The Mellon College of Science (MCS) is part of
Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...
in
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
,
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
,
US. The college is named for the
Mellon family
The Mellon family is a wealthy and influential Americans, American family from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The family includes Andrew Mellon, one of the longest-serving U.S. Treasury Secretaries, along with prominent members in the judicial, bankin ...
, founders of the
Mellon Institute of Industrial Research
The Mellon Institute of Industrial Research is a former research institute in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, which is now part of Carnegie Mellon University. It was founded in 1913 by Andrew Mellon and Richard B. Mellon as part of the ...
, a predecessor of Carnegie Mellon University.
The college offers various
bachelor's
A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ye ...
,
master's
A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice. , and
doctoral degree
A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''li ...
s. It also awards the
Dickson Prize in Science. Since 2016, its dean is
Rebecca Doerge.
History
The Mellon College of Science was founded in 1967, when the
Carnegie Institute of Technology
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...
merged with the
Mellon Institute of Industrial Research
The Mellon Institute of Industrial Research is a former research institute in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, which is now part of Carnegie Mellon University. It was founded in 1913 by Andrew Mellon and Richard B. Mellon as part of the ...
to form
Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...
. The scientific faculty and staff of both institutions became part of the new college, then named the Mellon College of Engineering and Science. As the college grew and scientific research advanced, the
Carnegie Mellon College of Engineering
The Carnegie Mellon University College of Engineering (formerly known as the Carnegie Institute of Technology) is the academic unit that manages engineering research and education at Carnegie Mellon University. The College can trace its origins ...
was split off in 1970, and the
Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science
The School of Computer Science (SCS) at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US is a school for computer science established in 1988. It has been consistently ranked among the top computer science programs over the decades. A ...
split off in 1988.
Facilities
The administration of MCS, as well as most of its biological sciences and chemistry faculty and research labs, and the
college's library, are based in the
Mellon Institute
The Mellon Institute of Industrial Research is a former research institute in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, which is now part of Carnegie Mellon University. It was founded in 1913 by Andrew Mellon and Richard B. Mellon as part of the ...
, which was constructed in 1937. The
neoclassical building was added to the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 1983, and was designated as a
National Historic Chemical Landmark
The National Historic Chemical Landmarks program was launched by the American Chemical Society in 1992 to recognize significant achievements in the history of chemistry and related professions. The program celebrates the The central science, cent ...
in 2013 by the
American Chemical Society
The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all d ...
.
The college's physics and mathematical sciences departments are based in Carnegie Mellon's main campus in Wean Hall, a
Brutalist
Brutalist architecture is an architectural style that emerged during the 1950s in the United Kingdom, among the reconstruction projects of the post-war era. Brutalist buildings are characterised by Minimalism (art), minimalist constructions th ...
building constructed in 1971.
Organization
The Mellon College of Science houses four
academic departments
An academic department is a division of a university or school faculty devoted to a particular academic discipline. This article covers United States usage at the university level. In the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth countries, universit ...
:
Chemistry
Chemistry is the science, scientific study of the properties and behavior of matter. It is a natural science that covers the Chemical element, elements that make up matter to the chemical compound, compounds made of atoms, molecules and ions ...
,
Biological Sciences
Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary ...
,
Physics
Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...
, and
Mathematical Sciences
The mathematical sciences are a group of areas of study that includes, in addition to mathematics, those academic disciplines that are primarily mathematical in nature but may not be universally considered subfields of mathematics proper.
Statisti ...
, each of which grants a variety of undergraduate and graduate degrees.
In addition, the college also oversees or is affiliated with a number of interdisciplinary research centers, including the
Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center
The Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center (PSC) is a high performance computing and networking center founded in 1986 and one of the original five NSF Supercomputing Centers. .
Notable people
*
Ada Yonath
Ada E. Yonath ( he, עדה יונת, ; born 22 June 1939) is an Israeli crystallographer best known for her pioneering work on the structure of ribosomes. She is the current director of the Helen and Milton A. Kimmelman Center for Biomolecular S ...
(
Post-doctoral fellow
A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to p ...
, 1969;
Honorary Doctorate in Science and Technology, 2018), 2009
Nobel Prize in Chemistry
)
, image = Nobel Prize.png
, alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then "M ...
*
Krzysztof Matyjaszewski
Krzysztof "Kris" Matyjaszewski (; born April 8, 1950) is a Polish-American chemist. He is the J.C. Warner Professor of the Natural Sciences at the Carnegie Mellon University Matyjaszewski is best known for the discovery of atom transfer radical ...
(
Professor
Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who pr ...
), discoverer of
atom transfer radical polymerization Atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) is an example of a reversible-deactivation radical polymerization. Like its counterpart, ATRA, or atom transfer radical addition, ATRP is a means of forming a carbon-carbon bond with a transition metal cat ...
*
Clarence Zener
Clarence Melvin Zener (December 1, 1905 – July 2, 1993) was the American physicist who first (1934) described the property concerning the breakdown of electrical insulators. These findings were later exploited by Bell Labs in the development of ...
(Professor, 1968–1993), theoretical physicist, discoverer of
Zener effect
In electronics, the Zener effect (employed most notably in the appropriately named Zener diode) is a type of electrical breakdown, discovered by Clarence Melvin Zener. It occurs in a reverse biased p-n diode when the electric field enables tunn ...
*
John Pople
Sir John Anthony Pople (31 October 1925 – 15 March 2004) was a British theoretical chemist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Walter Kohn in 1998 for his development of computational methods in quantum chemistry.
Early ...
(Professor, 1964–1993) 1998 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
*
Walter Kohn
Walter Kohn (; March 9, 1923 – April 19, 2016) was an Austrian-American theoretical physicist and theoretical chemist.
He was awarded, with John Pople, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1998. The award recognized their contributions to the unde ...
(Professor, Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1950–1960) 1998 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
*
Shafi Goldwasser
en, Shafrira Goldwasser
, name = Shafi Goldwasser
, image = Shafi Goldwasser.JPG
, caption = Shafi Goldwasser in 2010
, birth_place = New York City, New York, U.S.
, birth_date =
, death_date ...
(
BS, 1979; Honorary Doctorate in Science and Technology, 2018) 2012
Turing Award
The ACM A. M. Turing Award is an annual prize given by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) for contributions of lasting and major technical importance to computer science. It is generally recognized as the highest distinction in compu ...
*
Clifford Shull
Clifford Glenwood Shull (September 23, 1915 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania – March 31, 2001) was a Nobel Prize-winning American physicist.
Biography
Shull attended Schenley High School in Pittsburgh, received his BS from Carnegie Institute of Tec ...
(BS, Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1937) 1994
Nobel Prize in Physics
)
, image = Nobel Prize.png
, alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...
*
Paul Flory
Paul John Flory (June 19, 1910 – September 9, 1985) was an American chemist and Nobel laureate who was known for his work in the field of polymers, or macromolecules. He was a leading pioneer in understanding the behavior of polymers in solu ...
(Executive Director of Research, Mellon Institute of Industrial Research, 1957–1961) 1974 Nobel Prize in Chemistry
*
Otto Stern
:''Otto Stern was also the pen name of German women's rights activist Louise Otto-Peters (1819–1895)''.
Otto Stern (; 17 February 1888 – 17 August 1969) was a German-American physicist and Nobel laureate in physics. He was the second most n ...
(Professor, Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1933–1945) 1943 Nobel Prize in Physics
*
Clinton Davisson
Clinton Joseph Davisson (October 22, 1881 – February 1, 1958) was an American physicist who won the 1937 Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of electron diffraction in the famous Davisson–Germer experiment. Davisson shared the Nobel Priz ...
(
Assistant Professor
Assistant Professor is an academic rank just below the rank of an associate professor used in universities or colleges, mainly in the United States and Canada.
Overview
This position is generally taken after earning a doctoral degree and general ...
, Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1911–1917) 1937 Nobel Prize in Physics
*
John Nash (BS,
MS, Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1948) 1994
Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences
The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, officially the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel ( sv, Sveriges riksbanks pris i ekonomisk vetenskap till Alfred Nobels minne), is an economics award administered ...
, inspiration for
A Beautiful Mind
*
John L. Hall
John Lewis "Jan" Hall (born August 21, 1934) is an American physicist, and Nobel laureate in physics. He shared the 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics with Theodor W. Hänsch and Roy Glauber for his work in precision spectroscopy.
Biography
Born ...
(BS, MS,
PhD, Carnegie Institute of Technology, 1956, 1958, 1961) 2005 Nobel Prize in Physics
*
Paul Lauterbur
Paul Christian Lauterbur (May 6, 1929 – March 27, 2007) was an American chemist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2003 with Peter Mansfield for his work which made the development of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) poss ...
(
Research associate
Research associates are researchers (scholars and professionals) that usually have an advanced degree beyond a Master's degree.
In some universities/research institutes, such as Harvard/Harvard Medical School/Harvard School of Public Health, the ...
, Mellon Institute of Industrial Research, 1951–1953, 1955–1963) 2003
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded yearly by the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute for outstanding discoveries in physiology or medicine. The Nobel Prize is not a single prize, but five separate prizes that, accord ...
References
*
*
External links
*
{{authority control
Schools and departments of Carnegie Mellon
Liberal arts colleges at universities in the United States
Liberal arts colleges in Pennsylvania
1967 establishments in Pennsylvania