Jul - Aug 2007 Issue

 Special delivery: Crowd favorite Pilobolus returns. John Kane

Christine Morden Photography

The recently announced DukeEngage initiative aims to make civic engagement and service learning an integral part of every undergraduate's Duke experience. To emphasize its own commitment to service, the Duke Alumni Association board, at its May meeting, participated in an afternoon of community service at Lakewood Elementary School, one of Duke's partner schools, located only a few miles from West Campus.

In 2001, Duke Magazine explored notions of academic integrity in an article that highlighted the results of a 2000 Center for Academic Integrity student survey, which found that a significant proportion of students engaged in behavior that could, under many definitions, fall within the realm of cheating.

The wall surrounding East Campus. Duke University Archives

Megan Morr

©Marianna Day Massey/ZUMA/Corbis

Chapelville: The mini-community of campe

Peter Agre, vice chancellor for science and technology and James B. Duke Professor of cell biology, is taking a leave of absence to evaluate a possible run for the U.S. Senate from Minnesota. Agre's family has lived in Minnesota for four generations. Agre came to Duke in 2005 after spending more than twenty-five years at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He shared the 2003 Nobel Prize in chemistry.

Why do some people roll with life's punches, facing failures and problems with grace, while others dwell on calamities, criticize themselves, and exaggerate problems?

The two newest recipients of the Alumni Endowed Undergraduate Scholarship have several things in common: an early passion for Duke, close family ties to the university, and residence in Florida. They are Trisha Lowe, from Cudjoe Key, and Taylor Hausburg, from Sarasota.

Opening new doors: The French center's design encourages inter

 Jon Gardiner

What better time to contemplate a warming planet, the cover theme, than at the peak point of a Durham summer?

Portrait of T[h]amas Koulikan, King of Persia

Cathy Davidson

 Early March on the Lower East Side of New York, and it's cold—not facemask, frostbite, birds-falling-from-the-sky cold, but enough where it'd be advisable to slip on a pair of socks, which Dana Vachon hasn't. It's a strange choice, if an unremarkable one.

They range from fresh-faced teenagers to seasoned grad students, small-town kids to urban sophisticates.

Pictorial tributes to the natural world and to crowning achievements in science, engineering, and medicine adorn the granite walls in the cavernous lobby of the National Academies Building in Washington. On the back wall, a giant salmon hovers, midstream, just to the right of Einstein's E=mc2. A much smaller fish, its design evocative of an Inuit totem, is inscribed in the middle of the salmon's body, perhaps as a tribute to native cultures or as a nod to the diminutive but central role of the human dimension in the natural world.

Richard Shock

Gaining too much weight can be as bad for an employer's bottom line as it is for a person's waistline. A Duke Medical Center analysis found that obese workers filed twice the number of workers' compensation claims, had medical costs seven times higher from those claims, and had thirteen times the number of days absent because of work injury or work illness than did non-obese workers.

Monument Canada (detail),1988, by Christian Boltanski. Clothes, black-and-white photographs, and lights;

In June, Duke announced that it had reached a settlement with former lacrosse team members David Evans '06, Collin Finnerty, and Reade Seligmann, who were declared innocent of all legal charges in April.The specific terms of the settlement were not disclosed. It extends to all matters to date involving Duke and its staff and faculty members and includes no admission of wrongdoing.

The winning team of the second annual Duke-Engineering World Health CUREs nonprofit business competition has developed a low-cost device to help catch cervical cancer early in women of developing countries."Our ambition is to save the lives of 19,000 women in the next five years by helping them get access to cervical cancer screenings," says team leader Theo Tam M.E.M. '07.

Megan Morr

Horowitz: understanding constitutional complexity in emerging dem

So close: senior Danowski as final game endsPete Kiehart/

Bebop king: Monk makes music for Sonny Rollins,

All around town: PIE excursions have included weekend

Out into the world: Members of the Class of 2007 celebrated

Scott Lindroth, Kevin D. Gorter Associate Professor of music and chair of Duke's music department, was named the university's first vice provost for the arts. As vice provost, he will help to enhance programming, the curriculum, and cross-disciplinary collaboration in the arts; advise the provost; and oversee arts facilities.

Joe Gaffney

Cassandra Nelson/Mercy Corps

Flaxseed, an edible seed that is rich in omega-3 fatty acids and fiber-related compounds known as lignans, is effective in halting prostate tumor growth, according to a study led by Duke Medical Center researchers. The small, dark brown seed, which is similar to a sesame seed and is available in grocery stores, may be able to interrupt the chain of events that leads cells to divide irregularly and become cancerous.

Useless Arithmetic: Why Environmental Scientists Can't Predict the Future By Orrin H. Pilkey and Linda Pilkey-Jarvis.

Brief Encounters with Che Guevera: Stories By Ben Fountain J.D. '83. Ecco/HarperCollins, 2007. 272 pages. $13.95, paper.

All for one: Women's golf team unites in victory. Golfweek Magazine/Scott A.

Get your head in the game: Dale encourages athletes to focus on mental conditioning.

When I joined my company two years ago, I was told that a rotational program would be good for my career. Six departments, six bosses, and six great evaluations later, I've discovered that more recent hires who've worked in a single department are to be promoted over me. Should I look for a new job outside the company?