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Rice University today announced that applied mathematician and seismologist Maarten de Hoop has accepted a newly created faculty position that was established with a substantial grant from the Simons Foundation’s Math+X Program. De Hoop said the move to Houston will facilitate in-depth research collaborations between his research group and the energy industry.
Rice Professor Richard Tapia has received the 2014 Mayor’s Hispanic Heritage Lifetime Achievement Award for his commitment to helping minorities and women prepare for higher education and to increase participation of underrepresented students in the sciences.
The board presents the award each year to exceptional, lifelong leaders in science and technology who have made substantial contributions to the welfare of the nation through public service activities in science, technology and public policy. The NSB is the governing board of the National Science Foundation and policy advisers to the president and Congress.
Two Rice University professors and a fellow from Rice’s Baker Institute for Public Policy have been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Bonnie Bartel, Richard Tapia and John Mendelsohn joined the ranks of astronaut John Glenn, singer-songwriter Bruce Springsteen, actor Sally Field and operatic soprano Renee Fleming as members of the academy’s Class of 2013 — one of the highest honors for leaders in academia, business, public affairs, the humanities and the arts.
Paul Pfeiffer ’38, professor emeritus of computational and applied mathematics and one of Rice’s longest-serving faculty members, died Sunday in Austin at age 95. Pfeiffer taught full time at Rice for more than 50 years, served as dean of students for four years and played an instrumental role in establishing the Department of Computational and Applied Mathematics (CAAM).
Jennifer Young, a member of the Computational and Applied Mathematics (CAAM) faculty and a faculty associate at Brown College, died Tuesday after a car-pedestrian accident. She was struck by a car as she was walking across Main Street to campus around 9:20 a.m.
Richard Tapia, University Professor, the Maxfield-Oshman Professor in Engineering and a professor of computational and applied mathematics, presented the luncheon keynote address to a full house. Speaking about the “The Need for New Leadership: Crisis in Texas Higher Education,” Tapia said that the lack of minority faculty in mathematics and science is hurting the health of the nation. He too received a standing ovation.
CAAM professor Richard Tapia was elected “for significant contributions in optimization theory and numerical analysis and extraordinary efforts to foster diversity, inclusiveness and excellence in the mathematical sciences.”
The medal is the highest national honor for a U.S. scientist, but it won’t be the first White House honor for Tapia. He received the inaugural Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring in 1996, the same year he earned a presidential appointment to the National Science Board, the nation’s highest scientific governing body.
For CAAM student Sean Hardesty, the well-documented relations between music and mathematics have been a living fact since childhood.“Sean is working at the intersection of mathematics, music and materials,” said his adviser Matthias Heinkenschloss. “He is developing mathematical and computational tools to model and ultimately design violin.”
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