Oct. 9, 2018: Chemistry Nobel for Arnold ’79; She Roars Highlights; Gopinath *01 To Be IMF Chief Economist

Photo: Damian Dovarganes/AP Images

Last Wednesday, Caltech colleagues raised a toast to Frances Arnold ’79, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry for pioneering the “directed evolution” of new enzymes. She is the first Princeton alumna to win a Nobel. Read more coverage of Arnold’s honor in the Los Angeles Times and at PAW Online.

Highlights from She Roars 

Conference festivities included a conversation with Supreme Court Justices Sonia Sotomayor ’76 and Elena Kagan ’81. Read more

Harvard professor Gita Gopinath *01 has been chosen as the next chief economist of the International Monetary Fund and will be the first woman to hold the position. — The Wall Street Journal
 
Michael Lewis’ ’82 latest book, The Fifth Risk, chronicles the Trump Administration and its influence on parts of the federal government that are often overlooked in media coverage. — NPR
 
Ellen K. Pao ’91 argues in a recent opinion column that California’s law requiring public corporate boards to include women is “a necessary wake-up call for all companies.” — The Washington Post
 
As a teenager, Robert Chavez ’77 admired fashionable clothes at the local mall but couldn’t afford them. Today, he helps to define fashion as CEO of Hermes. — San Antonio Express-News

Economist Kevin Hallock *95 has been named the dean of Cornell’s S.C. Johnson College of Business. — Cornell Chronicle 

“When Trump leveled his first digital barbs at Rosie O’Donnell, he was pioneering the same tools of influence that he would use to win the presidency — and to reshape geopolitics soon thereafter.”

— P.W. Singer ’97 and Emerson Brooking, co-authors of LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media, in an essay on Donald Trump’s first tweet in 2009 — and the online persona he’s cultivated since then. Read more at Time.com.

Gregory Garcia *00 is the U.S. Army’s new deputy chief information officer, a position that oversees the Army’s communications and information technology. — C4ISRNET
 
Katherine Milkman ’04, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, proposes a theory for why people are saving less than they used to for retirement. — Inc.
 
Vanderbilt law professor Robert Mikos ’95 explains why the publicly funded drug-injection sites proposed in California may be legally unfeasible. — Associated Press
 
In a recent “On Parenting” column, Allison Slater Tate ’96 writes about the challenges of protecting young women from sexual assault. — The Washington Post 

Brian McAlindin ’80 talks about raising sons and the importance of due process in the #MeToo era. — The Story with Martha MacCallum
 
Economist and Nobel laureate James Heckman *71 published a study arguing that the pressure for economists to publish in prestigious journals can stifle innovative research. — The Economist 
 
Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi ’00 co-directs Free Solo, a feature-length film following professional climber Alex Honnold’s rope-free ascent of Yosemite’s El Capitan. — Fast Company
 
Vanessa Marshall ’91 lends her voice to the character Hera Syndulla on Star Wars: Rebels, an animated television series. — Hidden Remote