A new Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) air pollution study of millions of deaths from heart disease, lung disorders, and other causes in 75 American cities found that the effect of particles on mortality rates was about 75% higher in cities with a high proportion of sulfates from coal burning power plants than in cities with little sulfate…

Reflecting its decades-long commitment to confronting climate change, Harvard University was one of four inaugural members of Boston Mayor Martin Walsh’s Carbon Cup, which launched Saturday, May 31, 2014. By opting into the challenge Harvard, Boston University, Massachusetts General Hospital, and Brigham & Women’s Hospital have collectively agreed to commit roughly 15 million square feet…

Outside the gates of her Mexico City high school, Thalia Porteny would always see kids begging for food. “It made me feel uneasy and frustrated,” said Porteny. “I knew I’d had amazing opportunities given to me, and I felt responsible. I wanted to do something about it, but at the time I didn’t know how.”…

The Howard T. Fisher Prize for excellence in Geographic Information Science (GIS) for the 2013-14 academic year has been awarded to Graduate School of Design master’s candidate Leif Estrada for “Temporal Morphology: Synthetic Growth and Natural Decline of Alameda Island” and Jake Sobstyl for “Zero-touch scale-free and climate independent thermal energy audits.” Both students will receive…

Workers exposed to solvents may continue to experience cognitive difficulties decades later, according to new findings by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers and colleagues. In a study of retired male utility workers, the researchers found evidence of damage to thinking and memory as long as 50 years after exposure. They also found that the men most exposed…

Food vouchers and baskets provided through WIC (The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children) should continue to exclude white potatoes, according to a column co-authored by Eric Rimm, associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). The piece, published online May 22, 2014 in USA Today, was written in response…

A research team from Harvard University and MIT has released its third and final promised deliverable — the de-identified learning data — relating to an initial study of online learning based on each institution’s first-year courses on the edX platform. Specifically, the dataset contains the original learning data from the 16 HarvardX and MITxcourses offered in…

It’s not always comfortable being a person committed to what others see as an impossible goal, Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) Dean Julio Frenk told graduates at the School’s 2014 Commencement ceremony. He spoke from experience. When Frenk was Mexico’s minister of health from 2000 to 2006 and attempting what some thought was “impossible”—expanding…

The Gutenberg Research College of Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz granted this year’s Gutenberg Research Award to two internationally renowned academic, including Professor Michèle Lamont, Harvard’s Robert I. Goldman Professor of European Studies and acting director of the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. Lamont examines how symbolic boundaries and boundary-making stand for practices of distinction and…

Harvard’s Graduate School of Design is pleased to announce its participation in Fundamentals, the 14th International Architecture Exhibition at the Venice Biennale (June 7-November 23), curated by Rem Koolhaas, professor in practice of architecture and urban design at the GSD. For the past two years, 24 students enrolled in GSD’s Studio Abroad program have been based at Koolhaas’s OMA/AMO…

Founded in 1973, the Edwin O. Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies (RI) promotes research on Japan and brings together Harvard faculty, students, leading scholars from other institutions, and visitors to create one of the world’s leading communities for the study of Japan. For graduate students with a Japan interest, RI has provided dissertation completion grants, language study grants, and other travel and research…

Would you eat chips made with grasshoppers? That was the question posed by Laura D’Asaro ’13 and Rose Wang ’13, founders of Six Foods, the inaugural winner of the Deans’ Design Challenge, during Demo Day last Thursday at the Harvard Innovation Lab (i-lab). Dean Mohsen Mostafavi of the Graduate School of Design and Dean Cherry…

Zachary Gerson-Nieder spends a lot of time thinking about the role hospitals can play in communities. Of course they provide health care—but they also serve as regional economic anchors. Which makes him wonder: How much do hospital administrators, city planners and other key stakeholders consider hospitals’ impact on communities? Is it a major focus or more of…

Harvard Graduate School of Education Dean James E. Ryan announced May 19 that Susan Fliss has been named librarian and director of the Ed School’s Gutman Library. Fliss will begin this new role on July 1. “We are thrilled to welcome Susan to the HGSE community. Her expertise in teaching and learning, her passion for our…

Four members of the Harvard Business School MBA Class of 2014 and two graduating doctoral candidates have been named winners of the School’s prestigious Dean’s Award. They will all be recognized by HBS Dean Nitin Nohria at Commencement ceremonies on the HBS campus. The MBA winners are Greg Adams, Tara Hagan, Ana Mendy, and Cory…

Now in its thirteenth year, the program provides fellows with a one-year position in a nonprofit or public-sector organization where they can make a significant impact. Since 2001, the program has placed 125 fellows with 53 organizations. Participating organizations pay fellows $45,000, and Harvard Business School (HBS) awards fellows $50,000. Throughout the year, fellows also…

Before Perrine Marcenac even enrolled at Harvard School of Public Health, the institution changed her life. During an interview for the Ph.D. Program in Biological Sciences in Public Health, Marcenac found herself fascinated by her faculty interviewers’ work on the malaria vector and parasite, and by the time she said good-bye, she’d found her research calling. “I…

No other industry of the size and complexity of the U.S. health care system operates with so little understanding of the results of its investments, Dean Julio Frenk told an audience gathered May 15, 2014 at Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) for a symposium on what works in health care. “That is why comparative effectiveness research is absolutely critical,” he…

Mohsen Mostafavi, dean of Harvard’s Graduate School of Design (GSD), announced on Tuesday that Barcelona architect Jose M. Ahedo is the winner of the 2014 Wheelwright Prize, a $100,000 traveling fellowship aimed at fostering investigative approaches to contemporary design. Born in Vizcaya, Spain, in 1980, Ahedo received his BArch in 2005 from the Escola Tècnica Superior d’Arquitectura de…

With a vast and rich collection of materials spanning 10 centuries, Historical & Special Collections (HSC), in the Harvard Law School Library, is a treasure trove for those interested in tracing the history and development of the law, legal education, law practice, and the history of Harvard Law School. A current exhibit, called “Spanning the Centuries: An…

In this year’s Deans’ Health and Life Sciences Challenge, Aldatu Biosciences, a venture created by Harvard students and researchers, took home the Bertarelli Foundation Grand Prize and $40,000 in award money. Sponsored by deans from across the university and hosted at the Harvard innovation lab (i-lab), the challenge called for undergraduates, graduate students, and postdoctoral…

Two Harvard Law School students, Alexander Chen ’15 and Bianca Tylek ’16, were selected from a field of more than 1,200 applicants to receive the Paul and Daisy Soros New American Fellowship. Thirty scholars, all of whom are immigrants or children of immigrants, will receive $90,000 grants each to pursue graduate studies at U.S. universities.…

Harvard Law School Professor Steven Shavell received the 2014 Ronald H. Coase Medal from the American Law and Economics Association at its annual meeting May 9. Shavell is the Samuel R. Rosenthal Professor of Law and Economics and director of the John M. Olin Center for Law, Economics and Business at Harvard Law School. The…

The Umpiem Mai refugee camp in eastern Thailand was erected three decades ago to provide temporary housing for Burmese refugees fleeing the repressive rule of their country’s military government. Today, more than 13,000 people still live in this well-organized community of straw and bamboo buildings packed tightly together on a steep and verdant hillside. This…

What is the total price tag for the Great Recession? Almost five years after the official end of the worst downturn since the Great Depression, there is still no clear answer. What we do know is this: A full accounting must reflect its impact on the nation’s health costs. So writes Kasisomayajula “Vish” Viswanath, professor of health…

Every year the Harvard Foundation holds an award ceremony to honor those who have contributed to intercultural and race relations on campus. The awardees include faculty, staff, and students from a variety of Houses and class years, all working to promote intercultural understanding on campus. Distinguished Faculty Award: Professor William Gelbart Race Relations Advisor Award: Jonathan Gramling…

On May 14, the Harvard Innovation Lab celebrated the accomplishments of six finalist teams and crowned winners of the Deans’ Cultural Entrepreneurship Challenge. Now in its second year, the challenge calls upon students to utilize the platform of entrepreneurship to help sustain the longevity of the arts and expand their impact on society. PIVOT was…

Neighbors of foreclosed homes may face an elevated risk of high blood pressure, according to findings by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers and colleagues. A study of 1,750 Massachusetts residents participating in the long-running Framingham Heart Study from 1987 through 2008 found that each foreclosure within 100 meters of a person’s home raised his or her…

This January, three master’s students from the Center for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES) participated in a Harvard winter term field study course on the Syrian refugee crisis led by Professor Claude Bruderlein of the Harvard School of Public Health. Supported by a financial grant from CMES, master’s students Stephanie Sobek, Jenny Quigley-Jones, and Elsien van…

The Harvard Initiative for Learning and Teaching (HILT) awarded three Cultivation Grants of up to $200K to projects toward: Assessing curricular innovation (HMS). Edward Krupat, Richard Schwarzstein, Jeremy Richards, Amy Sullivan, and David Roberts will evaluate the impact of curriculum renewal at HMS and develop a model for educational assessment by analyzing student data of…