Relationships can be so complicated. First, Unlocking Science is the name for the International Science Council’s (ISC) multimedia hub and it’s the name for a new four-part podcast launching today, November 16, 2021. Plus, Unlocking Science (the podcast) can be found on the Unlocking Science multimedia hub/website.
Produced by BBC [British Broadcasting Corporation] StoryWorks Commercial Productions, this dynamic online series uncovers the innovative global stories of scientists and how they are addressing inequalities, engaging policymakers and the public, and pioneering a more sustainable future.
With all eyes on COP26, and a chance for the world’s leaders, policymakers and community activists to put the planet on a sustainable path, this series meets the scientists who are finding solutions to some of humanity’s most pressing issues. Unlocking Science, a new online series, looks at how the global collaborative effort by international science is rising to the challenge of finding pathways to living within planetary boundaries.
Produced for the International Science Council (ISC) by BBC StoryWorks Commercial Productions, Unlocking Science addresses the need for accessible science through compelling and innovative storytelling for the public. This new series of films, articles and podcasts explores the ever-changing face of science culture, where diversity of thought and creative approaches to our most immediate and complex concerns are championed.
“We want communities to realize that science creating solutions for our planet is certainly not taking place in a so-called ivory tower. It is open, multinational, participatory and fuelled with urgency,”
From innovators working to protect vital ecological biomes like the Great Barrier Reef and the Amazon rainforest, to scientists seeking stability after being displaced by conflict, to ordinary citizens discovering our galaxy and our place in it through community-led tourism, Unlocking Science tells the human stories and new discoveries created by science.
said Mathieu Denis, ISC Science Director.
From innovators working to protect vital ecological biomes like the Great Barrier Reef and the Amazon rainforest, to scientists seeking stability after being displaced by conflict, to ordinary citizens discovering our galaxy and our place in it through community-led tourism, Unlocking Science tells the human stories and new discoveries created by science.Explore the ISC stories to feature on the new hub:
Meet Laura de Santis as part of the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR)’s story on What Antarctica can teach us about climate change – “We need to combine multidisciplinary work in order to understand the sensitivity of the ice sheets to ongoing climate warming, and to even more warming, which is expected in the future in the next decades”
Discover the people behind the changing face of medical science – “The medical physicists and engineers are like the orchestra in the opera: they are not the people you see, but they are the ones who ensure that the technology needed in healthcare is created and developed” – in Tomorrow’s hidden visionaries with the International Union for Physical and Engineering Sciences [in Medicine (IUPESM)].
Learn about The communities using astronomy to bring tourism to their region with the International Astronomical Union Office of Astronomy for Development and meet Tsewang Dorjey and Arun Radhakrishnan, a local team leaders in the village sharing their knowledge of the night sky
Meet refugee scientists displaced by conflict, like Eqbal Dauqan, who left Yemen for Oslo, where she gained an academic position with support from the Scholars At Risk network. Eqbal was a mentee of the Global Young Academy’s At-Risk Scholars Initiative, and now acts as a mentor herself.
Additional films and articles will be joining the Unlocking Science series in early 2022.
I’m not sure how I stumbled on to to the Unlocking Science podcast before I got onto the multimedia hub website,
BTW, if the conference that the International Science Council’s subgroup, the International Network for Government Science Advice (INGSA) held here in Canada (August 30 – September 2, 2021) are an indicator, the podcasts and hub are likely to contain very interesting material. You can find out more about the conference in my August 31, 2021 posting.
The four-part podcast series should be here on the ISC podcasts webpage on November 16, 2021.
The Kyoto Prize (Wikipedia entry) was first given out in 1985. These days (I checked out a currency converter today, November 15, 2021), the Inamori Foundation, which administers the prize, gives out $100M yen per prize, worth about $1,098,000 CAD or $876,800 USD.
The Kyoto Prize is an international award of Japanese origin, presented to individuals who have made significant contributions to the progress of science, the advancement of civilization, and the enrichment and elevation of the human spirit. The Prize is granted in the three categories of Advanced Technology, Basic Sciences; Arts and Philosophy, each of which comprises four fields, making a total of 12 fields. Every year, one Prize is awarded in each of the three categories with prize money of 100 million yen per category.
One of the distinctive features of the Kyoto Prize is that it recognizes both “science” and “arts and philosophy” fields. This is because of its founder Kazuo Inamori’s conviction that the future of humanity can be assured only when there is a balance between scientific development and the enrichment of the human spirit.
The recipient for arts and philosophy, Bruno Latour has been mentioned here before (from a July 15, 2020 posting titled, ‘Architecture, the practice of science, and meaning’),
The 1979 book, Laboratory Life: the Social Construction of Scientific Facts by Bruno Latour and Steve Woolgar immediately came to mind on reading about a new book (The New Architecture of Science: Learning from Graphene) linking architecture to the practice of science (research on graphene). It turns out that one of the authors studied with Latour. (For more about Laboratory Life see: Bruno Latour’s Wikipedia entry; scroll down to Main Works)
Bruno Latour, Professor Emeritus at Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po), received the 2021 Kyoto Prize in Arts and Philosophy for his radically re-examining “modernity” by developing a philosophy that focuses on interactions between technoscience and social structure. Latour’s Commemorative Lecture “How to React to a Change in Cosmology” will be released on November 10, 2021, 10:00 AM JST at the 2021 Kyoto Prize Special Website.
“Viruses–we don’t even know if viruses are our enemies or our friends!” says Latour in his lecture. By using the ongoing Covid epidemic as a sort of lead, Latour discusses the shift in cosmology, a structure that distributes agencies around. He then suggests a “new project” we have to work on now, which he assumes is very different from the modernist project.
Bruno Latour has revolutionized the conventional view of science by treating nature, humans, laboratory equipment, and other entities as equal actors, and describing technoscience as the hybrid network of these actors. His philosophy re-examines “modernity” based on the dualism of nature and society. He has a large influence across disciplines, with his multifaceted activities that include proposals regarding global environmental issues.
Latour and the other two 2021 Kyoto Prize laureates are introduced on the 2021 Kyoto Prize Special Website with information about their work, profiles, and three-minute introduction videos. The Kyoto Prize in Advanced Technology for this year went to Andrew Chi-Chih Yao, Professor of Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences at Tsinghua University, and Basic Sciences to Robert G. Roeder, Arnold and Mabel Beckman Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at The Rockefeller University.
The folks at the Kyoto Prize have made a three-minute video introduction to Bruno Latour available,
For more information you can check out the Inamori Foundation website. There are two Kyoto Prize websites, the 2021 Kyoto Prize Special Website and the Kyoto Prize website. These are all English language websites and, if you have the language skills and the interest, it is possible to toggle (upper right hand side) and get the Japanese language version.
Finally, there’s a dedicated Bruno Latour webpage on the 2021 Kyoto Prize Special Website and Bruno Latour has his own website where French and English are items are mixed together but it seems the majority of the content is in English.
A quick reminder, ARPICO stands for the Society of Italian Researchers & Professionals in Western Canada and while the upcoming speaker, Jason Halter, doesn’t seem to be Italian, his topic is quintessentially so.
[downloaded from https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/uncovering-leonardo-da-vincis-earlier-isleworth-mona-lisa-tickets-205331049697]
From a November 5, 2021 ARPICO announcement (received via email),
After an extended break since our last (virtual) public event of last April and an unusually difficult summer, for BC in general and ARPICO in particular, we are happy to announce that our activity is restarting this fall. Our next event features a very enticing lecture presenting us with a story that neatly straddles art, science, and history, around one of the most intriguing portraits of the Renaissance, if not ever, by the great Leonardo Da Vinci. Modern day Renaissance man, designer, architect, historian and lover of Italia, Prof. Jason Halter will give us an account of his role, in collaboration with experts in other fields, in the uncovering of the so-called Earlier Mona Lisa, and verifying its authenticity. …
The lecture will take place on November 18th, 2021 at 7:00PM and will be hosted virtually, as our last few events have been. We continue to use BlueJeans as our videoconferencing platform, for which you will only require a web browser (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Safari, Opera are all supported). Full detailed instructions on how the virtual event will unfold are available on the EventBrite listing here in the Technical Instruction section.
If participants wish to donate to ARPICO, this can be done within EventBrite; this would be greatly appreciated in order to help us continue to build upon our scholarship fund, and to defray the cost of the videoconferencing license.
The announcement goes on to provide details about the topic and the speaker,
Leonardo da Vinci’s Earlier (Isleworth) Mona Lisa:
Time Travel, Pattern Recognition, and the Scientific Method
A fascinating presentation and discussion of Da Vinci’s Earlier Mona Lisa in the context of the paper of the same title that was published in Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa: New Perspectives, by Jean-Pierre Isbouts (Ed). Art historians have long debated the question why sources about the origin of the Mona Lisa portrait provide conflicting information. This monograph presents a solution for this quandary: those 16th-century sources don’t agree because they are not talking about the same painting. Jason Halter is one of a team of leading scholars and experts who have contributed to the veracity and authentication of this painting and the process has necessitated embracing technology and methods offered by science, which had not been uncovered before.
Design, Art & Architecture occupy a central position in the practice of Jason Halter & Wonder Inc. Having gained his formative experience under the tutelage of one of the world’s most important designers, Bruce Mau, Jason has won international acclaim for his innovative approach to design & art production. His unfettered curiosity & ability to realize ideas have made him intuit & manifest design solutions in new & novel ways.
As a Renaissance scholar, Halter spent several years teaching art & architecture of the late Gothic and early & late Renaissance in Florence and Rome, having held faculty positions with the University of Toronto & the University of British Columbia. He holds several degrees in history & architecture, & was awarded the prestigious Syracuse Fellowship during his post graduate work in Italy.
Halter was recently invited by the Mona Lisa Foundation, a consortium based in Zurich, Switzerland, to assist in the marketing and research for the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa’, 1503, by Leonardo Da Vinci. Contributing an article entitled ‘Time Travel. Pattern Recognition & the Scientific Method’, to the recent book entitled ‘Earlier Mona Lisa – New Perspectives’, published by the Fielding Graduate University, this new scholarship has established a series of insights and theories regarding this incredibly important artwork by Da Vinci, engaging new vital scientific investigation with critical cultural expertise on the work. The book was released in April 2019, ahead of an exhibition of the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa’ at Palazzo Bastogi in Florence, Italy in June of 2019, corresponding with the 500th anniversary of the passing of Leonardo da Vinci in 1519.
ARPICO offers an overview for how the night will proceed,
WHEN (EVENT): Thurs, November 18th, 2021 at 7:00PM (BlueJeans link active at 6:45PM)
WHERE: Online using the BlueJeans Conferencing platform.
The evening agenda is as follows:
6:45PM – BlueJeans Presentation link becomes active and registrants may join.
7:00pm – Start of the evening Event with introductions & lecture by Prof. Jason Halter
8:00 pm – Q & A Period via BlueJeans Chat Interface
Tickets are Needed
Tickets for this event are FREE. Due to limited seating at the venue, we ask that each household register once and watch the presentation together on a single device. You will receive the event videoconferencing invite link via email in your registration confirmation.
FAQs
Where can I contact the organizer with any questions? info@arpico.ca
Can I update my registration information? Yes. If you have any questions, contact us at info@arpico.ca
I am having trouble using EventBrite and cannot reserve my ticket(s). Can someone at ARPICO help me with my ticket reservation? Of course, simply send your ticket request to us at info@arpico.ca so we help you.
I found this about the BlueJeans Conferencing platform on the ‘Leonardo da Vinci’s Earlier (Isleworth) Mona Lisa: Time Travel, Pattern Recognition, and the Scientific Method’ registration page,
Technical Instruction
The event will be managed via the videoconferencing platform BlueJeans Meetings, by clicking on the link that will be emailed to each registered individual (to the email address provided). Please, note that the event will not be active until 6:45 pm on the day of the event.
At that time, clicking on the link will automatically let you join the event via your web browser (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera should all work smoothly). You are NOT required to download or install anything to your computer. The entire video stream will occur inside your web browser window just like any other website you might visit. There is no security risk or risk to your personal information. You can always join the event late, as this will not interfere with the presentation.
When you open the link you will be prompted to input a guest name. Please use your name that will allow us to identify you, and continue. On the following screen you may be prompted by your browser (depending on your settings) to allow access to use your computer’s microphone and camera. You do not need to approve these if you do not plan to talk or be seen at any time during the Q&A segment. Upon joining you should see a screen similar to the sample image seen below where the various icons superimposed on the pictures of participants will show when you hover the mouse pointer over the BlueJeans browser window.
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By default, your system’s camera will be turned on and your microphone will be turned off. If you do not wish to show your face, you can of course do that by clicking on the camera icon like the one on the bottom right of the sample screenshot provided. We ask that you keep your microphone muted, since any background sounds and noises from your environment will be audible and may interfere with the speaker’s voice.
As we have done for the in-person events, we will be recording our virtual ones for future reference.
Q&A
At any time during the lecture, participants will be able to post comments or questions for the speaker via the “chat” button also visible by hovering over the BlueJeans browser window. The moderator will read them for the speaker by way of a Q&A session at the end of the lecture.
Feedback
In the days following the event we will be sending all participants a succinct feedback form, which we encourage you to fill in and send back to us.
A little background
It seems this talk is the outcome of a Mona Lisa Foundation initiative, which resulted in a 2019 book (mentioned earlier), Leonardo Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa: New Perspectives, by Jean-Pierre Isbouts (editor).
Few works of art have garnered as much attention from experts and the public as the ‘Mona Lisa’ in the Louvre Museum. By contrast, the ‘Earlier Mona Lisa’ has spent much of its existence hidden from view. Despite this, on the few occasions the painting has been available to be viewed, significant expert opinion has been recorded.
It is probably fair to say that attributing a painting to Leonardo da Vinci with certainty is one of the most difficult tasks in the field of Old Master paintings. To date there are about 18 to 20 paintings “more or less” attributed to Leonardo. One states “more or less” since there is not even one painting about which all the recognized Da Vinci experts agree. It is even disputed whether some parts of the famous ‘Mona Lisa’ portrait in the Louvre are not by the master. One famous expert said that attributing a painting to Leonardo is like “holding in one’s hand a burning iron rod.”
Nonetheless, it is generally accepted that he did paint all or at least the essential parts of those paintings currently attributed to him. In the case of a Da Vinci portrait, an attribution is generally agreed upon if the artist painted only the face, while some experts argue that it is even enough if Da Vinci had simply conceived the structure of the painting. It should be noted that some of his pupils and followers had great talent. The well-known ‘Lady with an Ermine’ and ‘La Belle Ferronière’ represent only recent attributions to Leonardo, having been attributed to pupils for almost 400 years.
Professor Jean-Pierre Isbouts says, “Every interpretation is subject to subsequent dispute. When you look at dating, when you look at authorship, when you look at provenance. So I think it’s just part of the world we live in that Leonardo scholarship happens to be a debating society whether you like it or not.”
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The essay goes on to detail the key elements for establishing attribution and presents some contrarian views.
Jason Halter and science
I wish there was a little more detail about the science that Halter will be discussing. Halter’s science background seems to be confined to his work in architecture, which suggests material science. On the other hand, pattern recognition suggests algorithms and artificial intelligence.
As for Bruce Mau’s influence, mentioned as a colleague and mentor in Halter’s biographical details, Mau is a big deal in Canadian design circles who has an amateur’s interest (like mine) in science if his 2004 Massive Change show at the Vancouver Art Gallery is an accurate indicator. The show featured a bioengineered nose being grown in a beaker. (More about Massive Change and bioengineering in my February 21, 2013 posting.)
I am covering this because the study of science does not insulate anyone from issues of discrimination. In fact, there is a long standing use of science to defend discrimination and, in some cases, the elimination of some groups perceived as substandard. Eugenics and race science come to mind.
For any Canadians who may still feel a little smug, it might be useful to note that the highly revered Tommy Douglas (1904 -1986), the father of universal health care in Canada, had an interest in eugenics and wrote a master’s thesis proposing its use. From his Wikipedia entry, Note: Links have been removed,
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Douglas graduated from Brandon College in 1930, and completed his Master of Arts degree in sociology at McMaster University in 1933. His thesis, entitled The Problems of the Subnormal Family, endorsed eugenics.[15] The thesis proposed a system that would have required couples seeking to marry to be certified as mentally and morally fit. Those deemed to be “subnormal”, because of low intelligence, moral laxity, or venereal disease would be sent to state farms or camps; while those judged to be mentally defective or incurably diseased would be sterilized.[16]
Douglas rarely mentioned his thesis later in his life, and his government never enacted eugenics policies, even though two official reviews of Saskatchewan’s mental health system recommended such a program when he became Premier and Minister of Health. As Premier, Douglas opposed the adoption of eugenics laws.[16] By the time Douglas took office in 1944, many people questioned eugenics due to Nazi Germany’s embrace of it in its effort to create a “master race”.[17] Instead, Douglas implemented vocational training for the mentally handicapped and therapy for those suffering from mental disorders.[18][a]
Douglas seems to have quietly abandoned eugenics as a solution to social problems at some point after 1933.
Before moving onto the alleged casteist comments, a little bit about the caste system.
Castes are rigid social groups characterized by hereditary transmission of life style, occupation and social status. The caste system in India has its origins in ancient India, and was transformed by various ruling elites in medieval, early-modern, and modern India, especially the Mughal Empire and the British Raj.[1][2][3][4] The caste system consists of two different concepts, varna and jati, which may be regarded as different levels of analysis.
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The term caste is not originally an Indian word, though it is now widely used, both in English and in Indian languages. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, it is derived from the Portuguese casta, meaning “race, lineage, breed” and, originally, “‘pure or unmixed (stock or breed)”.[30] There is no exact translation in Indian languages, but varna and jati are the two most approximate terms.[31]
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Race science
Colonial administrator Herbert Hope Risley, an exponent of race science, used the ratio of the width of a nose to its height to divide Indians into Aryan and Dravidian races, as well as seven castes.[164]
Mahatma Gandhi University on Saturday [November 6, 2021] removed Dr Nandakumar Kalarikkal from the post of the director of the International and Inter University Centre for Nano Science and Nano technology (IIUCNN) for alleged caste discrimination against a research scholar.
The vice-chancellor of the university Sabu Thomas has taken charge as the director of the centre.
The university is learned to have made the decision based on a directive from the state government. Deepa P Mohanan, a research scholar, who has been on an indefinite hunger strike in the varsity, had demanded Kalarikkal’s removal from the department alleging that she faced discrimination based on caste from him and that he prevented her from doing her research.
The action against the faculty member has been taken even as the hunger strike by the student entered the ninth day on Saturday [November 6, 2021].
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Thomas said that Kalarikkal has stepped down and that the decision was made after holding talks with Kalarikkal based on a directive from the government.
“Kalarikkal is a brilliant faculty member. He was willing to step down,” the vice chancellor said. He also said that nobody can remove Kalarikkal as a faculty member, adding that he will be [sic] continue to serve in the centre as well as in the Physics department.
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Earlier in the day, minister for higher education R Bindu had signalled her support to the student.
In a Facebook post the minister said that the government has asked the university what is stopping it from removing the professor and conduct [sic] a probe.
Deepa P Mohanan, a Dalit PhD scholar at the Mahatma Gandhi University (MGU) in Kottayam, Kerala, on Monday, 8 November [2021], finally withdrew her hunger strike. …
… Mohanan claims that for the last 10 years, her progress is being scuttled by the director of the institute, Nandakumar Kalarickal, allegedly because she is a Dalit.
Professor Nandakumar who was earlier removed from the director’s post, has now been removed from the university’s nanoscience department.
A few thoughts
Mohanan certainly found a very powerful way to protest; her hunger strike at the Mahatma Gandhi University had to have resonated with officials and bystanders.
For anyone not familiar with Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948), he was India’s first prime minister after leading India to freedom from British rule with nonviolent protests (including hunger strikes).
With regard to the allegations, I imagine there will be some further investigation. Should I hear more about the matter, I will update this posting.
In the end, this situation is a reminder that science is not practised by flawless people and can be prey to the same social problems one encounters everywhere.,
It’s been quite a while since there’s been an equipment announcement here and, happily, this equipment will help with climate change, and more according to scientists from Swansea University (UK).
A new state-of-the-art instrument has been built by a team from Swansea University’s Nanomaterials Laboratory which will help scientists fight against climate change, microbial infection and other major global challenges.
The team invented and built the nanoparticle beam instrument with the help of scientists from Freiburg University, Germany and have now installed it at the UK’s national synchrotron science facility, Diamond Light Source, based at the Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire.
In an initial four-year contract, the instrument will be available for use by staff and users of the Diamond synchrotron and a new Swansea University satellite laboratory team based at the Diamond facility, seconded from the University’s Nanomaterials Laboratory in Engineering led by Professor Richard Palmer. The Laboratory is a world leader in inventing revolutionary nanoparticle beam technology.
The new Swansea instrument located at Diamond’s versatile soft X-ray (VerSoX) beamline B07 will enable the precise generation of nanoscale particles of diverse materials by the method of gas-phase condensation, their size-selection with a mass spectrometer and then deposition onto surfaces to make prototype devices. It will help scientists explore and optimise the influence of particle size, structure and composition on properties relevant to applications as varied as catalysis, batteries, and antibacterial coatings for medical implants. It has the potential to aid radical discovery and innovation in both energy and medical technologies. Initial focus will be on the generation of green hydrogen and green ammonia as clean fuels. This can positively contribute to tackling climate change by harnessing renewable but intermittent energy sources – such as wind, tidal and solar – and storing the energy in these molecules.
The nanoparticle source at Diamond will complement the Matrix Assembly Cluster Source (MACS) and two more new instruments developed by the group at Swansea University. The instrument at Diamond is an ultra-precision source of size-selected nanoparticles (also termed clusters) designed for materials discovery and optimisation, while the MACS is designed to scale-up discoveries made at this model scale to the level of manufacturing.
Professor Steve Wilks, Provost of Swansea University, said: “The installation of this new nanoparticle instrument heralds the start of a strategic partnership between Swansea University and Diamond Light Source, and is underpinned by the Welsh Government. It opens up new opportunities for the Diamond staff and user community to work alongside our Swansea University satellite team based at Diamond, as conceived by Professor Palmer. In particular, nanoparticles have tremendous potential as new catalysts for sustainable energy generation, such as the splitting of water by sunlight to make clean hydrogen fuel, and for the synthesis of medicines and sensors.”
Professor Laurent Chapon, Diamond’s Physical Sciences Director, commented: “Diamond always wants to offer state -of-the-art instruments – often unique in the world – to the user community. One of the ways we push our technology is by partnering with key universities to help us drive forward the balance of scientific vision and needs from the community. Our collaboration with Swansea University provides a unique experimental (nanoparticle beam) set-up for materials discovery, that supports our surface, interface and catalysis community in addressing the pressing challenges of global health and climate. We all now look forward to the advancement in knowledge this new capability will bring.”
The Welsh Government Office for Science Sêr Cymru Programme is supporting the secondment of Dr Yubiao Niu from the Swansea team to Diamond via a Sêr Cymru Industrial Fellowship. He will commission the new instrument and explore the use of nanoparticle catalysts for low energy synthesis of ammonia and storage of hydrogen, with Imperial College also collaborating.
Professor Peter Halligan, WG’s Chief Science Advisor, said: “Generating a hydrogen-based fuel such as ammonia promises to overcome several of the technical challenges faced by hydrogen but has its own challenges. The metallic cluster catalyst method is innovative technology and one which deserves to be explored and exploited to its full potential. Dr Yubiao Niu, Swansea University, Diamond Light Source and Imperial College should be applauded for their foresight and ambition in this exciting area of research.”
in case you’re curious,
Caption: Professor Richard Palmer and Dr. Yubiao Niu from Swansea University with the new nanoparticle instrument at Diamond Light Source.. Credit: Henry Hoddinott.
Every cancer arises following the accumulation of genetic changes known as mutations. Dr. Ryan Morin will discuss how genomics can allow us to understand how specific mutations influence the onset of lymphoma (and other common cancers) and can lead to new and more effective therapies.
There’s a little more detail about Morin’s work on his profile page on the BC Cancer Research Institute website,
Dr. Ryan Morin has been studying the genetic nature of lymphoid cancers using genomic methods for more than a decade. During his doctoral training at the University of British Columbia and BC Cancer, he pioneered the use of transcriptome and whole genome sequencing to identify driver mutations in non-Hodgkin lymphomas. Over the course of his training, he published a series of papers describing some of the most common genetic features of diffuse large B-cell (DLBCL) and follicular lymphomas including EZH2, KMT2D, CREBBP and MEF2B. Following his transition to an independent position at SFU, Dr. Morin has continued to identify genetic features of these and other aggressive lymphomas including non-coding (silent) regulatory drivers of cancer. His laboratory has implemented novel assays for the sensitive detection and genetic characterization of circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA). These “liquid biopsy” approaches continue to be developed as non-invasive methods for monitoring treatment response and resistance. Using these and other modern genomics tools and bioinformatics techniques, his team continues to explore the genetics of relapsed and refractory DLBCL with an ultimate goal of identifying novel biomarkers that predict treatment failure on specific therapies. This work has helped refine our understanding of genetic and gene expression differences that predict poor outcome in DLBCL.
Hopefully, Morin will be talking about the liquid biopsies and other non-invasive methods he and his team use in their work.
A November 6, 2021 article by Hyungwon Kang for The Korea Herald is a great reminder that for all the wonders of contemporary technologies, we still cannot equal the technological achievements of bygone ages,
For humans, the Bronze Age meant metal weapons, farming tools, and means to sustain large enough populations with an organized labor force which enabled construction of lasting monuments such as dolmens.
East Asia, especially in ancient Korea, must have been a happening place in the Bronze Age as there are more dolmens in Korea than anywhere else in the world.
Bronze mirrors are found in abundance in Korea and neighboring areas formerly occupied by ancient Koreans. Bronze mirrors with fine lines and geometric designs are a more advanced version of earlier Bronze Age mirrors with rough designs.
The largest and the most famous bronze mirror with fine lines, South Korea’s National Treasure No. 141, Bronze Mirror with Geometric Designs, or Jeongmungyeong in Korean, was found serendipitously in the early 1960s by Korean army recruits who were digging trenches at the Nonsan Republic of Korea Army Training Center.
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The bronze mirror is shattered into many pieces, apparently from the impact of an iron pick‘s sharp tip piercing the mirror from its shiny side.
The other side shows finely engraved geometric lines and has two knobs where a chain or cord would have been passed through to form a necklace. The round shiny mirror is considered to have represented the Sun, a heavenly source of mythical power in ancient times. Researchers believe a leader or a priest/priestess would have worn the mirror to reflect sunlight from the chest.
Researchers believe the 21cm diameter Bronze Mirror with Geometric Designs was made during the height of cutting-edge Bronze Age technology, when Korean civilization was transitioning into the early stage of the Iron Age. The mirror has an incredible number of more than 13,000 fine lines which are only 300,000 nanometers thick, a size thinner than human hair.
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The cutting edge high-tech Bronze Age mirror was made with zinc-bronze alloy, mixing zinc with copper, tin, and lead. In particular, the bronze mirror has an alloy ratio of 7 to 3 of copper and tin, which exhibits the most suitable hardiness and reflectivity as a mirror.
It is almost impossible to replicate [emphasis mine] the bronze mirror with fine lines even with 21st-century technology. Researchers have tried without success to replicate the mirror with modern technology.
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If you have the time, you can check out the full text and the other images which accompany Hyungwon Kang’s November 6, 2021 article.
Today [November 4, 20210], University of Ottawa and Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation – announced a partnership that brings an interactive and educational digital experience to Kanata North. Innovating beyond the walls of its museums, Ingenium has created iOS [formerly iPhone OS {operating system}] and Nintendo Switch games to make learning fun. On site at the University’s Kanata North campus at 535 Legget Drive, visitors can now experience what it is like to fly like a honeybee, go on a mission to Mars, or test their skills as a fighter pilot in WWI.
“The University’s partnership with Ingenium has been a long and productive one, anchored by a common mandate to promote science education and to create environments that foster science and technology innovation,” said Veronica Farmer, Director, Partnerships and Commercialization at uOttawa Kanata North. “The digital games installation reflects this intent and definitely brings an element of fun to our Kanata North campus.”
Opened in 2018, uOttawa’s Kanata North campus has been partnering with Kanata North companies, connecting them to exceptional young talent, valuable education programming, relevant research expertise as well as global networks – all important factors to facilitate innovation. Recently expanded to 8000sqft, uOttawa Kanata North offers a large, dynamic collaborative and training space.
“As a national institution, we know that digital innovation is key to connecting with all Canadians. In partnering with uOttawa, we hope to foster creativity, discovery and innovation [emphasis mine] in the next generation,” said Darcy Ferron, Vice-President, Business Development [emphasis mine] at Ingenium.
This digital experience [emphasis mine] will benefit students, researchers, alumni and partners based in Kanata North. All are welcome to visit the uOttawa Kanata North campus and immerse themselves in an innovative, interactive and educational digital experience through this unique installation dedicated to showcasing that science and technology innovation starts with curiosity and exploration.
“Ingenium has been the place where this has happened for generations and this digital experience offers a reminder to all that visit our Kanata North campus of the deep connection between science and technology education, university training and research, and fulfilling careers in technology,” added Veronica Farmer.
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The University of Ottawa—A crossroads of cultures and ideas
The University of Ottawa is home to over 50,000 students, faculty and staff, who live, work and study in both French and English. Our campus is a crossroads of cultures and ideas, where bold minds come together to inspire game-changing [inadvertent pun] ideas. We are one of Canada’s top 10 research universities—our professors and researchers explore new approaches to today’s challenges. One of a handful of Canadian universities ranked among the top 200 in the world, we attract exceptional thinkers and welcome diverse perspectives from across the globe.
About Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation
Ingenium oversees three national museums of science and innovation in Ottawa – the Canada Agriculture and Food Museum, the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, and the Canada Science and Technology Museum— and the new lngenium Centre, which houses an exceptional collection, research institute, and digital innovation lab. lngenium takes science engagement to the next level by co-creating participatory experiences, acting as community hubs and connectors, helping Canadians contribute to solving global challenges, and creating a collective impact which extends far beyond the physical spaces of our museums. Ingenium is a vital link between science and society. Our engaging digital content, outreach programs, travelling exhibitions, and collaborative spaces help to educate, entertain, and engage audiences across Canada and around the world.
I do have a few questions. Presumably offering these digital experiences will cost money and there’s no mention of how this is being funded. As well, it’s hard to know when this digital experience will be offered since there’s no mention of any proposed start date.
The innovation (in the instance I’ve emphasized, it’s code for business) part of this endeavour is a bit puzzling. Is this University of Ottawa/Ingenium partnership going to act as a lab for Apple and Nintendo games development?
Finally, if an outsider should wish to visit this digital lab/experience at the University’s Kanata North campus at 535 Legget Drive how should they identify it? There doesn’t seem to be a name for it.
Before getting to the news about Jean-Pierre Luminet, astrophysicist, poet, sculptor, and more, there’s the prize itself.
Established in 1951, a scant five years after UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) was founded in 1945, the Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science is the organization’s oldest prize. Here’s more from the UNESCO Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science webpage,
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The UNESCO Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science is an international award to reward exceptional contributions made by individuals in communicating science to society and promoting the popularization of science. It is awarded to persons who have had a distinguished career as writer, editor, lecturer, radio, television, or web programme director, or film producer in helping interpret science, research and technology to the public. UNESCO Kalinga Prize winners know the potential power of science, technology, and research in improving public welfare, enriching the cultural heritage of nations and providing solutions to societal problems on the local, regional and global level.
French scientist and author Jean-Pierre Luminet will be awarded the 2021 UNESCO Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science. The prize-giving ceremony will take place online on 5 November as part of the celebration of World Science Day for Peace and Development.
An independent international jury selected Jean-Pierre Luminet recognizing his longstanding commitment to the popularization of science. Mr Luminet is a distinguished astrophysicist and cosmologist who has been promoting the values of scientific research through a wide variety of media: he has created popular science books and novels, beautifully illustrated exhibition catalogues, poetry, audiovisual materials for children and documentaries, notably “Du Big Bang au vivant” with Hubert Reeves. He is also an artist, engraver and sculptor and has collaborated with composers on musicals inspired by the sounds of the Universe.
His publications are model examples for communicating science to the public. Their scientific content is precise, rigorous and always state-of-the-art. He has written seven “scientific novels”, including “Le Secret de Copernic”, published in 2006. His recent book “Le destin de l’univers : trous noirs et énergie sombre”, about black holes and dark energy, was written for the general public and was praised for its outstanding scientific, historical, and literary qualities. Jean-Pierre Luminet’s work has been translated into a many languages including Chinese and Korean.
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There is a page for Luminet in both the French language and English language wikipedias. If you have the language skills, you might want to check out the French language essay as I found it to be more stylishly written.
Compare,
De par ses activités de poète, essayiste, romancier et scénariste, dans une œuvre voulant lier science, histoire, musique et art, il est également Officier des Arts et des Lettres.
With,
… Luminet has written fifteen science books,[4] seven historical novels,[4] TV documentaries,[5] and six poetry collections. He is an artist, an engraver, a sculptor, and a musician.
My rough translation of the French,
As a poet, essayaist, novelist, and a screenwriter in a body of work that brings together science, history, music and art, he is truly someone who has enriched the French cultural inheritance (which is what it means to be an Officer of Arts and Letters or Officier des Arts et des Lettres; see English language entry for Ordre des Arts et des Lettres).
Nuclear energy is not usually of much interest to me but there is a Canadian company doing some interesting work in that area. So, before getting to the news about the company’s move, here’s a general description of fusion energy and how General Fusion (the company) is approaching the clean energy problem, from a June 18, 2021 posting by Bob McDonald on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s (CBC) Quirks and Quarks blog (Note: Links have been removed),
Vancouver-based fusion energy company General Fusion has entered an agreement with the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority to build a nuclear fusion demonstration plant to be operational in 2025. It will take a unique approach to generating clean energy.
There is an industry joke that fusion energy has been 20 years away for 50 years. The quest to produce clean energy by duplicating the processes happening at the centre of the sun has been a difficult and expensive challenge.
It has yet to be accomplished on anything like a commercial scale. That is partly because on Earth the fusion process involves handling materials at extreme pressures and temperatures many times hotter than the surface of the sun.
The nuclear technology that has provided electricity for decades around the world relies on fission, which splits heavy atoms such as uranium into lighter elements, releasing energy. However, this produces hazardous and durable radioactive waste that must be stored, and more catastrophically has led to major accidents at Chernobyl and Fukushima.
Fusion is the opposite of fission. Lighter elements such as hydrogen are heated and compressed to fuse into heavier ones. This releases energy, but with a much smaller legacy of radioactive waste, and no risk of meltdown.
The world’s largest fusion reactor experiment, ITER (Latin for “the way”) [International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor] is currently under construction in southern France. It’s a massive international collaboration developing on fusion technology that’s been been explored since it was invented in the Soviet Union in the 1950s. It involves a doughnut-shaped metallic chamber called a tokamak that is surrounded by incredibly powerful superconducting magnets.
An electrically charged gas, or plasma, will be injected into the chamber where the magnets hold it, compressed and suspended, so it does not touch the walls and burn through them. The plasma will be heated to the unbelievable temperature of 150 million C, when fusion begins to take place.
And therein lies the problem. So far, experimental fusion reactors have required more energy to heat the plasma to start the fusion reaction than can be harvested from the reaction itself. Size is part of the problem. Demonstration reactors are small and meant to test equipment and materials, not produce power. ITER is supposed to be large enough to produce 10 times as much power as is required to heat up its plasma.
And that’s the holy grail of fusion: to produce enough power that the nuclear fusion reaction can become self-sustaining.
General Fusion takes a completely different approach by using mechanical pressure to contain and heat the plasma, rather than gigantic electromagnets. A series of powerful pistons surround a container of liquid metal with the hydrogen plasma in the centre. The pistons mechanically squeeze the liquid on all sides at once, heating the fuel by compression the way fuel in a diesel engine is compressed and heated in a cylinder until it ignites.
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Exciting, eh? If you have time, you may want to read McDonald’s June 18, 2021 posting for a few more details about General Fusion’s technology and for some embedded images.
At one point I was under the impression that General Fusion was involved with ITER but that seems to have been a misunderstanding on my part.
I first wrote about General Fusion in a December 2, 2011 posting titled: Burnaby-based company (Canada) challenges fossil fuel consumption with nuclear fusion. (For those unfamiliar with the Vancouver area, there’s the city of Vancouver and there’s Vancouver Metro, which includes the city of Vancouver and others in the region. Burnaby is part of Metro Vancouver; General Fusion is moving to Sea Island (near Vancouver Airport), in Richmond, which is also in Metro Vancouver.) Kenneth Chan’s October 20, 2021 article for the Daily Hive gives more detail about General Fusion’s new facilities (Note: A link has been removed),
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The new facility will span two buildings at 6020 and 6082 Russ Baker Way, near YVR’s [Vancouver Airport] South Terminal. This includes a larger building previously used for aircraft engine maintenance and repair.
The relocation process could start before the end of 2021, allowing the company to more than quadruple its workforce over the coming years. Currently, it employs about 140 people.
The Sea Island [in Richmond] facility will house its corporate offices, primary fusion technology development division, and many of its engineering laboratories. This new facility provides General Fusion with the ability to build a new demonstration prototype to support the commercialization of its magnetized target fusion technology.
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The company’s research and development into practical fusion technology as a zero-carbon power solution to address the world’s growing energy needs, while fighting climate change, is supported by the federal governments of Canada, US, and UK.
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General Fusion is backed by dozens of large global private investors, including Bezos Expeditions, which is the personal investment entity for Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. It has raised a total of about USD$200 million in financing to date.
“British Columbia is at the centre of a thriving, world-class technology innovation ecosystem, just the right place for us to continue investing in our growing workforce and the future of our company,” said Christofer Mowry, CEO of General Fusion, in a statement.
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Earlier this year, YVR also indicated it is considering allowing commercial and industrial developments on several hundred acres of under-utilized parcels of land next to the north and south runways, for uses that complement airport activities. This would also provide the airport with a new source of revenue, after major financial losses from the years-long impact of COVID-19.
