UBC This Week | Jun. 19, 2008

Jun 19, 2008

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Museum of Anthropology:

www.moa.ubc.ca

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.

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Upcoming Event Highlights

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

UBC People

UBC engineers inducted as CAE Fellows

UBC professors Peter Lawrence, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering; Victor Leung, Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering; and Malcolm Scoble, Department of Mining Engineering, have been inducted as Fellows of the Canadian Academy of Engineering in recognition of their achievements in the engineering profession. The induction ceremony took place at the academy’s 2008 Annual General Meeting earlier this week in Montreal.

For more information, visit http://www.engineering.ubc.ca/news/2008/june18.html

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TRIUMF appoints physicist to top Canadian scientific post

TRIUMF has appointed Lia Merminga as the new Head of TRIUMF’s Accelerator Division. Merminga has over 20 years’ experience in accelerator physics. She is widely recognized for expertise in identifying problems and solutions associated with the push for higher energy, higher quality accelerator beams, and developing concepts for new accelerators.

TRIUMF is Canada’s national laboratory for particle and nuclear physics, located on UBC campus.

For more information, visit http://www.triumf.info/public/media/news.php?which=24

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Sauder professor named marketing science fellow

Prof. Charles Weinburg, of UBC’s Sauder School of Business, has been named a Fellow of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) at the annual INFORMS Marketing Science Conference last week, hosted by the Marketing Division of the Sauder School of Business.

Weinburg’s research interests are marketing in public and nonprofit organizations, marketing strategy and marketing models and analysis.

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Founder of UBC’s Mentor Centre recognized for outreach work

Assoc. Prof. Jane Roskams, a researcher with the Department of Zoology who founded UBC’s Mentor Centre, has been awarded a Canadian Institutes of Health Research Synapse Award for Mentorship in recognition of her outreach work. The award, worth $5,000, acknowledges researchers who work with Canadian youth to help them understand the value of health and scientific research.

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Computer Science spin-off wins commercialization award

A spin-off company from the Department of Computer Science has won the Precarn 20th Anniversary Commercialization Success Award for developing a stereo vision system for motion tracking. Point Grey Research – founded by Computer Science Prof. Jim Little – develops advanced digital camera technology products.

Precarn is an independent, not-for-profit company that supports the pre-commercial development of leading edge technologies.

For more information, visit http://www.precarn.ca/news/Paul080612.html

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Martha Piper Research Fund recipients named

Five winners of the spring round of the Martha Piper Research Fund have been chosen. The fund was established by President Stephen Toope to provide seed funding for collaborative research projects with an emphasis on interdisciplinary, international activities.

A $5 million portion of the Trek Endowment has been dedicated for this purpose for five years, providing $250,000 per year to be awarded in semi-annual competitions to UBC faculty.

For more information on the awards and to view the list of winners, visit http://www.research.ubc.ca/marthapiperfund.aspx

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Beaty and the BeastBeaty and the BeastBeaty and the Beast: a blue whale skeleton comes to Vancouver

Prof. Andrew Trites, Director of the Marine Mammal Research Unit of the Fisheries Centre, and skeleton articulator Michael deRoos will give an insider’s account of the UBC Blue Whale Project’s recent dig in P.E.I., share facts about blue whales and give a sneak peek into the project’s next steps. The skeleton will be the centerpiece of the Beaty Biodiversity Museum when it opens next year.

Date: June 26
Time: 7 p.m.
Place: Room 100, Wesbrook Building, 6174 University Boulevard
Info: http://www.beatymuseum.ubc.ca/proglect8.html

Notes: Free e-tickets are required, available at the above website.

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National Aboriginal Day concert at the MOA

Four all-aboriginal bands, from blues to rock n’roll, will take to the stage to celebrate National Aboriginal Day at the Museum of Anthropology. Admission to the museum is free after noon.

Date: June 21
Time: Noon – 4 p.m.
Place: Museum of Anthropology, 6393 N.W. Marine Drive
Info: http://www.moa.ubc.ca/programs/index.php

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Sauder offers a real estate capital markets roundtable

The UBC Centre for Urban Economics and Real Estate at the Sauder School of Business will present a roundtable event entitled Real Estate Capital Markets after the Credit Crisis. Presentations and a panel discussion on the effects of the U.S. sub-prime crisis on commercial and residential finance in the U.S. and Canada will be given by:

  • Carl Gomez, Bentall Capital’s Vice President, Research
  • Prof. Richard Green, George Washington University School of Business
  • Prof. Tim Riddiough, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Each presentation will be followed by a Q & A period. Assoc. Prof. Tsur Somerville, Director of the Centre for Urban Economics and Real Estate, will moderate the event.

Date: June 25
Time: 5 – 6 p.m. Reception; 6 p.m. Presentations
Place: UBC Robson Square, 800 Robson St.
Info: http://cuer.sauder.ubc.ca/CUER_roundtable_event08.html

Notes: Free event; pre-registration is required before June 23 at https://secure.sauder.ubc.ca/events/cuer_roundtable/registrationform.cfm

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Summer research institute addresses global capitalism and agrarian society

As part of the 2008 Peter Wall Summer Institute – themed The End of the Peasant? Global Capitalism and the Future of Agrarian Society – two gala events are open to the public:

Washington Rediscovers Agriculture: The Political Economy of the Agrarian Turn, by Jomo Kwame Sundaram, economist with the United Nations.

Date: June 23
Time: 6 – 8 p.m.
Place: Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre Pavilion Ballroom, 1088 Burrard St.
Info: http://www.wsir.pwias.ubc.ca/2008/gala.php

The Return of the Peasant: Possible? Desirable? by Immanuel Wallerstein, sociologist and research professor at Yale University.

Date: June 25
Time: 6 – 8 p.m.
Place: Frederic Wood Theatre, 6354 Crescent Road
Info: http://www.wsir.pwias.ubc.ca/2008/gala.php

Each presentation will be followed by a reception. Free tickets must be reserved by calling 604-822-1291.

A graduate student symposium, entitled Urban Hegemony, Agrarian Societies and Governance in the Global South, is also open to the public. Students from a range of disciplines will examine the conflicted formation and transformation of institutions, ideologies and practices in rural, urban and peri-urban parts of the world.

Date: June 28
Time: 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Place: Peter Wall Institute of Advanced Studies, 6331 Crescent RoadInfo: http://www.wsir.pwias.ubc.ca/2008/symposium_schedule.php

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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:

  1. Prof. Namni Goel, University of Pennsylvania: highlights of the 2008 SLTBR meeting

  2. Prof. Raymond Lam, UBC: overview of SAD and light therapy

  3. Dr. Robert Levitan, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health; President, SLTBR: Bodyclocks and ADHD

  4. 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