SEAS Event Calendar

September 2009
	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
(35)			01	02	03	04	05
(36)	06	07	08	09	10	11	12
(37)	13	14	15	16	17	18	19
(38)	20	21	22	23	24	25	26
(39)	27	28	29	30

November 2009
	Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
(44)	01	02	03	04	05	06	07
(45)	08	09	10	11	12	13	14
(46)	15	16	17	18	19	20	21
(47)	22	23	24	25	26	27	28
(48)	29	30

Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
				01	02 2pm» CEE Seminar Series	03
04 (Week 40)	05 Fall 2009 Reading Days 4pm» MSE Seminar	06 Fall 2009 Reading Days	07	08 3:30pm» STS Colloquium	09 2pm» SIE Colloquium 3pm» SAIC Sustainable Energy Future - Speaker Series	10
11 (Week 41)	12	13	14	15	16 Fall Convocation and Family Weekend 2pm» Systems and Information Engineering Colloquium 3pm» Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Seminar	17
18 (Week 42)	19	20	21 3:30pm» Technology and the Making of Contemporary Europe: Learning from the Tensions of	22	23 3pm» SAIC Sustainable Energy Future - Speaker Series	24
25 (Week 43)	26	27 3:30pm» Promoting ?Ethics Talk’: Lessons from Engagements with Bioscientists about the D	28	29	30	31

Time:

2:00pm

Description:

CIVIL AND ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING SEMINAR SERIES

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2, 2009
2:00 PM
OLSSON HALL 120

Civil Engineering at Machu Picchu

T. Andrew Earles, Ph.D., P.E., D.WRE

This presentation will provide an overview of paleohydrological research at Machu Picchu in Peru conducted over the past 15 years by Kenneth Wright, P.E. and his colleagues at Wright Water Engineers, Inc., and the Wright Paleohydrological Institute. Research topics will include water supply, hydrology, hydraulics, foundation engineering, Inca construction techniques and paleohydrology investigation techniques. The technical aspects of the presentation will be blended with award winning photography of the enigmatic Inca city.

Andrew Earles, M.S. '96, Ph.D. '99 has worked for Wright Water Engineers, Inc. since graduating from UVA in 1999. At UVA, Andrew studied groundwater bioremediation with Dr. Teresa Culver and urban stormwater management with Dr. Shaw Yu. Andrew is a Vice-president with Wright Water and works on projects related to hydrology, hydraulics, stormwater management and other urban water resources challenges.

The CEE seminar series is open to the University community.
CE undergraduate students are especially invited to attend.

Refreshments served at 3:00 PM in THN D204 (CEE Lounge)

Description:

Fall 2009 Reading Days

See: http://www.virginia.edu/registrar/calendar.html

Time:

4:00pm - 5:00pm

Description:

The Department of Materials Science and Engineering invites you to join us for an upcoming Seminar:

Dr. Costel Constantin

Physics Department
Seton Hall University

Host: Jerry Floro

Talk Title: Growth, Electrical and Magnetic Characterization of Nitride Dilute Magnetic Semiconductors

Date: Monday, October 5th
Time: 4:00 to 5:00 PM
Refreshments: 3:30 to 4:00
Room: Wilsdorf 101

Abstract:

Spintronics is an emerging technology which exploits for the first time the electrons' spin while making use of their charge. While traditional electronics are based on charge carrier control (e.g., n- or p-type), functional magnetic semiconductors called dilute magnetic semiconductors (DMS) would also allow control of the quantum spin (e.g., up or down). Future spintronic devices can take advantage of the
new type of electronic conduction control and can be quite faster and more efficient as compared to the traditional counterparts. However, one of the greatest challenges in making DMS useful is obtaining reliable Curie (i.e., ferromagnetic) transition temperature above 300K. In this
presentation, I will present the current efforts in obtaining reliable (e.g., above 300K) Curie temperature for manganese doped gallium arsenite (MnGaAs) and manganese doped gallium nitride (MnGaN) DMS materials. I will describe the
growth, electrical and magnetic characterization of manganese doped scandium nitride (MnScN) and iron doped scandium nitride (FeScN) grow on scandium nitride/magnesium oxide [ScN/MgO(001)] by molecular beam epitaxy as possible nitride
DMS materials.

Description:

Fall 2009 Reading Days

See: http://www.virginia.edu/registrar/calendar.html

Time:

3:30pm - 5:00pm

Description:

STS Colloquium, Thursday, October 8th - The Regulatory Governance of Nicotine in the UK

Department of Science, Technology and Society
Fall 2009 Colloquium Series

Speaker: Catriona Rooke, Science and Society, University of Nottingham
Title: The Regulatory Governance of Nicotine in the UK
Date: Thursday, October 8th, 2009
Time: 3:30 - 5:00 p.m.
Location: Rodman Room (A207), Thornton Hall

Abstract:
Recently, within the tobacco control community, there has been growing concern that the division of regulatory responsibility for conventional tobacco products (i.e. cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco) and alternative modes of nicotine delivery (or ?Nicotine Replacement Therapies’ (NRTs) such as gums, patches and inhalers) is having a negative effect on the reduction of smoking rates in industrialized countries (MHRA 2006). The ?alternatives’ are mainly regulated as pharmaceuticals; therefore, must reach safety standards comparable with those required for medications rather than being compared with the known harm caused by tobacco smoking. This paper will draw on Actor-Network Theory (ANT) ideas (particularly Latour, 1988; Law, 1987) to study the evolution of this divided responsibility in the United Kingdom, particularly how NRTs came to be regulated as pharmaceuticals.

I draw on scientific, policy and legal documents, together with oral history interviews, to explore the regulatory decisions taken in the UK in respect of the first NRT: a nicotine-containing gum developed in Sweden. This gum, as /Nicorette/, became available in the UK in 1980 as a prescription only medicine under the 1968 Medicines Act. It is proposed that utilizing ANT to explore the development of nicotine gum and the regulatory decisions taken about it in the UK, places these decisions into the wider context of ideas about tobacco control and addiction, and helps to better understand how different substances such as tobacco, nicotine and nicotine gum acted in different networks, leading to very different systems of regulation. More broadly, this paper explores the possibilities that ANT provides for shedding light on a historical case study, as well as whether ANT has the potential to be a useful tool for studying regulatory governance.

Brief Bio:
Catriona is a graduate student at the Institute for Science and Society at the University of Nottingham (UK). She has an undergraduate degree in Sociology from the University of Newcastle and a masters degree in Social Research from the University of Aberdeen. Catriona will be visiting through a U21 travel scholarship [Universitas 21, an international network of 21 leading research-intensive universities in 13 countries - UVa is the only American University]. Catriona is
working on a project that explores the evolution of regulatory strategies in relation to Nicotine Replacement Therapies and their implications for product innovation and harm reduction. She is currently investigating the utility of Actor-Network Theory for exploring these issues.

Time:

2:00pm - 3:15pm

Description:

SIE Colloquium - Michael Gallmeyer - Friday, October 9th, OLS 005

All faculty members and graduate students are invited.

Systems and Information Engineering Colloquium

Friday October 9th, 2009

2:00 ? 3:15 pm

Olsson 005

Michael Gallmeyer, UVA Associate Professor of Commerce

Portfolio Choice with Capital Gain Taxation and the Limited Use of Losses

We study an investor's consumption-savings problem with realized capital gain taxation. The distinguishing feature of our analysis is that we impose an important element of the tax code that has received little attention in the academic literature: the limited use of capital losses. Existing capital gain tax portfolio choice work assumes the full use of capital losses (FUL) implying unused capital losses generate tax rebates. We show that this common assumption leads to counterfactual welfare results. Due to tax rebates generated from tax loss selling, an untaxed investor would actually prefer to pay a capital gain tax. Instead, when only the limited use of capital losses (LUL) is allowed for, which is consistent with the U.S. tax code, an investor's optimal equity-to-wealth ratio is shown to be strongly non-monotonic in the portfolio's tax basis. For a tax basis significantly below the current stock price, LUL investors with no unrealized capital losses trade equity similar to FUL investors as the probability of tax loss selling in the future is small. For a tax basis close to the current stock price, LUL investors hold significantly less equity relative to FUL investors and untaxed investors. When LUL investors have large unused capital losses or a tax basis significantly above the current stock price, they trade as if they are not taxed on capital gains because they can use accumulated capital losses to offset any future taxes. This difference in trading strategies and the usage of capital losses leads to lower lifetime wealth and equity holdings for LUL investors relative to FUL investors and untaxed investors.

Biography

Professor Gallmeyer specializes in studying how market imperfections influence security prices and trade. His current research focuses on taxation, trading constraints, liquidity, and monetary policy. Before joining the McIntire faculty, Professor Gallmeyer was on the faculty at the Mays Business School at Texas A&M University and the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University. He has published in leading academic journals such as Journal of Financial Economics; Journal of Monetary Economics; Review of Finance; Mathematical Finance; and Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control. He has also presented his research at numerous universities and conferences. Professor Gallmeyer serves as an associate editor for Mathematics and Financial Economics.

Time:

3:00pm - 6:00pm

Description:

Clement Chen - A Strategic Perspective on the "Biology" of Smart Grid
Time: 3-6PM
Location: MEC 205

Smart grid is commonly viewed as the "internetization" of the electric power system that promises to help enable a sustainable
energy future. The question that is not often asked is what happens when millions of new entities join the grid as "micro" utilities
and start interacting with an infrastructure that is becoming highly networked with ever-increasing automation. This trend
points to an environment that may become increasingly "biological" and lend itself to unintended consequences.

Description:

Fall Convocation and Family Weekend

See:

http://www.virginia.edu/majorevents/convocation.html

http://www.virginia.edu/orientation/familyweekend.html

Time:

2:00pm - 3:15pm

Description:

Gerardo Hernandez del Valle, Columbia University

Optimal Execution of Portfolio Transactions with Geometric Price Process

Abstract
In this talk we derive the optimal execution trajectory for a trader who wishes to buy or sell a large position of shares which evolve as a geometric Brownian process in contrast to the arithmetic model which prevails in the existing literature (see for instance Almgren and Chriss 2000), and with a general temporary impact h. We will provide a couple of examples which illustrate the results. We would like to stress the fact that in this paper we use understandable user-friendly techniques, which might lead to an approach to solving the problem of optimal execution of derivatives.

Time:

3:00pm - 4:00pm

Description:

Can Strain Stimulus Create Spatial Ordering in Large Cell Populations?

Brian Cox
Teledyne Scientific Co LLC, Thousand Oaks, California

Friday October 16th, 3:00PM
MEC 341, Mechanical Engineering Building
Refreshments at 2:30PM in MAE Faculty Lounge, MEC 305

The popular view in biological science is that the spatial arrangement of cells in organs results from the response of the cells to chemical signals, whose presence can be traced back to the genetic code. For many aspects of morphogenesis, this paradigm may ultimately yield a continuous account of the development of many aspects of organ morphology from the embryonic stage all the way through to maturity. However, in numerous cases, triggering features of organ morphology in a large population of cells that is spatially uniform at some epoch in development requires the breaking of symmetry, for which no obvious mechanism based purely on chemical signaling exists. Morphogenesis may be correlated with chemical gradients, but why do the chemical gradients arise in the first place? We propose here that the primitive signal that breaks symmetry and triggers morphological development in at least several cases is strain stimulus. Furthermore, the patterning of morphology by strain stimulus can only be understood by considering the interactions a large population (thousands or millions) of cells, whereas the considerable literature on strain stimulus predominantly addresses the chemical and mechanical behavior of individual cells.

Three examples will be discussed. The first two demonstrate for the first time the existence of a strain-induced ordering transition in cell populations, i.e., a strain-induced transition in the spatial patterns they form. One is based on a theoretical analysis of the microstructure of dental enamel, where the ordering transition occurs over the cusp of the tooth during the migration of ameloblasts during amelogenesis. The second is an experimental result recently obtained for a large population of smooth muscle cells subjected to strain cycling in vitro, where the cells are seen to spontaneously re-organize into rows under strain, whereas they lie randomly in space without strain stimulus. The last example is a theory of the formation of network structures in organs, e.g., nervous networks in the gut or vascular capillary networks.

Time:

3:30pm - 5:00pm

Description:

Department of Science, Technology and Society
Fall 2009 Colloquium Series

Speaker: Arne Kaijser, Professor of Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm
Title: Technology and the Making of Contemporary Europe: Learning from the Tensions of Europe Project
Date: Wednesday, October 21st, 2009
Time: 3:30 - 5:00 p.m.
Location: Rodman Room (A207), Thornton Hall

Abstract:
Arne Kaijser will describe the Tensions of Europe project, a collaborative undertaking that explores ways to study transnational European history with a focus on the role of technology as a force of change. Kaisjer will also tell us about his current research on the development of a European gas grid and the export of Soviet gas to Western Europe during the Cold War

Brief Bio:
Arne Kaijser is a professor of History of Technology at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, and the current president of the Society for the History of Technology.

Kaijser has written extensively about the history of large technological systems, with specific projects on energy and information technology. He is also a member of the editorial boards of the Journal of Urban Technology and Centaurus.

Time:

3:00pm - 6:00pm

Description:

Mindi Farber-DeAnda - Sustainable Future Energy Storage
Time: 3-6PM
Location: MEC 205

Storage is essential to all energy systems, it provides the balancing necessary for supplies to meet demand. Storage is viable in
the fossil fuel industries where we depend on petroleum terminals, coal stockpiles, and natural gas caverns. Electricity storage
has not been able to make significant inroads in the electric grid until recently with the American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act of 2009.

Time:

3:30pm - 5:00pm

Description:

Department of Science, Technology and Society
Fall 2009 Colloquium Series

Speaker: Brian Rappert, Associate Professor of Science, Technology and Public Affairs in the Department
of Sociology and Philosophy at the University of Exeter, Devon UK

Title: Promoting ?Ethics Talk’: Lessons from Engagements with Bioscientists about the Dual-use
Dilemma

Date: Tuesday, October 27th, 2009

Time: 3:30 ? 5:00 p.m.

Location: Rodman Room

Abstract:
This presentation will examine the changing conditions of work of science professionals vis-?-vis the societal regulation of their work. More specifically, post 9-11 the relationship between national security and research has been a topic that has received considerable attention. As part of this, questions have been raised by national science academies, international organizations, and security agencies regarding whether the knowledge and techniques generated through fundamental and applied life science research might facilitate the production of bioweapons. This has resulted in debate regarding whether controls should be placed on what gets done, how, and whether information is widely circulated. Arguably this sort of discussion challenges many of the traditional presumptions of biologists regarding the implications of their research, its proper governance, and their professional identity.

This presentation elaborates the methods employed in and findings of some 120 seminars with practicing scientists and students in 15 countries about the so-called ?dual use’ aspects of life science research. There have been two aims to these seminars: one, to inform participants about current ?biosecurity’ debates and second, to generate interactive discussion about the merits of proposed policy responses. His presentation recounts some of the interactions in the seminars with a view to considering the tensions and lessons associated with efforts to promote responsive life science and social research.

Brief Bio:
Brian Rappert is an Associate Professor of Science, Technology and Public Affairs in the Department of Sociology and Philosophy at the University of Exeter.

Brian’s long term concern has been the social and ethical dilemmas associated with modern science and technology. He has sought to examine how choices about the adoption and regulation of technology are made where there is uncertainty and disagreement.

In recent years, much of his work has been directed towards the social, political, moral and technical aspects of the use of force by military and police organizations. The central substantive concerns herein are two-fold, to examine: how claims about the acceptability of the use of force are justified and how notions of what constitutes responsible conduct by security-related agencies are negotiated. Considering how public commentators attempt to justify contentions about what constitutes ?acceptable force’ has led him to more theoretical questions about the basis of knowledge claims and the politics of representation.