At the 63rd annual Staff Service & Impact Awards ceremony on May 31, Caltech President Thomas F. Rosenbaum presented awards to 289 staff members for their years of service and contributions to the Institute. Two employees have served the Institute for 50 years (Pat Anderson and Bob Logan); three for 45 years; six for 40 years; 14 for 35 years; 25 for 30 years; 35 for 25 years; 61 for 20 years; 49 for 15 years; and 93 for 10 years.

Julia McCallin, associate vice president for human resources, served as master of ceremonies for the event, while Provost David Tirrell (who is the Carl and Shirley Larson Provostial Chair at the California Institute of Technology) and Kip Thorne (BS '62), Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics, Emeritus, both gave speeches underscoring the vital importance of Caltech's staff members to the accomplishment of the Institute's scientific mission.

The event also included the announcement of two awards, one honoring individual achievement and another recognizing the impact of teams making significant contributions to the work of the Institute.

Manuel (Manny) De La Torre, stockroom lead for the Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, received the Thomas W. Schmitt Annual Staff Prize, which honors a staff member whose contributions "embody the values and spirit that enable the Institute to achieve excellence in research and education."

Nominators cited De La Torre—whose duties include managing equipment and supply procurement for multiple labs—for his hard work, cheerful attitude, and eagerness to help others. In the words of one supporter, De La Torre makes those he works with feel "like you're part of a winning team."

The Procurement and IMSS Teams won the Team Impact Award, which recognizes "teams that make significant contributions to the work and mission of the Institute" and are able to demonstrate work that has impacted and supported its research or education programs.

The teams' P2P project—which saw members working with vendors, Caltech divisions, and employees to implement a new and efficient payment-and-invoice processing system for the Institute—"meaningfully responded to years of frustrations many [on campus] had with old ways of integrating purchasing and payments," one nominator wrote. "This has taken an incredible amount of effort, and yet they have maintained positive, even cheerful attitudes throughout."

The other Team Impact Award nominees were: Applied Physics and Materials Science Administrative Team; Custodial Project Team; IMSS Help Desk & Advanced Help Desk; Mail Services; Office of Laboratory Animal Resources; PMA Student Support Team; Residential Life Coordinators; and Student-Faculty Programs.

James Keane, a postdoctoral fellow in Caltech's Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences and Irena Li, a JPL systems engineer, were among more than 600 artists who participated in the 26th annual Pasadena Chalk Festival, held June 16-17 at the Paseo Colorado.

Visiting Caltech in fall 2017, trustees Lynn Booth and Kent Kresa had a chance to stop by the newly opened Center for Autonomous Systems and Technologies (CAST). This interdisciplinary hub advances research on autonomous systems and robots with potential benefits ranging from improving disaster rescue and response to providing mobility for people with disabilities to expanding our ability to explore land, water, and outer space. The promise of innovation on display so fired the couple's imagination that they decided to endow the Booth-Kresa Leadership Chair for CAST.

"Caltech researchers are tackling some very exciting projects, and I think they're going to create amazing things," says Kresa, chairman emeritus of Northup Grumman and former chair of the Institute's Board of Trustees, which he joined in 1994.

Adds Booth, a prominent Los Angeles philanthropist who became a Caltech trustee in 2012, "When we got home from that visit, we thought about CAST and said, 'You know, we'd really like to be part of that.'"

Read the full story on the Break Through website

The Associated Students of Caltech (ASCIT) hosted its annual teaching awards on June 8 honoring exceptional faculty and TAs for the 2017–18 academic year.

Voted on by undergraduates, this year's ASCIT Teaching Awards were presented to Marina Agranov, professor of economics; Oleg Ivrii, the Olga Taussky and John Todd Instructor in Mathematics; Thomas Vidick, professor of computing and mathematical sciences; and Konstantin Zuev, lecturer in computing and mathematical sciences.

The TAs honored were junior Bobby Abrahamson and graduate students Sophie Miller, Angad Singh, and Ashmeet Singh.

Sophomore Erika Salzman, chair of the ASCIT Academics and Research Committee (ARC), which administers the awards, says they are intended to "recognize professors, instructors, and TAs who demonstrate exceptional commitment to teaching and concern for their students' learning." 

View images from the ceremony here (see bottom of the page).

Kristin Weyman, a student affairs professional with more than a decade of experience in supporting the personal and professional development of undergraduate students, is joining Caltech as an associate dean for undergraduate students. Weyman will assume her new role on July 30, 2018.

Weyman will be one of two associate deans who work with Dean of Undergraduate Students Kevin Gilmartin in sharing responsibility for the development of Caltech's 1,000 undergraduate students. The dean's office oversees a wide variety of issues related to the well-being and progress of students throughout their educational career, including academic advising and support services, personal and general advising, faculty outreach and communication, student conduct, crisis management, and disability services.

Weyman comes to Caltech from Ohio Wesleyan University, a small, private, residential liberal arts college, where she has served as the associate dean for student success for the last year. Prior to that, she was in Southern California, serving as the associate dean for students and dean for first- and second-year students at Claremont McKenna College. Throughout her time in higher education, and in particular in working within student affairs leadership, Weyman has taken on a broad range of increasing responsibilities, from supervising and aligning student support services throughout student affairs, to assisting in the review and development of policies and procedures to enhance the student experience, to overseeing new student orientation programs, to meeting one-on-one with individual students and groups in an advising and mentoring capacity.

Weyman says, "I am excited to join the Caltech community and work with its motivated student body and dedicated faculty and staff to further the Institute's goals in helping students foster a balanced, healthy lifestyle while engaging in academic and extracurricular pursuits."

Weyman's appointment is occasioned by the retirement of Barbara Green, after 29 years of supporting Caltech's students and families in the dean's office. Green, an honorary member of the Caltech Alumni Association and a 2013 Thomas W. Schmitt Annual Staff Prize awardee, has been an integral team member in the dean's office, overseeing the transition between several faculty deans as well as serving as interim dean and sole representative for the office during two separate academic years and filling the role of disability services coordinator for graduate and undergraduate students.

"As I leave my position as associate dean, I am happy to know that someone as thoughtful, experienced, and dedicated as Kristin will be joining the dean's office," Green says. "Throughout her career in higher education, Kristin has demonstrated a commitment to supporting individual students—understanding their individual needs and backgrounds, and aligning the support and resources to help them succeed. She will be a welcome addition to Caltech."

Catastrophe can be the mother of invention. That's why Caltech trustee Brad Jones feels optimistic in the face of climate change. Throughout history, according to the Manhattan Beach–based venture capitalist, people have solved major challenges by inventing things.

To that end, Jones has pledged $5 million to Caltech. Part of his gift endows the G. Bradford Jones Professorship, which Caltech's president and provost initially will use to support or recruit a top environmental scientist or engineer.

Looking forward, Jones says: "Efforts to decrease carbon emissions help, but not enough. I think we need new technologies that capture carbon to manage global warming. That's the kind of challenge that warrants the attention of people as smart as those at Caltech."

But he has an even broader vision for benefiting humanity. After 15 years, by his design, Caltech leaders will award the professorship in any field where breakthroughs can make a difference for the world.

In addition to the professorship, his pledge will create two G. Bradford Jones Fellowships, supporting graduate students in any discipline.

Read the full story on the Break Through website

Pedro J. Pizarro (PhD '94), president and chief executive officer of Edison International, has been elected to the Institute's Board of Trustees.

Pizarro, who spent his early years in Puerto Rico and now calls Pasadena home, earned a bachelor's degree in chemistry at Harvard University. After completing doctoral studies at Caltech, also in chemistry, he worked with the global consulting firm McKinsey & Company, advising energy, technology, engineering, and banking clients.

He joined Edison International in 1999.

Pizarro has served in a number of leadership roles at the company, including as president of Southern California Edison—one of the nation's largest electric utilities—from 2014 to 2016.

In addition to Caltech's Board of Trustees, Pizarro also serves on the boards of Argonne National Laboratory, the Electric Power Research Institute, and the Edison Electric Institute.

He is one of two individuals to have joined Caltech's governing body in recent months. The Board is led by David L. Lee (PhD '74), chair, and Ronald K. Linde (MS '62, PhD '64), vice chair. It is currently composed of 44 trustees, 26 senior trustees, 21 life members, and one honorary life member.

Pizarro recently reflected on his career in energy and his connection to Caltech.

How did you get into your line of work?

I was interested in science from a young age and started Harvard as a premed student. However, midway through college I realized I enjoyed more quantitative physical sciences and decided to instead pursue a PhD in chemistry (chemical physics). I started at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, then transferred after one year to Caltech in order to follow my then girlfriend—now my wife of 29 years, Monica Kohler (PhD '95), Caltech research professor of Mechanical and Civil Engineering. Upon completing my PhD, I declined a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellowship at MIT to become a management consultant at McKinsey. I was attracted to business by its potential for large-scale impact and its emphasis on teamwork. Then, after nearly six years, I was recruited by one of my clients, Edison International. Similarly, I was attracted by the broad impact of electric power across society. We power our portion of the world's fifth largest economy and are a key force behind California's ambitions to address climate change through greenhouse gas reduction. I was fortunate to take on different executive roles across the business every few years and even more fortunate to be named CEO in 2016.

What do you enjoy doing outside of work?

I enjoy my work, in particular our Edison team's sense of societal mission and public service within an innovative Fortune 250 company. That said, my true love is spending time with my family. Other fun activities include running 20 miles a week to keep myself healthy and sane, and the occasional day (perhaps once every three or four months) when I can make dough and sauces from scratch, fire up our wood oven to 800 degrees, and bake Neapolitan pizzas.

How did you become interested in Caltech?

I was first drawn to Caltech by its world-class graduate program—and, as I noted above, by my wife (then girlfriend) deciding to attend. I appreciate Caltech's innovation, excellence, and unique ability to stimulate collaboration among scientists across different fields.

Li Lu, the founder and chairman of Himalaya Capital, a multibillion-dollar firm focused on long-term investments in Asia and the United States, has been elected to the Institute's Board of Trustees.

Born in Tangshan, China, Li was among the student leaders of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, an experience he recounted in the 1990 memoir Moving the Mountain: My Life in China from the Cultural Revolution to Tiananmen Square.

After escaping from China, he enrolled at Columbia University, where he completed three degree programs simultaneously: a bachelor's degree in economics, a JD from Columbia Law School, and an MBA from Columbia Business School.

It was at Columbia in 1993 that Li was introduced to the investment field through a lecture by Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett. Li went on to found Himalaya Capital in 1997 after graduation.

Li, who also serves on Columbia's Board of Trustees, is a past recipient of the John Jay Award from Columbia College, the Raoul Wallenberg Human Rights Award from the Congressional Human Rights Foundation, and the Reebok Human Rights Award. He is featured in the National Museum of American History's Family of Voices online exhibit.

Li is one of two individuals to have joined Caltech's governing body in recent months. The Board is led by David L. Lee (PhD '74), chair, and Ronald K. Linde (MS '62, PhD '64), vice chair. It is currently composed of 44 trustees, 26 senior trustees, 21 life members, and one honorary life member.

He recently discussed the values that drive his work and what he admires about Caltech.

What have you learned during your career that you think others should know?

First, define your own circle of competence with intellectual honesty. You have to know what you don't know to determine what you know. Second, have the highest degree of fiduciary duty and imagine that every dollar you take from a client is coming from your own middle-class parents who are entrusting their life savings to you.

What is your passion in life?

The quest for truth, both in work and in life. As Caltech's motto states, "The truth shall make you free."

What don't people know about Caltech that you wish they did know?

Many people know the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and its affiliation with NASA, but fewer people know that JPL is managed by Caltech. This is a wonderful facility with a group of brilliant minds who innovate across planetary exploration, Earth science, space-based astronomy, and technology development.

I also wish more people understood Caltech's global impact. For example, the famous Chinese rocket scientist Qian Xuesen (PhD '39) helped establish JPL and conducted important work on campus as an assistant professor of aeronautics (1943–1946) and as the Robert H. Goddard Professor of Jet Propulsion (1949–1955). After returning to China, he made significant contributions to the Chinese missile and space programs.

Caltech's Board of Trustees, gathering for a meeting this week, has recently welcomed new members from the fields of investment and energy.

Li Lu, founder and chairman of Himalaya Capital, and Pedro J. Pizarro, president and chief executive officer of Edison International, were elected to the Board in recent months. In total, the Board is composed of 44 trustees, 26 senior trustees, 21 life members, and one honorary life member.

We recently asked each of Caltech's newest board members to reflect on their lives, careers, and connection to the Institute. Read more about Li and Pizarro.

Working in a Caltech chemical engineering lab this summer, Maggie Higginbotham spends a lot of her time coaxing bacteria to make extremely small bags of gas that can be used to improve the diagnostic abilities of ultrasound equipment.

While that task may be fairly routine for the faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and undergraduates in the lab, it's a brand-new experience for Higginbotham: she's still in high school.

Higginbotham, a 10th-grade student at Blair High School in Pasadena, is one of 22 local high school students—and three teachers—participating in Caltech's Summer Research Connection (SRC). The six-week program brings high school students and teachers to campus to conduct research in a dozen labs in fields ranging from chemistry, physics, and materials science to chemical engineering, astronomy, and planetary science.

After several weeks in the program, Higginbotham says working as a member of the research team "has been a fantastic experience that's allowed me to see what doing research is really like. I've learned how to use the tools and how to handle myself in a lab."

And that is precisely the point of the program, according to Mitch Aiken, associate director for educational outreach for the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Outreach, which runs the program each summer.

Aiken says the goal of the program is threefold: to provide graduate students and postdocs with the opportunity to practice mentoring, teaching, and polishing their scientific communications skills; to offer K–12 teachers opportunities to learn techniques that they can take back to their classrooms; and to give local high school students firsthand exposure to how research is conducted at the university level. "SRC also provides an avenue for many researchers on campus to engage in community outreach and meet a key component of the Broader Impacts fulfillment requirement of National Science Foundation grants," Aiken says.

Working for 20 hours a week in the lab of Mikhail G. Shapiro, assistant professor of chemical engineering, Higginbotham joined Marshall High School student Thomas Scott as well as Garrett Gibson, a teacher from Environmental Charter Middle School in Gardena. The team's work focuses on growing flasks of bacteria and archaea that produce gas vesicles—air-filled protein structures that the cells normally use as flotation devices. The Shapiro lab is developing the vesicles as imaging agents for ultrasound, making it possible for this imaging technology to visualize specific cells and molecules in the body.

In the lab, Higginbotham and Gibson work under the mentorship of research technician Dina Malounda, who has been teaching them proper lab techniques such as purifying gas vesicles from bacteria that will be used by other scientists in the lab for their experiments.

Malounda says SRC provides "a rare opportunity for high school students and K–12 teachers to witness and experience the atmosphere in an actual scientific research laboratory … and to interact with scientists."

Higginbotham and Gibson say they are learning a great deal about the process of conducting research by participating in regular lab discussions where all of the group's members pitch ideas, talk about their projects and goals, and ask questions about each other's work.

"I love asking questions," Higginbotham says. "It's always great when you can ask questions and learn."

Gibson praised SRC as intellectually rigorous and rewarding for teachers like himself and added that it greatly helps to "demystify research for students. Going from being an undergraduate to a PhD student is a big leap, but it's not impossible. Having an experience like this can make it much less scary for them."

The program culminates with a seminar day on August 10, when student-teacher-mentor teams from the various campus labs will explain their work to their peers and invited guests during formal 10-minute presentations followed by question-and-answer periods.

After being involved in her lab's weekly meetings, Higginbotham says she feels well prepared for her presentation: "I've seen how to present ideas at meetings and now know how to set up our information and explain it."

Shapiro says the program also serves a crucial function as a channel for "investing in future PhD students. Research relies on young, ambitious people, and this can help us encourage them to become scientists."

SRC is one of several programs for youth running on campus this summer, including iD Tech Camps, Alexa Café, Project Scientist, Community Science Academy, Da Vinci Camp, STEAM:CODERS, Education Unlimited, and Pathways to STEM Cell Science. More than 300 students, ranging from preschoolers to high school seniors are on campus on the days when all camps and programs are in session.

Caltech Athletics celebrated the reopening of the Institute's newly renovated Fox Stanton Track on Thursday, August 15.

The track, located on Caltech's South Field, had been closed for nearly a month for renovations to upgrade the surface and improve athletes' safety. Betsy Mitchell, director of athletics, physical education and recreation, says, "The surface was dry, brittle, and literally cracking apart."

The new polyurethane surface is now softer and safer for athletes, she notes, and it is also bright orange—a shade shared by only two other tracks in the United States, and the only one of its kind in higher education.

After a brief opening speech by Mitchell, the students, faculty, and community members in attendance took a commemorative first lap to celebrate the renovations. Runners stopped a few meters from the finish line to wait for those who chose to walk the new track, and everyone crossed the finish line together.

The Fox Stanton Track is named in memory of William L. "Fox" Stanton (1874-1946), who was Caltech's athletics director and coach of the Institute's football, cross country, and track and  field teams from 1921 to 1941. He was inducted into the Caltech Athletics Hall of Honor earlier this year. His son, W. Layton Stanton (BS '27, PhD '31), helped raise funds for the original track back in 1986.

To celebrate the work of its postdoctoral scholars, Caltech will mark National Postdoc Appreciation Week from September 17–21 with events including divisional town hall meetings, social mixers, career discussions, and a raffle for Amazon gift cards.

Initiated by the National Postdoctoral Association in 2009, the annual event recognizes the contributions that postdocs make to research and discovery worldwide. The Caltech Postdoc Association (CPA)—which advocates on behalf of the postdoc community and seeks to boost professional and personal developmentopportunities—has hosted events marking the occasion previously, but this year the organization is boosting the size, number, and coordination of events campus-wide to underscore the contributions postdocs make.

The weeklong event mirrors new Institute-wide efforts to provide more coordinated services that will support postdocs. Earlier this year, Caltech established the Postdoctoral Scholars Office (PSO)—overseen by Vice Provost Kaushik Bhattacharya—to represent postdocs' interests. It also established the Postdoctoral Studies Committee—made up of members from the PSO, faculty representatives from each division, the CPA, and Human Resources—to propose recommendations for improving the postdoc experience at Caltech.

CPA chair Sreeram Balasubramanian, a postdoctoral scholar in biology and biological engineering, notes that postdocs "represent a unique part of the Caltech community. They are scholars who play an invaluable role in Caltech's research enterprise by primarily engaging in research activities as part of their continued training post-graduation to help prepare for their chosen career paths." Moreover, most postdocs mentor graduate and undergraduate students: "That's an important service that most postdocs provide while pursuing their research endeavors."

Bhattacharya says that Caltech has about 700 postdocs working on campus at any given time, making its postdoc-to-student ratio as much as four times higher than peer institutions. This is why they play an "especially vital" role in research at the Institute, he says.

"The success of our alumni scholars is a critical part of our impact," Bhattacharya adds. "However, since postdoctoral scholars are deeply immersed in their research and identified with individual laboratories, they do not always feel integrated with the larger Caltech community. The Postdoctoral Scholars Office and the Postdoctoral Studies Committee seek to address their needs at the Institute and to enable them to succeed. National Postdoc Appreciation Week is an important opportunity to recognize this dedicated and talented group of scholars, and to acknowledge their contributions to the Institute."

In a letter to the campus community on September 17, the first day of National Postdoc Appreciation Week, President Thomas Rosenbaum highlighted the crucial work of postdocs, noting that "Caltech's mission of world-leading research and education depends crucially on our postdoctoral scholars. Although their time at Caltech may be short, they quickly become vital parts of the Institute's intellectual fabric."

For National Postdoc Appreciation Week, Balasubramanian says,the CPA aims to "increase awareness for postdocs, inform our postdocs about various campus resources, and facilitate interactions within the community."

In collaboration with the Office of the Provost as well as the Institute's divisions and its campus partners, the CPA will host Appreciation Week activities that include free morning coffee and informational booths, town hall meetings focusing on postdocs' needs and concerns, an ice cream social, a tech-and-industry mixer, reflections and advice from postdoc alumni, and an opportunity to get free professional headshots.

More information on the week's schedule of events can be found here. 

Postdoctoral Scholars contribute mightily to research on campus and to Caltech's standing in the world. More than 600 postdocs are on campus this year, spread across all six divisions. They make their influence felt across the academic enterprise, carrying out experiments, devising theories, mentoring students, setting intellectual directions, and conveying the power of science to the general public. Caltech postdocs have made scientific and technological contributions at the highest levels, garnering, for example, 14 Nobel Prizes and 14 National Medals of Science over the years. 

The start of National Postdoc Appreciation Week is a most appropriate time to recognize the unsung heroes in our midst. To that end, the Institute recently created a central postdoctoral office to supplement the support provided in the divisions. We are also buttressing career placement services in order to make sure that our postdocs are well-positioned to maximize their impact on society as they move on to the next stages of their careers.

Caltech's mission of world-leading research and education depends crucially on our postdoctoral scholars. Although their time at Caltech may be short, they quickly become vital parts of the Institute's intellectual fabric. In the words of Herman Hesse:  "Where paths that have an affinity for each other intersect, the whole world looks like home for a time." A heartfelt thank you to the Caltech Postdoc Association for your partnership and to all our postdoctoral scholars for making Caltech home.

Wilhelmus Luxemburg, emeritus professor of mathematics at Caltech, passed away on October 2, 2018. He was 89 years old.

Luxemburg was born on April 11, 1929, in Delft, the Netherlands. In his oral history interview with the Caltech Archives in 2001, he recalled growing up in the Netherlands during World War II, and having to hide out from the Germans in a secret place under the roof of his home, where he and his family would study mathematics and calculus despite living "in fear all day."

Luxemburg received his BA in 1950 and his MA in 1953, both from the University of Leiden. He earned his PhD from the Delft Institute of Technology in 1955. He joined Caltech as assistant professor of mathematics in 1958, became associate professor in 1960, and professor in 1962, a position he held until becoming emeritus professor in 2000. Luxemburg was also Caltech's executive officer for mathematics between 1970 and 1985.

His main area of study was functional analysis, a branch of mathematics involving infinite-dimensional vector spaces and the connections between them. He also developed methods for applying model theory techniques to conventional mathematics, thereby resolving certain paradoxes of infinitesimal calculus that had been unresolved since the inception of calculus. Luxemburg's most notable work was in the theory of Riesz spaces (partially ordered vector spaces where the order structure is a lattice) and infinitesimals (entities too small to be measured).

Luxemburg had a love for teaching—he called it "a joy" in his oral history—and working with his math students at Caltech. In his oral history, he said, "Caltech is a unique institution. I don't think there's anything that compares with it in the dedication to the fields that I represented here and what the school is doing. It's not, of course, a huge place like Berkeley and so on, so you know everyone more or less. … And you had all kinds of room to move. … And that is, of course, wonderful—for mathematicians particularly. You have such excellent students, and that makes a big difference."

Luxemburg was named a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1974.

He is survived by a son and daughter and other family members.

Anneila Sargent (MS '67, PhD '78), Caltech's Ira S. Bowen Professor of Astronomy, Emeritus, has made a gift to establish the Wallace L. W. Sargent Fellowship. With this fellowship, she is supporting tomorrow's scientists and engineers while also honoring her late husband. Wallace "Wal" Sargent, former Ira S. Bowen Professor of Astronomy, served on the Caltech faculty from 1966 until his death in 2012.

Read more on the Break Through campaign website.

Walter Burke, longtime president and treasurer of the Sherman Fairchild Foundation and a life member of the Caltech Board of Trustees, passed away on November 1, 2018. He was 96 years old.

First named to the Caltech Board of Trustees in 1975, Burke was elected a life member in 2009 and held this position until his death. He was a member of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory committee as well as a member of the visiting committees for the divisions of physics, mathematics and astronomy (PMA), and the humanities and social sciences (HSS).

In 2014, Caltech and the Sherman Fairchild Foundation honored Burke with the creation of the Walter Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics, which has strengthened Caltech's leading role in the quest to discover fundamental laws of nature and to explain natural phenomena at all scales—from subatomic, atomic, and molecular scales to the scales of celestial objects and the universe itself.

"Walter's leadership and longstanding participation on the board of trustees, as well as his generosity and commitment to advancing scientific understanding, have left an enduring legacy for us to honor and uphold," says David L. Lee (PhD '74), chairman of the Board of Trustees.

"Walter's storied career, taste for talent, and exemplary generosity contributed to Caltech's success for more than 40 years," says Caltech president Thomas Rosenbaum, the Sonja and William Davidow Presidential Chair and professor of physics. "He was a champion for our scholars and a catalyst for discovery, including the transformative detection of gravitational waves. He will continue to live in our memories and as part of the Institute's continuing impact on the world."

As the founding director of the Sherman Fairchild Foundation, Burke helped to establish a longstanding relationship between Caltech and the foundation. Among the efforts he was closely involved in were the creation of the Sherman Fairchild Distinguished Scholars Program, which brought hundreds of scientists and researchers to Caltech for extended visits from 1973 to 1994. The visitors who came to campus through this program have included Stephen Hawking and several Nobel laureates. Similarly, he was very supportive of a program that brought Hawking to Caltech annually for research collaborations and lectures between 1991 and 2013.

"Walter was a wonderful friend to me, to PMA, and to Caltech," says Kip Thorne (BS '62), Richard P. Feynman Professor of Theoretical Physics, Emeritus, and a 2017 Nobel Laureate in Physics. "He was a longtime member of the Caltech Board of Trustees and of the PMA visiting committee, where his frank, to-the-point advice was of great value."

Burke was an early supporter of Thorne's research group and, later, of the Caltech-Cornell SXS Program to simulate sources of gravitational waves. That program has been crucial to the black-hole discoveries made by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO).

"Walter made lasting contributions to theoretical physics and other areas of science at Caltech," adds Hirosi Ooguri, the director of the Burke Institute for Theoretical Physics and the Fred Kavli Professor of Theoretical Physics and Mathematics. "We miss him greatly."

Burke was born on July 30, 1922, in New York. He attended Dartmouth College from 1940 through 1942 and served as a lieutenant junior grade in the Naval Reserve from 1942 to 1946. After receiving his LLB from Columbia Law School in 1948, he practiced with Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft from 1948 to 1952. He then became a financial adviser to Sherman Fairchild, the inventor of the aerial camera, and eventually succeeded him as chairman of the board of the Fairchild Camera and Instrument Corporation. Burke served on the board of the Sherman Fairchild Foundation for more than 50 years, including 35 years as president.

He was a life trustee of the Pierpont Morgan Library and Museum, and a trustee emeritus of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and of Columbia University. He was also a former trustee and board chairman of both Dartmouth College and the Brunswick School in Greenwich, Connecticut, of which he was an alumnus. He held an Honorary Doctor of Laws Degree from Dartmouth College.

Burke, who was preceded in death by his son Douglas Burke, is survived by his wife of 76 years, Constance Burke; children Diane Burke, Nancy Burke Tunney, Bonnie Burke Himmelman, and Walter F. Burke III; and other family.

April Castañeda—who recently stepped into the newly created position of assistant vice president for equity and equity investigations and Title IX coordinator at Caltech—is charged with designing and implementing a comprehensive approach to all issues pertaining to discrimination, unlawful harassment, and sexual misconduct. Though the role is new for both the Institute and Castañeda, she is no stranger to 1200 East California Boulevard, having served in a variety of roles at Caltech (in the provost's and president's offices, as well as Human Resources) for more than 20 years before a recent two-year stint as the assistant director for human resources at JPL.

What is the scope of the job? How is it different from the Title IX office that used to exist?

The office now includes not just Title IX [a law that covers discrimination on the basis of sex] but also Title VII and Title VI. Title VII covers discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin. Title VI is the same thing but applies to federal contractors. And because we take federal money, that applies to us as well. We also have state regulations, and California has about 40 different protected classes. So anything that involves a protected class comes into this office.

And this office used to be part of Student Affairs but is now part of Human Resources …?

Although the office is now part of HR, we maintain very close connections with Student Affairs, working closely with the vice president, the deans and the many other offices that serve our students. We're also in the process of hiring an education and deputy Title IX coordinator for Student Affairs to ensure that the needs of the student community are met. The office deals with all constituents, so that's staff, faculty, postdocs, and students—both grad and undergrad.

How do these changes benefit the Caltech community?

For us, especially with the size of Caltech, it makes a lot of sense to create one equity office. There were times in the past where people had to figure out, "Where do I go? OK, I feel like it's discrimination. Is it sex discrimination? Is it race? If it's sex discrimination, I have to go to this office; if it's race, I go to that office." Whereas here, all you have to know is, "OK, that's the office that I go to if any discrimination or harassment or sexual misconduct happens."

I also think the combination of HR and Student Affairs is really powerful. We get to see all the different constituents, so we learn how they're all experiencing it—from the faculty side to the student side to the staff side to postdocs—making our investigations, outcomes, and solutions stronger.

We also have a lead investigator [a new position], Brian Quillen, who is focused on the equity office model and dedicated to it and has that expertise. That's a real strength because one of the things that we find is that with Title IX, the laws change, the regulations change. ... It's a burgeoning field. Having a lead investigator who is keeping up on those changes makes for a really strong program.

And as I said, we're also hiring a full-time community educator who will do preventative outreach. That person will be in the residences, working with grads and undergrads, getting to know the students, really understanding the culture.

How do you encourage people to come forward, and how do you make that process as comfortable as possible?

My whole career has been spent talking to people about difficult things. My approach is always that it is a privilege to be there in a person's life at a moment when they really need help, so I try to handle it with care and respect.

We also want to make this process as easy and as approachable as possible, as well as being impartial and fair. Having good investigations brings closure for people. When something happens in a community, the only way that you can become resilient is to feel like you had a fair process, it got closed, and now you are able to move on.

Some people come in and say, "I need an investigation. I want to get down to what happened, I want the fact-finding part." And we provide that. But it doesn't always reach the level of an investigation. And then there are lots of people who just come in for consultation. I tell people before we start, if you want to just tell me what happened, I'm happy to do that, too. And then they might come back later and be ready to share names.

The nice thing about Title IX is that the person who's reporting the incident has a lot of ability to dictate what happens. They often can come in and file a report without us taking action. I follow where they lead. That said, there are things we have to move on if we feel like there's a danger to a community or to themselves.

How has your career prepared you for this role?

I have done so many things in my life that really mesh well with this role, so I feel like I'm bringing all those different pieces of me into this job. When I was in grad school at USC [where Castañeda earned a master's degree in social work], I did my internship here in Caltech's Staff and Faculty Consultation Center. They asked me to stay on, and I worked full-time, but they let me work four 10-hour days, so that left me a day a week and the weekends to do trauma consulting. I then became a diversity liaison under David Baltimore, when he was president. From there, I came into HR as the head of staff education and development, and ultimately became executive director of Human Resources. About two and a half years ago, JPL asked me to come over there as assistant director of Human Resources to work on building communication and getting the different branches of HR to all grow in the same direction.

What does success look like for the equity office?

I'll know it's successful if the number of our cases goes down and the number of our office visits goes up. I want people to come in before things escalate. Absolutely there are times where we need to do an investigation, but there are also lots of things that we can do to build inclusive communities. We want people to worry about school, work, their research, winning Nobel Prizes. ... We don't want them to worry about, "Am I safe? Am I OK?"

What are some of your short-term goals for the program?

We've heard lots of feedback from people that they find our policy really daunting. It's a 25-page policy with lots and lots of process. It's a solid policy, with everything you could ever want in a policy. But when you're in a crisis, you don't want to have to sit down and read a 25-page legal policy. So, making guidelines that are easier to read and updating the language so that it's clear, concise, and relatable is really important.

Another goal is setting clear communication standards for what the equity office and Title IX is, so people really understand who we are. That involves changing everything from the look and feel of the Title IX website to how we engage the community.

We're also using data to inform our work and our practices. We're looking at the numbers of visits, the kinds of things people are coming in for. It's so important to have data so that you can really look and see what's happening without being prejudiced by your emotion.

What motivates you to do this work?

I've spent most of my career doing things that are engaged around social justice. It's important to me that people have the rights and the ability to do good work.

When I first came to Caltech, I was reluctant to be an intern here because before then I had always worked with underserved populations, and here I saw a lot of privilege. My adviser at the time said to me, "April, pain is pain, no matter if it's in a suit or on the street." And she said, "You have to decide. If you're trying to alleviate pain and help good things happen, there's a place for you here."

But I also do this kind of work for my 10-year-old daughter. Because what we do here sets precedent, and it changes how other people will experience college and education and work.

Fiona Cowie, professor of philosophy at Caltech, passed away on Sunday, December 9, from complications due to cancer. She was 55 years old.

Cowie was born in Sydney, Australia, on August 21, 1963. She joined Caltech in 1992 as an instructor in philosophy and was appointed assistant professor in 1993. She was promoted to associate professor in 1998, and to professor in 2010. Cowie trained at Princeton, where she received a Master of Arts degree in 1991 and a PhD in philosophy in 1993.

"In the best Caltech tradition, Professor Cowie asked big questions about important problems, marshaling insights from philosophy, biology, and linguistics," says Caltech president Thomas F.  Rosenbaum, the Sonja and William Davidow Presidential Chair and professor of physics. "She will be missed by colleagues across the Institute."

Cowie's research explored the evolution of the human mind and philosophical questions about language. In particular, she was a proponent of the theory that language is not an innate product of the human brain but is instead a technological innovation.

She is the author of What's Within? Nativism Reconsidered, which contends that many aspects of the human mind are acquired through learning rather than inborn. The book earned Cowie the Gustave O. Arlt Award in the Humanities in 1999.

"My approach is different from that of almost everyone else who works on the evolution of language, the majority of whom think that language arose initially through mutation and natural selection," Cowie explained to Caltech's Engineering & Science magazine in 2014. "And you can see how, if language arose in a species, it would be favored by natural selection because it's really useful. But you can only have selection for language once people are using it. So I tend to view language more as an invention, or technological advance, rather than as if it were some extra limb that grew as a result of selection on genetic mutations."

In 2004, she was selected for an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation New Directions Fellowship for Study of Neuroscience and Genetics.

"Fiona was a wonderful scholar, teacher, and colleague," says Caltech provost David A. Tirrell, the Carl and Shirley Larson Provostial Chair and Ross McCollum-William H. Corcoran Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering. "Her students consistently cited her deep knowledge of the subjects she taught, her concern for them, and her ability to engage and hold their interest in difficult and challenging subjects."

She was a member of the American Philosophical Association and the Philosophy of Science Association and was a visiting fellow at the Research School of the Social Sciences at Australian National University in 2004 and 2005.

"Fiona was above all a passionate person. She brought that passion to all her activities on campus. But most of all she was passionate about teaching to our undergraduates. Her courses on ethics and gender were important and uniquely valuable parts of the curriculum," says Jean-Laurent Rosenthal, the Ronald and Maxine Linde Leadership Chair of the Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences and Rea A. and Lela G. Axline Professor of Business Economics.

Details about a memorial service will be announced at a later time.

Harold Brown, who was Caltech president, emeritus; life member of the Caltech Board of Trustees; and former secretary of the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD), passed away on January 4, 2019. He was 91 years old.

Brown was president of Caltech from 1969 until 1977. During his presidency, he made significant changes to the undergraduate curriculum, establishing programs in independent studies and in applied physics, and turning the environmental engineering program into a degree option. He also developed a campus master plan, purchasing surrounding lots to make space for new buildings and creating an identifiable character for the Institute. Most significant, perhaps, were his efforts to open Caltech to female undergraduates. In 1970, the Board of Trustees voted to admit women. However, the board made the admission of women conditional upon the building of new student houses, which they knew would take at least two years. Not wanting to wait, Brown pressed for an arrangement that would set aside corridors for women in existing houses. Because of his persistence, Caltech began admitting women in the fall of that year.

"Harold Brown's accomplishments in any one arena were significant enough for a gratifying life's work," says David L. Lee (PhD '74), chair of the Caltech Board of Trustees. "Taken together, the different chapters of Harold's life reflect an individual with absolutely selfless dedication to others—whether students, colleagues across various industries, or citizens of our nation. We are grateful for Harold's service at critical times to our Institute and in our nation's history."

In an interview with Engineering & Science magazine during his tenure, Brown noted that he was surprised by how quickly he became "extremely proud" of Caltech: "It's a very infectious spirit, and as you get to see what's going on, you see the quality of the research in science and technology, its variety, and the really outstanding nature of the people. You inevitably become very proud of the place, very protective of it, very loyal to it."

"Harold's life was a brilliant example of service to colleagues and country, informed by a restless intellect and a broad-minded commitment to talent," says Caltech president Thomas Rosenbaum, the Sonja and William Davidow Presidential Chair and professor of physics. "He memorably shaped the Caltech of today."

On January 20, 1977, Brown was named secretary of defense by President Jimmy Carter and he was confirmed by the U.S. Senate the same day. He took the oath of office on January 21, becoming the first scientist to hold the position, in which he remained until January 1981.

As secretary, Brown helped to develop and presided over America's nuclear arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles, bombers, and nuclear submarines, and negotiated the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks II treaty between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.

After his tenure in the DOD, Brown became chairman of the Foreign Policy Institute of The Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies and was a distinguished visiting professor at the Nitze School until 1992. He was a retired partner in Warburg Pincus LLC, a director of Chemical Engineering Partners and of Philip Morris International, and a trustee emeritus of RAND and of the Trilateral Commission (North America). Brown served as counselor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies from 1992 until his passing.

Harold Brown was born on September 19, 1927, in New York, New York. He graduated from Columbia University with an AB degree in 1945, an AM in 1946, and a PhD in physics in 1949, at the age of 21. After working as a teacher and doing postdoctoral research for a short time, Brown joined the University of California Radiation Laboratory at Berkeley in 1950. When the lab's offshoot, the E.O. Lawrence Radiation Laboratory in Livermore, California, was founded in 1952, Brown became a staff member. He became the lab's director in 1960.

He served as the director of defense research and engineering in the DOD from 1961–65 and as secretary of the Air Force from 1965–69.

Among other advisory positions, Brown was a consultant to the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board from 1956–57 and a member of the board from 1958–61; a member of the Polaris Steering Committee from 1956–58; Senior Scientific Advisor to the U.S. Delegation to the Conference on Discontinuance of Nuclear Weapons Tests from November 1958 to February 1959; and a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee on Ballistic Missiles to the secretary of defense from 1958–61. Brown also was a consultant to several panels of the President's Science Advisory Committee from 1958 to 1960 and was appointed a member of the Committee in 1961.

Brown was reelected to the Caltech Board of Trustees in 1985 and was made a life member in 2010. During his tenure on the board, Brown served as a member of the Executive Committee, the Audit and Compliance Committee, the Buildings and Grounds Committee, the Business and Finance Committee, the Investment Committee, and the Nominating Committee. At the time of his death, he was a consulting participant of the Technology Transfer Committee and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory Committee.

Among his many honors, Brown was the recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1981) and the Fermi Award (1993), and was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and of the National Academy of Engineering.

Colene Brown, his wife of more than six decades, passed away last year. He is survived by daughters Deborah and Ellen and other family.

Caltech has recently created a multidisciplinary team of professional staff to identify and assist students with academic, social, and mental health needs. 

Jennifer Howes, executive director of Student Wellness Services, says the CARE Team was launched last fall to take "a unified approach to identifying students who are struggling and helping to connect them with appropriate early intervention strategies."

Howes, who chairs the CARE Team, adds, "We wanted to create an easy way for people to bring forward concerns and refer students to resources."

Formed through a partnership among offices within student affairs, campus security, and the Staff and Faculty Consultation Center, the CARE Team grew out of the Caltech Safety Net and Caltech Cares campaigns, which highlighted support resources around campus with a particular focus on suicide prevention. The team continues this work by offering mental health education and training, and also through though Caltech Connect, an interactive learning experience to help participants recognize the risk factors and warning signs of suicide so that they can intervene.

Additionally, Howes notes, the CARE Team is responsible for the initial assessment of threatening behaviors or concerns about student safety that come from the community. 

The CARE Team has an online referral form, which may be used by faculty, staff, and students to make the team aware of a student who may benefit from assistance.  A team member will reach out to the student and invite them in for a one-on-one conversation to learn more about their needs and to begin developing a support plan. For example, a student who is struggling academically might benefit from tutoring support or a connection to the registrar to discuss course planning.

"This team allows us to be responsive to community concerns around safety in a way that's designed to be helpful and supportive to students," she says. "We use tools that look at the actual behavior or data to reduce emotion-driven or fear-based responses. This is for the protection of both the community and of the individual's rights."

Community members can learn more about the team, make a referral, and sign up for training at caltechcares.caltech.edu.