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Awards and Honors

Dr. Robert W. Field, professor of chemistry, has won the prestigious 1996 William F. Meggers Award of the Optical Society of America.

The award, endowed by the family of William Meggers, several individuals and a number of optical manufacturers, honors him for his contributions to the field of spectroscopy and metrology. It is awarded for outstanding work in spectroscopy.

The citation accompanying the award to Professor Field said: "You are recognized for your invention of powerful high-resolution spectroscopic methods, including stimulated emission pumping, which have found widespread application. These methods, combined with your definitive studies of perturbations in diatomic molecular spectra, have changed the way we think about molecular complexity."

Dr. Field received the AB from Amherst College, and both the MA and PhD from Harvard University in 1971. He did postdoctoral work at the University of California at Santa Barbara for three years before joining the MIT faculty in 1974. More than 30 students have completed their PhD research in Professor Field's group.

He is on the editorial advisory board of the Journal of Molecular Spectroscopy and has served on the boards of several other journals. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the Optical Society of America.
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Dr. Alexander Rich has added another laurel to his many honors and awards.

Dr. Rich, the William Thompson Sedgwick Professor of Biophysics in the Department of Biology, has received the Pauling Medal for 1995 in recognition of outstanding achievement in chemistry. It is sponsored jointly by the Puget Sound and Portland, OR, sections of the American Chemical Society.

The award is named after Dr. Linus Pauling, a native of the Pacific Northwest, "because of the inspiration of his example." A renowned chemist and political activist, he received Nobel prizes for chemistry and for peace.

An MIT freshman, Wojciech P. Giziewicz of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, has been named as one of four recipients of the Young Canadian Innovation Award. The $4,000 prize is sponsored by the Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation, which promotes new ideas in research.

Mr. Giziewicz was honored for a high school science project that used an extract of starch to suck cholesterol out of eggs. He also won a trip to Japan from another agency for his egg project.

Another honor has come to Dr. Alan Brody, associate provost for the arts. Professor Brody, a playwright, has accepted an invitation to participate in the International Theater Festival of European drama schools and academies in Targoviste, Romania, in March. The festival includes invitees from the US, Peru, Russia, Israel, Albania, Croatia, Slovenia, Norway, Sweden, Germany and Bulgaria. Dr. Brody, professor of theater at MIT since 1988, will conduct workshops in American acting technique.
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The MIT Real Estate Office has won a prestigious award for the rehabilitation of 640 Memorial Drive, the former Ford Motor Assembly building, into office, research, development and light manufacturing space for emerging biotechnology and high-technology companies.

The 1995 Award for Excellence to MIT, in the category of small-scale rehabilitation, was one of nine awards to the world's most outstanding real estate development projects announced by the Urban Land Institute of Washington, DC.

Established in 1979, the ULI Awards for Excellence have gained the reputation as the development community's most prestigious awards program. The nine winning projects in 1995 were selected from 145 entries. The projects are evaluated on the basis of financial viability, the resourceful use of land, design, relevance to contemporary issues, and sensitivity to the community and the environment. Entries undergo a review process by a jury of at least 10 members.

The ULI is a nonprofit education and research institute with 13,000 members and associates representing the entire spectrum of the land use and development disciplines.

Noting that MIT is the owner, developer and sole financier of the award-winning project, the ULI said the university is "committed to furthering Cambridge's economic development" and "played a large role in attracting tenants by providing assistance for securing financing and by helping smaller or start-up firms to secure conventional financing for tenant improvements."

It added, "The success of the project has had a positive effect on the economy of Cambridge and has been the impetus for further development along the Charles River. Three other nearby buildings have since been renovated to house additional facilities for the growing biotech and high-tech market. The rebirth of Cambridge creates a highly visible scientific community close to MIT and Harvard."

Two MIT graduates played key roles in the Memorial Drive project.

They were the architect, Edward T. Tsoi '66, of Tsoi/Kobus & Associates, Inc., of Cambridge, and Robert P. McDonald '53, president of Erland Construction, Inc., of Burlington, the general contractor.
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MIT's name will also be enhanced this year by David L. Millay, senior manager of mechanical services in Physical Plant, who is serving as president of the American Institute of Plant Engineers. Mr. Millay will lead the 8,500-member organization through a name change as it becomes the Association for Facilities Engineering. A certified plant engineer, Mr. Millay is part of the management team that keeps MIT's 9.5 million square feet of space operating. He has been at MIT since 1982 and has long been active in the professional organization and its training programs. He was selected plant engineer of the year by the Boston chapter in 1993.

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