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Issues & Experts Archive > Week of July 15-22, 2002
Week of July 15-22, 2002
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Jul 16, 2002
The heavy cost of inaction…That’s what we’re paying now says SFU adjunct professor Tom Koch in reference to more results from the latest StatsCanada survey on health. A sub-survey of the national, annual look at Canadians’ lifestyle, health and economic well-being has found that 23 per cent of those polled report some kind of difficulty getting specialized medical services. It also found almost one in five Canadians who visited a specialist last year report worry, anxiety, stress or pain as a result of lengthy waiting lists. Koch, a medical ethicist, says this so-called crisis in healthcare has been a long time coming. "We’ve just ignored it and failed to think with much of a futuristic perspective," adds Koch. "This isn’t really a new crisis. It’s just an extension of the issues and problems that have been growing as a result of people living longer."
Tom Koch, 604.714.0348; tomkoch@kochworks.com
Making it onto the top 500 list of fastest computers…It’s a goal that computer manufacturers, computer experts and computational scientists dream of attaining and SFU has made it. June 2002 will go down in history as the month SFU’s home-made cluster of 96 computers, named Beowulf, ranked 465th on a Who’s Who list of the fastest 500 computers in the world. Lionel Tolan and Martin Siegert from SFU’s academic computing services can explain why getting on the list is such a coveted goal in the computing industry and how SFU’s Beowulf cluster got there.
Martin Siegert, 604.291.4691; martin_siegert@sfu.ca
Lionel Tolan, 604.291.3570; lional_tolan@sfu.ca
Sizing up seaweed…It’s part of the summer experience: sand, sun — and seaweed. But seaweed, or kelp, is also the focus of widespread research and even has potential new uses. American researchers have discovered that feeding cattle a seaweed found in the Maritimes two weeks before they are slaughtered and processed can significantly reduce the occurrence of a potentially deadly strain of E.coli found in beef. At SFU’s Bamfield Marine facility (on Vancouver Island), researchers study everything from kelp’s evolution to ways of improving kelp farming. SFU biologist Louis Druehl’s focus is on farming kelp for feed for farmed sea urchins and abalone. He is also looking at its use in spa products. His book, Pacific Seaweeds, looks at seaweed and human health, marine conservation, and farming, and also contains recipes.
Louis Druehl, 250.728.3301; druehl@bms.bc.ca
A world where nobody is actually there…Is that what we’re moving towards, with our proliferation of technologies capable of giving us simulated experiences and taking us to disembodied conferences? It’s a question that Henry Daniel, an assistant professor of dance and interdisciplinary studies at SFU's school for the contemporary arts, will ponder and open up for discussion in a lecture. Daniel will deliver his talk Performing in Virtual Environments with Technologically Mediated Bodies at SFU’s Burnaby campus on Wednesday, July 24 at 2 p.m. , room P8493. Daniel is available beforehand to discuss the complexity of the human experience as technology encroaches on its most sacred domain, the human body. He can also talk about the trend to imbue computing machines with the accumulated knowledge and experience that human beings have acquired over millions of years of evolutionary development.
Henry Daniel, 604.291.3897, hdaniel@sfu.ca
Tom Koch, 604.714.0348; tomkoch@kochworks.com
Making it onto the top 500 list of fastest computers…It’s a goal that computer manufacturers, computer experts and computational scientists dream of attaining and SFU has made it. June 2002 will go down in history as the month SFU’s home-made cluster of 96 computers, named Beowulf, ranked 465th on a Who’s Who list of the fastest 500 computers in the world. Lionel Tolan and Martin Siegert from SFU’s academic computing services can explain why getting on the list is such a coveted goal in the computing industry and how SFU’s Beowulf cluster got there.
Martin Siegert, 604.291.4691; martin_siegert@sfu.ca
Lionel Tolan, 604.291.3570; lional_tolan@sfu.ca
Sizing up seaweed…It’s part of the summer experience: sand, sun — and seaweed. But seaweed, or kelp, is also the focus of widespread research and even has potential new uses. American researchers have discovered that feeding cattle a seaweed found in the Maritimes two weeks before they are slaughtered and processed can significantly reduce the occurrence of a potentially deadly strain of E.coli found in beef. At SFU’s Bamfield Marine facility (on Vancouver Island), researchers study everything from kelp’s evolution to ways of improving kelp farming. SFU biologist Louis Druehl’s focus is on farming kelp for feed for farmed sea urchins and abalone. He is also looking at its use in spa products. His book, Pacific Seaweeds, looks at seaweed and human health, marine conservation, and farming, and also contains recipes.
Louis Druehl, 250.728.3301; druehl@bms.bc.ca
A world where nobody is actually there…Is that what we’re moving towards, with our proliferation of technologies capable of giving us simulated experiences and taking us to disembodied conferences? It’s a question that Henry Daniel, an assistant professor of dance and interdisciplinary studies at SFU's school for the contemporary arts, will ponder and open up for discussion in a lecture. Daniel will deliver his talk Performing in Virtual Environments with Technologically Mediated Bodies at SFU’s Burnaby campus on Wednesday, July 24 at 2 p.m. , room P8493. Daniel is available beforehand to discuss the complexity of the human experience as technology encroaches on its most sacred domain, the human body. He can also talk about the trend to imbue computing machines with the accumulated knowledge and experience that human beings have acquired over millions of years of evolutionary development.
Henry Daniel, 604.291.3897, hdaniel@sfu.ca