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Four students will continue a long-term research project titled “Silica Sol-Gels Containing Rare Earth Ion Chelates” at Hamilton College this summer as science researchers. Advised by Associate Professor of Chemistry Karen Brewer, Jodi Raymond ’08 (Camillus, N.Y.), Kim Roe ’08 (Maryville, Tenn.), Elizabeth Faroh ’08 (Bradenton, Fla.), and LeAnne Pasquini ’07 (Kingwood, Texas) will continue an investigation of the optical properties, the synthesis and spectroscopy of rare earth based solid materials. (Another student, Louisa Brown ’09, an incoming freshman participating in the Hamilton National Science Foundation's STEP (Science Talent Expansion Program) and the Henry and Camille Dreyfus Foundation Program, will join their research group later this summer.)

Professor of Classics Barbara Gold is co-editor, with John Donahue, of Roman Dining, a special issue of American Journal of Philology. According to the publisher's Web site, the issue "illuminates the nature and function of food and dining in the Roman world, offering historical, sociological, literary, cultural and material perspectives." The articles in the book "explore topics from diverse fields to analyze Roman culture and material practice, including the dietary practices and nutritional concerns of the Romans, dining and its links to ideology durign the early imperial period, public banqueting and its social function in Roman society, and the emphasis placed on the waiting servant in both domestic and funerary settings." Gold is editor of the American Journal of Philology.

Professor of English Margaret Thickstun gave a paper at the Eighth International Milton Symposium in Grenoble, France, June 7-11. Her talk was titled "Satan as Father in Paradise Lost." Thickstun teaches a course on Milton's poetry and prose at Hamilton.

Cheng Li, the William R. Kenan Professor of Government, was interviewed by Voice of America radio about the control of media and Internet to limit dissent in China. Li said, "Hu and Wen want to control the media. They want to use that media to express their own agenda. But at the same time, they also face an uphill battle because the Chinese media will become increasingly commercialized and also Chinese journalists [begin] to demand more freedom."

Hamilton Trustee John Rice '78 has been appointed a vice chairman at General Electric Company, under a new reorganization of its 11 businesses into six industry-focused businesses. Rice, currently head of GE's Atlanta-based GE Energy subsidiary, will lead GE Industrial. That unit will include Plastics, Silicones/Quartz, Consumer & Industrial, Security & Sensors, Automation, and Equipment Services. In making the announcement GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt said "John is one of our best operating leaders. He will accelerate our efforts to improve growth rates, margins and cash in these global businesses." Rice will relocate from Atlanta to GE headquarters in Fairfield, Conn.

Mary Beth Day ’07 (Seneca Falls, NY) has been interested in geology for as long as she can remember. “The intersection of geology and archaeology has long fascinated me,” the geoarcheology major explains. As an aspiring paleoclimatology researcher, Day will continue her long-running research of the Great Basin region of Nevada this summer. Under the advisement of Associate Professor of Geology Dave Bailey, she will be working on a research project titled “Chemical Characterization of Lithic Artifact Source Material” as an Emerson grant reicpient.

Professor of Economics Christophre Georges presented a paper titled "Staggered Updating in an Artificial Financial Market" at the 10th Annual Workshop on Economic Heterogeneous Interacting Agents (WEHIA 2005) June 13-15, at the University of Essex in the United Kingdom.

As a native of Central New York, John Adams ’06 (Rochester, N.Y.) has witnessed first-hand the decline in the industrial sector in the upstate area. He saw how difficult it was becoming for towns and cities to make ends meet, as the cost of health care and other services continue to rise. “Municipalities across the state and country are undertaking initiatives to raise the efficiency of service delivery and minimize costs,” Adams explains. Adams’ interest in government and concern for his local area inspired him to research the costs of local government services; as a Levitt Fellow, he will work on a project titled “Consolidating Local Government Services: A Viable Cost-Cutting Measure for Onondaga County?”

Professor of History Maurice Isserman has been selected by the Council of Independent Colleges and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History to participate in a faculty seminar on "Interpreting the History of Recent and Controversial Events." The seminar will be held June 21 to June 23 at Harvard University. Isserman is one of two dozen historians from across the country chosen in a competitive selection to join the seminar, which will discuss the problem of teaching and writing about such recent historical events as the Cuban missile crisis, the civil rights movement and the 9/11 attacks.

Hamilton students Meghan Dunn ’06, Pragyan Pradhan ’08, James McConnell '07 and Ngoda Manongi ’08 are working together on a chemistry research project on both terrestrial and exotic atmospheric chemistry. They hope to determine the structure, the levels of heat given off during a given reaction, and kinetics of certain molecules in different atmospheres, including the atmosphere of Mars and Venus. The students will work with Winslow Professor of Chemistry George Shields and Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Karl Kirschner on the project titled “Atmospheric Chemistry: Predicting structure, energy, reactivity, frequency and abundance of atmospheric species clustered with water.”