Tag Archives: Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada

Cities, technology, and some Vancouver (Canada) conversations

National Research Council of Canada

The National Research Council of Canada (NRC or sometimes NRCC) has started a new series of public engagement exercises based on the results from their last such project (Game changing technologies initiative) mentioned in my Jan. 30, 2015 posting. The report from that project ‘Summary of On-Line Dialogue with Stakeholders, February 9 – 27, 2015‘ has been released (from the summary’s overview),

Approximately 3000 invitations were sent out by NRC and collaborating organizations, including industry associations and other governmental organizations, to participate in a web-based, interactive dialogue. Participants were also welcomed to forward the invitation to members of their organization and their networks. In this early stage of NRC’s Game-Changing Technologies Initiative, emphasis was placed on selecting a diverse range of participants to ensure a wide breath of ideas and exchange. Once a few technology opportunities have been narrowed down by NRC, targeted consultation will take place for in-depth exploration.

Overall, 705 people registered on the web-based platform, with 261 active respondents (23% from industry; 22% from academia; 35% from government that included 26% from the Government of Canada; and 20% from the other category that included non-governmental organizations, interest groups, etc.). Sectors represented by the active participants included education, agriculture, management consulting, healthcare, research technology organizations, information and communications technologies, manufacturing, biotechnology, computer and electronics, aerospace, construction, finance, pharma and medicine, and public administration. Figure 1 outlines the distribution of active participants across Canada.

Once registered, participants were invited to review and provide input on up to seven opportunity areas:
• The cities of the future
• Prosperous and sustainable rural and remote communities
• Maintaining quality of life for an aging population
• Protecting Canadian security and  privacy
• Transforming the classroom for continuous and adaptive learning
• Next generation health care systems
• A safe, sustainable and profitable food industry (p. 4 of the PDF summary)

Here’s the invitation to participate in the ‘cities’ discussion (from a Jan. 22, 2016 email invite),

I would like to invite you to participate in the next phase of NRC’s Game-Changing Technologies Initiative, focused on the Cities of the Future. Participation will take place via an interactive on-line tool allowing participants to provide insights and to engage in exchanges with each other. The on-line tool is available at https://facpro.intersol.ca (User ID: Cities, Password: NRC) starting today and continuing until February 8, 2016. Input from stakeholders like you is critical to helping NRC identify game-changing technologies with the potential to improve Canada’s future competitiveness, productivity and quality of life.

In 2014, NRC began working with stakeholders to identify technology areas that have the potential for revolutionary impacts on Canadian prosperity and the lives of Canadians over the next 20 to 30 years. Through this process, we identified seven opportunities critical to Canada’s future, which were submitted for comments to a diverse range of thought-leaders from different backgrounds across Canada in February 2015. A summary of comments received is available at http://www.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/obj/doc/game_changing-revolutionnaires/game_changing_technologies_initiative_summary_of_dialogue.pdf (PDF, 3.71 MB).

We then selected The Cities of the Future as the first area for in-depth exploration with stakeholders and potential partners. The online exercise will focus on the challenges that Canadian cities will face in the coming decades, with the goal of selecting specific problems that have the potential for national R&D partnerships and disruptive socio-economic impacts for Canada. The outcomes of this exercise will be discussed at a national event (by invitation only) to take place in early 2016.

Please feel free to forward this invitation to members of your organization or your expert network who may also want to contribute. Should you or a member of your team have any questions about this initiative, please do not hesitate to contact Dr. Carl Caron at: Carl.Caron@nrc-cnrc.gc.ca … .

Before you rush off to participate, you might like to know how the participants’ dialogue was summarized (from the report),

The Opportunity: Urban areas are struggling to manage traffic congestion, provision of basic utilities, waste disposal, air quality and more. These issues will grow as more and more people migrate to large cities. Future technologies – such as connected vehicles, delivery drones, waste-to-energy systems, and self-repairing materials could enable sustainable, urban growth for Canada and the world.

Participant Response: Many participants pointed out that most of the technologies described in the opportunity area already exist/are under development. What is needed is pricing and performance improvements to increase scalability and market penetration. Participants that neither agreed nor disagreed stated that replacing aging infrastructure and high costs would be major stumbling blocks. It was suggestedthat the focus should be on a shift to smaller, interconnectedsatellite communities capable of scalable energy production and distribution,local food production, waste management, and recreational space. (p. 6)

Cities rising in important as political entities

There’s a notion that cities as they continue growing will become the most important governance structure in most people’s lives and judging from the NRC’s list, it would seem that organization recognizes the rising importance of cities, if not their future dominance.

Parag Khanna wrote a February 2011 essay (When cities rule the world) for McKinsey & Company making the argument for city dominance in the future. For anyone not familiar with Khanna (from his eponymous website),

Parag Khanna is a leading global strategist, world traveler, and best-selling author. He is a CNN Global Contributor and Senior Research Fellow in the Centre on Asia and Globalisation at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. He is also the Managing Partner of Hybrid Reality, a boutique geostrategic advisory firm, and Co-Founder & CEO of Factotum, a leading content branding agency.

Given that Singapore is a city and a state, Khanna would seem uniquely placed to comment on the possibilities. Here are a few comments from Khanna’s essay,

The 21st century will not be dominated by America or China, Brazil or India, but by The City. In a world that increasingly appears ungovernable, cities—not states—are the islands of governance on which the future world order will be built. Cities are humanity’s real building blocks because of their economic size, population density, political dominance, and innovative edge. They are real “facts on the ground,” almost immeasurably more meaningful to most people in the world than often invisible national borders.

In this century, it will be the city—not the state—that becomes the nexus of economic and political power. Already, the world’s most important cities generate their own wealth and shape national politics as much as the reverse. The rise of global hubs in Asia is a much more important factor in the rebalancing of global power between West and East than the growth of Asian military power, which has been much slower. In terms of economic might, consider that just forty city-regions are responsible for over two-thirds of the total world economy and most of its innovation. To fuel further growth, an estimated $53 trillion will be invested in urban infrastructure in the coming two decades.

Vancouver conversations (cities and mass migrations)

On a somewhat related note (i.e., ‘global cities’ and the future), there’s going to be talk in Vancouver about ‘mass migrations’ and their impact on cities. From the Dante Society of British Columbia events page,

The Dante Alighieri Society of BC and ARPICO and are pleased to invite you to a public lecture “Global Nomads, Modern Caravanserais and Neighbourhood Commons” which will take place on January 27th at 7.00 pm at the Vancouver Public Library.
Please see details below.
———————————————————————-
Global Nomads, Modern Caravanserais and Neighbourhood Commons
Dr. Arianna Dagnino
Wednesday, January 27, 2016, 7.00 pm
Vancouver Public Library, Alma VanDusen Room, 350 W Georgia St., Vancouver BC V6B 6B1
—————————————————————————

Global cities such as Vancouver, London, Berlin or Sydney currently face two major challenges: housing affordability and the risk of highly fragmented societies along cultural lines.

In her talk “Global Nomads, Modern Caravanserais and Neighbourhood Commons” Dr. Dagnino argues that one of the possible solutions to address the negative aspects of economic globalization and the disruptive effects of mass-migrations is to envisage a new kind of housing complex, “the transcultural caravanserai.”

The caravanserai in itself is not a new concept: in late antiquity until the advent of the railway, this kind of structure functioned to lodge nomads along the caravan routes in the desert regions of Asia or North Africa and allowed people on the move to meet and interact with members of sedentary communities.

Dr. Dagnino re-visits the socio-cultural function of the caravanserai showing its potential as a polyfunctional hub of mutual hospitality and creative productivity. She also gives account of how contemporary architects and designers have already started to re-envisage the role of the caravanserai for the global city of the future not only as a transcultural “third space” that courageously cuts across ethnicities, cultures, and religions but also as a model for low-rise, high density urban complex. This model contemplates a mix of residential units, commercial and trades activities, craftsman workshops, arts studios, educational enterprises, and public spaces for active fruition, thus reinstating the productive use of property and the residents’ engagement with the Commons.
—————————————————————————
Dr. Arianna Dagnino is an Italian researcher, writer, and socio-cultural analyst. She holds an M.A. in Modern Foreign Languages and Literatures from l’Università  degli Studi di Genova and a Ph.D. in Sociology and Comparative Literature from the University of South Australia. She currently teaches at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, where she is conducting research in the field of transcultural studies. She is a Board Member of the newly-established Dante Alighieri Society of British Columbia (www.dantesocietybc.ca).
Dr. Dagnino research interest focuses on how socio-economic factors and cultural changes linked to global mobility shape identities, interpersonal relations, cultural practices, and urban environments. As an international journalist and scholar, Dr. Dagnino has travelled across and lived in various parts of the globe. Her neonomadic routes have led her to study Russian in Gorbachev’s Moscow, investigate the researchers’ quest for ground-breaking technologies at MIT in Boston, witness the momentous change of regime in South Africa, analyze the effects of multiculturalism in Australia, and examine the progressive Asianization of Western Canada. In her twenty-year long activity Dr. Dagnino has published several books on the socio-cultural impact of globalization, transnational flows, and digital technologies. Among them, I Nuovi Nomadi (New Nomads; Castelvecchi, 1996), Uoma (Woman-Machine, Mursia, 2000), and Jesus Christ Cyberstar (IPOC, 2009 [2002]). Dr. Dagnino is also the author of a transcultural novel, Fossili (Fossils, Fazi Editore, 2010), inspired by her four years spent in sub-Saharan Africa, and of the recently published book Transcultural Authors and Novels in the Age of Global Mobility (Purdue University Press, 2015).
—————————————————————————

Please join us for a presentation & lively discussion.

Date & Time: [Wednesday] January 27, 2016, 7.00 pm. Doors open at 6.45 pm.

Location: Vancouver Public Library, Alma VanDusen Room, 350 W Georgia St., Vancouver BC V6B 6B1
Parking is available underground in the library building with entrance on Hamilton Street near Robson until midnight.

Refreshments: Complimentary following the event
Admission: Free
RSVP: Registration is highly recommended as seating is limited. Please register at info@arpico.ca by January 25, 2016, or at Event Brite: Link to the event: https://goo.gl/phAxTw

We look forward to seeing you at the event.
Best Regards,
ARPICO – Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada
and The Dante Society of BC

Tickets are still available as of Jan. 27, 2016 at 1015 hours PST but you might want to hurry if you’re planning to register. *ETA Jan. 27, 2016 1150 hours PST, they are now putting people on a wait list.*

Vancouver conversations (Creating the New Vancouver)

There has been a great deal of discussion and controversy as Vancouverites become concerned over affordability and livability issues. The current political party ruling the City Council almost lost its majority position in a November 2014 election due to the controversial nature of the changes encouraged by the ruling party. The City Manager, Penny Ballem, was effectively fired September 2015 in what many saw as a response to the ongoing criticism over development issues. A few months later (November 2015) , the City’s chief planner abruptly retired. And, there’s more. (For the curious, you can start with Daniel Wood and his story on development plans on Vancouver’s downtown waterfront (Nov. 25, 2015 article for the Georgia Straight. You can also check out various stories on Bob Mackin’s website. Mackin is a local Vancouver journalist who closely follows the local political scene. There’s also Jeff Lee who writes for the Vancouver Sun newspaper and its ‘Civic Lee Speaking‘ blog but he does have a number of local human interest stories mixed in with his political pieces.)

Getting to the point: in the midst of all this activity and controversy, the Museum of Vancouver has opened a new exhibit, Your Future Home: Creating the New Vancouver,

From the Vancouver Urbanarium Society and the Museum of Vancouver comes the immersive and timely new exhibition, Your Future Home: Creating the New Vancouver

As it explores the hottest topics in Vancouver today—housing affordability, urban density, mobility, and public space—Your Future Home invites people to discover surprising facts about the city and imagine what Vancouver might become. This major exhibition engages visitors with the bold visual language and lingo of real estate advertising as it presents the visions of talented Vancouver designers about how we might design the cityscapes of the future. Throughout the run of the exhibition, visitors can deepen their experience through a series of programs, including workshops, happy hours, and debates among architectural, real estate and urban planning experts.

Events & Programs

Vancouver Debates I – Wednesday, January 20 [2016]
How and where will Vancouver and its region accommodate increased population? In densifying neighborhoods, where do issues of fairness, democracy, ecology and community preservation come into play? Should any areas be off limits? Hosted by Urbanarium. Featuring Joyce Drohan (pro), Brent Toderian (pro), Sam Sullivan (con), Michael Goldberg (con).

Built City Speaker Series II – Thursday, February 11 [2016]

The world’s industrial design processes are becoming more precise, more computerized and more perfect.  In contrast, buildings are still hand-made, imperfect and almost crude.  D’Arcy Jones will present recent studio work, highlighting their successes and failures in the pursuit of craft within the limits of contemporary construction. Visual artist, Germaine Koh’s public interventions and urban situations cultivate an active citizenry through play and conceptual provocation. She will present Home Made Home, her project for building small dwellings, which promotes DIY community building and creative strategies for occupying urban space. More Info.

Talk & Tours
Intimate conversations with designers, architects and curators during tours of the exhibition.

Happy Hours
The most edutaining night of the week. Have a drink, watch a presentation. MOV combines learning with a fun, tsocial experience.

Out & About Walking Tours
Explorations of Vancouver architecture and infrastructure, led by urban experts.

Design Sundays Group Workshops
A series of workshops in April [2016] discussing the exhibition’s themes of housing affordability, urban density, mobility, and public space.

Interestingly and strangely, there’s no mention or discussion in the exhibit plans of the impact technology and science may have on Vancouver’s future even though the metropolitan area is abuzz with various science and technology startups and has two universities (University of British Columbia and Simon Fraser University) with considerable investment in science and technology studies.

Finally, it seems no matter where you live, the topic of ‘cities’ and their roles in our collective futures is of urgent interest.

A May 27, 2015 presentation on Bruno Pontecorvo in Vancouver (Canada)

A movie about Bruno Pontecorvo (a mover and shaker in the world of neutrino physics) is being hosted by ARPICO (Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada) on Wednesday, May 27, 2015. From a May 12, 2015 ARPICO announcement,

Maksimovic – The story of Bruno Pontecorvo

Prof. Samoil Bilenky will introduce a short movie on the life of Bruno Pontecorvo.

The movie will trace the main points of Bruno Pontecorvo’s life, a nuclear physicist, born in 1913 in Pisa (Italy) and dead in 1993 in Dubna (Russia).
Samoil Bilenky worked with Pontecorvo from 1975 until 1989 in Dubna where they developed the theory of neutrino masses and oscillations and proposed experiments on the search for neutrino oscillations.

The impact of Bruno Pontecorvo on neutrino physics is well recognized in the Scientific Community.

Prof. Samoil Bilenky obtained his doctoral degree at JINR (Joint Institute for Nuclear Research) in Dubna and collaborated with Bruno Pontecorvo for over a decade. He was also professor at the Moscow State University and later at SISSA (Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati) in Italy. He has been a visiting scientist at TRIUMF (Canada’s National Laboratory for Particle and Nuclear Physics) in Canada, at DESY (Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron) in Germany, at the University of Valencia (Spain), the University of Turin (Italy) and at the TU Munich (Germany).
In 2002 prof. Samoil Bilenky received the Bruno Pontecorvo Prize and in 1999 he received the Humboldt Research Award.

Here are location and other event details,

The story of Bruno Pontecorvo
  • May 27, 2015 – 7:15pm
  • Activity Room, Main Level – 480 Broughton St, Vancouver, BC
  • Underground pay parking is available – EasyPark – Lot 64
    Everyone is invited to a no-host dinner with the Board of Directors afterwards.

Enjoy!

Nano and the energy crisis, a March 25, 2014 presentation by Federico Rosei in Vancouver, Canada

ARPICO’s, Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada, is presenting a talk about the energy crisis and how nanoscience may help, which will be given by Federico Rosei, a nanoscientist based in Québec at the INRS (Institut national de la recherche scientifique). I don’t have much more information about the talk (from the March 4, 2014 ARPICO announcement),

Looming Energy Crisis & Possible Solutions
What is economically viable?
What is environmentally sustainable?
In the short term, in the long term…

Please join us for a presentation & lively discussion facilitated by

Federico Rosei, PhD
International award winning scientist, thinker and speaker

The exploration of the role of nanoscience in tomorrow’s energy solutions

There are more details about the speaker (from the ARPICO announcement),

Dr. Rosei’s research interests focus on the properties of nanostructured materials. Among numerous positions held, he is Canada Research Chair in Nanostructured Organic and Inorganic Materials, Professor & Director of INRS-Energy, Materials & Telecommunications, Universite du Quebec, Varennes (QC), and UNESCO Chair in Materials and Technologies for Energy Conversion, Saving and Storage. He has published over 170 articles in prestigious international journals and his publications have been cited over 4,500 times. He has received several awards, including the FQRNT Strategic Professorship, the Rutherford Memorial Medal in Chemistry from the Royal Society of Canada, and the Herzberg Medal from the Canadian Association of Physicists.

Dr. Rosei’s biographical notes have not been updat4ed as he has recently won two major awards as per my Feb. 4, 2014 posting about his E.W.R. Steacie Memorial Fellowship and my Jan. 27, 2014 posting about his 2014 Award for Research Excellence in Materials Chemistry from the Canadian Society for Chemistry.

Here are the event details,

Date & Time:      Tuesday, March 25, 2014, 7pm

Location:      Roundhouse Community Centre (Room C),
181 Roundhouse Mews, Vancouver, BC
(Yaletown-Roundhouse Sky Train Station, C21 & C23 Buses, Parking $3)

Refreshments:      Complimentary—coffee and cookies

Admission & RSVP:      Admission is free.

Registration at https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/looming-energy-crisis-possible-solutions-by-prof-federico-rosei-inrs-tickets-6582603745

I’m glad to see a talk about the energy crisis that’s geared to ways in which we might deal with it.

ARPICO offers scholarship for Canadian grad. students and young postdocs at Italy’s School on Neutron Scattering (SoNS)

ARPICO (Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada) is offering a scholarship (deadline Mar. 31, 2014) for Canadian students according to its Feb. 14, 2014 announcement,

ARPICO is pleased to announce the 2014 ARPICO Scholarship to attend the 12th School on Neutron Scattering Francesco Paolo Ricci:

http://www.sonsfpricci.org/
Erice (Italy) from 30 April to 9 May 2014

ARPICO invites graduate students and post-doctoral researchers
at Canadian Universities and Laboratories to apply.

How to apply:

* Graduate students and post-doctoral researchers at Canadian
Universities/Laboratories are eligible
* Please, send a cover letter and your CV to info@arpico.ca (.pdf format)

Deadline for application: March 31st, 2014

Scholarship covers for return-airfare from home institution to Italy,
school registration fee, lodging, and meals. The winner will be notified
by email by April 3rd, 2014.

For more information, please contact us at info@arpico.org

For anyone curious about Erice’s location in Italy, that would be the west coast of Sicily,

Erice (Vagabonda, May 2008) [downloaded from http://www.tripadvisor.ca/Tourism-g194757-Erice_Province_of_Trapani_Sicily-Vacations.html#17970260]

Erice (Vagabonda, May 2008) [downloaded from http://www.tripadvisor.ca/Tourism-g194757-Erice_Province_of_Trapani_Sicily-Vacations.html#17970260]

Good luck!

*Four Vancouver (Canada) science events: Policy Making and Science; Solving a global medical crisis with a particle accelerator; and Marc Garneau asks, Should Canada be in space?; light to quantum materials

It’s going to be busy in Vancouver (Canada) next week, if you plan your life around the city’s science events.

The first event, “The Art of Policy Making: What’s Science Got to Do With It?” is being held by the Canadian Association for the Advancement of Science. It will be held at lunchtime on Tuesday, November 26, 2013 at Simon Fraser University’s Harbour Centre campus in downtown Vancouver.

The Art of Policy Making:

What’s Science Got to Do With It?

Speaker: Andrew Petter, President of Simon Fraser University

Panelists: Adam Walters-Navigate Surgical Company, Vancouver, B.C. and David S. Fushtey, Senior Fellow,, Centre for Corporate Governance and Risk Management, SFU Beedie Faculty of Business, and Fellow, SFU Centre for Dialogue

Moderator: Bill Good, CKNW Radio, Vancouver, B.C.

Co-Chairs: Martin Zuckermann, D.Phil. (Oxon), FRSC, Emeritus Professor of Physics, McGill University

Olga A. Barrat, Ph.D., Research Scientist

Date: November 26, 2013

Location:
Simon Fraser University
Harbour Centre / Segal Centre
515 West Hastings, Vancouver
Registration: 11:30 a.m.
Presentation: 12:10 p.m.
Discussion: 12:50 – 1:45 p.m.

Pre-register via email at: caas@caas-acascience.org
Or by post to CAAS at the address or fax number noted below
Tickets: $35.00 (payable at the door by cash or cheque)
Information: caas@caas-acascience.org

For that price I hope they are including lunch. I did not realize we had a Canadian Association for the Advancement of Science (established in 1999) or that it was located in North Vancouver,

CANADIAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE
P.O. Box 75513, 3034 Edgemont Blvd., North Vancouver, B.C., Canada V7R 4X1 / Fax: 604-926-5806
www.caas-acascience.org

The next day, you can trot off to: ‘Medicine Accelerated: Canada’s role in the Medical Isotope Revolution’ (part of the Unveiling the Universe Lecture Series) will be held on Wednesday, 27 November 2013 from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM (PST) at Vancouver’s Science World., From the Nov. 15, 2013 TRIUMF;Canada’s National Laboratory for Particle and Nuclear Physics news release,

Medicine Accelerated: Canada’s role in the Medical Isotope Revolution

Join Science World and TRIUMF in welcoming Dr. Paul Schaffer for a free public lecture at the TELUS World of Science Wednesday November 27, 2013.  As part of the “Unveiling the Universe” lecture series presented by TRIUMF and Science World, Dr. Schaffer will be speaking about recent advances in radiopharmaceuticals and and their role in the diagnosis, treatment, and management of diseases such as cancer and Alzheimer’s. he also will be highlighting Canada’s leadership role in developing cyclotron particle-accelerator technology to create medical isotopes.  This lecture is offered in cooperation with ARPICO, the Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada. (www.arpico.ca).

Tickets are free but registration is required.

Visit http://medicine-accelerated.eventbrite.ca  to reserve your seat.

Doors open at 6pm with the lecture starting at 7pm.   There will be a Q&A session to follow.

A live webcast of the lecture will be available online (requires Silverlight plugin). Visit registration site for link.

About Paul Schaffer

Paul Schaffer is the Division Head of the Nuclear Medicine program at TRIUMF, Canada’s national lab for particle and nuclear physics in Vancouver, BC. He is responsible for maintaining TRIUMF’s medical isotope and radiotracer production programs in support of neurological and oncological research. He was recently recognized as one of British Columbia’s Top Forty under 40 by Business in Vancouver magazine

About Science World

Science World British Columbia is a not-for-profit organization that engages British Columbians in science and inspires future science and technology leadership throughout our province.

About TRIUMF

TRIUMF is Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics. It is owned and operated by a consortium of Canadian universities and is funded by a contribution through the National Research Council of Canada. The Province of British Columbia provides capital funding for the construction of buildings for the TRIUMF Laboratory.

There are some 23 General Admission tickets still available as of November 20, 2013 (9:15 am PST). This talk is likely to touch on TRIUMF’s recently ‘unveiled’ medical cyclotron (from my June 9, 2013 posting),

Today, Sunday, June 9, 2013, TRIUMF, Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics, and its partners announced that they have devised a technique for producing medical isotopes that is not dependent on materials from nuclear reactors. From the June 9, 2013 TRIUMF news release,

With Canadian-developed tools and technology, a national team led by TRIUMF has reached a crucial milestone at the BC Cancer Agency in developing and deploying alternatives for supplying key medical isotopes. The team used a medical cyclotron that was designed and manufactured by Advanced Cyclotron Systems, Inc. (ACSI) of Richmond, BC, and successfully achieved large-scale production of technetium-99m (Tc-99m), sufficient for a metropolitan area.

The team announced the successful ramp-up of its technology to regularly produce enough of the critical Tc-99m isotope to supply an urban area the size of Vancouver. This achievement eliminates the need for nuclear reactors to produce isotopes, especially those that use weaponsgrade uranium, which has been the traditional approach.

ETA Nov. 25, 2013: There’s a Nov. 22, 2013 news item (Medical isotope supply interrupted across Canada; Delivery of one isotope to hospitals down to less than 50 per cent of normal) on CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) News online about the latest shortage of medical isotopes.

The third event is being hosted by Canadian Member of Parliament,(Liberal) Joyce Murray (Vancouver Quadra) on Friday, November 29, 2013 at Enigma Restaurant on W. 10th Avenue near the University of British Columbia. From the November 15, 2013, invitation,

Please join Member of Parliament Joyce Murray at her Friday November 29th MP Breakfast Connections discussion with guest speaker Marc Garneau, MP: “Does Canada need a Space Program?”

 Be part of the conversation with Canada’s first Astronaut and former President of Canada’s National Space Agency, Marc Garneau.  Canada’s Space Agency began in 1990, with a mission to lead the development and application of space knowledge for the benefit of Canadians and humanity.  Canadians have made significant contributions to space travel with the robotic Canadarm, developed in part here in British Columbia, by MacDonald Dettweiler, and we were all enthralled last year when Canadian Chris Hadfield was commander of the International Space Station and shared his experiences from space.  Is there a future for Canada’s  Space Agency?  Let’s ask Marc!

Details:

Friday, November 29, 2013

7:30 – Registration + Buffet Breakfast

7:50 – 8:45 Speaker + Q and A

Enigma Restaurant – 4397 W. 10th Ave. (Off Trimble) (map)

The cost of the breakfast is $20 / $10 for students.

(Cash only at the door)

Please RSVP to joyce.murray.c1c@parl.gc.ca or by calling 604-664-9220.

Interestingly, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfleld has been in Vancouver giving interviews (Nov. 18, 2013 on The Rush television programme), as he’s been promoting his new book, An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth. You can find out more about the book at http://chrishadfield.ca/

Btw, I have been to Joyce’s breakfasts before and they serve a good breakfast at Enigma.

*As of Nov. 20, 2013, 2:30 pm PDT: I’m adding one more event: Vancouver’s Café Scientifique is being held in the back room of the The Railway Club (2nd floor of 579 Dunsmuir St. [at Seymour St.], Vancouver, Canada), on Tuesday, November 26,  2013 at 7:30 pm. Here’s the talk description (from the Nov. 20,, 2013 announcement,

Our speaker for the evening will be Dr. Andrea Damascelli.

From Light Quanta to Quantum Materials

he photoelectric effect – the ejection of electrons from a solid consequent to the absorption of light – was discovered by Hertz in 1887 and explained by Einstein in 1905 on the basis of the revolutionary hypothesis of Light Quanta, or photons. This intuition, which gave Einstein the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1921, marked the beginning of quantum physics and also of photoelectric spectroscopy, one of the most active fields in modern science and technology. Owing to recent technical progress and in particular to the development of third generation synchrotron sources – particle accelerators in which electrons traveling at nearly the speed of light generate the most brilliant light available to scientists – the last decade witnessed a renaissance in this technique and its applications. These have now become the primary tools in the study of emerging Quantum Materials, systems which manifest a wide range of astonishing electronic and magnetic phenomena and with the potential to revolutionize consumer electronics, telecommunications, next-generation computing, alternative energy, and medicine.

You can find Dr. Damascelli’s profile page here on the University of British Columbia website.

Inside story on doping; build it and they will collide; and physicist, feminist, and philosopher superstar Evelyn Fox Keller visits

Here are a few events being held in Vancouver (Canada) over the next weeks and months. This is not an exhaustive list (three events) but it certainly offers a wide range of topics.

Inside story on doping

First, Café Scientifique will be holding a meeting on the subject of doping and athletic pursuits at The Railway Club on the 2nd floor of 579 Dunsmuir St. (at Seymour St.) next Tuesday,

Our next café will happen on Tuesday January 29th, 7:30pm at The Railway Club. Our speaker for the evening will be Dr. Jim Rupert.[School of Kinesiology, University of British Columbia]

The title and abstract for his café is:

The use of genetics in doping and in doping control

Sports performance is an outcome of the complex interactions between an athlete’s genes and the environment(s) in which he or she develops and competes.  As more is learned about the contribution of genetics to athletic ability, concerns have been raised that unscrupulous athletes will attempt manipulate their DNA in an attempt to get an ‘edge‘ over the competition. The World Anti-doping Agency (WADA) has invested research funds to evaluate this possibility and to support studies into methods to detect so-called “gene doping”.  Superimposed on these concerns is the realisation that, in addition to contributing to performance, an athlete’s genes may influence the results of current doping-control tests. Natural genetic variation is an issue that anti-doping authorities must address as more is learned about the interaction between genotype and the responses to prohibited practices. To help differentiate between naturally occurring deviations in blood and urine ‘markers’ and those potentially caused by doping, the ‘biological-passport’ program uses intra-individual variability rather than population values to establish an athlete’s parameters.  The next step in ‘personalised’ doping-control may be the inclusion of genetic data; however, while this may benefit ‘clean’ athletes, it will do so at the expense of risks to privacy.  In my talk, I will describe some examples of the intersection of genetics and doping-control, and discuss how genetic technology might be used to both enhance physical performance as well as to detect athletes attempting to do so.

This is a timely topic  given hugely lauded Lance Armstrong’s recent confession that he was doping when he won his multiple cycling awards. From the Lance Armstrong essay on Wikipedia (Note: Footnotes and links have been removed),

Lance Edward Armstrong (born Lance Edward Gunderson, September 18, 1971) is an American former professional road racing cyclist. Armstrong was awarded victory in the Tour de France a record seven consecutive times between 1999 and 2005, but in 2012 he was disqualified from all his results since August 1998 for using and distributing performance-enhancing drugs, and he was banned from professional cycling for life. Armstrong did not appeal the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. Armstrong confessed to doping in a television interview in January 2013, two-and-a-half months after the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI), the sport’s governing body, announced its decision to accept USADA’s findings regarding him, and after he had consistently denied it throughout his career.

Build it and they will collide

Next, both TRIUMF (Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics) and ARPICO (Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada) have sent Jan. 23, 2013 news releases concerning Dr. Lyn Evans and his talk about building the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN (European Particle Physics Laboratory) which led to the discovery of the Higgs Boson. The talk will be held at 6:30 pm on Feb. 20, 2013 at Telus World of Science, 1455 Quebec Street, Vancouver,

Fundamental Physics Prize winner to deliver public lecture Wed. Feb. 20 at Science World

Back to the Big Bang – From the LHC to the Higgs, and Beyond
Unveiling the Universe Lecture Series
Wednesday, 20 February 2013 at 6:30 PM (PST)
Vancouver, British Columbia

(Vancouver, B.C.)  The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is history’s most powerful atom smasher, capable of recreating the conditions that existed less than a billionth of a second after the Big Bang. The construction of the LHC was a massive engineering challenge that spanned almost 15 years, yielding the most technologically sophisticated instrument mankind ever has created.

Join Science World and TRIUMF in welcoming Dr. Lyn Evans, project leader for the LHC construction, in his Milner Foundation Special Fundamental Physics Prize lecture. In this free event, Dr Evans will detail some of the design features and technical challenges that make the LHC such an awe-inspiring scientific instrument. He will also discuss recent results from the LHC and touch on what’s next in the world of high-energy physics. The lecture will be followed by an audience question and answer session.

Dr Evans, born in Wales in 1945, has spent his whole career in the field of high energy physics and particle accelerators. In 2012, he was awarded the Special Fundamental Physics Prize for his contribution to the discovery of the Higgs-like boson. See http://www.fundamentalphysicsprize.org

Tickets are free, but registration is required.

See  http://fpplecture.eventbrite.ca

Physicist, feminist, philosopher superstar Evelyn Fox Keller

Here’s the information available from the Situating Science Cluster Winter 2013 newsletter,

The UBC [University of British Columbia] Node and partners are pleased to welcome Dr. Evelyn Fox Keller as Cluster Visiting Scholar Th. April 4th. The Node and partners continue to support the UBC STS [University of British Columbia Science and Technology Studies] colloquium.

There is more information Fox Keller and the first talk she gave to kick off this Canadawide tour in an Oct. 29, 2012 posting. She will be visiting the University of Alberta and the University of Calgary (Alberta) just prior to the April 4, 2013 visit to Vancouver. There are no further details about Fox Keller’s upcoming visit either on the Situating Science website or on the UBC website.

Get on the waiting list for Professor Gino Segrè’s talk on Galileo & the Higgs Boson on November 20, 2012 in Vancouver

Sadly, I didn’t get the notice until late Friday, Nov. 3, 2012 but on a happier note it looks like Vancouver is really embracing physics. Professor Gino Segrè will be discussing the history of physics and more in a talk titled, Physics From Galileo to the Higgs Boson, which, as of today, is waiting list only.

The talk will take place on Tuesday, Nov. 20, 2012 from 6:30 to 8 pm at Vancouver’s TELUS World of Science. From the ARPICO (Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada) announcement,

Physics From Galileo to the Higgs Boson
Unveiling the Universe Lecture Series
Tuesday, 20 November 2012 from 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM (PST)
Telus World of Science
1455 Quebec Street 
Vancouver, British Columbia V6A 3Z7

This event is co-sponsored by TRIUMF, the Embassy of Italy in Ottawa,
Science World, CMC Engineering Group and the Consulate General Of Italy
at Vancouver.

I gather Segrè has a very personal take on some of the history,

Gino Segrè is a physics professor emeritus at the University of
Pennsylvania and the author of three popular science books, including
“Faust in Copenhagen”. He was the winner of the American Institute of
Physics Award for Best Science Writing. His lecture, entitled “Physics
in Florence from Galileo to the Higgs Boson”, will chart the history of
physics as it grew from the influence of Galileo, his disciples, and the
spirit of exploration in 17th century Florence, to the present day, with
the most recent dramatic example being the discovery of the Higgs boson.
Gino Segrè is also the nephew of 1959 Nobel Laureate Emilio Segrè, and
will be introduced by Ms. Olivia Fermi, granddaughter of 1938 Nobel
Laureate Enrico Fermi. [emphasis mine]

You can arrange to get on the waiting list here and, as encouragement to get on the list, here’s what the event organizers have posted,

Event is sold out at present but more seating likely will become available. Those on the waitlist will be notified automatically if new seating has been added.

Good luck!

Memory of the world

The fact that UNESCO will be holding its International Conference: “Memory of the World in the Digital Age: Digitization and Preservation” in Vancouver (Canada), Sept. 26 – 28, 2012 was one of the many snippets of information that Luciana Duranti, Chair and Professor at the School of Library, Archival and Information Studies at the University of British Columbia, passed on during her talk on Thursday, May 17, 2012 in Vancouver.

Organized by ARPICO (Society of Italian Researchers and Professionals in Western Canada), Duranti’s talk Trust and Authenticity in the Digital Environment: An Increasingly Cloudy Issue, first delved into definitions of trust, authenticity and cloud computing before focusing on the issues presented by storing our data on the  ‘cloud’. As Duranti noted, this is a return, of sorts, to the 60s and its mainframe environment.  However, unlike the 60s our data is not stored on one server, it may be split amongst many servers in many countries making our data quite vulnerable. For example, different laws in different countries means you can lose data if the legal situation changes as it did in the US recently.  According to Duranti (as best as I can recall), one of Megaupload’s servers has been shut down in the state of Virginia because of a problem with data from one business. Unfortunately, all of the data held there was also destroyed.

On investigating this further, I found a more general discussion of the situation with Megaupload on Techdirt (May 1, 2012 posting by Mike Masnick) which highlights law professor Eric Goldman’s extraordinary indictment of the government’s action in his April 20, 2012 posting, excerpt of 2nd point,

2) Taking Megaupload offline. Megaupload’s website is analogous to a printing press that constantly published new content. Under our Constitution, the government can’t simply shut down a printing press, but that’s basically what our government did when it turned Megaupload off and seized all of the assets. Not surprisingly, shutting down a printing press suppresses countless legitimate content publications by legitimate users of Megaupload. Surprisingly (shockingly, even), the government apparently doesn’t care about this “collateral,” entirely foreseeable and deeply unconstitutional effect. The government’s further insistence that all user data, even legitimate data, should be destroyed is even more shocking. Destroying the evidence not only screws over the legitimate users, but it may make it impossible for Megaupload to mount a proper defense. It’s depressing our government isn’t above such cheap tricks in its zeal to win.

As Masnick notes on Techdirt,

The more we hear and see about the government’s case against Megaupload, it really appears that the government was relying almost entirely on the fact that Megaupload looked bad. It’s hard to deny that there were plenty of things that Kim (in particular) [CEO Kim Dotcom] did that makes him appear pretty obnoxious. But being a crass showoff doesn’t automatically make you a criminal.

The Jan. 19, 2012 article by Nate Anderson for Ars Technica seems more sympathetic to the government’s position, initially,

The US government dropped a nuclear bomb on “cyberlocker” site Megaupload today, seizing its domain names, grabbing $50 million in assets, and getting New Zealand police to arrest four of the site’s key employees, including enigmatic founder Kim Dotcom. In a 72-page indictment unsealed in a Virginia federal court, prosecutors charged that the site earned more than $175 million since its founding in 2005, most of it based on copyright infringement.

As for the site’s employees, they were paid lavishly and they spent lavishly. Even the graphic designer, 35-year-old Slovakian resident Julius Bencko, made more than $1 million in 2010 alone.

The indictment goes after six individuals, who between them owned 14 Mercedes-Benz automobiles with license plates such as “POLICE,” “MAFIA,” “V,” “STONED,” “CEO,” “HACKER,” GOOD,” “EVIL,” and—perhaps presciently—”GUILTY.” The group also had a 2010 Maserati, a 2008 Rolls-Royce, and a 1989 Lamborghini. They had not one but three Samsung 83″ TVs, and two Sharp 108″ TVs. Someone owned a “Predator statue.” …

Yet the indictment seems odd in some ways. When Viacom made many of the same charges against YouTube, it didn’t go to the government and try to get Eric Schmidt or Chad Hurley arrested.

Anderson mentions that Megaupload had 525 servers in Virginia state and many more around the world. (I’m not sure why Duranti stated that one server had been shut down in Virginia but perhaps she was using it as an example to demonstrate what happens when just one server is shut down.) Regardless of whether it’s one server or 525 , I’m with Eric Goldman when he points out that destroying legitimate data is shocking.

Duranti’s talk was illuminating and I look forward to hearing more about these issues when the UNESCO conference takes place here in Vancouver next September. From the conference news webpage,

Digital information has economic value as a cultural product and as a source of knowledge. It plays a major role in national sustainable development as, increasingly, personal, governmental and commercial information is created in digital form only. But digitized national assets also constitute an immense wealth of the countries concerned and of society at large. The disappearance of this heritage will engender economic and cultural impoverishment and hamper the advancement of knowledge.

Ensuring digital continuity of content can only be overcome if a range of legal, technological, social, financial, political and other obstacles are addressed. The Vancouver Conference therefore seeks to achieve:

  • the launch of specific initiatives related to digital preservation and to the fostering of access to documentary heritage through digitization;
  • the revision of the UNESCO Charter on the Preservation of Digital Heritage;
  • the identification of the legal frameworks and solutions to facilitate long-term digital preservation;
  • the agreement on the promotion and/or development of exchange standards;
  • the definition of the respective roles and responsibilities of all stakeholders and elaboration of a cooperation model.

I have mentioned Duranti and issues relating to digitization and archives before (March 8, 2012 posting: Digital disaster).