Science magazine has chosen the discoveries of NASA's Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission as Breakthrough of the Year in its Dec. 17 edition, published today. The principal scientific investigator for the mission's twin-rover science program is Steve Squyres, professor of astronomy at Cornell University, assisted by a large team of researchers, 28 of them at Cornell, including 15 students. The mission is managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The journal, published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, says that its annual top honor is awarded for the mission's discovery of evidence for the prolonged presence of potentially life-supporting, salty, acidic water on the planet's surface. (December 16, 2004)
The symposium, "Women Working on Mars," was part of JPL's Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day, an annual outreach event that encourages young women to consider a career in engineering or science.
On April 7, David Macaulay will come to the Cornell to deliver the spring 1999 Spencer T. and Ann W. Olin Lecture at 7:30 p.m. in the Alice Statler Auditorium.
Cornell Library is the recipient of a $750,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for a three-year project to create an online repository for mathematics and statistics publications.
Cornell University is leading a newly formed international consortium of six universities and institutes collaborating on high-energy density plasma research, with the aim of developing a promising fusion power source.
"They paved paradise and put up a parking lot," singer Joni Mitchell lamented in the 1970s. Three decades later, they are demolishing a parking lot and paving the way for a paradise.
Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers of America, will deliver a talk, "Harvesting Change: Farm Workers' Rights 40 Years After the Founding of the UFW," Tuesday, April 29, at 7 p.m. in Anabel Taylor Hall auditorium. The event, hosted by the Farm Worker Advocacy Coalition at Cornell, is free and open to the public. Huerta is the most prominent Chicana (Mexican-American woman) labor leader in the United States. She is co-founder and first vice president of the United Farm Workers union. For more than 30 years she has dedicated her life to the struggle for equal rights for migrant farm workers. Honored with countless community service, labor, Hispanic and women's awards, Huerta has been called a role model for Mexican-American women. (April 24, 2003)
On the evening of Feb. 21, internationally renowned musician Yair Dalal will return to Ithaca for a performance of his unique style of Middle Eastern music.
With the harvest coming in and Thanksgiving ahead, many are thinking about festivities and food-laden holidays. For those less fortunate, more than 100,000 pounds, or 50 tons, of fruits and vegetables are being donated by Cornell University to local food banks and food distribution centers. (November 11, 2004)