2024
Tej Patel, C’25, W’25, and Sridatta Teerdhala, C’25, W’25, Selected as Marshall Scholars
The students, both part of the Roy and Diana Vagelos Program in Life Sciences and Management, will receive funding for up to three years of graduate study in the United Kingdom.
$50 Million Legacy Gift to Penn Arts & Sciences Funds Undergraduate Aid
With an estate gift of more than $42 million, William J. Levy, a graduate of the Wharton School and Law School, has contributed $50 million in support of undergraduate students in the College.
Jeffrey Kallberg Named Interim Dean of Penn Arts & Sciences
Kallberg, Deputy Dean and William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Music, will step into the role as of January 1, 2025.
Josephine Nock-Hee Park Named Associate Dean for Arts and Letters
The School of Arts and Sciences President’s Distinguished Professor of English will oversee the School’s humanities departments and research centers.
2024 Making a Difference in Global Communities and Klein Family Social Justice Grants Announced
The funding went to 11 projects from faculty in nine Penn Arts & Sciences departments, with work focusing on everything from better crime policy to a philosopher-in-residence program and psychology education in middle schools.
Bo Zhen Named Jin K. Lee Presidential Associate Professor of Physics and Astronomy
Zhen’s research focuses on the study of electromagnetic waves, such as light, in engineered environments.
Marisa Kozlowski Named Ponzy Lu Endowed Professor of Chemistry
Kozlowski’s research focuses on the rational design of new methods and catalysts for use in organic synthesis.
Om Gandhi, C’25, GEN’25, Awarded Rhodes Scholarship
At Oxford, Gandhi plans to pursue a DPhil in pediatrics with a focus in oncology, with an ultimate goal of attending medical school and practicing medicine as a physician-scientist.
Squire Booker Named Richard Perry University Professor
Booker, a world-renowned chemist who will have appointments in the School of Arts & Sciences and the Perelman School of Medicine, begins his appointment on Jan. 1, 2025.
Nicole Rust Named Simons Foundation Pivot Fellow
The program supports “researchers who have a strong track record of success and achievement in their current field, as well as a deep interest, curiosity and drive to make contributions to a new discipline.”
Econometric Society Honors for Four in Economics Department
Hanming Fang, Enrique Mendoza, Guillermo Ordonez, and Petra Todd were all recognized by the international organization whose aim is to advance economic theory in its relation to statistics and mathematics.
Timothy Rommen Appointed Vice Provost for the Arts
The Davidson Kennedy Professor and Professor of Music and Africana Studies will begin the new appointment on Jan. 1.
Bhuvnesh Jain One of Five Faculty to Lead Penn AI Council
The aim of the new initiative is to enhance visibility and impact of artificial intelligence research across the University.
Vaughn A. Booker Named George E. Doty, Jr. and Lee Spelman Doty Presidential Associate Professor of Africana Studies
Booker is a historian of religion whose scholarship and teaching center on 20th-century African American religions.
Patrick Walsh Named William Warren Rhodes-Robert J. Thompson Professor of Chemistry
Walsh works in the areas of catalysis, methods development, and reaction mechanisms.
Michael Mann Appointed Vice Provost for Climate Science, Policy, and Action
The Presidential Distinguished Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science and Director of the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability, and the Media will begin his new appointment on Nov. 1, 2024.
Scott Moore Named Department of Defense Senior Advisor for Climate Security
In this role, Moore, Practice Professor of Political Science, will help shape U.S. government policy at the intersection of climate change and national security.
Penn Arts & Sciences Launches Plant ARC
The Plant Adaptability and Resilience Center aims to enhance plant development and fortitude in the face of climate change.
Zahra Fakhraai Elected 2024 American Physical Society Fellow
The Professor of Chemistry was recognized for “innovative experiments that advance the fundamental understanding of polymer thin films, nanoconfinement, and amyloid aggregation.”
Historian Barbara Savage Honored for Book on Merze Tate
She received a 2024 American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation and was a finalist for the Stone Book Award from the Museum of African American History.
Sara Jaffee Named Class of 1965 Term Professor of Psychology
Jaffee conducts research on children and families experiencing a range of adversities, including poverty, housing insecurity, and violence.
I. Joseph Kroll Named Robert I. Williams Endowed Term Professor of Physics and Astronomy
Kroll’s research is in accelerator-based experimental particle physics, and he has worked on the study of proton-proton collisions, proton-antiproton collisions, and electron-positron collisions.
Francesco Agostinelli Named Janice and Julian Bers Assistant Professor in the Social Sciences
Agostinelli is an empirical microeconomist and a leading scholar in labor economics and the economics of education.
Paula Fomby Named Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Chair in the Social Sciences
Fomby’s research focuses on children’s well-being and life chances and the way these are shaped by families and social institutions, with particular attention to economic and racialized inequalities.
Hannah Feldman Named Katherine Stein Sachs, CW’69, and Keith L. Sachs, W’67, Associate Professor of History of Art
Feldman is a leading scholar of contemporary art.
Dorothy Roberts Named 2024 MacArthur Fellow
Roberts, George A. Weiss University Professor of Law and Sociology, was honored for “exposing racial inequities embedded in social service systems and uplifting the experiences of people caught up in them.”
Jeffrey Kallberg Named Deputy Dean of Penn Arts & Sciences
In this new role, Kallberg will provide additional management of the daily operations of the Dean's office and will represent Dean Fluharty in an official capacity when necessary.
Douglas Jerolmack Named Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Endowed Term Professor of Earth and Environmental Science
Jerolmack is pioneering the emerging field of “Soft Earth Geophysics.”
Daniel Hopkins Named Julie and Martin Franklin Presidential Professor of Political Science
Hopkins is a leading scholar of American politics whose research emphasizes racial and ethnic politics, state and local politics, and political behavior.
Mona Merling Wins 2025 Joan and Joseph Birman Research Prize in Topology and Geometry
The Associate Professor of Mathematics was recognized for her “innovative and impactful research in algebraic K-theory, equivariant homotopy theory, and their applications to manifold theory.”
Steven J. Fluharty to Step Down as SAS Dean
Fluharty, who is the Thomas S. Gates, Jr. Professor of Psychology, Pharmacology, and Neuroscience, has served as Dean since July 2013. He will return to the faculty effective December 31, 2024.
Osman Balkan Wins 2024 Charles Taylor Book Award
He received the honor for his book Dying Abroad: The Political Afterlives of Migration in Europe, an ethnographic account of migrants’ end-of-life dilemmas.
University Launches Penn Center for Media, Technology, and Democracy
The initiative complements the work being conducted by Penn Arts & Sciences’ Data Driven Discovery initiative, offering an opportunity for future collaboration.
Chemist Patrick Walsh Honored with 2025 Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award
The honor, administered by the American Chemical Society, recognizes and encourages excellence in organic chemistry.
Joshua Plotkin Receives 5-Year, $3.9-Million Department of Defense Award
The funding will go toward a project called “The Language of Parasocial Influence and the Emergence of Extremism.”
Guy Grossman Named David M. Knott Professor of Global Politics and International Relations
Grossman uses large-scale field experiments to answer central questions about the political causes and consequences of migration and forced displacement.
Peter Struck Named Vartan Gregorian Professor of Humanities
Struck, the Dean of the College, is a leading classical scholar and award-winning teacher and author.
Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations Renamed Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures
The new name, chosen after a collaborative process, better represents the scope of research and teaching by the department.
Chemist Eric Schelter Wins 2024 Cottrell SEED Award
The honor supports his research on new directions for sustainable separations of battery materials.
Andrew Santiago-Frangos Named M. Jane Williams and Valerie Vargo Presidential Assistant Professor of Biology
Santiago-Frangos is a molecular biologist with a focus on biochemistry and structural biology of natural bacterial immune systems. He is the recipient of prestigious awards from the Life Sciences Research Foundation and the Burrough-Welcome Fund.
Sarah Tishkoff Earns 2024 Vanderbilt Prize in Biomedical Science
The David and Lyn Silfen University Professor in Biology and Genetics was recognized for her “groundbreaking work in evolutionary genetics and diversity.”
Decherney-Directed Film Honored at Festivals
Is It Because I’m a Girl tells the story of the first South Sudanese woman to perform hip-hop music, dance, and poetry in the Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya.
Joseph Francisco Receives Pittsburgh Spectroscopy Award
He is the 68th honoree, recognized for his long-term work in applied spectroscopy.
Thachil Wins Awards for Book on Urban Migration and Political Power
A study of the transformative potential of urbanization in India received two awards from the American Political Science Association.
Doris Wagner Named DiMaura Professor of Biology
Wagner is the inaugural director for the Penn Plant Adaptability and Resilience Center. She is a leader in the fields of plant biology, chromatin modification, and epigenetics.
Marlyse Baptista Named President’s Distinguished Professor of Linguistics
Baptista directs the Language Contact and Cognition Lab in the Department of Linguistics and is a faculty member in MindCORE.
Andrew Zahrt Receives Scialog Funding for Automating Chemical Laboratories
Scialog: Automating Chemical Laboratories aims to accelerate innovation and broaden access within the chemical enterprise through advances in automated instrumentation and artificial intelligence.
Chatelain, Mani, Marteleto, and Mattern Named Presidential Penn Compact Professors
The professors are conducting innovative research in Africana Studies, English, Sociology, and Cinema & Media Studies.
Simon Richter Named Class of 1965 Term Professor of German
An environmental humanist, Richter’s research focuses on cultural aspects of the climate emergency in Germany, Indonesia, the Netherlands, and the United States.