Kravis Department of Integrated Sciences
Kravis Department of Integrated Sciences
The Kravis Department of Integrated Sciences offers a new approach to undergraduate science education that uniquely prepares our graduates to engage with some of the greatest challenges and opportunities facing society. Among these are contributing to the health of our species, improving quality of life, driving economic growth, and protecting our planet for future generations.
Our courses employ a “just in time” approach where topics are motivated by societally relevant issues. Concepts and skills are taught to allow students to engage with those issues and make their own discoveries and conclusions.
Our curricula provide students with the ability to confidently navigate within and between traditional scientific disciplines, and the humanities and social sciences, to prepare them to fearlessly engage with problems that require diverse skills and perspectives.
Graduates will be exceptionally well-prepared for a variety of postgraduate pathways including medical school, advanced research, scientific innovation, entrepreneurship, science policy, engineering, and other roles in science and technology.
Ran Libeskind-Hadas
Kravis Professor of Integrated Sciences:
Computational Biology and Founding Chair
RDSC 347
rhadas@cmc.edu
Resources
Major Offerings
Integrated Sciences
The Integrated Sciences major is currently structured around three global societal and scientific challenges: Health, Brain, and Planet.
3+2 Program
CMC’s 3+2 Dual Degree Program allows students to spend 3 years at CMC and 2 years at a partnering engineering program, resulting in a BA from CMC and a BS in engineering from the partner institution. An Integrated Sciences pathway is available.
Department News
Dr. Eric Schuppe, Assistant Professor of Integrated Sciences, is a co-author on a paper published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B entitled "Repeated evolutionary turnover of vertebrate skeletal muscle myosins." This study maps the evolution of over 1200 myosin proteins across chordates and shows that vertebrate groups independently evolved distinct sets of skeletal muscle myosins through repeated gene duplication and loss.
Dr. Rui Cheng, Assistant Professor of Integrated Sciences, is a co-author on a new paper published in Remote Sensing of Environment entitled "Characterizing effects of tree mortality from wildfire and bark beetles using satellite observations of solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence." The study used satellite measurements of solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF) to track forests across the western US hit by wildfire and bark beetle outbreaks.
Dr. Colin Rathbun, Assistant Professor of Integrated Sciences, and his co-authors have recently published a paper in ACS Omega entitled "Semisynthetic, Multicolor Probes for Bioluminescence Imaging." Bioluminescence imaging is a sensitive and noninvasive technique for monitoring molecular and cellular processes in living systems.
Dr. Emily K. Ho, Assistant Professor of Integrated Sciences, and her colleagues published a paper that is showcased on the cover of the journal Cell Reports. The paper, entitled "A live-cell biosensor of in vivo receptor tyrosine kinase activity reveals feedback regulation of a developmental gradient", introduces a novel biosensor for detecting receptor activity.
Dr. Diana Williams, Kravis Professor of Integrated Sciences, and her colleagues have published a paper in Psychological Medicine identifying biological mechanisms underlying disordered eating.
Dr. Jason Keller, Kravis Professor of Integrated Sciences, and his former students and colleagues have recently published several recent papers including a paper in the journal Global Change Biology and a paper in the journal Ecosystems.
Dr. Shibu Yooseph, Kravis Professor of Integrated Sciences and Dr. Andy Thompson, a former postdoctoral fellow at KDIS, have co-authored a paper with colleagues in Environmental Microbiology Reports on evidence for trace gas metabolism and widespread antibiotic synthesis in an Antarctic soil ecosystem.
Dr. Paul Nerenberg, Kravis Associate Professor of Integrated Sciences was a awarded a grant from NASA to establish a partnership between CMC, JPL, and Blue Marble Space Institute of Science. This work will involve computational and experimental studies to better understand the surface composition of Saturn's moon Titan and how erosion shaped its surface, as observed by the Cassini mission.
