Fall 2007
Welcome to Engineering Our World, the MIT School of Engineering's free bulletin for alumni and friends. Updated four times yearly, Engineering Our World describes some of the work we're doing at the leading edge of technological change, providing news and articles of the School's major initiatives.Past Issues
My First One Hundred Days
by Dean Subra Suresh
Late October marked the end of my first 100 days as dean and the culmination of many exciting developments and activities. I'm pleased to share with you the recent news of the School of Engineering in several areas:
- Research Highlights
- Recent Significant Developments
- Faculty Honors and Achievements, including NAE, AAAS, and NIH awards
Research Highlights
I'd like to bring your attention to articles highlighting some of the many cutting-edge research projects and other exciting activities in which our faculty and students are involved. Just look in the leftmost section of this page to link to an article in each category: bioengineering, nano- and micro- technologies, energy, emerging technologies, engineering systems, diversity, educational innovation, and global perspectives. To find more news stories in these categories, simply go to the corresponding section on the next page.
Recent Significant Developments
In late July, MIT announced plans for the new Bernard M. Gordon-MIT Leadership Program. More recently, I was pleased to announce the appointments of Edward Crawley and Joel Schindall, leaders of this exciting program. Established with a gift of $20 million by Bernard Gordon (S.B. 1948, S.M. 1949) and his wife, Sophia, through the Gordon Foundation, the Gordon-MIT Program is a major undertaking by the School to institute a more comprehensive approach to project-based learning and leadership development for engineering students. It comprises three main initiatives: a progressive set of enhancements to MIT’s core educational program with a focus on product development and project engineering, an industry mentoring and practice program for students, and an active program to disseminate best practices to other universities.
Also on the educational forefront, MIT announced a $30 million gift from Joan and Irwin Jacobs (S.M. 1957, Ph.D. 1959) in October that will support graduate fellowships for students in the School of Engineering, focused on electrical engineering and computer science. The Jacobs' gift creates the Irwin Mark Jacobs and Joan Klein Jacobs Presidential Fellowships and will support at least 15 Jacobs Presidential Fellows annually.
In a major development in biomedical engineering, MIT announced the MIT-Novartis partnership in pharmaceutical manufacturing in late September. This long-term research collaboration, known as the Novartis-MIT Center for Continuous Manufacturing, is aimed at transforming the way pharmaceuticals are produced.
In October, David H. Koch (S.B. 1962, S.M. 1963) made an extraordinary gift of $100 million to MIT for cancer research. One of the largest gifts in MIT history, it will establish an integrative research institute bringing together scientists and engineers under one roof to develop new paradigms in cancer research. Multidisciplinary efforts at the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research will undertake to find new and powerful ways to detect, diagnose, treat and manage cancer.