A Lady at the Helm: MIT's New President. (October 14, 2005)

    She's 54 the immediate former provost of Yale University, a gifted neuroscientist who pioneered the use of monoclonal antibody technology in brain research focusing on gaining an understanding of glioma, a deadly form of brain cancer. On  December 6, 2004 Susan Hockfield became the first life scientist and first woman president of MIT. She has succeeded the mechanical engineer Charles Vest who held the MIT presidency for 14 years.

As MIT moved into the twenty-first century it set on a path to integrate strongly independent players to challenge all comers in the area of the biomedical sciences.  For example as if in recognition of the new president's research interests Science reports that a new building housing cross-disciplinary neuroscience studies will open shortly while computational and systems biology has become an integrated initiative made up of some 80 biologists, computer scientists, and engineers derived from 10 separate academic units.

Professor Hockfield believes that molecular genetics is providing a "convergence of life sciences with engineering," and she intends to have MIT take full advantage of it.

MIT's fledgling president also told Science that one of the questions "we must ask as a society is not 'Can women excel in math, science, and engineering?'--Marie Curie exploded that myth a century ago--but 'How can we encourage more women with exceptional abilities to pursue careers in these fields?' Colleges and universities must develop a culture, as well as specific policies, that enable women with children to strike a sustainable balance between workplace and home."

And she says that one of her primary concerns is that US government support for science is not keeping up with the expanding opportunities.