Johns Hopkins University

North County High School freshman Jack Andraka stood on the auditorium stage, speaking about the invention that earned him the $75,000 grand prize at the recent Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. Behind him stood Dr. Anirban Maitra, a professor in the Johns Hopkins University's department of pathology who gave Jack use of his lab to craft his invention, a cheap and effective "dipstick-sensor" method of testing blood or urine to identify early-stage pancreatic cancer and other diseases.

What a delight it was to read that Secret Service agents will be receiving ethics training from the Johns Hopkins University ("Secret Service to receive ethics training at Hopkins," April 30). I knew Hopkins was strong in the fields of science and medicine, but I had no idea their expertise extended to avoiding excessive drinking and consorting with prostitutes while on duty overseas. I'm sure the Hop's pious Quaker founder would be proud to know that the men charged with protecting the president of the United States will now be schooled in the fine art of avoiding acts that even a four year old knows are wrong.

Haven't paid your city property taxes? Then you're on the city's list of owners whose properties could end up in tax sale this May, along with nearly 27,000 others who (as of last week) were behind on taxes, water bills or other city tabs. That's more than 10 percent of city properties, located in neighborhoods as varied as Poppleton and the Inner Harbor . If previous years are any judge, many owners will pay up quickly and avoid tax sale altogether. Here's an interactive map that shows where all the properties are. You can click on the dots for more details, including the address, who owns and how much the city says they owe. (Keep in mind that some may have paid already -- and at least one is an error .)

The Rev. Dorris D. Alcott, a retired Unitarian Universalist minister who had been director of religious education at Towson Unitarian Universalist Church, died April 3 of heart failure at Oak Crest Village retirement community. The former longtime Timonium resident was 91. "Dorris was ordained at a time when there were not many women Unitarian Universalist ministers," said the Rev. Clare Petersberger, pastor of Towson Unitarian Universalist Church. "She was a trailblazer.

Don't look for traditional bus stop signs marking one of Baltimore's busiest transit conveyances, a bumpy jitney called the Shuttle by those who live and learn by its frequent goings and comings.These traditional 40- to 44-passenger school buses -- which melt into a yellow blur in city traffic -- are a conduit provided by the Johns Hopkins University to its various outposts in North and East Baltimore and Mount Vernon. There is no parallel MTA service that duplicates the Hopkins Shuttle.Starting at 6: 30 a.m. weekdays, the first of a day's 96 bus runs begins on an asphalt apron directly behind the Baltimore Museum of Art.By the time the bus reaches its first off-campus stop, St. Paul and 27th streets in Charles Village, it is half-filled.

Clifford L. Culp, a retired fund-raiser for the Johns Hopkins University and a founding member of the Maryland chapter of the National Society of Fundraising Executives, died of lung cancer Friday at his home in Stoneleigh. He was 96. Mr. Culp, a native of Huntsville, Pa., graduated from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania before moving to Baltimore. He worked in business and accounting before joining the Johns Hopkins University in 1952 as its first development professional.

Joseph Cooper, a distinguished professor of social sciences at Rice University, is to be the new provost and vice president of academic affairs at Johns Hopkins University.Cooper was appointed Monday by the executive committee of the Johns Hopkins Board of Trustees. His selection was recommended by Hopkins President William Richardson."Dr. Cooper is a distinguished scholar . . . and a seasoned administrator who brings to us a wealth of experience," Richardson said.Cooper, who assumes his new post Sept.

Benjamin S. Walker Sr., a retired Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory writer and a baseball fan, died Saturday at Suburban Hospital in Bethesda of a subdural hematoma as a result of a fall. The Rockville resident was 77. Mr. Walker was born in Omaha, Neb., and raised in Washington. After earning a bachelor's degree from Auburn University in 1951, he enlisted in the Navy and served for three years aboard the USS John R. Craig, a destroyer, during the Korean War. From 1954 to 1960, he was a technical writer for RCA Services Co., Vitro Laboratories and Washington Engineering Services Co. One of his assignments was writing the technical manual for the USS Boston, the Navy's first guided missile ship.

Springtime at Johns Hopkins University transforms the campus into an outdoor gallery of youth, a profusion of students moving from one intense period of their lives to the next.But one senior, Sue Hubbard, has something more permanent, more painfully intense, on her mind: erecting a campus memorial to honor the boyfriend who will not be graduating with her next month, a young man murdered in the full bloom of his potential.Rex Chao, 19, was a gifted student, a widely admired violinist, a political junkie whose glamorous internship with New York congresswoman Susan Molinari made him stand out among his classmates.

Owen Martin Phillips, a retired Johns Hopkins University oceanographer and former chair of its Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, died of gastric cancer Oct. 13 at his Chestertown home. He was 79 and lived for many years in Roland Park. Dr. Phillips developed a methodology for predicting and describing the shape of ocean waves, including giant waves, which are 100-foot-high upheavals of the sea surface. Hopkins colleagues said his research became crucial in the design of ships and oil drilling platforms, which need to withstand these outsized swells.

Pictures of actor James Franco here in Baltimore during his recent visit to Johns Hopkins University are proving quite popular. Baltimore, it seems, likes looking at some James Franco. Well, fans, here's even more. Video we shot while he was here in town on Friday for the quickest of visits to promote his movie, "The Broken Tower. " (The cut to the audience reminds me of that scene in "Indiana Jones" where they show Prof. Jones' class and it's all rapt women...) And none of you wrote to tell me if you were able to meet him, exchange a few words...anything!

Johns Hopkins University's motion to dismiss a family's lawsuit over development plans for a Montgomery County farm was denied Friday evening, according to the plaintiffs. The suit claims that Hopkins' plan to construct high-rise buildings on the land violates an agreement the land's previous owner entered into with the university more than twenty years ago, according to a statement from plaintiffs, led by John Timothy Newell. Elizabeth Beall Banks and her siblings transferred the 138-acre Belward Farm to Hopkins with the expectation that development of the land, near Gaithersburg, would be limited to a low-rise campus.

Local lore has it that Elizabeth Beall Banks once chased developers off her Gaithersburg-area farm with a shotgun when they came around asking questions. But even then, the sprawl opponent knew that the same forces that turned parcels around her into housing tracts, business parks and shopping centers would eventually threaten the 138-acre Belward Farm. Rather than sell it to the highest bidder, her heirs said, she sold it to the Johns Hopkins University — a suitor she believed would protect the farm from the development she detested.

Earle Havens can almost hear their voices. Each time Havens steps inside the George Peabody Library, he senses the muted exclamations, the murmured back-and-forth of a conversation that's been going on now for more than two millennia. In one corner, there's a treatise from the third century B.C. in which Aristarchus of Samos estimated the distances between the sun, moon and earth. Across the room is an extremely rare unbound volume of Copernicus' "Revolution of the Celestial Spheres," in which the 15th-century astronomer advanced the then-heretical notion that the Earth was not the center of the universe.

Dr. John Howard "Jack" Yardley, former director of pathology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who had also been associate dean for academic affairs, died Dec. 7 of a stroke at Gilchrist Hospice Care in Towson. The longtime Roland Park resident was 85. "For more than 50 years, John devoted his energies to research, patient care and teaching," Dr. Edward D. Miller, dean of the medical faculty and CEO of Johns Hopkins Medicine, wrote in an email to his medical school colleagues.

As a proud Johns Hopkins University alumna with a lifelong love of sports, reading Kevin Cowherd 's piece ("Hopkins stays grounded as it soars," November 19) about the Hopkins football program was a real pleasure. Coaching is a demanding profession, and at times those who choose it do not set a perfect example for his or her players. When a coach falls short, especially in a very visible program, the negative publicity seems endless. The recent case at Penn State is a glaring example.

THE WONDERFUL ride in the stock market that benefited so many investors last year also paid off handsomely for colleges and universities.The Johns Hopkins University's endowment -- the sum of gifts and bequests and the interest earned on them over the years -- passed the billion-dollar mark last year, rising from $982,618,000 to $1,156,598,000.That's a 17.7 percent increase, lower than the 21.9 percent average posted by the nation's colleges and universities. But the bigger the endowment, the harder to keep up with the average.

A core piece of Montgomery County's plans to build a "science city" has ended up in court. When it was approved by the County Council in the spring of 2010, the Great Seneca Science Corridor master plan envisioned a $10 billion research and development center that would rival industry hubs such as North Carolina's Research Triangle or Palo Alto, Calif. The Johns Hopkins University expected to play a major role. But the university's plans to develop the 138-acre Belward Farm may have run afoul of the terms under which the school received the property from a longtime Montgomery County family.