About 50 Princeton students enrolled in three courses next year will be among the first to test Amazon.com’s new Kindle DX ELECTRONIC READER in a classroom setting. Serge Goldstein, director of academic services for the Office of Information Technology, said the $489 e-readers will be provided to the students free of charge as part of a sustainability program to reduce paper use. He said $30,000 in funding will come from the High Meadows Sustainability Fund, founded by Carl Ferenbach ’64 and his wife, Judy. Amazon, which is headed by founder and CEO Jeff Bezos ’86, will match the grant with donated materials and services.

The project will focus on reserve reading materials taken from books, journals, and papers, Goldstein said. They will be scanned electronically in a form allowing them to be annotated through Kindle’s keyboard and controller. The downloading of textbooks still was being explored in late May.

The University will receive $4 million per year in federal economic-stimulus funds over the next five years to support a new ENERGY RESEARCH CENTER for combustion science. The facility will focus on the design of fuels, such as those derived from plants and other renewable sources, to power transportation vehicles. The director of the center, one of 46 Energy Frontier Research Centers announced April 27, will be Chung Law, mechanical and aerospace engineering professor. Researchers from Stanford, Cornell, and several other institutions will collaborate in the projects.  

While much of the country was focusing on the H1N1 swine flu, Princeton endured an outbreak of a different respiratory ailment: pertussis, the bacterial infection commonly known as WHOOPING COUGH. In April, University Health Services (UHS) confirmed 12 cases of the illness, which begins like a cold and develops into a severe cough. New cases waned by early May, according to UHS physician Dr. Peter Johnsen. The University recommends that incoming students receive the “TDaP” booster vaccine to guard against tetanus, diphtheria, and pertussis.  

The yield of students who accepted an OFFER OF ADMISSION increased to 60 percent, up from 58.6 percent a year ago, Dean of Admission Janet Rapelye said. The class is evenly split between men and women, and 13 percent are legacies. The University admitted 31 students from the waitlist in early May after receiving 1,284 acceptances. Princeton is seeking 1,300 students for the Class of 2013, plus 20 students who will be the initial bridge-year participants.