The Royal Society of Tasmania

The advancement of knowledge

Science Week – Dr Barbara Holland @ Beaker St

Friday 16 August – Main Stage Seating open from 8:25pm

Dr Barbara Holland and Meow-Ludo Meow Meow
With MC Mark Horstman

 

In TMAG’s Central Gallery

 

Presented by The Royal Society of Tasmania

 

 

 

Dr Barbara Holland, UTAS – 8:45pm

Why be Happy When You Can be NORMAL?

 

What is normal anyway? Any good statistician will be able to tell you the answer. Normal is a distribution. The normal distribution holds a famous spot in statistics due to the Central Limit Theorem which, in layman’s terms, explains why bell-shaped curves are so ubiquitous in describing a wide range of phenomena. Back in the good old days of the 19th Century, the normal distribution went by the name “Law of the Frequency of Error.” Indeed, one of the things the normal distribution should be able to explain is the behaviour of polls and how accurate their predictions should be. In this talk, Barbara will discuss what our faithful friend the normal distribution can tell us about why polls should work and try to give some insight into why they failed so spectacularly at the last election!

 

About the Speaker:
Dr Barbara Holland is an Associate Professor in the discipline of Mathematics within the School of Natural Sciences at the University of Tasmania. She works within the Theoretical Phylogenetics research group and lectures in Statistics. Since beginning her PhD she has enjoyed the challenge of working with biologists in trying to translate the problems they face into the language of mathematics.

Click on the Beaker Street link here for more information and booking details

National Science Week – Beaker Street (Hobart)

Friday 16 August & Saturday 17 August
6:00pm – Midnight.

Hobart Town Hall and TMAG.

The Australian Academy of Science is a proud partner of BeakerStreet@TMAG.

 

You are invited to join the Academy for four fascinating talks at Hobart Town Hall, featuring Academy Fellows, Professor Martina Stenzel, Dr Steve Rintoul, Professor Jenny Graves, Professor Mike Archer and Robyn Williams. Following each talk, all guests are invited (and musically escorted!) across the road to Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery for more science, including talks, workshops, art, music, food, bars and more. Tickets to each talk are sold separately. Check www.beakerstreet.com.au for details and tickets.

 

Friday 16 August 

5.30pm: Professor Martina Stenzel – The chemistry of life

6.30pm: Dr Steve Rintoul in conversation with Professor Robyn Williams – Ice, wind and waves: In search of climate clues in the Southern Ocean

7.30pm: Professor Jenny Graves in conversation with Professor Robyn Williams – The future of men?

8.30pm: Professor Mike Archer – Bringing back the dead: why extinction should not have to be forever.

 

About Beaker St:

During National Science Week in Hobart, BeakerStreet@TMAG is a pop-up science bar, a parlour of curiosities, an inn for inquiring minds. Come along to quench your thirst…for knowledge. You will encounter live music, zoological oddities, photographic inspiration, amiable wandering scientists, seriously good food and drink, and such a bounty of distractions that you may forget to go home. Entry at TMAG is free, but tickets must be purchased for some events.

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Friday 16 August & Saturday 17 August
6:00pm – Midnight
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery

August at TMAG – Marley Large

The Royal Society of Tasmania

Presents

Marley Large

Snapshots of 175 Years of The Royal Society of Tasmania’s Minutes

A Public Lecture  – 6  August 2019

8.00pm in the Royal Society Room,
Customs House Building, TMAG, entrance from Dunn Place. 

 

 

Over the last year, Marley has researched several topics in the Royal Society of Tasmania’s archives. Along the way, she discovered various unexpected and often exciting twists and turns and went down many irrelevant but highly enjoyable rabbit holes. The result is a wealth of information, sometimes scientific and sometimes quirky, about individuals, developmental events, social issues, infrastructure and innovation that made a significant difference in Tasmania.

 

 

 

 

 

Science Week – Breaking New Ground (Launceston)

 

The Royal Society of Tasmania

INVITES YOU TO

Breaking New Ground

PUBLIC PRESENTATIONS BY

University of Tasmania PhD Candidates

 

 

.

This a FREE event, presented as part of NATIONAL SCIENCE WEEK

Venue: Auditorium, QVMAG at Inveresk

Time: 1.30 pm Sunday 11 August 2019

 

 

 

Microbiome: The new clinical frontier

Ravichandra Vemuri’s project is a collaboration between the UTAS, CSIRO (Brisbane),and UAS labs (a USA probiotic company) With ageing, the gut microbiota develops significant imbalances affecting host metabolism and overall health.Dietary supplementation with probiotics could beneficially change gut microbiota and metabolism. Ravi’s project is primarily focused on investigating the influence of probiotics on gut microbiota and metabolic profiles in ageing mice, and potential implications in humans.

 

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The Socio-Ecology of Wildlife Conservation on Private Land

Matt Taylor is researching the socio-ecology of wildlife conservation on private land. He has Interviewed landholders to capture their views about wildlife management, and organised 160 of them into using wildlife cameras and other technologies to collect information. His research aims to empower communities to become involved in scientific enquiry about matters relevant to the management of wildlife on their own land. Matt’s study is a partnership between UTAS and the Tasmanian Land Conservancy, where he works as an ecologist.

 

Changes in the surface waters of the Southeast Pacific and beyond

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Rachael Sanders is a PhD student at the British Antarctic Survey and University of Southampton, UK, which has funded a three-month internship at UTAS. Her research focuses on how the surface of the Southern Ocean is changing due to changes in the amount of sea ice and the strength of the winds around Antarctica.

 

 

 

Living long or living well: dilemmas older people face when considering dialysis

Rajesh Raj is a full-time nephrologist at Launceston General Hospital. He is studying the factors which affect the outcome of dialysis for older patients with kidney failure, as not enough is known about the impact of dialysis on quality of life. His research aims to identify information clinicians can use to help the elderly choose treatment options or to improve outcome after they have started therapy.

 

 

 

Generously supported by

 

 

July at QVMAG – Prof Hallegraeff

2019 Launceston Lecture Series

 

The Royal Society of Tasmania 

 

INVITES YOU TO

 

Harmful Algal Blooms in the Australian Region

 

A PUBLIC LECTURE BY

 

Professor Gustaaf Hallegraeff

 

Venue: Meeting Room, QVMAG at Inveresk, Launceston
Time: 1.30 pm Sunday, 28 July 2019
Admission is free for members of the Royal Society of Tasmania*
$6 for general admission, and
$4 for students, QVMAG Friends, and members of Launceston Historical Society.

(*membership forms available at the door)

 

 

 

While microalgal blooms are natural phenomena, since the 1980s their impacts on public health, tourism and fisheries have increased in frequency, intensity and geographic distribution. Environmental agencies and aquaculture are increasingly forced to invest in improved technologies for monitoring for an increasing number of harmful algal species in water, and increasing complexity of algal toxins in seafood. Climate change is calling for increased vigilance in seafood safety.

 

Gustaaf Hallegraeff is a Professor at the Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies, University of Tasmania. He has worked on a wide range of Harmful Algal Bloom issues including shellfish toxins, climate change, ship’s ballast water and fish-killing algae. He is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences and Engineering, winner of the 2004 Eureka Prize for Environmental Research, and 2014 Lifetime Achievement Award by the International Society for the Study of Harmful Algae.

 

 

 

 

Generously supported by 

Joint meeting with Geological Society at QVMAG

2019 Launceston Lecture Series

 

The Royal Society of Tasmania

  and

The Geological Society of Australia

 

INVITE YOU TO A JOINT MEETING AND PUBLIC LECTURE BY

 

Dr Claire Kain

Hazards of Flooding and Flood Modelling for Northern Tasmania

 

Venue: Meeting Room, QVMAG at Inveresk, Launceston
Time: 1.30 pm Sunday, 14 July 2019
Admission is free for members of the Royal Society of Tasmania and Geological Society of Australia
$6 for general admission, and
$4 for students, QVMAG Friends, and members of Launceston Historical Society.

 

 

The storm events of 2011 and 2016 led to severe flooding and sediment movement across northern Tasmania. During both events, the Westmorland Stream alluvial system at Caveside (near Mole Creek) was affected by debris flows and flash flooding, which threatened nearby residents and farming operations. A multidisciplinary study was undertaken to understand the hydrogeomorphic functioning of this system. The findings of this study have wider implications for the estimation of debris flow and flood hazard in Tasmania and elsewhere.

 

.Dr Kain is employed as a Natural Hazards Geologist at Mineral Resources Tasmania, working on understanding the risk and effects of hazards such as landslides, floods, debris flows and tsunamis in Tasmania. Originally from New Zealand, she has worked in the natural hazards field since 2008. After finishing her PhD at the University of New South Wales she moved to Tasmania three years ago.

 

 

 

Generously supported by

July at TMAG – Vision Zero

The Royal Society of Tasmania

presents

Garry Bailey

Vision Zero: Road Safety in Tasmania

 

Tuesday, 2 July 2019

8.00pm on the RST Rooms,

Customs House Building, Dunn Place, Hobart

 

 

Garry Baily, as chair of the Road Safety Advisor Council (RSAC) will present a lecture on their “vision zero” – working towards reducing the number of serious casualties associated with road accidents. The public have a seemingly high tolerance of serious road casualties, with an average of 35 people killed, and 260 injured annually in Tasmania. If this incidence of deaths and injuries happened in one place or time, it would no doubt led to public outcry, and demands for something to be done. The RSAC is implementing a range of initiatives and systems that underpin the Towards Zero strategy, which aims to change people’s perceptions about speeding.

 

Road Safety Advisory Council chair, Garry Bailey, has more than 45 years’ experience as a media professional. He held senior management positions with Davies Brothers Pty Ltd, publisher of the leading Tasmanian newspapers, The Mercury and the Sunday Tasmanian, for 30 years and was editor from November 2001 to January 2012. He has had an enduring interest in road safety, leading a series of campaigns in his time as editor of both newspapers. Garry continued that commitment as the Tasmanian advocate for Bicycle Network from 2014 to 2017 and as a member of the RACT’s southern advisory committee. Since leaving newspapers, he has been a broadcaster with the ABC, a media and communications consultant, a foundation member of the advisory board for the 26Ten adult literacy organisation, is on the board of the not-for-profit disability service provider Nexus, and was an inaugural member of the Tamar Valley Writers Festival committee.

June Lecture at QVMAG – Prof. Ross Large

2019 Launceston Lecture Series

 

 

The Royal Society of Tasmania

Presents

The Rhythms of Earth and Life through Time

A Public Lecture by  

Professor Ross Large AO

 

 

Venue: Meeting Room, QVMAG at Inveresk, Launceston
Time: 1.30 pm Sunday, 23 June 2019
Admission is free for members of the Royal Society of Tasmania
$6 for general admission, and
$4 for students, QVMAG Friends, and members of Launceston Historical Society.

 

 

This talk by challenges the Darwinian concept that evolution is a random process. Professor Large outlines recent research on the trace element composition of sedimentary pyrite that demonstrates that the chemistry of the oceans and atmosphere has varied significantly through geological time in a rhythmic fashion, which has greatly influenced the course of evolution on Earth. The rhythms, which are ultimately driven by super continent cycles and mountain building events, have sped up through time, and not only control evolutionary events, but also the variation of atmosphere oxygen and mass extinction events.

 

Ross Large is an Emeritus Distinguished Professor of Geology at the University of Tasmania. He gained his BSc (Hons) from the University of Tasmania in 1969, PhD from University of New England in 1973, and an Honorary Doctor of Engineering from the University of Lulea, Sweden. Ross has published over 130 scientific papers and is internationally recognised for his research on the genesis of ore deposits and relationships to Earth evolution. He has won many awards during his career the most recent being the 2016 Eureka prize for interdisciplinary research, and the 2018 Medal of the Royal Society of Tasmania. He was awarded an Order of Australia in 2019. Ross is the current President of the Royal Society of Tasmania and the immediate past chair of the Tasmanian Division of The Academy of Technology and Engineering.

 

 

This event is generously supported by  

Revival of Tasmanian Aboriginal language – June at TMAG

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 2019 is the International Year of Indigenous Language

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Theresa Sainty and Annie Reynolds 

present

  palawa kani  – The revival of Tasmanian Aboriginal language

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Tuesday, 4  June 2019
  8.00pm in the Royal Society Room,
Customs House Building, entrance from Dunn Place, Hobart

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From the flourishing possibly sixteen original languages spoken in lutruwita (Tasmania), to near extinguishment under post-invasion colonial pressures and sleeping for almost two hundred years, palawa kanihas emerged as the language of Tasmanian Aborigines. It is now fundamental to Aboriginal community activities and family life, with two generations of children having learnt it from infancy.  palawa kaniis shared with the public through renaming of places, and things as varied as a newly discovered squat lobster and the next Antarctic icebreaker. How did this happen? Where does the knowledge of the language come from?  And can it ever be a ‘living’ language, one that is used in daily life?

 

 

Theresa Sainty is a Pakana woman and has been Aboriginal Linguistic Consultant for the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre’s palawa kaniLanguage Program since 1997. Theresa has also worked with the Tasmanian Department of Education, Aboriginal Education Services, developing Aboriginal Cultural Awareness training and a number of curriculum resources about Tasmanian Aborigines. Theresa is current Chair of TMAG’s Tasmanian Aboriginal Advisory Council, and has begun a Senior Indigenous Research Scholarship at UTAS.

 

 

 

 

Annie Reynolds has evolved from graduate studies of Old Norse, Old English and Old Irish in Sydney and Adelaide to coordinating the work of the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre’s  palawa kaniLanguage program statewide since the mid 1990s.  Within the TAC she also conducts historical research and writes and edits a variety of material, mostly for the Aboriginal community.

 

Dr Alison Alexander – May lecture at QVMAG

2019 Launceston Lecture series

 

The Royal Society of Tasmania

INVITES YOU TO

 

Jane Franklin – the Real Founder of the Royal Society of Tasmania

A PUBLIC LECTURE BY

   Dr. Alison Alexander

Sunday 26 May 2019, 1.30 pm
Meeting Room, QVMAG, Inveresk

 

admission free for members of the Royal Society of Tasmania
$6   general admission
$4    for students, QVMAG Friends, and members of Launceston Historical Society

 

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Various people have desired to gain kudos from establishing themselves as the founder of the Royal Society of Tasmania, notably Governor Eardley Wilmot. Alison will argue that Jane Franklin was the real founder, though as a woman with no official status she had to work behind the scenes.

Born and educated in Tasmania, Dr. Alexander has written thirty-three books about Tasmanian history. Her paid career was writing commissioned histories, including Launceston Church Grammar School and the Australian Maritime College. The subjects of her biographies range from romantic writer Marie Bjelke-Petersen to governor’s wife Jane Franklin, this book winning the National Biography Award in 2014. Duck and green peas! Forever! Finding Utopia in Tasmania (2018) is her most recent book.