We’ve conquered flight, put a man on the moon, developed disease-fighting drugs, and have succeeded in harnessing energy from the sun and wind. It’s hard to doubt, we’re a pretty intelligent species.

Yet to the ordinary person, it may come as somewhat far-fetched that the humpback whale has played a significant role in the design of wind turbines. Or that the Zimbabwean termite mount is currently serving as a model of sustainable building architecture. It may be easier to start with something seemingly more plausible, for example, Speedo’s sharkskin inspired swimsuits that allowed swimmers to break 13 world records at the Sidney 2000 Summer Olympics. As a matter of fact, the hydrodynamic suit gave athletes the equivalent of a six metre head start in a 200 metre race.

We have invented a lot of cool stuff, most of which tackle specific problems; however, the most ingenious solutions often aren’t truly our own, but nature’s.

Biomimicry translates to the “imitation of nature,” from the Greek words bios and mimesis. The world can be interpreted as nature’s petri dish, where species continuously adapt to their environments and each other. Only the most effective characteristics survive. As a matter of fact, this particular research and development project (also known as evolution) has been ongoing for the past 3.8 billion years.

Take the ultra-fast Japanese Shinkansen bullet train. When designing it, engineers came across a unique problem. The high-speed train, travelling at over 320 km/hr would produce a sonic boom effect caused by the transition from a high to low pressured environment as it leaves the tunnel. Coincidentally, the train’s chief engineer, Eiji Nakatsu, was an avid bird watcher. He realized that the kingfisher bird traverses two different mediums – air and water – when hunting for fish. He proposed to design the nose of the train in such a way that it mimics that of the kingfisher’s beak. This seemingly simple modification not only resulted in a quieter train, but a faster and more electricity efficient one.

At McGill’s Biomimetic Materials Laboratory, Francois Barthelat and his students work together to produce new and innovative ways to build synthetic materials such as ceramics and biopolymers. Inspired by this idea of biomimicry, Barthelat is presently investigating the natural formation of what would seem an unlikely candidate of engineering research: the seashell.

After meeting with The Daily, Barthelat explained that nature has the unique talent of making the best out of what it has available. Over the course of millions of years, seashells have evolved to protect their soft tissue inhabitants from oceanic debris, predators, and parasites. The shell’s inner membrane is composed of a lustrous, rainbow coloured coating more commonly known as mother of pearl.

On the ocean seabed, which consists mainly of soil, rock, coral, and mud, one can’t be too picky. There is, however, an abundance of calcium carbonate, an element commonly found in rocks all over the world. Seashells use this compound in layered sheets separated by an organic matrix of proteins. Amazingly, by combining these basic ingredients, the shell’s inner membrane becomes essentially 3,000 times stronger than its individual prerequisite components.

Adapting this process of “toughness amplification” to a more industrially relevant application, Barthelat replaces the relatively weak calcium carbonate based starting blocks with more robust elements such as boron carbide – the stuff used to make cutting edge body armors. Recently, the lab has been able to produce some exciting high-performance biomimetic composites – it’s no surprise that Barthelat is also considering the biomedical applications of such materials.

One such application is to artificially build more capable and strengthened bone replacements. In order to do so, Barthelat uses the bio-friendly element chitosan. Found in the crustacean shells of shrimp, chitosan makes for a prime candidate in medical applications due to its unique adhesive properties.

By examining the unique structure of human bones, one will notice a network of multi-cylindrical arrangements known as osteons. The outer layers are composed of compact bone tissue that surround a more fragile interior. The magic, explained Barthelat, is again in the structure. Rebuilding the multi-layer osteon, Barthelat’s chitosan-based substitutes show a seven-fold improvement in strength when compared to ordinary bones.

We don’t always think of Mother Nature to have developed the most adept solutions to life’s problems. When looking towards a sustainable future, it is interesting to draw comparisons between our rapid and resource-heavy development and nature’s relatively sluggish yet elegant evolution. In nature, almost everything is made at low temperatures and near atmospheric pressured environments – there are neither Bunsen burners nor vacuum chambers. Taking the McGill Biomimicry Lab as an example, the key to unlocking the processes of sustainable development may be right in front of us.

The next big leap for mankind may not be on Mars, but somewhere closer to home – where we may be more inclined to learn from nature rather than simply extract from it.

The post Lessons from Mother Nature appeared first on The McGill Daily.

Most of us remember Dolly, the world famous sheep, as the first mammal ever to be cloned. In research communities around the world, this achievement was applauded as a step forward in the name of science. To the population at large however, images of the man-made sheep served more as a catalyst for debate than an opportunity for progress.

Synthetic biology refers to an interdisciplinary field where engineering techniques are applied to the fundamental principles of biology to help solve real world problems such as energy production, food processes, climate change, and medicine. Although formal definitions of the term “synthetic biology” differ, The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) defines it as (1) the design and construction of new biological parts, devices, and systems, and (2) the re-design of existing, natural biological systems for useful purposes.

Breakthroughs such as Dolly and the more recent creation of man-made bacteria by Craig Venter, the first U.S. geneticist to sequence the human genome, have thrown synthetic biology under the public microscope. But this isn’t a first. Mankind has been genetically modifying plants and animals for a long time. Through farming and domesticating, we’ve encouraged the practice of selective breeding for thousands of years. Only recently has this process moved into the lab. Synthetic biologists have been able to enormously accelerate and influence the process of evolution by effectively taking genetic information associated with features deemed “useful” from one organism and encoding it to the DNA of another.

Ethical, social, and security concerns are an understandable response to this new ability to profoundly alter the building blocks of life. Rapid development of such a controversial technology has justifiably engendered a mixed response. The controversy surrounding the creation of life de novo in a petri dish has taken centre stage at many academic and government institutions in ongoing discussions over topics of intellectual property rights and regulation.

At the recent World Congress on Industrial Biotechnology in Montreal, talks centred on the potential utility of such applications while also addressing the perils of synthetically creating organisms in a lab. The conference, held annually, brings together academics, industry leaders, investors, and policy makers to discuss the current state of biotechnology.

Jason Kelly, one of the five MIT PhDs who founded the start-up Gingko Bioworks, presented the appealing concept of organic circuitry. Organisms can be structured in a way to essentially emulate the functionality of an electric circuit. At Gingko Bioworks, the organism is the product. Organic circuits in bacteria are developed to perform predefined tasks, much like circuits are on computer chips. Gingko’s artificially produced bacteria are presently used to produce biofuels from materials that are plant-based. The company is currently working on bacteria that can detect nitrogen levels in the air and destroy plastics in an environmentally conscious way.

To understand the basis of synthetic biology, we can make an analogy to the automobile industry: a car consists of various components that can be tinkered with to optimize the vehicle’s overall performance. An organism contains different genetic parts that too can be altered in an effort to optimize its performance. Right across the Charles River from Ginkgo sits the MIT’s Standard Registry of Parts, a continuously growing database of genetic functional units that can be mixed and matched to build organic components. Like in any engineering process, such a modular approach allows biologists to use predesigned components as building blocks for new synthetic devices and systems.

According to sources such as the United Nations, by 2050 the world population is estimated to surpass nine billion people. Our energy needs are estimated to surge up fivefold. If this were the case, the entire U.S. reserve of petroleum today would last a mere six months. With this in mind, Jim Lane, editor of Biofuels Digest suggested that the benefit of synthetic biology lies in engineering organisms to supply our growing energy needs.

Canada is onboard with the idea of using synthetic biology to meet our energy demands. As of 2012, the federal government committed nearly 25 million dollars over a period of five years through the National Centre of Excellence (NCE) program to support and accelerate research, development, and deployment of advanced biofuels through the BioFuelNet Canada. The NCE programs are government funded academically-led virtual research networks mandated to solve critical issues affecting Canadians. Don Smith, a professor in McGill’s faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, was elected to lead BiofuelNet Canada. He predicts that within 20 years, 25 per cent of the fuels in Canada will stem from biofuels. As a matter of fact, BioFuelNet recently signed an agreement with Airbus and Air Canada to develop biofuels solutions for the aviation industry.

Presenting a more cautious vision at the conference, Edward You – from the FBI’s Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) Directorate – expressed his concern in the infancy of the field of synthetic biology and the need for well-established regulations. You highlighted that without a proper governing system in place, the tendency for misconduct is too high. In a 2006 investigative story by The Guardian, a reporter was remarkably able to order parts of the smallpox DNA sequence and have them delivered to his house. In another case, a Harvard graduate student claimed to be able to produce LSD from simple microbes found in ordinary baker’s yeast.

‘Frightful must it be; for supremely frightful would be the effect of any human endeavor to mock the stupendous mechanism of the Creator of the world.’ Adversaries to synthetic biology fear that playing God, as in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, may have dire consequences. They argue that it is important to have a distinction between life and non-life, natural and artificial.

While the future of synthetic biology may not be entirely certain, advocates and pessimists will both have opportunities to voice their opinions. What cannot be denied however is the potential such technology has to further research in fields such as medicine, food processing, and energy production – subjects relevant to everyone.

The article previously mistakenly stated that Craig Venter is the geneticist behind the Human Genome Project. In fact, he was the first to sequence the human genome independent of the project. The Daily regrets the error.

The post Competing with evolution appeared first on The McGill Daily.

On May 14, tech entrepreneur and McGill alumnus, Lorne Trottier, officially announced his latest contribution to higher education and science at the “Toward a 100% Clean-Energy Quebec” conference held at École Polytechnique de Montréal.

The conference kicked-off Trottier’s newest endeavour, L’Institut de l’Énergie Trottier (IET) at École Polytechnique, mirroring his venture last year, McGill’s equivalent Trottier Institute for Sustainability in Engineering and Design (TISED).  As innovative think tanks, both IET and TISED tackle our future energy sector challenges through education, research, and community outreach, aiming to teach sustainability to Quebec’s next generation of engineers and scientists.

Established in 2010 as a partnership between the Trottier Family Foundation, the David Suzuki Foundation, and the Canadian Academy of Engineering, the Trottier Energy Futures Project (TEFP) takes the initiative to answer today’s hottest questions surrounding the reduction of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions. The project serves as a catalyst for progress in Canada’s energy sector by promoting various challenges that revolve around the fossil fuel industry. These include net zero energy buildings, bioenergy, supply chain strategy, and transportation, while also addressing the hurdles of financing a low carbon future.

TEFP promotes low-carbon technologies and practices such as reducing energy intensive industrial processes, developing carbon capture and storage, and the further development of nuclear energy.

In spite of Canada’s shift toward lucrative black gold and the prospect of huge profits from shale gas, Quebec’s dedication to a post-carbon economy has so far remained firm.

However, the recent discoveries of oil and gas reserves in the province have Quebecers divided. Advocates declare that exploiting these hydrocarbon deposits is Quebec’s golden ticket to prosperity and a moral obligation to future generations to take measures to decrease our debt. In contrast, supporters of a greener Quebec cite fracking – hydraulic fracturing of the earth to release stored gas – as a potential source of groundwater pollution and considerable environmental degradation, and therefore a step in the wrong direction.

Unfortunately, the debate in Quebec has turned political. Premier Pauline Marois and her Parti Québécois hold only a marginal minority in the National Assembly and cannot afford to upset their base supporters. It’s interesting to note that the Canadian Energy Institute has valued shale gas extractions in Quebec at over $100 billion for the next 25 years. So when pressed for a decision, Marois decided to punt – asking the environmental board to further review fracking projects and potential drawbacks – effectively avoiding a potential controversy.

*             *             *

The conference mostly focused on the global environmental picture. Hans Björn (a.k.a. Teddy) Püttgen, director of the Energy Center at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland, and world renowned for his research in energy systems, was one of the panelists and presenters invited to the conference. He opened his presentation with the notion of bifurcation, which implies differentiating the moral responsibilities of industrialized and emerging countries.

He argues that in industrial nations – where a certain level of technology has been achieved – the challenge is the utilization of energy in a more efficient way. On the other hand, the challenge in emerging countries is massively and rapidly developing energy generation while avoiding potentially catastrophic environmental consequences. It’s shocking that while you read this off your computer or smartphone, 15 per cent of the world population – over one billion people – do not have access to electricity.

Since 1973, the global demand for energy has doubled. But even more remarkably, energy production has shot up by an astounding 350 per cent. Energy consumption in countries that are a part of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) grew 127 per cent, led mostly by renewable sources. By contrast, the energy consumption growth of countries outside of the OECD – such as China, India, and Brazil – surged up by a staggering 257 per cent, dominated mostly by oil and coal. As Püttgen puts it, “The 21st century will, unfortunately, be that of coal,” as he notes the 348 per cent increase in coal burning to produce electricity.

Countries like China have few options. Coal is a reliable energy resource, as it does not depend on the weather nor require highly sophisticated technology. Unlike hydro or nuclear plants, coal power plants can be built up fast and close to population centers. And as it turns out, most major developing countries have vast coal resources within their borders.

*             *             *

Many claim nuclear energy is the key to a carbon-free economy. According to industry experts and academics, including the conference’s panelists, nuclear energy is the answer. Some argue that everyone would be better off if industrialized nations simply made the technology available to all. Easier said than done.

Catastrophic events at Fukushima and Chernobyl have tainted the public image, inviting the idea of mushroom clouds and radioactive fallout – a mess no politician wants to be faced with. Yet, Püttgen was not shy to give his opinion. He claimed that to truly consider a 100 per cent clean energy path, the nuclear option must remain on the table – bar the threat of a potential disaster.

On December 28, 2012, Quebec closed down its only nuclear power plant, the Gentilly-2, which supplied 675 megawatts (MW) of electricity, enough to power 275,000 households. Fortunately for Quebec, hydroelectricity is available and vast. Other regions are not so lucky.

France’s President François Hollande is committed to decreasing dependence on nuclear energy from 75 per cent to 50 per cent of their total electricity profile by 2025. Germany is also going through with an anti-nuclear strategy and is closing eight of their seventeen nuclear plants. The political decision to take nuclear offline without an equivalent decrease in the demand for electricity is not an easy one.

European countries have highly developed renewable resources – wind in particular. In the long term, they can install more wind turbines or solar power plants, but as Germany has already started its nuclear decommissioning process, they’ve been importing France’s nuclear and Switzerland’s carbon-based electricity, effectively leaving the bigger picture unchanged. Germany has a huge capacity for carbon based fuels, and recent events have put heavy pressure on the industry to reopen their plants as a solution to the power mismatch.

In lieu of this, the Swiss are aggressively tackling the problem from a different angle. They’ve set a long-term goal to cut energy consumption in half by 2050. This means not only a reduction in their electricity use, but also more efficient vehicles, smaller houses, less garbage, and a huge change from a fossil fuel based economy to one more dependent on renewable sources – an enormous and risky undertaking that has politicians terrified of the repercussions.

Politics play a big role in our progressive reform to the global energy sector. Püttgen argues that we can no longer consider energy the “sujet du jour.” It must be a long-term goal, not a campaign promise.

Advances in renewable technology are driving down electricity production costs and leading to a renewed interest in long-term investments. However, as Püttgen decisively pointed out, the challenge is not finding a new energy source, but improving energy storage. In other words, we need better batteries. He confidently claimed that decarbonisation will happen as a direct consequence.

That being said, there is much to be hopeful for. In recent news, green energy is making front-page headlines, and investment is at a record high. Goldman Sachs recently announced a $500 million investment in a rooftop solar company SolarCity, which has successfully raised over two billion dollars to finance rooftop installations.

And they are not the only ones. Financial heavyweights like US Bancorp and Credit Suisse have also created huge tax equity funds to invest in renewable energy companies.

*             *             *

At the conference, McGill’s Professor James Nicell pointed out that 40 years ago, engineers were taught that “the solution to pollution is dilution.” Prior to the 1980s, the world was believed to have infinitely available resources and unlimited space. Today we know this to be false. Environment protection ideology – with the goal of reducing waste – has adopted the 4 R’s: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, and Recover.

Yet, as countries like China and India emerge into the industrial age, the demand for energy has never been so high. The needs of both industrialized and emerging countries must be addressed together. In Quebec, serious questions regarding the exploitation of newly found oil and gas reserves and the adoption of a permanent non-nuclear energy strategy are being addressed. Institutions, like those established by Trottier, allow us to tackle these challenges through education and research. As Nicell puts it, “Students are the most renewable resource that we have.”

In his closing remarks, Nicell echoed Richard Branson’s hopeful words, “I believe in goals. It’s never a bad thing to have a dream, but I’m practical about it. I don’t sit daydreaming about things that are impossible. I set goals and then work out how to achieve them.”

The post Clean energy: Ruse or Reality? appeared first on The McGill Daily.

In reference to its ultra-violent and barbaric nature, this was the name given to the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) by U.S. Senator John McCain during his 1998 countrywide campaign to ban the sport. Today, UFC remains one of the only stages in the world – other than actual war – where contestants legally engage in hand-to-hand combat. This eight-sided steel-caged battle of survival has gained considerable mainstream media attention since its birth in 1993. It is televised in over 150 countries, and broadcast in 22 different languages.

UFC 158: March 16, 2013

I arrived to a capacity-filled Bell Centre to witness my first-ever mixed martial arts (MMA) event, UFC 158: Georges St-Pierre (GSP) vs. Nick Diaz.

I was seated in the section specially reserved for media, much closer to the action than my graduate student budget could afford. To my right, I introduced myself to a professional photographer specializing in the niche of wrestling. Hanging from his neck was a high-calibre Canon DSLR camera. To my left was a short bald fellow, a sports broadcaster for SIRIUS satellite radio. Throughout the course of the night, they both served as my main source of rules, explanations, and gossip.

At the start of each card (the UFC term for a fight), blasting pump-up music fills the air as the fighters charge into the arena accompanied by an entourage of trainers, medical staff, camera men, and security. Wrestling enthusiasts, UFC fans, and what seemed to be self-declared prospective fighters lined the front row, determinedly extending out their fists toward the fast moving group. An array of sporadic multi-coloured lights, followed by an energetic introduction by “The Voice of the Octagon,” ring announcer Bruce Buffer (who sounded like he could have been hooked up to an IV espresso drip), got the crowd on their feet.

Fighters rip off their advertisement-laden warm-ups, complete a quick medical check, and enter the Octagon.

Cards other than the main event are composed of three five-minute rounds. The two contestants start at opposite corners of the ring. In order to win, one must inflict so much pain onto the other that they either collapse to the floor from a decisive knock-out (often leading to concussion-like symptoms), or tap out (voluntarily quit) due to extreme discomfort. In the event that time expires, the winner of the fight is decided by the judges. The fighter must evidently channel all his anger, will, and hostility towards his enemy, essentially vilifying his foe. It’s a fight for survival.

At the end of each round, the fighters head to their respective blue or red corner and are attended to by their medical staff, who fix up nosebleeds, soothe swellings, and cover lacerations.

I wonder about the possible long-term health risks – traumatic brain injury, dementia, Parkinson’s. Thankfully, eye-gouging and hitting the opponent in the groin is banned under UFC regulations, but the risk for other injuries remains.

After their one minute of allowed recovery time, the blood is wiped away and we’re back – game on.

As the two prize-fighters get back to business, the crowd cheers on their favourite – and the cheers are considerably louder if one is a homegrown Quebecer. That being said, it does not take much to turn things around. If there has not been a sufficiently bloody blow or considerable action within about a minute, the crowd gets impatient.

“What the hell are you doing, dancing?!” screams a particularly aggravated man from the crowd. It is instantly followed by immature giggles and juvenile comments from the spectators in front of me. Then, as if pre-planned, a fierce kick to the face immediately prompts cheering, and the Bell Centre is back on its feet.

As a newcomer to the UFC fan world, I get the impression that, consciously or not, we’re really here to see someone get knocked-the-hell-out.

The only small hint of civility comes after the referee calls the fight. The two bleeding and bruised opponents shake hands or embrace in an odd and somewhat misplaced act of camaraderie. After all the rampage, it seems almost inappropriate to see such a sign of mutual respect.

The victor is crowned, and they both proceed to leave the arena down the same path. First the loser, bloodied and defeated, stumbles slightly dismayed toward the exit to a few hurrahs and consoling chants. Following him, in sharp contrast, the winner parades down the aisle with an arrogantly pumped chest, radiating his macho-man energy while acknowledging a few lucky fans by slapping high fives or tossing away sweaty merchandise. People go bonkers!

Curious to investigate the sort of audience that such an event attracts, I observed a middle-aged man, seated a couple rows from me and likely deep into his night’s beer quota, openly snapping a few shots of the rather un-conservatively dressed ring girls. He then continued to cheer with his bros, laughing over a few sleazy comments.

As I glanced up at one of the dozen overhanging big screens, the message to the audience was further drilled home – “Sports, beer n’ sex.” Broadcast to the entire stadium, and to everyone watching from home, the ring girls – Arianny Celeste and Brittney Palmer – seductively waved and blew kisses in the air. The stadium filled with whistles and cat calls. “Pft, ya, I could tap that,” narrated the same middle-aged man.

I can’t help but notice the irony of the situation. The audience may have been one of the most unathletic, Bud Light-drinking and Pizza-Pizza gorging group of people I have come across. The contestants, on the other hand, have probably spent the better part of the last year enduring the toughest of training programs and following a diet consisting of something like lean chicken breast, broccoli, and whey protein shakes. It is rumoured that some even abstain from sex for up to six weeks before their fight.

Furthermore, in between the overweight and drunk members of the audience, I could see little kids decked out in Georges St.-Pierre robes and headbands inscribed with “must win” in Japanese. They chased each other around, screaming and boasting their championship belt replicas, only briefly pausing to quench their thirst with sugar-concentrated and caffeine- infused beverages served in gulp sized, 1.5 litre cups. And if they got hungry, they scuffled down some buttery popcorn or a slice of oil-dripping cheese and pepperoni pizza. One day, they, too will have a chance to share seven or eight beers with their ‘bros.’ Shouldn’t this event be R-rated?

The Main Event

The start of the pay-per-view main event was like an alarm clock sounding off. The  crowd in the sold out Bell Centre was on its feet, cheering, yelling, and all fired up. This was Quebec’s very own golden boy, Georges St-Pierre, against the audaciously cocky American fighter, Nick Diaz. Chants of “Fuck you Diaz!” filled the Bell Centre, followed by a chorus of “GSP, GSP, GSP.”

The main event consists of five rounds lasting a maximum of 25 minutes total.

Aside from my spiteful rant, I will admit, I was actually enjoying this egocentric, testosterone-filled environment. Press are prohibited from ordering alcoholic beverages, but I would have killed for a beer. Neither can the press be openly biased towards a particular fighter – but seriously, “Fuck Diaz!” The machismo atmosphere was a bit too much for me to deny; I was sold.

In the prelude to the fight, Diaz aggressively paced back and forth in the Octagon. One could literally feel his flowing arrogance as he stared down his opponent like an anxious killer, ready to pounce.

GSP held up his cool. He portrayed the shining image of a knight defending Quebec from an onslaught of loud-mouthed American bigotry. He could be Captain Quebec. Each time GSP took Diaz to the ground, the crowd roared with enthusiasm.

Despite the lack of blood and a conclusive knock-out punch, the fight lived up to its hype. After five rounds of a mostly one-sided assault, the pride of Quebec was left untarnished. GSP was re-crowned champion.

In the post-game interview, GSP thanked Diaz for his competitive spirit and further insisted that he is, in fact, a nice guy. Diaz, oddly, admitted to tax evasion, and contemplated retiring.

The UFC experience defines all that is stereotypically manly. Its violent nature and beer-drinking culture may make for the ultimate bros-night-out, but our society should seriously consider asking the question: Do we want our kids watching this?

The post Violence and machismo appeared first on The McGill Daily.

The McGill Daily: How did COOL McGill start?
David Harpp: It started, not with the University’s money, but through the Office of Science and Society. It was a project that I had wanted to do. We had two programmers…that were really keen and capable. So we sat down and digitized about 16,000 35 mm slides; we used a great many visuals.
During the first couple lectures in 2000, we tested COOL without informing the class. On the third day a woman approached me, wide-eyed and slightly panicking. She said that she missed the first two classes and asked “what do I do?” I thought that this would be the perfect time to tell her about COOL.
Expecting her to be amazed, I was a bit disappointed when all I got was a “thanks” and she quickly walked back up the aisle. It’s all very much like in a Harry Potter movie; we are just expecting people to walk through walls. This was only a lecture.
In the first couple of years there were only maybe ten courses being recorded. We had some money, so we funded the programmers until 2006, and in a more modest fashion since then. Before that, we [Harpp, Joe Schwarcz and Ariel Fenster] – the inventors – owned it. But that seemed wrong, and plus I didn’t want to have anything to do with the finances. So we later navigated with the Provost [Anthony Masi] to give these two programmers the whole thing. They started a company [IDEALS, with Nic Siggel as chief programmer] and gave McGill a license to use the software.

MD: Where did the idea come from?
DH: [It started] in Organic Chemistry during the mid seventies. I was able to supply all 500 students with 12 feet of 36mm film each – that’s a mile of film! We sat down, cut it up and sold it for a cost ($2.50 including the viewer) to the students. This set my head in a direction for the rest of my life.

MD: What’s with the name?
DH: COOL, it’s a neat acronym – it stands for COurses OnLine. I don’t say the word cool very often, but this was just too good to not use. McGill also offers the Lecture Recording System, LRS – such a boring name – and it uses the same software!

MD: Does a professor need to be in a lecture hall to create a COOL stream?
DH: COOL lets you do it from anywhere, your home or at the office. Professors can remotely review midterms and upload extra learning modules. 350 courses per year use the software, but via a student ID. It runs on a laptop – in fact, we could do it right now – and it’s available to anyone. Unfortunately it isn’t used nearly as much as it should be.

MD: Any student or anybody can use it?
DH: Anybody in the world – we get emails from people in strange places. Frankly, it’s been a MOOC for 13 years, except that we don’t have any organized course arrangement.

MD: If COOL works so well, why hasn’t it been marketed better?
DH: The new owners of COOL have talked with University of Montreal, Concordia, Sherbrooke, and others, but they don’t seem to be interested. I don’t know why. We would be saving everybody a lot of money and it works well. At least from my point of view – [but] some people just don’t get it.
Egos are a part of it. Some professors don’t want their lectures recorded for a number of reasons: they don’t like the sound of their voice, the way it will look, and they didn’t want publicly talk about their research – they don’t feel comfortable. They are concerned about class attendance – which does decrease depending on the time the lecture is given. In today’s modern student life, illness, religious holidays, athletic events, and sometimes work schedules [are some of the reasons students regularly skip]. We’re the victims of our own success – all instructors prefer a filled room, so we will have to try a bit harder if the class is reduced. If Jerry Seinfeld went to Leacock 132, and there were 14 people scattered throughout the room, he’d probably die out there.
However, if the grades were going down, I’d say this isn’t good – but the grades aren’t going down. Actually all of our classes show that the grades are gently sliding upwards. The students are doing the work.

MD: Have you been involved in the recent edX talks?
DH: Well, kind of. I went with our Provost to a symposium in Boston last week. There were high profile people from Berkeley, Cornell, McGill, Harvard, MIT, et cetera – these were the biggest guns that you could find in the armament.
I’ll bet you it was the first time in history that all these high-powered academic leaders were in one room talking about teaching. I don’t think that has ever happened before. That’s my take on it. You just don’t get those kinds of people in one place at one time talking about the direction of pedagogy.
MD: What were some big topics discussed at the conference?
DH: There were questions about lowering tuition – why don’t you guys lower your tuition just a wee bit – it’s 50,000 bucks to go to some of these schools!
And Provost Masi said that if we have to lower our tuition in Quebec any more, we’ll have to pay the students to come!
Quebec is sort of a special situation. It costs so little to go here that you would think that people wouldn’t want to miss that opportunity to be on campus or to live at home and come to campus. Somewhere around 30 to 40 per cent of McGill students live at home – part of why COOL works.
This is in sharp contrast to the Harvards, MITs, and Berkeleys. They are saying that edX is their way of paying back – offering information free of charge.

MD: How is the quality of MOOC courses evaluated?
DH: Well, they would be the same courses that have already passed muster here. They are not going to be some watered down half-credit lectures on some topic. They are going to be bona fide courses.
Upon completion, students are only offered a certificate. There are, though, some courses on Coursera [an online education company that works with universities to hold courses online], where a couple universities are actually offering course credit!
… [But] I don’t think that most schools are going to offer credit at all, they are only offering information if people want it – they could have done it for years on COOL, and they can still do that.

MD: Where is the money for the program coming from?
DH: True, this is coming at the worst imaginable time in terms of our budget, but it’s not coming out of our budget. McGill is depending on donors who want McGill to be in this high-level league.

MD: Do you think that free online courses will level the playing field among universities?
DH: What if the best organic chemistry course, anywhere, was put on by somebody from, say, the University of Illinois, why shouldn’t we [assign it at our university]? And someone can make that case, but I think [a professor’s] ego is going to get in the way.
On the other hand, they could also take the attitude that this super professor [from another university] gives a very good class, and I [the McGill professor] could fill in the blanks. Students could be better off and I might be able to guide them in a way that I would have never had the time to otherwise.
In fact, at the Harvard Business School, they don’t teach accounting anymore – at all! Everyone finds that odd. They don’t teach accounting at all at the Harvard Business School! That’s a shocker. They have their students take it online!

MD: Is this the evolution of education?
DH: Yes, and a lot of people think so. Many people also feel that the residential university experience is important for all the “other” contacts and learning experiences, outside of the classroom.
But frankly, I remember a lot more of the fraternity and dorm stuff than I do about my classes back in my time. I think there is room for both – traditional campus lectures and online MOOC classes. I just wish they had a better acronym.

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Amina is a third year Arts student at McGill, lives at home in Brossard, actively participates in rallies organized by the Fédération étudiante universitaire du Québec (FEUQ) against increasing tuition hikes, and has high aspirations to change the world.

It’s a school day and her first class starts in five minutes – leaving her with ample time to make her morning commute of fifty feet.
8:35 a.m., Amina’s iEverything projects her professor in 3D as my daughter sits back comfortably on the sofa, eager to start her favourite class, ISLA 385 Politics and Poetics in Arabic Literature (a McGill Arts class that was apparently threatened to be cut thirty years ago). The class has been prerecorded, yet is still interactive and free to access by anyone with an internet connection. In addition to the McGill students, registered pupils from around the world are also signing in. To Amina’s surprise, there’s a pop quiz today.

After the lecture, tuition-paying students are separated into online groups supervised by professors or teaching assistants (TAs). In these smaller groups, students have the chance to pose questions, discuss problems, and share ideas. Midterms and final exams are administered to registered, fee-paying, students during these meetings; meanwhile, GPS coordinates are recorded to avoid group work on exams. Course feedback can be given by anyone registered to the course – student or instructor. The University collects and processes all the feedback in order to keep the course up-to-date, accommodating changing ideas and events while also making any necessary corrections.

The beauty here is that Amina can go back and review anything from the lecture that she had trouble understanding. She can ask a supervisor for help during discussion periods, discuss issues in depth on the class’s online TA-monitored forum, or send an email to a professor.

At the end of a semester, university credit is given to those who pay for the online course, while the nonpaying students receive only a certificate of completion. Furthermore, students that pay tuition are eligible to attend workshops, tutorials, and conferences and are evaluated by sitting for exams.
Before making the big step forward and deciding to pay for Amina’s degree at McGill, we had a serious talk about the pros of having a degree versus the money saved upon completing a certificate.
A lot of things have changed around McGill since 2012.

It is unfortunate that McGill’s campus has been reduced to the iconic Arts building, Leacock, and the Redpath Museum. However, it is understandable, since McGill doesn’t require as many classrooms or libraries, due to an increasing demand towards online services. The once bustling hallways of the engineering and science departments are now occupied by overly qualified scientists that once held teaching positions. Under the banner of the McGill Research Corporation, these technical gurus are pushed to their limits to produce scientific results as efficiently as humanly possible.

The popular MOOCs (massive open online courses) movement of the early 21st century consequently separated the idea of learning from research, formerly under the same umbrella definition of education. Elite universities began by posting several lectures online with an open invitation to anyone with an internet connection. Following the popular trend, many other institutions did the same. This deviation from conventional attitudes forced universities to revisit, and in many cases, revise their statement of purpose, stressing their focus on quality of teaching and their students’ needs more than ever before.

Initially, the MOOCs movement had been dominated by big name schools – championing their brand name around the world. Their efforts granted millions of people free universal access to quality education, while erasing the limitation of physical location or financial constraints. The price of information – and arguably education – drastically fell.

While this had a positive effect on the level of global education, it forced lower-tier and mediocre universities to compete with elite institutions over the same crop of students. The enticement of attending a Harvard philosophy course was too much for local and state universities to contend with.
Large campus schools were faced with tough decisions and found it harder and harder to defend their vastly built campuses and expensive infrastructure in lieu of these lower cost alternatives. In fact, MOOCs became so popular that only a few elite universities survived as learning institutions, forcing others to specialize in specific hands-on professions that require in-class instruction.

* * *

MOOCs have recently been the subject of much debate on many university campuses, including our own. The name MOOCs originates from the University of Manitoba, where the first university-level course was offered free of charge to 2,300 online students. This small Canadian success story has blossomed into a global movement, gaining momentum as more and more universities jump on the MOOCs bandwagon.

This may come as no surprise.Statistics Canada puts the in-province tuition increase for Quebec at 110 per cent and Ontario at 210 per cent since 1990. While these numbers are high, they are profoundly dwarfed by the American tuition surge of 360 per cent since 1986. This resulted in a high interest in MOOCs by U.S. universities.

In late December 2011, academic faculty at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) decided to experiment with a MOOC-style pilot program by offering an engineering circuits and electronics course online, for free. A couple months later, the course opened to a colossal audience of 155,000 registered students. If each lecture hall held 200 students and five classes were offered each semester during the fall and winter terms, that would be equivalent to the total class participation realized over 77 and a half years!

At Princeton, longtime professor of Sociology Mitchell Duneier offered an online course after thirty years of routine classroom- style lectures. 40,000 students enrolled. Stanford, too, experienced similar success with its Artificial Intelligence course, recording over 160,000 registrations, according to the New York Times.

* * *

Today, McGill is continuously ranked amongst the top twenty universities around the world – as ranked in a Times Higher Education poll in Macleans – year after year. However, according to Principal Heather Munroe-Blum, we have been recently hit by an estimated $19-million budget cut from the Quebec government that may have tarnishing repercussions on the McGill’s reputation. As the University’s figures out how to deal with a smaller financial endowment, students face mounting tuition fees.

Will the MOOCs movement spark a drastic change in our education system? Will prospective students consider MOOCs as an alternative to a traditional education? How will universities bring in revenue from free online courses? How does all this affect McGill?

The Daily asked Professor James Clark, the former associate dean of academics of McGill’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, about the MOOCs movement at McGill. Clark asserted that online course offerings are a natural extension of McGill’s educational outreach and that “online lectures have a number of advantages over classroom lectures, such as flexibility in scheduling, and allowing students to review the lecture many times if needed. Students will have to be self-disciplined to make sure they keep up with all of the lectures.”

Clark also expressed positivity when asked about the financial returns of such a program, believing that such an offering could bring in additional revenue. McGill would be able to expand its reach into new markets, while also reducing on-campus costs by more efficient use of classrooms.
As this debate continues to mature on McGill’s campus, the right question may not be whether we can afford to give free classes online, but rather, can we afford not to.

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Despite having the self-adopted motto “Safe, humane, legal, transparent,” Gitmo still holds 166 inmates, of which all but nine are without conviction or charge. The United States argues that the third Geneva Convention, which protects prisoners of war, does not apply to Taliban or Al-Qaeda fighters, and only to uniformed soldiers. This claim creates a distinction between “prisoners of war” and “illegal combatants.”

The prison camp has a record of holding prisoners indefinitely and without charge. Many different torture techniques – including sleep deprivation, beatings (with broken glass, barbed wire, and burning cigarettes), solitary confinement, cold cells, sexual harassment, and forced drug injections – are also allegedly used at the camp. Amnesty International has named Gitmo a human rights scandal on numerous occasions.

Moreover, under new rules passed by the Obama administration in 2012, if a Gitmo detainee loses a first habeas corpus trial, the prisoner no longer has the right to a lawyer.

Just after winning his first presidential election, in 2008, Obama said: “I have said repeatedly that I intend to close Guantanamo, and I will follow through on that.”

It looked like he would follow through: on his first day in office, January 20, 2009, Obama issued an executive order closing the Guantanamo detention facility.

But it’s February 2013 and the Gitmo is still open.

True, Obama did try to pass a bill through Congress that would close the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay. But Congress blocked the bill. Obama’s National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor was quick to point the finger: “Obviously Congress has taken a number of steps to prevent the closure of the prison at Guantanamo Bay, but the President still believes it’s in our national security interest and will keep trying.”

However, Vietor’s accusation hid some of the truth. The same bill also called for the construction of a new, similarly inhumane detention centre on U.S. soil. Dubbed “North Gitmo,” the plan to build the new prison in Illinois was even voted against by Democrats in Congress.

No wonder the bill was turned down. Establishing a Gitmo-style prison on U.S. soil could set a dangerous precedent. If it works so well, why stop at one?

Some supporters of keeping Gitmo open argue that the 166 prisoners left are “too difficult to prosecute, too dangerous to release.”

I can understand the first part – we don’t want these guys going back to their home countries and ‘terrorist ways’ – but too difficult to prosecute? Why, because they have been tortured, or left for a decade in a cage with no outside communication, and very limited or no access to legal aid? The United States often champions values of justice and humanitarianism– it should do so again.

There were a lot of promises made four years ago, and many more last month. I hope, in Obama’s second term, we do see some of the changes that have been promised.

Omar Saadeh is a Master’s student in Engineering. Omar can be reached at omar.saadeh@mail.mcgill.ca.

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In today’s technology-driven world, we are in constant communication through computers. Financial markets can move at a click of a mouse and I can Skype with my parents before going to sleep. Computer programming uses languages such as Java, C, HTML, and others, all of which have clear roots in the English language.

Origin

The world’s first computer program is credited to an English mathematician by the name of Augusta Ada Byron, aka Ada Lovelace. She worked on Charles Babbage’s mechanical general purpose machine in 1830, the first machine that used an arithmetic logic unit, control flow, and integrated memory. Another English-speaker, American Dr. Grace Hopper, worked on the Bureau of Ordinance’s Computation Project at Harvard (an IBM project). She is credited with developing programs for the first automatically sequenced digital computer, the Mark I. Through the U.S. Navy’s wartime efforts in World War II, this was the first computer operated on a large scale, setting a worldwide precedent.

Rather than dealing with specific memory addresses, stacks, and registers, a high-level programming language focuses on usability, offering a simpler way to program and use the computer system. In 1945, a German civil engineer by the name of Konrad Zuse designed the first high-level programming language, Plankalkül (“Plan Calculus”). Unfortunately, due to the wartime and postwar conditions in Germany, Plankalkül was never published, leaving the door open for another language to become the foundation of high-level programming.

Almost a decade later, IBM created their Mathematical FORmula TRANslation System, abbreviated to FORmula TRANslation, and further reduced to FORTRAN. In 1954, it was initially developed to compute lunar positions and is now regarded as the oldest high-level programming language ever published.

Development of English-based languages

After witnessing the potential of computers during World War II, Europe and North America wanted to employ a universal computing language between the two continents. Various languages were proposed, including IBM’s FORTRAN and Lisp (an American language used in the early development of artificial intelligence for the military). In 1958, however, at a conference in Zurich, both sides agreed to implement ALGOL, short for ALGOrithmic Language, another English-based language developed by a team of American and European scientists, as the universal standard.

An interesting dilemma unfolded between IBM and the committee. IBM had allocated an enormous amount of resources to develop their programming language FORTRAN, and was resistant to forfeiting its investment. They claimed that ALGOL’s user experience was incomplete and required further development if it were to be considered the standard. However, the committee stuck to its decision.

The employment of the ALGOL language was slow to catch on and was initially concentrated in academia. IBM, on the other hand, expanded globally and promoted FORTRAN as the lingua franca of the industrial computing world.

The next big step in programming was real-time computing. In the aftermath of the Cuban missile crisis and during the later years of the Cold War, the U.S. military was especially interested in the idea of real-time computing. At the time, conventional military tactics demanded information sooner rather than later. They wanted a platform that could control all tanks, planes, missiles, et cetera in a synchronized fashion. The military funded Project Ada, consisting of thousands of computer scientists collaborating over the course of several years. Project Ada formed the basis for real-time computing around the world – yet another English-based standard.

In a post-WWII world, American superiority in commerce, technology, and military can be seen as the cornerstone of the English-language dominance of technology. It is evident that universal computer programming standards have been defined through players like American research institutions, private and public companies (such as IBM), and projects funded by the U.S. military. That being said, other countries have, both in the past and present, made pushes of their own.

The Non-English Languages

Obviously, there are linguistic factors that can impact the building of a programming language. For example, one byte (consisting of 8 bits, and able to represent 256 characters) can more than represent all the characters in the English language. The Hanyu Da Zidian Chinese dictionary, as published in 1989, consisted of 54,678 distinct Chinese characters. A Chinese programming language would then require two bytes (representing 65,536 characters), a fundamental difference that would set it apart from an English-based language. Some may question the value of implementing a language requiring so many characters.

That is not to say that non-English-based programming languages do not exist – they do. A quick Google search comes up with many results in many languages. Starting in the 1960s, the Soviet Union made many attempts at developing its own languages. ANALITIK was designed initially domestically at the Institute of Cybernetics in Kiev. Yet many have noticed its resemblance to Western ALGOL-like languages. Research and development efforts in other countries such as Brazil, India, South Korea, and Singapore have also produced very capable and developing software industries. These up-and-coming players will undoubtedly participate on the global stage and may in the future put a dent in the English-dominated industry.

Does it matter?

When the major programming languages are based in English, one wonders if fluency, or if you’re a native speaker, matters. Interviews with members of the McGill community suggest that this has a possible, but variable, effect.

“I think programming code is sufficiently divorced enough from English such that the actual language of the keywords used is irrelevant,” said Bentley Oakes, a second-year Master’s student in computer science.

However, Michael Misiewicz (MSc ’12), a McGill graduate who now works at AppNexus Inc. in New York City, claimed that “… nearly everything to do with computers has been invented or designed in the U.S., mostly everything is in English. I’d say proficiency in written English is a requirement for complex technology work.”

What’s next

Is the world moving away from a lingua franca of English? As with anything, it is difficult to predict, but as long as significantly more scientific research is published in English, and many computer-based industries are based in the West, incentives for the development and use of English-based standardized languages remain.

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To start off on a positive note – there are many benefits, both environmental and financial, of electric and hybrid vehicles. Fact: driving a Toyota Prius is more environmentally friendly than a Ford F1 pickup. Fact: an EV can convert up to 70 per cent of a battery’s energy, while a gas guzzler only reaches about 25 per cent efficiency. Fact: an EV also means less money spent at the pump.

Putting things into perspective, the global motor vehicle industry adds about 50 million new cars to those already on the road per year. Of these, only a few thousand are electric. Of the estimated 1 billion cars in use today, just under 4.5 per cent are considered alternate vehicles (hybrids, electric, or hydrogen based). But that’s because people are just warming up to the idea, right?

Let’s face it, even disregarding the relative smaller sizes of EVs or the lack of the apparent “manliness” aura we are meant to associate with turning the keys of a V8 engine, tacking on an additional $10,000 to $16,000 to the base price of a car doesn’t necessarily translate into a good sales pitch. According to J.D. Power and Associates, a self-described “marketing information services company,” charging an EV adds roughly $18 per month to a user’s electricity bill, while saving them $147 per month at the pump. This translates into a payback period of 6.5 years for an EV and 11 years for a plug-in hybrid, based on today’s prices. However, due to the uncertainty of the price of oil, these numbers could become more attractive in the future.

While BMW and Cadillac will soon be launching their first EVs, Toyota’s vice chairman, Takeshi Uchiyamada, recently announced that Toyota would be scaling back their EV development, citing high production costs, long charging delays, and poor electric mileage. It might also be important to note that this is the same man who, in 1994, spearheaded the Prius electric vehicle program for Toyota. One wonders why he has recently had a change of heart.

One of the big questions is, “Are EVs actually green?” To answer this question, we need to look at where our electricity actually comes from. The goal of modernizing the global vehicle fleet is to ultimately reduce greenhouse  gas emissions. However, if there’s a dirty coal power plant on the other side of the power cord, is it any better than running on gas?

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, 45 per cent of the electricity generated in the U.S. still comes from coal, emitting literally tons of pollutants into the air, while only 3.6 per cent comes from renewable sources. On the other hand, the U.S. government gives up to $7,500 in tax credits for purchasing an EV as an added bonus for environmentally-conscious buyers.

Aside from the bad rap Canada gets for digging into tar sands, its energy profile is actually much cleaner with hydroelectricity accounting for almost 58 per cent of the total generation. There are also provincial incentive programs in place for buying EVs. As of January 1, 2013, the Quebec government will give you up to a $8,500 rebate if you decide to buy an EV.

It is clear that the energy profile of the country is important in assessing how ‘green’ EVs really are. Because of the relative means by which electricity is generated, it seems that Canadian EVs are more environmentally friendly than their American counterparts. Regardless of personal opinion, however, alternative energy sources and alternative vehicles are a major area of research, especially at McGill.

At McGill’s Alternate Fuels Lab, Professor Jeff Bergthorson and his group of mechanical engineering students look into hot topics such as combustion and the emission properties of burning diverse bio-fuels. Furthermore, they tackle the big questions surrounding the development of a safe and effective metal-based battery with potentially zero carbon emissions. According to Bergthorson, “today’s industry is…far too conservative and…too wedded to fossil fuels to consider any big shifts.” In an effort to change the status quo, work is being conducted to test the concept of using reactive metals as alternative energy carriers for future transportation vehicles, eliminating harmful pollutants associated with fossil fuels.

In the Power Engineering Research Lab, professors and their grad students are inspecting the bigger picture, working on new techniques to incorporate EVs into daily life. Some interesting ideas floating around include the use of the EV’s battery to power some household appliances, or better yet, sell excess electricity back to the power grid. On a cloudy day or when the wind stops blowing, stored electricity in EVs may also hold the key to a future of renewable energy. Diego Mascarella, a second year master’s student working in the lab, told The Daily that he has “no doubt that electric vehicles will dominate future markets, but until then, drivers will still need to weigh the higher price tags against the self-satisfaction of reducing carbon emissions.”

Outside the glamorous showrooms and media frenzy over whose electric vehicle can drive the furthest, many of the big car manufacturers are making tough decisions. Some have opted to continue down the path of EVs while a few others have decided to scale back. Many of these decision factors are based on the origins of electricity, efficiency of vehicles, and productions costs – all of which require both improvement and research.

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