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California Institute of Technology (Caltech)
A world-leading research university founded in 1891 as Throop Polytechnic Institute, now located on a 124-acre campus in Pasadena with 987 undergraduates and 1,443 graduate students.
The California Institute of Technology was founded on September 23, 1891, as Throop University, evolving into Throop Polytechnic Institute before taking its current name in 1920. The institution is situated on a 124-acre campus at 1200 East California Boulevard in Pasadena. Caltech manages NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and operates major research facilities including the Seismological Laboratory and a global network of astronomical observatories at Palomar Mountain and the W.M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii.
The university is one of the world's premier research institutions in science and engineering. As of October 2024, eighty Nobel laureates have been affiliated with Caltech through study, teaching, or research—the highest per-capita concentration of any university in America. The institution is particularly renowned for advances in space exploration and planetary science through JPL, quantum physics research, seismology, and sustainability science, including work on gravitational wave detection through LIGO, which earned three faculty members the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Caltech represents the kind of institution that draws talented people to Pasadena for their careers and their families' futures. Like the researchers and faculty who plan their work in decades, families in Pasadena benefit from thinking about insurance across the same time horizon. Coverage that protects a household through career transitions, education expenses, and retirement years ensures that the work and plans of today are protected tomorrow.