The University boasts a number of commendable graduate and professional programs including a well-regarded law school and medical school.The University's School of Computing has made several important contributions to the field. In 1968, the University joined with the University of California, Los Angeles, the Stanford Research Institute, and the University of California, Santa
Barbara to form the first four nodes of the ARPANET, direct ancestor to today's
Internet. Other accomplishments include the first method for representing surface
textures in graphical images, the Gouraud smooth shading model for
computer graphics, invention of magnetic ink printing technology,
the Johnson counter logic circuit, development of the oldest algebraic
mathematics package (REDUCE) still in use, and the Phong lighting model
for shading with highlights. The school has pioneered work in asynchronous circuits, computer animation, computer art, digital
music recording, graphical user interfaces, and stack machine architectures. Notable alumni include Nolan Bushnell, Ed
Catmull, Jim Clark and John Warnock. Companies founded by faculty and alumni include Adobe Systems, Ashlar, Atari, CAE Systems,
Centillium
Technology, Cirrus Logic,
WordPerfect, Evans and Sutherland, Myricom, NeoMagic, Netscape Communications Corporation,
Pixar, Pixal Plane, PlanetWeb, and Silicon Graphics.The University of Utah's School of Medicine is respected as one of the region's finest with several notable achievements, and
the University of Utah Hospitals & Clinics has consistently ranked as "Best Hospital" by U.S. News & World Report. In
1970, the school established the first Cerebrovascular Disease Unit west of the Mississippi River. In 1982, Barney Clark received the world's first
permanently implanted artificial heart, the Jarvik-7, during an operation performed
by William C. Devries, M.D. Clark survived 112 days with the device. The campus houses both the Huntsman Cancer Institute, one of
the premier cancer research centers in the country, and the Moran Eye Center, an ophthalmic clinical care and research facility.
Areas for which the school is often praised include cardiology, geriatrics, gynecology, rheumatology, pulmonology,
oncology, orthopedics, and
ophthalmology.A particularly notable program at the University is in economics. Despite
belonging to the major university of what is generally considered the most conservative state in the United States, the U's
economics department is one of the few in the country that actively advocates Marxist
and socialist practices.The University is well known in the field of biology for its unique contributions
to the study of genetics. This is due in part to long-term genealogy efforts of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (also known as the LDS or
Mormon church) which is headquartered about four miles from the University. LDS members
are an asset to researchers who are able to use family records to trace genetic disorders through several generations.
Additionally, the relative homogeneity of Utah's population (stemming largely from the church's 19th-century practice of polygamy) makes it an ideal laboratory for studies of population genetics.The University suffered some embarrassment in 1989 as the result of its then-chair of
chemistry (Stanley Pons)
and Martin Fleischmann (visiting from the University of Southampton) purportedly discovering
cold fusion, which was swiftly discredited by the nuclear physics community.The university suffers from some inherent problems associated with its urban location. Some consider the University a
"commuter campus" as many students commute from all over the Salt Lake Valley and from Davis County to the north and Utah
County to the south.