Harvard Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences

Encyclopedia : H : HA : HAR : Harvard Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences

Harvard University's Division of Engineering and Applied Science (DEAS), currently part of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), serves as the connector and integrator of Harvard’s teaching and research efforts in engineering, applied sciences, and technology.

DEAS lists its core tenets as---educating broad-minded students; interdisciplinary research; integration across disciplines; and balancing theory, experimentation, and practice---in support of its mission of collaborating with researchers from all parts of Harvard, other universities, and industry, to bring discovery and innovation directly to bear on improving human life and society.

DEAS is designed to create “renaissance engineers” or students who excel in applied science, but also have a broad knowledge of other disciplines. Because of Harvard's liberal arts environment, all undergraduates, regardless of concentration, must take classes in several categories: foreign cultures, historical study, literature and the arts, moral reasoning, quantitative reasoning, science, and social analysis. And because Division students are part of a liberal arts environment, they interact with students from completely different concentrations in their dorms, Houses, dining halls, and student centers.

Undergraduates can pursue programs in Computer Science (A.B.); Engineering Sciences (A.B., and S.B. – ABET Accredited); and Applied Mathematics (A.B.). At the graduate level, the Division offers S.M., M.E., and Ph.D. options covering interdisciplinary research areas including: Applied Mathematics, Applied Physics, Bioengineering, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Environmental Sciences and Engineering, Mechanical Engineering. In addition graduate students may puruse collaborative options: Engineering and Physical Biology (with the Faculty of Arts and Sciences); Information, Technology and Management (joint with the Harvard Business School); Medical Engineering and Medical Physics; (Harvard/MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology); and Systems Biology (with Harvard Medical School).

Faculty, who number approximately seventy (66 FTEs), account for some $33.5 million in annual research funds. These faculty members have particularly close ties (and there are multiple joint appointments) with the departments of Physics, Earth and Planetary Science, and Chemistry and Chemical Biology. The current undergraduate and gradaute student populations are 308 and 298, respectively. On-campus Facilities provide 400,000 square feet of interconnected labs, classrooms, clusters, and offices in six buildings.

The current Harvard Dean of Engineering and Applied Sciences is Venkatesh "Venky" Narayanamurti, who has served in that role since 1998.

http://www.deas.harvard.edu

Expansion

In May of 2006, it was announnced that the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences would become its own school.

History

"The knowledge acquired will be found to be applicable, not only in the ways and on the subjects which are now known to be open to its use, but in a multitude of directions … to which its importance cannot be at presence appreciated, nor even foreseen." — Harvard Treasurer Hon. Samuel L. Eliot, on the gift that created the Lawrence Scientific School

The formation of the Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard University in 1847, 30 years before Edison announced his invention of the phonograph, marked Harvard's first major effort to provide a formal, advanced education in science and engineering.

The School was named for Massachusetts industrialist and entrepreneur Abbott Lawrence, who donated $50,000 (an unprecedented sum at the time) to create the institution. While he never attended Harvard, he had a long personal history with key members of the faculty such as Louis Agassiz and enjoyed the pursuit of and understood the value in science and engineering. In the letter that accompanied his gift, Lawrence explained his rationale for forming a school:

"But where can we send those who intend to devote themselves to the practical applications of science? Our country abounds in men of action. Hard hands are ready to work upon our hard materials; and where shall sagacious heads to taught to direct those hands?"

Originally separate from the College, the School saw a diverse group of thinkers and professionals—astronomers, architects, naturalists, engineers, mathematicians, and even philosophers—pass through its doors. Simon Newcomb, Rear Admiral in the United States Navy and a leader in mathematical astronomy, graduated in 1858. Charles S. Peirce, who created America’s greatest legacy in modern philosophy (pragmatism), graduated in 1862. While staying for less than a year, the future doctor, psychologist, and author William James entered around the same time before switching to medicine.

The School’s initial success did not escape the notice of other institutions, leading William Greenleaf Eliot, president of Eliot Seminary (later renamed Washington University) to declare in 1854:

"Harvard University is, at this time, gaining more credit and accomplishing greater good, by the Lawrence Scientific School than by any other agency. We need just such a school, here. Its effect would be to elevate mechanical, agricultural, and mercantile pursuits, into learned professions. It would annihilate that absurd distinction by which three pursuits, of Law, Medicine, and Theology, are called professions, and everything else, labor or trade …"

While the School initially thrived, in the latter decades of the 19th century, the institution faced increasing “competition” from the newly formed Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and was also constrained by the conflicting views about its role and status by the then Harvard President Charles Eliot. Eliot, in fact, repeatedly, yet unsuccessfully, tried to "merge" the Lawrence School with MIT. As a result of such activities, the Scientific School became less of an independent entity, losing its influence and students to other parts of College and University.

In 1891, to bolster the School and engineering and applied sciences at Harvard, industrialist Gordon McKay designated the Lawrence Scientific School his beneficiary. The American inventor, engineer, entrepreneur was born in Pittsfield, Massachusetts and was best known for the development of machinery that revolutionized the manufacture of footwear.

In 1906, however, before the first payment from his bequest arrived, the scientific and engineering programs of Lawrence Scientific School were incorporated into Harvard College and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. In short, the School ceased to exist as an independent entity. (McKay's gift, however, lives on, supporting over 40 endowed professorships today).

Although the structure to support faculty and research in engineering applied sciences underwent several reorganizations and names over the next century, advances in engineering and applied sciences remained a critical part of Harvard’s success and legacy in the coming decades.

Evolving structure of engineering and applied sciences at Harvard

1904 – Harvard President Charles Eliot at the invitation of MIT President Henry S. Pritchett , started negotiations for a merger between the Lawrence Scientific School and MIT. The deal was eventually scuttled due to the protests of faculty, students, and a decision by the Massachusetts courts. See: http://libraries.mit.edu/archives/exhibits/harvard-mit/index.html

1906 – Lawrence Scientific School was dissolved and the undergraduate and graduate programs separated; the graduate engineering program is incorporated into the Graduate School of Applied Science.

1918 –The Harvard Engineering School was established. As is recorded in the President's Reports for 1917-18, the School was authorized to offer the BSc, MSc, and a doctor's degree. The immediate cause for the establishment of the School was a decision of the Supreme Judicial Court in 1917, outlawing the arrangements reached with MIT in 1914. As Mr. Lowell wrote in his Annual Report for 1918-19: "[In 1917] negotiations looking to cooperation were proceeding with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It was found, however, impossible to reach any agreement mutually satisfactory on the basis of a separate Harvard Faculty, and therefore our School of Engineering has been opened without any connection of this kind."

1934 – The Harvard Engineering School incorporates graduate-level/professional programs.

1942 – The undergraduate Department of Engineering Sciences’ name changes to the Department of Engineering Sciences and Applied Physics to reflect an increased emphasis on applied physics.

1946 – 1949 – The Graduate School of Engineering merges its faculty with the undergraduate program, (the Department of Engineering Sciences and Applied Physics), into the Division of Engineering Sciences within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

1951 –The Division of Applied Science is formed from the merger of the Division of Engineering Sciences and the Department of Engineering Sciences and Applied Physics.

1955 – Division of Applied Science name changes to the Division of Engineering and Applied Physics.

1975 – Division of Engineering and Applied Physics' name is changed to the Division of Applied Sciences.

1996 – Division of Applied Sciences name is changed to the Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

Selected research highlights during the 20th century

1919 – One of the most important inventions in broadcasting and telephone came out of the Harvard Engineering School's Cruft Laboratory, the crystal oscillator invented by George Washington Pierce (Ph.D., 1900), Rumford Professor of Physics and director of Harvard's Cruft High-Tension Electrical Laboratory. The oscillator enabled a given radio station to stay “fixed” at a proper frequency and allowed multiple telephone calls to occur over a single line.

1938 – A cyclotron was constructed at the Graduate School of Engineering's Gordon McKay Engineering Laboratory. Projected to be the largest such operating facility in the world, it was built to support research in biology and medicine as well as physics. In 1942 it was sent to Los Alamos.

1944 – Howard Aiken ’37 (Ph.D.) developed the Mark I series of computers, the first large-scale automatic digital computer in the USA. Around the same time, a new generation of technically-trained students began to share their knowledge well beyond Harvard’s campus. Alumnus and donor of an endowed professorship at DEAS), Allen E. Puckett S.B. '39, S.M. '41, went on to define modern aerodynamics, served as CEO as Hughes Aircraft, and won the National Medal of Honor in Technology.

1952 – Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR), the scientific foundation for MRI (used in modern medical imaging systems), was pioneered by Nicolaas Bloembergen, Henry Purcell, and Robert Pound at Harvard. Purcell won the 1952 Nobel Prize in Physics for this discovery and the 2003 Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded to Paul C. Lauterbur (University of Illinois, Urbana) and Peter Mansfield (University of Nottingham, School of Physics and Astronomy Nottingham, United Kingdom) for work leading to the development of modern MRI imaging.

1977 – The year Bill Gates would have graduated had he not left to found Microsoft. His classmate and future colleague, Steven A. Ballmer AB ’77, did finish his degree and returned in 1999 to dedicate the Maxwell Dworkin Building that he and his former classmate made possible, perfectly melding the past with the optimism of the present.

Selected research highlights from 1995-present

Stopping light – Lene Hau and her colleagues created a new form of matter to bring a light beam to a complete stop, then restart it again.

Unbreakable hyperencryption – Michael Rabin embedded messages in rapidly moving streams of random digital bits in ways that cannot be decoded, even with unlimited computing power.

Black silicon - Eric Mazur’s group created a new material that efficiently traps light and has potential use in solar cells, global warming sensors, and ultra-thin television screens.

The mathematics of nature - L. Mahadevan and colleagues discovered how the Venus flytrap snaps up its prey in a mere tenth of a second by actively shifting the curved shape of its mouth-like leaves.

Atmospheric modeling - Loretta J. Mickley, Dan Jacob, and colleagues found that the frequency of cold fronts bringing cool, clear air out of Canada during the summer months declined by about 20 percent. These cold fronts are responsible for breaking up the hot, stagnant air that builds up regularly in summer, generating high levels of ground level ozone pollution.

High speed nanowire circuits – Donhee Ham and Charles Lieber made robust circuits from minuscule nanowires that align themselves on a chip of glass during low-temperature fabrication, creating rudimentary electronic devices that offer solid performance without high-temperature production or high-priced silicon.

Double emulsions - A new microfluidics-based device made by David A. Weitz and colleagues at Harvard University and Unilever Corp. makes precisely controlled double emulsions in a single step. Double emulsions--droplets inside droplets--could be useful for encapsulating products such as drugs, cosmetics, or food additives.

Some Notable Alumni and Students Steven A. Ballmer, A.B. ’77, President, Microsoft

Leo Beranek, Ph.D. ’40, Co-Founder, Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN Technologies). BBN held the original contract to design and operate the ARPAnet, the ancestor to the modern internet.

Danielle Feinberg, A.B. ’96, Lead lighting artist at Pixar Animation Studios

William H. “Bill” Gates III Col ’77, Chairman and Chief Software Architect, Microsoft

David Gilmour, AB ’80, AM ’82, MBA ’84, President and CEO, Tacit Software

Gary Schermerhorn, A.B. ’85, Co-Chief Operating Officer for the Technology Division of Goldman Sachs, with operational oversight of the division’s business units

An Wang, S.M. ’46, Ph.D.’48, L.L.D.’87, Founder, Wang Laboratories. Dr. Wang is responsible for the original development of the basic components and systems of digital computing machines.

Stephanie Wilson S.B., ’88, NASA Astronaut. Wilson is slated for Shuttle Mission STS-121.

Schools of Harvard University
Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences>Faculty of Arts and Sciences: College • Graduate School of Arts and Sciences • Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences • Continuing Education
Faculty of Medicine: Harvard Medical School>Medical School • School of Dental Medicine
Harvard Divinity School>Divinity School • Law School • Business School • Graduate School of Design
Harvard Graduate School of Education>Graduate School of Education • School of Public Health • Kennedy School of Government
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study (successor to Radcliffe College)

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