Monday, October 31, 2011

TDLC Renewal Grant / NSF $18M

How do humans learn, and how is the element of time critical for learning? The Temporal Dynamics of Learning Center (TDLC), headquartered at UC San Diego in the Institute for Neural Computation, is helping to answer that question, thanks in part to an $18 million renewal grant from the National Science Foundation.
Founded in 2006 with support from the NSF, TDLC is led by Gary Cottrell, professor of computer science and engineering at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering. The interdisciplinary team of scientists and educators includes over 40 principal investigators at 17 partner research institutions, including UC Berkeley, Rutgers University at Newark, and Vanderbilt University, in three countries, and in several local San Diego schools.


Better Education for Women in Science & Engineering program (BEWiSE) in Union Tribune

A nice and in-depth story about a science and engineering outreach program for young women in San Diego, in the Union Tribune. The program is Better Education for Women in Science & Engineering program (BEWiSE). Check out the story by Karen Kucher in the Oct 24 issue of the UT entitled "Program inspiring young women to discover science".

Also, some related links from the Jacobs School of Engineering.

IDEA Student Center

Women in Computing @UCSD

UC San Diego Society of Women Engineers

Seismic Outreach team from the Society of Civil and Structural Engineers

ENSPIRE (TESC event)

COSMOS at UC San Diego

 Saura Naderi / Calit2 MyLab @ Variability Expedition

I'm sure there are other projects, organizations to mention. If you have suggests, please let me know: dbkane at UCSD dot EDU

-Daniel

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

IEEE Pumpkin Carving Contest / Part 1

Out on Warren Mall, engineering students are carving away. I just overheard one student lament that he "can't write integrals in pumpkin". Perhaps, but he seems to have the exponent thing down no problem. More photos on the Jacobs School Flickr site.  (There are lots of students out there with cameras, so hopefully we'll get some more pictures from IEEE student org soon.)

2010 LED Pumkin Carving contest photos.

The event is put on by the UC San Diego student branch of the IEEE. (Read more about UC San Diego IEEE.)

ERA 51: What R U Doing? (Video Contest for Founder's Day) / $200 Prize!


This year the campus is hosting a video contest  “What R U Doing?”   to highlight the remarkable innovations of UC San Diego students, staff, faculty and alumni. The winning video will earn a premiere party at The Loft, with a $200 gift certificate to Zanzibar. Click the graphic above for details.

What are you doing that’s sustainable? How are you giving back to the community? What are you doing to advance technology or to express your creativity? From conducting cutting-edge research to producing original works of art, we know that our campus community is leading the way in innovation and making a positive impact at the university, and in the greater community. In honor of our newest tradition, Founders’ Celebration, the campus is hosting a video contest to showcase what students, staff, faculty and alumni are doing at UC San Diego. Create a video telling us your story and you could win a $200 gift certificate to Zanzibar at The Loft. The contest begins today, Oct. 25, and the winner will be announced Nov. 15—just in time for Founders’ Celebration.


Here’s how it works: create a short video that shows us what you are doing at UC San Diego. Show us through song, dance, performance or any creative method you choose—it can be just you, or recruit your colleagues and friends to be part of the fun! Upload your video to YouTube and post the link to UC San Diego’s new official Facebook page, Facebook.com/UCSanDiegoLife. All video submissions should begin with the sentence “What am I doing in (technology/community service/sustainability/other)…?” and should end by stating your name and relationship to UC San Diego (student/staff/faculty/alumni). The winning video will be chosen by the Founders’ Celebration committee and announced in the Nov. 15 issue of ThisWeek@UCSanDiego, as well as featured on learnlive.ucsd.edu. View the complete contest rules.

 

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Well-known Author Doles Out Career Advice During Talk at Jacobs School

Gayle Laakmann McDowell, author of "Cracking the Coding Interview," recently shared career advice for computer science majors at the Jacobs School of Engineering during a talk sponsored by the Women in Computing group at UC San Diego.
Laalmann has worked for Microsoft, Apple and Google. At the latter, she interviewed more than 150 candidates and served on Google's hiring committee for three years. She has a bachelor's and master's in computer science from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from the Wharton School. 
Missed the talk, but still want her advice? Here is the video of the event:

Friday, October 21, 2011

Images from National Medal of Science event / Shu Chien

Screen shots from the live web video feed of the National Medal of Science ceremony at the White House today are on the Jacobs School of Engineering Flickr stream. Congratulations to UC San Diego bioengineering professor Shu Chien. Check out the screen shots on the Jacobs School flickr feed. Read the story on the Jacobs School news site.

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Jacobs School Shake Table Puts Aquariums to the Test

What would happen to your aquarium during an earthquake? Engineers at the Powell Structural Laboratories here at the Jacobs School of Engineering recently helped the TV show "Totally Unprepared" to answer this question.
They placed two 60-gallon aquariums and two dummies on one of the laboratories' small shake tables. One tank was secured to the wall with $12 worth of furniture straps. The other was not. Engineers then put the whole set up through the lateral ground motion that took place during the 1995 Kobe earthquake in Japan, which registered at 7.2 on the Richter scale. The unsecured aquarium shook and shattered, ultimately falling down on one of the dummies.
Morale of the story: secure your aquarium.
The episode marks the second collaboration between Powell Labs and "Totally Unprepared." Engineers helped put wine racks to the test in a previous episode, which you can watch here
"Totally Unprepared" is funded by the California Emergency Management Agency, the California Earthquake Authority and the California Seismic Safety Commission.

French Kids Magazine Highlights Smell-O-Vision


What better way to make science fun for children than to tell them about Smell-O-Vision? The French magazine "Science et Vie Decouvertes" (Life and Science Discoveries)is doing just that in its November 2011 issue.
The magazine ran a picture of Jacobs School of Engineering Professor Sungho Jin and two of his graduates students, who showed that it is possible to generate an odor, at will, in a compact device small enough to fit on the back of your TV.
The caption can be roughly translate to: "American scientists, well, they've invented a machine that emits smells that you can see on TV! Great!"
The photo is paired with a short story about the seven different families of odors.
You can read more about Jin's proof of concept work here.
Also, here is a link to excerpts from the current issue of Science et Vie Decouvertes.

Tesla Motors CEO Makes Bold Predictions at UC San Diego Event

Solar power will be the leading source of energy in the United States by mid-century. We will be sending men to Mars within the next 25 years. Within the next 20 years, the majority of cars manufactured around the world will be purely electric.
These were some of the predictions made by Elon Musk, CEO of the renowned electric car manufacturing firm Tesla Motors. Musk spoke during the first night of The Atlantic Meets the Pacific event at UC San Diego this week. The three-day conference is a joint venture between UC San Diego and The Atlantic magazine, a well-known, high-end publication.
Musk also is the CEO of SpaceX, which aims to design a rocket for inter-planetary exploration. On top of that, he is the chairman of Solar City, one of the leading providers of solar energy in the United States.
In case you missed it, here is our live Twitter feed from Musk’s talk, with more interesting tidbits from him.




 UCSD engineering 
This concludes our live tweet from The Atlantic Meets the Pacific event at UC San Diego. 
 UCSD engineering 
: SpaceX's focus is to transport many people at very low cost reliably to Mars, even when no one else wants to do it. 
 UCSD engineering 
: Mars is a fixer-upper of a planet. It will take a couple of 100 years to terraform. 
 UCSD engineering 
: We should spend about 1/4 of 1 percent of GDP on space exploration. Less than health care but more than lipstick. 
 UCSD engineering 
: The mood ought to improve. Life is really pretty good. 
 UCSD engineering 
: Daily news should be called "what's worst in the world today?" 
 UCSD engineering 
: What is the future of US as an arena for innovation? 
 UCSD engineering 
: the goal is to get the price of moving to Mars below the costs of a middle class home in California: $500,000 
 UCSD engineering 
: We should try to establish a self-sustaining growing civilization on another planet. Best shot is Mars. 
 UCSD engineering 
: what originally brought him to CA was the find a high-energy storage device for electricity. 
 UCSD engineering 
: In 20 years, majority of cars manufactured purely electric. 15 years after majority of cars on the road will be too.
 UCSD engineering 
: the biggest challenge is to provide solar power at competitive costs without subsidies. 
 UCSD engineering 
Correction: : Solar power will be biggest power source in US by mid-century. 
 UCSD engineering 
: Solar power will be biggest power source in US by turn of century. 
 UCSD engineering 
: How should people think about energy? What role does solar power play? 
 UCSD engineering 
: Interest in electric vehicles goes back to his college years. 
 UCSD engineering 
Musk: With Internet, more info than library of Congress on your iPhone. Wanted to add a brick to that edifice. 
 UCSD engineering 
: in college 3 fields most important: Internet, alternative energy and making life multi-planetary. 
 UCSD engineering 
: How can you be involved in so many fields: PayPal, Solar Power, Tesla, SpaceX, etc. 
 UCSD engineering 
: the theme of the event is confluence of various kinds.  maybe has unified field theory of it all. 
 UCSD engineering 
 and  are on stage. 
 UCSD engineering 
At  event, waiting for  and Fallows to take the stage.