Dear Colleagues, I am absolutely delighted to inform that Rakesh Agrawal has been elected as a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Founded in 1780, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences is one of the oldest and most prestigious honorary societies and a leading center for independent policy research in the United States. Election to the Academy is considered one of the nation's highest honors since its founding during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock and other scholar-patriots who contributed prominently to the establishment of the new nation, its government, and its Constitution. The Academy membership encompasses over 4,500 Fellows and 600 Foreign Honorary Members and reflects the full range of disciplines: mathematics, the physical and biological sciences, medicine, the social sciences and humanities, business, government, public affairs, and the arts. Among its Fellows are more than 250 Nobel Prize laureates and 60 Pulitzer Prize winners. The Engineering Sciences & Technologies division, a part of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, has about 170 members. The Class of 2013 has 198 new members, including Bruce A. Beutler, recipient of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine; Maxine Savitz, VP-NAE and Retired General Manager, Honeywell, Inc.; John Glenn, Retired NASA astronaut and former US senator; Richard Lugar, former US senator from Indiana; Actor, Director and Producer Robert De Niro and musician Bruce Springsteen! For more details, pl visit: https://www.amacad.org/news/pressReleases.aspx?i=198 Pl join me in congratulating Rakesh for this terrific honor, which brings recognition to him, to our School and to Purdue! Best, Arvind Arvind Varma R. Games Slayter Distinguished Professor Jay and Cynthia Ihlenfeld Head of Chemical Engineering Purdue University