1.
Baltimore
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Baltimore is the largest city in the U. S. state of Maryland, and the 29th-most populous city in the country. It was established by the Constitution of Maryland and is not part of any county, thus, it is the largest independent city in the United States, with a population of 621,849 as of 2015. As of 2010, the population of the Baltimore Metropolitan Area was 2.7 million, founded in 1729, Baltimore is the second largest seaport in the Mid-Atlantic. Baltimores Inner Harbor was once the leading port of entry for immigrants to the United States. With hundreds of identified districts, Baltimore has been dubbed a city of neighborhoods, in the War of 1812, Francis Scott Key wrote The Star-Spangled Banner, later the American national anthem, in Baltimore. More than 65,000 properties, or roughly one in three buildings in the city, are listed on the National Register, more than any city in the nation. The city has 289 properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the historical records of the government of Baltimore are located at the Baltimore City Archives. The city is named after Cecil Calvert, second Lord Baltimore, of the Irish House of Lords, Baltimore Manor was the name of the estate in County Longford on which the Calvert family lived in Ireland. Baltimore is an anglicization of the Irish name Baile an Tí Mhóir, in 1608, Captain John Smith traveled 210 miles from Jamestown to the uppermost Chesapeake Bay, leading the first European expedition to the Patapsco River. The name Patapsco is derived from pota-psk-ut, which translates to backwater or tide covered with froth in Algonquian dialect, a quarter century after John Smiths voyage, English colonists began to settle in Maryland. The area constituting the modern City of Baltimore and its area was first settled by David Jones in 1661. He claimed the area today as Harbor East on the east bank of the Jones Falls stream. In the early 1600s, the immediate Baltimore vicinity was populated, if at all. The Baltimore area had been inhabited by Native Americans since at least the 10th millennium BC, one Paleo-Indian site and several Archaic period and Woodland period archaeological sites have been identified in Baltimore, including four from the Late Woodland period. During the Late Woodland period, the culture that is called the Potomac Creek complex resided in the area from Baltimore to the Rappahannock River in Virginia. It was located on the Bush River on land that in 1773 became part of Harford County, in 1674, the General Assembly passed An Act for erecting a Court-house and Prison in each County within this Province. The site of the house and jail for Baltimore County was evidently Old Baltimore near the Bush River. In 1683, the General Assembly passed An Act for Advancement of Trade to establish towns, ports, one of the towns established by the act in Baltimore County was on Bush River, on Town Land, near the Court-House
2.
University of Minnesota
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The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university in Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota. The Minneapolis and St. Paul campuses are approximately 3 miles apart, and it is the oldest and largest campus within the University of Minnesota system and has the sixth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 51,147 students in 2013–14. The university is the institution of the University of Minnesota system, and is organized into 19 colleges and schools, with sister campuses in Crookston, Duluth, Morris. Minnesota is one of Americas Public Ivy universities, which refers to top universities in the United States capable of providing a collegiate experience comparable with the Ivy League. Founded in 1851, The University of Minnesota is categorized as an R1 Doctoral University with the highest research activity in the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, Minnesota faculty, alumni, and researchers have won 25 Nobel Prizes and three Pulitzer Prizes. Notable University of Minnesota alumni include two Vice Presidents of the United States, Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale, and Bob Dylan, who received the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature. The University of Minnesota Twin Cities is also a member of the Association of American Universities which is an association of the 62 leading research universities in the United States and Canada. In its 2017 edition, U. S. News & World Report ranked Minnesota 38th in their Best Global University Rankings, the Times Higher Education World University Rankings for 2015 ranks Minnesota 46th in the world. In 2015, Academic Ranking of World Universities ranked the university 11th in the world for mathematics, the University of Minnesota is ranked 14 over-all among the nations top research universities by the Center for Measuring University Performance. The U. S. News & World Reports 2016 rankings placed the program of the University as the 69th-best National University in the United States. Additionally, nineteen of the Universitys graduate-school departments have been ranked in the nations top-twenty by the U. S. National Research Council, in both 2008 and 2012 U. S. News & World Report ranked the College of Pharmacy 2nd in the nation. 2016 U. S. News & Report now rank the College of Pharmacy 2nd in the nation. In 2011, U. S. News & World Report ranked the School of Public Health 8th in the nation, the University of Minnesota ranked 19th in NIH funding in 2008. Minnesota is listed as a Public Ivy in 2001 Greenes Guides The Public Ivies, the university developed Gopher, a precursor to the World Wide Web which used hyperlinks to connect documents across computers on the internet. However, the produced by CERN was favored by the public since it was freely distributed. The University also houses the Charles Babbage Institute, a research, the department has strong roots in early days of supercomputing with Seymour Cray of Cray supercomputers. Notable faculty of the department are Yousef Saad, Vipin Kumar, Jaideep Srivastava, John Riedl, some notable alumni of the department are Ed Chi, Imrich Chlamtac, Leah Culver, Jeff Dean, Mark P. McCahill, Arvind Mithal, and Calvin Mooers. Puffed rice - Alexander P. Anderson led to the discovery of puffed rice, transistorized cardiac pacemaker - Earl Bakken founded Medtronic, where he developed the first external, battery-operated, transistorized, wearable artificial pacemaker in 1957
3.
Yale University
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Yale University is an American private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Founded in 1701 in Saybrook Colony to train Congregationalist ministers, it is the third-oldest institution of education in the United States. The Collegiate School moved to New Haven in 1716, and shortly after was renamed Yale College in recognition of a gift from British East India Company governor Elihu Yale. Originally restricted to theology and sacred languages, the curriculum began to incorporate humanities and sciences by the time of the American Revolution. In the 19th century the school introduced graduate and professional instruction, awarding the first Ph. D. in the United States in 1861 and organizing as a university in 1887. Yale is organized into fourteen constituent schools, the undergraduate college, the Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. While the university is governed by the Yale Corporation, each schools faculty oversees its curriculum, the universitys assets include an endowment valued at $25.4 billion as of June 2016, the second largest of any U. S. educational institution. The Yale University Library, serving all constituent schools, holds more than 15 million volumes and is the third-largest academic library in the United States, Yale College undergraduates follow a liberal arts curriculum with departmental majors and are organized into a social system of residential colleges. Almost all faculty teach courses, more than 2,000 of which are offered annually. Students compete intercollegiately as the Yale Bulldogs in the NCAA Division I – Ivy League, Yale has graduated many notable alumni, including five U. S. Presidents,19 U. S. Supreme Court Justices,20 living billionaires, and many heads of state. In addition, Yale has graduated hundreds of members of Congress,57 Nobel laureates,5 Fields Medalists,247 Rhodes Scholars, and 119 Marshall Scholars have been affiliated with the University. Yale traces its beginnings to An Act for Liberty to Erect a Collegiate School, passed by the General Court of the Colony of Connecticut on October 9,1701, the Act was an effort to create an institution to train ministers and lay leadership for Connecticut. Soon thereafter, a group of ten Congregationalist ministers, Samuel Andrew, Thomas Buckingham, Israel Chauncy, Samuel Mather, the group, led by James Pierpont, is now known as The Founders. Originally known as the Collegiate School, the institution opened in the home of its first rector, Abraham Pierson, the school moved to Saybrook, and then Wethersfield. In 1716 the college moved to New Haven, Connecticut, the feud caused the Mathers to champion the success of the Collegiate School in the hope that it would maintain the Puritan religious orthodoxy in a way that Harvard had not. Cotton Mather suggested that the school change its name to Yale College, meanwhile, a Harvard graduate working in England convinced some 180 prominent intellectuals that they should donate books to Yale. The 1714 shipment of 500 books represented the best of modern English literature, science, philosophy and it had a profound effect on intellectuals at Yale. Undergraduate Jonathan Edwards discovered John Lockes works and developed his original theology known as the new divinity
4.
Princeton University
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Princeton University is a private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The institution moved to Newark in 1747, then to the current site nine years later, Princeton provides undergraduate and graduate instruction in the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, and engineering. The university has ties with the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton has the largest endowment per student in the United States. The university has graduated many notable alumni, two U. S. Presidents,12 U. S. Supreme Court Justices, and numerous living billionaires and foreign heads of state are all counted among Princetons alumni body. New Light Presbyterians founded the College of New Jersey in 1746 in order to train ministers, the college was the educational and religious capital of Scots-Irish America. In 1754, trustees of the College of New Jersey suggested that, in recognition of Governors interest, gov. Jonathan Belcher replied, What a name that would be. In 1756, the moved to Princeton, New Jersey. Its home in Princeton was Nassau Hall, named for the royal House of Orange-Nassau of William III of England, following the untimely deaths of Princetons first five presidents, John Witherspoon became president in 1768 and remained in that office until his death in 1794. During his presidency, Witherspoon shifted the focus from training ministers to preparing a new generation for leadership in the new American nation. To this end, he tightened academic standards and solicited investment in the college, in 1812, the eighth president the College of New Jersey, Ashbel Green, helped establish the Princeton Theological Seminary next door. The plan to extend the theological curriculum met with approval on the part of the authorities at the College of New Jersey. Today, Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary maintain separate institutions with ties that include such as cross-registration. Before the construction of Stanhope Hall in 1803, Nassau Hall was the sole building. The cornerstone of the building was laid on September 17,1754, during the summer of 1783, the Continental Congress met in Nassau Hall, making Princeton the countrys capital for four months. The class of 1879 donated twin lion sculptures that flanked the entrance until 1911, Nassau Halls bell rang after the halls construction, however, the fire of 1802 melted it. The bell was then recast and melted again in the fire of 1855, James McCosh took office as the colleges president in 1868 and lifted the institution out of a low period that had been brought about by the American Civil War. McCosh Hall is named in his honor, in 1879, the first thesis for a Doctor of Philosophy Ph. D. was submitted by James F. Williamson, Class of 1877. In 1896, the officially changed its name from the College of New Jersey to Princeton University to honor the town in which it resides
5.
Physics
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Physics is the natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion and behavior through space and time, along with related concepts such as energy and force. One of the most fundamental disciplines, the main goal of physics is to understand how the universe behaves. Physics is one of the oldest academic disciplines, perhaps the oldest through its inclusion of astronomy, Physics intersects with many interdisciplinary areas of research, such as biophysics and quantum chemistry, and the boundaries of physics are not rigidly defined. New ideas in physics often explain the mechanisms of other sciences while opening new avenues of research in areas such as mathematics. Physics also makes significant contributions through advances in new technologies that arise from theoretical breakthroughs, the United Nations named 2005 the World Year of Physics. Astronomy is the oldest of the natural sciences, the stars and planets were often a target of worship, believed to represent their gods. While the explanations for these phenomena were often unscientific and lacking in evidence, according to Asger Aaboe, the origins of Western astronomy can be found in Mesopotamia, and all Western efforts in the exact sciences are descended from late Babylonian astronomy. The most notable innovations were in the field of optics and vision, which came from the works of many scientists like Ibn Sahl, Al-Kindi, Ibn al-Haytham, Al-Farisi and Avicenna. The most notable work was The Book of Optics, written by Ibn Al-Haitham, in which he was not only the first to disprove the ancient Greek idea about vision, but also came up with a new theory. In the book, he was also the first to study the phenomenon of the pinhole camera, many later European scholars and fellow polymaths, from Robert Grosseteste and Leonardo da Vinci to René Descartes, Johannes Kepler and Isaac Newton, were in his debt. Indeed, the influence of Ibn al-Haythams Optics ranks alongside that of Newtons work of the same title, the translation of The Book of Optics had a huge impact on Europe. From it, later European scholars were able to build the devices as what Ibn al-Haytham did. From this, such important things as eyeglasses, magnifying glasses, telescopes, Physics became a separate science when early modern Europeans used experimental and quantitative methods to discover what are now considered to be the laws of physics. Newton also developed calculus, the study of change, which provided new mathematical methods for solving physical problems. The discovery of new laws in thermodynamics, chemistry, and electromagnetics resulted from greater research efforts during the Industrial Revolution as energy needs increased, however, inaccuracies in classical mechanics for very small objects and very high velocities led to the development of modern physics in the 20th century. Modern physics began in the early 20th century with the work of Max Planck in quantum theory, both of these theories came about due to inaccuracies in classical mechanics in certain situations. Quantum mechanics would come to be pioneered by Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schrödinger, from this early work, and work in related fields, the Standard Model of particle physics was derived. Areas of mathematics in general are important to this field, such as the study of probabilities, in many ways, physics stems from ancient Greek philosophy
6.
Institute for Advanced Study
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The IAS is perhaps best known as the academic home of Albert Einstein, John von Neumann and Kurt Gödel, after their immigration to the United States. Although it is close to and collaborates with Princeton University, Rutgers University, Flexners guiding principle in founding the Institute was the pursuit of knowledge for its own sake. There are no programs or experimental facilities at the Institute. Research is never contracted or directed, it is left to each individual researcher to pursue their own goals and it is supported entirely by endowments, grants, and gifts, and is one of the eight American mathematics institutes funded by the National Science Foundation. It is the model for the eight members of the consortium Some Institutes for Advanced Study. The institute consists of four schools–Historical Studies, Mathematics, Natural Sciences, in 2016, the Institute has been in the news for a faculty housing project proposal. While the Institute owns the property on which it wants to build these houses, historians and archaeological evidence confirm the site witnessed Gen. George Washingtons arrival and charge on horseback across the battlefield during the January 3,1777 Battle of Princeton. The Institute was founded in 1930 by Abraham Flexner, together with philanthropists Louis Bamberger, Flexner is generally regarded as one of the most important figures in the history of American medicine and played a major role in the reform of medical education. This led to an interest in education generally and as early as 1890 he had founded a school which had no formal curriculum, exams. It was a success at preparing students for prestigious colleges. The Bamberger siblings wanted to use the proceeds from the sale of their department store in Newark, New Jersey, Flexner convinced them to put their money in the service of more abstract research. In 1932 Veblen resigned from Princeton and became the first professor in the new Institute for Advanced Study and he selected most of the original faculty and also helped the Institute acquire land in Princeton for both the original facility and future expansion. Flexner and Veblen set out to recruit the best mathematicians and physicists they could find, the rise of fascism and the associated anti-semitism forced many prominent mathematicians to flee Europe and some, such as Einstein and Hermann Weyl, found a home at the new institute. Weyl as a condition of accepting insisted that the Institute also appoint the thirty year old Austrian-Hungarian polymath John von Neumann, indeed, the IAS became the key lifeline for scholars fleeing Europe. Einstein was Flexners first coup and shortly after that he was followed by Veblens brilliant student James Alexander, Flexner was fortunate in the luminaries he directly recruited but also in the people that they brought along with them. Thus, by 1934 the fledgeling institute was led by six of the most prominent mathematicians in the world, in 1935 quantum physics pioneer Wolfgang Pauli became a faculty member. With the opening of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton replaced Göttingen as the center for mathematics in the twentieth century. Princeton Universitys science departments are less than two miles away and informal ties and collaboration between the two institutions occurred from the beginning and this helped start an incorrect impression that it was part of the University, one that has never been completely eradicated
7.
National Defense Research Committee
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Most of its work was done with the strictest secrecy, and it began research of what would become some of the most important technology during World War II, including radar and the atomic bomb. It was superseded by the Office of Scientific Research and Development in 1941, Bush managed to get a meeting with the President on June 12,1940, and took a single sheet of paper describing the proposed agency. Roosevelt approved it in ten minutes and that, in fact, is exactly what it was. One member was appointed by the Secretary of War and another by the Secretary of the Navy, Conant, President of Harvard University, Frank B. Jewett, President of the National Academy of Sciences and President of Bell Telephone Laboratories, Brigadier General George V. Strong, Tolman, Professor of Physical Chemistry and Mathematical Physics at California Institute of Technology. Strong was succeeded by Brigadier General R. C. Moore on January 17,1941, during its first meeting on July 2, the NDRC elected Tolman as its Vice-Chairman and appointed Irvin Stewart as its Secretary. The NDRC members met approximately once a month until September 1942, after which it met weekly or bi-weekly until the end of the war with Germany. The former grew to be the largest single activity of the NDRC, in the year of its autonomous existence, the NDRC received approximately $6,500,000 for research. The NDRCs most important project eventually became the Manhattan Project — the full-scale project to nuclear weapons by the United States. It was instructed in Roosevelts June 15 letter to report to the NDRC and Bush, during June 1940 Bush reorganized the Uranium Committee into a scientific body and eliminated military membership. No longer beholden to the military for funds, the NDRC had greater access to money for nuclear research, however, there was little impetus until the British MAUD Committees findings were presented in 1941. At Bushs insistence Roosevelt issued Executive Order No.8807 on June 28,1941, the NDRC technically still existed after the creation of the OSRD but its authority had been reduced from being able to actually fund research to becoming simply an advisory body to the OSRD. The NDRC ceased to exist officially after its last meeting on January 20,1947, when it became the NDRC of the OSRD, the committee membership and structure was re-organized. The NDRC of the OSRD membership consisted of Conant, Tolman, Adams, Compton, and Jewett, along with the Commission of Patents, the Committee on Uranium was reorganized as the S-1 Section and it stopped being part of NDRC jurisdiction during December 1941. The NDRC funded research into hundreds of different projects at different educational and industrial sites around the country. During early June 1941, shortly before it was superseded by the OSRD, its organization was as follows, Section B Section H Section S Section T Section E Division B – James B. Conant, Chairman Synthetic Problems — Roger Adams, Vice-Chairman Section A-1 Section A-2 Section A-3 Section A-4 Physical Chemical Problems – W. K, jolliffe, Hartley Rowe, R. D. Booth, and J. T. Tate, Vice-Chairmen. Section C-1 Section C-2 Section C-3 Section C-4 Section C-5 Division D – Karl Compton, Chairman, Alfred L. Loomis, Section D-1 Section D-2 Section D-3 Section D-4 Division E – Conway P. Coe, Chairman
8.
Los Alamos National Laboratory
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Los Alamos National Laboratory is one of two laboratories in the United States in which classified work towards the design of nuclear weapons has been undertaken. LANL is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, managed and operated by Los Alamos National Security, located in Los Alamos, the laboratory is one of the largest science and technology institutions in the world. It conducts multidisciplinary research in such as national security, space exploration, renewable energy, medicine, nanotechnology. General Leslie Groves wanted a central laboratory at a location for safety. It should be at least 200 miles from international boundaries and west of the Mississippi, major John Dudley suggested Oak City, Utah or Jemez Springs, New Mexico but both were rejected. Manhattan Project scientific director J. Robert Oppenheimer had spent much time in his youth in the New Mexico area, Dudley had rejected the school as not meeting Groves’ criteria, but as soon as Groves saw it he said in effect This is the place. Oppenheimer became the laboratorys first director, during the Manhattan Project, Los Alamos hosted thousands of employees, including many Nobel Prize-winning scientists. The location was a total secret and its only mailing address was a post office box, number 1663, in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Eventually two other post office boxes were used,180 and 1539, also in Santa Fe, though its contract with the University of California was initially intended to be temporary, the relationship was maintained long after the war. The work of the laboratory culminated in the creation of several devices, one of which was used in the first nuclear test near Alamogordo, New Mexico, codenamed Trinity. The other two were weapons, Little Boy and Fat Man, which were used in the attacks on Hiroshima, the Laboratory received the Army-Navy ‘E’ Award for Excellence in production on October 16,1945. Many of the original Los Alamos luminaries chose to leave the laboratory, in the years since the 1940s, Los Alamos was responsible for the development of the hydrogen bomb, and many other variants of nuclear weapons. In 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory was founded to act as Los Alamos competitor, Los Alamos and Livermore served as the primary classified laboratories in the U. S. national laboratory system, designing all the countrys nuclear arsenal. Additional work included basic research, particle accelerator development, health physics. Many nuclear tests were undertaken in the Marshall Islands and at the Nevada Test Site, during the late-1950s, a number of scientists including Dr. J. Robert Bob Beyster left Los Alamos to work for General Atomics in San Diego. Three major nuclear-related accidents have occurred at LANL, criticality accidents occurred in August 1945 and May 1946, and a third accident occurred during an annual physical inventory in December 1958. Several buildings associated with the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos were declared a National Historic Landmark in 1965, Los Alamos nuclear work is currently thought to relate primarily to computer simulations and stockpile stewardship. The development of the Dual-Axis Radiographic Hydrodynamic Test Facility will allow complex simulations of nuclear tests to take place without full explosive yields, the lab has made intense efforts for humanitarian causes through its scientific research in medicine
