Astronomy Professor Expects New Generation to be Inspired by New 'Cosmos' Series–As He was by the Original

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Released: 3/11/2014 4:00 PM EDT Source Newsroom: Ithaca College Expert Available Contact Information

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Newswise ITHACA, NY Seth McFarlane and Carl Sagan. Associating those two names may confuse folks familiar with the works of both men. McFarlane's Emmy Award-winning TV show "Family Guy" is an often brilliant but equally crude and over-the-top examination of popular culture, while the late Sagan was a world-renowned and respected astronomer.

Yet the two now share a place in TV history, as McFarlane is part of a team reviving Sagan's Cosmos television legacy and dusting it off for a new generation. The series will air on the Fox Network and National Geographic Channel.

The goal for the new iteration of the show is the same as Sagan's: make complex ideas accessible to a wide audience and nurture an interest in science. Another aim is to spur young viewers to pursue an education in the sciences, just as the original program did for Luke Keller, chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at Ithaca College.

Keller, an associate professor of physics, has research interests in astrophysics, optics and physics education. He maintains research programs in imaging and spectroscopic instrumentation and in the astrophysics of star formation and planetary system formation. In addition to teaching and researching, Keller is a member of a team of scientists and engineers who produced an infrared camera for NASAs new airborne Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA).

An avid viewer of the original "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, Keller credits both the show and Sagan himself as significant influences to his personal and professional achievements. He thinks the new version, titled Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, and hosted by famed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, will serve the same benefit.

"I think Cosmos will attract a younger generation since similar projects with Tyson have been popular. He is a dynamic presenter in any venue," Keller said. "McFarlane's association can only improve viewership and engagement of the public since he is well known as a producer of excellent and popular television.

Sagans original 13-episode series aired on the Public Broadcasting System in 1980 and explored the universe and the history of scientific discovery. Topics included the origin of life, space exploration and the danger of mankinds self-destruction from our own technology. As host and narrator, Sagan spoke in terms understandable to a broad audience and helped make the program the most widely watched series of its time.

Tyson, known for his gift of explaining complicated ideas in simple terms, will attempt to reinvent certain celebrated elements of the original. Fox hopes the successor will have the same cultural impact the original series delivered, and ICs Keller agrees thats a good thing.

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Astronomy Professor Expects New Generation to be Inspired by New 'Cosmos' Series--As He was by the Original

119M Investment to Open New Scientific Frontiers in Astronomy

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UK scientists, engineers and industries will be helping to design and build the worlds largest telescope. The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) will manage the UK role in this exciting project which will be at the forefront of astronomy over the coming decade.Today STFC confirmed the release of 19M over the next 4 years to support the design of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project, made up of a capital investment in Big Data of 11m, and a further 2M a year in the on-going core research program.The SKA will be the largest and most sensitive radio telescope in the world, stretching technology to its limits.In addition, speaking ahead of an event at Jodrell Bank Observatory today, the Science Minister David Willetts announced further funding of 100M for the SKA project as it moves towards construction from 2017. This support will build on the work the UK is already doing in leading the effort to design the computing and software for the project which will have a data processing capacity 1,000 times greater than currently available.The Minister declared, Investment in science is a crucial part of this governments long-term economic plan. Its about investing in our future, helping grow new industries and create more jobs -- and that will mean more financial security for people across the country.The SKA radio telescope project will produce around twenty times the current global traffic of the internet in its internal telecommunications system. In fact, to play back a single days worth of SKA data on an MP3 player would take 2 million years. Thanks to the investment being made in the design phase, British scientists and industry partners are already helping to develop the central computing and data handling systems which will read the huge volume of new data, meaning this project could lead to faster smartphones and increased internet speeds across the UK in the future. The global market for data analysis is also expected to be worth 31 billion by 2016. With the additional resources being announced today by the Minister, Britain will be in a prime position to dominate the market and exploit the spin out technologies and knowledge that will arise from tackling the huge technical challenge of the SKA.STFC Chief Executive Professor John Womersley said: For the SKA, todays announcement allows the UK astronomy research community the chance to address some of the fundamental questions in research on the origin and evolution of the universe. At the same time the technical innovations needed for the project will transform the capabilities of high-performance computing.Using a network of radio antennae around the globe SKA will advance radio astronomy in understanding how the universe evolved and challenging Einsteins theory of relativity. With receivers across Africa and Australia, its dishes and antennae will provide a large scale 3D structure of the entire Universe.Professor Phil Diamond, Director General of the SKA Organisation, said: This is a really exciting announcement for the SKA and a solid proof that the project is now really underway. With such a major investment secured there is no stopping it.The UK expertise is such that it has played key roles in developing the SKA project through to the detailed design phase currently underway and being supported through the grants being announced, won work packages in these vital data handling areas and most significantly, currently host the project office at the Jodrell Bank Observatory near Manchester for this global, billion Euro project.The 19M from STFC will consist of funding to the consortium of institutes involved in the global consortia designing the project. These include the Universities of Cambridge, Manchester and Oxford, University College London and the University of Southampton, and support for STFCs national laboratories at RAL, Daresbury and the UK Astronomy Technology Center. The support will keep the UK at the forefront of the design activities in the SKA project, in the design of computing and software systems, data transportation and processing, novel antenna designs and the approach to controlling such a huge network of telescope infrastructure.The science done by SKA will help us understand some of the strangest questions in astronomy, and a whole generation of astronomers will be able to use this inspiring facility to transform the way we understand the universe.Contacts:Wendy EllisonSTFC Press Officer+44(0)1925 603232, cell: +44(0)7912 177935wendy.ellison@stfc.ac.ukCorinne MoseseSTFC Press Officer+44(0)1793 442870, cell: +44(0)7557 317200corinne.mosese@stfc.ac.ukUK

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nvolvement in SKA* The University of Manchester is a member of five of the SKA consortia: Signal and Data Transport (SaDT), Science Data Processor (SDP), Central Signal Processor (CSP), Low Frequency Aperture Array (LFAA), and Mid Frequency Aperture Array (MFAA), one of which (SaDT) it leads. The Group is led by Dr. Keith Grainge.* The University of Oxford is taking a major role in the development of the Low-Frequency Aperture Array and in the Central Signal Processing and Science Data Processor consortia. Oxford is also one of the key universities involved in preparation for the scientific exploitation of the SKA, with members on several of the SKA Science Working Groups. The Oxford SKA team is based in Department of Physics and the Oxford e-Research Center, led by Professors Mike Jones and David De Roure respectively.* The University of Cambridge is leading the global Science Data Processor (SDP) consortium. The SDP work involves designing the hardware and software for the massive scale of data processing required for SKA Phase 1, building on decades of local expertise. The universitys High Performance Computing service will house a laboratory for testing computer implementations and to test scalability of architectures to the enormous proportions needed for SKA. Professor Paul Alexander leads the work. Cambridge also leads the work developing the low frequency antennas and system design for SKA1, for the Low Frequency Aperture Array consortium.* Engineers at STFCs Rutherford Appleton Laboratory are involved in the Central Signal Processor work package.* Expertise and infrastructure access at STFCs Scientific Computing Department and the Hartree Center at STFCs Daresbury Laboratory are playing a key role in the Science Data Processor activity.* The UK Astronomy Technology Center (UKATC), part of STFC and the UKs national center for astronomical technology, will lead one of the critical elements of the Telescope Manager activity. This builds on more than a decade of experience in developing software for observation preparation, telescope control and operation, most recently for the ALMA telescope array in Chile. Members of the Systems Engineering group at the UKATC are involved in the Central Signal Processor work package.SKA website:http://www.skatelescope.orgSKA images:https://www.skatelescope.org/multimedia/image/Amazing facts on the SKA:https://www.skatelescope.org/newsandmedia/outreachandeducation/amazingfacts/The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC,http://www.stfc.ac.uk) is keeping the UK at the forefront of international science and tackling some of the most significant challenges facing society such as meeting our future energy needs, monitoring and understanding climate change, and global security. The Council has a broad science portfolio and works with the academic and industrial communities to share its expertise in materials science, space and ground-based astronomy technologies, laser science, microelectronics, wafer scale manufacturing, particle and nuclear physics, alternative energy production, radio communications and radar. STFC operates or hosts world class experimental facilities including in the UK the ISIS pulsed neutron source, the Central Laser Facility, and LOFAR, and is also the majority shareholder in Diamond Light Source Ltd. It enables UK researchers to access leading international science facilities by funding membership of international bodies including European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN), the Institut Laue Langevin (ILL), European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) and the European Southern Observatory (ESO). STFC is one of seven publicly-funded research councils. It is an independent, non-departmental public body of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS).

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119M Investment to Open New Scientific Frontiers in Astronomy

Artificial Intelligence Poses 'Extinction Risk' To Humanity Says Oxford University's Stuart Armstrong

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Artificial intelligence poses an "extinction risk" to human civilisation, an Oxford University professor has said.

Almost everything about the development of genuine AI is uncertain, Stuart Armstrong at the Future of Humanity Institute said in an interview with The Next Web.

That includes when we might develop it, how such a thing could come about and what it means for human society.

But without more research and careful study, it's possible that we could be opening a Pandora's box. Which is exactly the sort of thing that the Future of Humanity Institute, a multidisciplinary research hub tasked with asking the "big questions" about the future, is concerned with.

"One of the things that makes AI risk scary is that its one of the few that is genuinely an extinction risk if it were to go bad. With a lot of other risks, its actually surprisingly hard to get to an extinction risk," Armstrong told The Next Web.

Above: Student Alejadro Bordallo plays rock-scissors-paper with a robot programmed by scientists to use artificial intelligence to learn strategy as they play

The thing for humanity to fear is not quite the robots of Terminator ("basically just armoured bears") but a more incorporeal intelligence capable of dominating humanity from within.

The threat of such a powerful computer brain would include near-term (and near total) unemployment, as replacements for virtually all human workers are quickly developed and replicated, but extends beyond that to genuine threats of widespread anti-human violence.

"Well it will realise that, say, killing everybody is a solution to its problems, because if it kills everyone and shuts down every computer, no more emails will be sent and and as a side effect no viruses will be sent."

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Artificial Intelligence Poses 'Extinction Risk' To Humanity Says Oxford University's Stuart Armstrong

Sbastien Paquin of NAV CANADA – The CSeries aircraft seen from the Mirabel Tower – Video

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Sbastien Paquin of NAV CANADA - The CSeries aircraft seen from the Mirabel Tower
Sbastien Paquin, Flight Service Specialist (FSS), explains to us how Bombardier and NAV Canada ensure safe test flights for the CSeries. Follow the CSeries ...

By: Bombardier Aerospace

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Sbastien Paquin of NAV CANADA - The CSeries aircraft seen from the Mirabel Tower - Video

Gigabit Ethernet Switch targets aerospace and defense industry.

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The market has responded quickly and enthusiastically to the new VPX3-652 GbE Switch module, which has already been designed into a number of important customer programs, said Lynn Bamford, Sr. VP/GM, Defense Solutions division. With more ports, faster power-up and lower power consumption than alternatives, this small form factor module meets the needs of our customers looking to save valuable space and weight in today's cost conscious environment."

The VPX3-652 GbE Switch features an extremely low power and fast boot architecture and dramatically lowers the cost of adding network connectivity into new and legacy platforms. This rugged COTS GbE Switch solution is designed to meet the continuing technology refresh requirements of defense and aerospace systems integrators facing pressure to decrease their system size, weight, power and cost (SWaP-C). It provides up to 20 ports of Ethernet connectivity in a single 3U slot with a very low power footprint. The VPX3-652 GbE Switch is ideal for use in space-constrained embedded C4ISR and Electronic Warfare (EW) subsystems to support network communications, both within the subsystem and to connect externally to other subsystems within the platform.

Curtiss-Wright End-to-End System Solutions The VPX3-652 VPX module complements a wide range of Curtiss-Wright COTS solutions for the defense industry, including our wide range of Intel and Power Architecture single board computers (SBC), graphics controllers, and our FPGA and DSP engines. With modules available in VME, VPX, and mezzanine PMC/XMC form factors, as well as our complete family of fully integrated subsystems, these solutions are designed for immediate deployment in the most rugged environments.

Additional Information Please contact the factory for additional information and availability. Click here for more information on the VPX3-652 GbE Switch module.

Sales inquiries: Please forward all Sales and reader service inquiries to Jerri-Lynne Charbonneau, Curtiss-Wright Defense Solutions, Tel: (613) 254-5112; Fax: (613) 599-7777; email: defensesales@curtisswright.com.

For more information about Curtiss-Wrights Defense Solutions division, please visit http://www.cwcdefense.com.

About Curtiss-Wright Corporation Curtiss-Wright Corporation (NYSE:CW) is a global innovative company that delivers highly engineered, critical function products and services to the commercial, industrial, defense and energy markets. Building on the heritage of Glenn Curtiss and the Wright brothers, Curtiss-Wright has a long tradition of providing reliable solutions through trusted customer relationships. The company employs approximately 10,000 people worldwide. For more information, visit http://www.curtisswright.com.

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Gigabit Ethernet Switch targets aerospace and defense industry.

US foundation funds ReNeuron stem cell therapy

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Date: 16:37

A US-based charity has agreed to provide funding and access to clinical expertise for ReNeuron's retinal stem cell therapy candidate for a degenerative eye disease.

Shares in ReNeuron rose 8.8% to 3.54p on the news.

The Foundation for Fighting Blindess has agreed to provide further funding towards the AIM-listed company's late pre-clinical work on its stem cell therapy candidate for retinitis pigmentosa, together with resources in support of preparations for initial clinical trials such as access to its network of expert pre-clinical and clinical advisers.

The charity has previously funded pre-clinical work on its ReN003.

ReNeuron's Chief Scientific Officer, John Sinden, said: "We are delighted that the Foundation Fighting Blindness will be supporting the development of our ReN003 therapeutic candidate for retinitis pigmentosa. In particular, the Foundation's extensive knowledge, experience and network of advisers will be invaluable to us as we look to progress the ReN003 programme into its clinical phase."

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US foundation funds ReNeuron stem cell therapy

The connected car experience continues to fall short

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Editors note: this post originally appeared on Roger Chens blog, Beyond the bell curve. It is reposted here with permission.

Theres been a lot of buzz about the connected car recently. Thats nothing new, but it feels a little more serious this time around. The discussion has become more sophisticated, driven by the ongoing maturation of smartphones and device connectivity. My reason for interest in the connected car remains a rather simple one: cars arent going away. Smartphones arent either. And people will only use information technology more and more going forward. Yup, more selfies and snaps behind a steering wheel (I feel myself getting angry already).

A lot of discussion has centered on how the connected car will evolve. How heavily will car makers lean on third-party platforms like Android or iOS? How will car companies facilitate third-party integration? How much do they want to do on their own? What about cross-brand functionality? What standards will have to be in place? Whos going to set them the automotive industry or the government? Given the plethora of existing content and legitimate uncertainty about the answers, I dont want to focus on those issues here. Instead, allow me to dive into how drivers will interact with the connected car. Sure, people have discussed this as well, but there is a critical point that most seem to overlook: the winning connected car experience will be the safest connected car experience, hands down.

With all the buzz around contextual awareness these days, its fascinating to me that the car is perhaps the perfect proving ground for a contextually aware future because if it isnt done right, people will die. Its that consequence that has led me to stress the importance of safety. No one will use a system no matter how delightful the experience is if people die from it.

At this point, many would cite the advent of voice technologies as a clear-cut solution to this problem.Here, I would like to debunk that notion and show that we are still far from seeing the right connected car experience. There are both neurological and social reasons why.One studyhas shown that humans have limited mental resources to allocate across the different parts of the brain. Effectively, this means that simultaneously performing different actions like driving and listening make us worse at both. To prove this,fMRIimages were taken as test subjects underwent driving simulations. They showed that brain activity associated with visual information processing decreased as brain activity related to speech processing picked up when listening to auditory stimuli. Not a huge surprise, right? However,the biggest implication of this for the connected car is that hands-free voice technology alone does not ensure safer driving, contrary to common assumption.

Biological limitations arent the only factor, though. Social dynamics play a huge role as well. When talking over mobile, hands-free or not, a driver might be hesitant to seem silent out of fear of being rude, so he or she tries to pay attention. Meanwhile, when its a passenger speaking to the driver, that passenger often knows when the driver needs to focus on the road, and, well, shuts up at the appropriate moments. In fact, several studies have now empirically shown that hands-free voice has not been any safer than using a cell phone. You can find a World Health Organization studyhereand a National Safety Council studyhere.

So what does this all mean? Im definitely not saying that hands-free voice technology wont be a major part of the future connected car, but we will need to start crafting user experience (UX) with much more emphasis on the behavioral science and even neuroscience of driving. If you think youre close to figuring things out, I would love to talk.

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The connected car experience continues to fall short