WAIS seminar: Computer Science, the Revolution in Schools

Tuesday 22nd April 2014 Speaker(s): Sue Sentance Organiser: Leslie Carr Time: 22/04/2014 15:00-16:00 Location: B32/3077 File size: 698 Mb Abstract Until recently, "computing" education in English schools mainly focused on developing general Digital Literacy and Microsoft Office skills. As of this September, a new curriculum comes into effect that provides a strong emphasis on computation and programming. This change has generated some controversy in the news media (4-year-olds being forced to learn coding! boss of the government’s coding education initiative cannot code shock horror!!!!) and also some concern in the teaching profession (how can we possibly teach programming when none of the teachers know how to program)? Dr Sue Sentance will explain the work of Computing At School, a part of the BCS Academy, in galvanising universities to help teachers learn programming and other computing skills. Come along and find out about the new English Computing Revolution - How will your children and your schools be affected? - How will our University intake change? How will our degrees have to change? - What is happening to the national perception of Computer Science?

Data Science Seminar: The data science revolution in Physics and Astronomy

Abstract Heading into the 2020s, Physics and Astronomy are undergoing experimental revolutions that will reshape our picture of the fabric of the Universe. The Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the largest particle physics project in the world, produces 30 petabytes of data annually that need to be sifted through, analysed, and modelled. In astrophysics, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) will be taking a high-resolution image of the full sky every 3 days, leading to data rates of 30 terabytes per night over ten years. These experiments endeavour to answer the question why 96% of the content of the universe currently elude our physical understanding. Both the LHC and LSST share the 5-dimensional nature of their data, with position, energy and time being the fundamental axes. This talk will present an overview of the experiments and data that is gathered, and outlines the challenges in extracting information. Common strategies employed are very similar to industrial data! Science problems (e.g., data filtering, machine learning, statistical interpretation) and provide a seed for exchange of knowledge between academia and industry. Speaker Biography Professor Mark Sullivan Mark Sullivan is a Professor of Astrophysics in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. Mark completed his PhD at Cambridge, and following postdoctoral study in Durham, Toronto and Oxford, now leads a research group at Southampton studying dark energy using exploding stars called "type Ia supernovae". Mark has many years' experience of research that involves repeatedly imaging the night sky to track the arrival of transient objects, involving significant challenges in data handling, processing, classification and analysis.