Academy of Arts and Sciences inducts Alder
Retired Lab physicist and computational pioneer Berni Alder will be inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences at a ceremony in Boston on Saturday, Oct. 11.
Also among this year’s inductees is Sidney Drell, a physicist and arms control expert who served on the University of California President’s Council on the National Laboratories in the 1990s. Drell is a deputy director emeritus of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC). The program to officially welcome the academy’s 228th class of fellows celebrates cutting edge research and scholarship, artistic accomplishment and exemplary service to society.
Six members of the newly elected class will address their colleagues at the induction ceremony: PepisCo Chairman and CEO Indra K. Nooyi; trailblazing mathematician and hedge fund leader James Simons; biochemist and Merck Research Laboratories President Peter S. Kim; Harvard economist Susan Athey; and historian and Emory University Provost Earl Lewis. Soprano Dawn Upshaw will perform. During the program, the academy also will present its Scholar-Patriot Award in honor of Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, who was elected a fellow of the academy in 2002.
Lab physicist Claire Max joined the ranks of fellows in 2002 while LLNL founding father Edward Teller earned it in 1954. Science and Technology Principal Associate Director Cherry Murray also is a member of the academy.
Founded in 1780, the academy honors excellence each year by electing to membership the finest minds and most influential leaders of the day. The academy draws on its distinguished membership to address critical social and intellectual issues through studies, publications, meetings and symposia.
The 190 new fellows and 22 new foreign honorary members are leaders in scholarship, business, the arts and public affairs. They come from 20 states and 15 countries, and range in age from 37 to 86. The new members represent universities, corporations, museums, research institutes, media outlets and foundations.
Among this year’s inductees are winner of the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine, Linda Buck; computer company founders Michael Dell (Dell Inc.), and Charles M. Geschke and John E. Warnock (Adobe Systems Inc.); former Secretary of State George P. Schultz; former Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Sam Nunn; astronomer Adam Riess, who contributed to the discovery of dark energy in the universe; electrical engineer Henry Smith, the father of X-ray lithography; Darwin biographer Janet Browne; and architect Elizabeth Diller.
A complete list of new members is available on the academy’s Website.
