Recent news from The Johns Hopkins University
This section contains regularly updated highlights of the news from around The Johns Hopkins
University. Links to the complete news reports from the nine schools,
the Applied Physics Laboratory and other centers and institutes are to
the left, as are links to help news media contact the Johns Hopkins
communications offices.
The event will take place, rain or shine, from 8:40 a.m. to approximately noon on Thursday, May 23, on Homewood Field. The ceremony will feature remarks from President Ronald J. Daniels and a speech by Dr. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa, the conferring of all degrees, and the bestowing of honorary degrees.
May 13, 2013 | Category: Academic Disciplines, Arts and Humanities, Commencement, Engineering, Homewood Campus News, Medicine and Nursing, Natural Sciences, Peabody, Student-Related News, University-Related
Three undergraduate researchers at The Johns Hopkins University are among the 271 students recently awarded Goldwater Scholarships for the 2013-2014 academic year. The one- and two-year funding the three Johns Hopkins students receive will help further their investigations in molecular dynamics, the biomedical science of disease, and developing a computational tool to help surgeons treat epilepsy.
April 16, 2013 Tags: Goldwater Scholars
| Category: Engineering, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, Student-Related News
With every sunrise and sunset, our eyes make note of the light as it waxes and wanes, a process that is critical to aligning our circadian rhythms to match the solar day so we are alert during the day and restful at night. Watching the sun come and go sounds like a peaceful process, but Johns Hopkins scientists have discovered that behind the scenes, millions of specialized cells in our eyes are fighting for their lives to help the retina set the stage to keep our internal clocks ticking.
March 4, 2013 Tags: biology, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Samer Hattar
| Category: Natural Sciences
According to a Johns Hopkins earth scientist, the hole in the Antarctic ozone layer has caused changes in the way that waters in those southern oceans mix – a situation that has the potential to alter the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere and eventually could have an impact on global climate change. In a paper published in today’s issue of the journal Science, Darryn W. Waugh and his team show that subtropical intermediate waters in the southern oceans have become “younger” as the upwelling, circumpolar waters have gotten “older” – changes that are consistent with the fact that surface winds have strengthened as the ozone layer has thinned.
January 31, 2013 Tags: CFC-12, chlorofluorocarbon, Darryn Waugh, global climate change, global warming, Montreal Protocol, Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, ocean circulation, ozone layer, Science
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Environment, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
Lay Kodama, a Johns Hopkins University senior from Columbus, Ohio, has been selected as a Churchill Scholar by the Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States. The Churchill Scholarship is awarded to 14 students nationwide who have demonstrated a capacity to contribute to the advancement of knowledge in the sciences, engineering or mathematics by completing original, creative work at an advanced level.
January 28, 2013 Tags: Churchill Scholar, Kelly Barry, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Lay Kodama, Mark Wu, Winston Churchill Foundation of the United States
| Category: Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, Student-Related News
Ten Johns Hopkins University mathematicians have been named Fellows of the American Mathematical Society for 2013, the program’s first year. The designation recognizes those who have made outstanding contributions to the creation, exposition, advancement, communication and utilization of mathematics.
November 27, 2012 Tags: AMS, Bernard Shiffman, Christopher D. Sogge, Edward Sheinerman, Fellows of the American Mathematical Society, J. Michael Boardman, Joel Spruck, Johns Hopkins University, Jun-Ichi Igusa, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Steven M. Zucker, Takashi Ono, W. Stephen Wilson, Whiting School of Engineering, William P. Minicozzi II
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
Storing music and photos on distant computers via “cloud” technology is nothing new. But Johns Hopkins researchers are now using this tactic to collect detailed information from thousands of cancer cell samples. The goal is to help doctors make better predictions about how a patient’s illness will progress and what type of treatment will be most effective.
November 6, 2012 Tags: biotech research, cancer, cancer data, cloud computing, nanobiotechnology, pathology
| Category: Engineering, Medicine and Nursing, Natural Sciences, Technology
October 17, 2012 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE MEDIA CONTACT: Lisa De Nike (443)-287-9960 (office) (443) 845-3148 (cell) Lde@jhu.edu Andrew Watson, a Royal Society research professor who studies the carbon cycle and its connection climate change, will give the George S. Benton Endowed Lecture in Meteorology and Fluid Dynamics at The Johns Hopkins University at 4 p.m. [...]
October 17, 2012 Tags: Andrew Watson, carbon cycle, climate change, George S. Benton Endowed Lecture in Meteorology and Fluid Dynamics, global resources, Homewood campus, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, School of Environmental Sciences at the University of East Anglia, The Johns Hopkins University, United Kingdom
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Events Open to the Public, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
Johns Hopkins University chemist Tyrel McQueen has been awarded a 2012 David and Lucile Packard Foundation Fellowship for Science and Engineering. The fellowship is one of 16 awarded each year nationwide, and bestows unrestricted funds of $875,000 (over a five-year period) to unusually creative young faculty members in science and engineering.
October 15, 2012 Tags: chemistry, David and Lucile Packard Foundation Fellowship for Science and Engineering, Gerald Meyer, Katherine Newman, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, The Johns Hopkins University, Tyrel McQueen
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, Physics and Astronomy, University-Related
Supported by a five-year $7.4 million National Science Foundation grant, experts at The Johns Hopkins University are partnering with teachers and administrators in Baltimore City Public Schools on a program to enhance teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering and math in city elementary schools by making STEM a community affair. The program, called STEM Achievement in Baltimore Elementary Schools – SABES for short — not only will benefit more than 1,600 students in grades three through five in nine city elementary schools, but could also become a national model for science, technology, engineering and math education.
September 25, 2012 Tags: Baltimore City Public School System, City Schools, Engineering, Greater Homewood, Highlandtown/Greektown, Johns Hopkins-Baltimore City Public Schools partnership, Katya Denisova, Lower Park Heights, Maryland Science Center, mathematics, Michael Falk, National Aquarium in Baltimore, National Science Foundation, Ronald J. Daniels, SABES, Science, STEM education, Technology, The Johns Hopkins University, Whiting School of Engineering
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Education/K-12, Engineering, Government and Politics, Homewood Campus News, Institutional News, Natural Sciences, Physics and Astronomy, Psychology, Social Sciences, Technology, University-Related
A Johns Hopkins biologist has been selected by the Partnership for Undergraduate Life Sciences (PULSE) as one its new Vision and Change Leadership Fellows, a group charged with spending a year identifying and recommending ways to improve undergraduate life sciences education. Joel Schildbach, a biology professor and director of undergraduate studies at Johns Hopkins’ Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, is one of 40 faculty members selected from 250 applicants from 24 states and the U.S. Virgin Islands by PULSE, a joint initiative of the National Science Foundation, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the National Institutes of Health.
September 19, 2012 Tags: Department of Biology, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Joel Schildbach, National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, Partnership for Undergraduate Life Sciences, PULSE, science education, The Johns Hopkins University, undergraduate science education
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
Donald Brown, an adjunct professor of biology at The Johns Hopkins University since 1969 and director emeritus of the Carnegie Institution for Science Department of Embryology, has won the prestigious 2012 Lasker-Koshland Special Achievement Award in Medical Science for groundbreaking fundamental work in genetics, along with exceptional work mentoring young scientists. Also honored is Tom Maniatis of Columbia University.
September 11, 2012 Tags: Alfred Sommer, American Nobels, Beverly Wendland, Carol Greider, Columbia University, Department of Biology, Donald Brown, Johns Hopkins University, Joseph Gall, Lasker Award, Life Sciences Research Foundation, Solomon H. Snyder Department of Neuroscience, Tom Maniatis, Vernon Mountcastle
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Institutional News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
The National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado has reported that there is less ice in the Arctic Ocean this summer than at any time since satellite measurements were first taken back in 1979, a finding that underscores the reality of global climate change. Johns Hopkins oceanographer Thomas Haine, who studies how the physics of ocean currents affects global climate, is available to put these findings into perspective.
August 29, 2012 Tags: Arctic sea ice, atmosphere, carbon dioxide, ecosystem, global warming, Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, NSIDC, The National Snow and Ice Data Center, Thomas Haine
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, Public Health, University-Related
You are what you eat, and that seems to have been as true two million years ago, when our pre-human relatives were swinging through the trees and racing across the savannas of South Africa, as it is today. A study done by a team that included Johns Hopkins University geochemist Benjamin Passey and published in today’s issue of the journal Nature reveals that Australopithecus sediba, an ape-like creature with human features living in a region about 50 miles northwest of today’s Johannesburg, exclusively consumed fruits, leaves and other forest-based foods, even though its habitat was near grassy savanna with its rich variety of savory sedges, tasty tubers and even juicy animals.
June 27, 2012 Tags: Amanda Henry, Au. sediba, Australopithecus sediba, Benjamin Passey, carbon isotopes, evolution, geochemist, Johns Hopkins University, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Lee Berger, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, pre-human relatives, savanna, South Africa, University of Witwatersrand
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences
Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered that a single protein molecule may hold the key to turning cardiac stem cells into blood vessels or muscle tissue, a finding that may lead to better ways to treat heart attack patients.
June 20, 2012 Tags: biomedical engineering, cardiac blood vessels, cardiac stem cells, cell engineering, heart attack treatment, heart muscle, stem cells
| Category: Engineering, Medicine and Nursing, Natural Sciences, Technology
Two swimming strokes—one that pulls through the water like a boat paddle and another that whirls to the side like a propeller—are commonly used by athletes training for the Olympic Games. But elite swimmers and their coaches have long argued over which arm motion is more likely to propel an aquatic star toward a medal. A university research study has picked a winner.
June 19, 2012 Tags: fluid dynamics, mechanical engineering, Olympics, swimming, swimming science, swimming strokes
| Category: Engineering, Natural Sciences, Technology
If your story concerns casino games, particularly poker, computer scientist Avi Rubin is available to comment. Rubin, technical director of the Johns Hopkins University Information Security Institute, led a research team that discovered that hackers could easily tamper with the touchscreen voting machines used widely in the United States. More recently, he has studied the security of electronic medical records. In his spare time, Rubin is an avid poker player.
June 12, 2012 Tags: card games, casino gambling, casino table games, poker, Texas Hold 'em
| Category: Engineering, Government and Politics, Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, Technology
In life, we sort soiled laundry from clean; ripe fruit from rotten. Two Johns Hopkins engineers say they have found an easy way to use gravity or simple forces to similarly sort microscopic particles and bits of biological matter—including circulating tumor cells.
June 12, 2012 Tags: Bernate, biomolecular engineering, Drazer, lab-on-chip, micrifluidic device, tumor cells
| Category: Engineering, Medicine and Nursing, Natural Sciences, Student-Related News, Technology
Amid growing concerns about the spread of harmful mercury in plants and animals, a new study by researchers from The Johns Hopkins University and The National Aquarium has compared levels of the chemical in captive dolphins with dolphins found in the wild. The captive animals were fed a controlled diet, while the wild mammals dined on marine life that may carry more of the toxic metal.
May 21, 2012 Tags: dolphins, environmental damage, marine mammals, mercury, mercury contamination, National Aquarium
| Category: Engineering, Environment, Natural Sciences, Public Health
Robert J. Adams, a veterinarian, biomedical researcher and member of the faculty for 35 years, has been appointed associate provost for animal research and resources.
May 14, 2012 Tags: animal research, associate provost, molecular and comparative pathobiology, Robert Adams, veterinarian
| Category: Institutional News, Medicine and Nursing, Natural Sciences, University Administration, University-Related
The Johns Hopkins University Business Plan Competition, hosted by the Center for Leadership Education, provides an opportunity for students to take a novel idea or innovative technology and develop a business plan based around it. The competition will take place on Friday, April 27, in Hodson Hall on the Homewood campus.
April 25, 2012 Tags: Business Plan Competition, Johns Hopkins Business Plan Competition, Student Business Plan Competition
| Category: Arts and Humanities, Business and Economics, Engineering, Homewood Campus News, Medicine and Nursing, Natural Sciences, Public Health, Social Sciences, Technology
The Johns Hopkins University performed $2 billion in medical, science and engineering research in fiscal 2010, making it the leading U.S. academic institution in total research and development spending for the 32nd year in a row, according to a new National Science Foundation ranking. The university also once again ranked first on the NSF’s separate list of federally funded research and development, spending $1.73 billion in FY2010 on research supported by NSF, NASA, the National Institutes of Health and the Department of Defense.
March 30, 2012 Tags: Applied Physics Laboratory, Lloyd B. Minor, National Science Foundation, R&D, research and development, The Johns Hopkins University
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Engineering, Institutional News, Natural Sciences, Physics and Astronomy, Psychology, Public Health, Social Sciences, University-Related
It seems that “Lucy” was not the only hominin on the block in northern Africa about 3 million years ago. A team of researchers that included Johns Hopkins University geologist Naomi Levin has announced the discovery of a partial foot skeleton with characteristics (such as an opposable big toe bone) that don’t match those of Lucy, the human ancestor (or hominin) known to inhabit that region and considered by many to be the ancestor of all modern humans.
March 30, 2012 Tags: A. afarensis, Afar region, Africa, Ardipithecus ramidus, Australopithecus afarensis, Berkeley Geochronology Center, Burtele foot, Burtele hominin, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland Museum of Natural History, Ethiopia, hominin, how humans learned to walk upright, human ancestors, Human evolution, Johns Hopkins University, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Lucy, Morton K. Blaustein Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Naomi Levin, Yohannes Haile-Selassie
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
Two Johns Hopkins University mathematicians each have been awarded the very competitive Simons Fellowship in Mathematics, which provides scholars with the opportunity to spend a semester away from classroom and administrative duties in order to pursue their research interests. Christopher Sogge and Joel Spruck, both professors in the Department of Mathematics in the Zanvyl Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, are among just 50 mathematicians in North America to receive this highly competitive, honorific fellowship.
March 5, 2012 Tags: Christopher Sogge, Department of Mathematics, Eigenfunctions of the Laplacian, geometric analysis and harmonic analysis, Joel Spruck, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, mathematics, Riemannian geometry, Simons Fellowship, The Johns Hopkins University, William Minicozzi
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Institutional News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
George D. Rose, a biophysicist at The Johns Hopkins University, has been awarded a Humboldt Research Award by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany.
February 21, 2012 Tags: Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, Bertrand Garcia-Moreno, biophysics, George Rose, Institute for Advanced Study in the Technical University in Munich, Krieger School of Arts and Sciences, Krieger-Eisenhower Professor, protein folding, The Johns Hopkins University, Thomas C. Jenkins Department of Biophysics, Thomas Kiefhaber
| Category: Academic Disciplines, Homewood Campus News, Natural Sciences, University-Related
