative to help students meet people outside of the so-called 'Orange Bubble,'" Kim said.

Lichtenberg said it was a happy diversion.

"You often can get lost in your own student world, so it's really nice to have an excuse to go out for the evening and talk with young kids and families. This dinner is definitely something different," Lichtenberg said.

His new friends agreed.

"Tonight's fun because it's a change," Andrew said.

"It would be great to be a student here. They all seem very nice," Jack added.

As she watched her children run around the Scudder Plaza Fountain, Heather Kisilywicz said she valued the simple spirit of the evening.

"We live near campus, so we've enjoyed sitting down with some of the familiar student faces," she said. "It's nice because the event is just about dinner — there's nothing involved except enjoying each other's company."

That is exactly why Corner House promotes family dinners in the community, said co-organizer Janet Giles. She added that the idea is based on research that children who have regular family meals are less likely to engage in risky behavior such as drinking alcohol or doing drugs.

"Dinner does not have to be what it looks like in Norman Rockwell paintings. The point really is just to sit down with your family, whomever that may be, and learn something about each other," said Giles, a member of the Corner House Foundation Board.

Looking over plates piled with tomato and cucumber salad, roasted fall vegetables and rotisserie-style baked chicken, Director of Dining Services Stu Orefice said he jumped at the chance to be part of the event.

"The evening is about building relationships with the community, providing an atmosphere where you can have great conversations over a nice meal, and showcasing Dining Services' partnerships with local food purveyors," he said, as student musical groups serenaded dinner guests in the background.

In addition to the fare prepared by Dining Services, Terra Momo Bread Company, Bent Spoon ice cream, Infini T Caf? and Spice Souk, and the Princeton School Gardens Cooperative donated items for the meal.

Michael Hecht, professor of chemistry and master of Forbes College, said the evening also was an occasion for fun during a busy midterm week.

"Forbes is a very tight-knit residential college community. This is a chance for everyone to have a great time and a great meal," Hecht said.

Students often stay on campus because everything they need or want is right here, said freshman Julia Langer, so the dinner was an easy way to meet people who live nearby.

As a Princeton resident and University freshman, Sam Dercon said he appreciated D?ner Inn Blanc from both perspectives.

"I can't remember having an event like this when I was a kid in town," Dercon said. "It's great for the students and the families to come together on such a large scale."

Bethany Andrade, women's outreach coordinator at Corner House, said she was thrilled with how the evening turned out.

"We are grateful for this partnership with the University," she said. "It really was just a wonderful opportunity for people to come together to eat, to talk, to laugh and to share."

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Two millennia of poetry, 'making a statement' in the 21st century

Posted September 26, 2012; 03:07 p.m.by Jamie Saxon, Office of Communications

If Sandra Bermann, Princeton's Cotsen Professor of the Humanities and professor of comparative literature, had to pick her favorite love poetry, it would be Shakespeare's sonnets. "I have loved them the most over the longest time for the range of emotion, theme and wit they reveal," she said. "Among those 154 poems, Sonnet 116, 'Let me not to the marriage of true minds,' still speaks to me with particular power."

Bermann, who enjoys reading love poetry "from as many parts of the planet as possible," had plenty of time to immerse herself not only in Shakespeare's sonnets, but also in the entire history of love poetry, in order to write a completely reconceived entry on the subject for the Princeton University Press' new edition of "The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics," edited by Roland Greene and Stephen Cushman.

Bermann is one of 11 Princeton professors — among hundreds of contributors from all over the world — who wrote entries for the revision, only the fourth in more than four decades.

Peter Dougherty, director of Princeton University Press, which published the first edition in 1965, likened the job to "renovating a cathedral." The third edition was published nearly 20 years ago and the completion of the fourth edition — a slim 1,664 pages — has taken six years. "The new edition is considered a singular event in the humanities. It represents a statement of where the fields of poetry and literature are in the 21st century," Dougherty said.

Princeton poet Susan Stewart, the Avalon Foundation University Professor in the Humanities, calls the book "a compendium of all culture."

When Bermann set out to write her entry, she knew she would have to decide carefully what to include in her 6,000-word essay. "Since there is no way to detail all the many sorts of love poetry that have existed across the globe from earliest times to the present, I decided to offer some broader conceptions of the genre, as well as a number of more localized conventions, themes and examples. I wanted the piece to be informative and intriguing, encouraging the reader to explore this delightful topic independently," she said.

A "trailer" for her entry might be pulled from the thematic overview section, which begins: "Love poetry imaginatively presents the vicissitudes of that human emotion we call love. But what is love? Is it sexual pleasure, passionate desire, religious enlightenment, joyful connection to another, a painful disruption and reconstruction of self, or a cherishing of another human being? Is it idealized or sexual, public or private, a sickness unto death or an exhilarating rebirth of the mind and the senses? If we are to believe the poets, it is all of these and more."

Martin Kern, a professor of East Asian studies, wrote one of the 250 new entries, out of more than 1,100 in the book. An expert in ancient Chinese literature, Kern wrote on the Chuci ("Lyrics of Chu"), an anthology of southern Chinese poetry that contains songs from the third century B.C.E. through the second century C.E. and is one of the two principal sources of ancient Chinese poetry.

"Adding an entry on the ancient 'Lyrics of Chu' strikes me as utterly meaningful," Kern said. "For the last two millennia the Chuci — a poetry of spectacular beauty and sophistication that speaks inexhaustibly to the human condition — has exerted enormous influence on the literatures not only of China but of East Asia altogether."

Other Princeton professors who contributed to the book are (their entries appear in parentheses):

• Margaret Beissinger, research scholar and lecturer, Slavic languages and literatures (oral poetry; Romani poetry);
• Claudia Brodsky, professor of comparative literature (romantic and postromantic poetry and poetics);
• Jeff Dolven, associate professor of English (Spenserian stanza; style);
• Sophie Gee, associate professor of English (bathos);
• Meredith Martin, associate professor of English (estampida, ploce, prose rhythm, quatrain, quintain);
• Fran?ois Rigolot, the Meredith Howland Pyne Professor of French Literature (Pl?iade);
• Michael Wachtel, professor and chair of Slavic languages and literatures (symbolism);
• Susan Wolfson, professor of English (form); and
• Eliza Zingesser, a graduate student in the Department of French and Italian (dit; planctus).

"The new edition incorporates a vast array of new knowledge from cultures around the world — especially emerging nations — and from new forms of expression," Dougherty said.

One of those new forms is electronic poetry, also called e-poetry and digital poetry, which, the entry explains, is created "using personal computers as platforms for compositions intended to be encountered and experienced in native digital format…. Electronic poems typically include one or more of the following: multimedia, animation, sound effects or soundtracks, reader interaction in the form of choices or other participatory features, and automated behaviors."

Another new entry is poetry slam, "A contest in which poets compete against each other with judges (chosen at random from the audience) assigning a score to each performance on a scale of one to 10 to determine the winner."

"The team of editors carefully evaluated what to keep, what to drop and what to add or change to make the book even more useful to 21st-century readers," said Anne Savarese, executive editor, reference, at Princeton University Press, who served as the acquiring editor for the new edition.

The revised encyclopedia now includes articles on the poetries of more than 110 nations, regions and languages, with expanded coverage of poetries of the non-Western and developing worlds. "Poetry is a profoundly global art form, and the new edition captures the excitement of this worldwide phenomenon," Dougherty said.
?

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 University assists first responders, area residents after Hurricane Sandy

Posted November 8, 2012; 07:01 a.m.by Office of Communications

As Princeton Borough and Princeton Township started recovering from the havoc caused by Hurricane Sandy, about 150 first responders working during the storm were provided with free meals by the University's Dining Services. Local residents whose homes lost power were invited to warm up, recharge phones and other electronic devices and use wireless Internet service at a hospitality center on campus.

The hospitality center, which was opened at the request of the Princeton municipal emergency operations center, "was just one of a number of ways that the University looked to provide resources to the community during the emergency," said Kristin Appelget, the University's director of community and regional affairs.

The University also offered a heavy duty electricity generator for use by Princeton municipal authorities if necessary.

Students affiliated with the University's Pace Center for Civic Engagement also volunteered at a community respite center at the John Witherspoon Middle School, where Princeton residents who lost power during Hurricane Sandy were able to take showers, charge electronic devices, get food and stay overnight.

The University's TigerTransit system provided free shuttle bus service between Princeton Junction station and the Princeton station while the "Dinky" train service was suspended in the aftermath of the storm. The TigerTransit service continued until New Jersey Transit began running shuttle buses on the route.

The University, which also lost power from the public electricity provider, had to shut down many administrative and academic buildings and run critical functions on limited power from the University's independent cogeneration plant for more than 24 hours. The plant can generate 13 megawatts of electricity, which is significantly less than the maximum campus demand when all buildings are fully operational.

However, University buildings that depend solely on electric power from the public grid remained without power for extended periods of time, and power was not restored to some University housing until Monday, Nov. 5.

Due to continued power outages in the Princeton area, several polling stations were relocated to the University’s Computer Science Building on Olden Street and the University's Jadwin Gym, where a large section of the parking area was reserved for voters. More than 3,400 voters from municipal districts 1, 2, 4, 14, 15, 16 and 20 cast their votes on campus on Nov. 6.

The meals for the first responders, students who remained on campus during fall recess and employees on duty were prepared and served by a small team of Dining Services employees who were able to make it to work.

"We always use the phrase, 'it's all about food, mood and attitude,'" said Stu Orefice, executive director of Dining Services. "Despite the challenges that they faced, our staff maintained a positive attitude, and our goal was to share that spirit through our service."

Orefice continued working even though his own house was badly damaged by the storm.

"We were operating with a lean but dedicated team that made literally hundreds of people happy — by serving nearly 9,000 hot and cold meals over five days," he said. "When Frist Campus Center opened its doors on Wednesday, not many restaurants in town were open, so members of the Princeton community started coming in, and we were selling as much as we do when all our students are back."

Elsewhere on campus, hundreds of employees, many of whom were unable to reach their homes, worked in shifts to keep critical University functions running. The storm felled about 110 trees, which blocked roads and damaged vehicles, fences and other property. No injuries were reported.

Throughout the storm the University coordinated its efforts with a joint emergency operations center for Princeton Borough and Princeton Township.

The University's response to the hurricane was coordinated through an emergency operations center on campus, which was staffed by representatives from the Department of Public Safety, Facilities, Dining Services, University Services, Office of Information Technology (OIT), Office of Environmental Health and Safety, University Health Services, Campus Life, Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students, Office of the Dean of the Graduate School, Office of Human Resources, and Office of Communications, among others.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 FACULTY AWARD: Nineteen Princeton professors named inaugural AMS Fellows

Posted November 7, 2012; 10:00 a.m.by Staff

The American Mathematical Society selected 19 Princeton professors to be among its inaugural class of Fellows. The class includes 1,119 researchers from more than 600 institutions worldwide.

The inducteees from Princeton are: Michael Aizenman, professor of physics and mathematics; Manjul Bhargava, the Brandon Fradd, Class of 1983, Professor of Mathematics; Peter Constantin, the William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Mathematics and Applied and Computational Mathematics; Weinan E, professor of mathematics and applied and computational mathematics; David Gabai, chair and Hughes-Rogers Professor of Mathematics; Robert Gunning, professor of mathematics; Philip Holmes, the Eugene Higgins Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering; Joseph Kohn, professor of mathematics, emeritus; Janos Kollar, the Donner Professor of Science and professor of mathematics; Elliot Lieb, the Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics; William Massey, the Edwin S. Wilsey Professor of Operations Research and Financial Engineering; John Moore, professor of mathematics, emeritus; John Nash Jr., senior research mathematician; Edward Nelson, professor of mathematics; Yakov Sinai, professor of mathematics; Christopher Skinner, the Henry Buchard Fine Professor of Mathematics; Elias Stein, the Albert Baldwin Dod Professor of Mathematics, Emeritus, and lecturer with the rank of professor in mathematics; Anna Wienhard, assistant professor of mathematics; and Paul Yang, professor of mathematics.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 FACULTY AWARD: Llinás receives Gates Foundation grant

Posted November 6, 2012; 04:30 p.m.by Staff

Manuel Llin?s, an associate professor of molecular biology and the Lewis-Sigler Institute for Integrative Genomics, received a Grand Challenges Explorations Round 9 grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to seek more effective malaria drugs. Llin?s was among more than 80 recipients of the award, which includes an initial grant of $100,000 with a potential follow-on grant of up to $1 million.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 STORY: Fired up! Schedule for bonfire

(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1&appId=238312316239555"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));Skip over navigation?View Access Keys

Mudd Manuscript Library's archives include the construction of the "Championship Fire of 1901."

? Posted November 17, 2012; 06:18 a.m.by Staff

A traditional campus bonfire to celebrate the Princeton football team's wins over Harvard and Yale this season will be held at 7?p.m. Saturday, Nov. 17, on Cannon Green. The bonfire festivities also will be webcast live on the Office of the Dean of Undergraduate Students website. The Undergraduate Student Government and the four undergraduate class governments are sponsoring the event. Commemorative T-shirts and posters also will be sold at the bonfire, with proceeds benefitting Hurricane Sandy relief efforts.

Also, the Princeton football team hosts Dartmouth at 1 p.m. Saturday. Visit Princeton Athletics for details.

Read more:

Each class assists with the construction of the bonfire. Breakfast is included for students:

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 University thanks alumni and friends for Aspire's success

President Shirley M. Tilghman welcomes more than 1,000 alumni and friends to the Oct. 19 Aspire "thank you" celebration in Jadwin Gymnasium, noting that their contributions to the recently concluded fundraising campaign "helped to ensure that future generations of Princetonians will continue to receive the finest education of its kind." Many others joined the event via the Internet through live streaming.

?

Photos by Kevin Birch

?

"Princeton Is the Place" videos show Aspire's impact on international, arts and engineering initiatives.

? Posted October 22, 2012; 03:30 p.m.by the Office of Development Communications

Princeton University expressed its gratitude to more than 1,000 alumni and friends who contributed to the success of its recent fundraising campaign on Friday night by showcasing Aspire's impact.

The Oct. 19 "thank you" celebration, which took place in a transformed Jadwin Gymnasium, combined multimedia presentations with speeches and performances. A pair of 60-by-30-foot screens displayed images and video of programs and facilities that have been enhanced by the campaign, including recorded messages from Bridge Year students as they began their year of service abroad. On a stage in front of the screens, artists performed, Princeton faculty and researchers — including undergraduates — described their work, and alumni and students spoke of the ways in which the University has touched their lives.

President Shirley M. Tilghman, who served as emcee for the evening, told those attending in person and via the Internet through live streaming, "Together, you have helped to ensure that future generations of Princetonians will continue to receive the finest education of its kind and, thus equipped, will continue to make our world a better place for all."?

The five-year campaign ended on June 30 after raising $1.88 billion, exceeding its goal of $1.75 billion. More than 65,000 donors — including more than 77 percent of all undergraduate alumni — contributed 271,559 separate gifts.

Aspire's areas of priority were Annual Giving, which provides unrestricted funds that the University can use immediately in the areas of greatest need and that typically provide significant support to the financial aid program; neuroscience; engineering and the environment; the arts; global initiatives; and "the Princeton experience," which encompasses all aspects of teaching, learning and campus life.

Speakers during the evening included international business executive Gerhard Andlinger of the Class of 1952, whose 2008 gift created the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment. He told of arriving in Princeton from war-torn Europe and finding a wealth of support and opportunities as a scholarship student at the University. Leslie-Bernard Joseph of the Class of 2006, a former Teach for America corps member who is now a student at Stanford Law School, and senior Brittany Sanders also shared personal stories of their Princeton experiences.?

Lively performances throughout the evening featured the Princeton University Band; the breakdancing group Sympoh; Princeton Bhangra, which performed a South Asian folk dance; and the Triangle Club. Professional dancers Silas Riener of the Class of 2006 and Sydney Schiff of the Class of 2010 performed an original interpretive piece, accompanied by the Princeton University Orchestra conducted by Michael Pratt.

The program also showcased innovations in neuroscience and engineering. Jonathan Cohen, the Robert Bendheim and Lynn Bendheim Thoman Professor in Neuroscience and founding co-director of the Princeton Neuroscience Institute, presided over an experiment in which the audience saw the real-time brain activity of Research Specialist Jessica Jones as she viewed photos and live video from the event, while inside an fMRI scanner at another location on campus. Naveen Verma, assistant professor of electrical engineering, and Alexandra Landon and Eric Kuto, both of the Class of 2012, described their novel research projects.

The evening concluded with several student a cappella groups leading the crowd in "Old Nassau," Princeton's anthem. The students then launched orange and silver streamers into the crowd while the "Cannon Song" played and photos of alumni, parents and friends appeared on the screens.

During the event, campaign co-chairs Robert Murley of the Class of 1972 and Nancy Peretsman of the Class of 1976 presented Tilghman with a box containing an "honor roll" — the names of all 65,120 donors to the campaign. A final report about the campaign is available online.

The festive evening was the culmination of a day of gatherings on campus sponsored by the Office of Development and the Alumni Association. Visiting alumni, parents and friends could choose to attend panel discussions and workshops led by faculty members and alumni. Panelists included Eric Schmidt of the Class of 1976, executive chairman of Google Inc.; Nobel laureate Paul Krugman, professor of economics and international affairs; and former Secretary of State George Shultz of the Class of 1942.

Activities concluded on Saturday with a panel discussion, the Tiger Tailgate and Princeton football's 39-34 victory over Harvard.

Tilghman now will travel around the country and abroad to thank donors at events in seven U.S. cities, Hong Kong and London.

?

?

?

?

?

?

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Hurricane relief efforts being organized at Princeton

Posted November 6, 2012; 04:55 p.m.by Emily Aronson, Office of Communications

As communities across the East Coast continue to recover from Hurricane Sandy, Princeton University faculty, staff and students are helping organize relief efforts for affected individuals.

A Hurricane Sandy supplies drive will collect nonperishable food, clothing, blankets and other items through Nov. 16. Donation bins are located at: the Center for Jewish Life; Dillon Gym; Engineering Quad, Room 232; Frist Campus Center; Murray-Dodge Hall; Maclean House; 200 Elm; the residential college dining halls; and the laundry rooms inside Spelman, Patton and Dod halls. Supplies will be delivered throughout Princeton, Trenton and Keyport, N.J., as well as Staten Island, N.Y.

The Pace Center for Civic Engagement is working with various University offices and community groups to coordinate student volunteer opportunities. Students may visit the Pace Center website or Princeton University "Sandy Relief" Facebook group for information on how they may help storm-ravaged areas as it becomes available. Student organizations also may contact the Pace Center if they are interested in organizing hurricane aid events on campus.

In addition to aiding nearby communities, the University also is assisting faculty and staff affected by the hurricane. The Office of Human Resources is a resource for employees seeking assistance for such issues as displacement from their homes, financial hardships due to the storm, assistance with child or elder care, or concerns about medical insurance. For more information, employees should contact 609-258-3300 or hr@princeton.edu.

Updates will be posted on individual department websites as more efforts and events are organized.
?

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Quick, high-volume test offers fast track in search for Alzheimer's drugs

Posted November 15, 2012; 12:30 p.m.by Morgan Kelly, Office of Communications

An efficient, high-volume technique for testing potential drug treatments for Alzheimer's disease uncovered an organic compound that restored motor function and longevity to fruit flies with the disease, according to new research that could help put the search for an effective Alzheimer's drug on a faster track.

Princeton University researchers report in the Journal of Biological Chemistry that they discovered an organic compound that prevented the formation of protein clumps, or aggregates, found on human brain cells afflicted by Alzheimer's disease. The researchers realized the compound's potential via a high-throughput — meaning many materials can be examined at once — screening process developed at Princeton that examined the ability of 65,000 molecular compounds to inhibit protein aggregation.

When administered to fruit flies bred to exhibit Alzheimer's-like symptoms, the compound — which the researchers call D737 — restored climbing ability and increased the flies' lifespan by several days in comparison to flies that did not receive the compound, the researchers reported.

The compound worked by stopping the accumulation of a peptide known as amyloid beta 42 (Aß42), which disrupts cell function, is found in high quantities in Alzheimer's plaques, and is thought to initiate the disease's characteristic neural deterioration. The fruit flies were genetically engineered at the University of Cambridge to have human Aß42 collect in their neurons. As in humans, this accumulation results in memory and mobility loss, disorientation and early death.

Senior researcher Michael Hecht, a Princeton professor of chemistry, said the findings demonstrate a quick and efficient screening method that could help in the search for a medicinal defense against Alzheimer's. Currently, he said, the disease's proliferation in an aging population has outpaced the success of efforts to develop a treatment for it.

"As the population ages, Alzheimer's is the big disease," Hecht said. "There are drugs to control symptoms, but nothing to treat the disease itself. One approach could be to control peptide aggregation as we have done, but the compounds tested so far often fail.

"Our technique would allow scientists to create an artificial genetic system, examine it with a high-throughput screen and find whether it works," Hecht said. "From that they can fish out the best results and test them in other models."

Furthermore, an effective compound such as D737 can reveal information about Aß42's structure that can be used to formulate other treatments, said lead author Angela Fortner McKoy, a postdoctoral researcher at Rutgers University who received her Ph.D. in chemistry from Princeton in 2011. Fortner McKoy and Hecht worked with second author Jermont Chen, who earned his Ph.D. in chemistry from Princeton in 2008, and Trudi Sch?pbach, the Henry Fairfield Osborn Professor of Biology.

The Princeton researchers used a screening process developed in the Hecht lab to specifically identify Aß42 aggregation. First reported in the journal ACS Chemical Biology in 2006, the technique hinges on a fusion of Aß42 and green fluorescent protein — which glows under ultraviolet light and is found in animals such as jellyfish — that is expressed in the bacteria E. coli. The fluorescent protein does not glow when Aß42 is able to aggregate. When a compound such as D737 inhibits peptide clumping, however, the E. coli bacterium appears bright green. The efficiency of the screening system stems from the relative simplicity of attaining and working with E. coli, a standard laboratory bacterium, Hecht said.

For the current research, Hecht and his co-authors examined 65,000 randomly chosen organic compounds that Chen acquired from the Broad Institute of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University. The technique revealed 269 compounds that halted the buildup of Aß42 aggregates. Of those, Fortner McKoy selected the eight most readily available for further testing. Fortner McKoy found that D737 best prevented the accumulation of Aß42 and reduced mortality in cell cultures. In addition, the researchers found that the compound reduced the production and accumulation of reactive oxygen species, which damage cells.

The researchers then tested the compound on healthy fruit flies with no Aß42 accumulation, as well as on flies with a regular human-form Aß42 gene and flies with a mutant gene — which is found in some humans with Alzheimer's — that causes extra buildup of the peptide. For each of these three fly types, one group of flies did not receive D737 while another group was given the compound in concentrations of 2, 20 or 200 micromolar.

In the flies with regular and accelerated Aß42 buildup, those receiving D737 lived an average of four to six days longer than similarly altered flies that were not fed the compound. The healthy fruit flies that received D737 showed no change in lifespan, demonstrating that the compound is non-toxic in fruit flies, Hecht said.

To test mobility, the researchers put 20 flies from both of the genetically altered groups into the bottom of a vial and recorded how many had climbed to the top. After 38 days, only 6 percent of untreated flies with normal Aß42 accumulation could climb, as opposed to as many as 34 percent of the flies receiving D737.

In flies with the mutant Aß42 gene, all those left untreated lost mobility after 27 days. Of those given the compound, however, 50 to 78 percent — depending on the dosage — could still climb after the same time period.

Damian Crowther, a group leader in the Department of Genetics at Cambridge who created and supplied the flies used in the Princeton research but had no active role in the work, said that D737 demonstrated a notable ability to suppress in fruit flies the same neurological, physical and mental deficits seen in humans with Alzheimer's.

"It's not common to see such a strong effect in the fly model. Of the compounds that my lab tests, which have been through rigorous in vitro screening, we see effects as good as this in only 5 to 10 percent," Crowther said. "To find that a compound administered orally is able to show beneficial effects on both of these fly phenotypes indicates that the drug can access the neurons and, once within the brain, presumably control the aggregation of amyloid beta peptides."

Crowther said the Princeton research further supports the approach of curbing the buildup of Aß42 and related variants of the amyloid beta peptide to treat Alzheimer's. In the middle stages of accumulation, variations of the peptide can be highly toxic to neurons and kill them, he said. But the work by Hecht and his co-authors helps show that blocking amyloid-beta aggregation can be safe and potent.

"There is always a worry when looking for aggregation-blocking agents that the aggregation process may be interrupted at the wrong point," Crowther said.

"Further work should try to characterize in an in vivo system exactly where this compound halts or modifies the aggregation process," he said.?"For a beneficial effect we don't need to completely block aggregation — indeed, amyloid formation is a thermodynamically inevitable process. It could be that the compound simply modulates the aggregation process so that the most toxic intermediates are less populated."

Although the compound's success in flies would not necessarily translate to humans, Fortner McKoy said, its effectiveness illustrates that worthwhile treatment candidates can be uncovered with the Princeton screening method.

"It inhibited the peptide aggregation effectively enough so that we could see an improvement in the flies," Fortner McKoy said. "In general, a compound like this would be further developed and changes would be made to it to test its efficacy in humans. But the fly results show that it is worth testing this compound in another model."

The paper, "A novel inhibitor of Aß peptide aggregation: From high throughput screening to efficacy in an animal model for Alzheimer's disease," was published Nov. 9 in the Journal of Biological Chemistry. The research was funded by grants from the Alzheimer's Association, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the National Institutes of Health.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Princeton endowment earns 3.1 percent return, boosts 10-year average

Posted October 19, 2012; 03:00 p.m.by Martin Mbugua, Office of Communications

In the fiscal year that ended June 30, 2012, Princeton University's endowment earned a 3.1 percent investment gain, raising the 10-year annualized return to 9.9 percent. The endowment value stood at $17.0 billion, a decrease of about $100 million from the year before. The decrease in market value was primarily due to University spending from the endowment that exceeded investment gains.

The Princeton University Investment Co. (PRINCO), the University office that manages the University's endowment, certified the results at its directors meeting on Oct. 18, 2012.

The 10-year average return on the endowment places the endowment among the top percentile of 294 institutions reporting to the Trust Universe Comparison Service.

"Despite the extreme market volatility of the past decade, PRINCO’s excellent stewardship of the endowment has generated significant growth and ensured that the University can successfully pursue its key priorities. We have maintained our commitment to generous financial aid, supported superb teaching and world-class research, and attracted excellent faculty and staff," Princeton University Provost Christopher Eisgruber said.

The University increased the financial aid budget for the 2012-13 fiscal year by 5.6 percent to $116 million, continuing a trend in which Princeton's scholarship spending has outpaced fee increases for a decade. As a result, the average "net cost" for Princeton students today is lower than it was in 2001, even before adjusting for inflation. About 60 percent of undergraduates receive financial aid in the form of grants that do not have to be repaid, making it possible for them to graduate debt free, Eisgruber said.

"As a result of the endowment’s performance over the last three years, the loyalty of our alumni and friends, and the budget discipline of managers throughout the campus, Princeton has successfully rebaselined its budget in the wake of the market losses we experienced four years ago. We are pleased that we were able to achieve this result while continuing to provide our students with the generous financial aid that enables them to graduate from Princeton with little or no debt," Eisgruber said.

Eisgruber said that the University’s spend rate of 4.4 percent of the market value of the endowment in fiscal year 2012 was well within the spending policy that aims for spending between 4 percent and 5.75 percent. The spend rate for the current fiscal year is expected to rise to approximately 4.7 percent.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Video feature: 'French Theater: Behind the Scenes'

Princeton students interested in developing their French and dramatic skills may decide to enroll in the French Theater Workshop, with the potential of joining the troupe L'Avant-Sc?ne. Both under the direction of Florent Masse, a senior lecturer in the Department of French and Italian, students learn and perform a range of French plays. Above: Juniors Dayna Li (left) and Olivia Nice note that the variety of the material and the deep immersion in rehearsing dialogue and pronunciation are hallmarks of learning about French theater at Princeton.

?

Video stills courtesy of Evelyn Tu

? Posted November 5, 2012; 12:00 p.m.by Nick Barberio and Karin Dienst, Office of Communications

The stage is a classroom for Princeton students honing their skills in French and acting. Since 2001, students have developed their fascination for French language and culture by learning and performing classic French plays under the guidance of Florent Masse, a senior lecturer in the Department of French and Italian.?

Annually, about 18 students participate in L'Avant-Sc?ne, a troupe that focuses on linguistic as well as dramatic training, culminating in the public performance of full-length plays from the French canon.

Students from the troupe often also are enrolled in the French Theater Workshop (FRE 211), an academic course that provides approximately 16 advanced-level students in French with performance-quality training in the language. The workshop serves as a steppingstone to students interested in joining L'Avant-Sc?ne.

This video gives a behind-the-scenes look at students involved in French theater as they rehearse dialogue and practice their pronunciation.

Masse said students are attracted to the French workshops from academic fields across the University and from a range of backgrounds. He noted that about a third of the students are from countries other than the United States.

About his training method, Masse said: "First I make sure the students master the pronunciation of the texts, and fully understand them. Then we move on to the acting part. The more prepared they are linguistically before taking the stage, the better it is."

Students have a rigorous rehearsal schedule, which includes individual training with Masse. The students often rehearse in pairs, which allows for intense practice in dialogue. As the performers recite lines, Masse observes and follows the scenes of each play, occasionally interjecting to correct pronunciation.

Senior Christina Bott said the French workshop, which she took her first year at Princeton, was one of her "favorite courses," and she "loved every second of it." A French major, she now performs with L'Avant-Sc?ne.?

"Florent really takes the time to work with each student individually," Bott said. "You learn about the intricacy of language and just how important pronunciation is."

She added, "French theater is much more about the text and a lot less about what you're doing with your arms, and all that jazz, which took a lot for me to learn."?

The repertoire of plays the students learn is expansive. They have performed works by 17th-century playwrights Moli?re and Racine; by the Belle ?poque playwright Georges Feydeau; by 20th-century playwright Eug?ne Ionesco; and "Incendies" by contemporary playwright Wajdi Mouawad, among others.

The students perform across campus to audiences Masse said are "very attentive," hailing from the University as well as from francophone communities in New Jersey and New York. The students have acted in theaters in the residential colleges, outside in the Butler College amphitheater and in Rockefeller College's Holder Court, as well as in the Chancellor Green Rotunda and the Princeton University Art Museum.?

Farther afield, a highlight for members of L'Avant-Sc?ne is the opportunity to participate in one trip to Paris. During the eight-day trip over intersession, students attend a play every night and take acting and directing classes at the Paris National Conservatory for Dramatic Arts. The trip is supported by the Department of French and Italian, the David A. Gardner '69 Magic Project, the Lewis Center for the Arts, the Center for French Studies, and the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies.?

Students also may have the opportunity to work with practicing French artists at Princeton. This term, they are benefiting from the visit to campus of Com?die Fran?aise actor Guillaume Gallienne, who is a short-term vising fellow at the Council of the Humanities. He will participate in a public conversation with Masse in English at 4:30 p.m. on Nov. 7 and in French at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 8, both in East Pyne, Room 010.

Upcoming performances by L'Avant-Sc?ne are "Les Femmes savantes" by Moli?re on Dec. 12 at the Rocky/Mathey Theater; "Le Cid" by 17th-century playwright Pierre Corneille on Feb. 22-23 in the art museum; "Les Mamelles de Tir?sias" by early-20th-century writer Guillaume Apollinaire on April 19, location to be determined; and "Partage de midi" by 20th-century author Paul Claudel on May 10 in the Butler amphitheater. Admission is free but reservations are recommended.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 John Templeton Foundation grant supports Princeton neuroscientists to study cognitive control

Posted November 8, 2012; 04:00 p.m.by Catherine Zandonella, Office of the Dean for Research

Princeton neuroscientists have been awarded a $4 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation to explore how the human brain enables us to pursue goals and juggle priorities in an environment full of distractions.

The grant will fund brain imaging and other experiments aimed at discovering how the brain exerts "cognitive control" over our thoughts and behavior, keeping us on task and able to achieve long-term goals. Cognitive control is fundamental to higher-level mental activities such as planning, problem-solving and social interaction, according to project leader Jonathan Cohen, the Robert Bendheim and Lynn Bendheim Thoman Professor in Neuroscience and co-director of the Princeton Neuroscience Institute (PNI).

"Our studies will reveal how the brain accomplishes real-world tasks — everything from ignoring distractions when driving to sticking to your diet," said Cohen, whose work centers on developing theories of cognitive control as well as testing those theories using brain imaging. "This understanding may point the way to new interventions for strengthening cognitive control in healthy individuals," Cohen said, "and restoring it where it is impaired, as in neuropsychiatric disorders." 

The project will explore how parts of the brain interact to decide what goals are important and how to pursue them. In addition to using Princeton's world-class brain imaging equipment, the researchers will develop computational models of brain function, as well as new brain imaging methods tailored to studying cognitive control.

The foundation grant will support five research questions:

—How do we exert self-control over impulses, such as resisting the urge to scratch a mosquito bite or the temptation to cheat on a diet? (Led by Cohen and Matthew Botvinick, associate professor of psychology and PNI) 

—How does the brain manage and remember goals and competing subgoals? For example, if you need to study for a test, how do you decide how long to spend studying each of the particular topics that may be on the test? (Led by Botvinick and Yael Niv, assistant professor of psychology and PNI)

—What goes into prospective memory and planning? For example, how do we decide when to commit a plan to long-term memory and return to it later, rather than keep it actively in mind? (Led by Kenneth Norman, associate professor of psychology and PNI and Cohen)

—How do we balance goal-directed behavior with discovery and learning? When immersed in achieving a goal such as completing a homework assignment, how do we decide to postpone that goal in favor of exploring and learning about other things — for example, going to a seminar rather than completing the homework assignment?  (Led by Cohen and Niv)

—How can we improve on the machine-learning algorithms that take brain scans and decode what people are thinking about at a particular time? (Led by Norman and Cohen)

Support from the foundation will enable researchers to move away from simplified models of human behavior that neuroscientists use because they are relatively easier to study in the laboratory and interpret than the complicated behaviors of real life. "The grant will enable Princeton researchers to design experiments that are much closer to what goes on in the real world," Cohen said. 

The John Templeton Foundation, established in 1987, serves as a philanthropic catalyst for discoveries relating to the fundamental questions of human purpose and ultimate reality.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Program will support employees aiding hurricane relief efforts

Posted November 16, 2012; 03:36 p.m.by Office of Communications

Princeton University has established a humanitarian relief program that will allow University employees to assist ongoing relief efforts following Hurricane Sandy, which devastated parts of the Northeast in October.

The program, effective Nov. 19 through June 30, 2013, may grant regular and term employees a paid leave of up to five days while they participate in recognized relief efforts. The University recognizes that some staff members have unique skills and training that could be useful in the recovery efforts under way in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania.

In addition to granting leave time, the program will support reimbursements for transportation, accommodations and other expenses incurred by employees while they are helping relief efforts.

Among the conditions to participate, employees must get approval from their supervisor.

The Office of Human Resources website provides a complete overview of the program and eligibility requirements. Employees may also contact 609-258-3300 or hr@princeton.edu.
?

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 'Sharing the Stage: Science and Art at Princeton'

Chemistry majors Anna Wuttig and Gary Fox have immersed themselves in the arts during their time at Princeton — discovering a creative synergy between their endeavors in the lab and on the stage. Wuttig, concertmaster of Princeton University Orchestra, and Fox, who is pursuing a certificate in theater, appear in the world premiere of "Der Bourgeois Bigwig," an adaptation of the 17th-century Molière comedy "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme."

 

Video stills courtesy of Nick Barberio

  Posted November 15, 2012; 12:00 p.m.by Nick Barberio and Jamie Saxon, Office of Communications

Creativity is a passion for Princeton seniors Gary Fox and Anna Wuttig — as scientists and as artists.

On a typical weekday afternoon, the two chemistry majors can be found in the lab.

When not in the lab, they are immersed in the arts. Fox and Wuttig have successfully found a way to share the stage in pursuing both art and science at Princeton. They are bringing their talents to the fore in "Der Bourgeois Bigwig," an adaptation of the 17th-century Molière comedy "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme."

The play had its world premiere last weekend and will be performed Thursday through Saturday, Nov. 15 to 17, at the Berlind Theatre at McCarter Theatre Center.

This video shows what inspires Fox and Wuttig as they pursue their dual roles on and off the stage.

Fox and Wuttig do research in the lab of Robert Cava, the Russell Wellman Moore Professor of Chemistry. When Wuttig isn't recording and analyzing results for Cava's research group, which is focused on finding new materials with unique electronic and magnetic properties, she can be found playing her 1871 Georges Chanot violin with her custom-made German bow in the McAlpin Rehearsal Hall in the Woolworth Music Center.

And when Fox isn't pulling synthesized compounds out of the Newman furnace in the lab, he may be found balancing an iPad displaying a theater script in one hand while gesturing emphatically with the other in a rehearsal room at the Lewis Center for the Arts.

For the past nine weeks, the students have been rehearsing for "Der Bourgeois Bigwig." The production, a collaboration between the Department of Music and the Program in Theater, is directed by Tim Vasen, a lecturer in theater and the Lewis Center for the Arts and director of the theater program. Michael Pratt, conductor of the Princeton University Orchestra and director of the Program in Musical Performance, conducts. The new adaptation is by James Magruder, a well-known translator of Molière and a visiting faculty member in the Program in Theater this year.

Fox, who has appeared in the annual fall theater show each of his four years at Princeton and is pursuing a certificate in theater, plays the title role of Mr. Jordan in "Der Bourgeois Bigwig."

"Mr. Jordan is a middle-aged man, who, with all of this money, decides that he wants to buy himself culture," Fox said. The character realizes his one aim in life is to rise above his middle-class background and be accepted as an aristocrat.

After graduation, Fox, who is earning a high school chemistry certification through the Program in Teacher Preparation, plans to pursue other interests before becoming a teacher. 

During his time at Princeton, he has found a good balance between taking on roles such as Mr. Jordan and pursuing experiments in the lab.

"I like to think of research and performance as two entities that are built out of a toolbox, and those tools are different for each discipline," Fox said. "In science, we have balances, we have furnaces, we have mortars and pestles, we have all of these things that we need to put together in a way to create something new, something that can solve problems.

"Similarly, on stage, we have techniques, we have to rehearse lines, we have certain gestures we can rely on, props that we can use, and all of those work together to create something that's much greater than the sum of its parts," he said.

In "Der Bourgeois Bigwig," Mr. Jordan even hires a house orchestra — made up of 35 members of the 118-member Princeton University Orchestra — to impress his friends. Conductor Pratt picks up the baton with the ensemble onstage, performing the original score that Richard Strauss composed for an early-20th-century German musical adaptation of "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme."

Wuttig is the orchestra's concertmaster and has a lengthy violin solo in the play. "The music department at Princeton is really great because it offers opportunities for students who are not even music majors," she said.

One of those opportunities enabled Wuttig to have a private session to work on her solo with David Kim, concertmaster of the Philadelphia Orchestra. Another paved the way for her to study at the New England Conservatory of Music last year — and to decide whether to pursue violin professionally.

While Wuttig said the experience was extraordinary, she "wanted to choose a more science-oriented career path" and returned to Princeton. Along with chemistry, she is pursuing a certificate in materials science and engineering. She plans to attend graduate school in chemistry, but said she will always find time to perform.

Like Fox, Wuttig has found a meaningful connection at Princeton between what may appear as contradictory interests.

"Science and music are really interwoven because they are both creative," Wuttig said. "In science it's important to study known systems and reactions but also it's important to be innovative so we can make new technologies for society.

"In music it's important to study the score, to know a little bit about the composer's life, to practice and work hard. But when I'm actually performing, I forget all of that. I am just living in the moment, and every note that I play is something new and organic. That experience is motivation for science and vice versa," she said.

Fox echoed this observation. "If we're not creative in the lab, we're not going to be able to solve any of the problems that we're currently facing here in the United States and around the globe. Similarly on stage or with music, if we're not creative, we're not inspiring people to think about the world in a broader context."

Remaining performances of "Der Bourgeois Bigwig" will take place at 8 p.m. Thursday and Friday, Nov. 15 and 16; and 8:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 17, in the Berlind Theatre. Tickets are available by visiting University Ticketing online or calling 609-258-9220 or the McCarter Theatre box office at 609-258-2787.

Back To Top

View the original article here

0 Physicists and engineers at Stanford take first step toward quantum cryptography

Stanford Report, November 15, 2012

Stanford researchers demonstrate the first step in a scalable quantum cryptography system that could lead to uncrackable telecommunications.

By Bjorn Carey

Furqan M Fazal

The spin-photon entanglement experimental apparatus.

Quantum mechanics offers the potential to create absolutely secure telecommunications networks by harnessing a fundamental phenomenon of quantum particles. Now, a team of Stanford physicists has demonstrated a crucial first step in creating a quantum telecommunications device that could be built and implemented using existing infrastructure.

Quantum cryptography relies on the curious aspect of quantum mechanics by which pairs of electrons can become "entangled." Electrons have a property called "spin": Just as a bar magnet can point up or down, so too can the spin of an electron. When electrons become entangled, their spins mirror each other.

If the spin of electron A is found to be pointing "up," then electron B's spin will also point up. If electron A's spin measures "down," so too would electron B's. An amazing feature of entangled electrons is that this pairing persists no matter the distance between electron A and electron B.

This behavior can be applied to create a perfectly secure communications network, which is of great interest to governments as well as members of private industry, such as banks. If one has a set of electrons in San Francisco and another set in New York, and the electrons can be made to be entangled, then it is possible to distribute cryptographic keys – strings of 1s and 0s, in which the different electron spin directions correspond to either 1 or 0 – between San Francisco and New York. The nature of quantum entanglement means it would be impossible for an eavesdropper to intercept the keys without the original parties noticing.

The work done by the Stanford research group of Yoshihisa Yamamoto, a professor of applied physics and of electrical engineering, in collaboration with the group of applied physics Professor Martin Fejer, provides a solution to one of the key wrinkles of quantum telecommunications. In the example above, the electrons are thousands of miles apart, so they can't be directly entangled; instead, they become entangled by sending photons between the two over fiber optic cables.

In this case, the San Francisco-based sender would coax its electron to emit a photon, which would itself be entangled to the electron. The New York-based recipient's electron would also emit an entangled photon, and when the two photons interact, the electrons on either end would then become entangled and share the same quantum spin.

A challenge is that light "leaks" from even the best fiber optic cables; current systems employ multiple devices called "repeaters" that receive a fading light signal and then amplify and reproduce it to send to the end recipient. In order to transmit quantum messages, scientists need to build "quantum repeater" systems that enable entanglement between electrons to be created over many repeater stations between the start and end locations.

Quantum telecommunication networks such as this are still years away, but the new Stanford research – published this week in Nature, with recent PhD graduate Kristiaan De Greve as lead author – demonstrates a critical first step in that chain.

Other researchers have entangled an electron and photon and created a memory using the electron, but those efforts required complex systems that are bulky and difficult to duplicate. The new approach, however, is potentially easier to scale up to systems that have many entangled pairs of electrons, said one of the study co-authors, Peter McMahon, an electrical engineering PhD candidate at Stanford.

The Stanford group used a quantum dot array – provided by collaborators at the University of Würzburg in Germany – that sits on a postage stamp-size semiconductor chip that contains a layer that is covered with millions of tiny bubbles, or dots. Each of these so-called quantum dots contains a single electron; in essence, each quantum dot is an artificial atom. By focusing a laser on a single dot, the researchers excited the electron inside and caused it to emit a photon. Tests showed that the emitted photon's orientation corresponded to the electron's spin direction, confirming that the photon and electron were quantum entangled.

An advantage of quantum dot arrays is that they could be produced using standard semiconductor-manufacturing technology. A single chip could contain millions of dots, arranged in a regular grid layout that would allow for the generation of long keys at high speeds.

Another experimental first achieved by the Stanford group is that the photon entangled with the electron is produced at the optimal frequency for transmission along fiber optic cables. The ability to slide into existing telecommunications networks and the ease of manufacture make Stanford's approach particularly appealing for future research, McMahon said.

The next step will involve building a receiver and confirming that electrons on both ends become entangled. And though that work could take several years, McMahon and his colleagues are optimistic. "We have demonstrated a fundamental building block of a quantum repeater node," he said. "It should not be impossible to create the second link."

The paper by Kristiaan De Greve and co-contributors Leo Yu, Peter McMahon, Jason Pelc et al. appears in Nature, Vol. 491. The work was done in collaboration with researchers from the University of Würzburg and Heriot-Watt University.

The work was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Special Coordination Funds for Promoting Science and Technology, and the State of Bavaria. Funding also came from the Herb and Jane Dwight Stanford Graduate Fellowship, a David Cheriton Stanford Graduate Fellowship and a Robert N. Noyce Stanford Graduate Fellowship.

Kristiaan De Greve, lead author: kdegreve@stanford.edu

Bjorn Carey, Stanford News Service: (650) 725-1944, bccarey@stanford.edu

View the original article here

0 Stanford Libraries acquire the archives of leading environmentalist William McDonough

Stanford Report, November 15, 2012

Stanford Libraries will create a "living archive" with the visionary who is considered to be the leading environmental architect of our time.

By Cynthia Haven

Courtesy William McDonough

Environmental architect William McDonough

William McDonough is one of the superstars of the environmental movement. Time magazine heralded him as a "Hero for the Planet" in 1999. President Clinton awarded him the Presidential Award for Sustainable Development in a 1996 White House ceremony. McDonough is the only individual to receive the award, the nation's top environmental honor.

Now the man who has been called the leading environmental architect of our time will be donating his extensive archive and professional papers to Stanford University Libraries.

Roberto Trujillo, head of the libraries' Special Collections, hailed McDonough's partnership with Stanford as a new kind of "living archive": "We see the possibility to capture not just the writings and artifacts but the activities and conversations of a designer and thought leader – and the many influential individuals he works with – as they happen. It's a real-time archive."

McDonough is perhaps best known for the iconic 10-acre green roof atop Ford Motor Co.'s River Rouge truck factory in Dearborn, but his influence has been felt beyond architecture. He is co-author of Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, with German chemist Michael Braungart. He is founder of William McDonough + Partners and co-founder (again with Braungart) of McDonough Braungart Design Chemistry. In 2010, he launched the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute to promote the design and manufacture of safe and healthy products and materials.

His environmental motto is "Being less bad is not being good." He has criticized moves to "reduce the carbon footprint" when, for example, they merely recycle items that may be carcinogenic or otherwise environmentally harmful.

According to Time, "His utopianism is grounded in a unified philosophy that – in demonstrable and practical ways – is changing the design of the world."

The extensive McDonough historical collections cover more than 40 years of the designer's professional career. But McDonough is very much active and alive, and constantly generating new material for the archive. Hence, one of the challenges the libraries face will be managing the process of continually harvesting material for the archive from a living donor, and creating technological (and human) protocols so that the process will not be invasive.

The acquisition was announced at an event in San Francisco Wednesday night. Susan Sarandon was the emcee for the event, with Meryl Streep as a special guest.

The Stanford Libraries and McDonough have agreed to collaborate on a comprehensive approach to archiving the McDonough collections, which include paper and born-digital material. The libraries will use the digital components to create a set of open-source archival technologies that will allow creators, archivists and selected contributors to actively collaborate.

Stanford is an international leader in creating standards and best practices for realizing the digital library – one of the reasons McDonough was attracted to Stanford in the first place.

Speaking of the collaboration with the libraries, McDonough said he was "especially excited about their interest in new ways of archiving and look forward to working with their team. We are doing something new here. It's not just pulling the past into the present. We are pulling the present into the future."

Stanford University Librarian Michael Keller sees the acquisition as "an extraordinary opportunity not only to advance and redefine what an archive can be, but also a chance to engage with William McDonough to explore and document such questions as how the sustainable movement happened, and to examine links between pioneering thinkers such as McDonough and Buckminster Fuller."

Keller's mention of Fuller is apt. Stanford Libraries acquired the Buckminster Fuller archives in 1999, and it is one the libraries' most in-demand collections. It is also one of the most extensive personal archives anywhere. In a sense, the new McDonough acquisition is an extension of that visionary effort. It is a connection, also, that is personally meaningful for McDonough.

As a student at Dartmouth, McDonough heard one of Fuller's famously long lectures (more than three hours) – an encounter that left an indelible mark.

Speaking to Forbes Magazine in 2010 about his early influences, McDonough said, "In design, people like Buckminster Fuller amazed me at the levels at which he could think. He could think molecularly. And he could think at the almost galactic scale. And the idea that somebody could actually talk about molecules and talk about buildings and structures and talk about space just amazed me." Some consider McDonough an heir to Fuller's legacy.

According to McDonough, "That Buckminster Fuller's archives are at Stanford University Libraries is especially meaningful to me. He was an important influence on my early thinking."

Roberto Trujillo, Stanford Libraries: (650) 387-6816, trujillo@stanford.edu

Andrew Herkovic, Stanford Libraries: (650) 725-1877, andrew.herkovic@stanford.edu

View the original article here

0 Glycine plays key link in a deadly staph bacteria, Stanford researchers discover

Stanford Report, November 14, 2012

A new study from Stanford's Department of Chemistry reveals that the cell wall structure of Staphylococcus aureus, a bacterium responsible for a broad range of diseases, depends on growth stage and nutrient availability.

By Melissa Pandika

MicrobeWiki.Kenyon.edu could eventually change the way bacterial infections are treated. " href="C:\Program Files (x86)\ABS\Auto Blog Samurai\data\Internet In Schools\Stanford\bacteria_news.jpg">

The researchers' work on Staphylococcus aureus could eventually change the way bacterial infections are treated.

Chemistry graduate student Xiaoxue Zhou had carried out an experiment to find out how antibiotics affect cell wall structure in Staphylococcus aureus, a bacterium responsible for a slew of ailments from food poisoning to boils and abscesses.  As she sifted through the data, she uncovered a peculiar result that could ultimately change how bacterial infections are treated.

The study in Biochemistry shows that the Achilles' heel of these germs may be the nutrient glycine, which keeps intact the cell walls of the staph bacteria that cause acne in teenagers and sneak up on elderly hospital patients.  

 "This started very serendipitously," said Lynette S. Cegelski, an assistant professor of chemistry. The researchers relied on a highly sensitive technique called solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance, allowing them to study the chemical structure of a major component of the bacterial cell wall – a large, cage-like molecule called peptidoglycan.

In S. aureus, peptidoglycan units are linked together by a bridge made from molecules of the amino acid glycine, forming a dense, sturdy cell wall that maintains cellular shape and integrity. Shortening of this bridge prevents peptidoglycan linking. Previous research has shown that this shortening impairs bacterial growth and overcomes resistance to the powerful antibiotic methicillin, the defining characteristic of the "hospital bug" MRSA, or methicillin-resistant S. aureus.

While poring over the solid-state NMR results, Zhou noticed a peak in the readings that appeared higher at later growth phases of the bacteria. Further analysis showed that the peak corresponded to a structure missing a glycine bridge.

"It was a control experiment, and we started chasing it down," Zhou said.

While earlier studies already showed that cell wall structure varies with growth phase, what caused these differences remained a mystery. Zhou’s NMR results hinted at glycine levels, showing that they also depend on growth phase.

Bacteria use glycine as they divide at an exponential rate, which slows and eventually plateaus as the cells use up nutrients and space. At that point, called the stationary phase, the bacteria have depleted the glycine needed to assemble the cell wall bridges.  

Zhou and Cegelski proved that glycine availability was the "master dial" controlling cell wall structure. As expected, when they turned the dial themselves by starving S. aureus of glycine, peptidoglycan molecules with missing bridges appeared earlier. Supplementing the cells with glycine resulted in relatively normal peptidoglycan with only a few missing bridges.

"It's always the case when you tip nature off balance a little bit, in this case with changing nutrient conditions, you discover something neat," Cegelski said. 

Previous studies have traced alterations in peptidoglycan's structure to antibiotics or genetic changes and have focused on bacteria still undergoing exponential division, when they're thought to be most vulnerable to antibiotics.  Zhou's and Cegelski's study is the first to explore the role that nutrient availability plays in cell wall assembly in bacteria in the stationary phase.   

"People normally only study (bacteria) in the exponential phase … but we think we need to check all the different conditions," Zhou said. "That's why we looked at the stationary phase, which is more relevant in persistent and biofilm-associated infections."

"Bacteria tend to grow as communities, Cegelski explained.  They form complex arrangements called biofilms, which are associated with serious, persistent infections, like those associated with cystic fibrosis.

Bacteria can produce their own glycine, so they could theoretically wait until they've made enough to assemble complete peptidoglycan units, with full-length bridges, before transporting them to the cell surface.  Instead, Zhou and Cegelski observed the opposite, with bacteria transporting incomplete units that lack the ability to crosslink.

The next step is to determine whether growing the cells in environments with even less glycine would cause them to transport more of these incomplete peptidoglycan units to their surfaces, eventually causing the cell wall to weaken and the bacterium to burst.

"If you can figure that out … how to mimic that glycine deprivation and encourage the transport of stems without bridges, in a sense molecularly, you could exploit that to develop an antibacterial strategy," Cegelski said.

"The results are just as exciting as what we were originally after," she said, adding that researchers should "always be ready or prepared for these unanticipated discoveries that might lead your research to new heights that you hadn't necessarily charted out."

Melissa Pandika is an intern with the Stanford News Service.

Lynette Cegelski, Department of Chemistry, (650) 725-3527 cegelski@stanford.edu

Xiaoxue Zhou, Department of Chemistry, (650) 725-1853 xiaoxuez@stanford.edu

Dan Stober, Stanford News Service, (650) 721-6965, dstober@stanford.edu

View the original article here

0 Superstorm Sandy shows climate change isn't science fiction, top U.N. official tells Stanford audience

Stanford Report, November 12, 2012

Helen Clark, the administrator of the United Nations Development Program, visited Stanford to set the stage for international climate talks taking place in Doha, Qatar, later this month.

By Rob Jordan

Courtesy of New Zealand Office of the PM

Helen Clark leads the UN Development Program

"Until recently, climate change seemed like a science fiction scenario," Helen Clark told a Stanford audience recently.

Clark, the administrator of the United Nations Development Program and former prime minister of New Zealand, argued that a lack of coordinated global action on the issue is undermining efforts to alleviate extreme poverty. Climate change is damaging agriculture, driving up food prices, creating water insecurity, destroying coral reef fishing grounds and exposing millions to diseases such as diarrhea, dengue fever and malaria, she said.

Ahead of global climate negotiations set to begin in Doha, Qatar, later this month, Clark visited campus on the heels of Superstorm Sandy in the Eastern United States and a wave of extreme weather events worldwide. "It's not just a problem for small coastal regions in developing countries," she said.

Her Environmental Forum talk was co-sponsored by the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment and Stanford's Program in Human Biology.

The Doha talks will be the 18th conference of the 192 signatory countries of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol – the only internationally legally binding regulations on climate protection.

International discussion on the issues has tended to focus on the long term rather than the short term, and to underestimate the effect on poor populations, Clark said. Commitments such as developed countries' pledge to give $100 billion to an adaptation fund have fallen through.

Clark reviewed key areas: regular reviews of international climate actions planned and taken; private climate financing and carbon markets; increased international cooperation to deploy new technologies; and addressing greenhouse gas emissions created through forest loss and degradation.

Using California as a model of climate progress, she pointed specifically to the state's cap-and-trade program launching this year as part of the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.

Any action should be interdisciplinary in approach, Clark said, arguing that real progress would require holistic changes in government and social structures, "just as fixing health problems is about far more than fixing your hospital system." She pointed to corruption and weak government as enabling forces behind deforestation and forest degradation – the source of about a fifth of the world's greenhouse gas emissions.

Like any intractable problem, climate change cannot be tackled by government alone, Clark said. Grassroots advocacy and consumer choices – "bottom-up action" – will drive meaningful progress, she said, citing recent surveys showing increased public support for action on climate change. "The costs of inaction are increasingly clear."

In an interview following her lecture, Clark stressed the need for President Obama to use the momentum of his re-election to act quickly on climate change. "There is a window of opportunity to see the U.S. take a strong position," Clark told ClimateWire. "This is the hour for moving on climate change. I think it's time to mobilize, and not just the U.S., but worldwide."

Read the full text of Clark's speech.

Rob Jordan is the communications writer for the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment.

Rob Jordan, communications, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment: (650) 721-1881, rjordan@stanford.edu

Dan Stober, Stanford News Service: (650) 721-6965, dstober@stanford.edu

View the original article here

0 Stanford scholars discuss Asia-Pacific policy during Obama's second term

By Sarah L. Bhatia

Philip Scott-Andrews/Reuters

Confetti obscures the stage as President Barack Obama celebrates winning re-election, Chicago, November 2012.

Fresh off his re-election victory, Barack Obama – the "Pacific President" – will become the first president to visit Myanmar and Cambodia when he travels to the Southeast Asian countries this month.

The trip highlights the region's importance to the United States and signals that Obama's second term will significantly focus on Asian trade, security and governance issues.

Scholars from the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center sat down to discuss reactions to the election in Asia, and possible directions for U.S.-Asia relations and foreign policy during the second Obama administration.

How do you think countries in Asia view the outcome of the U.S. presidential election?

Karl Eikenberry: Overall, I think the countries of Asia will view President Obama's reelection as positive, including because of the likely continuity in American policy toward the region.

Thomas Fingar: Beijing is troubled by Obama's policies toward Asia because it sees them as directed against China and detrimental to its interests. But it was more troubled by Romney's rhetoric during the campaign and probably interprets the election outcome as portending more continuity than change in U.S. policy. On balance, Beijing would rather deal with a devil it knows than cope with the uncertainties of a new U.S. administration.

Gi-Wook Shin: There was some concern in South Korea that Mitt Romney would have reverted to the hardline North Korea policy of George W. Bush's first term. It would have created a bit of tension between the United States and South Korea, so in that context many Koreans are relieved that Obama was re-elected.

David Straub: Interestingly, President Obama personally is overwhelmingly popular in South Korea, but opinion polls show that most South Koreans continue to have complex, even critical views of American foreign policy under him.

Is President Obama likely to make major changes to Asia policy in his second term?

Eikenberry: Some of the people in key positions in the second Obama administration will change, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, but President Obama will of course be in office for four more years. He has been in Asia and knows the players. He has a clear strategy, so overall I expect continuity in his administration's Asia policy.

Michael H. Armacost: Events are really what shape foreign policy, and developments can occur that are hard to predict.

Henry S. Rowen: We tend to assume there is a continuity or gradual evolution to events, but there are also discontinuities. Something could happen in North Korea, for example. Unexpected events do happen from time to time, and the question is to try to figure out what they might be.

How could U.S. China policy develop?

Fingar: If President Obama has a clear plan for his second term, its goals and priorities are not yet clear to the Chinese. They worry that he may continue, or ratchet up, efforts they see as designed to constrain China's rise. That said, they know that steady relations with the United States are essential for their own continued economic success and will respond positively to U.S. efforts to reduce distrust and enhance strategic stability. They will be troubled, however, by likely – and overdue – U.S. pressure to secure enforcement of China's intellectual property and other trade-related commitments, and by likely U.S. efforts to deepen trade relations with other countries.

How could the possible election of a more conservative Japanese government during the second term of the Obama administration affect U.S.-Japan relations?

Armacost: The Trans-Pacific Partnership is an issue where we both have potential constraints on the extent to which Japan can be included, and it is not certain whether that will change very much under a Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) administration. Secondly, there is the longstanding Okinawa base issue. The LDP did not do anything about the base from 1996 onward, and that will probably also be the case if the LDP comes into power again. Finally, the United States will probably push Japan to take more of a stand on the ongoing Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute with China.

After the failure of the United States' Leap Day agreement with North Korea this year, and especially with the election of a new South Korean government next month, do you think that Obama's second term could bring a renewed effort in diplomacy with North Korea?

Shin: It will be important to watch the outcome of the South Korean election. If the opposition party wins, they will move very quickly to engage with North Korea and the question then will be how the United States will respond.

Straub: In any event, the United States periodically reaches out to North Korea, to test it or just because time has passed. It may do so again after the election, particularly since there is a still fairly new leadership in North Korea, and also because there are elections or leadership changes in all the countries in the region. A number of the Six Party Talks member states, likely including South Korea, may also push harder for a resumption of those talks, which were never held during President Obama's first term. But the Obama administration will be cautious because it was burned by North Korea's breaking of their Leap Day agreement.

What direction might U.S. policy toward South Asia take?

Eikenberry: Our presence in Afghanistan is going to remain an important part of our overall military posture in Central, South and East Asia. Managing properly the transition to full Afghan responsibility for their internal security will remain very high on President Obama's agenda. At the same time, it will be important to keep some U.S. counterterrorism capability in Afghanistan, with the permission of the Afghan government.

The nature of our security dialogue with Pakistan will change in emphasis from one that since 9/11 has mostly been informed by international terrorism. If we continue to make progress against al-Qaida, I expect our conversation with Pakistan will place more emphasis on its nuclear weapons programs and deployments. This is a potentially destabilizing issue and a concern not only to India, but also to China.

There has been a steady appreciation in the current and future importance of India. It will continue to be key in terms of the administration's broader Asia-Pacific policy, but with a clear understanding of the limits of defense engagement with India.

Will the rebalancing, or "pivot," toward Asia continue to be a central theme in U.S. foreign policy in Obama's second term?

Donald K. Emmerson: Asia will continue to loom large on Washington's policy horizon. Although the pivot was originally all about security, the rebalance has since been "rebalanced" to encompass economic concerns. In July 2012, when Secretary Clinton went to Phnom Penh to attend the security-focused ASEAN Regional Forum, she brought along the largest delegation of American businesspeople ever to visit Southeast Asia. Their presence upgraded the profile of the U.S.-ASEAN Business Forum, which met the following day. The Obama administration has also taken the lead in promoting a Trans-Pacific Partnership to liberalize Asia-Pacific trade.

Sarah L. Bhatia is the communications and outreach coordinator at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.

View the original article here

0 Stanford School of Education course tackles challenges of digital learning

Stanford Report, November 15, 2012

A free-flowing, ambitious course brings students, faculty and professionals together to debate Education's Digital Future.

By R.F. MacKay

Chris Wessleman/Stanford School of Education

Mitchell Stevens, associate professor of education, (with mic) draws questions from an audience of students, venture capitalists, educators and entrepreneurs at the Oct. 9 lecture in the class, Education's Digital Future.

Amid all the hyperbolic proclamations that massive open online courses, or MOOCs, are poised to take over the educational universe, dispassionate and well-trained minds are needed to assess just exactly what is going on with digital and online learning and what we can reasonably expect.

Funny how the Stanford School of Education reached that same conclusion. Throughout this academic year, a 1-unit course called Education's Digital Future (EDF) is bringing together students, faculty and professionals from Stanford and its community to study how digital education works and which models work better.

Start with the graduate students of the School of Education, then add students from around campus, faculty and local K-12 teachers. Mix in software developers, venture capitalists, policy experts and anyone else who cares to walk in to join the Tuesday conversations in the CERAS building.

It's more than a course: It's a website, a hub, a potential movement. And it's way more than technology.

"We're at a moment of an epic shift in the political economy of higher education; how we measure it, fund it, govern it are all in flux," says Mitchell Stevens, one of the course's organizers. For one thing, he said, the progression from K-12 to college, with a high school diploma in between, does not necessarily reflect the true pace of human learning. "We need to rethink the relationship between college education and the life course and radically re-narrate the chronology."

Stevens, an associate professor of education, and Roy Pea, the David Jacks Professor of Education, are the organizers of EDF (Educ 403x), which combines the classroom experience with a speakers series and online forums on the Piazza platform for enrolled students. This quarter, 37 students are officially enrolled in the course. Dozens of nonstudents also take part; sometimes the room overflows.

The idea was to create a low-barrier town square where all relevant players could gather, talk, listen and sift out the substance from the hype. Stevens, who came to Stanford in 2009 from New York University, acknowledged that the whole thing is an experience unlike anything he has ever taken part in, "a pedagogical challenge I never envisioned having." But it's a challenge he has fully embraced.

"It's great," he said. "You say 'digital' and 'Stanford School of Education,' and everyone says 'yes.'"

Although many think the promised land is around the corner, the 403x speakers throughout fall quarter let their audience know that they're in for an uphill struggle, both conceptually and on the ground. Suddenly, it seems, all our preconceived notions of educational institutions are being challenged and even threatened by digital and online technologies. Will they work? Will they, to use Schumpeter's expression, be creatively destructive?

Stevens is quick to point out that though this may feel to some like a sudden dilemma, in fact, it's the culmination of a long process.

"This is not just a technical transformation," he said, "it's economic and political, and it has been turbo-charged by new business models. It's happening so quickly now because of larger changes that have been going on in U.S. education for 30 years."

Speakers at 403x have represented just about every sector relevant to its ambitious agenda. They included Adrian Sannier, senior vice president for product at Pearson, a leading education services company; Candace Thille, director of Carnegie Mellon University's famed Open Learning Initiative (OLI); Catherine Casserly, CEO of Creative Commons; Tom Vander Ark, formerly with the Gates Foundation and now a venture capitalist focused on education; Prasad Ram, founder and CEO of the nonprofit Ednovo; and Steve Midgley, a consultant with the U.S. Department of Education.

All, as well as Stevens and Pea, see a tension between two narratives that are not mutually exclusive: On the one hand, the possibilities are infinite. With new technology, education can be everywhere, flexible, responsive, better, cheap. On the other, we have to deal with resistant technologies, market rigidities, closed minds, anxious school districts, missing infrastructure, a shrinking tax base and politics.

But, Ednovo's Ram noted at the EDF panel held on Election Night, "everyone these days wants to be the Education President, so something is going right!"

Class sessions explore both university-level MOOCs and hybrid learning in general, as well as K-12 learning, whose challenges are quite different. In her presentation, Carnegie Mellon's Thille, for example, addressed the twin missions of learning about learning and teaching those who otherwise would not have access to high-quality higher education.

OLI comprises hybrid, mostly core-curriculum courses created by multidisciplinary Carnegie Mellon teams and then made available to a wide range of colleges and universities. Students learn both in a real classroom and using CMU's videos, and instructors are able to gather valuable data about how students learn. In fact, Thille said, it is the research that is most compelling: "OLI is not just the technology; it is an approach, a research question. … We need a research agenda that goes way beyond the technology."

Beyond concerns about how MOOCs might upend higher education, many of those crowded into the auditorium are most worried about K-12 education. That was best illustrated in the Nov. 6 forum on digital curricula, delivered to an overflow crowd of several hundred, with dozens watching on a screen in the lobby.

Venture capitalist Vander Ark set the tone. "The shift we're going through now is the most important in the history of learning," he said. "It's one of the most important trends of the world," along with phenomena such as the spread of democracy and the rise of biotechnology. The shift in question is toward "personalized learning with new tools in new kinds of schools," with online learning being just one piece of the puzzle.

Ednovo CEO Ram similarly stressed the absurdity of arbitrarily deciding that six hours a day are for school, two hours are for homework "and the rest is not learning." Rather, he suggested, learning should be (and in fact is) pervasive. We learn every minute of every day. The challenge is to ensure that K-12 students have the means for making learning possible and gaining as much as they can from it.

But school districts and public school teachers were not front and center in the panel's presentations, a deficit that questioners immediately pointed to. They also wondered who or what is going to pay for all these innovations (schools? government? foundations? companies?) and how the new financial or fiscal infrastructure would be coordinated with existing school district structures.

The EDF website is nearly as busy as the classroom itself. Homework assignments and comments are posted on Piazza forums, most class readings are available to the world, course assistants post summaries of lectures and panels weekly, and video footage of most guest speakers can be viewed.

Looking ahead to the rest of the year, Stevens said 403x students will be working on team projects, with EDF functioning as an incubator of ideas. He would like to see more discussion about the digital revolution and equity and about the whole notion of diploma-laden education, which he believes has far more to do with statistical convenience than with measuring true learning.

Overall, he said, he is pleased with the experiment and with what he calls the "plural conversations" every week in the large and diverse 403x community. "The future is coming," he said. "We need to think about it."

Jonathan Rabinovitz, School of Education: (650) 724-9440, jrabin@stanford.edu

R. F. MacKay, Communications Manager, Stanford Online: rmackay@stanford.edu

View the original article here