School of Humanities and Sciences
Showing 1-20 of 62 Results
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Marcel Fafchamps
Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and Professor, by courtesy, of Economics
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsSee my personal website for all my recent working papers.
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Judith Ellen Fan
Assistant Professor of Psychology
BioI direct the Cognitive Tools Lab (https://cogtoolslab.github.io/) at Stanford University. Our lab aims to reverse engineer the human cognitive toolkit — in particular, how people use physical representations of thought to learn, communicate, and solve problems. Towards this end, we use a combination of approaches from cognitive science, computational neuroscience, and artificial intelligence.
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Shanhui Fan
Joseph and Hon Mai Goodman Professor of the School of Engineering and Professor, by courtesy, of Applied Physics
BioFan's research interests are in fundamental studies of nanophotonic structures, especially photonic crystals and meta-materials, and applications of these structures in energy and information technology applications
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Michael Fayer
David Mulvane Ehrsam and Edward Curtis Franklin Professor of Chemistry
BioMy research group studies complex molecular systems by using ultrafast multi-dimensional infrared and non-linear UV/Vis methods. A basic theme is to understand the role of mesoscopic structure on the properties of molecular systems. Many systems have structure on length scales large compare to molecules but small compared to macroscopic dimensions. The mesoscopic structures occur on distance scales of a few nanometers to a few tens of nanometers. The properties of systems, such as water in nanoscopic environments, room temperature ionic liquids, functionalized surfaces, liquid crystals, metal organic frameworks, water and other liquids in nanoporous silica, polyelectrolyte fuel cell membranes, vesicles, and micelles depend on molecular level dynamics and intermolecular interactions. Our ultrafast measurements provide direct observables for understanding the relationships among dynamics, structure, and intermolecular interactions.
Bulk properties are frequently a very poor guide to understanding the molecular level details that determine the nature of a chemical process and its dynamics. Because molecules are small, molecular motions are inherently very fast. Recent advances in methodology developed in our labs make it possible for us to observe important processes as they occur. These measurements act like stop-action photography. To focus on a particular aspect of a time evolving system, we employ sequences of ultrashort pulses of light as the basis for non-linear methods such as ultrafast infrared two dimensional vibrational echoes, optical Kerr effect methods, and ultrafast IR transient absorption experiments.
We are using ultrafast 2D IR vibrational echo spectroscopy and other multi-dimensional IR methods, which we have pioneered, to study dynamics of molecular complexes, water confined on nm lengths scales with a variety of topographies, molecules bound to surfaces, ionic liquids, and materials such as metal organic frameworks and porous silica. We can probe the dynamic structures these systems. The methods are somewhat akin to multidimensional NMR, but they probe molecular structural evolution in real time on the relevant fast time scales, eight to ten orders of magnitude faster than NMR. We are obtaining direct information on how nanoscopic confinement of water changes its properties, a topic of great importance in chemistry, biology, geology, and materials. For the first time, we are observing the motions of molecular bound to surfaces. In biological membranes, we are using the vibrational echo methods to study dynamics and the relationship among dynamics, structure, and function. We are also developing and applying theory to these problems frequently in collaboration with top theoreticians.
We are studying dynamics in complex liquids, in particular room temperature ionic liquids, liquid crystals, supercooled liquids, as well as in influence of small quantities of water on liquid dynamics. Using ultrafast optical heterodyne detected optical Kerr effect methods, we can follow processes from tens of femtoseconds to ten microseconds. Our ability to look over such a wide range of time scales is unprecedented. The change in molecular dynamics when a system undergoes a phase change is of fundamental and practical importance. We are developing detailed theory as the companion to the experiments.
We are studying photo-induced proton transfer in nanoscopic water environments such as polyelectrolyte fuel cell membranes, using ultrafast UV/Vis fluorescence and multidimensional IR measurements to understand the proton transfer and other processes and how they are influenced by nanoscopic confinement. We want to understand the role of the solvent and the systems topology on proton transfer dynamics. -
James Fearon
Theodore and Frances Geballe Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences, Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Professor, by courtesy, of Economics
Current Research and Scholarly Interestspolitical violence
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Benjamin Ezekiel Feldman
Assistant Professor of Physics
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsHow do material properties change as a result of interactions among electrons, and what is the nature of the new phases that result? What novel physical phenomena and functionality (e.g., symmetry breaking or topological excitations) can be realized by combining materials and device elements to produce emergent behavior? How can we leverage nontraditional measurement techniques to gain new insight into quantum materials? These are some of the overarching questions we seek to address in our research.
We are interested in a variety of quantum systems, especially those composed of two-dimensional flakes and heterostructures. This class of materials has been shown to exhibit an incredible variability in their properties, with the further benefit that they are highly tunable through gating and applied fields. -
Jessica Feldman
Associate Professor of Biology
On Leave from 01/01/2024 To 06/30/2024Current Research and Scholarly InterestsWe are interested in understanding design principles within cells that contribute to the diversification of cellular form and function. Using a combination of genetic, biochemical, and live imaging approaches, we are investigating how the microtubule cytoskeleton is spatially organized and the mechanisms underlying organizational changes during development.
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Marcus Feldman
Burnet C. and Mildred Finley Wohlford Professor
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsHuman genetic and cultural evolution, mathematical biology, demography of China
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James Ferguson
Susan S. and William H. Hindle Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences, Emeritus
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsJames's Ferguson's research has focused on southern Africa (especially Lesotho, Zambia, South Africa, and Namibia), and has engaged a broad range of theoretical and ethnographic issues. These include the politics of “development”, rural-urban migration, changing topgraphies of property and wealth, constructions of space and place, urban culture in mining towns, experiences of modernity, the spatialization of states, the place of “Africa” in a real and imagined world, and the theory and politics of ethnography. Running through much of this work is a concern with how discourses organized around concepts such as “development” and “modernity” intersect the lives of ordinary people.
Professor Ferguson's most recent work has explored the surprising creation and/or expansion (both in southern Africa and across the global South) of social welfare programs targeting the poor, anchored in schemes that directly transfer small amounts of cash to large numbers of low-income people. His work aims to situate these programs within a larger “politics of distribution,” and to show how they are linked to emergent forms of distributive politics in contexts where new masses of “working age” people are supported by means other than wage labor. In such settings of scarce and diminishing employment opportunities, distributive practices and distributive politics are acquiring a new centrality, with social protection, in particular, emerging as a key arena within which fundamental questions are addressed concerning how resources should be distributed, who is entitled to receive them, and why. In this context, new political possibilities and dangers are emerging, even as new analytical and critical strategies are required. A book on this topic (Give a Man a Fish: Reflections on the New Politics of Distribution) was recently published by Duke University Press. -
Anne Fernald
Josephine Knotts Knowles Professor of Human Biology, Emerita
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsWorking with English- and Spanish-learning children from diverse socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds, our research examines the importance of early language experience in supporting language development. We are deeply involved in community-based research in San Jose, designing an innovative parent-engagement program for low-resource Latino families with young children. We are also conducting field studies of beliefs about child development and caregiver-child interaction in rural villages in Senegal. A central goal of this translational research is to help parents understand their vital role in facilitating children’s language and cognitive growth.
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Russell D. Fernald
Benjamin Scott Crocker Professor of Human Biology, Emeritus
Current Research and Scholarly InterestsIn the course of evolution,two of the strongest selective forces in nature,light and sex, have left their mark on living organisms. I am interested in how the development and function of the nervous system reflects these events. We use the reproductive system to understand how social behavior influences the main system of reproductive action controlled by a collection of cells in the brain containing gonodotropin releasing hormone(GnRH)
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Brian Ferneyhough
The William H. Bonsall Professor in Music, Emeritus
BioStudies with Ton de Leeuw, Amsterdam Conservatory, and Klaus Huber, Basel Conservatory.
Awards: Mendelssohn Scholarship, 1968; Lady Holland Composition Award, Royal Academy of Music, 1967; Grand Prix du Disque, 1978 and 1982; Gaudeamus Music Week Prizes 1969 and 1970; Composition Stipend, City of Basle, 1969-71; Koussevitsky Prize 1978; Composition Stipend of Southwest German Radio, 1974-5; Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Artes et des Lettres, Paris 1984; Associate Royal Academy of Music, 1990; Royal Philharmonic Award for Chamber Music Composition, 1996; Fellow, Birmingham Conservatoire, 1995; Elected Member of the Akademie der Künste, Berlin, 1996; Fellow, Royal Academy of Music, 1998; Elected Corresponding Member of the Bayrische Akademie der Schönen Künste 2005.
Activities: member of International Jury ISCM, 1980 (Finland) and 1988 (Hong Kong); member jury Gaudeamus Composition Competition 1983; member of International Reading Panel, IRCAM, 1993 & 1999; member of Kranichsteiner Preis Jury, Darmstadt, 1978-96; member of board, Perspectives of New Music 1995-present.
Compositions featured throughout the world and at all the major European festivals of contemporary music. Compositions include: Fourth String Quartet, Bone Alphabet, Terrain, Allgebrah, Incipits, Unsichtbare Farben, String Trio. His opera Shadowtime was premiered as part of the Munich Biennale 2004, and has been taken to Paris, New York, Bochum and London 2004-5. In 2006, it was staged in Stockholm, Sweden. In October 2006, his orchestral piece Plötzlichkeit was premiered at the Donaueschingen Festival, Germany. His Fifth String Quartet was premiered in Witten and later played in the Aldeburgh and Salzburg Festivals.
Publications: Collected Writings, Harwood Academic Publishers, 1998; POETIK, and various articles and interviews. -
Chris Field
Melvin and Joan Lane Professor of Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies, Director, Woods Institute for the Environment and Professor of Earth System Science, of Biology and Senior Fellow at the Precourt Institute for Energy and at Woods
On Leave from 01/01/2024 To 06/30/2024Current Research and Scholarly InterestsResearch
My field is climate-change science, and my research emphasizes human-ecological interactions across many disciplines. Most studies include aspects of ecology, but also aspects of law, sociology, medicine, or engineering. -
Paula Findlen
Ubaldo Pierotti Professor of Italian History and Professor, by courtesy, of French and Italian
BioI have taught the early history of science and medicine for many years on the premise that one of the most important ways to understand how science, medicine and technology have become so central to contemporary society comes from examining the process by which scientific knowledge emerged. I also take enormous pleasure in examining a kind of scientific knowledge that did not have an autonomous existence from other kinds of creative endeavors, but emerged in the context of humanistic approaches to the world (in defiance of C.P. Snow's claim that the modern world is one of "two cultures" that share very little in common). More generally, I am profoundly attracted to individuals in the past who aspired to know everything. It still seems like a worthy goal.
My other principal interest lies in understanding the world of the Renaissance, with a particular focus on Italy. I continue to be fascinated by a society that made politics, economics and culture so important to its self-definition, and that obviously succeeded in all these endeavors for some time, as the legacy of such figures as Machiavelli and Leonardo suggests. Renaissance Italy, in short, is a historical laboratory for understanding the possibilities and the problems of an innovative society. As such, it provides an interesting point of comparison to Gilded Age America, where magnates such as J.P. Morgan often described themselves as the "new Medici," and to other historical moments when politics, art and society combined fruitfully.
Finally, I have a certain interest in the relations between gender, culture and knowledge. Virginia Woolf rightfully observed at the beginning of the twentieth century that one could go to a library and find a great deal about women but very little that celebrated or supported their accomplishments. This is no longer true a century later, in large part thanks to the efforts of many scholars, male and female, who have made the work of historical women available to modern readers and who have begun to look at relations between the sexes in more sophisticated ways. Our own debates and disagreements on such issues make this subject all the more important to understand.
