Professor Aaron Quigley has been appointed a Visiting Senior Research Fellow in the Smart Systems Institute in the National University of Singapore. As part of his next sabbatical Aaron will spend 6 months in the Creating Unique Technology for Everyone (CUTE) centre in Singapore [Video]. He will be collaborating with researchers there on next generation interfaces, discreet computing and new forms of interaction. The research and lessons learnt will help advance the field of HCI and will be incorporated in future teaching and research here in St Andrews.
News
Science and Innovation mission to Japan
Sue Kinoshita, Minister Counsellor economic affairs and Professor Quigley
This week Professor Quigley joined a mission to Japan with other academics from the University of Oxford, Edinburgh, UCL and Manchester. The week long event was organised by the UK’s Science and Innovation team in Japan, part of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Over five days the delegation visited and presented at seven companies along with three seminars and workshops. Across nine presentations Professor Quigley presented to hundreds of people and introduced some of the Human Computer Interaction research in SACHI, along with research from the AI research group. This mission has the goal to strengthen research collaboration and innovation partnership between the UK and Japan.
During his talks, Aaron provided examples from our engineering doctorate program, our MSc program, work on research interns, PhD students and academics from across Computer Science.
Griff Jones, First Secretary, science innovation & global challenges, Sethu Vijayakumar, Edinburgh University, Sue Kinoshita, Minister Counsellor economic affairs, Professor Aaron Quigley, Seiichi Asano, Senior science Officer and Joesph Robertson, Science & Innovation Officer.
Global Human Computer Interaction at World Usability Day Estonia
Professor Quigley will be a distinguished speaker at the World Usability Day in Tallinn, Estonia this November as part of the ACM DSP. Aaron was appointed to the Distinguished Speaker Program (DSP) of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) earlier this year. The DSP brings together international thought leaders from academia, industry, and government.
In Estonia, Aaron will present a talk on Global Human Computer Interaction. This is the study of HCI when considering global challenges, languages, concerns, cultures and different economic drivers. This talk explores new technologies and the next generation of interfaces beyond the desktop, in a global context. The World Usability Day was founded by the User Experience Professionals Association (UXPA) and the theme for 2018 is “Design for Good or Evil”. It brings together UX professionals and the topics range from usability to user experience, and innovative technologies to studies in human computer interaction.
The next big thing or the next big gimmick?
Dr Tom Kelsey will be holding a panel discussion at Computing’s first ever Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Live conference on Monday 19th November in London. Through a variety of expert key-notes, end-user case studies, and panel discussions the conference will highlight key developments within AI.
Tom’s panel discussion: The next big thing or the next big gimmick?
Read more about the conference and programme of events at http://events.computing.co.uk/computingai/programme
MSc Poster Demo Session 2018
After a year of hard work, and an intensive summer project, our MSc students submitted their final dissertation and presented their project posters and artefacts.
Last month’s busy poster demonstration session pictured below, provided a great opportunity for students to meet with second markers, reflect upon their MSc experience and appreciate the diverse projects completed by their peers.
We wish them all, every success with future plans, and look forward to seeing them again at December Graduation.
Images courtesy of Lisa Dow and Xu Zhu
Alumni visit School of Computer Science
A group of alumni who studied in the school over 20 years ago (graduating classes of 1994, 1995 and 1996) organised an informal reunion last month. During their stay in town they organised a visit to the school, where they sampled the school coffee, acquired a coveted CS mug and reminisced around the photo boards. The group were given an overview of the present day Computer Science at St Andrews and proceeded on a tour of the department with current Head of School, Simon Dobson, Professor Emeritus, Ron Morrison and Dave Munro.
Dr Roy Dyckhoff
Our friend and colleague Roy Dyckhoff died in hospital last month. He had been diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia, which was being managed through blood transfusions. His death was however sudden and unexpected.
Roy was educated at Winchester College, before studying at King’s College, Cambridge. He undertook postgraduate study at New College, Oxford. He was appointed as a Lecturer in the Department of Pure Mathematics in St Andrews in 1975, moving to Computer Science in 1981.
Roy worked in logic and proof theory, having begun his career as a topologist and category theorist (for which one of his thesis advisors was Dana Scott). Much of his work concerned various aspects of intuitionistic logic, but he also contributed to work in programming languages, type theory, natural language processing, and model checking. He was also instrumental in changing the peal of the bells in St Salvator’s chapel, the college church of the University, which he frequently rang at graduations and other events, including the celebration of the 550th anniversary of the consecration of the chapel.
He had retired from St Andrews but retained an honorary position with us, and was a frequent visitor and seminar-goer until very recently. We’ll remember him as someone who was always ready to dive into deep mathematical or philosophical discussions, as well as being someone who could explain the essence of advanced mathematical concepts even to those with a lot less mathematical sophistication than he himself possessed. His engagement with the School and the wider academic community in Scotland and worldwide should have gone on for much longer than it did, and we’ll miss the conversations and interactions that we’ll no longer have with him.
Roy’s funeral will be held on Thursday 6 September at Kirkcaldy Crematorium at 11.45am, and plans are being developed for a Service of Thanksgiving at St Salvator’s Chapel later this year. There’s a card in the front office ready for his funeral later this week.
For those who’d like to mark his passing in some way, the family have suggested giving blood as a suitable marker. Alternatively, they are collecting for the Scottish Mountain Bothies Association, which was a charity he supported for many years.
DHSI Seminar Series
The school of Physics & Astronomy (Room 222) are hosting our next Digital Health Seminar
12.00pm – Lunch
12.20pm – Isla Rose & Mary Barnard Ultraviolet Radiation, DNA damage, and sunscreen
12.50pm – Lewis McMillan Monte Carlo radiation transfer model of laser tissue ablation
1.20pm – Nicole Schanche Planet candidate detection and ranking using MachineLearning
1.50pm – General discussions
All welcome!
DHSI Flyer – Physics & Astronomy 17.8
Event details
- When: 17th August 2018 12:00 - 14:00
- Where: Physics Bldg
- Format: Seminar
Graduation Reception June 2018
Congratulations to our Senior Honours Class of 2018, MSci Honours students and our PhD students Dr Adam Barwell, Dr Martin McCaffery, Dr Gonzalo Mendez and Dr Long Thai, who graduated last month. Students were invited to a reception in the School prior to the ceremony, to celebrate their achievement with staff, friends and family.
Our graduates will move on to a wide variety of interesting and challenging employment and further study opportunities, and we wish them all well with their future careers.
School Technician wins sponsorship prize.
Technician David Letham entered the raffle for sponsorship of Berwick Rangers and won first prize!
“Berwick Rangers are excited to confirm that Berwick-based Northern Soul Kitchen will be the primary shirt sponsor for the 2018/19 season.
David Letham, founder of St Andrews Berwick Rangers Supporters and winner of the front of shirt sponsor prize at our sponsor draw on Saturday evening, has opted to donate the shirt sponsorship to the local community project: “Rather than putting my Supporters club on the front of the home shirt, I’ve asked Northern Soul Kitchen of Berwick if they would like the sponsorship and they were delighted to accept. It’s a good community initiative that is just starting up and I’m happy to help them by donating this sponsorship and hopefully forging a new link between Berwick Rangers and the local community in the process.”
Northern Soul Kitchen are a community project on West Street, Berwick, turning unsold food into affordable and delicious meals for people. The food is offered on a Pay-As-You-Feel (PAYF) basis meaning people can pay what they think the food is worth, donate whatever amount they can afford or even volunteer their time and skills to pay for a meal – all have their value.
Everyone knows that there is a nationwide problem with perfectly edible food being chucked away. Northern Soul Kitchen rescue this food before that happens and use it to make healthy meals for everyone. The kitchen will work to help a number of local issues, including food waste, food poverty, social exclusion and a misunderstanding about nutrition. As well as serving meals, Northern Soul Kitchen will be offering workshops and events for people to learn more about eating healthily on a budget.
Harriet Grecian, co-founder of Northern Soul Kitchen, is delighted to have been offered the primary shirt sponsorship prize: “We are incredibly grateful to David Letham and Berwick Rangers for this sponsorship opportunity. As a community project, it means a great deal to have partnerships with local organisations, especially one as significant as the local team. We’re looking forward to a great season for Berwick Rangers and can’t wait to come and see a game at Shielfield!”
The club are looking forward to working with Northern Soul Kitchen, with a number of exciting ideas already being discussed for the next 12 months. You can learn more about Northern Soul Kitchen here.”
