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Hunter Alumna Mildred Dresselhaus Receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom

Hunter Alumna Mildred Dresselhaus Receives the Presidential Medal of Freedom

President Obama awards the Presidential Medal of Freedom to alumna Mildred Dresselhaus

Eminent scientist and Hunter alumna Mildred Dresselhaus (HCHS ’47, HC ’51) received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, at a White House ceremony on November 24.

"Growing up in New York during the Great Depression, this daughter of Polish immigrants had three clear paths open to her: teaching, nursing, and secretarial school," said President Obama. "Somehow she had something else in mind. She became an electrical engineer, and a physicist, and rose in MIT's ranks. She performed groundbreaking experiments on carbon and became one of the world's most celebrated scientists. Her influence is all around us, in the cars we drive, the energy we generate, the electronic devices that power our lives.

"When she arrived at MIT in 1960 only 4% of students were women. Today almost half are. A new generation walking the path that Millie blazed," said Obama.

Dresselhaus is a professor emerita of physics and electrical engineering at MIT. In its announcement of the 2014 medalists, the White House called her “one of the prominent physicists, materials scientists and electrical engineers of her generation,” and recognized her for “deepening our understanding of condensed matter systems and the atomic properties of carbon, which has contributed to major advances in electronics and materials research.”

A forceful advocate for women in science and engineering, Dresselhaus cites another Hunter alumna, physiologist and Nobel laureate Roslyn Yalow ’41, as a significant influence and early inspiration. In fact, Dresselhaus has said, taking Yalow’s class at Hunter changed the course of her life.

Upon graduating summa cum laude, Dresselhaus won a Fulbright Fellowship to work in a major laboratory at Cambridge University. She went on to earn a master’s at Radcliffe and a doctorate at the University of Chicago.

Dresselhaus has received many top prizes, including the National Medal of Science and the Enrico Fermi Award. She has chaired the governing board of the American Institute of Physics, and has served as president of both the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

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