2011-2012 Bulletin – PDF - SEAS Bulletin - Columbia University

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After receiving a master’s degree
from the School in 1929, Admiral
Hyman George Rickover served during
the Second World War as head of the
electrical section of the Navy’s Bureau
of Ships. A proponent of nuclear sea
power, Rickover directed the planning
and construction of the world’s first
nuclear submarine, the 300-foot-long
Nautilus, launched in 1954.
The Technological Age
Today, The Fu Foundation School of
Engineering and Applied Science, as
it was named in 1997, continues to
provide leadership for scientific and
educational advances. Even Joseph
Engelberger, Class of 1946, the father
of modern robotics, could not have
anticipated the revolutionary speed with
which cumbersome and expensive “big
science” computers would shrink to the
size of a wallet.
In 1986 the Engineering School was
one of the first schools in the country
to use videotapes as tools for distance
learning. Today Columbia Video
Network continues to be in the forefront
of distance learning at the graduate level
through its online education programs.
Named as one of Forbes Magazine’s
“Best of the Web,” CVN offers the
opportunity for students anywhere in the
world to enroll in certificate programs or
obtain a master’s or professional degree
from Columbia Engineering via the web.
The New Century
No one could have imagined the
explosive growth of technology and its
interdisciplinary impact. The Engineering
School is in a unique position to take
advantage of the research facilities
and talents housed at Columbia to
form relationships among and between
other schools and departments within
the University. The School’s newest
department, Biomedical Engineering,
with close ties to the Medical School,
is but one example. Interdisciplinary
centers are the norm, with crossdisciplinary
research going on in
biomedical imaging, environmental
chemistry, materials science, medical
digital libraries, nanotechnology, digital
government, new media technologies,
and GK-12 education. The School
and its departments have links to the
Departments of Physics, Chemistry,
Earth Science, and Mathematics, as
well as the College of Physicians and
Surgeons, the Graduate School of
Journalism, Lamont-Doherty Earth
Observatory, Teachers College,
Columbia Business School, and the
Graduate School of Architecture,
Planning and Preservation. The
transforming gift of The Fu Foundation
has catapulted the School into the
forefront of collaborative research and
teaching and has given students the
opportunity to work with prize-winning
academicians, including Nobel laureates,
from many disciplines.
The New Research
For the past several years, Columbia
has been among the handful of research
universities that earn the largest patent
income from inventions created by
its faculty. The University is the only
academic institution that holds patents
in the patent pool for the manufacture
of MPEG-2, the technology that
engineering 2011–2012