̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - symposium

Winton Symposium tackles the challenges of a growing population

sc604 — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 05:00:00 +0000

̽��ֱ��third annual Winton Symposium will be held on 29th September at the ̽��ֱ��’s Cavendish Laboratory. ̽��ֱ��topic for this year is ‘Global Challenges for Science and Technology’ and will again bring together leading scientists from around the world to explore how to tackle the increasing demands of a growing population with declining natural resources.

Attendance is free of charge; however participants are required to register online due to the high demand for places.

This year’s sessions for the one-day symposium will be:

Session I
̽��ֱ��opening speaker is Professor Joseph Heremans from Ohio State ̽��ֱ��, who will discuss ‘Solid State Heat Engines and Waste Heat Recovery,’ providing insight into the design and use of thermoelectric systems for converting waste heat into useful energy. Professor Nina Fedoroff, who has performed pioneering work in the field of plant genetics and the development of modified crops, will speak on ‘Who will produce the food for a hotter, more crowded world?’ Fedoroff was Science and Technology Adviser to the US Secretary of State and director of the Center for Desert Agriculture at the King Abdullah ̽��ֱ�� of Science and Technology and is currently the Evan Pugh Professor at Penn State ̽��ֱ��.

Session II
How can new technology make a difference on a global scale? Dr Simon Bransfield-Garth is CEO of Azuri Limited, a Cambridge company that provides affordable solar lighting in several parts of Africa, and will talk about ‘Empowering the Rural African Consumer.’ Professor Winston Soboyejo is at the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Princeton ̽��ֱ�� and is President of the African ̽��ֱ�� of Science and Technology. His talk ‘New Frontiers in Materials for Global Development: From Health to Energy and the Environment,’ will provide examples of applying mathematics to the development of novel materials including nanoparticles and bio-micro-electro-mechanical systems.

Session III
̽��ֱ��focus of this session is on the provision of energy on a global scale, and the impact this has on people and the climate. Professor Richenda Van Leeuwen, Director of Energy and Climate at the United Nations Foundation, will address the growing needs for energy in her talk ‘Towards Sustainable Energy for All - innovation for energy access and development.’ She will draw upon her experience in providing energy services in the developing world and the impact on poverty alleviation. Professor David MacKay, former Chief Scientific Advisor to the Department of Energy and Climate Change, and Regius Professor in Engineering at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, will describe ‘ ̽��ֱ��Global Calculator.’ He will discuss how this tool can be used to engage people in the debate on reducing international emissions and global action on climate change.

“ ̽��ֱ��increasing pressure that an ever-growing population is placing on our natural resources is one of the great challenges currently facing our world,” said Dr Nalin Patel, Programme Manager for the Winton Programme. “This year’s speakers are all addressing these challenges in unique and ground-breaking ways, and we are delighted to welcome them to Cambridge.”

̽��ֱ��symposium is organised by Dr Patel and Professor Sir Richard Friend, Cavendish Professor of Physics and Director of the Winton Programme for the Physics of Sustainability.

For more information, please contact Dr Nalin Patel: nlp28@cam.ac.uk; 01223 760302

On September 29th, the Department of Physics will host the third annual Winton Symposium at the Cavendish Laboratory on the theme of ‘Global Challenges for Science and Technology’.

̽��ֱ��increasing pressure that an ever-growing population is placing on our natural resources is one of the great challenges currently facing our world

Nalin Patel

Winton Symposium

Global challenges for science and technology

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. If you use this content on your site please link back to this page. For image rights, please see the credits associated with each individual image.

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Winton Symposium‘s material world

sj387 — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 12:47:33 +0000

This year’s focus on ‘Materials Discovery’ will bring together leading scientists from around the world, revealing unexpected breakthroughs in a wide range of subjects from electronics to life sciences.

Attendance is free, and with last year’s inaugural ‘Energy Efficiency’ event drawing a large audience of researchers and industrialists from a range of disciplines, the event promises to be popular - so pre-registration is essential.

This year’s sessions for the one-day symposium will be:

Session I

Professor Chris Wise, designer of the award-winning London 2012 Velodrome, will open the symposium by focusing on sustainability in the engineering industry. Exploring current thoughts on demand reduction, the global problem of shrinking resources and an expanding population, Wise will discuss how these issues can inform innovative building design.

Session II

From great structures to the microscopic, graphene Nobel prize-winner Professor Sir Konstantin Novoselov from the ̽��ֱ�� of Manchester will explore the world of ultrathin films and their unexpected properties. This will be followed by Professor Paul Alivisatos, Director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, one of the pioneers in the field of nanocrystals, who will address the design of these minute structures and reveal their practical applications.

Session III

Professor Jason Chin from the Cambridge/MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology will delve into the building blocks of biological world. Despite their complexity, Chin will show how these structures can be manipulated to create new forms of functional materials, and share his research into the production of artificial genetic code. Professor Daniel Fletcher from ̽��ֱ�� of California, Berkeley, who has been studying the mechanics and dynamics of cell movement, will look at the self-organisation of biological structures.

Session IV

Finally, two leading scientists with backgrounds in chemistry will cover their latest breakthroughs. Professor Ben Feringa from the ̽��ֱ�� of Groningen has designed a wide range of synthetic materials, and will talk about his leading research in the field of 'molecular motors'. Professor George Whitesides, one of the leading material scientists of his generation and Professor at Department of Chemistry at Harvard ̽��ֱ�� will discuss his multi- disciplinary research with applications ranging from biology to microelectronics.

Dr Nalin Patel, Programme Manager for Winton Programme, said: “We are delighted to welcome world-leading scientists to Cambridge to explore some of the recent breakthroughs in materials research, and how they may have an impact on societies needs in the future.”

For more information, please contact Dr Nalin Patel: nlp28@cam.ac.uk; 01223 760302

On 30 September, the Department of Physics will host the second annual Winton Symposium at the Cavendish Laboratory on ‘Materials Discovery’.

We are delighted to welcome world-leading scientists to Cambridge to explore some of the recent breakthroughs in materials research, and how they may have an impact on societies needs in the future

Dr Nalin Patel, Programme Manager for Winton Programme

Cambridge Cavendish Laboratory

SEM image of 1-5 micrometer large silica particles attached to 50 micrometer large paraffin spheres

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How to explore the whole universe: watch COSMO 2013 live

sj387 — Wed, 04 Sep 2013 10:48:58 +0000

̽��ֱ��past year has been an extraordinary one for particle physicists and cosmologists, with the Planck satellite revealing the Universe’s earliest light, and the tentative discovery of the Higgs-Boson at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

Data collected from LHC experiments and the Planck mission - and their implications for the Universe - will be discussed by some of the giants of cosmology and particle physics during this week’s COSMO conference, all of which is being streamed live on YouTube.

Alongside the five-day long scientific conference - with days variously focused on Particle Physics, Cosmic Microwave Background, Large-Scale Structure, Primordial Cosmology and Cosmic Acceleration - there will also be a public symposium tonight, which, with speakers such as Stephen Hawking, Brian Cox and Andrew Liddle, will be a highlight of the COSMO YouTube broadcast.

Andrew Liddle, Professor of Theoretical Astrophysics at the ̽��ֱ�� of Edinburgh, will open the symposium with a talk on cosmology and the Planck satellite, currently being used to map the relic radiation expelled by the Big Bang. COSMOS 2013 is one of the first opportunities for researchers to gather and discuss the recent discoveries, with other lectures on the Planck data from George Efstathiou (Institute of Astronomy) and Ben Wandelt among others.

̽��ֱ��Planck satellite has given us a highly detailed image of the Universe a mere 380,000 years after the Big Bang; and will be used by researchers to learn about the origins of the Universe, its probable fate, and, ultimately, about existence itself.

̽��ֱ��night’s second speaker, Professor Brian Cox, has been credited with helping to demystify physics for the public. ̽��ֱ��former musician is now a particle physicist, Royal Society research fellow and professor at the ̽��ֱ�� of Manchester; he also works on the ATLAS experiment at the CERN super collider. Though a full time lecturer at Manchester, he is a prolific broadcaster and host of many science programmes such as the recent BBC series Wonders of Life.

̽��ֱ��symposium will finish with a talk from Stephen Hawking, the world-famous theoretical physicist, cosmologist and author. Hawking, author of the best-selling A Brief History of Time, gained his Ph.D. at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, was the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at the ̽��ֱ�� for 30 years and is a Fellow at Gonville and Caius College. He is also the Director of Research at ̽��ֱ��Stephen Hawking Centre for Theoretical Cosmology at the ̽��ֱ��.

Among Hawking’s many achievements is the proposal that black holes are not entirely black, but instead emit a type of thermal radiation now known as “Hawking radiation”. His talk, entitled Fire in the Equations, is likely to prove a spell-binding conclusion to the public evening of COSMO 2013.

COSMO 2013 is sponsored by Intel who are providing the live feed for the public event. Richard Curran, Intel Director Enterprise Server and Software Enabling Group EMEA, said “At Intel we have a long and successful history of working with Professor Hawking. We are proud to be supporting the team in its analysis of the data collected from the Planck satellite and wait with great anticipation to the insights the research can offer us about the universe and its origin. We are excited to open this research up to the public and we hope it encourages more people to take an interest in physics and the amazing work being done”.

Watch speakers such as Stephen Hawking and Brian Cox this evening as the public symposium of the 17th International Conference on Particle Physics and Cosmology, known as COSMO 2013, is broadcast live on YouTube.

Arun Venkataswamy

Orion Nebula / M42

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