In 1934, Caltech was elected to the Association of American Universities, and the antecedents of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which Caltech continues to manage and operate, were established between 1936 and 1943 under Theodore von Kármán.

Caltech was ranked first in the 2011 – 2012 Times Higher Education worldwide rankings of universities as well as ranking first in physical science and engineering.

During World War II, Caltech was one of 131 colleges and universities nationally that took part in the V-12 Navy College Training Program which offered students a path to a Navy commission.

In the 1950s – 1970s, Caltech was the home of Murray Gell-Mann and Richard Feynman, whose work was central to the establishment of the Standard Model of particle physics.

Caltech undergraduates have historically been so apathetic to politics that there has been only one organized student protest in January 1968 outside the Burbank studios of NBC, in response to rumors that NBC was to cancel Star Trek.

Caltech was ranked 1st internationally in 2011 by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings.

Caltech was ranked as the best university in the world in two categories: Engineering & Technology and Physical Sciences.

Caltech was also found to have the highest score for per-capita performance in that ranking.

The playing of the Ride is such a strong tradition that the music was used during Apollo 17 to awaken Astronaut Harrison Schmitt, a Caltech alumnus.

Caltech pranks have been documented in three Legends of Caltech books, the most recent of which was edited by alumni Autumn Looijen ' 99 and Mason A. Porter ' 98 and published in May 2007.

A " sold " banner was hung on front of the MIT dome building and a " Welcome to Caltech East: School of the Humanities " banner over the Massachusetts Avenue Entrance.

This was initially termed " splat cooling " by doctoral student W. Klement at Caltech, who showed that cooling rates on the order of millions of degrees per second is sufficient to impede the formation of crystals, and the metallic atoms become " locked into " a glassy state.

Conversely, JPL, through the Caltech lawyers representing the laboratory, allege that Coppedge's termination was simply due to budget cuts and his demotion from team lead was because of harassment complaints and from on-going conflicts with his co-workers.

This story was called " Instantané pour Caltech ".

Varga was visiting Olga Taussky-Todd and John Todd at Caltech.

His early work was done on mainframes at III, JPL, and Caltech.

The Infrared Radiometer ( IRR ) team was led by Professor Gerald Neugebauer from the California Institute of Technology ( Caltech ).

The term " Moore's law " was coined around 1970 by the Caltech professor, VLSI pioneer, and entrepreneur Carver Mead in reference to a statement by Gordon E. Moore.

An aeronautical engineer by profession, De Camp conducted his undergraduate studies at the California Institute of Technology ( where his roommate was at one point noted rocket fuel scientist John D. Clark ), and earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Caltech in Aeronautical Engineering 1930.

It was discovered on August 9, 1989, by Eleanor F. Helin ( Caltech ) on photographic plates taken at Palomar Observatory.

The 2003 University of California Berkeley report credits the estimate to the website of Caltech researcher Roy Williams, where the statement can be found as early as May 1999.

Concluding in March 2007, the Caltech investigation found van Parijs alone committed research misconduct and that four papers co-authored by Baltimore, van Parijs, and others required correction.

The term " house system " is also used to refer to the residential college systems found in some colleges and universities, such as Caltech, Yale College, Harvard College, and University of Chicago.

Caltech and JPL jointly offer research opportunities for students, such as the SURF program ( Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship ).

After Conant returned to the United States, Arthur Amos Noyes made him an attractive offer to move to Caltech.

Upon graduation, Caltech alumni have the highest median starting salary among graduates of other colleges or universities in 2010 – 2011, of $ 69, 900, according to PayScale.

Active funding from the National Science Foundation Directorate of Mathematical and Physical Science ( MPS ) for Caltech stands at $ 343 million as of 2011, the highest for any educational institution in the nation, and higher than the total funds allocated to any state except California and New York.

It serves as preparation for graduate school and helps to explain why Caltech has the highest percentage of alumni who go on to receive a PhD of all the major universities.

Harvey Mudd today still maintains the highest rate of science and engineering Ph. D. production among all undergraduate colleges and second highest ( Caltech ranks second and MIT third ) compared to all universities and colleges, according to a 2008 report by the National Science Foundation.

Dabney also hosts Drop Day, a party held the Saturday after the second term drop day to celebrate the point of no return, and Dabney Metal Night, an opportunity for the amateur bands of Caltech to play for the crowd.

The Caltech administration ordered its return in 1975, but negotiations began for an official transfer of the cannon back to Caltech in 1980, and in 1981 it was returned on a permanent basis to the Caltech campus.

U. S. News & World Report ranked Caltech as the 5th best university in the United States in their 2012 national college rankings, together with MIT, Stanford University, University of Chicago and University of Pennsylvania.

There are also some Caltech graduate students, college student interns and co-op students.

At age 19, Ed Fredkin left California Institute of Technology ( Caltech ) college after a year to join the United States Air Force ( USAF ) to become a fighter pilot.

In addition, from the pool of outstanding research reports, 30 individuals and 30 teams ( 2-3 students ) are selected from across the nation to compete for college scholarships at one of six regional partner universities ( GA Tech, Caltech, Notre Dame, UT Austin, Carnegie Mellon and MIT ).

In Kenosha, Wisconsin, Darcy, editor at her high school paper, and her long-term boyfriend Stan are in their final year of high school and already have been accepted at good colleges ; before Darcy goes to college to study journalism, she'll go on a trip to Paris with her mother for her graduation present, while Stan will go to Caltech to study architecture.

In 2001, Moore and his wife donated $ 600 million to Caltech, the largest gift ever to an institution of higher education.

One anecdote describes Thomas Hunt Morgan banning the Friden calculator from his department at Caltech, saying " Well, I am like a guy who is prospecting for gold along the banks of the Sacramento River in 1849.

In 1925, the school established a department of geology and hired William Bennett Munro, then chairman of the division of History, Government, and Economics at Harvard University, to create a division of humanities and social sciences at Caltech.

Since 2000, the Einstein Papers Project has been located at Caltech.

In 2010, Caltech, in partnership with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and headed by Professor Nathan Lewis, established a DOE Energy Innovation Hub aimed at developing revolutionary methods to generate fuels directly from sunlight.

Caltech is incorporated as a non-profit corporation and is governed by a privately appointed 46-member board of trustees who serve five year terms of office and retire at the age of 72.

The research facilities at Caltech are available to graduate students, but there are opportunities for students to work in facilities of other universities, research centers as well as private industries.

In addition to managing JPL, Caltech also operates the Palomar Observatory in San Diego County, the Owens Valley Radio Observatory in Bishop, California, the Submillimeter Observatory and W. M. Keck Observatory at the Mauna Kea Observatory, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory at Livingston, Louisiana and Richland, Washington, and Kerckhoff Marine Laboratory in Corona del Mar, California.

The Institute launched the Kavli Nanoscience Institute at Caltech in 2006, the Keck Institute for Space Studies in 2008, and is also the current home for the Einstein Papers Project.

Undergraduates at Caltech are also encouraged to participate in research.

The Caltech / Occidental College Orchestra is a full seventy-piece orchestra composed of students, faculty, and staff at Caltech and nearby Occidental College.

The orchestra gives three pairs of concerts annually, at both Caltech and Occidental College.

The theater program at Caltech is known as TACIT, or Theater Arts at the California Institute of Technology.

" The grand old days of pranking have gone away at Caltech, and that's what we are trying to bring back ," reported the Boston Globe, which noted that " security has orders not to intervene in a prank unless officers get Mannion's approval beforehand.

The Honor Code aims at promoting an atmosphere of respect and trust that allows Caltech students to enjoy privileges that make for a more relaxed atmosphere.

By 1952, at the age of 55, Capra effectively retired from Hollywood filmmaking and spent his later years working with Caltech, his alma mater, to produce educational films on science topics.

For example, in 1986, students from Mudd stole a memorial cannon from Fleming House at Caltech ( originally from the National Guard ) by dressing as maintenance people and carting it off on a flatbed truck for " cleaning.

He is the Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Theoretical Physics Emeritus at Caltech, a Distinguished Fellow and co-founder of the Santa Fe Institute, Professor in the Physics and Astronomy Department of the University of New Mexico, and the Presidential Professor of Physics and Medicine at the University of Southern California.