December 30, 2004
It might seem nuts . . but maths can save red squirrels.GARETH EDWARDS THEY are one of Britain's most endearing indigenous species, and also one of the most threatened. The plight of the red squirrel, at the paws of the larger American grey squirrel, might seem a million miles away from the cold, calculating world of number crunching. But now mathematicians at Heriot-Watt University may hold the key to the species' survival. And if successful their work could be used in conservation efforts around the world. The endangered red squirrel has seen its habitat steadily shrink as the more aggressive grey, originally imported from America in the 1930s, takes over. When the native red population went into decline it was initially thought that the greys were simply more successful at survival. It was later discovered that they carry a disease, harmless to them but fatal to the red squirrel. Grey squirrels also eat the same food as red squirrels, but can eat it at a more ripe stage, when it is unsuitable for reds. All of this has led to a rapid decline of the red squirrel population, and most of the remaining animals, around 160,000, are holed up largely in coniferous areas of Scotland including parts of the Highlands and Borders as environmentalists work on a way to help the species survive. Mathematicians at the university are also trying to work out an equation for the survival of the red squirrel. Dr Andrew White, lecturer in mathematics, has been studying the plight of the rare animals and how to halt the steady encroachment of the invading imported greys. With so few of the animals left, he knows environmentalists can't afford to make any mistakes when implementing strategy in the wild. And he believes that mathematical models created at the university could be used to help find the best way to save the squirrels. "The environment is delicate and where animals are under threat, going out and trying out conservation strategies in the field could end up doing more harm than good," he said. "That's where mathematical models come in, as they are able to test a variety of conservation and management strategies theoretically and safely. "There are too few red squirrels left in the wild to just try out a strategy and hope for the best, but a computerised mathematical model lets you experiment to establish what works best and what could actually be counter productive." These mathematical models of conservation are already being put to use, with Professor Jonathan Sherratt trying to work out a model for why animal populations can expand and contract rapidly and seemingly without explanation. He has been working with data gathered on the field vole population of the Kielder Forest in the Scottish Borders over the last twenty years. Their population undergoes regular cyclical fluctuations, rising by up to a hundred-fold and then declining again over periods of about four years, yet nobody has been able to work out why. Through mathematical simulations similar to those being used to work out conservation strategies for the red squirrel, Prof Sherratt has been able to demonstrate the key role played in the vole's population by the large reservoir in the middle of the forest. His mathematical model shows that if the reservoir is filled in, which could never be carried out in real life, the population throughout the forest disappears. Doreen Graham, of the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, said any move to help the survival of the red squirrel was to be welcomed. "The current work on conservation of the red squirrel is more towards containing the spread of the grey squirrel and keeping them in certain areas," she said. "If this model could test out conservation strategies it could lead to a more pro-active strategy to increase the population of the red squirrels, which everyone would welcome. "The red squirrel is one of the most beautiful native animals we have and anyone who has seen them in the wild will not forget it. The more people working to help save them the better." It might seem nuts . . but maths can save red squirrels |
December 30, 2004
Neunzert -Mathe 'magician' to the core!Most students dreaded this subject. Many others break into cold sweat when asked to take this exam but a tete-a-tete with German mathematician Helmut Neunzert is bound to change your entire outlook towards Mathematics. Neunzert, who recently received the prestigious Zakir Husain Award for his contribution to Industrial and Applied Mathematics says, "Mathematics is not a subject to be crammed but a tool to solve the real life problems". "Although one has to learn to put two and two to make four, beyond that mathematics is a creative science", he says. He cites an interesting example of a "real life" problem he subjects his students to, "Turtles have a pattern on their back. I ask my students to observe it and see what is similar or what is different between them as they grow." Based on their observations, the students evolve equations to explain the pattern growth. And just if you thought that the case was interesting but not of commercial value, wait till Neunzert tells you that he has visited over 400 companies all over the world to provide industrial solutions using the Mathematical tools. His association with India is not new one and he has visited the country nine times. "IIT Chennai started an MTech in Mathematics after my visit. I am also working for the Department of Oceanography where we are trying to predict the pattern of waves that destroy coastal areas every year so we can calculate where exactly to build the barriers," he says. Neunzert -Mathe 'magician' to the core! |
December 30, 2004
Web-Based Tool To Help Clinicians Select Schizophrenia TreatmentNASHVILLE, Tenn., Dec. 29 (AScribe Newswire) -- A new Web-based tool will be available January 1, 2005 to help clinicians determine the best medication for patients with schizophrenia. An international team led by Vanderbilt University Medical Center's Herbert Meltzer, M.D., recently completed the new algorithms, or step-by-step protocols, which will provide clinicians a resource as they make treatment decisions. The value of the algorithms was recently acknowledged by the World Health Organization (WHO), which has committed to establishing a Web link to the algorithms from its Web site. This will allow clinicians and patients worldwide to access the algorithms. The International Psychopharmacology Algorithm Project (IPAP), a team of psychiatrists, psychopharmacologists and algorithm designers, was founded by Knoxville, Tenn. psychiatrist Kenneth Jobson, M.D., to develop new Web-based tools to improve the treatment of psychiatric disorders. In 2000, Meltzer joined in their efforts and organized a group to develop the algorithms for schizophrenia treatment. "The idea was that we would come up with evidence-based medicine for schizophrenia, providing clinicians with a resource as they make decisions in standard situations, as well as in crises like suicidality, violence, and severe drug side effects," said Meltzer, the Bixler/Johnson/Mays Professor of Psychiatry and director of the Division of Psychopharmacology at Vanderbilt. "The algorithms are unique in many ways," Meltzer said. "First, they require clinicians to evaluate patients for these crises before deciding on the course of drug therapy. Also, the algorithms are designed to help clinicians who are not psychiatrists evaluate a patient's medication regimen." "The kind of people now prescribing drugs include nurse practitioners, as well as family doctors," Meltzer said. In addition, patients are often seen infrequently on an outpatient basis under managed care. Such changes have led to serious problems, which includes patients not using medications correctly and/or using multiple drugs without good evidence that multiple drugs should be used." Among patients with schizophrenia, around 20 percent are taking two or more antipsychotics," Meltzer said. "Algorithms have come into favor to give strong guidance to people who aren't fully knowledgeable about the literature or have very limited time with patients." This double- and triple-treatment, known as polypharmacy, leads to higher drug costs, both to traditional insurance plans and governmental health care plans like TennCare, Tennessee's Medicaid program. The IPAP algorithms are designed to limit this phenomenon of polypharmacy, which Meltzer expects will lead to a tremendous savings in drug costs. "Following the algorithms could save a minimum of 40 percent on the antipsychotics for schizophrenia," estimated Meltzer. Regarding the TennCare budget crisis, Meltzer added, "I think (use of the algorithms) could provide a way of reducing the cost of psychotropic drugs to the state." Meltzer's current research also suggests that limiting polypharmacy improves patient outcomes. In a study set to be published in the spring, Meltzer and colleagues found that adding a placebo to the standard antipsychotic medication, Clozaril, was better than adding a second antipsychotic in terms of improving psychosis and cognitive function. These findings strongly advocate limiting the use of multiple drugs. "I think patients will get much better care," Meltzer said. "We are excited to be involved in the implementation of these algorithms," said Karen Rhea, M.D., vice president for Medical Services at Centerstone, the largest behavioral health care provider in Tennessee. With approximately 2,000 schizophrenic patients seen by providers in the Centerstone system, the availability of such a tool will be a highly valuable asset to mental health care in the state. "We are particularly pleased with their being available online. It's going to make it much simpler for us to implement," Rhea said." As our system is completely paperless, this is a modality we use anyway, and will allow our providers to quickly access the portions of the algorithms that are of interest." Another strength of the IPAP algorithms is their incorporation of evidence-based medicine." Protocols and algorithms are one source of collecting information from the literature," Jobson said." And information from the literature is one of the data streams used to make clinical decisions. "So this will provide, we hope, salient information for health care providers in this country and abroad, to have the opinion of a large group of international experts on best treatment practices." The Web-based format will allow health care providers to not only see the recommendations, but also see the level of supporting evidence and the references that back those recommendations up. However, cautioned Jobson, "It is not prescriptive in the sense of being a recommendation for any single patient." Being Web-based, the IPAP algorithms can also be easily adapted to reflect the results of the most recent research advances -- a problem inherent in print-based algorithms. Its Web-based format also allows the algorithms to be adapted for use by clinicians in any country. "We devised a number of variations on the algorithms for different countries where the same medications are not available," Meltzer said. "Dr. Meltzer was able to recruit an extraordinary faculty through his international work, his international contacts," said Jobson. "It's the most international a faculty that's ever addressed schizophrenia, certainly in a Web-based way." To access the algorithm, visit www.ipap.org. Web-Based Tool To Help Clinicians Select Schizophrenia Treatment |
December 30, 2004
Tsunami Earthquake Location Included in ForecastThe location of the Dec. 26 earthquake that unleashed a devastating tsunami across the Indian Ocean was identified in a 10-year forecast of likely earthquake sites worldwide made recently by researchers at the University of California, Davis, Center for Computational Science and Engineering. The researchers used records of past earthquakes of magnitude 5 and greater and computer models to produce a map that shows "hotspots," where earthquakes of magnitude 7 or greater are likely to occur between 2000 and 2010. Of 38 large earthquakes worldwide since 2000, 30 have occurred directly on or within the margin of error of hotspots identified by the forecast. The Dec. 26 magnitude 9 event struck on a hotspot off the coast of Indonesia. "These results indicate that the technique developed by our group can successfully identify the locations for 80 to 90 percent of future large earthquakes over time periods of up to a decade or so," said John Rundle, director of the UC Davis center. The information could allow governments and agencies to make informed decisions about where to locate critical infrastructure and supplies, and to set priorities for allocating resources for emergencies or carrying out seismic strengthening and retrofits, he said. The 10-year forecasts could aid disaster preparation but are not yet focused enough in time to give actual earthquake warnings. Future work on computational methods, together with the use of specialized radar satellites that can make very precise measurements of ground movements, could be used to enhance future forecasts, Rundle said. "We can't prevent these devastating events, but we can provide tools so that people can take steps to reduce the potential damage and loss of life," Rundle said. Starting from identified hotspots, scientists could also use computer models to predict how earthquake-generated shaking would move through the ground, or how and where tsunamis might travel over the ocean, he said. The UC Davis Center's map uses the same technique as a more detailed forecast for California created by Rundle and colleagues as part of the Quakesim project in collaboration with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Quakesim is funded primarily by NASA and the U.S. Department of Energy. The worldwide map was prepared by UC Davis graduate student James Holliday and presented by Donald Turcotte, professor of geology at UC Davis, on Dec. 14, 2004, at the meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, California. Earlier this year, the team reported that the California forecast, which runs from 2000-2010, had successfully predicted the locations of 12 of 14 large earthquakes (magnitudes greater than 5.0) since January 1, 2000. The California forecast was published on February 19, 2002, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Eleven of the 14 large earthquakes occurred after the publication date. The researchers have made a similar forecast for Japan that successfully identified the location of the Oct. 23 earthquake in Niigata province on a previously unknown earthquake fault. That forecast, which was prepared by UC Davis postdoctoral researcher Kazuyoshi Nanjo, was presented during lectures by Rundle in Japan on Oct. 13 (Kyoto University) and Oct. 14 (Tokyo University), prior to the occurrence of the Niigata earthquake. Tsunami Earthquake Location Included in Forecast |
December 30, 2004
U.S. Energy Department Database Locates Tsunami VictimsBy Cheryl Pellerin Washington -- Relief agencies working to help victims of the December 26 tsunamis in the Indian Ocean are using a demographic database developed at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee. LandScan is a global population database that combines geographic information system and remote-sensing technology to show the geographical distribution of the world population at a 1-kilometer resolution. Using these population-distribution maps, relief workers can quickly determine the locations of potential tsunami victims who might otherwise be cut off from communication. The LandScan database system is being used to identify spatial and population numbers in the tsunami areas and aiding recovery efforts there, said Budhendra Bhaduri, group leader of geographic information science and technology in ORNL's Computational Sciences and Engineering Division. "Once you know how large an area is possibly being impacted, you can assess how many people are at risk from these disasters very quickly using the global dataset," Bhaduri said. ORNL's Global Population Project, part of the LandScan effort, collects the best available census counts (usually at the province level) for each country and uses factors such as proximity to roads, land cover, nighttime lights and an urban density factor to calculate the population distribution for each area. Remote sensing of land cover, nighttime lights and other factors is used to verify and validate the population model and the resulting LandScan database. Unlike conventional population database models, the ORNL LandScan model takes into account the difference between daytime and nighttime populations in areas around the world. The LandScan population distribution database can be used in emergency response to natural disasters, terrorist incidents, or other threats; in humanitarian relief for famines and other disasters; to protect civilian populations; to estimate populations affected by global sea-level rise; and other environmental and demographic applications. LandScan data was used to plan aid and recovery efforts after the 2003 earthquake that destroyed Bam, Iran. More than 1,300 international organizations use the LandScan system, including those in heavily impacted Sri Lanka. Many of the organizations participated in a conference in late August to analyze a response for a theoretical disaster, which has now become reality -- the aftermath of an earthquake of the magnitude that occurred December 26. "One of the things that was very obvious was that all these organizations were solely dependent upon LandScan as the ultimate answer-provider for how many people are going to be affected in response to an earthquake event. And post-recovery of human lives is very critical," Bhaduri said. He added that LandScan will be a continuous monitor of recovery efforts that will take many months to complete. (The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov) U.S. Energy Department Database Locates Tsunami Victims |
December 30, 2004
Proven: Privatization can't workBy MICHAEL KINSLEY My contention: Social Security privatization is not just unlikely to succeed, for various reasons that are subject to discussion. It is mathematically certain to fail. Discussion is pointless. The usual case against privatization is that (1) millions of inexperienced investors may end up worse off, and (2) stocks don't necessarily do better than bonds over the long run, as proponents assume. But privatization won't work for a better reason: It can't possibly work, even in theory. The logic is not very complicated: 1. To "work," privatization must generate more money for retirees than current arrangements. This bonus is supposed to be extra money in retirees' pockets and/or it is supposed to make up for a reduction in promised benefits, thus helping to close the looming revenue gap. 2. Where does this bonus come from? There are only two possibilities from greater economic growth or from other people. 3. Greater economic growth requires either more capital to invest or smarter investment of the same amount of capital. Privatization will not lead to either of these. a) If nothing else in the federal budget changes, every dollar deflected from the federal treasury into private Social Security accounts must be replaced by a dollar that the government raises in private markets. So the total pool of capital available for private investment remains the same. b) The only change in decisionmaking about capital investment is that the decisions about some fraction of the capital stock will be made by people with little or no financial experience. Maybe this will not be the disaster that some critics predict, but there is no reason to think that it will actually increase the overall return on capital. 4. If the economy doesn't produce more than it otherwise would, the Social Security privatization bonus must come from other investors, in the form of a lower return. a) This is in fact the implicit assumption behind the notion of putting Social Security money into stocks, instead of government bonds, because stocks have a better long-term return. The bonus will come from those saps who sell the stocks and buy the bonds. b) In other words, privatization means betting the nation's most important social program on a theory that cannot be true unless many people are convinced that it's false. c) Even if the theory were true, initially, privatization would make it false. The money newly available for private investment would bid up the price of (and thus lower the return on) stocks, while the government would need to raise the interest on bonds in order to attract replacement money. Proven: Privatization can't work |
December 30, 2004
Arthur Michelson: The precision of math, like poetry, gets to heart of thingsArthur Michelson American middle school students don't much care that they're worse at math than their counterparts in Hong Kong and Finland. "I don't need it," my students say. "I'm gonna be a basketball star." Or a beautician, or a car mechanic, or a singer. It's also hard to get much of a rise out of adults over the fact, released earlier this year, that the United States ranked 28th out of 41 countries whose middle school students' math skills were tested by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. So what if we're tied with Latvia, while nations such as Japan and South Korea leave us in the dust? After all, when was the last time you used algebra? But math is not just about computing quadratic equations, knowing geometric proofs or balancing a checkbook. And it's not just about training Americans to become scientists. It has implicit value. It is about discipline, precision, thoroughness and meticulous analysis. It helps you see patterns, develops your logic skills, teaches you to concentrate and to separate truth from falsehood. These are abilities and qualities that distinguish successful people. Math helps you make wise financial decisions, but also informs you so you can avoid false claims from advertisers, politicians and others. It helps you determine risk. Some examples: If a fair coin is tossed and eight heads come up in a row, most adults would gamble that the next toss would come up tails. But a coin has no memory. There is always a 50-50 chance. See you at the casino? If you have no sense of big numbers, you can't evaluate the consequences of how government spends your money. Why should we worry? Let our kids deal with it. ... Enormous amounts of money are spent on quack medicine. Many people will reject sound scientific studies on drugs or nutrition if the results don't fit their preconceived notions, yet they might leap to action after reading news stories on the results of small, inconclusive or poorly run studies. After an airplane crash, studies show that people are more likely to drive than take a plane in spite of the fact that they are much more likely to be killed or injured while driving. Planes are not like copycat criminals. A plane is not more likely to crash just because another recently did. In fact, the most dangerous time to drive is probably right after a plane crash because so many more people are on the road. The precision of math, like poetry, gets to the heart of things. It can increase our awareness. Consider the Fibonacci series, in which each number is the sum of the preceding two, (0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 ...). Comparing each successive pair yields a relationship known as the Golden Ratio, which often shows up in nature and art. It's the mathematical underpinning of what we consider beautiful. You'll find it in the design of the Parthenon and the Mona Lisa, as well as in human proportion; for instance, in the size of the hand compared with the forearm and the forearm to the entire arm. Stephen Hawking's editor warned him that for every mathematical formula he wrote in a book, he would lose much of his audience. Yet more than a little is lost by dumbing things down. It is not possible to really understand science and the scientific method without understanding math. A rainbow is even more beautiful and amazing when we understand it. So is a lightning bolt, an ant or ourselves. Math gives us a powerful tool to understand our universe. I don't wish to overstate: Poetry, music, literature and the fine and performing arts are also gateways to beauty. Nothing we study is a waste. But the precision of math helps refine how we think in a very special way. How do we revitalize the learning of math? I don't have the big answer. I teach middle school and try to find an answer one child at a time. When I can get one to say, "Wow, that's tight," I feel the joy of a small victory. Arthur Michelson, who teaches at Beechwood School in Menlo Park, Calif., wrote this article for the Los Angeles Times. Arthur Michelson: The precision of math, like poetry, gets to heart of things |
December 30, 2004
Math teaches more than we may thinkBy Arthur Ogden As the days of the year now quickly form into a new annual set, I reflect on a number of things, which hopefully will make my new year something worthwhile - things like resolutions to be a better person, more diligence in my professional endeavors, more patience with my children, and more stamina to make determined contributions to the world in which I find myself. One of my annual renewal rites is re-reading some of the classics which have given me a perspective on my relationship to how I approach others I encounter in daily routines. Of those readings, one of the most mind-clearing masterpieces is Machiavelli's "The Prince" for its sheer timelessness and understanding of human motivation. Another is Sun Tzu's "The Art of War", which follows closely on the heels of Machiavelli for making strategic moves. About seven years ago I added Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time" to my yearly literary "to do" list. Hawking really does simplify some of our contemporary considerations of physics, just as Bertrand Russell's "The ABC's of Relativity" did several decades ago. But the real challenge for me has always been trying to understand the importance of applications of mathematics, just as Hawking and Russell did in their works. And that is where the real fascination of thinking begins to take hold in American education, for little though we recognize or acknowledge it, our basic forms of deductive reasoning are mathematical applications of principles set down a few centuries ago by a Greek mathematician named Euclid. Now, for most of us, the mere thought of a proof for our sophomore geometry class is enough to send us to the bath for a cold shower and a cup of wake-up coffee after trying to put one postulate together with another to justify why the angle of one part of a figure can make the difference in how we build the next bridge! And future applications of these principles will tell us just how much and at what rate to put water into a bucket with a hole in it so that we can fill the bucket - and just how long it will take to complete this vital task. (I still think it is ridiculous to use a bucket with a hole in it!) At any rate, it is these kinds of mathematical gymnastics we are exposed to in our secondary school paths. And it is these kinds of mathematical "problems" which cause us so much frustration and consternation, and ultimately force us to pose the question, "Why do we study math?" In most practical instances, we learn basic math so that we may function in a world, which demands such basic skills. Someone working in the retail industry certainly needs to understand basic mathematical calculations in order to survive! Someone who works in a lumber yard had better well know basic measurements and calculations or that venture will dissolve in a morass of under and over cuts resulting in consistent miscalculations. Now, aside from those very fundamental reasons, there is another more subtle and more profound reason we study mathematics, from Algebra I, to Algebra II and to Geometry. It is to expose us to the basic principles of deductive reasoning. Of course, most of us believe that the end-all of this kind of deduction is Pythagoras' Theorem regarding right triangles - you know, a2+b2=c2. But more familiarly, we can remember the basic deduction declaring that "if A=B and B=C, then A=C." Whether or not we realized it when we first witnessed this magical equation, it was laying the foundation for our ability to think clearly. It was not until I was in a freshman logic class in college that I came to realize that three years prior to my venture into the world or symbolic logic I was being indoctrinated, albeit on the theoretical level, to the foundational rubric for how we think, how we formulate ideas, and how we reach conclusions - as well as how we come to rationalize that which we wish to promulgate and eventually to pontificate. Thus, the study of mathematics gives us a real opportunity to study the structural rudiments of our method of argumentation, of discovery, of theorizing, and of constructing our approaches to the universe we try to understand on a moment-by-moment basis. And at this time of year, I always ponder just why my sophomore geometry teacher never took the time to tell us that she was teaching us how to think, not what to think, but how to organize those random mental images floating in and out of our conscious awareness into a working body of knowledge which indicates a person exposed to an expansive, comprehensive education. Math teaches more than we may think |
December 30, 2004
Epasinghe Memorial Gold Medal for MathematicsAn endowment has been established in the University of Colombo to make an annual award of the Mr. and Mrs. D. P. Epasinghe Memorial Gold Medal for Mathematics. Among other conditions stipulated by the donors, the awardee should be the best student to graduate with First Class Honours at the Special Degree Examination in Mathematics. Late Mr. D. P. Epasinghe was a vernacular school teacher who began his career at the age of 18 years as a Monitor and was appointed as an assistant teacher in 1929 to Dodangoda Buddhist Mixed School in the Kalutara District. In 1942, he was appointed the Head Teacher of Urugala Buddhist Mixed School in the same District and was later transferred to Mahagama also in the same district in the same capacity. The managers of these schools were the Buddhist Theosophical Society who did not have adequate funds to develop the infrastructure of their schools. A building constructed at the school in Mahagama is living testimony to his devotion to his profession where he was able to mobilise the support of the ordinary villagers to contribute in cash, kind and labour to put up the building. He himself set an example by contributing with his labour. He retired as the Head Teacher from Vidyawardhana Maha Vidyalaya in Narahenpita in 1962. He was appointed a Justice of the Peace in 1970 and served in this capacity until his demise in 1995 at the ripe old age of 92 years. He was a well known social worker and among his great achievements was the service he rendered to the All Ceylon Buddhist Congress as the Treasurer of the Hospital Welfare Service of the Congress culminating in the establishment of the Neuro-Surgical Unit of the General Hospital, Colombo. Late Mrs. Epasinghe (nee Wijegunasekera) was a housewife who brought up her children with devotion and also contributed her bit as a social worker firstly in Dodangoda, her village of birth. She played an active role in the Kulangana Samithy of Dodangoda as its treasurer for some time. She was also a leading Dayika of Sri Sudarshanaramaya, the village temple. A public well in Dodangoda constructed partly at her expense is living testimony to her modest philanthropy. After the family moved to Kandewatta, Nugegoda in 1954, she got actively involved in the activities of Sri Wijayawardhanaramaya in Kandewatta until her demise in 1992. Mr and Mrs. Epasinghe were always treated by the neighbours as local leaders and were highly respected and loved by them. Far from being affluent, they were always there to give a helping hand to the neighbours whenever the necessity arose. Epasinghe Memorial Gold Medal for Mathematics |
December 30, 2004
Math + software = learningLynn Thompson A half-dozen high-school math students tell a remarkably similar story. Last year they didn't understand algebra. They came to class, listened to the teacher, tried to do the homework and failed. This year, using a computer-based program called Cognitive Tutor, these students are progressing steadily and staying engaged. Mukilteo, Everett and Marysville high schools are among about 60 schools in the state that are turning to the software program to teach math to struggling students. Research indicates that Cognitive Tutor, an interactive program that analyzes students' strengths and weaknesses and allows them to work at their own pace, significantly increases math skills. Teachers are excited about the results, particularly among students who had given up on math. But the computer-based program is expensive. Mariner High School in the Mukilteo district needed to build and equip a computer lab before school started in September. The software can be more costly than a standard mathematics textbook. "We purchased it because we saw the good results in other districts," said Lloy Schaaf, the director of curriculum and professional development for Mukilteo schools. "Integrating technology and cooperative learning in math seemed to have a huge impact." In comparisons made over the past two decades, U.S. students' math skills have lagged behind those of other developed countries. On the high-stakes Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL), math scores at many schools are significantly lower than reading and writing scores. Algebra is where many students lose their way because the mathematics begins to get abstract, said Steve Ritter, the head of research for Carnegie Learning, a private educational-technology company that markets Cognitive Tutor. He said the math program tries to make the subject more concrete by bridging from students' life experiences to problems that can be solved by algebraic equations. The Cognitive Tutor program also differs from traditional algebra classes in that it provides immediate feedback. Instead of making the same mistake on a dozen homework problems, a student finds out right away if his or her approach is wrong. Developed by learning theorists at Carnegie Mellon University, Cognitive Tutor is one of the few math programs to be included in the national What Works Clearinghouse, which identifies programs and products whose effectiveness is backed by scientific evidence. Math + software = learning |
December 28, 2004
NokodoNokodo Search Engine Technologies officially opens the Nokodo.com search engine on January 1, 2005. To launch the opening to the public, Nokodo.com joins three New Year's celebrations in Frankfurt, Berlin and Munich, Germany. In each of the three cities, promoters will distribute free Nokodo.com t-shirts, pens, lighters, and other special items. Finding a Nokodo.com promoter will be easier than finding Bigfoot in the forest. In addition, there will be a special live music performance in Frankfurt that you will not want to miss. A special page has been setup at http://www.Nokodo.com/newyears_2004.php with complete information about all Nokodo related events. This New Year's page is packed with images of promotional materials, free items being distributed, and live webcams feeds. Remember that all good things come from above. Going to be in one of the three cities for New Year's? We are looking for the best Nokodo.com picture from any of these events. Snap a picture of the Nokodo.com team handing out freebies or anything related to Nokodo.com and enter to win a digital camera! All entries must be emailed to pictures@nokodo.com with your full name, and picture attached. Pictures will be judged by the Nokodo.com staff, and the winner will be contacted on January 15, 2004 via email. Nokodo.com will also be giving away 100 MP3 players to celebrate the opening of the search engine. Random users will see an indicator of winning an MP3 player after searching Nokodo.com. About Nokodo.com After spidering millions of websites, Nokodo.com reshuffles the web and opens to the public on January 1, 2005. Nokodo.com does not use external feeds for data but relies on its own spiders to crawl actual website content for the most accurate information. Nokodo.com determines search results based on a unique, complex algorithm which analyzes the actual website content spidered. Nokodo |
December 28, 2004
Searching for the perfect flavourby Laura Durnford As you're savouring the mouth-watering delights of festive fare, spare a thought for the food chemists who spend a lot of time and effort in perfecting the flavours in all kinds of foods and drinks. It's normally a trial and error process, involving batteries of human guinea pigs to taste-test the products. But now Dutch researchers have devised an artificial throat, which can speed up the process by helping to predict which flavours will be released during consumption. A contraption of glass pipes, opening and closing clamps and rubber tubes may not look much like a person's throat, but scientists at NIZO Food Research in Ede, the Netherlands, have found that it does a pretty good job of swallowing and tasting the yoghurts and fizzy drinks they have been plying it with. Liquid layer By pouring liquid into the top glass tube - which represents the mouth - then opening a clamp to release the fluid into a lower chamber (the oesophagus), the researchers found that drink forms a thin layer coating in the throat as it is swallowed. Alexandra Boelrijk, the head of the NIZO team, says, "what we found out is that the forming of this liquid layer in the throat is really of the utmost importance for the aroma perception of a liquid product, like soft drink or yoghurt". But the key to tasting flavours is the breathing action that normally accompanies swallowing, which the team also imitated: "from the lower side of this machine the breath comes, mimicking the breath from your lungs which is very fast, like 1 or 2 litres per minute," Dr Boelrijk explains. "And this goes alongside this thin film in the lower glass tube and takes with it all the aroma compounds, and takes it to the upper part of the artificial throat." Here the 'breath' delivers the aroma molecules to a device that acts like an artificial nose, where the 'tasting' takes place. Recognition good or bad This device is a mass spectrometer, which measures the concentrations of different molecules carried in the 'exhaled' air. In the first breath during swallowing, up to 80 percent of the volatile compounds that give food and drinks their flavour are actually released into the human olfactory system, where smells and tastes are detected. Tests so far have shown that the artificial throat performs in terms of the profile of compounds released very much like that of a human. Unlike a human, though, the system cannot say whether a flavour profile tastes good or bad. For example, the concentration of a flavour in a low-fat product may be the same as in a normal-fat product, such as yoghurt, but the final taste will differ, depending on the combination of other ingredients in the recipe. Jack Burger, who's senior scientist at Quest International - the food flavours firm that commissioned the artificial throat - says, "there are many examples where we have added 10 percent sugar solution, and compared it with an artificially sweetened soft drink. The mass spectrometer detects more or less the same concentration, but you know - cola or cola light - it's a different world." Saving time and money What the artificial throat does do is to provide a standardised experimental set-up that produces replicable results, showing how different combinations of ingredients are released. It also speeds up the whole process of flavour adaptation, which used to take as long as 6 weeks, by coupling the system with a mathematical model that predicts flavour release for various liquids. "A flavour is a mixture of several hundred compounds," Dr Burger explains. "If you have to change each of those compounds, that's a time consuming process. Using a mathematical model you can reduce that time to probably half an hour." In the 4.41 billion euro global flavours market, such a time saving could also prove very cost-effective. But the fact that the research has already revealed the importance of the first breath for flavour release also points to its value for further research on human physiology, for example why breath matters so much and why different individuals may perceive flavours differently as a result of their particular patterns of mouth volumes and breathing. Ultimately though, Dr Burger says that human tasters are still vital to perfecting any product: "There are a lot of different people in a lot of different countries who have different tastes. So what we try to do is generalise it. Later, after we have adapted a flavour for a low-fat product, we can fine-tune it for another population in a different country." Searching for the perfect flavour |
December 28, 2004
The Israeli image makersBy Judy Siegel-Itzkovich Israeli brainpower provides much added value to computer software, according to Science magazine, which recently ranked Israeli computer science as the best in the world. And using the same hardware as anyone else, researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Benin School of Engineering and Computer Science have forged innovations unattained elsewhere. For example, instead of painstaking manual colorization of old black-and-white movies, the Hebrew University whizzes have developed a mathematical algorithm that requires marking images with only a few crude squiggles that in about 10 minutes creates a highly realistic color picture. Another team imitates the natural abilities of the human eye, optic nerve and the brain to depict gradations of light and shadow by using a mathematical algorithm to meld images of various exposures. A team of computer and engineering experts at the school are responsible for the world's first software to allow the creation of panoramic 3-D photographic images of up to 360 degrees with a single digital camera; these can be printed in 2-D on an ordinary home printer and glued to a cheap, lenticular plastic sheet to create an in-depth, hologram-like image. The success of their efforts can be viewed in and on international airports, bus shelters, train stations, phone kiosks, vending machines, magazine covers, brochures, inserts, mailers, CD covers and packages around the world. The Hebrew University?s mathematics department was founded at the launching of the university in 1925; it took 44 more years until the computer department was started. Originally, university management had decided to leave engineering to the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, but in 1999 it changed its mind, after realizing how math, computers and engineering had become inseparable. The aims are to shape an industry in which changes are endemic, and prepare the next generation of hi-tech pioneers with a dynamic, multi-disciplinary academic program integrating theory and application. Now celebrating its fifth anniversary, the school has 39 faculty members and 840 students pursuing bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees. Among the honors received by its faculty are the Turing Award and the Nevanlinna Award. The curriculum includes strategic planning courses, and students may study strategy for launching start-up companies. They also participate in joint projects under the guidance of faculty and industrialists, where they learn to provide practical solutions for real problems. Fortunately for the capital, the majority of its graduates work in Jerusalem hi-tech companies such as Intel and NDS. At a study day for science reporters organized by ISRAEL21c, leading researchers in the school presented their wares. Introduced by senior lecturer Dr. Yair Weiss, the faculty presented some of its active research groups, which include machine learning, computer vision, computer-aided surgery and medical image processing, artificial intelligence, computational biology and computational neuroscience. Dr. Dani Lischinski, a senior lecturer at the school who runs the computer graphics lab, tempted his guests with grayscale photos of two actresses - Ingrid Bergman and Lucille Ball. With growing interest in old films, Hollywood has sought colorization, but the process is very expensive. The movie Casablanca was transformed into color in a very expensive and complicated manual process some years ago, but the result left much to be desired. "There are no good automatic tools do this. It requires a lot of trial and error," Lischinski explained. But to fill this niche, his team developed a patent-protected semi-automatic technique to colorize black-and-white prints or videos." One merely has to scribble approximate colors in a handful of regions in each picture, and the computer program fills in the spaces with color gradients to make the image very lifelike and authentic. Ingrid looks sexy in a mauve wool sweater, and Lucy's flaming red hair suddenly appears. It looks like magic. "We have received a lot of interest from Hollywood studios," says Lischinski. "We must be doing something right." In another presentation, Lischinski displays photographs taken at the Beit Belgia guest house on the nearby HU Givat Ram campus. The image was photographed from the lobby looking toward the sunny courtyard beyond glass doors. But because the lobby is relatively dark and the outdoors very bright, no one camera exposure can depict the scene as the eye sees it; any attempt loses much of the texture and detail. The marble floors looked as if they had leopard spots, and the garden was completely bleached out. The team coded the light intensities of certain colors, with the goal of compressing the dynamic range. The images are then "squeezed" to avoid overexposure and underexposure, and the result is displayable on an ordinary monitor. He compared an indoor image of a stained-glass window taken in a Washington cathedral: if the colors of the stained glass come out distinctly, the architecture of the window is a blur. Images from teams who worked on this abroad were substandard, but that produced by the HU algorithm technology was nearly perfect, resembling what the eye sees naturally. But the most eye-catching presentation was that of Prof. Shmuel Peleg, a HU and University of Maryland graduate whose recent research interests include image motion analysis and "image mosaicking." He, Gideon Ben-Zvi and colleagues took his patented technique of combining 3-D stereo and panorama - which was previously considered impossible - and in 2000 established HumanEyes Technologies. The company's HumanEyes3-D software was the first to allow the creation of natural panoramic 3-D images of up to 360 degrees with a single digital camera held at arm's length, and the reuse of the same shot for multiple applications for print or display on 3-D monitors. Four years after its founding, the company remains the only one in its field. Some of the brands already generating 3-D or motion campaigns with the software include the Miss Universe Organization, Looney Tunes, Coca Cola, Tati, Castro, Coffee Bean, Segafredo and Dove Shampoo. With offices in Jerusalem and the US, HumanEyes now employs 30 talented and experienced staffers. Until now, anyone who wanted to take a 3-D photograph needed many cameras in different positions to snap pictures of a scene from various angles. All these views were then merged to create a stereoscopic image, which means that, just as in real life when we look at something, each eye sees a slightly different image, and the brain combines the two to create a three-dimensional picture without having to wear 3-D glasses, Peleg explained. But HumanEyes does away with all the cameras. The HU-developed software, Peleg said, creates a stereoscopic photograph by taking the pictures from a single digital camera that has been swept across a scene in a continuous mode. The computer algorithm selects strips from a series of images, each selected from different angles, and then puts a composite image together to produce depth and uncover objects located behind others. Alternately, a number of still pictures of the scene can be used. It is very different from ordinary magnification or zoom. "We believe it will do to two-dimensional photography what color did to black-and-white photography - that people will come to expect three-dimensional pictures," Peleg added. The company is now "trying to persuade" two giant computer printer companies, HP and Epson, to make printers that will print 3-D images directly on the special plastic, thus eliminating the need to glue the printed paper image to the lenticular material. If all goes well, he said, such printers could become available in a matter of months. Keep your eye on HU's Benin School... It has many more "magic" tricks up its sleeve. The Israeli image makers |
December 28, 2004
No simple solution on US math classesBy Valerie Strauss WASHINGTON -- Confused by the latest ''good news-bad news" headlines about how US students compare in math with their peers in foreign lands? Wondering whether the math program at your child's school is teaching addition better than another program might? You are not alone. Many parents are asking these questions and finding that, when it comes to math, the educational landscape in the United States can be maddeningly complicated. Math programs that give students different ways to answer basic problems are beloved by some teachers, while others scoff and label the programs ''fuzzy math." Research reports are issued, then debunked by critics. And the long-running ''math wars," pitting traditionalists against reformers, are at high pitch. Any large-scale meeting of the minds about the best way to teach the subject, educators and mathematicians say, is nowhere near -- in part because the country is so large and education decisions are locally driven. ''We have 50 states with 15,000 separate, independent school districts," said Gerald Kulm, a math professor and researcher at Texas A & M University. ''Our textbooks and other curriculum materials have to suit at least some majority of the people in those districts, and so things get complicated." The release this month of international comparisons of math performance highlighted the confusion. One study showed that US eighth-graders made significant gains compared with their counterparts worldwide, climbing several places -- to 15th out of 45 countries -- since the international math rankings came out nine years ago. But a recent study suggested that 15-year-olds in the United States lag behind their peers in most other leading industrialized nations in the ability to solve real-life math problems. Some mathematicians and educators even disagree on whether international comparisons are valid. R. James Milgram, a mathematician at Stanford University, said yes; Jeremy Kilpatrick, a University of Georgia professor, said different cultures and educational systems skew the results. There still may be hope of a truce in the math wars, according to Milgram and Kilpatrick, both of whom attended a conference designed to see whether common ground could be found. Richard Schaar, a mathematician and senior vice president of Texas Instruments Inc., wooed the two scholars, plus three other figures in math education, to Washington early this month. Also attending was Wilfried Schmid, a professor at Harvard University who, like Milgram, criticizes ''reform" math programs as failing to teach children the fundamentals. No simple solution on US math classes |
December 24, 2004
Ramanujan anniversary is marked by studentsTHE Indian School celebrated the 118th birth anniversary of the Indian mathematical genius Sreenivasa Ramanujan at its Isa Town campus yesterday. To mark the occasion, the school's mathematics department organised a variety of events, including a mathematics quiz, a mathematics paper presentation and an award ceremony for winners of the Mathematics Talent Search Examination (MTSE), held earlier this month. The paper presentation contest on the Contributions of India to the World of Mathematics and the quiz involved students from The New Indian School, Ibn Al Hytham Islamic School and the Asian School. The Indian School team emerged first in the quiz, with the Asian School in second place. Alongside the celebration was an award ceremony for the MTSE, held and organised by the Indian School earlier this month. A total of 125 students, aged from 11 to 13 years, from 10 schools across Bahrain sat in the 90-minute MTSE, which contained 45 questions to test the students' mathematical aptitude. At the ceremony, 23 prizes were awarded to students for their achievements in the MTSE. The event was attended by Bahrain University mathematics department chairman Dr Salman Abbas, Bahrain University mathematics department senior lecturer Dr Faisal Al Showikh, Indian School executive committee honorary chairman P V Radhakrishna Pillai, executive committee members Dhas Alphonse, P C Mathew and the officiating principal Srivalsan Murugan. Ramanujan anniversary is marked by students |
December 24, 2004
Math in a new centuryAmericans and New Yorkers are better at mathematics. Well, they're at least better at understanding the need to be better at it. A host of state and federal studies released over the last several weeks reflect the world's preoccupation with math and the challenges of teaching students how to apply mathematical principles to real life. Take New Yorkers. Many if not most parents who offer math homework help to their middle-schoolers are brought up short at the demanding content, highlighting both their own shortcomings in the most dreaded of the 3 Rs and the depth of math skills today's students must have. It can't be avoided: Teachers, policy-makers and business leaders all are insisting that public school students learn math and learn it well enough to be successful adults in a new, highly technical century and world. After a dismal experience with the June 2003 Math A Regents exam problematic scoring, high failure rates and questions ill-matched to curriculum New York's Board of Regents appointed a math standards committee. The panel was charged with considering research, teaching methods and standards from the United States and other nations, and proposing modifications to the state's mathematics standards "to improve clarity, specificity and functionality.'' With a good cross-section of members and after plenty of opportunity for public input, the panel issued its report in November. The public comment period for that ended Dec. 4 the state Education Department received more than 1,400 comments and the committee is making changes. The Regents will consider adoption of revised math standards, ones they hope will show a logical progression in skills for each grade, next month. Even during that process, though, New York students in younger grades managed to improve overall in learning math, state test results show. Middle-school math scores, traditionally the lowest since standards were raised and test scores went public, improved "dramatically" statewide, by 6.7 percentage points from the previous year. There were gains, for the third consecutive year, in the percentage of students meeting standards, including among nonwhite and urban students. Four Yonkers elementary schools and one middle school were named among the state's most improved schools based on math test data from 2002 to 2004. Mark Twain Middle School, in fact, did well enough in math and other areas to come off the so-called SURR list of the state's most precarious schools. Education Commissioner Richard Mills attributed the large gains overall to schools that increased the amount of time spent daily on math, provided extensive and routine training for math teachers, hired math "coaches" and provided more after-school tutoring. Yet neither New York nor the nation can rest on laurels or calculators. In other math news: U.S. high school students' math performance came out No. 28 out of 40 nations covered in an international study whose results, based on 2003 tests, were released earlier this month. The Trends in Mathematical and Science Study, done every four years, found that while American eighth-graders had made significant gains in math performance, fourth-graders' progress was flat. Finally, a federal Education Department study of 3,2000 charter schools found that fourth-graders there do as well in reading as those in traditional public schools, but were less proficient in math, by 6 percentage points. That was based on 2003 tests results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Experts questioned about all the math performance results frequently attributed low standings to two factors: not enough qualified math teachers and not enough effort to engage students in mathematics at an early age. Math in a new century |
December 22, 2004
TODAY IS SRINIVASA RAMANUJAN'S BIRTHDAYBy Prof. M.N. Gopalan Srinivasa Ramanujan was a rare and gifted Mathematician. Academically he did not succeed in passing any examination beyond the 10th standard. Born on this day in 1887, he passed away at the age of 33 years. After his marriage in 1909, he worked for a while in the office of the Accountant General and later in the Madras Port Trust as a clerk on a salary of Rs. 30 per month. His theorems, particularly on theory of numbers and integral equations, were published in various journals. He corresponded with Prof. G.H. Hardy of Cambridge University, sending him the results he had obtained through his pursuit of Mathematics. The University awarded him the BA degree in 1916 for his research on 'Highly Composite Numbers'. The Royal Society conferred its Fellowship on him based on Prof. Hardy's recommendation. After a stay of about five years, Srinivasa Ramanujan, following illness, returned to India on 27th March, 1919. He passed away on April 26, 1920. Ramanujan Institute for Advanced Studies in Mathematics has been established in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. The Indian National Science Academy (INSA), New Delhi, has also instituted a medal in his honour. The Government of India issued a commemorative stamp to celebrate his 75th birthday. Prof. Brue C. Berndt has published Srinivasa Ramanujan's research work in five volumes, the fifth volume coming in 1997. The volumes contain 3,254 theorems enunciated by the genius. TODAY IS SRINIVASA RAMANUJAN'S BIRTHDAY |
December 22, 2004
Using math to study molecules no small thing for profSANDRA GUY Students who hate math rail against its merit in the real world. Their protests would be quashed by a University of Chicago scientist's efforts to better understand molecules -- a substance's simplest unit -- by using mathematics. Indeed, David Mazziotti, an assistant professor of chemistry, has broken a 50-year-old barrier to a powerful approach for calculating the properties of molecules. The breakthrough is far from theoretical. Mazziotti, 31, came up with a mathematical algorithm for implementing rules that enable researchers to sketch an accurate picture of molecules with many electrons by using only one pair of electrons. With this novel approach to molecular properties, researchers may be better able to understand a wide range of problems, including the study of ozone depletion and the design of new drugs to treat sickle cell anemia. Mazziotti explained his method earlier this month in the Journal of Chemical Physics and in the Nov. 19 issue of Physical Review Letters. The instructions he developed can enable scientists to break free from the need to represent the motion of all the electrons inside a molecule they are studying -- a daunting task that requires scads of computing power. Now, researchers can follow Mazziotti's guidelines to accurately compute the electronic properties of a molecule with a single pair of electrons. That saves power and resources, and it lets scientists get a better computational description of molecules in their work. Mazziotti compares the feat to assembling a set of architectural blueprints that correctly represent in two dimensions a structure that can be built in three dimensions. The work leading up to Mazziotti's formula took about a year. A five-person research group did the mathematical calculations last spring. "We're at the beginning of the frontier," he said. What is the frontier? Almost every area of chemistry. Mazziotti's methods could also be used by mathematicians and mathematical physicists to gain knowledge about problems that interest them. One of the stumbling blocks in their field is figuring out why superconductivity at high temperatures manifests itself only in two-dimensional layers rather than in three-dimensional solids. Another puzzle that Mazziotti's algorithm could help to unravel is that of free radicals, a problem for atmospheric chemists. Free radicals, which are highly reactive unpaired electrons, play a role in depleting ozone and in creating greenhouse gases. In order to understand the role of the free radicals, scientists must be able to calculate the probability that they will create a reaction. A third area where the algorithm could be helpful is in finding a drug that could work faster and more effectively to alleviate sickle cell anemia. An important drug that reduces the death rate of people who suffer from sickle cell anemia works by forming a radical. The radical undergoes a series of reactions that help alleviate the cell sickling. If someone could design new drugs or modify the existing one so that this radical is produced at a faster rate, it could do a better job of stopping the cell-sickling process, Mazziotti said. Much remains to be accomplished, both in developing and applying the new approach to molecular properties. "We're not done by any means," Mazziotti said. Using math to study molecules no small thing for prof |
December 22, 2004
Dr Raj Reddy makes PCs talk the masses languageV. Rishi Kumar DR Raj Reddy, Head of Robotics and Artificial Intelligence Lab, Carnegie Mellon University, is on a mission to bridge the digital divide but with a difference empowering illiterates to actually use computers! Having started with the design of a low-cost innovative entertainment-cum-communication device referred to as PCTV, that builds on open source software, Dr Reddy is now engaged in building artificial intelligence into speech recognition software and language process synthesis. These would enable even a person with language barrier actually access the benefits of a computer, while reaping the advantages of entertainment. So how has Dr Reddy gone about addressing this task? Dr Reddy and a team of researchers at the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad, and the Indian Institute of Science, have jointly developed Indian language processing software that is available free with downloads. "We decided to work on Indian language synthesis since this poses a great challenge to communicators and is a major hurdle in PC usage. Therefore, we have developed a software that enables people to use the English keyboard and yet harness the advantage of local language. With the Andhra Pradesh Government embarking on a broadband project, we expect this software coupled with the low cost infotainment device will address the requirements of rural people. This device can be procured locally through vendors such as Videocon or from a Korean manufacturer Trigem. While this is priced at $500 now, in the next two years could possibly come down to as low as $250. Apart from serving as a TV, this will have a DVD player and have the capability to record video while serving as a phone-cum-video conferencing unit. "The speciality of this device is that, as opposed to asynchronous communication of mail, we can actually offer synchronous communication of voice mail and video conferencing," Dr Reddy said. The effort is on to hold parleys with the likes of Intel and AMD aimed at driving down costs with low cost chips for hardware inputs and software major Microsoft for cheaper operating system. We could also possibly consider Linux to support this PCTV project, he said. "The IIIT-H wanted to commence its pilot project with deployment of about 10 units in a village in Andhra Pradesh. Based on its success, we wanted to replicate in about 100 villages . We expect to commence work in January 2005," Dr Reddy explained. Dr Raj Reddy makes PCs talk the masses language |
December 22, 2004
E-protection necessary for nation's security: Kalam:[Business India]: Chennai, Dec 21 : India was moving into an "era of e-business, e-marketing, e-commerce and e-banking" and encryption technology to protect network communication was the only way to ensure the nation's security, said President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam. The president was addressing scientists here Monday evening at the 5th International Conference on Cryptology in India via videoconferencing. Reminding his audience that Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujam's work was being applied in communication networks today, Kalam said: "Cryptography is a wealth generator and wealth protector." Noting that India was the only country in the world with a huge linguistic diversity and more than 3,000 languages, he asked: "Can we make use of this diversity to our advantage by using different languages as a cryptographic tool?" Addressing several hundred delegates from all over the world, who had gathered here for the three day conference that began Monday, Kalam said: "Nations that are capable of generating and managing information in a secure way will become world leaders and economic superpowers" He called for state-of-the-art technology at competitive costs in India, to secure Indian e-systems. Inaugurating the conference, hosted by the Institute of Mathematical Sciences and the Society for Electronic Transactions (SETS), principal scientific advisor to the central government R. Chidambaram said the science of encryption was the "only know-how" technologists had to protect e-systems. Information flows over open networks. And to secure this information is "of social, political, commercial and strategic" importance, Chidambaram said. He asked Indian scientists for research inputs into standardisation processes, called 'advanced encryption standard' it could develop quickly in India. Experts from various countries, including France, South Korea, Australia, Belgium and Germany are attending the meet. During the conference, 147 scientific papers on the art and science of encryption will be presented. Cryptology is the science of hiding information through codes. Mathematical systems provide some of the best encryptions the world has so far generated. It is also the art of breaking down codes and getting at secrets. E-protection necessary for nation's security: Kalam: |
December 20, 2004
In a mathematical veinThe history of mathematics apparently has become a subject of concern and is gaining more and more attention now. Much literature on the subject has evolved in the 19th and 20th centuries. An analysis of this evolution is said to have revealed some distinguishable attitudes and dispositions in the study of the subject. Two principal groups have emerged, moving in two distinct directions. A group of scholars called 'cultural historians' depicted a unified image of mathematics giving descriptive historical accounts of the development of historical concepts over the centuries, without making any analytical distinction between various branches of mathematics. While the other group, called 'mathematical historians', approached the discipline from the standpoint of modern mathematical knowledge. Responding to the need, an international seminar entitled, 'Showcase seminar on history of mathematics' was organised by Ramjas College of Delhi University recently, to take a glimpse into such divergent schools, in the evolution of history and heritage of mathematics and to examine their implications in the overall development of mathematical and humanistic cultures. About 50 delegates participated in the two-day symposium from countries such as the US, the UK, China, Canada, Germany, Greece, France, Israel, Iran and Netherlands, apart from various eminent scholars from India. The deliberations were on topics such as chronology of ancient astronomers and mathematicians; mechanical character of Decarte's geometry; history of mathematical sciences in India; Indian numerical methods and their transmission to other cultures; 'Madhava' - the mediaeval astronomer and mathematician; mathematics history in education; Egyptian mathematical techniques - a new analysis; the amazing success story of statistics; some well-known and not-so-known mathematicians and some discussions about how Indian trigonometry affected Chinese-calender calculation during Tang dynasty's reign. But why was the need felt for talking about the history of mathematics? According to most of the speakers, history provided rich sources of alternative conceptualisation and diverse routes to the development of an idea. This deepened the close listening of teachers and researchers to student mathematics and led to re-conceptualising the epistemology of mathematics. According to V Lakshmikantham of the Florida Institute of Technology, USA, "Almost 60 per cent of the students require encouragement to develop their interest in mathematics. As kids are always curious, they always put up questions like 'how?' 'why?' and 'why not?' But parents as well as teachers kill this curiosity at the very outset by not providing answers to their questions. That is why there are not many scholars in the subject in India." He added, "The idea here is to sensitise teachers to the probable difficulties that the students encounter and help in listening to students' arguments. This way the students will develop interest in the subject and India will produce more scholars in mathematics." Realising the importance of teaching the history of mathematics today, the Indian Society for History of Mathematics was set up in 1978. The chairman of the organising committee of the international conference on the 'History of Mathematical Sciences 2004', held at Indore recently and former dean, Faculty of Mathematics, DU, B S Yadav said: "The aim of the society is to promote, throughout India, discussions, research, teaching and publication in the history and the philosophy of mathematics." On the relevance of the history of mathematics education, Yadav said: "The studies in history of mathematics have not yet begun in India, though it has started in other countries. One of the society's main aim is to start courses in history of mathematical sciences in various institutions and universities of India. The students should know ancient India's contribution to mathematics." Data found in the internet points out to the history of mathematics in India including an image of the 'Pancha-Siddhantika' or five principals, which documents the method of gradual calculation. The historical and philosophical concepts of zero and some concepts of algebraic computation are said to have been originated from our country. 'Rekha-Ganita' or line computation was used for architectural purposes and geometric patterns were prevalent in temple motifs. Many motifs in Hindu temples and palaces display a mix of floral and geometric patterns. According to Kim Leslie Plofker of the University of Utrecht, Netherlands, 19th-century historians of mathematics popularised the notions that mathematics in India lost prominence after the work of Bhaskaraa-II, in the 12th century. "More recent research has uncovered many sources that contradict this hypothesis, taking as its source important developments from latter centuries, in places such as Delhi, Jaipur and Kerala." Yadav said: "The influence of ancient India on mathematics is clear. So why should we be left behind? Our generations should know about ancient India's contribution to present-day mathematics." In a mathematical vein |
December 20, 2004
In science and maths, East Asians rockCHIRDEEP BAGGA Asian students are setting the standards for science and mathematics. A study of 360,000 students in 40 countries spread across six continents has found that East Asian students monopolise the top ranks in both subjects. This is despite India and China not being part of the survey. The latest global analysis is from the four-yearly Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) organised by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. Students from Singapore were the top performers in maths and science in both fourth and eighth grades the two categories from which the student sample was chosen. They had a mean score of 605 out of 800 in maths for the 8th grade compared to the international average of 467 while the mean science score for the same grade was 578 against the global average of 474. Students from South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan also performed extremely well in both subjects. In fact, these countries along with Singapore accounted for the top five ranks in both subjects in the 8th grade and the top four in 4th grade. The lone non-Asian entry among the top five was England, which finished fifth in science. Not only did the East Asian countries rank very high, there was also a huge gap between their scores and those of other countries. For instance, 44% of eighth graders in Singapore scored at the most advanced level in maths, as did 38% in Taiwan but only 7% of the US students could achieve the same level. Netherlands, Estonia and Hungary were some of the others who performed well. The US finished in the middling ranks. In maths, 8th grade and 4th grade US students managed ranks of 15 and 12 respectively. The rankings in science were 9th and 6th, respectively, for 8th and 4th grade students. The lower end of the rankings comprises countries primarily from Africa and West Asia. South America was the only continent that was not part of the study. The TIMMS report comes close on the heels of another education report, Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2003, brought out by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). This study assessed 250,000 students aged 15, across 29 OECD countries and 11 partner countries. It focused on real world-applications rather than grade curriculum as specified in TIMSS 2003 and also included reading and problem solving. Singapore, a top performer in TIMSS 2003, was not a part of the PISA study. Similarly, Finland, which performed exceptionally well in PISA 2003, did not take part in TIMSS. East Asian countries performed well in the PISA study too while Canada and Belgium were some of the other good performers. On the other hand, the US performed quite poorly in PISA and was ranked were ranked 18th in reading, 22nd in science and 28th in maths. Neither study has given a definite edge to either gender in mathematics. Boys have been found to be only marginally ahead in the subject. On the other hand, girls are solidly ahead of boys in reading skills as per PISA 2003. In science and maths, East Asians rock |
December 20, 2004
Math, science woesTry to read too much into two separate international rankings of U.S. teens in math and science and you'll just get a headache. One, known as PISA, slams U.S. teens for lagging behind their peers from two-thirds of the world's industrialized countries in their ability to use math and science skills. The other, known as TIMSS, praises U.S. eight-graders (13- and 14-year-olds) for outperforming most of their international peers on math and science knowledge. Politicians and some educators have singled out the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study -- TIMSS -- as the better indicator of learning. That's not because U.S. students performed better on it, they say, but because it is tied to curriculum taught. Still, if U.S. students can't apply that knowledge in a real-world way, the ability assessed in the PISA or Program for International Student Assessment, what's the point? Indeed, the PISA skills are deemed the next step in the learning process from the grasp of curriculum tested in TIMSS. The results released Tuesday from TIMSS are encouraging. U.S. teens outscored 25 countries in math and lagged behind their international peers in only nine. In science, U.S. students outperformed 32 countries and lagged behind just seven. Additionally the achievement gap between blacks and whites narrowed in both science and math. U.S. students lagged their peers from other countries in science and math when tested in an Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development study on applying those skills. In the PISA study, U.S. teens tied for 21st among 29 countries in math. In science, U.S. teens came in 20th. Any way you parse it, U.S. students are not where they need to be to compete globally. They especially lag students from Asian countries. With the exception of Finland, which is the top-ranking country in students' abilities to use math and science skills, students from Asian countries dominate when assessed in math and science. The most valuable part of the study for Americans is not the rankings, but what characteristics students from the top-ranking countries share. Many characteristics are familiar. Consider: Students did best who had well-educated parents with good paying jobs and more "cultural" possessions in their homes. Students did poorly in countries with large socioeconomic inequalities in the distribution of educational opportunities. Students did best who had attended a quality pre-school program. Students did best who had parents who read to them when they were young, helped with homework, attended meetings at school and provided a two-parent environment. A quiet place to study, a computer and access to classic literature, books of poetry and art and a dictionary also helped. High-quality teachers were also an important factor. In Finland's case, success is attributed to the fact that the teaching profession is revered there. Teachers are paid better than many other professionals such as doctors and lawyers. In short, countries with high-scoring students show it in the way they treat education. They're serious. If we want the same success, we should get serious too. Math, science woes |
December 20, 2004
The Platonic Form Of StalactitesNo matter whether they're big, little, long, short, skinny or fat -- classic stalactites have the same singular shape. Almost everyone knows that stalactites, formations that hang from the roof of caves, are generally long, slender and pointy. But the uniqueness of their form had gone unrecognized. "There's only one shape that all stalactites tend to be. The difference is one of magnification -- it's either big or it's small, but it's still the same shape," said researcher Martin Short of the University of Arizona in Tucson. Short and his colleagues have developed a mathematical theory that explains how stalactites get their shape. "It's an ideal shape in nature and in mathematics that had not been known before," said Raymond Goldstein, a UA physics professor and senior author on the research report. "The Greek philosopher Plato had the concept that there are ideal forms underlying what we see in nature. Although any particular stalactite may have some bumps and ridges that deform it, one might say that within all stalactites is a idealized form trying to get out." The universality of stalactites had probably been overlooked because the cave formations vary so much in size, said Short, a doctoral candidate in physics at UA. "The result was a surprise," he said. "We had no idea going into this that we'd find this basic shape." An article detailing the findings of Short, Goldstein and their colleagues will be published in an upcoming issue of Physical Review Letters. Other authors on the article are James C. Baygents, a UA associate professor of chemical and environmental engineering; J. Warren Beck, a research scientist in UA's department of physics; David A. Stone, a doctoral candidate in UA's department of soil, water and environmental science; and Rickard S. Toomey, III, science and research manager for Arizona State Parks. Although people have investigated how cave formations grow, few scientists examined why stalactites have their characteristic shape. After someone suggested that the tubules David Stone was growing in the laboratory resembled some cave formations, Goldstein became intrigued by caves. He and his colleagues took a field trip to the famed Kartchner Caverns State Park in Benson, Ariz. and were floored by the variety of forms, especially the ripples many structures possess. So Goldstein suggested that his student Martin Short investigate the formation of ripples on stalactites. That task turned out to be extremely difficult, Short said. First he had to learn about the underlying dynamics of stalactite growth. Stalactites grow when water laden with carbon dioxide and calcium carbonate drips from cracks or holes in the cave's ceiling. As a water droplet hangs from the crack, the carbon dioxide escapes, much as a bottle of sparkling water fizzes when opened. As a result, the calcium carbonate comes out of solution and is left behind as a tiny bit of solid calcium carbonate. As each successive drip flows over the minute mineral deposit, the sequence repeats, ultimately forming a stalactite. Because the shape stems from the flow of water over the surface of the growing stalactite, the team turned to the field of fluid dynamics. The researchers developed an equation to describe how a stalactite's shape evolves. "It's a general equation of motion for the growth of stalactites," Goldstein said. "It's a geometric law of motion." Then the researchers plugged the equation into a computer and asked it to "grow" some shapes. To the team's surprise, no matter what shape was used as a starting point, the computer's formations lengthened and thickened in a universal manner. The results looked strikingly like classic stalactites. "The computer told us there was something unique to look for, this ideal form," Goldstein said. The researchers then solved their equation of motion and obtained a specific mathematical expression that describes the carrot-like shape of stalactites. The next step was to test their model against the real thing, so the researchers returned to Kartchner Caverns. "We spent four hours in the cave with cameras and strobe lights and laptops. We took dozens of pictures," said Goldstein. Because cave formations are delicate, the researchers could not stomp around measuring the stalactites by hand. Instead, the scientists used lasers to project a pair of green dots onto the stalactites from afar and then took pictures of the stalactites. The researchers knew how far apart the green dots were, so the dots served as a scale bar for the pictures. Then the researchers could garner the stalactites' dimensions from the pictures. Back in the lab, the researchers analyzed the actual stalactites and compared their shapes to the ideal form predicted by the mathematics. The real and the ideal differed by less than 5 percent. "We calculated the shape mathematically and said, well, we have to go see if this is right," Goldstein said. "And we did. And it was." Kartchner's Toomey said, "It's cool because the research contributes to learning new things about this cave that apply as well to other caves throughout the world," adding, "Missions of state parks include preservation, understanding and education. To have Kartchner and other state parks available for these types of studies helps further these missions." Now, Short and Goldstein say, they finally know enough to figure out what gives stalactites their ripples. The Research Corporation and the National Science Foundation funded the research. The Platonic Form Of Stalactites |
December 16, 2004
Scientists crochet chaosDonald MacLeod As if Christmas weren't chaotic enough, a couple of mathematicians at Bristol University are suggesting you crochet your very own model of chaos. The result should be something bizarrely like a large Christmas decoration - unless of course your crocheting skills aren't up to it, in which case your chaos will just look a bit of a mess. Hinke Osinga and Bernd Krauskopf, of the university's department of engineering mathematics, have published their crochet pattern in the current issue of the Mathematical Intelligencer, basing it on the Lorenz equations that describe the nature of chaotic systems - such as the weather or a turbulent river. Dr Osinga explained: "Imagine a leaf floating in a turbulent river and consider how it passes either to the left or to the right around a rock somewhere downstream. Those special leaves that end up clinging to the rock must have followed a very unique path in the water. Each stitch in the crochet pattern represents a single point [a leaf] that ends up at the rock." Together, all the points (stitches) define a complicated surface, according to the Lorenz equations. The two academics have developed a method to describe such surfaces using a computer. After months of staring at animations on a screen, they suddenly realised that, in fact, their computations had naturally generated crochet instructions. Dr Osinga, who learnt to crochet at the age of seven, rose to the challenge of making a pattern called the Lorenz manifold. "The computer-generated crochet instructions were remarkable. "Simply by looking at the real-life surface I would never have designed it the way the computer did. After all those months of trying to create it on screen, it was fascinating to see the surface grow under my own hands," she said. "And it was truly amazing to see a floppy object fall into its desired shape when it was mounted with steel wire," Professor Krauskopf added. The final result consisted of 25,511 crochet stitches and took Dr Osinga about 85 hours to complete. It now hangs in their house as a Christmas decoration. They insist it wasn't just done for fun. The pair say their work gives much-needed insight into how chaos arises and is organised in systems as diverse as chemical reactions, biological networks and even your kitchen mixer. Their crocheted model, called the Lorenz manifold, is a very helpful tool for understanding and explaining the dynamics of the Lorenz system. If you would like to crochet your own Lorenz manifold in time for Christmas, the pattern and mounting instructions are available online Scientists crochet chaos |
December 16, 2004
Ants use geometry, say expertsANTS use angled signposts, using tiny scent markers, to find their way home or follow the path into the wilderness, according to a study published today. University of Sheffield scientists looked at the foraging trails laid by Pharoah's ants (Monomorium pharaonis). Scout ants would set the trail from the nest using pheromone scents as indicators for those coming behind them. Wherever the trail forked to let the ants explore potential sources of food, one of the angles between the forks was always around 60 degrees, the researchers found in the study published in Nature. This means that an ant which has gone off the trail can find its way by detecting this narrow angle. By having its back to the angle, the ant knows it can find its way home. Alternatively, by following one of the bifurcations formed by that same angle, the ant can follow the trail away from the nest, helping the quest for food. The research, led by Duncan Jackson of the university's Department of Computer Science, answers a puzzle about how lost ants are able to regain their sense of direction. Previous theories have speculated that different pheromones are set down at the fork in order to give the ants a pointer. But using geometry is far more efficient and simpler, Mr Jackson said. Agence France-Presse Ants use geometry, say experts |
December 16, 2004
NATIONAL BRAIN RESEARCH CENTRE UNRAVELLING THE FINAL FRONTIERSitanshu Kar One of the final frontiers of the 21st century is to understand the structure, function and development of the human brain. A marvelously complex and sophisticated organ, the brain mediates how we perceive the world around us, generates our thoughts, memories and emotions and controls our immediate and long-term behavioural responses to the environment. While the decade of the 90's was declared as the "Decade of the Brain", the current century would provide major leads into understanding the brain function. Since brain-related disorders represent one of the major disease groups that affect millions of people worldwide, the study of the brain or neuroscience is extremely important, not only from a scientific viewpoint but also to discover better therapies and cures. To overcome the enormous challenges of understanding the brain in health and disease, the National Brain Research Centre (NRC) was established by the Department of Biotechnology in 1999. It has brought together neuroscientists from diverse backgrounds such as molecular biology, systems neuroscience, computational and theoretical neuroscience. The NBRC campus currently located in Manesar, Gurgaon district Haryana, 40 km from Delhi is a state-of-art facility for carrying out multidisciplinary studies on different aspects of the brain. The mandate of NBRC is to function as a "Centre of Excellence in Brain Research" with state-of-art facilities, evolve the centre through a networking approach and generate highly trained human resource. In a remarkably short period since its inception, scientists at NBRC have made very successful inroads into understanding different aspects of the brain. Amongst the their major achievements are - successfully maintaining and differentiating human embryonic stem cells into neurons. These embryonic stem cells are also being transplanted into mice to see whether they help in repairing brain injury. In addition, cures for Alzheimer's disease are being tested in animal models using plant extracts from traditional medicine. Genotyping tests are being developed to predict the response to drugs used for the treatment of mental disorders. Yet another breakthrough by NBRC scientists is the development of a computational tool using stochastic resonance that helps to enhance the resolution of MRI images thus providing better diagnosis. A fast-emerging field in neuroscience is that of imaging the brain in real time using techniques such as "functional magnetic resonance imagine (FMRI)", brain morphometric (volume) measurements and magnetic resonance spectroscopy, which can be used to examine the neural correlates of complex human perception and behaviour. These techniques can also be used to analyze neural basis of abnormal behaviour seen in cognitive ailments such as Schizophrenia, Alzheimer's disease, attention deficit disorders (ADHD) and effects of malnutrition. Realising the need for an FMRI facility dedicated to research, a national research facility for brain imaging is being established at the centre. This facility would be used for furthering an indepth understanding of brain function by researchers from all over the country. Besides its scientific activities, the centre is also mandated to creating a group of highly skilled neuroscientists in the country. The institute was awarded Deemed University status by the Human Resources Development Ministry and has initiated both PhD and MSc programs. The curriculum for these programs ranges across diverse areas as neuroanatomy, neurophysiology, neurochemistry, molecular neurobiology and development and regeneration, neurogenetics. Besides, systems, cognitive, clinical and computational neuroscience would enable NBRC students to have the widest possible exposure for their future role as leaders in the field of neuroscience. The human resource development is geared towards generation of trained manpower who can bridge across diverse disciplines such as neurobiology, physics and mathematics. NBRC, the apex coordination centere for neuroscience research in India, is the hub of a network of 42 centres around the country that are involved in different facets of neuroscience research. The networking of existing neuroscience centers with NBRC is aimed to prevent unnecessary duplication of the work and facilities already existing. At the same time it facilitates sharing of expertise and available infrastructure for mutual benefit. Another invaluable feature of the centre is the 'Digital Library' that has been providing invaluable service to the Indian neuroscience research community by sharing its on-line journals and e-resources free of cost. Looking ahead, it is envisioned that NBRC would grow into a world-class institute for brain research, catalyzing the overall growth of this discipline in the country. It would not only create a vibrant, active neuroscience community throughout the country comparable to the best in the world but also contribute to the discovery of rationale therapies and cures for brain disorders through Brain Research.(PIB Features) NATIONAL BRAIN RESEARCH CENTRE UNRAVELLING THE FINAL FRONTIER |
December 16, 2004
Boost for Maths Teachers' SalariesSue Blaine EDUCATION Minister Naledi Pandor announced yesterday R600m would be used to increase the salaries of mathematics and science teachers in poorly resourced schools after an international survey , released yesterday, showed South African pupils to be the worst performers in these fields. Studies have shown that SA will not be able to take advantage of the new energy in the economy if mathematics and science marks are not improved and more pupils are able to study technical subjects at tertiary level. The Human Sciences Research Council yesterday released the South African results of the trends in international mathematics and science study at the same time as the results from the 50 participant countries were released. The council conducted the South African study. Pandor also announced that the Dinaledi project, which comprises 102 dedicated mathematics and science schools, would be expanded to more than 1 000 schools over the next five years. "We are extremely concerned by the (study) 2003 report. The department is under no illusion that decades of inequality would be eliminated in 10 years of democracy and freedom," Pandor said. The study shows SA almost un- changed since SA's poor showings in the 1995 and 1999 surveys. The council received the data about two months ago and is to release a full analysis in April. Boost for Maths Teachers' Salaries |
December 16, 2004
Big Improvement In Maths And ScienceNZEI Te Riu Roa, which represents teachers, principals and support staff in primary sector schools, is pleased to see a "significant improvement" in the maths and science achievement of 10 year-old New Zealand students, in an international study released today. The Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) assessed the achievement in maths and science of 10 year olds in 25 countries. In New Zealand 3800 Year 5 students were assessed in late 2002. The increase in the average maths score for New Zealand 10 year olds was the second highest among the countries involved in the study since the first TIMSS assessment was done eight years ago. The improvement in science was the third highest increase in the study. The average New Zealand maths score was similar to Australia and Scotland and was at the level of the international average. The average science score was significantly above the international average and ranked along side Australia, the Netherlands and Russia. "It is pleasing to see the significant improvement in the achievement in maths and science of 10 year old primary students in New Zealand," says NZEI Te Riu Roa National President, Colin Tarr.. "It's a credit to their teachers that the 10 year-old New Zealand students had a positive attitude to learning maths and science with more than half of those in the study saying they enjoyed the subjects and felt confident about their ability to learn them." "It's also good to see there is no gender gap between the achievement of boys and girls at this age in maths and science." "A big plus is the significant improvement in the performance of lower achieving 10 year old students in both maths and science since the first study eight years ago. This is very encouraging." "It would be nice to see New Zealand 10 year-olds achieving above the international average in maths, but the good news is they showed a significant improvement in performance, so the trend is heading in the right direction." "It appears the maths and science initiatives introduced into primary schools since the last TIMSS assessment are having a positive impact." "We need to ensure this continues, in particular the professional development and support that teachers have received in the teaching of maths and science," says Colin Tarr. The TIMSS study also assessed maths and science achievement of 14 year-olds in 46 countries. In New Zealand 3800 Year 9 secondary students were assessed in late 2002. The New Zealand students scored significantly above the international average in both maths and science. There was no significant change in their performance since the first TIMSS assessment eight years ago. Their maths achievement was at a similar level as 14 year old students in Australia, Scotland, Sweden and the United States while their science ranked alongside students in Australia, Sweden and the United States. Singapore was the leading country for maths and science achievement for both the 10 and 14 year olds, with Hong Kong, Chinese Taipei and Japan also ranked at the top of the average scores for maths and science in both age groups. "Overall the results of these assessments in maths and science of our 10 and 14 year old students are positive and show that we can have confidence in the work being done by the teachers, principals and other staff in New Zealand's schools," says Colin Tarr. Big Improvement In Maths And Science |
December 16, 2004
CODE, UNCODEaIf hieroglyphics kicked off the cipher game, digital signatures are now without par in the security business. Shefalika Samaddar explains THERE is evidence of messages being coded and decoded for secure communication dating as far back as 1900 BC when a scribe in Egypt first used a derivation of the standard hieroglyphics of the day to communicate. Julius Caesar used a simple substitution cipher 2,000 years ago, now known as the Caesar cipher. This science of coding and decoding or encrypting and decrypting information is called cryptography. Cryptography involves converting text into some code (known as a cipher) to hide the message from everyone other than the intended receiver who is provided with the clue to decipher the code back into the text. In days gone by, secure communication was ensured also by the use of seals, "panja" (a metal sheet resemblance of palm and wrist) and signs. In the Indus Valley civilisation, seals were used for export/import. The various firmans issued during the Mughal regime bore a seal or print of "panja". During the Raj era, authenticity was accepted in the form of a notification in the gazette. In course of time, signatures became the universal mode of authentication. In today's e-commerce era, when a major part of business communication is done digitally, manual or scanned signatures cannot obviously serve the purpose. Naturally some form of signature in digital form is called for, and so digital signature evolved in response to the need. However, digital signature does not exactly correspond to manual signature but is a coded (encrypted) number to ensure the authenticity of a message. The core of e-commerce, e-governance or e-business is digital communication, which obviously demands privacy, integrity, confidentiality, authenticity and non-repudiation to command trust and confidence of acceptance by users. In Electronic Document Interchange, an electronic document is indistinguishable from its copy because modification on the document can be made without leaving any trail as is apparent in the case of a paper document. Hence, some stringent measure is required to secure documents and messages from being tampered with or eavesdropped upon. Digital signature is just such a tool that ensures security in an electronic transaction. Digital signature provides the receiver with positive identification of the sender and indicates that the message is not altered. Thus, both message integrity and senders authentication are ensured. Two different techniques are used in generating digital signature. One of these, Hash algorithms, converts the message into a hash (# is a universal symbol for "Number"). It is a one-way function ie, the function converts the message into a unique number (called a message digest) and there is no way to transform the hash value back to the original message. Even a single character alteration in the document changes the hash value ie, the derived number. Therefore any alteration in a message can be detected by computing the hash value from the message received and the hash value sent along with the message for verification. MD5 is a family of Hash algorithms used extensively in e-commerce. Ron Rivest, one of the three researchers who discovered RSA Algorithm, developed MD5. RSA Algorithm, named after Rivest, Adi Shamir and Len Adleman, who invented it in 1977, is applied in Public Key Infrastructure. The Hash algorithms and the information about how these work are publicly available. The second technique used in creating digital signature is simple encryption. Both the techniques are used to ensure secure ( standard) transmission. But for less expensive secure transaction, the message is only encrypted using the Private Key of the sender, and the resulting form is used as a digital signature. As the Hash algorithms are publicly available it may appear that digital signatures do not offer secured transaction. Actually, the secrecy is not in the algorithms. Consider the case of a combination lock. We all know that a certain number has to be arranged by turning the digit wheels of the lock. But unless we know the secret number we won't be able to open the lock. A digital signature is created and verified using a technique called Public Key Cryptography. Whitfield Diffie and Martin Hellman from Stanford University, and Ralph Merkle from the University of California at Berkeley, first published the concept of PKC. This method uses two keys a "public key" and a "private key" and doesn't require two parties to first exchange a secret key in order to communicate, as in conventional cryptography. The Hash value obtained from the message by using Hash algorithms is further encrypted using an RSA algorithm corresponding to the private key (a number) allotted to the user (sender of the message). The number thus generated is called the digital signature. A digitally signed and encrypted message is converted back to the original message using the concept of a key pair generated by using complicated mathematical logics. The key pair is a set of two large numbers. Only the counterpart of the key pair generated can decrypt the document ciphered by one key of the pair. This Private Key (one of the numbers of the key pair generated) is securely held by the owner, while the Public Key is made known to all intended persons for verifying the digital signature of the sender. But knowing the public key doesn't as such allow one to compute the private key belonging to the sender, though some brilliant hackers have, in rare cases, been able to crack Private Keys by using mathematical simulation. However, such simulations require brute computing power. With 128 bit encryption, it takes so much time to crack the code by running mathematical simulation programmes that it becomes infeasible. But though the possibilities are few and far between with 128 bit encryption, the tapping and modifying of an encrypted electronic document by an Internet snoop cannot be ruled out. Such tapping is minimised when the sender encrypts the message digest using his or her Private Key. The Public Key infrastructure in India is realised through the establishment of a licensed Certifying Authority. The few CAs in India are NIC, TCS, and IDRBT, whereas Verisign is one of the recognised international CAs. The PKI comprises the Controller of Certifying Authorities, with the CAs and the CCA being at the root of the trust chain in India. This ensures authentic unaltered communication that cannot be repudiated. However, technology itself is inadequate to ensure security in electronic communication. The strong need for a legal framework led to the formulation of the Information Technology Act 2000 in India based on the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law Model Law of Electronic Commerce. Other countries have also adopted similar acts. In cyberspace, which extends beyond all geographic and political boundaries, the acts vis-ΰ-vis the laws, need to be formed in conformity with international laws. The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law adopted a model law on electronic commerce in 1996 in furtherance of its mandate to promote the harmonised unification of International Trade Law. Further, the Freedom of Information Act 2002 has been introduced recently. E-commerce/e-business is soon going to spread extensively and involve all kinds of goods and services between individuals, business firms and governments of different countries. Digital signatures are now accepted at par with long hand signatures in many countries. Any company, government department or individual interested in e-transaction should get acquainted with digital signature, its related techniques and issues. (The author is on the faculty of the National Institute of Management, Kolkata.) CODE, UNCODE |
December 13, 2004
Teen wins $54,000 by doing the mathBy SUSANNE QUICK Top honors were awarded to Po-Ling Loh, a senior at Madison's James Madison Memorial High School, in the 2004-'05 Siemens-Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science and Technology. She didn't win the grand prize, but she did get a total of $54,000 for college. Loh, 17, won the award for a project that examined an area of mathematics called grounded theory. Her project was titled, "Closure Properties of D2p in Finite Groups." "The class of groups is one of the most fundamental and important classes of mathematical objects," said Michael Aschbacher, professor of mathematics at the California Institute of Technology, and Loh's mentor on her project. "They appear everywhere in mathematics, but perhaps most often as the collection of symmetries of mathematical and physical objects," he said. "It's pretty abstract and technical," said Loh. But, it will potentially have applications in the fields of cryptography and Internet security. The project took six weeks to complete - an endeavor she dove into while at the California Institute of Technology on a summer scholarship for talented high school juniors called the Research Science Institute. "Very few people can cope with the abstraction and rigor that are necessary to do creative mathematics," said Aschbacher. "Po-Ling has that kind of ability, but also she is very disciplined and appears to be focused." He believes that if she ties up just "a few loose" ends in her project, she will have a publishable paper in a professional journal. Grounded theory was something she had been thinking about before she studied at Cal Tech. Loh said she had been a numbers theory class at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with professor Martin Isaacs. "She was by far the best student in the class," said Isaacs. And the two decided to set up weekly meetings where they could discuss mathematical issues. It was in these weekly discussions that grounded theory was introduced, and Loh became intrigued. "The idea that you can study these abstract math things and apply them" was thrilling for Loh. When not working on abstract mathematical problems, Loh likes to read historical fiction and write. She is the copy editor of her high school's paper. As for a possible major in college, she doesn't yet know where she'll be going, but Isaacs believes "she will fly through college and grad school and quickly get a PhD in math." "She will make a real contribution to mathematical research," he said, adding that he wouldn't be "surprised if she will eventually be one of the 'great mathematicians' of the 21st century." Teen wins $54,000 by doing the math |
December 13, 2004
Mathematics bombshell: God 'confirmed in Bible'Skeptical statistician IDs hidden messages that 'prove' Scripture's divine authorship For a lot of people, the Bible and mathematics are dry subjects, but not for Edwin Sherman he believes he's found how the two fit together. Sherman, founder of the Isaac Newton Bible Code Research Society and a professional mathematician, is convinced that the Hebrew Bible contains coded messages that are evidence of God's authorship of the Bible. His book, "Bible Code Bombshell: Compelling Scientific Evidence that God Authored the Bible," describes numerous examples of encoded phrases and sentences that are both lengthy and relevant to the text where they were found. In 1997, Michael Drosnin, a reporter, wrote "The Bible Codes" a book based on the work of Israeli mathematician Eli Rips that attained popularity, in part, from Drosnin's claim that future events, such as the Holocaust, Yitzak Rabin's assassination and the Gulf War were encoded in the Bible. Such claims invited attacks from skeptics like mathematician and physicist Dave Thomas, who wrote in 1997, "Hidden messages can be found anywhere provided you're willing to invest time and effort to harvest the vast field of probability. He, Drosnin, underestimates the power of chance combined with the brute force of computers. He says these messages are beyond the power of chance, and I've proven they are not." Another skeptic who was convinced he could prove Drosnin's messages to be fakes or statistical artifacts was Edwin Sherman. Sherman says he found most of Drosnin's examples trivial. "They were the simple kinds of words and phrases you might find if you searched for encoded messages in the Jerusalem phone book," he tells the Southern Oregon News. But he was intrigued enough to develop his own software and begin analyzing the Masoretic text of the Old Testament. "I was very skeptical about the whole thing," he says. "I started a project to try and show the whole thing was bogus." Instead, he says he found many examples of messages that went beyond simple words and phrases and they often were contextually similar to the Biblical passage in which they were found. "Finding dozens of lengthy encoded messages on the same topic in one short section of text is about as likely as winning a one-in-a-million jackpot ten times in a row," he told the paper. "Basically, it cannot happen by chance." The process of searching for encoded messages involves analysis of the Biblical Hebrew text in digital form. The Scriptures are encoded by removing all spaces between words and creating long strings of letters. According to Sherman, vowels are inserted in the strings of letters the Hebrew alphabet lacks vowels following standard rules based on the sequence of consonants. Software then analyzes the strings in search of patterns based on equidistant letter sequences. "The shorter an expression, the easier it is to find," Sherman notes in Southern Oregon News, "but when we find longer statements that have a connection to the actual biblical passage, and we find those longer statements with frequency, it leads us to believe that those statements were purposely implanted in the Bible by God." Some of the most compelling evidence of a mathematical pattern in the Hebrew text comes from the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, a passage most Bible scholars see as messianic and which Christians have traditionally seen as prophecy about Jesus. Sherman developed a baseline using non-encoded Hebrew texts as his standard of comparison for determining whether the number of messages he found in a Biblical passage were statistically significant. Isaiah 53 proved to be a rich cluster of hidden messages, containing 42 encoded statements relating to Jesus' death, resurrection and ascension, far more than his baseline predicted. As evidence, Sherman points to statements such as "Gushing from above, my mighty name arose upon Jesus, and the clouds rejoiced," "Dreadful day for Mary," "In his name as he commanded, Jesus is the way," "Resurrection of Jesus, he is risen indeed," and others that echo Isaiah's prophecy. It is the coherence between the hidden messages and the Hebrew text from which they are drawn that excites Sherman, who has no interest in predicting the future or looking for new "truths." The messages plucked from the text are more like divine fingerprints. "The Bible itself claims to be written by God, and when the subject of the encoded messages ties in so closely with the subject of the literal text, it has to make you take notice," Sherman told the paper. "I just want ... to capture the curiosity of skeptics and cause them to consider the possibility that the Bible is not written by men, but by God, and should therefore be taken very seriously." Mathematics bombshell: God 'confirmed in Bible' |
December 11, 2004
The Curious Case of the Eiffel TowerNewswise Debate has simmered among engineers over just why Gustave Eiffel designed his famous tower the way he did. Now it appears that the matter has been put to rest, thanks in part to an analysis by Michigan Technological University mathematician Iosif Pinelis. Pinelis, a professor of mathematical sciences, first became intrigued by the problem in 2002, when Patrick Weidman, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Colorado at Boulder, visited Michigan Tech. Weidman presented two competing mathematical theories, each purporting to explain the Eiffel Tower's elegant design. One, by Christophe Chouard, argued that Eiffel engineered his tower so that its weight would counterbalance the force of the wind. According to the other theory, the wind pressure is counterbalanced by tension between the elements of the tower itself, Pinelis said. Chouard had developed a nonlinear integral equation to support his theory, but finding its solutions was proving difficult. "Weidman and the mathematicians whom he had consulted could only find one solution, a parabola, of the infinitely many solutions that Chouard's equation must have," Pinelis said. As anyone who has survived high-school geometry can testify, the Eiffel Tower's profile doesn't look anything like a parabola. Weidman asked MTU mathematicians if they could come up with any other solutions. Pinelis went back to his office and soon found an answer confirming Weidman's conjecture that Chouard's theory was wrong. It turns out that all existing solutions to Chouard's equation must either be parabola-like or explode to infinity at the top of tower. "The Eiffel Tower does not explode to infinity at the top, and its profile curves inward rather than outward," Pinelis notes. "That pretty much rules out Chouard's equation." Weidman then went to the historical record, and found an 1885 memoire delivered by Eiffel to the French Civil Engineering Society affirming that Eiffel had indeed planned to counterbalance wind pressure with tension between the construction elements. Using that information, Weidman and developed an nonlinear integral-differential equation whose solutions yielded the true shape of the Eiffel Tower. That shape is exponential. The work by Weidman and Pinelis, "Model Equations for the Eiffel Tower Profile: Historical Perspective and New Results," has appeared in the French journal Comptes Rendus Mecanique, published by Elsevier and the French Academy of Sciences. An abstract may be viewed at http://www.elsevier.fr/html/index.cfm?act=abstract&cle=49158 "The funny thing for me was that you didn't have to go into the historical investigation to disprove a wrong theory," Pinelis says. "The math confirms the logic behind the design. For me, it was more fun to go to the math." The Curious Case of the Eiffel Tower |
December 11, 2004
Parallel WorldsFernando Q. Gouvκa The discovery of non-Euclidean geometry surely counts as one of the crucial turnings in the history of human thought. It was a slow turn, begun in the early 1830s and only really completed at the dawn of the 20th century. In the process, it caused a transformation in how scientists and philosophers thought about mathematics, about the space surrounding us, and about the relation between the two. Jαnos Bolyai, Non-Euclidean Geometry, and the Nature of Space gives us a rich account of what happened and how. The story begins, as many mathematical stories do, with Euclid's magisterial compendium of Greek mathematics, The Elements. Euclid based his account of geometry on five assumptions that he seems to have regarded as self-evident properties of space. Four of these assumptions are fairly simple, but the fifth, known as the "parallel postulate," is quite complicated. Many of Euclid's readers over the centuries have wondered whether it really needed to be that complicated. Even Euclid seems to have felt that there was something unusual about this postulate, as he carefully avoided using it until it became absolutely necessary. Dissatisfaction with the parallel postulate led many mathematicians to attempt to prove it on the basis of the other four postulates or to find some simpler fact that could be reasonably described as a "self-evident" truth about the space in which we live and from which the parallel postulate could be deduced. Everyone shared the assumptions that Euclidean geometry provided a true description of actual space and that what was missing was simply a full understanding of how the parallel postulate fit into the picture. In the early 19th century, Jαnos Bolyai and Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevskii both started to investigate the problem. Independently, each looked carefully at what sort of geometry would result if one did not assume the parallel postulate. (Bolyai called this a "geometry of absolute space.") They concluded that a geometry in which the parallel postulate did not hold true--a non-Euclidean geometry--was in fact possible and free from contradictions. Both published their work in obscure places, making it difficult for their achievements to be absorbed by the mathematics community. But slowly it dawned on mathematicians that a true intellectual revolution had occurred. If geometry does not have to be Euclidean, then in what sense is it a description of the actual space in which we live? Was it that our space is truly Euclidean, and these new geometries were purely imaginary worlds? Or could it be that one of these other geometries actually described our space better? The latter was possible because being non-Euclidean turned out to be a large-scale characteristic: space could "look Euclidean" on a small scale even if it was non-Euclidean overall. Such questions led mathematicians to back away from any claim that their geometries (now in the plural) described actual space. Instead, they came to view their work as simply describing possible geometries--and so to the idea that mathematics at best provides models of what reality might be like rather than somehow accessing reality directly. Deciding which of the possible models came closest to describing our actual physical space became a question for physicists. Jαnos Bolyai, Non-Euclidean Geometry, and the Nature of Space is the first in a new series of books published by the Burndy Library at MIT's Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology. The series is intended to make available to a wide audience the resources contained in the library. Accordingly, the volume reproduces in facsimile two items from the library's collection: Bolyai's original Latin publication (which was published in 1832 as an appendix to a much longer mathematical work by his father) and the 1896 English translation by George B. Halsted (an American mathematician whose writings did much to popularize the new geometry). These are preceded by a long "preface" by Jeremy Gray (a mathematician and historian of mathematics, at the Open University)--which is in fact a very full account of the story of the parallel postulate, the discovery of non-Euclidean geometry, and the impact of these ideas from the mid-19th to the early 20th centuries. Gray's preface is a delight. He tells us of various purported "proofs" of the parallel postulate, of Kant's controversial argument that Euclidean geometry provided an example of synthetic a priori knowledge, and much more. Having set up the context, he turns to Bolyai's own work and attempts to guide the reader through the contents of the papers reproduced later in the book. This shifts the discussion from overview to detailed mathematics; nonmathematicians are likely to find this section difficult. Should they persist, however, they will reach Gray's fascinating account of the reception of non-Euclidean geometry by mathematicians, physicists, philosophers, and even artists, which does not make serious mathematical demands on the reader. Any author who attempts to reach an audience that includes specialists and nonspecialists alike--as the preface specifies that books in the Burndy Library series should--is faced with difficult decisions. Though Gray often speaks successfully to both kinds of reader, the results are not uniform; at times, the reader will need a little bit of patience when dealing with material meant for others. Those who make that effort will find that they have acquired a much deeper understanding of the "non-Euclidean revolution" and its far-reaching consequences. Parallel Worlds |
December 11, 2004
Mounties on the lookout for secret messagesBy JIM BRONSKILL Ottawa The RCMP has warned its investigators to be on the lookout for cleverly disguised messages embedded by al-Qaeda in digital files police seize from terror suspects. An internal report obtained by The Canadian Press gives credence to the long-rumoured possibility Osama bin Laden's terrorist network and other extremist groups are using a technique known as steganography to hide the existence of sensitive communications. Steganography, from the Greek word stegos, meaning covered, and graphie, or writing, involves concealing a secret message or image within an apparently innocuous one. For instance, a seemingly innocent digital photo of a dog could be doctored to contain a picture of an explosive device or hidden wording. "Investigators in the course of their work on terrorist organizations and their members, including al-Qaeda and affiliated groups, need to consider the possible use of steganography and seek to identify when steganography is known or suspected of being used," the report says. It recommends investigators consult the RCMP's technological crime program for assistance, including "comprehensive forensic examinations" of seized digital media. A heavily edited copy of the January 2004 report, Computer-assisted and Digital Steganography: Use by Al-Qaeda and Affiliated Terrorist Organizations, was recently obtained from the Mounties under the Access to Information Act. Among the material stripped from the document is information on how best to detect, extract and view surreptitious messages. Steganography dates to before 400 B.C. The ancient Greeks hid messages in wax tablets, while invisible inks have long been used to convey secrets. Simple computer-assisted steganography helps apply such traditional methods in an electronic environment, the report notes. The messages may also be scrambled using cryptography to prevent them falling into the wrong hands. The RCMP seems especially concerned, however, about digital steganography the use of special computer programs to embed messages. "There now exist nearly 200 software packages which perform digital steganography," the report says. A limited number of publicly available software tools are designed to detect the use of steganography, but the "success rate of these tools is questionable," the RCMP adds. Some only detect the use of specific software, while others are useful for scouring only certain types of files in which the secret message may be hidden. There have been numerous media reports in recent years that terrorist groups, including al-Qaeda, were using steganographic techniques. The phenomenon is "deeply troubling," said David Harris, a former Canadian Security Intelligence Service officer now with Ottawa-based Insignis Strategic Research. He suggested any delay in detecting disguised messages could be disastrous. "We're talking very often about time-sensitive issues: Where is the bomb? Who's operating in connection with whom?" he said. "On that kind of basis, this is really, really disturbing as a development." Mounties on the lookout for secret messages |
December 11, 2004
Falling academic scoresTeach students Japanese before English. Japan's political community has produced a plethora of nonsensical remarks in recent years. Two disturbing examples this year came from Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. In response to opposition criticism about his past job and pension-related records, Koizumi said, ``Various lives and various companies.'' And concerning the Self-Defense Forces' mission in Iraq, he declared, ``An area where the SDF troops are operating is a noncombat zone.'' Fortunately, this kind of silly blather has so far been confined mainly to the politicians' habitat in Nagatacho. But the day may come when many more Japanese show such poor linguistic and communication abilities. The results of a test by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development should leave no doubt that Japanese children's ability to read, think logically and express their thoughts is declining rapidly. The survey was conducted last year on 15-year-olds in 41 countries and areas. It was designed to measure students' practical ability to think independently, deal with various real problems in the world and build healthy relations with others. Since it was not a pure scholarship test, students were allowed to use calculators in solving mathematical problems. Japanese students' performance in the test to gauge reading skills has dropped to 14th from eighth in the previous survey in 2000. Japan registered the largest drop in scores for reading among all participating countries. The ability to understand accurately what is written is essential for all types of intellectual activities. You cannot solve mathematical problems or understand scientific writings unless you can read. Poor reading skills tend to dampen people's appetite for reading books and newspapers and narrow the scope of their interest and understanding concerning their society and the world. The report on the future of Japanese language education submitted in February by the Council for Cultural Affairs to the minister of education, culture, sports, science and technology reflected a strong sense of crisis about the situation. Japanese must first master their own language, before English, in order to acquire necessary skills for any area of professional activity, be it international business or diplomacy. It is essential for any Japanese to acquire the ability to think, understand others' words and express thoughts clearly in the Japanese language. A growing diversity of values in this age of globalization makes this linguistic competence all the more important. For all that, however, the new curriculum guidelines implemented in the year that started in April 2002 reduced the amount of time for teaching Japanese at school. The number of children who don't read books at all has been rising steadily. The council report urged the government to enhance Japanese language education and provide more incentives for children to read books. As a step to achieve this goal, the report called for doubling the number of Chinese characters children learn at elementary school to cover most of the 1,945 designated by the government as basic characters. It is a very bold proposal that openly challenges the education ministry's controversial policy of promoting ``pressure-free'' education. Language education, however, should not be left completely to schools. It is a responsibility of adults to educate their children to have a good command of their national language. Every responsible member of society should think about this issue seriously from their own standpoint. The situation is simply so alarming. Japanese children performed relatively well in dealing with selection problems in the OECD test but did poorly in essay questions. This should be regarded as a warning about university entrance exams in Japan. Tokyo's Setagaya Ward is planning to seek government approval for establishing itself as a special deregulation zone for Japanese language education. The initiative is designed to help children develop the ability to think deeply in Japanese. The plan would reduce the number of classes for comprehensive study and everyday life skills to increase the hours for Japanese language education. Setagaya's initiative is conspicuous amid local governments racing to create a special zone for English education. Setagaya's sense of urgency should find a wide resonance in this country. Falling academic scores |
December 11, 2004
Terra dean named to math sciences boardFREMONT -- Terra Community College has announced that Nancy Sattler, Ph.D., the Dean of Arts and Sciences at Terra, has recently been appointed to the Mathematical Sciences Education Board for a three-year term. She will be serving as the community college representative. "I am looking forward to working on the MSEB," Sattler said. "It is a wonderful opportunity to have the community college voice be heard at a national level." The board, located within the National Research Council's Center for Education, strives to provide national leadership and guidance for policies, programs and practices supporting the improvement of mathematics education at all levels and for all members of society. Members, which includes colleges and universities like Harvard, Brown, Northwestern, University of Georgia, University of Florida and University of California-Irvine, meet in Washington, D.C. semiannually in November and May. Sattler actually missed her first meeting this year because of a previous commitment to another organization in which she is deeply involved - the American Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges. Sattler chairs the Distance Learning Committee for that group and was committed to delivering four presentations at the AMATYC conference. Sattler will serve on a MSEB subcommittee dealing with attracting and retaining students in mathematics majors in mathematically intensive careers. Terra dean named to math sciences board |
December 09, 2004
Lakewood Wal-Mart draws on 13th century mathBy John Rebchook About three years ago, Wal-Mart submitted a plan to the city of Lakewood for a Supercenter on 37 acres at West Colfax Avenue and Wadsworth Boulevard with a design it called a "value-engineered box." It was so ugly, "they probably couldn't even build it in Arkansas," recalled Frank Gray, the city's planning director. "And they sure as heck weren't going to build it in Lakewood." Rather than allow the Bentonville, Ark.-based giant discount retailer to tinker with one design after another, Gray decided to think outside the box. "We could keep telling them this is not the one, or we could take a different approach and hire our own architect and tell them this is what we want," Gray said. So the city hired Denver-based Klipp Colussy Jenks Dubois Architects. "We told them not to mess with the floorplates, because Wal-Mart knows what it is doing in the interiors, so don't move any walls," Gray said. "But for the outside, make it relevant to the retro corridor of the old U.S. 40 (Colfax) from the 1940s and 1950s. Don't try to make it look like a bunch of little buildings. Make it a big building. Give it big, funky fins." And there was one more thing: The design had to be less expensive than the 221,141-square-foot box Wal-Mart had proposed. So Gray and architect Chad Cox of Klipp Colussy Dubois flew to Bentonville to present their plan and a model. They were told that while every community complains about Wal-Mart's design, no other municipality had gone to such great lengths. Nevertheless, the Wal-Mart real estate team initially said Lakewood's design would be too expensive. "Then we told them that it would be 20 cents a linear foot less expensive than what they submitted - and they were on board," Gray said. Architect Cox said that his inspiration was the "1950s roadside architecture that was all about big moves. It was like those old gas stations with the soaring canopies and the old Cadillacs with the big fin tails." At the same time, he used what is known as the "Fibonacci Series" of numbers first constructed by Leonardo Fibonacci in 1202. Part of the series is known as the "golden section," a naturally occurring mathematical relationship found throughout nature. Cox used Fibonacci math and overlaid it with musical note relationships to design "the very large wall," on the back of the building. Gray calls it the "dancing wall. It's music set in stone." It all sounds very complicated, but it's the basis of works by Renaissance masters such as Michelangelo and Da Vinci, Cox explained. "We took this underlying order from the Renaissance and tilted it on its head - we gave it a rock 'n' roll attitude," Cox said. "The thing is, big-box design has fallen to the lowest common denominator," Cox said. "Everyone is trying to cut costs and make things look smaller. We wanted to raise the bar, without increasing the cost." Wal-Mart spokesman Keith Morris said about a year ago the retailer embarked on a national program to improve its architecture. Now, it tries to tailor its architecture to each community. Morris has seen the design for the Lakewood Wal-Mart, scheduled to open in the spring. "It is pretty unique," Morris said. But he doesn't want to see the same design used elsewhere. "The goal is not to," he said. "At the end of the day, we don't want the same design in Thornton that is in Lakewood. We don't want the Centennial Wal-Mart to be identical to the one at DIA." A Wal-Mart set apart The design is based on "bigger than life roadside architecture" of the 1950s. The architecture uses the Fibonacci Series first conceived in 1202 by Leonardo Fibonacci. "Golden section numbers" found throughout nature are incorporated into the design. The front of the building features giant "fins" as on old Cadillacs, while the back is known as the "dancing wall," inspired by musical notes. Source: Architect Chad Cox, Klipp Colussy Jenks Dubois Architects Lakewood Wal-Mart draws on 13th century math |
December 09, 2004
Computers get emotionalBy Michael Stroh Shiva Sundaram spends his days listening to his computer laugh at him. Someday, you might know how it feels. The University of Southern California engineer is one of a growing number of researchers trying to crack the next barrier in computer speech synthesis -- emotion. In labs around the world, computers are starting to laugh and sigh, express joy and anger, and even hesitate with natural ums and ahs. Called expressive speech synthesis, "it's the hot area" in the field today, says Ellen Eide of IBM's T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., which plans to introduce a version of its commercial speech synthesizer that incorporates the new technology. It is also one of the hardest problems to solve, says Sundaram, who has spent months tweaking his laugh synthesizer. And the sound? Mirthful, but still machine-made. "Laughter," he says, "is a very, very complex process." The quest for expressive speech synthesis -- melding acoustics, psychology, linguistics and computer science -- is driven primarily by a grim fact of electronic life: The computers that millions of us talk to as we look up phone numbers, check portfolio balances or book airline flights might be convenient but, boy, can they be annoying. Commercial voice synthesizers speak in the same perpetually upbeat tone whether they're announcing the time of day or telling you that your retirement account has just tanked. David Nahamoo, overseer of voice synthesis research at IBM, says businesses are concerned that as the technology spreads, customers will be turned off. "We all go crazy when we get some chipper voice telling us bad news," he says. And so, in the coming months, IBM plans to roll out a new commercial speech synthesizer that feels your pain. The Expressive Text-to-Speech Engine took two years to develop and is designed to strike the appropriate tone when delivering good and bad news. The goal, Nahamoo says, is "to really show there is some sort of feeling there." Scientist Juergen Schroeter, who oversees speech synthesis research at AT&T Labs, says his organization wants not only to generate emotional speech but to detect it, too. "Everybody wants to be able to recognize anger and frustration automatically," says Julia Hirschberg, a former AT&T researcher now at Columbia University in New York. For example, an automated system that senses stress or anger in a caller's voice could automatically transfer a customer to a human for help, she says. The technology also could power a smart voice mail system that prioritizes messages based on how urgent they sound. Hirschberg is developing tutoring software that can recognize frustration and stress in a voice and react by adopting a more soothing tone. So, how do you make a machine sound emotional? Nick Campbell, a speech synthesis researcher at the Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute in Kyoto, Japan, says it helps to understand how the speech synthesis technology most people encounter today is created. The technique, known as "concatenative synthesis," works like this: Engineers hire human actors to read into a microphone for several hours. Then they dice the recording into short segments. Measuring in the milliseconds, each segment is often barely the length of a single vowel. When it's time to talk, the computer picks through this audio database for the right vocal elements and stitches them together, digitally smoothing any rough transitions. Commercialized in the 1990s, concatenative synthesis has greatly improved the quality of computer speech, Campbell says. And some companies, such as IBM, are going back to the studio and creating new databases of emotional speech from which to work. But not Campbell. "We wanted real happiness, real fear, real anger, not an actor in the studio," he says. So, under a government-funded project, he has spent the past four years recording Japanese volunteers as they go about their daily lives. "It's like people donating their organs to science," he says. His audio archive, with about 5,000 hours of recorded speech, holds samples of subjects experiencing everything from earthquakes to childbirth, from arguments to friendly phone chat. The next step will be using those sounds in a software-based concatenative speech engine. If he succeeds, the first customers are likely to be Japanese auto and toy makers, who want to make their cars, robots and other gadgets more expressive. As Campbell puts it, "Instead of saying, 'You've exceeded the speed limit,' they want the car to go, "Oy! Watch it!" Some researchers, though, don't want to depend on real speech. Instead, they want to create expressive speech from scratch using mathematical models. That's the approach Sundaram uses for his laugh synthesizer, which made its debut in November at a meeting of the Acoustical Society of America in San Diego. Sundaram started by recording the giggles and guffaws of colleagues. When he ran them through his computer to see the sound waves represented graphically, he noticed that the sound waves trailed off as the person's lungs ran out of air. It reminded him of how a weight behaves as it bounces to a stop on the end of a spring. Sundaram adopted the mathematical equations that explain that action for his laugh synthesizer. Sundaram and others know synthesizing emotional speech is only part of the challenge. Another is determining when and how to use it. Jurgen Trouvain, a linguist at Saarland University in Germany who is working on laughter synthesis, says, "You would not like to be embarrassing." Computers get emotional |
December 09, 2004
Password imperfectBy Robert Lemos For years, Microsoft has hammered away at the security flaws in its desktop operating system. Now the company is looking to plug another security hole: weak passwords. People tend to choose easy-to-remember passwords--which means they're easy to crack. Even complex passwords can be stolen. They've moved from a security measure to a security risk, says Microsoft Chair Bill Gates, who for the past year has been publicly urging customers to stop relying on passwords. Last month, the software giant set an example for those customers when it kicked off a big push to adopt a second security measure for its internal networks: smart cards for every employee. By the end of 2005, tens of thousands of telecommuting Microsoft employees will be issued the cards, which will be required to log on to the company's networks. "Moving to biometric and smart cards is a wave that is coming, and we see our leading customers doing this," Gates told attendees at the IT Forum in Denmark last month. "In time, we will completely replace passwords." This isn't the first time Microsoft has got behind smart cards as a second line of protection for businesses. But this time, companies have already been sold on security. Organizations have been made more aware of the danger of passwords by a new set of concerns, such as the terrorist acts of Sept. 11 and Enron-inspired regulations that require companies to account for information security. To help lock down their networks, many companies are moving to centralized servers for handling the authorization of people attempting to access a network--whether employees entering a corporate system or shoppers logging in to an e-commerce site. These identity management systems make network management more simple, but they also put the most valuable network data in a single place--guarded by a password. A simple system of a log-on name and a password, no matter how complex, cannot guarantee that an unauthorized user will be prevented from getting access to critical systems. Passwords chosen by an individual are generally very easy for a machine to guess. Common variations are: a word followed by numbers, two words together, or a word with a number replacing a letter. All can be broken within minutes by the latest password-cracking programs. "Any password that we can expect people to remember can be brute-forced," said Bruce Schneier, chief technology officer for Counterpane Internet Security and author of several books on security. Consumers are worried as well. Phishing attacks--scams that use e-mail messages and fake Web sites to fool victims into giving up personal information--will likely cost home users between $150 million and $500 million, according to two estimates. In addition, surveys of home PCs have found as many as 80 percent infected with spyware--software that surreptitiously reports on a computer user's habits and data. Both trends highlight a major problem with passwords: Even the best password can be stolen. A digital thief armed with the password would likely appear to be the legitimate system user. The solution, security experts say, is to use two checks to protect systems--what's known as two-factor authentication. This combines a security device that people need to keep with them--such as a smart card--with a password or secret personal identification number, or PIN to protect against unauthorized access. Such security is routinely used by the military and by government agencies. The U.S. Department of Defense has rolled out a Common Access Card to most personnel, and the Transportation Security Administration has started prototyping its Transportation Workers Identity Card and hopes to have the smart cards issued to 200,000 cargo and transportation workers by June 2005. In its case, Microsoft hopes to tackle the insecurities posed by more than 60,000 employees and contractors who connect to its network through 175 different remote access points worldwide. That kind of implementation can be expensive, costing companies tens of dollars per employee. Centralized identity management systems cut costs and add security. For the most part, two-factor authentication just adds cost, said Charles Fitzgerald, Microsoft's general manager of platform strategies. "The move we made was driven by a security perspective, not an operational-cost perspective," he said. In its internal push, Microsoft is piloting its own technology: It's using .Net-enabled smart cards provided by Axalto, formerly known as Schlumberger. That puts .Net, Microsoft's software platform for running software on any device, back into competition with Sun Microsystems' JavaCard software for smart cards. The smart-card push comes after Microsoft has made a few missteps in the identity management arena. Its pint-size Windows CE for Smart Cards operating system failed to attract developers. On top of that, its Passport service, a foray into online consumer identity management, did not win over enough service providers to become useful. Fears about e-commerce fraud are adding momentum to the smart-card drive. The password issue is a lurking iceberg, and e-commerce sites, financial institutions and other large companies have only seen the tip of it, said Perakash Ramamurthy, vice president of products and technology for Oblix, a maker of identity management systems. Consumers and employees have multiple accounts holding personal information, and an attacker only has to find the one with the weakest security. "Identity is one thing that is being duplicated," Ramamurthy said. "And when you have that information more than once, you have a security hole." For the moment, Microsoft's plugging of that hole in it internal systems is not being carried over to its technology for consumers. People with password worries will have to wait and see whether the company puts any provisions in place in its software. "Enterprises are more willing to invest to solve the problems," Microsoft platform strategist Fitzgerald said. "On the consumer side, I am not saying that we are doing nothing in that space, but the things that we have talked about over the last few weeks have little to do with consumers." Password imperfect |
December 09, 2004
Meghnad momentsAFSANA AHMED After movies on scientists, thinkers, politicians and astronauts, Lord Meghnad Desai is all set to make a film on the mathematician Ramanujan and his friend Godfrey Hardy, the Cambridge mathematician. The movie is in the research and scripting stage and helping him is his wife and editor Kishwar Ahluwalia. In fact, it was an earlier project that brought the two together. The economist's fascination for Dilip Kumar, which culminated in a book on the thespian, led to romance and marriage with the book's editor, Kishwar. The Desais are open to joint international production for this crossover movie that will star a popular young Tamil actor playing the part of Ramanujan and a goodlooking English actor as Hardy. Meanwhile, Desai is also writing a book on Nargis. The actress who, according to Desai, is an interesting subject for the way she emerged from the underprivileged strata of society to one of India's most honoured positions. Meghnad moments |
December 09, 2004
Editorial: Good news on mathAlthough we know our schools could do better, it is useful to maintain perspective on how well they are doing. On that score, Canadians got some good news this week. In a 41-nation test of 15-year-olds conducted by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, Canadian students came in third overall in math, reading, science and problem-solving. Only Hong Kong and Finland scored higher. In reading, the Canadian kids ranked second. This speaks well of our own schools here in Ontario, which matched the overall national score. But there is room for improvement, as shown by Alberta, the province which led the country by achieving the second highest marks overall. The best news of all was the finding that Canadian teens from less advantaged backgrounds students from lower-income households, single-parent and new immigrant families and those with less educated parents scored near their more advantaged counterparts. When contrasted with the very wide gap between U.S. students, Canada's more uniform performance suggests we have the right policies in place to keep more challenged students from falling behind. The results speak well of our young people and of our national values. Editorial: Good news on math |
December 08, 2004
Where are all our number crunchers?Nicole Manktelow A shortage of statisticians could delay future health and drug research, a leading Australian researcher warns. Dr David Mitchell, research leader at CSIRO Mathematical and Information Sciences, says biological research is generating data that could help fight diseases such as breast cancer or leukaemia. But he says there are too few qualified people who can spot the hidden clues. "This sort of data is going to get enormous, but the number of people able to deal with it is tiny," says Mitchell, a molecular biologist supervising a group of statisticians. The Statistical Society of Australia is also worried about the shortage of qualified statisticians and is inviting the public to comment as part of a review. Details of the review are available on the society's website, with submissions closing on 14 January 2005. There is also a shortage of students studying statistics, Mitchell says, with most science graduates studying biology rather than mathematics. "In 2003 enrolments, there were about 3000 PhD students, about half of which are in biological science," Mitchell says. "That's not really surprising considering there's a wealth of discovery in there; it's the hot area. "But there were only 186 [postgraduate] students in mathematical sciences and not all of those will be statisticians." Will the shortage delay research? Statistical analysis can unlock complicated data, like data from genes on a microarray, a microchip or other substrate that allows thousands of DNA sequences to be analysed automatically and simultaneously. But without expertise Mitchell fears the benefits of research may be delayed. "Developments like prognostics for breast cancer, and diagnostics for leukaemia and other cancers will still happen, but it will be slowly," Mitchell said. Professor Terry Speed, an expert on microarray statistical analysis from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne, believes researchers will still reach their goals. "We would like to think that a highly trained person will get there, but that's not to say a lot of people who are not so highly trained are somehow not smart or will jump to conclusions," Speed said. "It's a question of efficiency, rather." He said that before he joined the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute seven years ago, researchers there had never had a statistician. "No one thinks they're hopeless. They've done OK." Where are all our number crunchers? |
December 08, 2004
Accoona has its share of bugsBY RICHARD J. DALTON JR December 8, 2004 A new search engine, Accoona, named after a Swahili phrase made popular in the Lion King song Hakuna Matata, is not so wonderful at finding a phrase and could just be a passing craze, experts said. The search engine gained attention after former President Bill Clinton spoke at the launch of the site on Monday night. Accoona executives say the site uses artificial intelligence to make the search results more relevant. China Daily Information Services, which runs an official government Chinese and English Web site, has partnered with Accoona, which is also backed by world chess champion Garry Kasparov. The site promises more relevant search results. A query for "antique cars" would also find pages with classic cars, said Stuart Kauder, chief executive. Once the search list appears, users can check off keywords to emphasize them in a subsequent search in a feature called "supertarget." Accoona can also recognize automatically which words are more important, said Steven Schwartz, Accoona's chief technology officer. For instance, a search for "track meet" would emphasize "track" more than "meet" in its search results, though the sponsored results identified at the top might differ as companies have paid for certain keywords through Yahoo's Overture program. Accoona also provides profiles of businesses, but executives wouldn't disclose where the information comes from. Despite the ballyhoo, the site seemed to have problems yesterday: the site crashed, some business information appears outdated or wrong and the site was running very slowly, experts on search engines said. Kauder acknowledged that yesterday was a "crazy, crazy day," following the high-profile launch. He said the site searches millions and millions of pages, provides more accurate results and will improve over time. Its competition, including Google, searches billions of pages. Schwartz said 50 employees work on the Web site at the company's Jersey City, N.J., headquarters. The home page mimics Google's barebones presentation in a similar manner to MSN's test search engine unveiled last month. Accoona faces a huge hurdle to match Google, Yahoo or MSN Search, said Chris Winfield, president of 10e20 LLC, an Internet marketing and Web development company in Brooklyn. "Saying 'artificial intelligence' and having an ex-president behind you - that is not going to be enough," he said. Gary Price, a news editor for Search Engine Watch, said "You have to be good from the get go. Once they see probably the quality of the results they're going to say, 'Well, I probably can do better at Google or Yahoo or Ask Jeeves, which are the three big ones, or even MSN.'" Accoona has its share of bugs |
December 08, 2004
Finland tops global school tableFinland's claim to have the best school system has been reinforced by the latest international comparisons. First results from the PISA study of 40 countries put it top overall in the maths, reading and science tests. PISA is a three-yearly appraisal of 15 year olds in the principal industrialised countries, organised by the OECD economic grouping. The UK as a whole was excluded for failing to provide enough results, though Northern Ireland did well. Maths focus PISA - the Programme for International Student Assessment - aims to assess the knowledge and skills needed for full participation in society, rather than mastery of a curriculum. It compares Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) member nations and "partner countries" and regions, such as Russia and Brazil. The tests were taken by more than a quarter of a million students, representing about 23 million in the participating countries. The focus of the 2003 study was mathematics, with problems mainly set in real-world situations, covering space and shape, change and relationships, quantity and uncertainty. Hong Kong had a slightly higher mean score than Finland but on overall proficiency, Finland came top, ahead of Korea then Canada, with Indonesia bottom. The OECD used seven proficiency levels in increasing order of skill, from "below Level 1" to Level 6. Half or more of the 15-year-olds reached at least Level 4 in Finland, Korea and Hong Kong. In Mexico, only 3% did so - with an even lower percentage in Indonesia and Tunisia. In most countries that are members of the OECD, at least three quarters of students reached Level 2 - but more than a quarter were unable to complete those tasks in Italy, Portugal and the US. "These students fail to demonstrate consistently that they have baseline mathematical skills," the report said. Internal variations The authors caution that - in line with previous international comparisons - only about one tenth of the variation in student performance on the overall mathematics scale lies between countries. Most is within countries - between education systems and programmes, between schools and between students within schools. For example, in Belgium, mean scores on the maths scale for the Flemish community were higher than those in the best-performing OECD countries, Finland and Korea. Results from the French community, however, were at the OECD average. Both Germany and the Republic of Ireland scored near to the OECD average but the range of performance within Ireland was one of the narrowest, while the difference between the 75th and 25th percentiles in Germany was among the widest. Gender gap In "reading literacy", the overall results found Finland, Korea and Canada at the top, and Indonesia again bringing up the rear. On the science scores, four countries had statistically indistinguishable high average performances: Finland, Japan, Hong Kong-China and Korea. The OECD report also considers gender differences. In maths, it said much remained to be done to close the gap which saw boys outperforming girls. In reading, girls had "significantly higher average performance" in all countries except Liechtenstein. The biggest gap was in Iceland. Science showed the smallest average gender gap, with boys doing a little better. Girls performed significantly better than boys only in Finland, Iceland and Tunisia. Finland tops global school table |
December 08, 2004
OECD test sees Japanese kids slipJapanese high school students have slipped in the latest international ranking of reading and mathematics skills by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development. In the first international student assessment of 15-year-olds conducted by the OECD in 2000, Japanese students came first in mathematics and eighth in reading. In 2003, they tumbled to sixth place for math and 14th for reading. Paris-based OECD conducts the Program for International Student Assessment test every three years. The results of the test, which measured students' performance in mathematics, science, problem-solving and reading, were released Tuesday. "In brief, they don't study hard these days, do they?" asked Nariaki Nakayama, minister for education, culture, sports, science and technology, in responding to the survey results. "We must clearly recognize that (their skills) are on a declining trend. . . . We must tell them to study harder." But an official at the education ministry said the ministry believes Japan still belongs in the top group of countries, because no marked differences exist statistically, except in reading scores. The official said of Japanese students, "Their learning skills rank high by international standards." Japanese students registered the largest decline in scores for reading from the previous test. They ranked second in performance in science, the same as in 2000, and came fourth in problem-solving, which was included in the test for the first time. Finland was ranked top in reading, with 543 points, and science, with 548 points, while Hong Kong came first, in math with 550 points. South Korea had 550 points to become the top performer in problem-solving. The ministry hopes to learn what caused the decline in reading skills. The official said it will establish programs to fix the problem. The official said the fall might have be linked to television viewing and increased computer use. About 4,700 freshmen at 143 Japanese public and private high schools took the test out of 276,000 students in 41 economies, mostly OECD member states, who participated. Britain was excluded from the final tally due to insufficient response rates. The PISA study sought to establish how well students can develop and apply their knowledge to real-life situations. The PISA scale for each area was devised so that the average score comes to 500 points. The reading section comprised 28 questions. Japanese students scored 498, down 24 points, to achieve the OECD average. There were also six questions in the reading test in which the rate of blank answers rose by 5 points from the previous test. About 7.4 percent of Japanese students were ranked below Level 1, the lowest category, exceeding the OECD average of 6.7 percent. Japan scored 534 in mathematics, down 23 points from the previous test. In science, it scored 548, down 2 points. Japan scored 547 in problem-solving. The OECD said the gap widened between the best and poorest performers. Some low-performing countries showed only small improvements or performed worse than in the previous test, it said. The Japan Times: Dec. 8, 2004 OECD test sees Japanese kids slip |
December 08, 2004
Love of science requitedBy NIKOLE HANNAH-JONES As little girls, Yueqi "Lucie" Guo and Xianlin Li dreamed of ending hunger, finding world peace and discovering a cure for cancer. Now high school seniors at the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics, the teenagers from Chapel Hill have found that clinging to childhood dreams can pay off. On Monday, Guo and Li, both 17, took the top group prize in Washington at the Siemens-Westinghouse Competition in Math, Science and Technology, the nation's top junior science contest, for their original research on early detection of breast cancer. A day later, they had $50,000 each in scholarship money and makeup artists dusting the shine off their faces and putting stray hairs in their places, preparing them for appearances on MSNBC and CNN Headline News. "It's not about the money. We'll never see the money; the colleges will get that," said Li, interviewed by phone Tuesday from New York City. "It's about what we're doing now, the memories we'll have." Started in 1998, the Siemens-Westinghouse competition invites the best original research among student scientists. This year, organizers got more than 1,200 applications and selected 54 projects to compete in six regional competitions. Six group and six individual projects were picked for the nationals. Guo and Li were among 10 students at the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics who competed in the southeast regional and three who went on to the finals in Washington last weekend. The top individual award went to Aaron Goldin of Encinitas, Calif., for an invention that converts ocean wave energy into electricity. Bhaskar Mookerji, a senior at NCSSM, won fifth place and a $20,000 scholarship in the individual competition. Guo and Li met as students at East Chapel Hill High School. Li had just arrived from Michigan and asked Guo for directions to her class, and the girls learned that they shared a love of science. Li's parents are both scientists, and she remembers lazy afternoons with her mom reading children's science books. Guo, who was born in China and lived in Maryland before moving to Chapel Hill, spent days at the Smithsonian Institution with her parents. Her mother is a researcher and her father a surgeon. Guo had a special interest in the early detection of cancer. Her grandfather died of cancer that was diagnosed too late to save him. A close family friend succumbed to breast cancer a few years ago. As students at NCSSM, a statewide magnet school in Durham, Li and Guo began working with their mentor, Jeffrey Marks, of the Duke University Comprehensive Cancer Center. During a year and a half of research, the girls discovered a tumor suppressor gene, a biomarker that may allow scientists to differentiate between cancer and healthy cells. Doctors rely on mammography to detect breast cancer. Biomarkers such as the one Guo and Li discovered could one day allow doctors to detect breast cancer before a tumor actually appears. Their research impressed the Siemens-Westinghouse panel of 11 scientists and researchers. The knots of nervousness and anticipation that curdled the teens' stomachs soon gave way to unabashed excitement as they learned they had beat out the 10 competitors. Zipping down the narrow streets of Times Square in a van Tuesday, the girls reflected on how winning the award was "icing on the cake" for a chance to pursue what many consider youthful fancy. Li hopes to enroll at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology next year. Guo has Harvard dreams. "You have this illusion that as a scientist, you're just going to walk into a lab one day and suddenly discover the cure for cancer," Guo said. "That's not going to happen. Researchers all over the world are just taking baby steps. ... But we have contributed to the war on cancer. This is a war we want to keep fighting in." Love of science requited |
December 06, 2004
Instant Chinese |
December 06, 2004
How to retire by age 4500 |
December 06, 2004
JIS Students' Bag Honours In 1st International Maths & Science OlympiadBy Rosli Abidin Yahya Bandar Seri Begawan - Two primary school students representing Brunei Darussalam in the 1st International Mathematics and Science Olympiad for Primary Schools (IMSO) recently held in Jakarta shone the name of the nation by winning honours in the event. Nurul Atiqah Shamir of Jerudong International School (JIS) won silver medal in the Science Olympiad while Hafizah Azahar, also from JIS won bronze in the same category. Some six primary school students from Brunei participated in the IMSO, a follow-up to the 1st Asean Primary Schools Mathematics and Science Olympiad initiated and held in Jakarta, last year. They were accompanied to Jakarta by the head of the Science, Technology and Environment Partnership Centre (STEP), Ministry of Education, Mr Koh Hong Puah and two teachers, Satinah Hj Abang of Pintu Malim Primary School and Ramlan Hj Abdul Samad of Sengkurong Primary School. The lucky students were selected from winners of Brunei's own recently held Primary School Olympiad which was organised by STEP Centre in collaboration with the Brunei Shell Petroleum Company Sdn Bhd. Mr Koh told the Bulletin that the Brunei students provided stiff challenge to their counterparts from other countries such as Cambodia, Turkey, China and Taipei in Science Olympiad. "However, we need to improve ourselves in the Mathematics Olympiad where China and Singapore once again dominated the event," he said, adding that Brunei students showed a lot of improvement in this year's competition. The Olympiads were meant to develop primary school students' talent, interest, intellectual ability and skills in Science and Mathematics. The event, which ran by the theme "Smart, Skilled and Creative in a Joyful Competition for Excellence", involved the participation of Primary Six students aged less than 12 years. Throughout the competition, each participant sat for three gruelling papers, namely "Theory 1", "Theory 2" and "Experiment for science / Exploration for mathematics". Prior to the event, the six students had undergone coaching and training by selected teachers every Friday and Sunday at the STEP Centre. -- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin JIS Students' Bag Honours In 1st International Maths & Science Olympiad |
December 05, 2004
Sacred spaces should transcend the ordinaryBy Jim Baker Professor Bill Carswell's architecture students weren't asked to ponder the unique challenges of designing sacred space. Their assignment was simply to build a model of a familiar type of building that incorporates a few standard features, such as a gathering space, sanctuary, changing rooms, etc. But Steve Padget, an associate professor in Kansas University's School of Architecture and a registered architect, has spent years researching "sacred geometry" -- a subdiscipline of his field that specifically looks at the making of sacred space. He explained overall the impression that architects typically strive to create when designing a church or chapel. "At a symbolic level, it always has to do with bringing many parts into focus, so that there is a focus on unity. In a way, that could be said of any architecture, but it is particularly true of any sacred space -- that the users of the space are to be aware of one source," said Padget, who has taught at KU since 1978. Some of the elements that architects often employ in church design, he said, are soaring ceilings, exposed structure (such as roof trusses) and the filtering or other manipulation of sunlight. "The use of verticality in whatever form, the drawing of the eye upward -- that, coupled with bringing in light in a very directed or articulated way, is a common device in order to attempt to transcend the ordinary," Padget said. In church design, he added, "You are more aware of something bigger than you." Sacred spaces should transcend the ordinary |
December 05, 2004
German mathematician gets Zakir Hussain AwardGerman mathematician Helmunt Neunzert was presented with the Zakir Hussain Award on Friday for his "pioneering contribution" to Industrial and Applied Mathematics. The award, instituted by the Aligarh Muslim University in memory of the third President of India to be given to a scientist of international reputation was given away by Union Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh. Stressing on the significance of applied mathematics Singh said "it is at the root of all scientific endeavour and is rightly called the mother of modern technology." Singh said Mathematics needed to be popularised with the students and added, "all the steps have not been taken to popularise the subject among students." Professor Neunzert, who has been contributing to the field of applied mathematics world over said, "mathematics is the key to technology to future. Applied mathematics is more about solving real life problems." The function was also attended by Minister of State MAA Fatmi who said it was imperative to have new methodology for teaching mathematics to students to make it more interesting. German mathematician gets Zakir Hussain Award |
December 05, 2004
Why do the unsolved problems of maths matter?Alex Antonov "Who of us would not be glad to lift the veil behind which the future lies hidden; to cast a glance at the next advances of our science and at the secrets of its development during future centuries?" Thus David Hilbert opened his address to the second International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris on 8 August 1900, before announcing his seminal list of 23 problems. Much of the mathematical research in the 20th century has been influenced by this list of unsolved problems, as both successful and unsuccessful attempts at solutions have yielded a number of important discoveries on the way. To commemorate the occasion and provide a suitable launch for mathematics into a new century and a new millennium, one hundred years later, the newly-formed Clay Mathematics Institute (CMI) of Cambridge, MA, devised its own list of old nuts that have yet to be cracked and formally announced it at the Collθge de France in Paris on 24 May 2000 in a lecture entitled "The Importance of Mathematics". While to some the latter might sound like an obvious oxymoron, there are some circumstances surrounding this list of problems which indicate that this is not just mathematics for mathematics' sake. For one, the founder and sponsor of the CMI is not himself a mathematician, nor did he read maths at university. Landon T Clay is a Boston businessman who believes maths research is underfunded and would like to see a wider dissemination of mathematical knowledge. Then, there is also the attractive price tag of $1,000,000 attached to each of the seven problems to be won by the first person to demonstrate a correct solution. So if you thought maths couldn't make you rich and famous, think again! The list of problems itself has been carefully selected to include not only the most difficult ones, but also the ones whose solutions would have a relevance to areas of mathe-matics and the other sciences beyond the one in which the problem was originally for-mulated, hopefully leading to further serendipitous discoveries en route. Thus, far from being formal exercises, the seven prize problems are widely considered the most important problems in mathematics. In an extended feature, I propose to look at each of the seven so-called millennium problems in a non-specialist manner and explain its significance, while conveying some of the excitement contained in the mathematical concepts behind it. The first problem we consider is the P vs NP problem, notorious for the plethora of false proofs it regularly attracts. P = NP? Despite a rather unassuming name, the P vs. NP problem is, in a way, the problem of all problems. Originating in the field of computational complexity theory, it is essentially concerned with how easy it is to solve problems on a computer, or, put more cynically, whether computers will eventually replace mathematicians. Indeed, were this problem to be solved in the affirmative, it is most likely that a computer could furnish the proofs to the remaining six millennium problems. So what do the symbols P and NP actually mean and why is their (in)equality so difficult to ascertain? P and NP are just two of the many classes in complexity theory used to distinguish between the difficulty of problems. Generally speaking, problems that are in P are easy to solve, while problems in NP are difficult to solve, but significantly, given an answer to an NP problem, it is easy to verify whether it is indeed a solution. For example, many of the problems involved in data processing, such as sorting information or searching and re-trieving, are instances of P-type problems. Formally, P stands for polynomial time, which means that the number of steps required to obtain a solution can be expressed as a polynomial in the length of the input. On the other hand, there are data-processing problems that are not so easy. Consider, for instance, the 'floppy-disk-packing' problem which asks whether, given a number of floppy disks and a number of computer files, it is possible to copy all the files to the floppy disks. For small numbers of disks and files, it is straightforward to give an answer: you just go through all the possible combinations. However, if large numbers are involved, it quickly becomes very difficult to solve: the possibilities are simply too many. At the same time, given a particular answer, you can reasonably easily check whether it is indeed a correct answer. This is an example of an NP-type problem. Formally, NP stands for non-deterministic polynomial time and includes the problems whose answers can be checked in polynomial time, given the right information. However, the 'floppy-disk packing' problem is not just any NP problem. It is in fact an NP-complete problem, which means that all other NP problems can be reduced to it. This includes some interesting examples, such as the problem of prime factorisation, which is in NP but is not known to be NP-complete. Before you get too excited, let me point out that there are actually quite a few NP-complete problems, so there is nothing special about our floppy disk example. In fact, there are a number of popular games that can be formulated as NP-complete problems, among them checkers, crossword puzzle generation, and even Minesweeper! Let us recall the actual problem: is P equal to NP? In other words, if the solutions to a problem are easy to verify, is it possible that the answers can be easy to compute as well? It turns out that this is a very difficult question to answer either way. Whether one is trying to prove or disprove the above proposition, the class of NP-complete problems turns out to be crucial. For, if trying to prove P=NP, it would suffice to show that there is a method which can be used to solve one of the NP-complete problems in polynomial time (remember, an NP-complete problem is such that all other NP problems can be reduced to it). Conversely, if trying to disprove P=NP, it would suffice to demonstrate that a certain NP-complete problem is not solvable in polynomial time (one way to do this would be by showing that the least time the problem could be solved in is super-polynomial). Although this may sound like a fairly abstract problem, an affirmative proof would have potentially stunning practical consequences. Hundreds of NP-complete problems are known, many of them related to scheduling and routing problems with industrial importance. For example, there is a problem concerning the fitting of oddly shaped items into a knapsack, which is closely associated with the question of placing components on a circuit board, while the problem of constructing a working timetable for a school so that teachers and students are never in two places at the same time is similar to the problem of placing pilots in an airline. Perhaps more importantly, however, there is the problem of factorising large numbers, which lies at the heart of modern cryptography. The codes routinely used to secure worldwide financial transactions are complexity-theory based and, in particular, the proof of their security assumes P is not equal to NP. Were it to be proven that P does equal NP, current ciphers could become obsolete overnight. Despite such potentially destructive consequences, there are some of a more positive nature. For example, as mentioned earlier, an affirmative solution to the problem will allow a computer to find a formal proof to any mathematical theorem, provided it has a proof of reasonable length. More strikingly, it is thought that this may be applied to other areas of creative human endeavour, such as designing planes, creating physical theories or even composing music, as in each case what is ultimately required is an efficient method for recognising a good result. Finding such methods is one of the fundamental problems in artificial intelligence, whose resolution would be aided by a proof of the P vs NP question. With such momentous implications, it is unsurprising that many people are interested in finding a solution to this particular millennium problem. Indeed, an astonishing number of papers are regularly published purporting to have found a proof. However, ever since the problem was initially formulated in the 1970s, there has been no success, whatever the line of attack. This has prompted speculations that the problem may be unsolvable after all and, in particular, Gφdel's incompleteness theorem has been invoked. In other words, it has been suggested that under our current mathematical framework of assumptions it is not possible to prove whether P = NP. Some have accordingly proposed that 'P not equal to NP' (for that is what most complexity theorists believe to be the case) be established as a new assumption. Over time, the fact that a proof definitively settling the question one way or the other has failed to materialise, has lent a somewhat metaphysical aura to the problem. In complexity theory circles, whether P equals NP has become a matter of belief rather than a matter of established fact. When and if the problem is finally resolved (and there is little indication of this happening in the foreseeable future), it is bound to affect the way we do science. Perhaps the picture is not so gloomy though: remember, all you have to do to solve the problem and win the prize is solve the equivalent NP-complete Minesweeper problem, which boils down to demonstrating an efficient algorithm for playing Minesweeper perfectly (without unnecessary guesses)! Why do the unsolved problems of maths matter? |
December 03, 2004
Polymath prof finds beauty in chaos in classroom, on Broadway, under sailBy Tim Stoddard Robert Devaney's office is neat, orderly, and, fittingly, chaotic. A CAS professor of mathematics and statistics, Devaney studies dynamical systems, or phenomena that are always changing and thus impossible to predict using mathematics. He's decorated his walls and shelves with colorful posters representing various forms of disorder: patterns called Mandelbrot and Julia sets that swirl and twist and defy easy geometry. As if to offset all the uncertainty, Devaney has neatly arranged on shelves a massive collection of coffee mugs, one from each of the some 200 universities he has spoken at around the world. A 2003 winner of a Metcalf Award for Excellence in Teaching, Devaney was recently named the 2004 Massachusetts Professor of the Year by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. This fall he's teaching courses on differential equations and chaotic dynamical systems, and according to one of his former students, he "is able to make every lecture entertaining and understandable: he renders jaw-droppingly difficult mathematics simple and fun." Another student says, "The brilliance of Devaney's instruction lies in his ability not only to present complex theory so that it can be clearly understood, but more important, appreciated. Mathematics is an art form." The B.U. Bridge recently visited Devaney in his office. Bridge: Do you have any guiding philosophy in your teaching? Devaney: One thing I enjoy doing is bringing contemporary mathematics into the classroom. In the typical high school math classroom, you see 4th-century bc geometry and 11th-century algebra. If the kids stick with it for a long enough time, they see some 17th-century calculus, but nobody ever touches this incredible math that's going on now. I think that's something we should be doing more of in mathematics. Bridge: What attracted you to dynamical systems? Devaney: In the late 1970s, people realized that most of these systems such as weather patterns and the Dow Jones average are chaotic, or totally unpredictable. That's interesting, but how do you study chaos? Luckily the computer arrived around then, and how do you study a system like this on the computer? You draw a picture of it, and these beautiful fractal images emerge. Even though you can't understand anything from the numbers they just go crazy when you stand back and take a viewpoint from afar, you see this very distinctive pattern. What it means remains to be decided, but it was a very different and exciting way of looking at mathematics. Bridge: How can technology improve the teaching of mathematics? Devaney: When I started teaching, I would walk into the classroom, pick up some chalk, and immediately turn my back on the class. We didn't have computer graphics, and we didn't know about chaos. We'd start each class with a differential equation, and demonstrate all kinds of mathematical tricks to solve very special problems. Now I go in, turn on the computer, and immediately draw solution after solution. We can see the chaotic behavior changing. It's just a totally different environment. Bridge: You've been a "chaos consultant" in the theater? Devaney: There's a wonderful play by Tom Stoppard called Arcadia that involves a lot of mathematics. He writes so beautifully about mathematics that I think a lot of people in the play are intimidated by it. My son is an actor in New York City, and he told a director that I was a chaos person and that I could help him. Next thing I knew I was coaching the actors, showing them what this mathematics means. The director had these crazy ideas that had nothing to do with what Stoppard was saying, so when he saw how beautiful chaos is the way it can be used to make pictures of leaves, mountain ranges he changed his plans pretty quickly. Bridge: What's the most challenging aspect of teaching math? Devaney: In mathematics, we've got to be absolutely rigorous, but we also need to keep the material interesting for the students. So there's this problem: you could shave off a little bit of the complexity here and make it a little more accessible and interesting, but you also want to be thorough and rigorous. The most rewarding part is seeing students get excited about the mathematics. Some kids are just born to be mathematicians they're going to be excited no matter what you do. But to have other students encounter contemporary mathematics for the first time and get just as excited that's amazing. Bridge: Can I ask you about that photograph of the sailboat? Are you a sailor? Devaney: Oh God, yes, I'm a fanatic. My wife and I keep our boat, Cygnet, down in a beautiful harbor in Buzzards Bay. We went up to Maine for a couple of weeks last summer, then down to New York City, and all over the place. I do a lot of single-handed sailing this particular boat is easy to single-hand; you don't have to be changing the lines all the time. When my wife's working, I'll just sail wherever the wind's blowing, and sometimes I look up and say, geez, I'm in Nantucket! Now I gotta get back for dinner. But it's great because I can do math the whole way. Bridge: When are you not thinking about mathematics? Devaney: When I'm listening to opera. I'm a fanatic about that as well. I'll drive all the way down to the Metropolitan Opera in New York for a Saturday matinee with a CD playing of the opera I'm about to see. I'll watch the opera all afternoon and then get in the car and drive back to Boston listening to the next opera I'm going to see. It's a little strange. Polymath prof finds beauty in chaos in classroom, on Broadway, under sail |
December 03, 2004
Going shopping crackersBy Jonathan Prynn According to the calendar, there are still 23 shopping days left until Christmas and no need yet to panic. In reality, shoppers have only two-and-a-half more days before present-buying becomes a stressful nightmare, one expert said today. Maths specialist Dr Tony Mann has calculated the precise moment when the joys of Christmas shopping are outweighed by the irritations. And that moment will arrive at exactly 12.30pm on Saturday, according to a complex mathematical model he has devised. Dr Mann drew up the formula after a study of all aspects of Christmas shopping, ranging from the size of the crowds on the high street and the crush on public transport to postal deadlines and the dates when schools break up. The formula is expressed by the mathematical equation E(t) = A (1 - keat) where E is the amount of enthusiasm for Christmas shopping, t is the time left in days, a is the rate at which enthusiasm is lost, A is a factor to express enthusiasm at 100 per cent and k is a factor to express enthusiasm at 0 per cent. The formula allowed Dr Mann, head of mathematics at Greenwich University, to plot a line on a graph showing how our first great burst of enthusiasm for Christmas shopping ebbs away. At the same time, a separate mathematical model was used to plot how stress factors rise through the festive season. The two lines cross over in less than three days time on what has been dubbed "Black Saturday". Dr Mann said: "The graphs show that we start our Christmas shopping with great enthusiasm, which left to itself would gradually decrease. As the external factors kick in, however, stress rises. "The key point at which stress overtakes enthusiasm falls at around 12.30pm on 4 December." However, changing patterns of shopping suggest that the advice, which was commissioned by online retailer Amazon.co.uk, is being ignored. Retailers report that Christmas comes "later" every year, with consumers waiting to see if they can pick up bargains in pre-Christmas sales. Going shopping crackers |
December 03, 2004
Film Fest Focuses on Man and MachineA Spiritual Take on High Technology The Third-Millennium Spiritual Film Festival is focusing on the relationship between man and machines. The initiative, which will be complemented by a study congress sponsored by the pontifical councils for Social Communications and for Culture, will reflect on the ethical questions posed by this phenomenon. The congress, entitled "Man-Machine Hybridization, Identity and Conscience in Postmodern Cinema," is being held today and Thursday in St. Mary of the Assumption University (LUMSA) of Rome. The film festival, organized by the Italian Cinematographic Review, will show movies through Dec 19. Among them is the much-awaited animation film "Robots," by 20th Century Fox. At a press conference Monday, Archbishop John Foley, president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, said, "The cinema creates futuristic scenes, in which one often sees possible harmful consequences for the human person." "The evolution of technology has certainly allowed a revolution which has changed our way of living, and will change it even more, with undeniable advantages, but also with dangerous aspects," he warned. The issue posed by the initiative was summarized by the American prelate in this question: "Is it about humanizing the machine or about transforming man into something inhuman?" For his part, Cardinal Paul Poupard, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, said that "the machine seems to be the negation of man and robotics the annulment of the spiritual dimension." Yet, modern man "cannot do without all that is the product of his intelligence and creativity, of art and technology, of engineering and literature, of reason and skill," he said. "God has given man intelligence, which has enabled him to produce ever-more sophisticated machines, and has left him free to make his choices," the cardinal noted. "We are the ones who create our technological reality." "We have said many times that the cinema is a great instrument to recount stories, thanks to the power of the image," he said. "And the commitment of many directors might help us to confront the evolution of a new dimension in which human intelligence is united to artificial intelligence." Cardinal Poupard added: "We cannot forget that humanity's future will also be shaped by our capacity to love, to have feelings, by our need for spirituality. Man will continue to try to find out who he is, who others are, and who God is. Identity and consciences will continue to be irreplaceable human qualities." Film Fest Focuses on Man and Machine |
December 03, 2004
A math specialist's formulaBY JUAN ANTONIO LIZAMA Math specialist Theresa Donnelly walked into Joy Mays' third-grade class all smiles and sweet talk. She had a math problem for the third-graders. Donnelly and the class read the problem out loud, identified key information and talked about what the question asks students to do. Then she let the students work the problem. Diandre Mickey drew a table of seven rows and nine seats per row to find how many seats the cafeteria at his school, Gandy Elementary, had. He counted the seats across the page and counted seven rows down. He decided he could use multiplication to solve the problem. His classmate, Isaac Waggoner, added the rows by two to get the answer. Colleen Eades, another student, added nine seven times. "It is fun to give them a problem and not tell them it's a multiplication problem and see what they'll do," Donnelly said. Her goal is to have students think mathematically rather than follow a procedure to solve a problem. "We are trying to back away from memorization," she said. Donnelly spends her time hopping from classroom to classroom at Gandy, coaching teachers and students in math. She is the only math specialist in the Hanover County school system. Virginia school systems have an estimated 30 math specialists this school year, according to William Haver, math professor at Virginia Commonwealth University's department of mathematics and applied mathematics. He said the state does not keep statistics on math specialists because it hasn't endorsed them, he said. VCU, the University of Virginia and Norfolk State University have embarked on grant-funded programs to increase the number of math specialists in Virginia and elsewhere. Within the next two years about 300 additional teachers are expected to be pursuing math-specialist degrees. VCU received the first of two grants in May from the National Science Foundation through its Mathematics Specialist Partnership Institute program for kindergarten through fifth grade. Participating in this grant of more than $4.4 million are five school systems - Portsmouth, Virginia Beach, and the counties of Richmond, Stafford and Spotsylvania. Teachers began taking classes this summer and will start instructing as math specialists next fall, even though they won't have their master's degrees yet, said Reuben Farley, project director of the grant and professor at VCU's department of mathematics and applied mathematics. VCU received the second grant of more than $3.7 million in October. The Richmond city school system is participating in the second grant program along with those in Virginia Beach, Alexandria and the counties of Arlington, Fairfax, Hanover, Roanoke and Stafford. U.Va. and Norfolk State University are also partners in this grant program, which gives participating school systems the opportunity to select six teachers to earn master's degrees in math and educational leadership to become math specialists. There will be two cohorts of 25 teachers. One group will start classes next summer and the other in 2007. These teachers will be taking classes for three consecutive summers at one of the three partner universities, Farley said. Both programs also will include distance learning. U.Va. also received $750,000 in April from the Virginia Department of Education from the state's portion of No Child Left Behind funds to develop and offer new courses for future mathematics specialists for K-8 teachers who already have master's degrees. The initiative of having math specialists in the schools has been in the works for about 15 years, said Haver, project director of the second grant for VCU. VCU has been working with the Virginia Math and Science Coalition on this effort, he said. "We think that student performance on mathematics, in K-8 in particular, can be greatly improved," he said. Haver's colleague, Farley, said improving the methods of teaching can result in students performing better in math. "There is a great deal of evidence that many students can be better at mathematics than is currently the case," he said. The programs at VCU, U.Va. and Norfolk State will prepare teachers in mathematics content, instructional strategies and school leadership, Haver said. Math specialists will coach other teachers and students, going beyond simple procedures of solving math to explaining why a certain math process works and why it's right, he said. That's the goal of Donnelly, the math specialist at Gandy Elementary. "My graduate work has given me a good sense of how kids think mathematically," she said. Another aspect of the math-specialist program is the collection of data, Haver said. Schools with math specialists will be compared with "control schools" with the same demographics to determine if the initiative makes a difference. Haver said he hopes and expects that math specialists will make a difference in the schools. "If that happens, we're confident that just like the reading specialists, there will be math specialists in nearly every school," he said. The state is considering an endorsement for math specialists, Haver said. The endorsement would let school systems know that math specialists were prepared. Haver said he hopes the state School Board will approve that endorsement in about two years. A math specialist's formula |
December 03, 2004
With 'mathematical' precisionBy John L. Paul Mathematics wizard Shakunthala Devi, who found a place in the Guinness Book of World Records, is on a mission to Kerala. She will call on the Chief Minister, Oommen Chandy, requesting at least five acres of land in the State to set up a Centre for Mathematics. "I preferred Kerala because Malayalis are high in intellect and the State has a high literacy rate," she says. Ms. Devi, who has written a movie script about the life of Neha, a young girl, is on the lookout for good film producers. "Neha is a bright student who became weak in mathematics because of torture meted out by a teacher. Later, with proper guidance, she turned out to be a genius. I find that Kerala is the right place for quality movies. I am on the lookout for Malayali producers who can make a movie based on the script. This is because Malayalis and Bengalis make no-nonsense films. Neha's story will soon be out in book form." Her other loves are astrology, number games, puzzles and IQ development. Many of her forefathers were into astrology. Her skills in mathematics help her draw astrological charts faster. 'Living wonder' Ms. Devi's skills in mathematics began to be noticed when she was five years old. She found solutions to complicated calculations within seconds. This made her better known as a `living wonder'. She left for Europe in 1950. She multiplied two 13-digit numbers in 28 seconds, finding her name in the Guinness Book. She also founded the Shakunthala Devi Educational Foundation Public Trust. "Maths is considered a violent subject because teachers beat their students. Our aim is to bring about a change in attitude." Ms. Devi feels that computers render humans useless people, depriving them of the power to think. "Just like lack of exercise wears off muscles, computers deprive human beings of the capacity to think," she says. With 'mathematical' precision |
December 03, 2004
Noted mathematician Chen Xinshen passes awayShiing-shen Chern (Chen Xingshen), a world-renowned overseas Chinese mathematician, 93, died of illness at his home at Nankai University in north China's city of Tianjin at around 7:15 p.m. Friday, the university announced. Chern, a US citizen, is best known for his achievements in the study of differential geometry. He was born in 1911 in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province, east China. He graduated from Nankai University in 1930 and received further education at Qinghua University and the University of Hamburg in Germany. He taught at several Chinese and US universities + including Princeton University, the University of Chicago, and the University of California, Berkeley + and is the only Chinese to win the Wolf Prize + the most distinguished award in the international mathematics field. The International Astronomical Union officially named asteroid No. 1998CS2 after the noted mathematician in November for his outstanding contributions to human society. Noted mathematician Chen Xinshen passes away |
December 01, 2004
A geek PrimerBy TRALEE PEARCE By the time he reached the Toronto International Film Festival in September, Shane Carruth's epic tale had preceded him. In his first try at filmmaking, the Dallas native wrote, directed and starred in a delightfully geeky little science thriller, Primer. Made for a measly $7,000 (U.S.) on Super 16-millimetre film in 2001, it won Sundance's Grand Jury Prize this year. Carruth is almost apologetic that Primer fits so neatly into its own genre: the little film that could. "You guys have to be so sick of this story," said the artfully dishevelled 32-year-old during an interview. No, we're not, actually -- we live for this stuff. But that doesn't stop him from admitting he wishes he'd maxed out maybe one more credit card. "Everything in the film is the first take. There's a much better film if I had found just a little bit more money," he said. "But part of the interest in the film comes from the fact that it was shot on such a small budget with a bunch of first-time people, I know that that's the case. There's no way I'm going to complain." And nor are initial audiences. Primer, opening here Friday,is a weird little morality tale that is about as un-Hollywood as it gets. The grainy, dialogue-heavy film centres on two shirt-and-tie best-friend engineers, Abe (David Sullivan) and Aaron (Carruth), who live in an unnamed generic American city. They spend off-hours in a garage, obsessing on a side project that fiddles with mass and gravity. When they invent a machine that can open up pockets of time, at first, the possibilities for profit seem endless. When everything actually becomes endless -- think body-doubles with a mind of their own -- the science and the friendship begin to implode. "What they find is that not only are they doing a really great job of severing gravity but with it they're also severing any other kind of communication." I asked Carruth how far the real-world science goes in this field and he happily geeked out for a few minutes. I couldn't see his pocket protector under his sweater, but I became convinced it was there. "There are superconducting devices that are usually the size of a house that can exhibit diamagnetism in objects that are not metal or magnetic," he said. "There's videotape of a frog that's levitating in huge cylinders. What our guys are doing is tweaking it. Usually it needs to be cooled to absolute zero and our guys are doing it at room temperature . . . but the analogy is based on real stuff." The intensity of that "real stuff" is garnering the film comparisons to other brain-melters such as Memento -- the Canadian distributor ThinkFilm is even offering stunned viewers who paid to see the film a chance to see it for a second time free. Still, through all the chatter about parabolas and proteins (Primer also won Sundance's Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Award for films dealing with science and technology), Carruth said the film would be nothing without the personal politics behind the lingo. "Even if they're humming, there's information there." And Carruth, a trained mathematician and a software engineer by trade, said that Primer wasn't conceived out of an abiding desire to push science. "I knew thematically what the story was before I knew that it would have anything to do with science." "I knew we were going to have a story with people with conventional relationships where they were able to trust each other. And because of the introduction of some kind of power to change what's at risk, it was going to change these relationships and make it so they aren't even able to be around each other at the end." That device came out of reading piles of non-fiction about the history of the number zero, the history of calculus and the history of the transistor. "I really like the idea that there's a machine that can put you in a place where you're unsure about your place in the scheme of things," he said. What if time really is on a loop and everything has happened already? Which is your real self, the one you're experiencing now, or the one in the past or future? One of the film's best lines comes from Carruth's character Aaron, once he realizes the dangers of toying with time: "What's worse, being paranoid or knowing you should be?" In the making of Primer, Carruth was perhaps the most paranoid when casting actors. He was not planning on stepping into the role of Aaron, for one thing. But everyone seemed either too unprepared or too actor-y. There was deadpan nerd humour to harness, too. It had to sound natural. "I didn't know what I was doing. I tried out over 100 guys for the two leads. I have no casting experience, no directing experience. I had no way to tell if an actor had it or not, reading off the page. "I was able to find David Sullivan. And I had memorized the script anyway. . . ." And now Carruth, who has serious leading-man good looks in his favour, is reluctantly discovering the cachet of being one. "I don't have any delusions about being an actor. But what I've learned is how much credit you get as an actor. Certain people react much better to telling them you're an actor in a film as opposed to a writer or director. "What I care about is who the director is. If they tell me Colin Farrell is in it, I'm done." Carruth won't be casting any Farrell types any time soon. His next film is a romance, if you can believe it. "It's between an 18-year-old oceanography prodigy and the daughter of a commodities trader on the trade routes of Eastern Africa and Southern Asia," he said, grinning at the decidedly odd synopsis. His budget may be bigger this time, but he's certain that he'd rather struggle looking for international locations instead of giving in to Los Angeles's gravitational pull. He has a hunch that would be a transformation riskier than time travel. And despite the awards piling up for his first effort -- he's also nominated for a best-feature-film award at New York's Gotham Awards tonight -- there will be no Primer 2, ΰ la that other low-budget indie success, The Blair Witch Project. "I always thought of Primer as this superhero creation story. By the end of it, you've got two guys on the planet who know how to construct these devices and they're pretty much at odds with each other. "What happens after is not nearly as interesting as how it got to that point." Not so for Shane Carruth. I'd wager his "after" will nab more than a little interest. A geek Primer |