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While students made their way back from their spring break locations earlier this week, I remained at home due to feeling ill. Even though I have not been on campus much the past few days, I felt like ����ý was still reaching out to me.

����ý professor Peter Balakianhas been named the 2012 recipient of the Alice and Clifford Spendlove Prize in Social Justice, Diplomacy and Tolerance.

����ý University President Jeffrey Herbst today announced the appointment of Suzy M. Nelson as dean of the college, effective in June. Nelson, who has served more than 20 years as a university leader, administrator, and instructor, will join ����ý after seven years at Harvard University.

Ken Belanger, Raab Family Chair and associate professor of biology, has received another prestigious grant that builds on the biology department’s momentum and further expands the research opportunities on campus for undergraduate biology students.

“Understanding the role that church forests play in the provision of ecosystem services is critical,” wrote ����ý biology professor Catherine Cardelús and two colleagues in a letter published in Science, the world’s leading journal of original scientific research, global news, and commentary.

Two ����ý professors — Rebecca Miller Ammerman, classics, and Randy Fuller, biology — along with seven collaborative partners across the globe, received major research grants from ����ý’s Picker Interdisciplinary Science Institute. Both projects, as envisioned by Harvey M. Picker ’36 when he established the institute in 2006, extend the reach and resources of ����ý faculty members […]

After co-leading 27 members of ����ý’s faculty around India for two weeks, Professor Padma Kaimal was all the more convinced that the enterprise would have lasting impact on ����ý.

The Manhattan String Quartet arrived on campus this week to perform for and instruct ����ý students and faculty. The quartet offered several classes for students who were interested in learning about the evolution of classical music.

An exhaustive seven-year project by Nigel Young, who was Cooley Professor of peace studies and director of the Peace Studies Program at ����ý from 1984 to 2004, has received the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, in the Award for Scholarship category.

A scientist wearing lace wings paces about the stage, while a blue-and-white “bird spirit,” also costumed in lace and feathers, sings her a birdcall. All the while, animations of cellular processes unfold on the dome above their heads. Needless to say, this was not your average science lecture.