Frontiers of Science Lecture Series
The COLLEGE OF SCIENCE and THE COLLEGE OF MINES AND EARTH SCIENCES have teamed-up to present FOUR lectures during the 2007-2008 academic year! The Frontiers lecture series will feature eminent scientists and researchers from across the country who are exploring the latest frontiers in their fields.
The Frontiers lecture series was established in 1967, and is celebrating its 40th year in 2007, making it one of the longest-running lecture series on campus! Over the years, we have hosted many Nobel laureates, Guggenheim Fellows, MacArthur Fellows, and members of the National Academies of Science.
All FOS lectures are free and open to the public! All lectures begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Aline Wilmot Skaggs Biology building (lower campus, near University Bookstore). Click to see map: Aline W. Skaggs Biology.
The first lecture was Wed, October 24. This lecture featured Larry R. Dalton, the George B. Kauffman Professor of Chemistry at the University of Washington, Seattle, who discussed "Nano-engineering: A Technology Revolution!"
Thirty years ago few individuals could have imagined the impact that the advent of the personal computer, cell phones, flat panel displays and GPS systems would have on their daily lives.
Today we are faced with daunting technological challenges: the energy crisis, rising medical diagnostic costs, homeland security issues and bandwidth saturation in telecommunications.
THIS FOS LECTURE IS AVAILABLE ON VHS VIDEO OR DVD. PLEASE CALL (801) 581-3124 TO OBTAIN A COPY.
The second presentation was on Wed, November 28. This event showcased the research of Orest G. Symkorest G. Symko, professor of physics at the University of Utah. His lecture title was "A Sound Way to Turn Heat into Electricity."
Professor Symko is developing novel devices for converting heat energy into sound waves and, subsequently, into electric power! This new technology holds promise for capturing heat now wasted during industrial processes and turning it into useful electricity! In addition, researchers may be able to harness solar energy and also cool down electronics, computers and radars. "It is a new source of renewable energy from waste heat," says Symko.
THIS FOS LECTURE IS AVAILABLE ON VHS VIDEO OR DVD. PLEASE CALL (801) 581-3124 TO OBTAIN A COPY.
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The third presentation was Wed, January 30, and featured Marcia K. McNutt, the president of Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, who discussed "Changing Climate: It's All About the Oceans."
“Carbon dioxide that is released into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels changes ocean temperature, alters ocean circulation and makes the ocean more acidic. These changes affect the productivity of ocean fisheries and influence how we manage the ocean, but it is ocean acidification, in particular, that may be mankind’s most severe environmental disturbance,” says McNutt.
THIS FOS LECTURE IS AVAILABLE ON VHS VIDEO OR DVD. PLEASE CALL (801) 581-3124 TO OBTAIN A COPY.
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The final event of the academic year will be Wed, April 2, with Neil Shubin, associate dean and professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Chicago. His lecture topic is "New Evidence of How Fish Evolved to Walk on Land."
Neil Shubin, University of Chicago professor of organismal biology and anatomy and internationally renown paleontologist, will discuss his most recent fossil discovery, Tiktaalik roseae, which has been dubbed the "missing link" between fish and land animals, during a free public lecture at the U.
The fossil, Tiktaalik roseae, better known as the "fishapod," is a 375-million year old fish that was discovered in the Canadian Arctic in 2004 by Shubin and colleagues. Its discovery highlights a pivotal point in the history of life on Earth – when the first fish ventured onto land. Tiktaalik lived about 12 million years before the first tetrapods, or four-legged animals, so the existence of tetrapod features in a fish like Tiktaalik marks the earliest appearance of shoulders, necks, limbs, elbows and wrist-joints in the fossil record!
His new book, Your Inner Fish: A Journey Through the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body (Pantheon Press), was just released in January, and will be available at this event!
Click here to see PDF flyer: Shubin flyer.pdf