Conducted by renowned pianist and Peabody Conservatory faculty member Leon Fleisher, the Peabody Symphony Orchestra presented in November its inaugural concert in memory of Steven Muller, president of Johns Hopkins University from 1972 to 1990. It was the first of what is to be an annual event, supported by the Jill E. McGovern and Steven Muller Fund.
A team of scientists led by Alexander Szalay, a professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and a professor of computer science in the Whiting School of Engineering, has received a $9.5 million National Science Foundation grant to develop, build, and maintain large-scale data sets that will give the science community greater access to information. The project is called DIBBs, for Data Infrastructure Building Blocks.
The presidents of 10 colleges and universities across the state have formed the Maryland Collaborative to Reduce College Drinking and Related Problems. President Ronald J. Daniels is a co-chair of the group, and the Bloomberg School of Public Health is one of the two hosts.
Johns Hopkins led U.S. universities in research spending for the 34th straight year in fiscal 2012, performing $2.106 billion in medical, science, and engineering research and development, according to the National Science Foundation.
Seth Guikema, an assistant professor of geography and environmental engineering in the Whiting School, received a $3 million grant from the National Science Foundation to build a program that will determine the effect of repeated hurricanes and heat waves on the Mid-Atlantic region and suggest ways to improve the region's ability to withstand them. He will lead a multidisciplinary team that will create a computer model incorporating research on engineering, social and behavioral sciences, geosciences, climate science, public health, and landscape architecture.
Three undergraduates have won prestigious scholarships to study in England. Anna Wherry, a Krieger School senior and double major in public health and anthropology, earned a Marshall Scholarship. Malinda McPherson, who is majoring in cognitive science in the Krieger School, has won a Churchill Scholarship to study at University of Cambridge. Stephen Filippone, a senior in the Whiting School's Department of Materials Science and Engineering has received a Gates Cambridge Scholarship.
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center will receive $90 million in new funding as part of a $540 million gift from Ludwig Cancer Research to six U.S. institutions. Bert Vogelstein and Kenneth Kinzler, co-directors of the Ludwig Center at Johns Hopkins, used an initial $20 million Ludwig gift to establish the center and create the first genomic maps of cancer in 2006.
Among the 388 new fellows elected to the American Association for the Advancement of Science are four Johns Hopkins researchers: L. Mario Amzel, Department of Biophysics and Biophysical Chemistry; Philip Cole, Department of Pharmacolog y and Molecular Sciences; and Valina Dawson, Department of Neurology, all from the School of Medicine; and Stephen Murray, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Krieger School.
Peabody voice faculty artist Denyce Graves was presented with the Marian Anderson Living Legacy Award at the National Women's History Museum's third annual de Pizan Honors ceremony in October.
A team of undergraduate biomedical engineering students in the Whiting School won first prize in its division at the national Collegiate Inventors Competition for PrestoPatch, a system to improve the way lifesaving shocks are delivered to the hearts of patients experiencing arrhythmia, an erratic heartbeat that can be fatal. A School of Medicine student, Isaac Kinde, won third place in the graduate division for being part of a team that developed the PapGene test, which uses cervical fluid obtained during routine Pap tests to detect ovarian and endometrial cancers.
The American Astronomical Society has awarded its Newton Lacy Pierce Prize to the Krieger School's Nadia L. Zakamska, an assistant professor of physics and astronomy. The 2013 Pierce Prize went to Jason Kalirai, the project scientist for the James Webb Space Telescope at the Space Telescope Science Institute and an associate researcher at Johns Hopkins' Center for Astrophysical Sciences.
Michael Ryschkewitsch, who was chief engineer at NASA, moved in January to the Applied Physics Laboratory, where he is head of the Space Sector, leading a team of technical experts who are tackling some of NASA's and the military's toughest space science and systems engineering challenges.
SAIS has appointed new directors of its two international campuses; both will assume their positions in August. Cornelius C. Kubler will be the American co-director of the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies. Michael George Plummer will be the director of SAIS Europe in Bologna.
James E. West, a research professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Whiting School, has been named a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, a high professional distinction given to academic inventors who have made a tangible impact on quality of life, economic development, and the welfare of society.
Paula Boggs, a member of the university's board of trustees and of Peabody's National Advisory Council, was appointed by President Obama to serve on the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, which advises the White House on cultural issues. An attorney, Boggs was most recently executive vice president, general counsel, and secretary of the Starbucks Corp. She is also a songwriter and lead vocalist for the Paula Boggs Band.
Deborah Finnell, an associate professor in the School of Nursing's Department of Acute and Chronic Care, is lead editor of the newly published edition of Addictions Nursing: Scope and Standards of Practice. She and Christine Savage, chair of Nursing's Department of Community-Public Health and a contributor to the book, developed a model to frame primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention interventions for nursing.
Todd Johnson, the risk and market development manager at General Electric Africa, based in Johannesburg, was the executive in residence at the Carey Business School. He talked with Global MBA students at Carey about his career working for GE in Africa.
