Yale Science & Engineering Association recognizes Engineering Dean

The Yale Science & Engineering Association, Inc. (YSEA) honored Yale School of Engineering & Applied Science Dean T. Kyle Vanderlick, life-sciences entrepreneur David I. Scheer and Yale Professor Daniel A. Spielman at its annual awards dinner on Thursday, April 25, 2013. Accomplished undergraduate science and engineering students and retiring faculty were also recognized at the event.

Dean Vanderlick received the YSEA Award for Meritorious Service to Yale University. The Thomas E. Golden, Jr. Professor of Engineering, Vanderlick spearheaded the establishment of the current Yale School of Engineering & Applied Science with a goal of creating a culture of engineering and collaboration on campus to facilitate cutting-edge research and educational excellence. Her own research in the department of Chemical & Environmental Engineering focuses on the creation of new membrane-based structures and superstructures using biological and chemical building blocks.

David I. Scheer, ’84 M.S., received YSEA’s award for Distinguished Service to Industry, Commerce & Education, which honors a member of the business community who has given outstanding service to science or engineering at Yale. Scheer, a life-sciences entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist, is chairman of the board of directors of Aegerion Pharmaceuticals, Achillion Pharmaceutics and Tengion, Inc. He is also the vice chairman of the Long Wharf Theatre Board of Trustees.

The YSEA Award for Advancement of Basic and Applied Science went to Daniel A. Spielman ’92 B.A., the Henry Ford II Professor of Computer Science and Mathematics at Yale and a Fellow of the MacArthur Foundation. Spielman’s research focuses on design and analysis of algorithms and heuristics, machine learning, smoothed analysis and combinatorial scientific computing. Spielman was recently named co-director of the new Yale Institute of Network Science, an initiative that brings together researchers in engineering, computer science, the social sciences, biology, math, physics and medicine to study individual and collective human behavior.

The Yale Science & Engineering Association, founded in 1914, connects alumni with students, the university and each other to strengthen Yale’s science and engineering community.