Harpending Named To National Academy Of Sciences

5-3-96
University Park, Pa. -- Henry Harpending, professor of anthropology at Penn State, has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences.

He joins 59 other new members and 15 foreign associates from eight countries who were recognized for their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. Election to the Academy is considered one of the highest honors that can be accorded a U.S. scientist or engineer. The current active membership of the National Academy of Sciences is 1,760.

Harpending is a creative thinker who has integrated theories and methods from various disciplines into a coherent and well received perspective. He has done extensive field work among the !Kung, Herero and other peoples of southern Africa on population history and relationships, population dynamics and ecology, and he has written "Structure of an African Pastoralist Community: Demography, Ecology, and History of Ngamiland Herero."

In collaboration with colleagues at Penn State, he has developed a new way of analyzing mitochondrial DNA differences among human populations that reveals ancient episodes of population growth before the last ice age.

Harpending began his career as an assistant professor of anthropology at Yale University in 1971. He became assistant professor of anthropology at the University of New Mexico in 1972, associate professor of anthropology in 1976 and professor of anthropology in 1979. He joined the Penn State faculty in 1985 as professor of anthropology. He received Penn State's Faculty Scholar Medal in 1995.

He received a B.A. in anthropology from Hamilton College in 1964 and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in anthropology in 1972.

The NAS is a private organization of scientists and engineers dedicated to the furtherance of science and its use for the general welfare. The Academy was established in 1863 by a congressional act of incorporation, signed by Abraham Lincoln, that calls upon the Academy to act as an official adviser to the federal government, upon request, in any matter of science or technology.

Other members of the National Academy of Science at Penn State are Paul T. Baker, Evan Pugh Professor Emeritus of Anthropology; Stephen J. Benkovic, University Professor, Evan Pugh Professor of Chemistry and holder of the Eberly Family Chair in Chemistry; Karl H. Beyer, Jr., visiting professor of pharmacology, Milton S. Hershey Medical Center; Nina V. Fedoroff, professor of biology, holder of the Verne M. Willaman Chair in Life Sciences and Director of the Biotechnology Institute; Calyampudi R. Rao, holder of the Eberly Family Chair in Statistics and director of the Center for Multivariate Analysis; William T. Sanders, Evan Pugh Professor Emeritus of Anthropology; Robert K. Selander, Eberly Family Chair in Biology; David A. Shirley, professor of chemistry and physics and senior vice president for research and graduate education; and Philip S. Skell, Evan Pugh Professor Emeritus of Chemistry.

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Vicki Fong (814) 865-9481 (office) (814) 238-1221 (home) vyf1@psu.edu