Volume 12, Number 6
Friday, February 9, 1996
Next Issue: Friday, February 16, 1996. Chemformation is published by the Office of the Department Chairman. The deadline for the next issue is Tuesday, February 16. Please convey items of interest (or mailing list changes) to Linda Earle, Room 18-393, Department of Chemistry, MIT, Cambridge, MA 02139, 617/253-4080; 617/258-7500 (fax) or e-mail to lkn@mit.edu. Back issues of Chemformation can be accessed via the Chemistry Department Website.
Visit the Chemistry Department Website at http://web.mit.edu/chemistry/www/
All of their colleagues and friends in the Chemistry Department extend sincere congratulations to Professors Rick L. Danheiser and Robert J. Silbey, whose appointment as MacVicar Facuty Fellows was announced Thursday by President Charles Vest and Provost Joel Moses. Professor Michael Rubner of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering was also appointed a MacVicar Fellow. Since Professor Daniel S. Kemp was selected as an "inaugural" MacVicar Fellow in 1992, the appointment of Professors Silbey and Danheiser brings to three the number of chemistry faculty who have been recognized with MIT's highest teaching award. No other MIT department has so high a proportion of MacVicar Fellows among its faculty.
Selection as a MacVicar Faculty Fellow recognizes outstanding classroom teaching, major innovations in education, dedication to being an "apostle of teaching", and helping others to achieve teaching excellence. The MacVicar Faculty Fellows Program was established following the death in 1991 at age 47 of Margaret MacVicar, MIT's first dean of undergraduate education. Its goal is to create a small academy of scholars committed to fine teaching and innovation in education, and in so doing, to honor the late dean's unrelenting efforts - at MIT and nationally - to enhance undergraduate education.
The MacVicar Fellows, of which this is the fifth group, serve ten-year terms. Their appointments are made by the Provost with advice from a committee comprised of students and faculty and chaired by Professor Rosalind Williams, the Dean for Undergraduate Education and Student Affairs. The fellowships provide an annual scholar's allowance to assist each Fellow in developing ways to enrich the undergraduate learning experience. With the inception of the program, then Provost Mark S. Wrighton stated that MIT would ultimately commit at least 10 million dollars in endowment to support the program.
Professor Rick Danheiser is Associate Head of the Chemistry Department with special responsibility for the Department's undergraduate and graduate educational programs. Professor Danheiser is teaching Organic Chemistry 5.13 this semester together with Visiting Professor Ken Williamson. Professor Bob Silbey, the former Head of the Chemistry Department, is currently on sabbatical, but will return next year to co-teach 5.11 (Introductory Chemistry) in the fall and 5.60 (Thermodynamics and Kinetics) in the spring.
The Chemistry Department is pleased to welcome Ken Williamson to MIT as a Visiting Professor of Chemistry for the spring semester. Ken is the Mary E. Woolley Professor of Chemistry at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA, where he has been a member of the faculty since 1961. Ken's research interests involve applications of nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. In the educational arena, Ken has a special interest in microscale organic laboratory, and he is the author of the popular textbook "Macroscale and Microscale Organic Experiments" published by D. C. Heath and Co.
Ken will be teaching the first half of Organic Chemistry 5.13 this semester. He can be found in Room 18-211, and he can be contacted at 253-1829 or by email at kwilliam@mtholyoke.edu.
Gordon Binder, Chairman and CEO of Amgen will discuss the rapid pace of bio-technological advancements as well as his own company's accomplishments, during a 90-minute presentation entitled "Business Success in Advanced Technology" at Bartos Theater on Thursday, February 22, at 10 a.m.
Based in Thousand Oaks, California, Amgen employs over 4,000 workers and develops, manufactures, and markets human therapeutics based on advanced cellular and molecular biology. Two of its products were among the top ten biotech drugs of 1994: Neupogen, which boosts white blood cell production and combats infection from chemotherapy and infectious diseases, and Epogen, a recombinant human hormone which stimulates red blood cell production for the treatment of anemia.
One of Amgen's most recent accomplishments has been procuring a license from Rockefeller University to develop the so-called fat gene, or gene OB, which may control the body's storage of fat and have huge market potential.
Binder's lecture is open to the MIT community, although seating is limited to 200. Bartos Theater is located on 20 Ames Street, E15-070. For more information, call 258-7897. The "Industry Leaders in Technology and Management" lecture series features CEO's from the world's leading corporations. For a calendar of upcoming lecturers, refer to the WWW homepage at http://web.mit.edu/ctpid/www.
The tax information workshop sponsored by the Graduate School office for graduate students who are U.S. citizens or Resident Aliens will be held on Thursday, February 15, 1996 from 2-4 p.m. in Room 10-250.
All F-1 and J-1 International students and their dependents are required to file federal tax returns. If you have been in the US for 5 years or longer, you are considered a resident for tax purposes and you should file returns on 1040. If you have been in the US less than 5 years, you are considered non-resident for tax purposes and you should file form 1040 NR or 1040 EZ and Form 8843. If you are a non-resident for tax purposes and you received any income from a US source, you are required to file a tax by April 15th. If you are a non-resident for tax purposes and did not receive any income from a US source you can file by June 15th.
The ISO will hold two Tax Workshops, the first of which will cover RA and TA stipend and tuition awards, graduate fellowships, withholding and tax regulations for internationals. on Thursday, February 29th, Room 34-101 from 3-5 p.m. and the other workshop is designed more for undergraduate students but it will also address tax regulations and tax forms pertinent to all international students and is scheduled for Monday, March 18th Room 10-250 from 3-5.
Amgen cordially invites those interested to attend interviews for several positions on Wednesday, February 28, 1996 at the MIT Career Center. Interviews will be based on preselection of candidates. Students interested in competing to be included on the schedule should submit a resume to the Career Center immediately. Positions are for BS or MS chemists (organic or biochemistry) for a position as a chemistry research associate or a BS in Life Science, Biochemistry, or Bioengineering for a clinical manufacturing associate.