DSLS 1991-1992

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  Distinguished Scientist Lecture Series Program 1991-1992

  Bard College

  Distinguished Scientist Lecture Series Brochure 1991-1992, published by the Bard Center

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  Can Simple Chemical Reactions Tell us How the Leopard Got Its Spots?

  Irving R. Epstein

  (Abstract taken from the Distinguished Scientist Lecture Series Program 1991-1992).

  Born in New York City, Professor on Oscillating Chemical Reactions Epstein received a B.A. in Chemistry in 1982. He currently serves on and Physics in 1966, an M.A. in the Science Council, New England Chemistry in 1968 and a Ph.D. in Region, of the Weizmann Institute, Chemical Physics (with W.N. and is an editor of Chaos: An Lipscomb) in 1971, all from Harvard Interdisciplinary Journal of Non- University. He also holds a Diploma linear Science. in Advanced Mathematics from Oxford University, where he studied as a Marshall Scholar with the late C.A. Coulson. He was a NATO Postdoctoral Fellow at the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge University, in 1971, and an NSF Faculty Professional Development Fellow in the laboratory of Manfred Eigen at the Max-Planck-lnstitut liir Biophysikalische Chemie in Giittingen in 1977-78. He has received Woodrow Wilson, Guggenheim and Humboldt Fellowships as well as a Dreyfus Foundation Teacher-Scholar Award. He has taught at Brandeis since 1971, and served as Chemistry Department Chairman from 1983 to 1987. April 11, 1992 Irving R. Epstein is Helena Rubinstein Professor of Chemistry and a member of the Center for Complex Systems at Brandeis University. His work: Dr. Epstein's research interests revolve around nonlinear dynamical behavior in systems of chemical and biological interest. His group developed the first systematic approach to designing new chemical oscillators, and they have pioneered in the discovery and mechanistic analysis of oscillating chemical reactions. Author of more than 175 publications, Dr. Epstein's current research interests include the behavior of systems of coupled chemical oscillators and the study of neural oscillators, both singly and in coupled networks. Dr. Epstein organized and chaired the first Gordon Research Conference on Oscillating Chemical Reactions in 1982. He currently serves on the Science Council, New England Region, of the Weizmann Institute, and is an editor of Chaos: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Non-linear Science.

  His work: Dr. Epstein's research interests revolve around nonlinear dynamical behavior in systems of chemical and biological interest. His group developed the first systematic approach to designing new chemical oscillators, and they have pioneered in the discovery and mechanistic analysis of oscillating chemical reactions. Author of more than 175 publications, Dr. Epstein's current research interests include the behavior olfsystems of coupled chemical oscillators and the study of neural oscillators, both singly and in coupled networks.

  Irving R. Epstein is Helena Rubinstein Professor of Chemistry and a member of the Center for Complex Systems at Brandeis University.

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  Data Structures

  Robert E. Tarjan

  (Abstract taken from Distinguished Scientist Lecture Series Program 1991-1992)

  Professor Tarjan received his B.S. degree in mathematics from the California Institute of Technology in 1969 and his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer science from Stanford University in 1971 and 1972, respectively. He was an assistant professor at Cornell University (1972-73), a Miller Fellow at the University of California at Berkeley (1973-75), and assistant professor (1975-77) and then associate professor (1977-80) at Stanford University. He was affiliated with At&T Bell Labs from 1980 to 1990, most recently in the capacity of Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff. In 1985 Professor Tarjan was appointed the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of Computer Science at Princeton. In addition to his faculty appointment at Princeton University, Professor Tarjan is the co-director of the Center for Discrete Mathematics and Theoretical Computer Science, located at Rutgers University, and also Adjunct Fellow of the NEC Research Institute of Princeton, New Jersey.

  Professor Tarjan was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1987. He was awarded the Nevanlinna Prize in Information Science in 1983 by the International Mathematical Union and received the A.M. Turing Award of the Association for Computing Machinery in 1986. Professor Tarjan is currently a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the American Philosophical Society.

  His work: Professor Tarjan is well known for his pioneering work on the design and analysis of algorithms and data structures and is widely published in these and related fields. His current research interests continue to include the design and analysis of data structures and combinatorial algorithms, discrete optimization, and computational complexity

  Robert E. Tarjan is the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of Computer Science at Princeton University.

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  The Human Genome Project

  James D. Watson

  (Abstract taken from the Distinguished Scientist Lecture Series Program 1992-1992).

  Born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1928, Dr. Watson received a B.S. (1947) from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. (1950) from Indiana University, both in zoology. Following a National Research Fellowship in Copenhagen and a National Foundation of Infantile Paralysis Fellowship at the University of Cambridge, England, he spent two years at the California Institute of Technology. He joined the Harvard faculty in 1955 and became Professor in 1961, resigning in 1976 to become Director of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. In 1988 he was also appointed Associate Director tor Human Genome Research of the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Watson was awarded the John Collins Warren Prize of Massachusetts General Hospital (1959), the Eli Lilly Award in Biochemistry (1960), the Albert Lasker Prize, awarded by the American Public Health Association (1960), the Research Corporation Prize (1962), the John J. Carty Gold Medal of the National Academy of Sciences (1971 ), and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1977). His memberships include the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1958), the American Society of Biological Chemists (1958), the National Academy of Sciences (1962), the American Association for Cancer Research (1972), and the American Philosophical Society (1977). He holds honorary affiliations with the Danish Academy of Arts and Sciences (1963), Clare College, Cambridge University (1968), Athenaeum, London (1980), the Royal Society, London (1981) and the Academy of Sciences, USSR (1989). Dr. Watson has received honorary degrees from fourteen universities and has published live books: Molecular Biology of the Gene, The Double Helix, The DNA Story, Molecular Biology of the Cell, and Recombinant DNA: A Short Course.

  His work: James D. Watson is best known tor his discovery of the structure of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), tor which he shared with Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. The "Watson and Crick" model of DNA structure lead inevitably to a revolution in biology which culminated in the development of modern recombinant-DNA techniques. James D. Watson is the Director of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Associate Director for Human Genome Research of the National Institutes of Health.

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  Science and Science Policy in the 21st Century: A Modest Proposal

  Leon Cooper

  (Abstract taken from the Distinguished Scientist Lecture Series Program 1991-1992).

  Leon Cooper was born and bred in New York City, attending the Bronx High School of Science and Columbia University (B.A. '51, Ph.D. '54). After receiving his Ph.D., Dr. Cooper became a member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Following short residencies at the University of Illinois and Ohio State University, he proceeded to Brown University in 1958 and became the Henry Ledyard Goddard University Professor there in 1966 and the Thomas J. Watson, Sr. Professor of Science in 1974. He is long time co-chairman of Brown University's Center for Neural Sciences, the successor to the Center for Neural Studies, of which he was the first director, with an inter-disciplinary staff drawn from the departments of Applied Mathematics, Biomedical Sciences, Linguistics, and Physics. He is also co-founder and co-chair­ man of Nestor, Inc., an industry leader in neural network systems applications. In recognition of his work Dr. Cooper has received, in addition to the Nobel Prize, the Comstock Prize (with J.R. Schrieffer) of the National Academy of Sciences, the Award of Excellence of the Graduate Faculties Alumni of Columbia University, the Descartes Medal of the Academie de Paris, Universite Rene Descartes, and the John Jay Award of Columbia College.

  His work:

  For his studies on the theory of superconductivity, completed when he was in his twenties, Dr. Cooper shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1972 with John Bardeen and J.R. Schrieffer. For the past twenty years he has been doing leading work on animal nervous systems and the human brain, working towards a scientific model of how the mind works.

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  Human-Accelerated Environmental Change

  Gene E. Likens

  (Abstract taken from 1991-1992 Distinguished Scientist Lecture Program).

  Dr. Likens obtained a B.S. degree from Manchester College in 1957, and his MS. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 1959 and 1962. An instructor and associate professor at Dartmouth College (1963-1969), Dr. Likens moved to Cornell University in 1969, where he was promoted to full professor in 1972 and appointed Charles A. Alexander Professor of Biological Sciences in 1983. Before joining the New York Botanical Garden, Dr. Likens was Chairman of the Section of Ecology and Systematics at Cornell. In addition to his roles with the Botanical Garden, Dr. Likens retains faculty appointments at Yale University (Professor of Biology), Cornell (Adjunct Professor of Ecology and Systematics), and Rutgers University (Professor in the Graduate Field of Ecology). Dr. Likens is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Royal Swedish

  Academy of Sciences (foreign member). He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a recipient of both a NATO Senior Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the first recipient of the G.E. Hutchinson Award for excellence in research. In addition to numerous other prizes and awards, Dr. Likens has received five honorary doctorates. His work: Dr. Likens is an ecologist best known for his discovery of acid rain in North America. He is a co-director of the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study, a multidisciplinary ecological analysis of forest, stream, and lake ecosystems in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. An advisor at state, national, and international levels on the ecological effects of air pollution and acid rain, Dr. Likens is author, co-author, or editor of over 300 research articles and ten books.

  Gene E. Likens is Vice President of the New York Botanical Garden, and Director of the Institute of Ecosystem Studies at the Mary Flagler Cary Arboretum, Millbrook, New York.