In Pursuit of the Salesman: Mathematics at the Limit of Computation - December 16, 2009
Lunch 'n Learn presentation: The traveling salesman problem, or TSP for short, is easy to state: given a number of cities along with the cost of travel between each pair of them, find the cheapest way to visit them all and return to your starting point. Easy to state, but difficult to solve! Despite decades of research by top applied mathematicians around the world, in general it is not known how to significantly improve upon simple brute-force checking. It is a real possibility that there may n
The Fruits of the Genome for Society - February 17, 2010
Lunch 'n Learn presentation: The sequence of the human genome, the primary goal of the Human Genome Project, was achieved just a few years ago. Because our genomes are a string of 3 billion sequences of four chemical letters in the DNA polymer, the ability to obtain genomic sequences depended on revolutionary progress not just in DNA chemistry but also on the equally revolutionary advances in speed, capacity and versatility of digital computers. By far the most prominent result of the determinat
The Fruits of the Genome for Society PDF - February 17, 2010
Lunch 'n Learn presentation: The sequence of the human genome, the primary goal of the Human Genome Project, was achieved just a few years ago. Because our genomes are a string of 3 billion sequences of four chemical letters in the DNA polymer, the ability to obtain genomic sequences depended on revolutionary progress not just in DNA chemistry but also on the equally revolutionary advances in speed, capacity and versatility of digital computers. By far the most prominent result of the determinat
Public Media: Exploring the Gap between Reality and Ideals in the Arab World
CSM - Publications & Resources - Public Media: Exploring the Gap between Reality and Ideals in the Arab World - American University > TEACHING AND LEARNING AT AU > Center for Social Media > Publications & Resources > Public Media: Exploring the Gap between Reality and Ideals in the Arab World
The Trading System in Crisis: The Threat from Proliferating Preferences
Preferential trading arrangements are becoming increasingly popular among the nations of the world. But are they a positive development? In the Fourth H W Arndt Memorial Lecture – presented by…
China and the West in the 21st Century
China’s phenomenal economic growth is paralleled in scale and speed only by the rise of the United States between the Civil War and the First World War in 1914. Since 1978 the economy has grown…
Coping with Climate Change: Is Development in India and the World Sustainable?
2007 K R Narayanan Oration Recent high rates of economic growth in India and other parts of the developing world, while reducing poverty and raising global…
Vanishing Third World Emigrants? The Seventh H. W. Arndt Memorial Lecture
A secular decline in emigration rates from the Third World since the 1990s has gone unnoticed. The recent rise in unemployment in high-wage countries has accelerated the secular decline. These trends…
The Next 100 Years - A Forecast for the 21st Century
In his book The Next 100 Years, George Friedman offers a lucid, highly readable forecast of the changes we can expect around the world during the twenty-first century. He explains where and why future…
Abolishing all Nuclear Weapons
Mr Fraser addressed the current state of nuclear weapons acquisition and distribution and the present danger and opportunities facing the world. He covered the failures in disarmament and non-proliferation…
Patterns of urban conflict in East Timor: The implications for peacebuilding and policing
CEPS Visitor, James Scambary, has been researching gangs and urban conflict in East Timor since 2006 and has recently conducted an urban violence assessment there for the World Bank. Abstract: Informed by conversations with NGOs involved in mediation and also Australian peacekeeping forces in Dili, this presentation will focus on the patterns and dynamics of urban conflict in East Timor, with some practical implications for policing and peacebuilding.
The GFC in Our Region: India and Indonesia
These back-to-back public lectures, sponsored by the ANU Chapter of Golden Key, will present expert views on the economies of our close neighbors India and Indonesia in the context of the global financial crisis, and the implications for Australia. The lectures will be aimed at a general audience, and an extended Q&A session will be held afterwards. Free refreshments and nibbles will be available before the lectures, and wine and cheese after they conclude. Professor Hal Hill speaking on Indones
The Protection of Human Rights in Australia - A Way Forward, The Alice Tay Lecture on Law & Human Ri
Mary Kostakidis was a member of the Human Rights Consultation Committee that inquired into the adequacy of the protection of human rights in Australia. The Committee reported to the federal Attorney General on September 30 after an extensive period of nationwide community consultation. In this lecture Ms Kostakidis will discuss the themes that emerged from the 40,000 responses that were received during this consultation and outline the suite of measures which the committee saw as the way forward
Too Hot To Talk About: Why Is Australia Still Debating Climate Change?
Some international commentators have expressed dismay that Australia is still debating climate change while other developed and developing economies have moved on and are already making positive steps towards climate change strategies. Is Australia out of step with the rest of the world?Who's telling fibs and who's providing facts about climate change in Australia? Have the Australian people switched off? On 25 November 2009 at 12.30 pm the ANU Climate Change Institute and the ANU Centre for Pub
China's Policy Response to the Global Financial Crisis
Yu Yongding will be in Australia to deliver the Productivity Commission's Richard Snape Lecture for 2009. An Academician with Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, former Director-General of Institute of World Economics and Politics (1998- ), Professor with Post-Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, President of the China Society of World Economics (2001- ), Editor of China and World Economy, Associate Editor of Asian Economic Policy Review. He was formerly the academic member of
How Globalisation and Climate Change will Reshape Humanitarian Crises and Aid
Public Seminar hosted by the Department of International Relations and RegNet How Globalisation and Climate Change will Reshape Humanitarian Crises and Aid Peter Walker Rosenberg Professor of Nutrition and Human Security, and Director of the Feinstein International Center, Tufts University Date: Tuesday 9 February 2010 Time: 12.30 -- 2pm Venue: Centre for Arabic and Islamic Studies Al Falasi Lecture Theatre, Building 127, Ellery Crescent, ANU Peter Walker has been active in development and disas
APW2010: Divergent Dictators: Legacies of Leadership in Three Asian Authoritarian Regimes
"Finding the right place for individuals is an old problem for political analysis," explains Richard Samuels in his comparative analysis of leadership in Japan and Italy. "Do individuals make history, or does history make individuals who make history?" This paper examines the highly divergent legacies that came forth from the leadership of three Asian dictators: South Korea's Park Chung Hee (1961-1979), Indonesia's Suharto (1965-1998), and the Philippines' Ferdinand Marcos (1965-1986). Through t
Graduate Studies in International Affairs: Special Responsibilities -The United States in Global Gov
GSIA SPECIAL PANEL Special Responsibilities: The United States in Global Governance Speakers Mlada Bukovansky Mlada Bukovansky is Associate Professor of International Relations at Smith College. Her research focuses on the evolving norms and institutions of the international system, both current and historical. She has published articles in the journals International Organization, Review of International Studies, Review of International Political Economy, and International Relations. Her book, L
2010 Crawford-Nishi Lecture: The Prospects for APEC and Japan-Australia Relationship
The lecture series is organised by the Australia-Japan Research Centre at the Australian National University with the assistance of a grant from the Australia-Japan Foundation. The lecture series honours the two individuals from Australia and Japan who made the greatest contribution to the post-World War Two normalisation of Australia-Japan relations, Sir John Crawford, then Secretary of the Department of Trade and later ANU Vice Chancellor, and Ambassador Haruhiko Nishi, Japan's first Ambassado
India & NPT: How does a nuclear power & non-signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty engage
India's Nuclear Elephant In The Room How can India - a state with nuclear weapons which is not a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) - still influence proceedings at this year's review of the NPT? That's the subject to be discussed at a public lecture today at The Australian National University. The lecture - India and NPT - will be delivered by Professor Swaran Singh of Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, India. Professor Singh says that in the five years since the last review
