Slums: Unfinished task of the great freedom movements
- By Wits University
The legacy of Rusty Bernstein was on Thursday, 16 May 2013 honoured by Ananya Roy, Professor in City and Regional Planning and Distinguished Chair in Global Poverty and Practice at the University of California, Berkeley.
Roy delivered the annual Rusty Bernstein lecture, in which she focussed on slums "because patterns of segragation and separation in our cities, the marginalisation of the urban majority, the urban poor, is the unfinished task of the great freedom movements of the 20th century - from anti-apartheid movements to anti-colonial movements".
She spoke about the national urban renewal mission, meant to create world-class cities - Asian world-class cities, Indian world-class cities - and the conceptualisation of such a world-class city as slum-free.
"For the past decade, the building of the Indian world-class city has proceeded through what we may broadly understood as an urbanism of dispossession, a making of the Indian 'world-class city' through the smashing of the homes and livelihoods of the urban poor."
In 2004 to 2005, Mumbai’s city authorities sought to implement their “Vision Mumbai” plan through the eviction of 300 000 slum-dwellers. A few years ago in Pushta, a settlement on the banks of the river Yamuna in Delhi, 150 000 residents were cleared in the blink of an eye on the occasion of the Commonwealth Games. And across India, the creation of Special Economic Zones inspired by the Chinese model of development, has entailed violent land grabs of agricultural land by the state.
"The Asian world-class city then is the work of the activist state. And if we are to understand this type of government of the urban as neoliberal, then we must also understand it homegrown, as a conjuncture mediated by state practices, diasporic investment, and middle-class associational life," said Roy.
Bernstein was also commemorated by his eldest child, Toni Strasburg, who said of her father: "My father believed in humanity, he stood by his beliefs throughout his life and spoke out against injustice even when doing so threatened his life. We still need people like him in South Africa today, people who will speak out against oppression and injustice and not turn a blind eye no matter who the perpetrators are."
The annual Yebo Gogga Yebo amaBlomo exhibition currently underway at Wits is proving to be more than an adventure into the hidden world, offering a range of lessons.
Brooke Tucker and her three children are among today’s visitors at the animal and plant exhibition. For her, the two-floor exhibition which allows revellers to get up-close and personal with nature is a wonderful opportunity to supplement her home-schooled children’s education. Having moved to South Africa only a year ago, the Wits trip is not only a lesson in life sciences but builds on her Johannesburg experience.
Since the opening of the exhibition on Wednesday, 8 May 2013, the School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences has hosted hundreds of visitors. A large majority of these are learners and teachers from Johannesburg schools and crèches with the early part of each day seeing the most number of visitors.
Grade 10 learners from Queens High School in Bezuidenhout Valley could be seen furiously taking down notes as they moved from one exhibition to the next seeping information from the experts manning the desks. Non-believers in the existence of dinosaurs, Sarah Milikwini, Joy Olanrewaju and Ketsia Luneko, had their views shattered upon encountering a model of gorgonopsian, a mammal-like reptile found in South Africa and lived over 255 million years ago.
The Yebo Gogga Yebo amaBlomo exhibition is a unique annual Johannesburg event that brings animals and plants together under one roof complete with tailor-made talks from experts, making it a fun and educational experience for kids and nature lovers of all ages. Over 30 exhibitors are part of this showcase concluding on Sunday, 12 May 2013.
Equally excited and caught in the buzz of the learning experience are Wits senior students who have committed their time to support the event by acting as tour guides or sharing their areas of interest with the public.
Maitse Monye, a third year zoology and ecology student has renewed respect for the teaching profession having been faced with inquisitive minds and some disengaged learners at his desk.
“I’ve seen three different categories of learners – those who know about termites from home because of their surroundings; those who have learnt about them from discovery channels; and those who are uninformed and underexposed to nature,” he says.
His guests have given him much think about and some which he says could be research questions at postgraduate level.
While many of the lessons are academic, for the group manning the welcome area, their discussion ranges from which are better to manage – girl or boy groups; and some are life lessons on whether they should have kids or not having got a taste of adult responsibility.
Since its launch Yebo Gogga has proved to be a success with over 8 000 visitors and 26 schools flocking to the show annually. The interactive exhibition provides an educational and social outreach service to the Gauteng community by addressing shortfalls in teaching life sciences at schools by means of the provision of live animals and plants which form an interactive framework round a theme and thus an educational situation for learners that is not encountered in the classroom. This year's theme is Underground and is going deep below teh surface to familiarise visitors with the earth's inhabitants.
This interactive exhibition is a joint effort by the School of Animal, Plantand Environmental Sciences at Wits University; Johannesburg based societies, government and environmental organisations.
Opening times:
09:00 - 16:00 Weekedays
10:00 - 16:00 Weekend
Venue: Oppenheimer Life Sciences Building, East Campus, Wits University
More info: www.wits.ac.za/YeboGogga
2013 YEBO GOGGA YEBO AMABLOMO DISPLAYS
Secret spiders underground by Spider Club of SA
Secret Life of Biological Control Agents by BIOCONTROL – AP&ES
Asbestos : Wonder Fibre –Serial Kiler; Adler Museum
Underwater World by Abby’s Aquarium
Undercover Agents, insects of medical importance by Medical Entomology
Journey to the Centre of the Earth by School of Geosciences
Life under the microscope by School of Molecular and Cell Biology
Conserving wildlife: inspiring the world by Free Me Wild Life
Wild About legs by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Low Down on Cockroaches by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Goggas from the past by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Secrets from the Underground by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
To the power of Slime by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Earthworm Mother nature’s recyclers by Earthworm Buddies
Don’t go underground, take action by CoAction Group
Underground Treasures by City Parks
Cared for Underground: Only to Fly free by Lepidopterist Society of SA
Water: Under US, Over US, All Around by Rand Water
Nature’s Prehistoric Giants by RhinoSA
Buried Treasure-plant style by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Finding the Past Underground by School of Geosciences
Animals dig the Zoo by Johannesburg Zoo
Go underground for the Small Five by SANPARKS Honorary Rangers
Let us Take you on an underground Trip by Delta Park Environmental Centre
Bad Buddies – Animal parasites by National Zoological Gardens
Low Down and Underground by Snake City
The Buzz Underground by Southern Beekeepers Association
Trees- an underground movement by Grow-A-Tree
Trees Grow underground by Tree Society of SA
Underground protectors by Gauteng Conservancy and Stewardship Association
Amphibians, a wet life by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Making Slum-Free Cities
- By Wits University
On Thursday, 16 May 2013, the School of Architecture and Planning will host Prof. Ananya Roy, who will be delivering the 2013 Rusty Bernstein Memorial Lecture. For details click here.
Roy is Professor of City and Regional Planning and Distinguished Chair in Global Poverty and Practice at the University of California, Berkeley, where she teaches in the fields of urban studies and international development. She also serves as Education Director of the Blum Center for Developing Economies. Most recently, Roy served as co-director of the Global Metropolitan Studies Center.
Roy is the author of City Requiem, Calcutta: Gender and the Politics of Poverty (University of Minnesota Press, 2003), co-editor of Urban Informality: Transnational Perspectives from the Middle East, South Asia, and Latin America (Lexington Books, 2004) and co-editor of The Practice of International Health (Oxford University Press, 2008). Her book, Poverty Capital: Microfinance and the Making of Development (Routledge, 2010), was the recipient of the 2011 Paul Davidoff Book Award of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning, a book award for research that advances social justice. Roy's most recent book is co-edited with Aihwa Ong and titled Worlding Cities: Asian Experiments and the Art of Being Global (Blackwell, 2011).
Roy is a committed teacher in the fields of global urbanism and international development. In 2006, she was awarded the Distinguished Teaching Award, the highest teaching honour UC Berkeley bestows on its faculty. Also in 2006, Roy was awarded the Distinguished Faculty Mentors award, a recognition bestowed by the Graduate Assembly of the University of California at Berkeley. In 2008, Roy was the recipient of the Golden Apple Teaching award, the only teaching award given by the student body. She was the 2009 California Professor of the Year by CASE/ Carnegie Foundation. Most recently, Roy received the 2011 Excellence in Achievement Award of the California Alumni Association, a lifetime achievement recognition.
Roy is currently involved in three collaborative projects of research and practice: Urban Revolutions in the Age of Global Urbanism; The 21st Century Indian City: Setting New Agendas for Policy; and Territories of Poverty: Rethinking Welfare and Development. She is also launching a new book series with the University of California Press to foster global and transnational agendas of poverty and inequality scholarship.
Abstract for Roy’s talk: Making Slum-Free Cities: Global Urbanism in the Asian Century
The Asian Century can be understood as a historical conjuncture marked by new formations of economic hegemony and bold claims of Asian ascendancy. This talk examines how, at such a historical moment, the urban question becomes the matter of government, and how in particular, the megacity of slums is transformed into the Asian world-class city. Taking up the example of India’s recent Slum-Free Cities policy, which marks a break with hitherto dominant modes of governing, the talk interrogates emerging paradigms of inclusive growth, those that seek to integrate the poor into market rule and capitalize the entrepreneurial slum. In this way, the talk tackles the broader question of postcolonial government and its frontiers of development, as well as the politics of poverty thus unleashed.
The #GlobalPOV Project video series
Based on Roy's popular Global Poverty class at the University of California, Berkeley, The #GlobalPOV Project video series combines critical social theory with improvised art and live-action sketch to explore issues of global poverty, development and foreign aid. The series is written and narrated by Roy.
A very delicate, very powerful instrument has been installed in the Biology building. It has a sleek body with a cold white exterior but it is warming the hearts of Wits researchers across campus. The thing is, there’s never been anything like it.
Previously Wits researchers had to go elsewhere to find its equivalent. They had to stand in line and pay. During mid-2012, the motivation for Wits to acquire its own instrument began circulating. Council approved the purchase in August 2012, and Finco approved and released the required financial support shortly thereafter.
At the end of October 2012, arriving at Wits from its previous owner – a semi-conductor company in Taiwan – the University’s first ever high-resolution transmission electron microscope (HRTEM) was installed.
High-resolution transmission electron microscopy is an imaging mode of the transmission electron microscope (TEM) that allows the imaging of the crystallographic structure of a sample at an atomic scale. It is identical to TEM imaging except that the magnifications used are high enough to see easily the lattice spacing of inorganic materials.
“The HRTEM looks at the interface between materials (in a composite) at an atomic level. It’s about learning what’s happening at a microstructure level,” says Prof. Alexander Ziegler from the Microscopy and Microanalysis Unit (MMU).
One might, for example, investigate how chrome interacts and disperses in an alloy of steel, and what happens when you tinker with the composition. Does the new composition corrode? How strong is it? One might want to change the composition of a ceramic drill bit to make it stronger, or the composition of a semi-conductor to increase conductivity.
It also allows for a multitude of experiments that are of interest to researchers from the life sciences. For example, it allows for the visualization of the distribution of chemical elements in a cell or tissue sample, and it also allows for a tomographic, 3D-view of such samples.
The HRTEM was accepted and commissioned as a fully working instrument on 18 March 2013 and made available to the Wits scientific community on 15 April 2013. Users can now place their microscope time bookings through the online booking system of the MMU.
Since this instrument is a very high-end TEM, with multiple, delicate, peripheral detectors and attachments, thorough training on a more robust and basic instrument is mandatory. Experienced microscopists are on hand to assist, but this instrument is so complex that even present staff members will have to learn a lot in the next few months.
Wits researcher names new dino
- By Wits University
A new species of theropod, or meat-eating dinosaur, an ancient ancestor of today’s birds, has been named by newly appointed Wits Evolutionary Studies Institute Senior Researcher Dr. Jonah Choiniere and a team of international researchers.
The study about the find, which has been two years in the making, appears in the 3 May 2013 online edition of the prestigious scholarly publication Journal of Systematic Palaeontology.
The dinosaur, discovered in a remote region of Xinjiang, northwestern China, is named Aorun zhaoi, after the Dragon King in the Chinese epic tale Journey to the West.
The new dinosaur is estimated to have been a little over one meter long and probably weighed about 1.5 kilograms. It wasn’t necessarily a small dinosaur species, though, because Aorun was still a youngster when it became a fossil.
“We were able to look at microscopic details of Aorun’s bones and they showed that the animal was less than a year old when it died on the banks of a stream,” says Choiniere.
Aorun lived more than 161 million years ago, in the Late Jurassic Period. Its small, numerous teeth suggest that it would have eaten prey like lizards and small relatives of today’s mammals and crocodilians.
“The new discovery is another great example of the rich dinosaur diversity of the Late Jurassic of northwestern China,” says Xu Xing, the leader of the Chinese side of the research team.
The specimen was discovered by Choiniere’s former supervisor, Professor James M. Clark of the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. “All that was exposed on the surface was a bit of the leg. We were completely surprised to find a skull buried in the rock too,” says Clark.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jonah Choiniere grew up near Boston in the USA, on a 1000 hectare wildlife sanctuary, where he became interested in natural history. He completed an undergraduate degree with honours in Anthropology and another undergraduate degree with honours in Geology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.
He completed his PhD at the George Washington University, studying meat-eating dinosaurs from China. During the course of his PhD he participated in six summers of field work in China. After a postdoctoral research fellowship at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, where he worked in the Gobi desert of Mongolia searching for dinosaurs, he joined the Evolutionary Studies Institute at Wits in September 2012, where he is the Senior Researcher in Dinosaur Palaeontology.
Currently one of the many things he is working on is researching the Elliot Formation of South Africa.
Whether it is banks or bread, oil or milk, Competition Law and the authorities that enforce it are the pillars that keep competition alive and fair in South Africa.
A new book, entitled The Development of Competition Law and Economics in South Africa, further strengthens the knowledge pool of this important field. Edited by Kasturi Moodaliyar, Associate Professor in the School of Law at the University of the Witwatersrand, and Simon Roberts, Director of the Centre for Competition Economics at the University of Johannesburg, this book is an important source for students and practitioners of competition law and economics in South Africa.
The book was launched at the Origins Centre at Wits University on Tuesday, 21 May 2013, during a function hosted by the book’s publisher, the HSRC Press, the Competition Commission and the Mandela Institute at Wits.
According to the publisher “it is an important and timely contribution to the rapidly growing field of Competition Law in South Africa. While the South African competition authorities have established an enviable local and international profile for their work, there is a need for critical evaluation of the developments in this field since the Competition Act came into force in 1999. This book meets this need”.
Guest speaker, David Lewis, Executive Director of Corruption Watch hailed the editors as well as the many academics and experts who contributed papers to the book, saying it is an important collection of work that shows that collaboration between universities and the Competition Authority is vital to strengthen Competition Law.
“It is a rich field for collaboration between academics and practitioners,” he said. It is especially the building up of institutional memory and knowledge information as well as recording the work of the Competition Authority that will become even more important for those who work in Competition Law in the future.
To listen to Lewis speech, click
For details of the book, visit the publisher’s website here
About the editors:
Kasturi Moodaliyar holds the position of the Senior Lecturer in Competition Law at the University of the Witwatersrand School of Law. Prior to her joining the Law School in February 2005 she worked as enforcement and exemptions investigator and thereafter a merger analyst at the Competition Commission in Pretoria. Moodaliyar graduated from the University of Natal with B.Proc.LLB and LLM degrees. She was admitted as an Attorney of the High Court of South Africa in 2000. Moodaliyar was awarded the Nelson Mandela Magdalene scholarship to read for her M.Phil degree in criminological research at Cambridge University in 2001. In 2004 she completed the Programme in Economics and Public Finance at Unisa. She is currently reading for her PhD in Competition Law. She is also the coordinating editor for the Butterworths Competition Law Reports and has been a guest editor on the South African Journal of Economics and Management Sciences. She has published both nationally and internationally in the field of competition law. Moodaliyar joined the Film and Publication Board as an Appeal Tribunal Member late 2011. She is also an adjudicating member of ICASA's Complaints and Compliance Commission.
Simon Roberts joined the Competition Commission of South Africa in November 2006 as Chief Economist and Manager of the Policy & Research Division, and also acted as Manager of the Enforcement & Exemptions Division from 1 November 2008 to 30 April 2009. Prior to this he was Associate Professor in Economics at the University of the Witwatersrand, where he established and directed the Corporate Strategy and Industrial Development research programme examining firm decision-making and economic outcomes. In addition, Roberts has consulted widely on competition matters over the past 15 years and has been an expert witness in a number of major cases. Simon holds a PhD from University of London (Birkbeck College), MA from University of East Anglia, and BA (Hons) from Oxford University. He has published widely including in the Journal of Competition Law and Economics, Industrial and Corporate Change, Journal of African Economies, Development and Change, Journal of International Development, and the South African Journal of Economics.
Pathfinder new Head of Accountancy
- By Wits University
Wits University has appointed Professor Nirupa Padia as the new Head of the School of Accountancy.
Padia, an Associate Professor in Auditing, is considered a pathfinder having achieved significant firsts for women of colour in the accounting sphere in higher education.
Her appointment as the first black female to lead a school of accountancy in South Africa follows closely on her recent achievement. In 2012, Padia’s contribution to research, teaching and learning was recognised with the awarding of a professorship to her by the University marking yet another milestone and a first for black female Chartered Accountants in a South African university. This promotion is granted to academics who have distinguished themselves in the above areas.
Padia is a Witsie through and through having begun her studies in the 1980’s at Wits. She completed her B. Com degree in 1985. Marriage and the upbringing of children led to a nine-year hiatus recommencing her studies in 1995 to complete her B Acc. She then joined PwC where she completed her articles and qualified as a CA (SA) before rejoining Wits to commence a successful academic career.
Padia has made a significant contribution to the School and the Auditing Department over the past twelve years. As a senior lecturer, she was involved in teaching auditing modules at undergraduate and postgraduate levels. During this time she also completed her masters of commerce specialising in taxation. The refinement of existing courses in the School of Accounting and introduction of new courses necessitated her involvement in the B.Com (Hons) and M.Com (Accounting) programmes as coordinator and supervisor of M.Com students – a task she gracefully accepted despite her demanding modules.
Overall she has been greatly instrumental not only in moulding her students to be among the top ten achievers in the SAICA board exam, but has also assisted in maintaining the pass rate of Witsies. Eight out of the 40 students in the masters course are currently supervised by Prof. Padia.
Under Padia’s leadership the School is confident to continue on the current trend of success that it has achieved in the recent SAICA and IRBA Professional Examinations where Wits graduates featured highly in the top 10 positions and passing with honours.
She serves the profession by sitting as an academic representative on the Auditing Guidance Committee of SAICA as well as on the board of the PwC Business School.
Outside of her teaching commitments Padia is a yoga and spiritual teacher at the Art of Living foundation. She is also a mother of three Wits alumni that are successful dentists.
* The School of Accountancy has a SAICA Level 1 accreditation status, which is the highest level of accreditation awarded by SAICA.
Wits mining intake reaches record levels
- By Wits University
The number of first-year mining students at the Wits School of Mining Engineering has surpassed all expectations in 2013, reaching record levels that will help solve the industry’s skill shortages.
According to Prof. Fred Cawood, head of the School of Mining Engineering at Wits, the word is out that mining is a good career choice for a young person looking for a secure job after graduation.
In less than 15 years, the number of first year students registering in the department has risen from 43 (in 1999) to 302 at the beginning of this year.
There has been a particularly sudden jump since 2012, requiring that the first year intake be split into two streams to keep class sizes manageable. The School is also hiring more staff to meet this increased demand.
Cawood said the School is pleased with the demand for its courses, despite the extra pressure that this places on its resources. It is already putting extra effort into academic and other support for new students, to give them the best possible chance of success.
Extra maths and physics classes on Saturdays have been one way to address the lack of academic preparedness for university.
“The outcomes-based education (OBE) system simply does not prepare students well enough for engineering studies,” he said. “This is evidenced by the fact that their grade 12 marks bear no relation to the marks that they get at university.”
The other main area of support is financial and logistical.
“Less than 30% of our students have a support system in Johannesburg; many of them have never even been in Gauteng before,” said Cawood. “Many first-year students are the first in their families ever go to university – so they are not sure what is required when they arrive, and often there is inadequate provision for accommodation and meals.
“In other cases, students have been booked into sub-optimal living arrangements, which are not conducive to learning. We have raised money from sources like the Department of Mineral Resources, Eskom, SRK Consulting, the London Metals Exchange, BME and the SA Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (SAIMM) to put students into a situation where they can focus on their studies.”
The school aims to attract 150 new students into the degree course each year; this is generally augmented by up to 50 students who have not passed all their subjects and must repeat first year.
At the postgraduate level, the Wits School of Mining Engineering has stabilised at a level of about 200 students per year. Entrance to the postgraduate programme is strictly controlled to develop and maintain a better match between available lecturing resources and students serviced.
He said it is unfortunate that in managing overall student growth the postgraduate programme is negatively affected, resulting in the postgraduate programme shrinking from 340 students in 2010 to 191 postgraduates in 2013.
“If we had the lecturing capacity, we could easily double the size of the programme,” said Cawood. “One of the reasons is our unsurpassed range of specialisations, which allows us to accept graduates from other disciplines and convert them into the specialists required by the mining industry.
“Most engineering programmes will only take you into a postgraduate course if you have a first degree in that discipline. We don’t work like that. We accept any first degree, provide them with a specialisation, and ‘convert’ them to what the mining sector needs. An example would be converting an economist to a mineral economist by adding the mining and mineral economic content.”
Another recent development is the school’s certificate-level studies, which are seeing very good growth with the two Level 6 Certificate programmes in mine resource management (MRM) and mine planning from 54 students in 2008 to 77 in 2013.
These courses are aimed at practitioner level and represent an important Wits Mining School initiative to address the shortage of skills at this level. These two-year, part-time certificate programmes are aimed specifically at practitioners, to and prepare them for either promotion or employment on mines.
“The learners must spend eight weeks having lectures at Wits over a period of two years,” said Professor Cawood. “It is a practical qualification with various on-the-job assignments over the duration of the course. This is an area of critical skills shortages at this level, and we could probably attract many more students if we had the capacity to grow further.”
Although the labour-related disruptions in the mining industry prevented some students from fulfilling their vacation work requirements during 2012, he said there were no signs that these events dampened students’ perceptions that mining was an exciting sector with plenty of opportunities.
“We saw this in the demand for first-year seats in the programme, which was at an all-time high at the start of 2013,” he said.
The disruption of vacation work will mean that several second and third-year students will not be able to graduate at the end of 2013, despite the fact that they would have passed all their academic subjects; this is clearly a problem for industry and the university, he said.
In a recent paper for the SA Institute for Mining and Metallurgy, Professors Cuthbert Musingwini, Huw Phillips and John Cruise of the Wits School of Mining Engineering highlight the benefits of stronger partnerships between universities and industry in efforts to close the skills gap.
“It is important to bear in mind that it usually takes about 10 years of training and
development after graduating with a bachelor’s degree (BEng, BSc) before a mining graduate is appointed to their first substantive managerial position, when they start to make a full contribution to the mining company,” they said. “This time frame dictates that the education and development of mining engineers (as opposed to ‘competitive poaching’) should be treated as a corporate strategic decision.”
Adopting new mining technology: Finding a balance between leading and bleeding
- By Kanina Foss
The mine of the future is coming. It will be digital, more constrained, and it will require a greater investment in leading edge technology.
“The good times are gone,” said Barloworld Equipment Information Bureau Officer, JP Briggs, who outlined how mines of the future would have to drill deeper, under increased safety and environmental regulations.
So how will the mine of the present become the mine of the future? Change management and associated problems were the focus of intense discussion at this week’s Mining Into The Future conference sponsored by Barloworld.
Head of the Wits School of Mining Engineering, Prof. Fred Cawood, gave a presentation introducing aspects of the mine of the future as envisaged by the Wits Centre for Mechanised Mining Systems.
Essential functions like safety, optimisation, guidance, tracking and reporting will increasingly be automated by sophisticated systems providing real-time information.
Connected worksites will mean improved communication between equipment, operators and managers. For example, there might be monitors inside mines identifying individual mine workers and raising an alarm if someone has entered an area where they’re not authorised to be.
“A connected worksite is key. If you know more, you can do more, you achieve more,” said Briggs.
The School of Mining Engineering is developing an underground, airtight test tunnel 67m long under the Chamber of Mines building on East Campus to assess the suitability of WiFi, WPAN, UWB and WiMAX to carry a mass of information many more times the amount currently being transferred in underground mines.
Changes in mining conditions will also drive new technology. For example, South Africa is expected to run out of coal a lot faster than previously anticipated, creating an urgent need for underground coal mining in the Waterberg. In this new underground environment, spontaneous combustion will be a real and on-going hazard that can only be managed by atmospheric monitoring on an unprecedented scale.
To develop atmospheric monitoring technology, a section of the 67m of tunnel under the Wits building is being used by a group developing tools for the accurate monitoring of air velocities and quantities.
Following the presentations by Cawood and Briggs on Thursday, day two of the conference, delegates raised concerns about the mining industry’s ability to absorb these new technologies.
The technologies promise to help achieve a lower cost per ton or a lower cost per hour, but are the people, the processes, and – in less developed countries – the national infrastructure, ready?
According to one delegate, mines might ask: “We’ve been doing things a certain way for 10 years, why should we change now?”
Briggs emphasised that the new technologies were building blocks to autonomy, which could be integrated step by step on a gradual path towards the next generation of autonomous mine, rather than imposing everything all at once.
In fact, the rate at which new technology should be manufactured and sold remains a big problem for suppliers like CAT.
Customers on one end of the spectrum prefer to buy up old machines so that their entire fleet comprises the same equipment. They say that what they lose in terms of efficiency, they make up for in terms of easier maintenance and the lower risk of a proven track record. These customers can’t be sold the latest technology, because it is more advanced than their equipment.
Customers on the other end of the spectrum are more willing to adopt new equipment and technology, but no one wants to be on the bleeding edge. As one delegate pointed out: “The problem in mining is we cannot afford teething problems while they sort out new products.”
Farewell to Saki Macozoma
- By Wits University
The University bid farewell to Mr Saki Macozoma, whose term as Chairperson of the Council has ended, at a function held on 18 April 2013.
At the last Council meeting on 19 April 2013, Macozoma was hailed as a valuable leader who guided the institution over the past five years with great enthusiasm and wisdom.
Last night saw the opening of the new green state-of-the-art building for the School of Construction, Economics and Management, adjacent to the John Moffat building.
An architectural design competition led to the construction of the new building by renowned architect Michael Scholes. The School of Construction, Economics and Management previously shared the John Moffat building with the School of Architecture and Planning. This resulted in a shortage of teaching and research space.
The new building, in conjunction with the John Moffat building, John Moffat Extension and the historical Yale Telescope Building (earmarked to house the 21st Century Wits Cities Institute) comprises an exciting Built Environment Precinct with many opportunities for optimisation and growth into the future.
Due to a huge growth in student numbers in both Schools, the University has ambitious plans of constructing the Built Environment Precinct in order to bolster and strengthen the University’s ability to continue being a key player in the production of graduates and research outputs for the built environment professions within South Africa and the continent.
The total cost of these plans, which include the renovation of the John Moffat building, is approximately R50 million. The Department of Higher Education and Training in South Africa, as part of its commitment to higher education infrastructural development, has contributed R13 million. The University is committed to raising the balance of R37 million through donations from individuals, foundations and the corporate sector.
The Precinct will provide new offices and research, teaching and exhibition spaces including:
A physical space for the intellectual engagement and greater interaction between staff, students and outside stakeholders;
Accessibility of the Schools work to a wider range of stakeholders:
Increased integration of Information and Communications Technology into the various teaching domains and into students’ assessments;
Improved facilities for postgraduate training and research, including visiting academics and
A venue for continuing professional development activities run by the Schools.
Prof. Johnny Mahlangu was appointed as the new Head of the School of Pathology in the Wits Faculty of Health Sciences and the National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS).
A Witsie through and through, Mahlangu was born in Benoni where he matriculated, after which he came to Wits where he has remained since then.
He completed a BSc in Laboratory Medicine in 1988 with biochemistry and haematology majors. Encouraged to do medicine by Wits stalwart Prof. Barry Mendelow, he graduated with an MBBCh in 1994 and then FC (Path) in 2000, MMed in 2000 and a Certificate in Clinical Haematology (SA) subspecialty in 2002.
Initially accepted into Engineering at Wits, he was always interested in the business of health sciences and knew that he wanted to be in the health sector. He enrolled for the BSc in the Faculty of Health Sciences and was mentored by Prof. Mendelow whom he regards as a true lateral thinker and role model during the time that he was the Head of the Department of Haematology.
“I treasure Prof. Mendelow’s input in my career development,” he says.
He says he looks forward to the opportunity to shape and influence the curricular future content and the training of professionals in pathology.
“As Senator and Secretary of the College of Pathologists and President of the Southern African Society, I have already started to contribute to these roles at national level. The appointment to head of the School of Pathology at Wits will be an opportunity to contribute to these roles locally,” says Mahlangu.
His research interest is in the area of bleeding disorders in which he is involved in basic, clinical and translational research. The unit he heads up has extensive national and international collaborations in the global bleeding disorders fraternity which includes the World Federation of Haemophilia, the Global Haemophilia Network and Global Emerging Haemophilia Panel.
“There are lots of clinical trials on the go at the moment and new therapeutic proteins being engineered to make bleeding people’s lives better. I will remain involved with this exciting clinical research in my headship tenure,” says Mahlangu.
Prof. Mahlangu is married and with two daughters. “I am a very hands-on person and enjoy making and repairing things around my home. I take great pleasure in seeing things I have made myself!”
International Research Award for Education
- By Wits University
The Wits School of Education has been recognised for its distinctive role in expanding research in the field of education.
The award of the Most Enabling Institutional Environment for Educational Researcher in Africa jointly sponsored by theAfrican Development Institute (ADI) in the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Korea-Africa Economic Cooperation (KOAFEC), was presented at a ceremony in Paris, last night, 14 May 2013. The award is one of four presented under the Education Research in Africa Award (ERAA).
According to ADI, the purpose of the award is to institutionalise a culture of high quality and relevant educational research in African universities, research networks and institutes. The awards further recognise the critical role of education in social and economic development, and acknowledge the role of research in the formulation and implementation of educational policy and reforms.
Prof. Osman says the institutional award recognising the entire School demonstrates that “the School has an excellent mentoring system of young researchers and invests in research. Furthermore, it speaks highly of the variety of opportunities created for people to engage in research, particularly the young and emerging researchers.”
“The idea of research-led-education and research-led-teacher education is something that the School has taken seriously and hopefully will impact on the quality of education in South Africa,” says Osman.
To foster a conducive environment, the School encourages its academic staff members to compete for research grants at the National Research Foundation of South Africa where six established researchers received rating. Novice researchers as well as postgraduate and undergraduate students receive grant holder-linked bursaries and research assistantships to develop research skills at various competence levels.
Postgraduate students are further supported via school-wide compulsory programs such as PhD weekends and Doctoral Seminars. These programmes have ensured accelerated the postgraduate research completion rate over the years.
The School also houses the Marang Centre for Mathematics and Science Education; the Centre for Deaf Studies; Research in Education and the Labour Market (REAL) Research Programme; and the UNESCO Chair in Teacher Education for Diversity and Development, among a range of other research projects. Over the past five years, book publications in the School have also increased – a testimony to the School’s excellent support structure.
From 1-6 July 2013 the School is hosting a conference entitled Making Education Inclusive which aims to identify and dismantle exclusionary pressures and practices in education to promote inclusion.
Managing global conflicts at Wits
- By Wits University
Professors Adam Habib, Vice-Chancellor Designate, and outgoing Vice-Chancellor and Principal, Loyiso Nongxa, write in an opinion piece published in the Business Day on Monday, 20 April 2013:
"There is a global conflict playing out in the corridors of Wits University. On the one hand, there are advocates of the Palestinian struggle calling for the academic and cultural isolation of Israel. On the other, members of the Zionist lobby oppose any such attempt to isolate Israel. In between there are multiple shades of opinion, most of which are crowded out in the acrimonious public discourse over the issue. The contest at Wits over these controversies has raised managerial challenges, some of which have been covered in the media. This, and the fact that Wits is a public institution, prompts us to explain the managerial dilemmas of this struggle, and who we are managing them..." Read the full article
Governor General of Canada at Wits
- By Wits University
Wits University in collaboration with the South African Institute of International Affairs presented a keynote address and discussion by H.E. the Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada, themed Canada-South Africa Relations, on Tuesday, 21 May 2013.
The Governor-General is the federal representative of the Canadian Monarch, Queen Elizabeth II and his visit to South Africais expected to strengthen bilateral relations and deepen commercial and educational ties between the two countries. The address at Wits is the only public address that the Governor-General will deliver in Gauteng during this state visit to the country.
David Johnston began his professional career as an assistant professor in the Faculty of Law at Queen’s University in 1966, moving to the Law Faculty at the University of Toronto in 1968. He became dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Western Ontario in 1974. In 1979, he was named principal and vice-chancellor of McGill University, and in July 1994, he returned to the McGill Faculty of Law as a full-time professor. In June 1999, he became the fifth president of the University of Waterloo.
Mr. Johnston has served on many provincial and federal task forces and committees, and he has also served on the boards of a number of public companies. He was president of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada and of the Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universités du Québec. He was the founding chair of the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, chaired the federal government’s Information Highway Advisory Council, and served as the first non-American chair of the Board of Overseers at Harvard University.
He is the author or co-author of 24 books including new editions, holds honorary doctorates from over twenty universities, and has been awarded the Order of Canada (Companion).
Mr. Johnston holds an LL.B. from Queen’s University (1966), an LL.B. from the University of Cambridge (1965), and an AB from Harvard University (1963). While at Harvard, he was twice selected for the All-American hockey team and is a member of Harvard’s Athletic Hall of Fame. His academic specialisations include securities regulation, information technology and corporate law.
He was born in Sudbury, Ontario, and is married to Sharon Johnston. They have five daughters and nine grandchildren.
Sworn in on October 1, 2010, His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston is the 28th governor general since Confederation.
Photo: Sgt Serge Gounin
Click here to read his address at Wits University.
What does a multi-billion rand freight-transport company do when its employees are so busy they don’t have time to solve the systematic problems which can hamstring productivity and growth?
If that company is Transnet, they approach Wits to establish a Transnet Centre of Systems Engineering (TCSE) at the University, where intrinsic issues can be addressed by dedicated project teams and crucial research can be carried out in an academic environment.
The urgency of the problems which Transnet faces and their desire to tackle those problems head-on, as well as their willingness to open the TCSE to other companies, have resulted in a centre which has the scope and resources to become a valuable national asset.
Systems engineering goes to the root of an organisation’s problems. At the same time, it is a holistic way of thinking about those problems.
Transnet has identified a handful of critical areas that need attention. One such area is operational efficiency, which spans a multitude of issues, including train turn-round times, improved scheduling of train drivers, optimal fleet size and positioning of assets, and more environmentally friendly operations within port terminals. Wits, in collaboration with an extensive network of expertise, has the necessary range to address these issues in a multi-disciplinary manner.
The idea for the Centre was born four years ago, when Transnet proposed a chair. Wits came back with a design for a centre focused on systems engineering that would bring together academia and industry.
The Centre started operating in August 2012, under the Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment. The first appointment was the Director, Rudolph Louw, former Director of the National Aerospace Centre at Wits. “We have an extremely positive relationship with Transnet. They realise they’ve got challenges and they welcome help,” says Louw.
Problems which emerge from Transnet’s experience are tackled on a project basis, and each project team comprises members who are selected according to the expertise needed. Longer term research problems are tackled by Wits (and other) postgrads, postdocs and other staff members who fall under an autonomous Chair of Systems Engineering, operating within the conventional Faculty structures. This Chair is currently occupied by Prof. Ian Jandrell, former Head of School of Electrical and Information Engineering.
The Director reports to a board chaired by Wits University and comprising senior representatives from Transnet, Wits and industry. An advisory panel of acknowledged experts meets regularly to advise the Director and provide short-term guidance on an on-going basis.
Although the engineering skills that Transnet requires to achieve its goals cover a wide spectrum, including mechanical, electrical, software, civil and industrial engineering, the effectiveness and efficiency of operations as a whole are paramount. This is where systems engineering comes in – the concept that the whole should exceed the sum of its parts.
This concept could be strengthened in other industries as well, and according to Louw: “The nice thing about Transnet is they’re visionary – they’re not claiming the Centre for themselves, they’re encouraging us to take it to other companies like Eskom and to engage with other universities and research institutions.”
Rural Health Week 21-24 May 2013
- By Wits University
The Wits Faculty of Health Science invites you to the annual Wits Centre for Rural Health Seminar entitled Our missing link? Impacting health outcomes through training health professionals.
This forms part of the annual Rural Health Week, hosted by the Centre to discuss issues pertaining to rural health in South Africa and exchange ideas with peers on how to manage it better. .
The Wits Faculty of Health Sciences has a long and proud history of training high quality professionals for South Africa and for being a leader in medical education, research and service. We assume this will have a major impact on the health of our nation. Have we stopped however to examine what impact our training does indeed have on the health outcome of the communities we serve or the society as a whole, or the impact on the lives of our students? Is this a missing link in our programmes? It is hoped that hearing what one much less-resourced school in the Philippines has achieved may stimulate us in this country to consider the impact of our training more carefully.
The keynote speakers at the seminar are Prof. Fortunato Cristobal, Dean of the Ateneo de Zamboanga University School of Medicine in the Philippines, and Dr John Michale Dellariarte, a graduate of the Ateneo de Zamboanga University School of Medicine.
Prof. Cristobal’s School has had a significant impact on the health outcomes of this region, in the troubled southern part of the country. A practising paediatrician, Prof. Cristobal has led the development of this values-driven, socially accountable school, which has reversed the national trends of health professional migration, despite minimal resources.
Dr Dellariarte graduated from the Ateneo de Zamboanga University School of Medicine in 2012, and will offer a student perspective of the training experience. With a pre-medical degree from political science, Dr Dellariarte has been active in leadership and engagement during his years as a medical student.
Everyone welcome to attend. The seminar takes place on Wednesday, 22 May 2013 at 17:30 for 18:00 in the Adler Museum, Wits Faculty of Health Sciences, 7 York Road, Parktown. RSVP: Siwe.Dlamini@wits.ac.za on (011) 717-2131.
Building to boost health capacity
- By Wits University
The Faculty of Health Sciences at Wits University is a key partner in the broad strategy by government to improve the delivery of healthcare services to the country. As such, the Faculty of Health Sciences is steadily increasing its annual intake of students at all levels.
In an effort to meet the ever increasing demand from students for professional degrees, Wits University is continuing to expand its facilities. In line with this comes the recent purchase by the University of the former Human Rights Building in Parktown, which will now become the Phillip V Tobias Health Sciences Building. The rationale behind the name is to continue the legacy of Professor Emeritus Phillip V Tobias, who dedicated over 50 years of his life to the Faculty and was a notable defender of human rights.
Apart from his contribution to teaching and human rights awareness, Professor Tobias was one of South Africa's most honoured and decorated scientists, and a world leading expert on human prehistory. He was nominated three times for a Nobel Prize, received numerous honorary doctorates and had been awarded South Africa's Order for Meritorious Service. He published over 600 journal articles and authored or co-authored 33 books.
The new Phillip V Tobias building will permit the consolidation of many of the Faculty’s functions, thereby releasing additional space for both research and teaching facilities within the existing Medical School building.
“In a time of economic challenge and global competition for philanthropy, the fundraising to support South Africa’s great universities has been most encouraging. This reflects an understanding of the need for sustained investment in teaching and research to remain cornerstones of Wits’ excellence and ability to seed the nation with hugely-needed healthcare professionals. However, an additional R15 million is required to complete the project and I would like to issue a plea to philanthropists to donate to this worthy cause,” says the Dean of the Faculty, Professor Ahmed A Wadee.
The Faculty already has an overall 85% to 95% pass rate per year of study. “This bears testament to the success of our mentoring and tutoring programmes, and is the foundation of our high pass rate,” explains Professor Wadee.
Professor Wadee says: “Professor Tobias left a legacy of his students being his family. We believe that a consolidated student facility in the new building- a place students can call their own – would have delighted him.”
The Phillip V Tobias Building Project has a total budget of R65 million. The project has already generated much support and only R15 million is needed from the private sector and individual investors in order to complete renovations by October 2013.
A group of international scientists, including a Wits researcher, have made the first discovery where all three of the middle ear ossicles have been found in one fossil hominin skull. The discovery of these tiny bones shows a mixture of ape-like and human-like features and represents some of the rarest of fossils that can be discovered.
Dr Darryl de Ruiter, from the Department of Anthropology Texas A&M University in the US as well as from the Evolutionary Studies Institute at Wits University, and his colleagues published their findings this week in an article in the scientific journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS).
According to their paper, entitled Early hominin auditory ossicles from South Africa, the complete ossicular chain (malleus, incus, and stapes) were discovered in a skull of a hominin believed to be about 1.9 million years old and found in the Swartkrans cave in the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site near Johannesburg in South Africa. The skull belongs to a Paranthropus robustus hominin and they also report on additional ear ossicles from Australopithecus africanus.
The paper states the researchers found the malleus in both early hominin taxa to be “clearly human-like in the proportions of the manubrium and corpus, whereas the incus and stapes resemble African and Asian great apes more closely. A deep phylogenetic origin is proposed for the derived malleus morphology, and this may represent one of the earliest human-like features to appear in the fossil record. The anatomical differences found in the early hominin incus and stapes, along with other aspects of the outer, middle, and inner ear, are consistent with the suggestion of different auditory capacities in these early hominin taxa compared with modern humans.”
De Ruiter says the discovery is important for two reasons. “First, ear ossicles are fully formed and adult-sized at birth, and they do not undergo any type of anatomical change in an individual lifetime. Thus, they are a very close representation of genetic expression. Second, these bones show that their hearing ability was different from that of humans – not necessarily better or worse, but certainly different.”
“They are among the rarest of fossils that can be recovered,” de Ruiter adds.
“Bipedalism (walking on two feet) and a reduction in the size of the canine teeth have long been held to be ‘hallmarks of humanity’ since they seem to be present in the earliest human fossils recovered to date. Our study suggests that the list may need to be updated to include changes in the malleus as well.”
(The team’s research was funded by the National Research Foundation of South Africa, and by the Ray A. Rothrock Fellowship at Texas A&M.)
Read the paper
About De Ruiter:
De Ruiter, a palaeoantropologist at the Evolutionary Science Institute at Wits, was also part of a team of Wits and international researchers who recently published a series of papers in Science magazine that demonstrate how close Australopithecus sediba lies to the ancestry of Homo sapiens.
De Ruiter is a ‘Ray A. Rothrock’ Fellow in the College of Liberal Arts at Texas A&M and an Honorary Reader in the Institute for Human Evolution of the University of the Witwatersrand.
He has excavated at nearly every hominin fossil cave in South Africa, spanning the middle Pliocene to the late Pleistocene, and he currently directs two fossil exploration projects in the Free State.
He has published extensively on the hominins of South Africa, including both craniodental and postcranial remains. De Ruiter is the lead craniodental specialist on the Malapa Research Project, and is responsible for the analysis of the cranium, jaws and teeth of the newly discovered Australopithecus sediba fossils.
In addition to his research into the anatomy of the hominins, De Ruiter has also explored the ecology of both the hominins and the animal paleocommunities that accompany them. He has published more than 50 scientific papers in high impact journals such as Science, Nature, the American Journal of Physical Anthropology and the Journal of Human Evolution.
Brazil launches $16 billion for innovation
- By Kanina Foss
Brazil has made a massive $16.6 billion available for innovation. The money will be dispersed by FINEP (Research and Projects Financing, also known as the Brazilian Innovation Agency).
On Monday, 29 April 2013, the President of FINEP, Prof. Glauco Arbix, delivered a presentation at Wits during which he discussed how the plan was the next logical step in Brazil's economic success story. Brazil is unique among the BRIC countries because it is both growing its economy and lowering inequality – the kind of innovation-driven economic growth that post-apartheid SA so desperately needs.
The money will be given in the form of credit, economic subvention, equity and grants (to research institutions). The higher the technological risk, the better the credit terms.
Key investment areas will be areospacial, energy, pre-salt oil, renewables, second generation ethanol, ICTs, health, and social technologies (generic name to group technologies that do not relate directly to industry such as assistive technologies for disadvantaged people).
The event also saw the launch of Prof. Arbix's contribution to the Gauteng City-Region Observatory's Provocation series, titled .
You described the change as happening over the last decade. I’m sure there were investments that created momentum. You’ve also mentioned the Lula administration which perhaps was absolutely pivotal in creating the coherence, common direction and intention which we seem to struggle with. But the speed of change and the ability to establish at a high national level a certain common direction is what really comes through. Listen to response
SA and Brazil’s policy trajectories seem to mirror each other: Is it just a question of time, or is there something else that explains the differences in the economic realities of the two countries? Listen to response
Yebo Gogga Yebo amaBlomo thrills
- By Wits University
The annual Yebo Gogga Yebo amaBlomo exhibition currently underway at Wits is proving to be more than an adventure into the hidden world, offering a range of lessons.
Brooke Tucker and her three children are among today’s visitors at the animal and plant exhibition. For her, the two-floor exhibition which allows revellers to get up-close and personal with nature is a wonderful opportunity to supplement her home-schooled children’s education. Having moved to South Africa only a year ago, the Wits trip is not only a lesson in life sciences but builds on her Johannesburg experience.
Since the opening of the exhibition on Wednesday, 8 May 2013, the School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences has hosted hundreds of visitors. A large majority of these are learners and teachers from Johannesburg schools and crèches with the early part of each day seeing the most number of visitors.
Grade 10 learners from Queens High School in Bezuidenhout Valley could be seen furiously taking down notes as they moved from one exhibition to the next seeping information from the experts manning the desks. Non-believers in the existence of dinosaurs, Sarah Milikwini, Joy Olanrewaju and Ketsia Luneko, had their views shattered upon encountering a model of gorgonopsian, a mammal-like reptile found in South Africa and lived over 255 million years ago.
The Yebo Gogga Yebo amaBlomo exhibition is a unique annual Johannesburg event that brings animals and plants together under one roof complete with tailor-made talks from experts, making it a fun and educational experience for kids and nature lovers of all ages. Over 30 exhibitors are part of this showcase concluding on Sunday, 12 May 2013.
Equally excited and caught in the buzz of the learning experience are Wits senior students who have committed their time to support the event by acting as tour guides or sharing their areas of interest with the public.
Maitse Monye, a third year zoology and ecology student has renewed respect for the teaching profession having been faced with inquisitive minds and some disengaged learners at his desk.
“I’ve seen three different categories of learners – those who know about termites from home because of their surroundings; those who have learnt about them from discovery channels; and those who are uninformed and underexposed to nature,” he says.
His guests have given him much think about and some which he says could be research questions at postgraduate level.
While many of the lessons are academic, for the group manning the welcome area, their discussion ranges from which are better to manage – girl or boy groups; and some are life lessons on whether they should have kids or not having got a taste of adult responsibility.
Since its launch Yebo Gogga has proved to be a success with over 8 000 visitors and 26 schools flocking to the show annually. The interactive exhibition provides an educational and social outreach service to the Gauteng community by addressing shortfalls in teaching life sciences at schools by means of the provision of live animals and plants which form an interactive framework round a theme and thus an educational situation for learners that is not encountered in the classroom. This year's theme is Underground and is going deep below teh surface to familiarise visitors with the earth's inhabitants.
This interactive exhibition is a joint effort by the School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences at Wits University; Johannesburg based societies, government and environmental organisations.
Opening times:
09:00 - 16:00 Weekdays
10:00 - 16:00 Weekend
Venue: Oppenheimer Life Sciences Building, East Campus, Wits University
More info: www.wits.ac.za/YeboGogga
2013 YEBO GOGGA YEBO AMABLOMO DISPLAYS
Secret spiders underground by Spider Club of SA
Secret Life of Biological Control Agents by BIOCONTROL – AP&ES
Asbestos : Wonder Fibre –Serial Kiler; Adler Museum
Underwater World by Abby’s Aquarium
Undercover Agents, insects of medical importance by Medical Entomology
Journey to the Centre of the Earth by School of Geosciences
Life under the microscope by School of Molecular and Cell Biology
Conserving wildlife: inspiring the world by Free Me Wild Life
Wild About legs by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Low Down on Cockroaches by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Goggas from the past by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Secrets from the Underground by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
To the power of Slime by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Earthworm Mother nature’s recyclers by Earthworm Buddies
Don’t go underground, take action by CoAction Group
Underground Treasures by City Parks
Cared for Underground: Only to Fly free by Lepidopterist Society of SA
Water: Under US, Over US, All Around by Rand Water
Nature’s Prehistoric Giants by RhinoSA
Buried Treasure-plant style by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Finding the Past Underground by School of Geosciences
Animals dig the Zoo by Johannesburg Zoo
Go underground for the Small Five by SANPARKS Honorary Rangers
Let us Take you on an underground Trip by Delta Park Environmental Centre
Bad Buddies – Animal parasites by National Zoological Gardens
Low Down and Underground by Snake City
The Buzz Underground by Southern Beekeepers Association
Trees- an underground movement by Grow-A-Tree
Trees Grow underground by Tree Society of SA
Underground protectors by Gauteng Conservancy and Stewardship Association
Amphibians, a wet life by Life Sciences Museum, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences (APES)
Farewell to a legal legend
- By Wits University
Wits University and the Chaskalson family recently paid tribute to the late Honourable Justice Arthur Chaskalson, who passed away in December.
Chaskalson was a Wits alumnus and a stalwart of our country, and his legacy as a respected jurist, as an international leader and as an architect of the South African Constitution, will benefit future generations just as we have reaped the gains of his contribution to our democracy. He was renowned for his insightful and astute perspectives on the law and for not wavering in his quest for justice. The world has lost a legend and our country is a poorer place without Justice Chaskalson, who was a dear friend of Wits.
At the memorial, attended by the Chaskalson family, the Wits Community, Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke, Advocate George Bizos, and various friends and colleagues from the legal fraternity paid tribute to Chaskalson.
Read the tribute by Prof. Loyiso Nongxa, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of Wits,
Read the tribute by Muzi Sikhakhane, Group Leader of the Victoria Mxenge Group of Advocate,
To read more about Justice Chaskalson and his involvement with Wits, visit the Historical Papers' website here
Evolutionary Studies Institute launched
- By Erna van Wyk
Wits University has launched a global hub to study the origins of species and firmly establish the University as one of the world leaders in the palaeosciences.
Combining the strengths of the Institute for Human Evolution, the Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, and many allied disciplines - palaeontology, palaeoanthropology, molecular biology, genetics, geosciences, archaeology, geography, biology, ecology and climatology – the new Evolutionary Studies Institute (ESI) aims to expand and extend South Africa’s position as the global leader in the palaeosciences.
Launched on Wednesday, 29 May 2013, the ESI will be an international training centre, a magnet for leading academics, and the center of South African efforts to develop a prosperous palaeotourism industry.
Prof. Bruce Rubidge, first Director of the ESI, said the establishment of the Institute was a long term dream of outgoing Vice-Chancellor and Principal, Prof. Loyiso Nongxa. Officially opening the ESI was also the last public event Nongxa oversaw as his term ended on 31 May, 2013.
“This event will always be a reminder of your (Nongxa’s) vision to successfully create a centralised palaeontological research institute at Wits and one that is a global leader in this field. We will ensure that, with our strong national and international collaboration, we will continue to break new palaeontological ground,” Rubidge said in his tribute to Nongxa.
In his address, Nongxa said he was grateful to Wits palaeontologists for the “education” he has received from them on the origins of life on earth. “Growing up in the mountains of the Eastern Cape I was aware of the rock art found there. When I first came to Wits, I knew very little about fossils but you gave me an aspect of my identity in terms of where I come from,” he said. To listen to his full address, click
Establishing the ESI has been a long process in the making. “The fossil wealth and long rock record of South Africa goes back more than 3 billion years and is uniquely expansive for any one country. Many internationally significant fossil discoveries have been made in our country. I am extremely proud that Wits has played an important role in developing this story as well as the advancement and dissemination of palaeontological knowledge in Southern Africa,” Rubidge said. Click to listen to Rubidge relaying the history of palaeosciences at Wits.
Wits owns some of the most important fossil hominid sites in the world and played a key role in having the Cradle of Human Kind declared a World Heritage Site.
The University has large and internationally-acclaimed fossil collections of ancient dinosaurs, therapsid mammal-like reptiles, plants and fossil hominids. Its recorded discoveries include that of the oldest dinosaur eggs and nests, the earliest sauropod dinosaurs, description of Australopithecus africanus (Taung skull) in 1925, and the discoveries of Australopithecus sediba and “Little Foot”.
The ESI will be the hub of multidisciplinary research programmes that map the history of life on Earth through the fossil record, while also exploring the driving mechanisms of biodiversity changes though time.
It is also one of six prestigious, multi-disciplinary 21st Century Research Institutes being established in areas the University has a special research niche and a notable scientific, geographical, sociological or historical edge: the City Institute; the Global Change and Sustainability Research Institute; the Institute for Wellbeing and Development; the Sydney Brenner Institute for Molecular Bioscience; and the Wits Mining Research Institute.
21st Century Institutes will have as their primary focus the production of research of the highest quality. Based on large-scale, multi-disciplinary and complex questions, they will seek to influence the world through generating new knowledge, influencing policy, building strategic partnerships and leading society. Read more about the new Institutes here
More eyes needed to address challenges
- By Erna van Wyk
From famine to pollution; temperature increases to population explosion. Remote sensing has become an indispensable tool for governments, aid agency, scientists, researchers, policy makers and many others to address global issues with.
The need for experts in this field has also increased rapidly in the last few decades.
Dr Michel Verstraete, a physicist and researcher at the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) in Italy, currently researches the quantitative characterization of land surfaces using remote sensing techniques in the optical domain. He is one of the international scholars to visit Wits University this year as part of the University’s Distinguished Scholars Programme and he is being hosted by the Global Change and Sustainability Institute at Wits.
During his three week visit he will be passing on his expertise in the field of remote sensing and he will also be returning to Wits later this year to stimulate discussion and help establish interdisciplinary curricula around remote sensing. While here, Verstraete will be helping honours, masters and doctoral students to conceptualise projects and will be working across various fields to identify opportunities for collaborations between various disciplines.
As an introduction to remote sensing, Verstraete presented a lunchtime lecture in the Biology Building on Monday, 20 May 2013. His lecture, entitled Environment Monitoring from Space, focused on why remote sensing from space is important and how it is used to research and address various global problems, such as temperature increases, draughts, floods, fire, biodiversity destruction, pollution and population increases.
Remote sensing is the use of an instrument, such as a satellite, to scan an object to collect information about it.
The lecture – attended by among others physicists, environmentalists, biologists, food security as well as climate experts – highlighted that remote sensing is a much more technical field of study and is not only about looking at images, but more importantly, it is how the data collected with remote sensing techniques are interpreted and used to solve problems.
“Remote sensing is not about images and maps. To make effective use of the data, one has to look at it scientifically. The biggest problem with remote sensing is interpreting the data. That is where we need you,” Verstraete told the academics and students from various Schools at Wits.
He said remote sensing is a field that needs the expertise of physicists, mathematicians, biologists, chemists, engineers, computer scientists, teachers, journalists, geographers, economists, sociologists, and many other disciplines.
The benefits of remote sensing from space are huge. Verstraete explained that it provides a large, global, hemispherical coverage of an area; it provides adequate temporal coverage over decades; it gives researchers access to remote and dangerous places from space which are not reachable from the ground; and is a systematic and predictable observation over a long distance with few instruments, making it cost-effective.
“If you are invested in environmental issues, remote sensing is a good field to work in,” he added.
Verstraete also highlighted that technology is increasingly being developed at a faster rate and scientists need to keep up with the advancement. “Using the data collected will be more complex in the future and we need to acquire systems in countries that can fulfill this need,” he said.
This is not the first time Verstraete is in South Africa. In 2011 he was on a sabbatical at the CSIR doing research, teaching and lecturing on advanced remote sensing techniques, as well as fieldwork. Most recently, he has been developing and implementing at the South African National Space Agency (SANSA), a new processing system to generate high-resolution (275 m) land surface products.
Wits in National Geographic
- By Wits University
Congratulations to Prof. Marcus Byrne who has been mentioned in National Geographic Magazine for his research on dung beetles.
Byrne and colleagues from Lund University in Sweden found that dung beetles use their dung balls to stay cool when walking across hot sand.
Silicon booties were critical to experiments. Click to find out why and view the story that appeared in National Geographic.
