Provost Robert A. Brown has appointed nine professors to serve as his Advisory Committee for the selection of the next dean of science. The committee will be chaired by Mario Molina, Institute Professor and Nobel laureate in chemistry.
The provost told the committee, "We must appoint a person of the highest stature who has the vision and energy to move the School [of Science] forward into this century." He asked the committee to report to him by the end of May.
The other members of the committee are Martha Constantine-Paton, professor of biology; Rick L. Danheiser, the Arthur C. Cope Professor of Chemistry and associate department head; John M. Essigmann, a MacVicar Fellow and professor of toxicology and chemistry in the Division of Bioengineering and Environmental Health; Jerome I. Friedman, Institute Professor and Nobel laureate in physics; Jacqueline N. Hewitt, associate professor of physics; Peter S. Kim, professor of biology and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator at the Whitehead Institute; Mary C. Potter, professor of brain and cognitive sciences; and Michael F. Sipser, professor of mathematics.
"The membership of the committee represents the breadth of the School of Science and its links to other disciplines. I have confidence that the committee will identify candidates who can supply the high level of leadership needed in the school," Provost Brown said.
Professor of Physics Robert J. Birgeneau, who will become president of the University of Toronto in July (Tech Talk article), has stepped down as dean of science. Robert J. Silbey, the Class of 1942 Professor of Chemistry and director of the Center for Materials Sciences and Engineering, is serving as interim dean of science.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on March 8, 2000.
