Caltech Fund

This National Postdoc Appreciation Week, we are thankful to the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation for a new grant supporting postdoctoral researchers across five academic divisions.

Read more: https://giving.caltech.edu/news/Gordon-and-Betty-Moore-Foundation-Grant-Supports-Postdoctoral-Fellows

At Caltech, Richard Blish (BS '63, MS '64, PhD '67) was taught by three Nobel laureates: theoretical physicist Richard Feynman, nuclear physicist William Fowler, and physicist Carl Anderson, who discovered the positron.

For more than 40 years, Blish has supported the Caltech Fund to help others access an education that instills the belief you can solve any problem put to you.

"Throughout my whole career, there were things I had to learn along the way," he explained. "Caltech prepared me for that."

Read his story: https://giving.caltech.edu/news/Triple-Graduate-Grows-Legacy-of-Support

Masoud Sharif’s (PhD ’06) doctoral research helped establish the mathematical basis for limiting signal spikes while transmitting large volumes of data. The findings helped lay the groundwork for today's 4G and 5G networks.

Receiving a graduate fellowship gave Sharif the chance to study at Caltech. Now he’s creating that chance for others by endowing the Sharif Family Engineering Graduate Fellowship.

Read his story: https://initiativeforstudents.caltech.edu/story-listings/Sharif-Family-Fellowship-Invests-in-the-Next-Generation-of-Researchers/

Some of Tony Bakke’s (PhD ’78) fondest memories of Caltech are of the bonds he formed within the campus community—playing tenor saxophone in the Caltech Jazz Band, chess games with his neighbor in graduate student housing, and conversations with people in many academic fields.

“Having been in that environment opened so many doors for me,” he says. “A Caltech degree gives you a leg up in so many situations."

To help ensure these experiences are available for more students, he created the Tony Bakke Graduate Student Support Fund to invest in community-building programming and mentorship opportunities.

Read more: https://initiativeforstudents.caltech.edu/story-listings/Fostering-Connection-for-Graduate-Students/

US Olympian and Caltech Athletics Hall of Honor inductee Phil Conley (BS ’56) and Frances Conley, the first tenured female neurosurgeon in the United States, extend their legacy with a $30 million bequest to Caltech.

Read their story:

Pioneering Neurosurgeon Frances Conley and US Olympian Phil Conley Leave $30 Million Bequest to Caltech Phil Conley, inducted into the Caltech Athletics Hall of Honor in 2014, and Frances Conley, the first tenured female neurosurgeon in the United States, leave a lasting legacy to the Institute.

This alumni couple have endowed a SURF, which they’ve named Ingenuity, so that a new generation of students can engage in research and discover where their curiosity takes them.

"Vlad and I entered Caltech and met at frosh camp," Jean Wang says. "In the years since, we've grown in many dimensions including having a family, and we're happy to be able to share and give back to the community together."

Read their story: https://initiativeforstudents.caltech.edu/story-listings/alumni-establish-ingenuity-surf-to-support-research-that-could-lead-to-the-unexpected/

Mike Klein (BS ’79) had a lifelong love of science and engineering. In high school, he built his own six-foot-tall telescope, even grinding the glass by hand to make the curved mirror.

"That telescope got him into Caltech," says his wife of over 43 years, June Rumiko Klein. He had also used that telescope to show June the moon and distant planets on one of their first dates. They were married just nine months later.

After his death, June established the Michael F. Klein Scholarship to honor his passion for physics.

Read more:

Honoring a Lifelong Passion for Physics - initiativeforstudents.caltech.edu A successful entrepreneur and engineer in the semiconductor industry, Michael "Mike" F. Klein (BS '79) was also a lifelong admirer of all things physics. When Mike passed away last November, his family chose to honor his memory with a scholarship in his name for undergraduates with demonstrated fina...

When Jerrell Watts (MS '96, PhD '98) arrived at Caltech as a graduate student, neural networks were more promise than practice.

Three decades later, Watts is now head of algorithmic trading at Point72 Asset Management and has helped to spearhead a $3 million gift to leverage AI for scientific discovery. The Point72 Artificial Intelligence Research Program at Caltech will fund graduate students, computing resources, and large-scale data production while encouraging collaboration across disciplines through the use of AI.

Read more: https://giving.caltech.edu/news/Point72-Gift-Funds-AI-Research-Program-at-Caltech

“We'll figure it out. Jump!”

With her parents’ encouragement, Sukhada Fadnavis (BS ’07) became the first person in her family to study abroad. At Caltech, completing two Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowships in the math department gave her a taste of what open-ended, challenging research was like. The 10-week program also provided an opportunity to create close friendships with other students who were far from home.

Fadnavis is honoring her parents by endowing the Shubhangi and Sharad Fadnavis Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship to support students as they explore their interests and find their path.

Read more: https://initiativeforstudents.caltech.edu/story-listings/Alumna-Endows-SURF-to-Honor-Parents/