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Christine Fitzpatrick
Office of the Vice President for Information Technology
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Last modified: Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Peebles recognized as distinguished scholar, IT leader

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Nov. 17, 2009

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Christopher S. Peebles, Indiana University professor emeritus of anthropology, has been awarded the Thomas Hart Benton Mural Medallion by IU President Michael McRobbie. Recognized for his prominent achievement and dedicated service, Peebles is a distinguished expert on the ancient past whose contributions to IU's high-tech present and future also are recognized with this honor.

Peebles Award

IU President Michael A. McRobbie presents an award to Christopher S. Peebles, IU professor emeritus of anthropology.

Peebles served IU as director of the Glenn A. Black Laboratory of Archaeology, associate vice president for research and academic computing, and dean for information technology during his career at IU Bloomington.

"Professor Peebles, Indiana University is very proud of you," said President McRobbie during the dedication ceremony for the Indiana University Data Center in Bloomington on Nov. 5. "For more than two decades you have produced distinguished and innovative research as a faculty member of this great institution, and you have enabled IU to advance rapidly into its high-tech future through your leadership of many information technology initiatives."

Before his retirement this year, Peebles served IU with distinction for more than 25 years. His areas of expertise extend from prehistory to the information age. He has conducted wide-ranging research on the application of expert systems, management information systems and artificial intelligence as well as archaeological problems and projects. His investigations have received financial support from the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of the Interior, and the Dutch Organization for Pure Research.

Peebles also served for more than a decade as associate vice president for research and academic computing and dean for information technology on the Bloomington campus. In that role, he supported projects in disciplines as diverse as high energy physics and music librarianship. From 2004 to 2009, Peebles served as a special advisor to the Office of the Vice Provost for Research (OVPR) and as manager and mentor for OVPR centers and institutes.

Peebles also was recognized at the inaugural Peebles Lectures in Information Technology Series on Nov. 10, in the new Innovation Center at IU Bloomington located in IU's new technology park adjacent to the Data Center. The lecture series, established in 2003 by then-Vice President for Information Technology Michael McRobbie, is expected to bring some of the sharpest minds in information technology to Indiana University. The inaugural speaker was Thomas Sterling, renowned professor of computer science at Louisiana State University, best known as the father of the Beowulf cluster and for his work on petascale computing.