Announcements

Holiday party is December 20. Highlights this year include Italian food and traditional Italian music performed by Richard Stillman on the 17th floor of Weiss Research Building, French food in Café East and Spanish tapas and music by Spanish guitarist Shan Kenner in Café South.

Evolution Symposium to be held in May. Rockefeller University will host a symposium on evolution on May 1 and 2, 2008, supported by the Fairfield Osborne Memorial Lecture fund. Eighteen speakers from research institutes across the world will present the science of evolution in four subtopics: archaean chemistry and earliest fossils; cells, cellular evolution and protein history; development of eukaryotic genetic capacity and multicellularity; and human evolution: through the lens of DNA sequences. The two-day event will also include a public lecture. More information about the event will be published in a future issue of BenchMarks.

Events calendar gets an overhaul. Communications and Public Affairs and Information Technology are in the process of overhauling Rockefeller’s online calendar of events and room reservation system. Based on input from the campus community, improvements to the user interface and functionality of the calendar are being implemented. To check out the changes and new features, go to www.rockefeller.edu/
calendar.

New benefit offers discounted event tickets. University employees are now eligible for exclusive theater, sports, music, museum and other entertainment discounts through Plum Benefits, a corporate marketing service. To take advantage of the service, enroll for free at www.plumbenefits.com, choose an event featured on the Web site and use the special discount codes displayed with the event when purchasing tickets. For more information, call Plum Benefits customer service at 212-660-1888 or e-mail contact@
plumbenefits.com.