Institute Woods

Predicting thousands of years of forest growth with just an afternoon of fieldwork and a simple calculator might seem like an impossible task, but Jonathan Levine, Chair of Princeton’s Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, who runs annual classes in “Forest Succession” in the Institute Woods, enables his students to achieve precisely this.

Vladimir Voevodsky, a truly extraordinary and original mathematician, was also an avid photographer who enjoyed capturing the diverse wildlife of the Institute Woods. 

and we bopped to a sync of dry leaves’ kick and crackle
with the Skip-To-My-Lou of daughter Hillary hailing
Princeton’s pre-school bus that mustered those fledgling

flocks set to soar and sing like the...

More than seventy-five years ago, Founding Director Abraham Flexner sought to create with the Institute for Advanced Study a haven where “scholars and scientists may regard the world and its phenomena as their laboratory, without being carried off...

Dario Mastroianni, IT Manager at the Institute for Advanced Study, shares personal memories that entwine his family history with the Institute’s legacy. He recounts childhood experiences of exploring the Institute Woods with his father, who worked at IAS for 30 years, and discovering a secret mushroom foraging spot shared by Enrico Bombieri, Professor Emeritus in the School of Mathematics.