Cafe2010

DATE	PRESENTER	TITLE
29-Jul-10	Asst/P Ionat Zurr	SymbioticA – The Centre of Excellence in Biological Arts
15-Jul-10	A/P Mark Yim	Modular Reconfigurable Robots
28-Jun-10	Ms Maria Isabel Garcia	When Culture Meets Science How does culture influence the practice and communication of science and vice-versa?
25-Jun-10	A/P Vincent Hugel & A/P Nicolas Jouandeau	Research & RoboCup with NAO Humanoid Robots
27-May-10	Dr Timothy J Killeen	The Cardamom Conundrum Reconciling Conservation & Development in the Kingdom of Cambodia
24-May-10	Dr Stuart Kohlhagen	The Square Kilometre Array Project
13-May-10	Prof Vlatko Vedral	Decoding Reality The Universe as Quantum Information
6-May-10	Prof Patricia Vickers-Rich	Reading Rocks Uncovering Secrets of the Past
21-Apr-10	Dr Paul F Clark	Hairy Crab & Chips
10-Mar-10	Dr Sutherland K Maciver	The Nature of the Continued Threat to Humankind from Bacterial Pathogens
04-Feb-10	Prof Chris Margules	Conservation Planning What? Where? How Much?
TENTATIVE/PROSPECTIVE CAFÉS For your information only. Your suggestions of presenters and/or topics will be much appreciated.
01-Sep-10	Mr Peter McLeish	????? On The Red Sprites Phenomena ?????
??-???-10	Capt Michael Caston	Flight Simulators
??-???-10	Prof Venni Venkata Krishna	????? On the Social Anthropological Aspects of Science and Technology in (Modern) Singapore Society ?????

DETAILS

Date of Café Time @ Venue
Presenter, Organisation / Supporters
Title : Synopsis

29 Jul 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Asst/P Ionat Zurr, SymbioticA, University of Western Australia
SymbioticA – The Centre of Excellence in Biological Arts ... Neurons cells moving a robotic arm. Stem cells grown to shapes of wings. A fungi dress. ... These are all projects created at SymbioticA – The Centre of Excellence in Biological Arts, in the School of Anatomy and Human Biology at the University of Western Australia. SymbioticA is an artistic laboratory dedicated to the research, learning, critique and hands-on engagement of the life sciences. It is the first research laboratory of its kind in the world, in that it enables artists to engage in wet biology practices in a biological science department. SymbioticA offers a new means of artistic inquiry, one in which artists actively use the tools and technologies of science, not just to comment about them, but also to explore their possibilities.

15 Jul 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
A/P Mark Yim, GRASP Lab, University of Pennslyvannia
Modular Reconfigurable Robots ... are robots built from many copies of a few simple modular types, (similar to LEGO® bricks or cells in mammals). A modular robot that can reconfigure itself – change its shape by re-arranging its modules – can “morph” to meet the demands of changing tasks and environments. As the numbers of modules increase to hundreds or thousands or millions, how are they to be built? programmed? maintained? These problems are rich in interesting problems including: distributed computation and control, modular design, reconfiguration planning, motion planning, and others. We will show progress on several modular reconfigurable robot systems including programmable matter, self-folding origami, forming shapes by folding chains and by shaking tables, and scaling of systems in size and numbers.

28 Jun 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Ms Maria Isabel Garcia, The Mind Museum, Philippines
When Culture Meets Science : How does culture influence the practice and communication of science and vice-versa? ... Does culture or the cultural environment affect or even determine the teaching and learning, and even the practice of science? This café aims to catch glimpses of different cultures and their impact on science in their own settings. We shall begin, for example, with how evolution is explained or taught in a superstitious culture like in the Philippines and how the public understanding of science is changing this. We can then proceed to study other cultural settings and their effects on science within their own societies. For this session, we hope to capture and exchange insights on the dynamics between culture and science.

25 Jun 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
A/Prof Vincent Hugel, Université de Versailles Saint Quentin-en-Yvelines &
A/Prof Nicolas Jouandeau, Université Paris 8
Research & RoboCup with NAO Humanoid Robots ... "Our main research objective consists of endowing legged robots with autonomous skills that allow them to operate in unknown human-scale environments and to achieve useful tasks. In the long term, human-size biped robots can be used to assist elderly or disabled people at home. They should be able to move and manipulate objects in the same way humans do inside furnished homes, and they must be able to interact with people and to behave naturally to be accepted as human-like machines. To achieve this goal may appear ambitious, but researchers of robotics have started to implement artificial intelligence into legged robots, and more and more progress is being made each year. Firstly, a biped robot must master how to walk efficiently in every direction on every kind of surface without falling down. Locomotion must be robust and resist perturbations such as pushing or stumbling. That is where feedback from exteroceptive sensors such as inertial sensor and foot pressure sensor comes in useful. Secondly, the robot must be able to detect objects in the environment through vision. The challenge here is to extract enough correct visual information at video rates despite varying lighting conditions. Thirdly, the robot must be capable of exploiting visual information to self-localize in the environment, and in the best case, to make a 'map' of it using appropriate landmarks. Then it must adopt behaviours depending on the tasks assigned to it by the human supervisor." The RoboCup Competition is an excellent test bed to implement and check locomotion, visual, localization and behavioural skills that are designed for our legged robots. RoboCup is an international event that regroups research teams from all over the world who compete in the different robotics leagues, namely rescue, small-size, middle-size, simulation or standard platform leagues. Our team Les Trois Mousquetaires is involved in the standard platform league where all teams have to program NAO humanoid robots to play soccer. (NAO robots are built by Aldebaran Robotics, a French company.) Therefore, the difference between teams only comes from the design quality of the embedded software. In this league, 3 NAO robots play against 3 other robots on a green carpet. One goal is blue, the other is yellow. The ball is orange. There is no wall around the field, and white lines delimit the pitch and the penalty areas. The participation in this league entails equipping the robots with autonomous skills. These skills allow the robots to operate on the playing field (considered as an a priori known environment) and adopt efficient individual and collective strategies to play soccer to score the maximum number of goals. In addition to the soccer tournament, the league also organizes challenges where teams must show original developments that may improve the quality of their robots’ behaviour in future years. "Our Les Trois Mousquetaires team is pleased to present its research activities on the NAO humanoid robots at this Café. The talk will be illustrated with RoboCup videos and live demonstrations of the NAO robot’s walking, ball-tracking and visual feedback capabilities. The presentation will be interactive and the audience will be invited to comment and ask questions throughout the talk." Videoclips: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSKRgasUEko ; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbnELOZbsls

27 May 2010 7pm @ Mendel Auditorium
Dr Timothy J Killeen, Conservation International, Singapore
The Cardamom Conundrum : Reconciling Conservation & Development in the Kingdom of Cambodia ... Cambodian society faces a paradox in deciding how to reconcile the need for economic growth with the equally important priority to conserve its unique natural heritage. The solution to this paradox is akin to solving a puzzle where different pieces of the national development strategy are arranged so that policies designed to create wealth and generate jobs are complimentary to those that protect the goods and services provided by natural ecosystems. Many view these two policy agenda as contradictory, but Dr Killeen will demonstrate that the conservation of natural ecosystems can be beneficial to the national economy and that the wise management of the natural resources of the region will promote economic growth in the short, medium and long-term.

24 May 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Dr Stuart Kohlhagen, Questacon, Australia
The Square Kilometre Array Project ... will be one of the largest scientific undertakings of our generation. It is supported by a wide range of countries, and will revolutionise how we explore and understand the universe, its origins, structure and fate. In order to realise this ambitious facility, new technologies are being developed to improve radio signal reception and processing, new computer architecture at least a 100 times as powerful as today's best supercomputers will need to be developed. The project will help answer some of the remaining fundamental questions regarding cosmology, and the new technologies supporting the endeavour will find their way into our lives in ways we can only begin to imagine. We might even finally get the space food sticks we were promised in the 60's! Come learn from the overview our host will be giving.

13 May 2010 7pm @ Mendel Auditorium
Prof Vlatko Vedral, Centre for Quantum Technologies / National University of Singapore
Decoding Reality: The Universe as Quantum Information ... What if the fundamental entity is not energy or matter, but information? Prof Verdal explores this hypothesis using evidence that suggests the quantum world, once thought to be limited to the tiniest scales, may reach much further – thereby challenging our concepts of particles, of time, of determinism, and of reality itself!

06 May 2010 7pm @ Hall B
Prof Patricia Vickers-Rich, Monash Science Centre, Monash University, Australia
Reading Rocks – Uncovering Secrets of the Past ... Geologists really have a good job. They spend most of their days, whether in the field or in the lab, or even just reading, trying to solve the mysteries of the past – they are detectives of the distant past. They do this by taking careful note of the rocks and fossils that most people just ignore or use to build their houses, their buildings, sidewalks, roads, … or even kitchen benches. But these building materials hold great secrets, and if you are a geologist, you learn how to read those very rocks. They tell tales of animals and plants long extinct. They tell the tales of catastrophes of the past, and of the “winners” and “losers” during these great events. They give us advice about how to plan our future, if indeed human existence is to be sustainable. Time-permitting, Pat and her colleague will lead us through her exhibition, Wildlife of Gondwana, which is now at Science Centre Singapore.

21 Apr 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Dr Paul F Clark, Natural History Museum, London / National University of Singapore
Hairy Crab & Chips ... The hairy crab has been part of the rich cultural culinary experience for many centuries: in East Asia, it is regarded as a delicacy. During the 1970s, this native Chinese crab was accidentally introduced into the River Thames, London. Within a relatively short period of time, the hairy crab became a real nuisance and is now regarded as a pest. Is commercial exploitation and possible exportation of the hairy crab from London to SE Asia a viable means of controlling this crab in the River Thames?

10 Mar 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Dr Sutherland Kester Maciver, The University of Edinburgh / British Council Singapore
The Nature of the Continued Threat to Humankind from Bacterial Pathogens ... Throughout history, human populations have periodically experienced waves of bacterial pathogens such as the great plagues. Although the situation seems under control (for now), we are still at risk. Understanding the difference between human-specific and generalist bacterial pathogens is thus very important! If we are only threatened by human-specific pathogens, then we can be reasonably sure that we have seen them all and probably know how to deal with most of them. New threats in this case, would be limited to mutations or acquisition of new pathogenicities of these familiar bacteria. On the other hand, if it is true that we mainly succumb to generalist bacterial pathogens, then we face a much less predictable situation because we may then be facing new emerging pathogens of which we have little prior knowledge.

04 Feb 2010 7pm @ Maxwell Auditorium
Prof Chris Margules, Conservation International / Conservation International, Singapore
Conservation Planning: What? Where? How Much? ... A procedure is described for identifying areas within landscapes or seascapes that should have priority for the allocation of scarce biodiversity conservation resources. Biodiversity spans the biological hierarchy from alleles through genotypes to species, phyla and kingdoms, with numerous viable configurations at all levels. There is no accepted absolute measure. Therefore, biodiversity is measured in a relative way called complementarity: the degree of similarity or difference among species, habitat types, populations, etc, between places. Goals for biodiversity protection are discussed and have to be set. Flexible tools for identifying priority areas are then described, which incorporate cost trade-offs and other spatial constraints.

xx Sep 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Mr Peter McLeish, Sky-Fire Productions, USA
Red Sprites ...

?? ??? 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Capt Michael Caston, Flight Experience Singapore
Flight Simulators ... This presentation will include the evolution and history of flight simulators and their uses in Aviation training and education.

?? ??? 2010 7pm @ Newton Room
Prof Venni Venkata Krishna, National University of Singapore
... ... ????? On the Social Anthropological Aspects of Science and Technology in (Modern) Singapore Society ?????