UW Data Science Seminar: Nathan Baker

Wednesday, April 26, 2017 3:30 Johnson 102

Nathan Baker, Director of the Advanced Computing, Mathematics, and Data Division at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) and a Visiting Faculty member at Brown University, will be presenting "Uncertainty in Biomolecular Solvation" at this week's Data Science Seminar. The Data Science Seminar is free and open to the public.

Abstract

Solvation-related interactions strongly influence a wide range of biomolecular processes. However, both our models and our information for parameterizing those models are imperfect. This talk will describe strategies for quantifying the uncertainty in biomolecular solvation models and optimizing those models to provide the best possible accuracy and performance. The first part of the talk will describe generalized polynomial chaos methods for quantifying solvation energy uncertainty due to conformational noise and errors in atomic charge and radius parameters. The second part of the talk will outline Bayesian methods for addressing model uncertainty through statistical aggregation of predictions from multiple models.

RESCHEDULED: UW Data Science Poster and Networking Session

Monday, Feb 21, 2017 | 3:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Location: Mary Gates Hall Commons 

The Data Science Poster and Networking Session is an opportunity for the University of Washington campus community and regional partners to present their activities and connect with others engaged in data-intensive discovery.

Are you engaged in research or teaching involving data-intensive discovery - either advancing the methodologies, or putting these methodologies to work in any field of discovery? Does you work require extracting knowledge from large, noisy, or complex datasets? Do you use advanced statistical techniques, advanced data management platforms, or advanced visualization methods in your work? Are you involved in inventing these advanced methods? If so, please register to present your work in this poster session!

Refreshments will be provided for all attendees. . . the costs of poster production will be covered. . . easels will be provided. . . This is an incomparable opportunity to network with others who are advancing the forefront of data-intensive discovery.

For details on poster requirements and further questions click here.

UW Data Science Seminar: Paul Ginsparg

January 18, 2017 3:30 in Johnson 102

Paul Ginsparg, Professor of Physics and Information Science at Cornell University, will be presenting “Adventures in Little Data” at next week’s Data Science Seminar. The Data Science Seminar is free and open to the public.

Abstract

"I will give a very brief sociological overview of the current metastable state of scholarly research communication, and then a technical discussion of the practical implications of literature and usage data considered as computable objects, using arXiv as exemplar. From the physics standpoint, there is a surprising amount of statistical mechanics in text-mining and machine learning."

UW Data Science Seminar: Matthew Salganik

November 16, 2016 3:30 in Johnson 075

Matthew Salganik, Professor of Sociology at Princeton University, will be presenting “Social Research in the Age of Big Data” at this week’s Data Science Seminar. The Data Science Seminar is free and open to the public.

Abstract

The digital age has transformed how researchers are able to study social behavior. These new opportunities mean that the future of social research will involve blending together insights from two communities: social scientists and data scientists. In this talk, I'll begin by describing what I think each community has to contribute and what each community has to learn. Then, I'll focus on this social science/data science hybrid in one particular domain where I see a lot of opportunities: survey research. The talk will conclude with some predictions about the future of social research.

UW Collaborating on $37M Data Science Initiative

Big news for the University of Washington: UW, along with NYU and Berkeley, has been given 5-year, $37.8M award from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to advance the growth of data-intensive discovery across a broad range of fields. It's a huge, cross-institutional and multi-disciplinary effort that will build and explore new data science challenges and environments.

The UW team includes more than a dozen faculty, and is led by Ed Lazowska, Director of the UW eScience Institute. Berkeley's team is led by Saul Perlmutter and NYW's by Yann LeCun.

Fernando Perez from Berkeley has written a good description of his hopes for the project, what he thinks it means and what he thinks it might help solve (hint: it involves more than just data science). 

DataONE Summer Internship Program

Data folks interested in spending part of their summer working on intensive data-and-science-related topics can now apply for one of eight open DataONE internship positions. The internships are available to undergraduates, graduates and post-graduates who have received their masters in the last five years, and there are no restrictions on field of study as long as prospective intern's qualifications and interests match a project. Each intern will be paired with a mentor, who does not have to be in the same location or institution. 2013 project titles include:

- Next Generation Data Environment: Semantically-Enabling the DataONE Metadata Environment
- Ontology Mappings in the Earth and Environmental Sciences
- Evaluation of Ontology Coverage for Curation
- Integrating Data Stories into DataONE Education and Community Engagement Products
- Data Policies for Public Participation in Scientific Research
- Bi-level Metadata Registry Development
- PBase: Provenance as a First-class Citizen in DataONE
- Build Fundamental Components for Provenance-aware Model Exploration, Evaluation, and Benchmarking Cyber-infrastructure Prototype
- A Visualization Tool for Provenance in DataONE

More detail about these topics and the internships is available at www.dataone.org/internships.

Application deadline is March 17th 2013. The internship runs from May 27 - July 26 and interns will receive a stipend of $5,000.

The Data Observation Network for Earth (DataONE) is "a virtual organization dedicated to providing open, persistent, robust, and secure access to biodiversity and environmental data, supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation."

Digital Curation Conference videos online

For those of us who weren't in Amsterdam last month for the 8th International Digital Curation Conference, video for many of the presentations has been posted online: 

Included is UW's Stephanie Wright participating in a panel, "What is a Data Scientist?" She spoke as the Data Librarian, along with Data Steward Louise Corti from the UK Data Archive, Data Publisher Scott Edmunds from Gigascience, and Data Analyst Francine Bennett from Mastodon C. Slides of the presentations are also available, though not from Wright, who spoke without slides. 

Interview with Stephanie Wright #IDCC13

UW's Data Services Coordinator Stephanie Wright will be speaking at the upcoming 8th International Digital Curation Conference in Amsterdam in January 2013. The conference brings together folks who create, manage and use information, and those who research and teach about the curation process. This year's theme, "Infrastructure, Intelligence, Innovation: driving the Data Science Agenda," has invited speakers from around the globe to discuss issues such as stewardship in the marine sciences, data stories from the business world, supporting data-intensive research, and many others.

In preparation for her participation in the symposium, titled "What is a Data Scientist?," the conference organizers interviewed Wright and asked her opinion on pressing issues, her thoughts of types of data, and more. Follow the conference January 14-16 via #idcc13.