UBC Feature Web Site
e-Strategy:
UBC This Week is a weekly summary of UBC people in the news, recent media releases and upcoming event highlights. UBC This Week past issues are also available on-line.
Sign up for UBC This Week and other UBC Public Affairs e-mail services at www.publicaffairs.ubc.ca/eservices.
Recent UBC Media Releases
Upcoming Event Highlights
- Jun. 10: Seeing is Believing: Photographs from the MOA Archives
- Jun. 12: Roundtable Forum: On-Campus Student Housing and the Vancouver Campus Plan
- Jun. 15: Sunday Mass at St. Mark’s College
- Jun. 16: Income-related equity in health care services use and physician practice characteristics: What is the relationship?
- Jun. 19: “A Partnership of Peoples” Exhibit
Find out what else is happening at UBC this week. For sports events, visit the UBC Athletics site at www.gothunderbirds.ca/schedule.asp.
UBC People
- Researchers receive Career Investigator awards
- Student receives scholarship for robot that sees and self-corrects
- UBC midwifery director receives honorary degree
- Spotlight on UBC’s people practices
- Borealis quartet to perform downtown
- Kunqu performance comes to Vancouver
- Conference looks at intersection of law and theatre
- Café Scientifique breaks the silence of men’s mental health
- Eden Robinson to read at Robson Reading Series
- Public lecture on SAD and light therapy
UBC People
Researchers receive Career Investigator awards
Assist. Prof. Ninan Abraham, Departments of Microbiology and Immunology and Zoology; Assoc. Prof. Nelly Pante, Department of Zoology; and Assist. Prof. Suzana Straus, Department of Chemistry, have received 2008 Career Investigator Awards from the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research. Their funded projects will look at how antimicrobial peptides and lipopeptides function – research with implications for the design of better antibiotics; the growth and proper functioning of T cells; and how viruses deliver their genome to the cell nucleus.
For more information, visit www.science.ubc.ca/news/179
Student receives scholarship for robot that sees and self-corrects
PhD student Ambrose Chan, Department of Mechanical Engineering, has received the 2008 Gordon M. MacNabb Scholarship presented by Precarn Incorporated for his work entitled Visual Servoing of Mobile Eye-In-Hand Manipulators to Objects with Model Uncertainties.
Under the co-supervision of Prof. Elizabeth Croft, Department of Mechanical Engineering, and Prof. James Little, Department of Computer Science, Chan intends to develop a vision-based robot controller capable of planning and updating robot motion for target finding and picking, while simultaneously refining its model of the target object and the environment through ongoing visual input.
The Gordon M. MacNabb Scholarship Foundation was founded in 1993 as a charitable organization to support graduate students in the area of robotics and intelligent systems.
For more information, visit www.engineering.ubc.ca/news-events/article.php?page=/2008/05/mechanical-engineering-student-receives.html
UBC midwifery director receives honorary degree
Saraswathi Vedam, Director of Midwifery within the Department of Family Practice, Faculty of Medicine, was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science degree in May by Amherst College, a US liberal arts college of which she is an alumna.
Vedam was honoured for significant contributions to developing birth policy locally and worldwide. Since 2007, she has led the division of Midwifery within the Department of Family Practice as director and professor. The Midwifery Education Program is the only program for registered midwives in BC and the western provinces.
For more information, visit www.med.ubc.ca/news/Awards_and_Honours.htm
Spotlight on UBC’s people practices
Lisa Castle, Acting Vice-President of Finance and Administration and Associate Vice-President, Human Resources, will be presenting UBC’s Focus on People framework at the 2008 Canadian Association of University Business Officers (CAUBO) conference in Winnipeg this month. The framework outlines UBC’s people practices and commitment to employee engagement.
For more information on Focus on People, visit www.focusonpeople.ubc.ca
For more information on CAUBO, visit www.caubo.ca/index_e.cfm
Borealis quartet to perform downtown
UBC’s Borealis String Quartet will perform Passion of the Northern Lights to showcase repertoire from their spring tour.
Formed in the fall of 2000, the Borealis String Quartet is a quartet-in-residence at UBC, where they give regular master classes and teach chamber music at the School of Music.
Date: June 15
Time: 3 p.m.
Place: Christ Church Cathedral, 690 Burrard Street
Tickets: $25/$20; available at the door (discounts for Society members)
Info: www.borealisstringquartet.com/index.php
Kunqu performance comes to Vancouver
UBC and the Vancouver Society for Chinese Performing Arts will present the first Vancouver Kunqu performance with the visit of three Shanghai artists: Liang Guyin, Ji Zhenhua and Liu Yilong.
Kunqu – a synthesis of drama, opera, ballet, poetry and music – is one of the oldest literary styles of traditional Chinese theatre performed today. Each word or phrase is expressed by a stylized movement or gesture, with strict rules of style and execution. The Kunqu tradition is recognized as a UNESCO Masterpiece of World Heritage.
Date: June 16 – 80 min.
June 17 – 70 min.
Time: 7:30 p.m.
Place: Frederic Wood Theatre, 6354 Crescent Road
Info: www.100.ubc.ca/events/june/KUNQU.html?PageMode=HTML
Conference looks at intersection of law and theatre
The creators of Masks – a new online journal of law and theatre – will host a two-day conference focusing on the intersection of law and theatre studies. Participants will explore academic theory the first day and participate in workshops and discussion on the second.
Speakers include:
- Adj. Prof. Carrie Gallant, UBC Faculty of Law, and David Diamond, Headlines Theatre: Vancouver’s legislative theatre project, Practicing Democracy
- Assist. Prof. Sharon Sutherland, UBC Faculty of Law: improvisational theatre tools for law school and mediation practice
- Prof. Gillian Calder, University of Victoria: legal pedagogy using Theatre of the Oppressed tools
The conference will also include a public performance of Women in Law Power Play, co-produced by Masks Journal and Headlines Theatre, and will launch the inaugural edition of Masks.
Conference: June 17 – 18
Place: Cecil Green Park House, 6251 Cecil Green Park Road (check!)
Power Play: June 17
Time: 6:30 p.m. launch reception; 7:30 p.m. play
Place: Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, 6265 Crescent Road
Info: http://masksjournal.com/wordpress/conference/
Café Scientifique breaks the silence of men’s mental health
In Canada, 4 out of 5 suicides are men. The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) will host a Café Scientifique with men’s health experts to generate discussion around questions such as: why is it that men are less likely to acknowledge mental health problems and seek help? How can we improve the way we recognize and treat mental health issues for men? Is it just a “guy thing”?
Café Scientifique is an opportunity to bring researchers together with members of the public to discuss research.
Expert speakers include:
- Phillip Banks, Health Initiative for Men
- Prof. Blye Frank, Division of Medical Education, Dalhousie University
- Assist. Prof. John Oliffe, UBC School of Nursing
- Moderated by Dr. Joy Johnson, Scientific Director, CIHR Institute of Gender and Health
CIHR is the Government of Canada’s agency for health research. For more information on the Café, visit www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/36391.html
Date: June 12
Time: 5 p.m.
Place: Steamworks, 375 Water St.
Info: www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/36391.html
Eden Robinson to read at Robson Reading Series
Eden Robinson is the author of two best-selling novels, Blood Sports and Monkey Beach, winner of the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize and a finalist for the 2000 Giller Prize. Her collection of stories, Traplines, was awarded the Winifred Holtby Prize and was a New York Times Editor’s Choice and a Notable Book of the Year. Robinson is a Hailsa woman who was raised and now lives in Kitimat Village, B.C.
Date: June 18
Time: Noon – 1:30 p.m.
Place: Lillooet Room (301), Chapman Learning Commons, Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, 1961 East Mall
Info: www.robsonreadingseries.ubc.ca/#June
Public lecture on SAD and light therapy
The Society for Light Treatment and Biological Rhythms (SLTBR) will host a public education event entitled Update on SAD and hot topics from the 2008 SLTBR meeting as part of their annual meeting. Audience members will hear from experts in light therapy, Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and related disorders. Speakers include:
- Prof. Namni Goel, University of Pennsylvania: highlights of the 2008 SLTBR meeting
- Prof. Raymond Lam, UBC: overview of SAD and light therapy
- Dr. Robert Levitan, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health; President, SLTBR: Bodyclocks and ADHD
- Assist. Prof. Erin Michalak, UBC: self-management strategies for depression
Date: June 28
Time: 4 – 6 p.m.
Place: UBC Robson Square, 800 Robson St.
Info: contact Loretta Musselwhite, Mood Disorders Centre, Department of Psychiatry at musselwh@exchange.ubc.ca
