Amidst the swirl of ongoing uncertainty and extraordinary actions by our federal government, we are continuing to deal with events as they arise. Please look at the Northeastern FAQs that are updated as needed, for responses by our university. Our commitment to top quality education and brilliant, crucial research is unwavering.
This week brought brightness through Northeastern University’s Giving Day. A huge thank you to everyone who participated! The College of Science raised an amazing $257,330.75, around 400% MORE than we raised last year. How absolutely wonderful. I am overwhelming grateful to our donors, including many of you. Thank you. Giving allows us to support students and faculty in many ways, including professorships, faculty research support, student scholarships, undergraduate research awards, our Emergency Fund for students, the Advancing Women in Science Award, Department Funds, the Jacob Davis Fund in memory of our wonderful BNS student, and our Bridge to Science program.
Our wonderful Communications Team (Caroline Leary, Nikki Ziner and Jackie Donnelly) and lots of students ran the tables, and people stopped by to make a gift and get a great memento. Our advancement team (Veronica Jorge-Curtis, Jeremy Brick and Sarra Sundstrom) brought their fantastic commitment to the event. I did a fun live interview on Centennial Common, celebrating the College of Science as the best Northeastern College where we make science ‘not scary’. I was joined by Goggles, our Science Husky, and as we are the only college with a specialized Husky, Goggles is the envy of all! Giving Day is lots of fun, but it serves a serious purpose. In the video for this event, I explained the that your gift goes directly to help students and to support research as we build the Good Power of Science. The outstanding outcomes of Giving Day where COS met every challenge, demonstrate an awareness that philanthropy is more important than ever. Thank you to everyone!
On this theme, today was the first Nath Distinguished Lecture, a wonderful event that celebrates discoveries and significant advances at the frontiers of physics. It’s with enormous gratitude that I acknowledge the generous contribution of Professor Pran Nath and Dr. Shashi Nath who have enabled the Lecture series through their love for Northeastern University and the Physics department. Pran Nath is a renowned theoretical physicist with a research focus in elementary particle physics. He is George and Kathleen Waters Matthews University Distinguished Professor and holds the distinction of being Northeastern’s longest serving professor. Dr. Shashi Nath has been a valued and beloved teacher at Northeastern University for many decades.
Pran Nath’s area is supergravity, where he is credited with modeling minimal supergravity or mSUGRA. I had to look up supergravity, being a life scientist, and learned that supergravity combines principles of general relativity with those of supersymmetry – another term I looked up. Supersymmetry suggests that for every known particle, there exists a partner particle with different spin properties. This is fantastic work at the frontiers of understanding how the universe is built. Thank you, Professor Nath and Dr. Nath!
