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Peter Hinks, assistant professor of history, attended a three-day conference on slavery at Yale University. One of the goals of the conference was to debunk the myth that slavery did not occur in New England. According to Hinks, “at the time of the American Revolution about 5,000 Africans were enslaved in Connecticut.” Slavery was not abolished in Connecticut until 1848. He said, “the revolution gave the Africans the impetus to seek their freedom.”

Current Genetics recently published an article by Visiting Instructor of Biology Astrid H. Helfant titled, "Composition of the Spindle Pole Body of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the Proteins Involved in its Duplication." In her review paper, Helfant focuses on the centrosome in the budding yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, referred to as the spindle pole body (SPB). The centrosome is an organelle found in fungi (including yeast) and in most animal cells and is known to play a key role in maintaining the genomic stability of the cell. Upon its duplication, the centrosome forms a bipolar spindle responsible for separating the genomic DNA of a dividing cell.

Professor of Computer Science Stuart Hirshfield is working with Hamilton students at the Rome Research site of the Air Force Research Lab. Jonathan Woods '04, Doug Boulware '02, Bryan Pettigrew '03, and Brian Burkhart '04 are each working in a different research group on projects related to new programming technologies, database systems, artificial intelligence, and hardware measurement systems.

Assistant Professor of Theater and Dance Mark Cryer is playing "the Duke" in Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors. Cryer can be seen at the Saratoga Springs Shakespeare Festival in Congress Park, Wednesday, July 31 through Saturday, Aug. 3 at 6 p.m., and Sunday, Aug. 4, at 5 p.m. Performances are free and open to the public.

Barbara Tewksbury, the Stephen Harper Kirner Professor of Geology, headed a workshop for professors of undergraduate geoscience from July 28 to August 3 on the Hamilton campus. The workshop is part of the program “On the Cutting Edge: Workshops for Geoscience Faculty,” supported by the National Association of Geoscience Teachers and DLESE, with funding provided by a $4.2 million grant from the National Science Foundation. Hamilton has been awarded more than $70,000 from the grant for 2002, and will receive additional funding each year for the next five years.

Professor of Art Rand Carter spoke at a Friends of Schinkel international symposium in Siracusa, Sicily, in June. Co-sponsored by the faculty of architecture of the University of Catania, the conference was titled "From the Italian Vernacular Villa to Schinkel to the Modern House." Carter's presentation was titled "Schinkel as Traveller."

Daniel Heyman ’03 is working with Assistant Professor of Physics Seth Major on Einstein’s theory of Special Relativity. New discoveries have had physicists believing that an aspect of Einstein’s famous theory must be flawed, and Heyman has begun a quest to discover if adding a third postulate to the theory might be the solution. Major believes that including a third condition to the existing two will correct the inconsistencies physicists have been finding in Einstein’s theory and are thus unable to sort out. Heyman, a physics and math major at Hamilton, approached Major about the possibility of working on theoretical physics research and has enjoyed the experience immensely. Having learned a lot of physics and encountered math he had never previously experienced, Heyman hopes to continue his research for his senior thesis.

Does a wandering mind impede your ability to complete a task on the Internet? Do negative, intrusive thoughts decrease your efficiency while working on the web? These are questions that a group of Hamilton College professors and students are trying to answer this summer. Rebekah Grome ’05 and Lindsey Schantz ’03 are collecting and analyzing data with Hamilton College Associate Professors of Psychology Penny Yee and Greg Pierce in their study of cognitive interference. Cognitive interference is the types of thoughts people have when completing a task.

Julianna Allport ’05 and Christopher Butts ’04 are working with Assistant Professor of Chemistry Ram Subramaniam on a project that is seeking new means of treating diabetes. The students are exploring how sugars in the blood modify proteins and looking for possible drugs that could medicate diabetes in new, more effective ways.

Thirteen recent Hamilton graduates and undergraduates are packing their bags to begin travel around the world as the recipients of prestigious and competitive national fellowships. Among the fellowships awarded were the J. William Fulbright Scholarship, Goldwater Scholarship, NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship and Watson Fellowship.