UBC News Digest
The UBC News Digest is a weekly summary of news stories about UBC
people, research, learning, community, and internationalization
initiatives. News Digest past
issues are also available on-line.
Apr. 10, 2003
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Out of the Classroom and into the Community: UBC
Reading Week Community Service Projects
During this year's spring break, 38 UBC students got out of the
classroom and into the community to participate in four unique community
service projects in Vancouver and Guelph, Ontario.
Organized by staff from the UBC Learning Exchange and Student Services,
in collaboration with the University of Guelph and partner community
organizations, the projects encouraged students to think about important
social issues such as family violence, hunger and food security,
poverty, homelessness and marginalization while applying their enthusiasm
and energy to benefit these organizations.
Vancouver-based activities included painting two large office spaces
at the YWCA's Munroe Transition House, assisting teachers in various
classes and painting a mural depicting characters from children's
literature on the walls at the Lord Nelson Elementary School, and
working with students from the Grandview/Uuqinak'uhh Elementary
School to improve the school's community garden by building bird
feeders, mason bee houses and birdhouses.
In Guelph, nine UBC students worked with seven University of Guelph
students to help renovate a space to be used as a much-needed shelter
and drop-in centre for youth at the First United Church. Students
also visited the Salvation Army's Gateway shelter in Toronto's Regent
Park/Cabbagetown area.
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UBC PhD student wins national graduate student
award
Recent UBC graduate David Vocadlo had been named winner of a 2003
Natural Sciences and Engineering Council (NSERC) Doctoral Prize,
one of Canada's top graduate student awards. The award is one of
four given annually and comes with a $10,000 prize.
Vocadlo, now a post-doctoral fellow at the University of California,
Berkeley, entered UBC aiming to be an architect. He graduated with
a PhD in Chemistry in January 2002 having developed groundbreaking
insights into the function of enzymes; molecules that are among
the key building blocks of life.
Vocadlo's doctoral work substantially clarified the general catalytic
mechanism for a key sub-set of enzymes called glycosidases. When
we eat carbohydrates, from pasta to potatoes, certain glycosidases
break the links between the many constituent sugar units that make
up a carbohydrate, such as starch, liberating the sugars for use
by our bodies.
The general understanding of glycosidase activity that emerged
from Vocadlo's research pointed to a problem with the textbook explanation
of the functioning of an iconic glycosidase known as hen egg white
lysozyme.
Vocadlo also earned his B.Sc from UBC in 1994. He has been offered
a job in the Chemistry Dept. at SFU.
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Six UBC researchers win Killam Research Fellowships
Six UBC researchers have been named Killam research fellows for
2003. The award winners are: Prof. Sherrill Grace, English; Prof.
Michael Devereux, Economics; Prof. Veronic Strong-Boag, History/Canadian
Studies; Prof. Harvey Richer, Astronomy; Prof. Peter Legzdins, Chemistry;
and Prof. Anthony Barrett, History/Classics.
The six are among 28 researchers from across Canada to be awarded
a total of $2 million in funding in the 35th annual competition
for Killam Research Fellowships, administered by the Canada Council
for the Arts.
The awards support scholars engaged in research in the fields of
humanities, social, natural and health sciences, engineering and
interdisciplinary studies. The fellowships enable them to devote
two years to full-time research and writing.
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Wireless Network Gives UBC Athletes a Leg Up at
Storm the Wall
The last thing on athletes' minds as they climb over the twelve-foot
wall in UBC's Storm the Wall relay race, is a wireless computer
network. But the first thing they want to know when they're done
is "What's my time? How well did I do?"
This year UBC Legacy Games, which runs the event, used UBC's Wireless
Network for the first time to update scores and maintain records
over the Web. It allowed the group to manage the administrative
side of Storm the Wall much more effectively and give athletes their
results just minutes after the race.
This may be the first time a campus wireless network has been used
at an intramural event. Storm the Wall, held last week, is North
America's largest intramural event. Every year more than 2,500 UBC
students swim, sprint, bike, run, and hoist themselves and their
teammates over two massive walls in front of the Student Union Building.
Event marshals replaced their mountain of paperwork with a laptop
and input the information into a central database on their Web site.
In other years, it would take event marshals hours to calculate
and post the results. They would write down all the teams and scores
on different sheets of paper, track all of the paper then input
all the information into an Excel spreadsheet in order to determine
the results.
"Now, when we go back to do our advancements at the end of
the day, we download from the web, instead of compiling all our
written sheets," says Toor. Because the information is centralized
online and readily accessible via the wireless network, "it
saves a lot of time and basically takes away a step after the event."
The event marshals were able to access the Web on site thanks to
the Wireless network. UBC Wireless is a free Internet service for
students, faculty and staff. With a laptop or PDA and a wireless
(Wi-Fi) compatible Ethernet card, they can access the Internet and
email almost anywhere on campus. Currently covering 75% of the campus,
the network will be complete this fall, providing seamless connection
to the Web, instant e-mail, and constant access to the growing resources
of the UBC network.
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2004 Distinguished Scholars in Residence
The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies is looking for four
good scholars.
Those selected to be one of the 2004 Distinguished UBC Scholars
in Residence will receive an office at the Institute for a year
and $12,000 in research funds (up to half of which can be used as
a stipend).
They also become Faculty Associates of the Institute and will receive
regular invitations to Institute events. Every two weeks there is
a lunch or dinner to which all Associates are invited. These gatherings
offer an opportunity to engage in informal discussions with colleagues
from a wide diversity of disciplines as well as to hear a talk by
one of the Associates. While the appointment as a Distinguished
Scholar in Residence is only for the calendar year, one remains
an Institute Associate indefinitely.
The deadline for nominations is May 16. For more information visit
www.pwias.ubc.ca or phone
(604) 822-4782.
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Lecture on Building Biotechnology in BC Planned
Dr. Julia Levy will speak on Building Biotechnology in BC on Wednesday,
April 16, 3:00 - 4:30 pm in Room 202 of the Macleod Building.
Levy, President and Chief Executive Officer of QLT PhotoTherapeutics
Inc. and a UBC faculty member will discuss the challenges in raising
investment money and building competencies in drug development in
region where there is no history of pharmaceutical development.
The basic platform technology behind the success of QLT will also
be covered, as well as the story behind the clinical development
of Visudyne for the treatment of age-related macular degeneration.
This presentation is part of an Industry Lecture Series sponsored
by ASI and ICICS. For further information call (604) 822-6601 or
email ross.icics@ubc.ca
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Celebrating women in science, engineering and
technology
Promoting women in science, engineering and technology has had
a proud history in British Columbia since the founding in 1981 of
the Society of Canadian Women in Science and Technology (SCWIST)
and the first conference of women in science and technology by Mary
Vickers and Hilda Cheng. Hilda says "We were a band of itinerant,
underpaid, undervalued women who wanted to know where the other
women scientists were". This led to many continuing activities
targeted toward encouraging young women, and providing role models
and opportunities for networking.
Women in Science, Engineering and Technology were celebrated once
again on Friday 28 March at UBC at an event to mark the end of the
term of Maria Klawe as the NSERC/ IBM Chair for Women in Science
and Engineering for BC and Yukon. Maria was one of 5 chair holders
across Canada. In this position she spear headed a number of initiatives
including the design of multimedia games for learning mathematics
and science particularly targeted toward young girls, the promotion
of a career interest survey of high school students, the development
of the ARC program (alternate routes to computing) and of the "virtual
family" computer activity to encourage girls' interest in computing
skills. Under Maria's leadership many outreach activities were initiated
and supported to bring the message to young women that science,
engineering and technology can be fun and profitable.
Among others recognized at this event were two founding members
of the Division for the Advancement of Women in Engineering and
Geoscience (DAWEG), Karen Savage and Lianna Mah. Daweg has played
an important role in promoting engineering to young women.
Two important SCWIST programs are the Immigrating Women in Science
Project and the MS-infinity program - math and science, infinite
possibilities. The IWIS program attempts to identify the needs of
immigrating women for building skills and making connections that
will help them achieve their potential in Canadian society. The
MS-infinity conferences are for young women in grades 9 and 10 and
promote interesting and exciting career options and provide female
role models to carry forward the message that women can do science
and math.
All together the accomplishments of 18 women were recognized at
this event which was a true celebration of progress for women in
science, engineering and technology. More information on activities
to promote women in SET can be found on the following web sites:
www.ccwest.org/english/ccwest.html,
www.harbour.sfu.ca/scwist/,
http://batman.mech.ubc.ca/~daweg/
or from myers@zoology.ubc.ca
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