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BU professor found dead in lab

The Daily Free Press reports foul play doesn't seem to be at work in the death of the professor in a fifth-floor lab in the Photonics Center this morning.

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There are three possible causes: accident, suicide, and massive freaking stroke/heart attack.

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There was a party at Tanglewood and Cahill is attacking Baker...

Guess there was too much going on this morning for a dead professor to grab an inch of space on boston.com by 4 PM today...

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Why should he? Presuming that it was a suicide (sounds like it was pretty clearly not a heart attack), it's not particularly noteworthy to the community at large. Let the family grieve in peace.

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Pretty clearly not a heart attack? How do you figure?

Also, he was pretty big in his field. He was the chairperson of the ECE department at BU. He is scientifically notable and co-founded 2 successful companies.

This wasn't the passing of a major legend or anything, but even if it is suicide it would be notable and newsworthy. It's not like it's commonplace for someone to go kill themselves at work, let alone a lab at BU.

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Heat waves, and the high pollution situations that often accompany them, are associated with a rise in the risk of sudden death from stroke and massive heart attack. While that may not be the specific case here, I can't sit here reviewing a research report on heat, smog, and mortality and not consider the possibility.

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Well, they made it sound like there were only two possibilities: Suicide, or accident. To me, that makes it sound an awful lot like the man suffered some fatal injury of some kind. I could be wrong. But if it's a random heart attack, that's even LESS reason for the story to make the news. Why should people be speculating about this at all?

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...People die EVERYDAY at their places of employment. There's nothing REMOTELY out of the ordinary or unusual about this guy dying in his lab.

People die. I'm going to die. You're going to die. EVERYONE alive right at this moment is going to die.

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Yes, people drop dead at work - they typically do not drop dead at work when there is nobody in the area to witness the event. The professor unfortunately appears to have died alone. Thus there was nobody around to see him turn gray and clutch his chest, say Bof Fri Fleu and collapse, receive an electric shock, or do something to intentionally harm himself. In those situations, there is little or no need for an investigation unless there are emergency response issues or a clear lab accident.

Finding a dead person who died alone? That means an investigation, cops, and press.

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I'm not sure this dood would know to say bof fri fleu though. They only have the PSA videos in Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese and Zombie, not Italian:

http://1smootshort.blogspot.com/2010/01/bof-fri-fl...

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I knew him and he was an absolutely wonderful man-- brilliant, charming, funny, caring.... This is a truly sad day for Boston University and for those that knew him. I hope it wasn't suicide, because it would make me very sad to know that he was in inner turmoil and nobody knew.

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