NEWS BRIEFS
Take one
Construction has begun on the nation's first Sundance Cinema, at 40th and Walnut streets. With a flash of their matching silver shovels, 10 digging dignitaries last week dug into a tidy rectangle of dirt impressed with the Penn shield to break ground on the complex multiplex cineplex that will include an eight-screen movie theater with a video library, lecture room, coffee bars and restaurant; a fresh food market with indoor and outdoor café and sushi bar; an 800-car garage; places to shop; and places indoors and out just for hanging out.
The University, collaborating with Sundance and others, expects the complex to serve as a commercial hub, attracting other businesses and creating an environment that will draw people from the campus and beyond.
Space odyssey
Baruch S. Blumberg has been tapped by NASA to head its new Asto biology Institute, a consortium of experts and institutions dedicated to studying the origin, distribution and destiny of life in the universe. Blumberg, University Professor of Medicine and Anthropology and 1976 Nobel laureate in medicine, will move to the institute's headquarters at NASA's Ames Research Center in California in September.
Tough talk
Penn's Speech and Debate Team made a strong showing at the National Championships in Ypsilanti, Mich., last month. The team placed fourth in the debate category and took 10th place overall. During the four-day event, students from more than 80 colleges competed in a series of team and individual events.
Among the six competitors Penn sent, Jay Haverty (W'01) scored fifth and Scott Pollack (C'02) ninth in a one-on-one category, while Jason Auerbach (W'98) took 13th in impromptu speaking.
Oops!
Paul Guyer is a professor of philosophy, not a professor of psychology as identified in a the story about four distinguished faculty (Current, May 13).