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Nine MIT faculty members elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Among 198 elected this year to the prestigious honorary society.
Nine MIT faculty members are among 198 leaders from academia, business, public affairs, the humanities and the arts elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the academy announced today.

One of the nation’s most prestigious honorary societies, the academy is also a leading center for independent policy research. Members contribute to academy publications, as well as studies of science and technology policy, energy and global security, social policy and American institutions, the humanities and culture, and education.

Those elected from MIT this year are:
  • Anant Agarwal, professor of computer science and president of edX;
  • David Matthew Altshuler, adjunct professor of biology;
  • Samuel A. Bowring, the Robert R. Shrock Professor of Geology;
  • Martha Constantine-Paton, a professor of brain and cognitive sciences and a principal investigator at MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research;
  • Paula T. Hammond, the David H. Koch Professor in Engineering;
  • Robert Jaffe, the Otto (1938) and Jane Morningstar Professor of Physics;
  • Rae Langton, professor of linguistics and philosophy;
  • Andrew W. Lo, the Charles E. and Susan T. Harris Professor of Finance and the director of MIT’s Laboratory for Financial Engineering; and
  • Ernest Moniz, the Cecil & Ida Green Professor of Physics and Engineering Systems and the director of the MIT Energy Initiative and MIT’s Laboratory for Energy and the Environment.
“Election to the Academy honors individual accomplishment and calls upon members to serve the public good,” Academy President Leslie C. Berlowitz said in a statement. “We look forward to drawing on the knowledge and expertise of these distinguished men and women to advance solutions to the pressing policy challenges of the day.”

The new class will be inducted at a ceremony held on Oct. 12 at the academy’s headquarters in Cambridge.

Since its founding in 1780, the academy has elected leading “thinkers and doers” from each generation, including George Washington and Benjamin Franklin in the 18th century, Daniel Webster and Ralph Waldo Emerson in the 19th century, and Albert Einstein and Winston Churchill in the 20th century. The current membership includes more than 250 Nobel laureates and more than 60 Pulitzer Prize winners.

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