James West

X-STEM Symposium Kicks-Off the USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo at the DC Convention Center; “TED-Style” Event Introduces Kids to Science Visionaries

carlyo — Tue, 18 Mar 2014 17:09:07 +0000

X-STEM Symposium Kicks-Off the USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo at the DC Convention Center; “TED-Style” Event Introduces Kids to Science Visionaries

By Shawn Flaherty

The first ever X-STEM: Extreme STEM Symposium—presented by Northrop Grumman Foundation and MedImmune—kicks-off the 3rd USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo and Book Fair, hosted by founding and presenting sponsor Lockheed Martin. Being held on April 24^th at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in DC, X-STEM is a “TED-style” event for kids with talks by 50 of the nation's most noted science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) professionals representing top universities, corporations, non-profits, and governmental agencies.

“X-STEM is the perfect start for the Festival as we work to spark kids’ interest in STEM careers. Opening students’ minds to all the possibilities that science creates is critical to ensuring our nation’s progress,” explained Larry Bock, Festival co-founder.

Geared towards middle and high-school students, X-STEM features interactive presentations and workshops by an exclusive group of visionaries who aim to empower and inspire kids about STEM careers. Throughout the day, top STEM role models and industry leaders will ignite students’ curiosity through storytelling and live demonstrations. Sessions will cover a wide array of subject areas including space exploration, storm chasing, oceanography, the science of social networks, the physics of superheroes, mathematical puzzles and more.

“The Northrop Grumman Foundation and the employees of Northrop Grumman are excited to be part of the Festival and to support the X-STEM Symposium. This is a wonderful opportunity for students to hear from great speakers, participate in workshops that explore the wonders of science and ignite their interest in STEM and STEM careers,” Sandra Evers-Manly, President, Northrop Grumman Foundation and vice president, Global Corporate Responsibility, Northrop Grumman.

Here is a sampling of scheduled X-STEM speakers and their topics:

Jack Andraka – This Baltimore high school student developed a diagnostic test that detects pancreatic cancer more accurately, quicker and cheaper than existing tests.
Anousheh Ansari – She made headlines as the first female private space explorer and astronaut of Iranian descent. Now she is helping drive space industry commercialization.
Blake Bullock – This exciting, plain-speaking astrophysicist from Northrop Grumman will discuss the next-generation telescope being developed to replace Hubble.
Francis Collins, Ph.D. – He’s known for his landmark discoveries in genetics and for leading the Human Genome Project. He now heads the National Institutes of Health.
Sylvia Earle, Ph.D. – This legendary oceanographer has been dubbed “Her Deepness” by the New York Times and a “Hero for the Planet” by Time magazine.
David Gallo, Ph.D. – Find out what life is like deep below the ocean from this renowned oceanographer (who co-led the Titanic exploration).
Bernard Harris, M.D. – This physician and entrepreneur was an NASA astronaut and the first African American to walk in space.
Nan Hauser, Ph.D. – Profiled on 60 Minutes, this scientist-conservationist’s work in the remote tropical region of the Cook Islands may help save the endangered humpback whale!
John Holdren, Ph.D. –Gain perspective from this noted aeronautics and plasma physics researcher who works as the senior advisor to President Obama on science and technology!
Barrington Irving – He made history in 2007 by becoming the youngest person and the first African American to pilot a plane solo around the world.
Laura Richman, DVM, Ph.D. – This MedImmune veterinarian scientist and molecular virologist launched her career by identifying a mysterious virus that was killing elephants.
Michael Shermer, Ph.D. – Author and Skeptic Magazine publisher says human’s tendency to believe strange things boils down to the brain's most basic, hard-wired survival skills.
J. Craig Venter, Ph.D. – The scientist who led the first sequencing of the human genome has plenty to say about the future of DNA research discovery.
James West, Ph.D. – An acoustical scientist world-known for his invention of the foil electret microphone.
Josh Wurman, Ph.D. – Discover first-hand from this original storm chaser what it is like to track and study deadly tornadoes.

“We are excited to sponsor the first-ever X-STEM symposium, with its focus on engaging students in the exciting and important work being done in the STEM fields,” stated Dr. Bahija Jallal, Executive Vice President, MedImmune. “I am hopeful this accomplished group of speakers will inspire many of our young participants to learn more about pursuing careers in STEM.”

X-STEM runs from 9am-5pm and has a nominal cost of $15 per person for students and educators and $25 for others. Space is limited to the first 3,000 registrants. Schools and individuals interested in attending should sign up at: www.usasciencefestival.org/schoolprograms/x-stem-extreme-stem-symposium/x-stem-registration-form.html.

The symposium is part of the USA Science & Engineering Festival, which culminates with the Festival Expo on April 26-27 from 9am-6pm. The Festival Expo is a free, family-friendly event with more than 3,000 hands-on activities and 100 live stage performances. Taking over the entire convention center, the Festival Expo will also have a Career Pavilion, Book Fair—complete with signings by well-known science authors, and multiple workshops and competitions such as EPA P3’s sustainability challenge, making it the Super Bowl of STEM. In all, the Festival expects more than 250,000 people to participate.

Founded by serial entrepreneur Larry Bock and Lockheed Martin CTO Ray O Johnson to address the severe shortage in science and tech talent, the USA Science & Engineering Festival is the nation’s largest science festival. To learn more, visit www.USAScienceFestival.org or watch the video at www.usasciencefestival.org/festival-highlight-video.

carlyo Tue, 03/18/2014 - 13:09

Join Us In Honoring These African American X-STEM Symposium Speakers During Black History Month!

carlyo — Fri, 28 Feb 2014 21:47:59 +0000

Join Us In Honoring These African American X-STEM Symposium Speakers During Black History Month!

African American scientists and engineers have made extraordinary contributions to STEM and high-tech innovation, and you'll meet some of these key pioneers at the Festival Expo's X-STEM Extreme STEM Symposium hosted by Northrop Grumman Foundation and MedImmune on Thursday, April 24 in Washington!

In honor of National African American History Month, the Festival would like to acknowledge these trailblazers and their achievements as they prepare to present at this extraordinary event.

The all-day symposium will bring students, teachers and others up close with these and other leading STEM innovators in an unforgettable experience of workshops, live demonstrations and other hands-on learning experiences. Tickets are on sale now! Click this link for details.

Our noted STEM luminaries will include those in space exploration, robotics, green technology, storm chasing, quantum physics, the science behind Hollywood TV and film, oceanography, nanotechnology, biomimicry, and biotech entrepreneurial startups.

Which is why we want to be sure you don't miss out on this exciting "limited tickets only" event set for the Washington, D.C. Convention Center! So sign up today!

Here's a brief look at just some of the high-profile X-STEM speakers we would like to recognize for National African American History Month!

Alvin Drew – This United States Air Force officer and former combat pilot is one of the last NASA astronauts to perform a spacewalk as part of the Shuttle Discovery's mission to the International Space Station. Learn how in space, he started the "Storytime in Space" reading program for children!

Bernard Harris, M.D. – This physician served as a NASA astronaut from 1990 to 1996, including flying aboard STS-55 (Spacelab D-2), Columbia,and as Payload Commander on STS-63 in 1995 (in which he became the first African American to walk in space). Learn of his perspective on the future of space flight, and of his career transition to Chief Executive Officer and Managing Partner of Vesalius Ventures, Inc., a venture capital firm focused on early-stage companies in medical informatics and technology.

Barrington Irving – He made history in 2007 by becoming the youngest person to pilot a plane solo around the world (and the first African American to accomplish this feat). Now discover how he is further inspiring kids in aeronautical science by developing the first-ever flying K-12 classroom through his non-profit organization, Experience Aviation!

James West, Ph.D. – This acoustical scientist is world-known for his invention of the foil electret microphone (the most widely used microphone today). Learn how he turned his childhood fascination with electricity into a career as a world-class innovator in acoustics!

For a complete look at bios for all X-STEM speakers scheduled for Festival Expo 2014, visit this link.

carlyo Fri, 02/28/2014 - 16:47

Genomes, cool conferences, and what the hell to tell people about behavioral genes

ddobbs — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 21:22:37 +0000

Genomes, cool conferences, and what the hell to tell people about behavioral genes

I had the pleasure of attending the Genomes, Environment, and Traits conference on Tuesday. Was wonderful and strange, with many inspiring, exciting, and/or entertaining moments -- and a few things a bit worrisome.

The twitter feed from the event tracks the talks and agenda pretty thoroughly; it's far better than my own notes. I especially enjoyed the morning's main event, in which a tag team of Robert Krulwich and Carl Zimmer called to stage for interviews different combinations of 13 the 10 "pioneers" who had been among the first to have their entire genomes run. As a journalist, I had wondered how Zimmer and Krulwich would handle this. The program said they would interview all 13 ten. When I pictured all of these people lined up on stage while the two journalists tried to interview them, I pictured chaos and trouble. These pioneers featured some larger-than-life figures and a couple cowboys, including James Watson and Skip Gates: a diversity and range of energy, personality, and ideas that might prove hard to handle.

But Krulwich and Zimmer had stayed up late forging a plan that proved up to the task: divide and conquer. They brought up Watson first, and alone, and extracted from that dangerously unpredictable and sometimes caustic presence 15 minutes of humorous and insightful history and charm. Then they brought up the other genome'd pioneers -- Jay Flatley, Esther Dyson, Stephen Quake, Misha Angrist, James Lupski, Seong-Jin Kim, Greg Lucier , Rosalynn Gill, and the West Family-- in various combinations to address various business, personal, historical or ethical angles in friendly but often pointed conversations.

It worked beautifully. A highlight was Skip Gates. Gates talked about how getting his own genome done seemed to bring his mother right into the room. Then, talking about his TV and DVD series on genomic geneology, Faces of America, he first slayed with an hilarious account of how he used his friendship with Quincy Jones ("Quince, what's up?") to draw a coveted phone call from Oprah Winfrey, who convinced the Coca-Cola company "to split open the ceiling and lower a giant ATM machine that just started spitting out money"; and then moved us by describing how the overlapping genetic heritages he looked at in the series -- personal geneologies of whites, blacks, Asians, Native North Americans (the incomparable Louise Erdrich), and others -- crossed and joined one another in ways so rich and unexpected that they "completely destroyed any notion of racial purity" and "showed we're all a great big boulliabaise." Beautiful.

And splendid programming and interviewing from Krulwich and Zimmer, especially with Watson and Gates. Those two you don't know what you'll get -- might be genius, could be trouble. But from each they got 20 minutes of their most inspiring and engaging stuff.

The other interview guests and combinations held their own too, with many good tales, surprises, and laughs, and an almost frighteningly intelligent and self-possessed 17-year-old.

But it wasn't all charm and entertainment. We talked a lot all day about balancing the promise of genomics -- reliable insights that would help people understand themselves and manage their lives and medical care -- with the many problems in putting it to use, such as inevitable gaps in knowledge or execution. A major concern was how to analyze the information and help people understand what it means. As many there noted, we can now produce a person's raw genomic data pretty quickly -- but we aren't nearly as fast or clear in discerning its real significance. Some genetic analysis companies are working hard to do this. Others are focused mainly on pumping out the raw data. And whatever the intentions and plans of the most responsible players, the overall move here, as in so many fields, is toward producing and selling data at cheaper and cheaper rates to a broader array of people. Some of these companies may do a bangup job of explaining the results. Others, maybe not.

And so emerged through the day (to me, anyway) a sharp and deep tension between the genuine potential to use genomic information to improve medical and other personal decisions on one hand, and on the other, the extreme difficulty of doing so when even the medical and genetic worlds don't know or agree on what much of this information means â and the industry is racing to put this information directly into the hands of people who have little idea what to make of it.

Dan MacArthur had a good post today on a new paper that shows the technical difficulties simply extracting the genomic information. Interpreting it may prove even trickier, particularly with genes related to behavior or mood. As I'm quite interested in those, I couldn't help but notice that they didn't come up a lot in the formal discussions. But when I talked to people on the side, including some of those who had their genomes run, they usually confirmed my impression that people take a particularly keen intereste in genes related to things like mental health or behavior -- depression, bipolar, hyperactivty, aggression. "Oh God yes," one person told me. "Unless you're really worried about cancer or something, that's the first thing people look at. 'Do I have the crazy gene?'" Yet by my read, neither the industry nor the research community quite knows what to tell people to do with that information -- even as we move closer to making it cheaply available.

We discussed this in the breakout session I led, on "Predicting Temperament." Predictably enough, we didn't come up with all the answers. I'm not sure what they are. Cheap genomes are good. Information wants to be free. You can't stop these things. But it seems to me that people in both genomics and behavioral science need to talk a lot more about how to help people make sense of not just the classic medical implications about things like cancer, aging, or diet, which are tricky enough, but about behavior. Many people likely to be tested take a keen interest in these genes. And well they should, since temperament, mood, and behavior drive so much of our fates. Yet the testing, genomics, and behavior communities don't seem to know what to tell them. We talked about that some at GET; kudos to George Church, Jason Bobe, Tom Goetz, and the other organizers for making that possible. We need to talk about it some more.

PS April 30: Zimmer has put up a nice post on the conference, as has Tech Review's Emily Singer. And Zimmer called out a piece I'd forgotten about, his own, about the slippery business of typing genes for intelligence. Also notable (via Zimmer again) are Steven Pinker's long 2009 article in the Times Magazine and George Church's "Genomes for All" manifesto [pdf] from from Scientific American. And Wired editor Tom Goetz has a 2007 article on his own and others' genotype data.

*Apologies on this front to readers. I've been traveling, conferencing, and researching at a furious pace lately and so have been especially short on blogging time. This pace should soon slow, however, leaving me more time to post on genes, behavior, and much else.

ddobbs Thu, 04/29/2010 - 17:22

Sounds like a fantastic conference. We are still very very far from being able to predict even major disease risk accurately from a single genome, however - mainly because we have not yet found most of the genes that are involved (say in psychiatric illness, for example). And predicting behavioural traits or temperament will also be very difficult on an individual basis - trends across populations due to particular genetic variants may emerge but applying these in the context of a unique genome will be hugely problematic. More fundamentally, though, is the fact that much of the variance (usually at least half) in these traits is not genetic. So there are major limits to how much genetic information can tell us - one of the strongest factors limiting genetic determinism is simply intrinsic developmental variation - even if you start with the same genotype, you never end up with exactly the same phenotype.

See this post on Wiring the Brain: "Nature, nurture and noise" for more on this topic: http://wiringthebrain.blogspot.com/2009/06/nature-nurture-and-noise.html