External News

2008 Daresbury Machine Evaluation Workshop 2-3rd Dec 2008

2008-11-10T16:13:00.003Z

Part of the EPSRC's Distributed Computing Support Programme, the Daresbury Machine Evaluation Workshop will be held on 2nd and 3rd December at the Holiday Inn Runcorn.

This Workshop is now established as a leading national event dedicated to distributed high performance scientific computing. The principle objective is to encourage close contact between the research communities from the Mathematics, Chemistry, Physics and Materials Programmes of EPSRC and the major vendors of workstations, software and peripherals.

You are invited to attend this year's workshop, which will have a format similar to that of previous years with about a dozen major vendors making 20-minute presentations on topics such as hardware, compilers, graphics, storage, networking etc. In past years the audience has been very appreciative of the technical content of these talks and we have encouraged the speakers nominated by the vendors to focus their presentations accordingly. Important components of the workshop include the availability of systems for benchmarking evaluation purposes, plus the exhibition itself. Vendors are providing Internet access to these systems prior to the event, and the availability of products on the day will help delegates evaluate the machines. We hope to make loaned systems available from the 1st December for the duration of the event.

See provisional programme

Please confirm your attendance - using the online registration form - before 26th November 2008.

Please contact Damian Jones on +44 (0)1925 603805, Shirley Miller on +44 (0)1925 603240, or Laura Johnston +44 (0)1925 603529 (or email: machine_evaluation_workshop@dl.ac.uk) for information, or if you have any comments.

Developing countries benefit from online gold rush

2008-09-25T21:57:00.008+01:00

Ground-breaking research by Prof Richard Heeks, Centre for Development Informatics.

Impatient online computer gamers have sparked a new industry in developing countries - by paying fellow gamers real cash in return for financial help in the virtual world.

The practice - known as 'gold-farming' has been ongoing for a number of years.

But ground-breaking research by Prof Richard Heeks, from the University's Institute for Development Policy and Management, has highlighted the scale of the practice for the first time.

'Gold-farming' is concentrated on online computer games - such as World of Warcraft and Runescape - that are set in complex virtual worlds.

These game worlds are so comprehensive, they include their own cities, populations, economies and even their own virtual currencies, known as 'gold'.

Although most gamers earn their 'gold' by playing the game for many hours each week, some are taking a short-cut, by paying real money outside the game to buy their gold.

In doing so they seek the help of so-called 'gold-farmers', who work within the games' virtual worlds to build up a supply of the online currency and then sell this to players all over the world through the Paypal payment system.

Prof Heeks' research suggests 'gold-farming' is now a 'cyber-industry' employing more than 400,000 people in Asia and generating trade in excess of $1billion (US).

"The workers in Asia undertake long shifts and earn about US$145 per month," said Prof Heeks, who is based in the School of Environment and Development."

"However, the image of 'virtual sweatshop' seems inappropriate: most workers are young men who would otherwise be unemployed, and they report enjoying their work. This represents an intriguing new way in which the Internet is helping to create jobs and incomes in developing countries; one that is likely to grow over time."

The impact of computer gaming in developing countries forms part of the research agenda for the new Centre for Development Informatics; a cross-university grouping that studies the role of digital technologies in international development.

For more details contact:

Mike Addelman

Media Relations Officer

Faculty of Humanities

The University of Manchester

0161 275 0790

07717 881 567

michael.addelman@manchester.ac.uk

Textured graphics can be captured in a flash

2008-09-08T15:16:00.003+01:00

A new technique that can reconstruct the depth of a surface simply by taking two photos of it - one with a flash and one without - has been developed by a team led Dr Mashuda Glencross from the School of Computer Science. The team worked with Gregory Ward at Dolby Canada in Vancouver to develop a quick and cheap alternative to the time-consuming process of using bulky and expensive laser scanners.

The technique is already being used to add depth and realism to the ancient carvings that will appear in "Maya Skies" - a full-dome digital projection for planetariums that tells the story of the Mayan people.

Prof Douglas Kell appointed as Chief Executive of BBSRC

2008-07-11T10:28:00.003+01:00

Prof Kell is a leading figure in the field of systems biology, the multidisciplinary approach to tackling complex biological problems using theory, computer modelling and experimentation. It is revolutionising how bioscientists think and work and will make the outputs of their work both more useful, and easier to use, in industry and policymaking.

Prof Kell was an early pioneer in the development of systems to generate and handle the huge amounts of data that followed the emergence of the 'omic' sciences - such as genomics, proteomics and metabolomics.

His work has enabled researchers to harness the power of these approaches by giving them the tools to interpret and analyse the data generated by modern biology.

Prof Kell is currently Professor of Bioanalytical Science at the University of Manchester and Director of the BBSRC-funded Manchester Centre for Integrative Systems Biology.

He will maintain his scientific links by continuing to work one day a week at the Manchester Interdisciplinary Biocentre.

Prof Kell said: "I am delighted to take this opportunity to lead BBSRC at what is a very exciting time for post-genomic and predictive biology and their application across the biosciences. The UK has a world-class bioscience research community which underpins vital sectors such as agriculture, healthcare and food production. Our aim must now be to embed new, multidisciplinary approaches to tackling the major problems where bioscience can help with solutions, and to do so in a way that not only sustains and builds on the excellence of UK bioscience research but which continues to maximise the economic and social impact of BBSRC science."

Dr Peter Ringrose, Chairman of BBSRC, said: "I am very pleased to welcome the appointment of Professor Doug Kell as the next Chief Executive and Deputy Chair of BBSRC. Prof Kell has a long association with BBSRC and BBSRC science. He has not only been a pioneer in his own field of work but has served the research community for a number of years through membership of multiple BBSRC bodies. As chair of a review of BBSRC's research in bioenergy, he demonstrated a willingness to take on the challenges facing both bioscience and society as a whole. UK bioscience is amongst the strongest in the world. Our challenge in the future is to continue to make an impact internationally while maximising the social and economic impact of our research. Prof Kell is ideally placed to lead BBSRC and the bioscience community with a world-class track record in multidisciplinary research and a strong history of working to commercialise his science."

Prof Kell will take up his post on 1 October 2008 and the appointment is for four years.

Cancer Biomedical Informatics caBIG uses the Taverna workbench

2008-05-23T15:01:00.006+01:00

The goal of the cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid caBIG is to develop applications and the underlying systems architecture that connects together data, tools, scientists and organizations in an open federated environment. To meet this goal, caBIG brings together data from many and diverse data sources. caGrid is the underlying service oriented infrastructure for caBIG.

caGrid enables numerous complex usage scenarios, but its basic technical goals are to: enable universal mechanisms for providing interoperable programmatic access to data and analytics in caBIG, create a self-described infrastructure wherein the structure and semantics of data can be programmatically determined, and provide a powerful means by which services available in caBIG can be programmatically discovered and leveraged.

caGrid implements grid technologies and methodologies that enable local organizations to have ultimate control over access and management.

Workflow Improvements - Early Preview

caGrid 1.2 provides early preview of the ability to orchestrate caGrid services in a workflow using the Taverna workbench. Users can automatically download the caGrid plug-in from Taverna and use it develop workflows in the rich user interface provided by Taverna. The instructions on how to create a simple workflow using Taverna can be found in the caGrid users guide and on the caGrid wiki. This integration will be further enhanced in the future releases based on user feedback.

For further details on caGrid see https://cabig.nci.nih.gov/workspaces/Architecture/caGrid

Creation of Manchester Informatics

2008-05-17T22:03:00.022+01:00

Manchester Informatics, established in September 2007, is now working to bring together the informatics community across the University. Professor Chris Taylor is the Director and Professor Peter Halfpenny the Deputy Director. Carmel Dickinson will shortly take up the post of Programme Manager.