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Dig Deeper: Careers in International Development Day 2015

 

Careers in International Development Day at the Connelly Center is not your usual job fair – it’s a symposium designed for career exploration and a perfect event for students interested in pursuing careers that address global poverty and related issues. Lindsay Coates, Executive Vice President of InterAction, an alliance of 190 International Non-governmental agencies will open the day at 1:30 p.m. in the Cinema with an overview of the changes, challenges, and opportunities in the field. From 2:30-4:30 p.m. in the Villanova Room, professionals representing a variety of career paths, including the UN, USAID, Social Entrepreneurship, Impact Investing, Global Health and others will meet students in roundtable breakouts (repeating every 30 minutes) to share their professional experience and offer advice on what students need to get a foot in the door. In the Villanova Room Market Stall area, students can meet one-on-one with representatives from graduate programs, post-graduate overseas internship and volunteer opportunities and relevant VU curricular and extra-curricular programs from 2:30-4:30 p.m.

Catholic Relief Services organized and will host the event in partnership with Villanova University, the College of Nursing Center for Global and Public Health, the Villanova School of Business, the VSB Center for Global Leadership, the Career Center, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the College of Engineering, the Office of Mission and Ministry and the Southeastern Pennsylvania Consortium for Higher Education.


Dig Deeper

The library’s collection includes many books, article databases and statistical sources about international development. For the policy wonk, Columbia International Affairs Online includes full-text  case studies, policy briefs, scholarly articles and books. Public Affairs International  Service (PAIS) is an article database covering similar territory. Because international development is truly interdisciplinary, academic research on international development can be found in many specialized databases, such as  PubMed for health, EconLit for economics, and  Compendex or Inspec for engineering.

Since 1990 the United Nations has published the Human Development Report, which identifies trends in development, and the Index, which is a tool used to assess country level development in terms of life expectancy, education and income. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development publishes numerous books and statistical series on development in many dimensions all available in the OECDiLibrary. AidData.org takes a data driven approach to improving outcomes by publishing datasets, visualizations and reports.

Villanovans across the disciplines are engaged in research on various aspects of development aid. Suzanne Toton, EdD, writes about Catholic relief, world hunger and social justice. The writing of Kishor Thanawala, PhD, explores economic development and justice. Latin American Development is the area of expertise of Satya Pattnayak, PhD. Jonathan Doh, PhD, is a prolific researcher on nongovernmental organizations and global corporate responsibility. Christopher Kilby, PhD, is a thought leader on the economics of foreign aid. Ruth McDermott-Levy, PhD, is a practicing nurse, educator and researcher on international community health.

Careers in International Development Day speakers represent a variety of organizations, all with interesting web sites well worth exploring with links below:

Speakers Organizations

Alliance to End Hunger
InterAction
United States Agency for International Development USAID
Doctors Without Borders
Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Center
Catholic Relief Services
Uhl & Associates
TriLinc Global
Oiko Credit
Village Capital

 

Post-Baccalaureate Volunteer Organizations

Acumen
Amigos de Jesus
Augustinian Volunteers
Catholic Volunteer Network
Catholic Relief Services
Jesuit Volunteers
Maryknoll Lay Missioners
Mennonite Central Committee
Mercy Volunteer Corps
Peace Corps
Profugo
Unite for Sight


imagesArticle by Linda Hauck, MS, MBA, business librarian and team coordinator for the Business Research team.

 


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'Caturday: Cool 'Cats

villanova recyclingYou already know that Wildcats are cool, but did you know that Villanova ranked as one of Sierra Magazine‘s 2015 “Cool Schools”? As one of the “greenest colleges and universities in the United States,” Villanova has added a master’s degree program in environmental sciences that begins with the fall 2016 semester.

Father Donahue also signed the St. Francis Pledge “to protect God’s Creation and advocate on behalf of people in poverty who face the hardest impacts of global climate change.” You can find out more about the Pledge on the Catholic Climate Convenant website.

The Library supports that program and that pledge, even now, by providing specialized resources and librarian research and consultation services. Contact Alfred Fry, science librarian, or Robin Bowles, life sciences librarian, to discuss our resources or to make an appointment.


‘Caturday post by Luisa Cywinski, editorial coordinator on the Communication & Service Promotion team and team leader of the Access Services team.


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Pluto—the Second of Two Dwarf Planets Seen at Close Range in 2015

Before New Horizons captured the first-ever detailed images of Pluto this month, it had traveled for nine-and-a-half years to reach the edge of our Solar System. When that spacecraft launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. on January 19, 2006, Pluto was still classified as a planet.

 

Pluto discovered—Clyde Tombaugh, working at the Lowell Observatory in Arizona, discovered Pluto February 18, 1930. But the first such object, albiet smaller than Pluto, had been discovered more than a century earlier.

Ceres discovered—A Catholic priest, Giuseppe Piazzi, who held a PhD in mathematics, was also an astronomer. His catalog of almost 7,000 stars earned him the L’Institut de France prize for “best astronomical work published in 1803” (Barr). On January 1, 1801, while working on his catalog, he discovered an object whose changes in position were more like those of a planet than a star. “Piazzi had found the first [and the largest] of many thousands of ‘asteroids’ or ‘minor planets’ whose orbits lie mainly in a belt between Mars and Jupiter” (Barr).

Eris discovered—The next such discovery, after that of Pluto, came more than two centuries later, on October 21, 2003.

 

This sphere, at the Solar System’s limit and orbiting the Sun, was larger than Pluto and had its own moon (Pluto has five known moons). This find begged the question: If Pluto is a planet, how could this larger globe, Eris, not also be considered a planet?

Haumea discovered—Its discovery was officially announced in 2005.

Makemake discovered—The International Astronomical Union officially recognized Makemake as a dwarf planet in 2008.

More dwarf planets?—Scientists have estimated that “dozens or even more than 100 dwarf planets” may be awaiting discovery. The likelihood of additional yet-to-be-discovered globes has left astronomers asking, “Just what constitutes a planet?”

 “Planet” (re)defined— At the International Astronomical Union (IAU) General Assembly in Prague, 2006, astronomers “debated vigorously” over the definition of “planet.” They established a definition that would classify Ceres, Pluto, Eris, Makemake and Haumea as “dwarf planets,” leaving our Solar System with eight planets.

 

Why, then, is Pluto the second dwarf planet to be seen at close range in 2015?

Dawn makes history—Earlier this year, another space probe reached another dwarf planet, capturing detailed images and, this time, discovering a mystery. NASA’s Dawn space-probe entered into orbit around Ceres March 6, 2015, becoming “the first mission to achieve orbit around a dwarf planet.” Dawn’s photos revealed “a cluster of mysterious bright spots” on Ceres’ surface, which have intrigued scientists.

 

Father Giuseppe Piazzi would undoubtedly be pleased that his discovery has generated such interest more than two centuries after he identified it.

Works Cited

Barr, Stephen, and Dermott Mullan. “Planets, Priests and a
……..Persistent Myth.” Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition ed.
……..May 22 2015. ProQuest. Web. 15 July 2015. Gerald Dierkes


Check out these Villanova resources for additional information:

The Library’s Astronomy and Astrophysics subject page

Falvey resources on dwarf planets

The Villanova Astronomical Society

The Villanova Public Observatory


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Spotlight on Subject Librarians—Today’s Subject: Science

Spotlight

Think of them as research accelerators,

…………………resource locators,

…………..idea developers,

…….database navigators,

personal coaches …

… we call them “subject librarians.”

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Today’s subject librarian—Science Librarian Alfred Fry

What’s new this year?

AF—We don’t have any new science resources this year, but the Library just hired a new director. I expect there will be a lot of changes.

What are the challenges for science students who want to use the Library? 

AF—Our databases, particularly in chemistry, are very powerful. Although it is very easy to do simple searches, it can be challenging to discover all the advanced features without instruction. Also, many students are familiar with just one database and are unaware of others that would be more appropriate in some situations.

What resources does the Library offer to help science students overcome those challenges? 

AF—Me. I’m happy to teach classes or provide individual or small group instruction.

What do you wish science students knew about you, about the Library? 

AF—I majored in chemistry. Many students know about the subject guides, but I wish more did.

What do you like best about being a librarian? 

AF—Helping students and faculty in all areas, but particularly in science and engineering.

What do you like best about working with Villanova students? 

AF—Villanova students tend to be more patient than students at other places I’ve worked. So, I can take the time to demonstrate the most effective techniques for getting the best results. There are also a few people from the wider Villanova community who have asked very interesting questions.


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Art of Spring Break: See Rare Illustrations that Complement Cortona Painting—A Conservation Update

ARTOFSB
What is the latest news about the conservation of “The Triumph of David,” the large painting attributed to Pietro da Cortona, located in the Reading Room of Falvey Hall (aka Old Falvey)?

Conservation is well under way. The painting has been cleaned, areas where paint is missing have been filled (these are the reddish brown areas visible), the painting has been varnished several times and the conservator,

deGhetaldi

deGhetaldi

Kristin deGhetaldi, and her interns are now in-painting (filling in with color the areas where paint was lost). This in-painting is a slow process, using very soft, fine pointed brushes to make tiny strokes. Thus, you are not likely to see dramatic changes day to day or even week to week.

However, one very obvious change to the room is the addition of a small exhibit housed in two cases, one on each side of the gated entrance to the painting. This exhibit, designed by Laura Bang, Digital and Special Collections curatorial assistant, will remain on display until the conservation of “The Triumph of David” is completed.

In her introduction to the exhibit, Bang explains, “Princess Ruspoli’s adopted daughter, Maria Theresa Droutzkoy, also a princess after marrying a Russian prince in 1945, provided funds for the framing and conservation of “The Triumph of David” in the 1950s. [The painting itself was donated to Villanova University by Princess Ruspoli.] She and her husband, Prince Alexis Droutzkoy, donated some other art to the University at the same time, as well as four books that were donated to the Library’s Special Collections, on display in these cases.”

The two books in the left case are both open to show illustrations. The first book is Catalogue of Paintings Forming the Private Collection of P. A. B. Widener: Ashbourne, Near Philadelphia, written by Aliene Ivers Robinson and published in Paris in 1885. The large black and white illustration shows a man with two horses in an expansive landscape. At the time this catalog was published, it was not possible to print photographs in books, so what is shown is a black and white engraving of the painting.

P.A.B. Widener

P.A.B. Widener

P. A. B. Widener, Peter Arrell Brown Widener (1834-1915), was a wealthy Philadelphia businessman, an art collector and a former Philadelphia city treasurer. His collection included works by Rembrandt van Rijn, Frans Hals, Jan Steen, Edouard Manet and Auguste Renoir. Ashbourne, the residence named in the book’s title, still stands in Elkins Park although it is now called Lynnewood Hall. In 1940 P. A. B. Widener’s sole surviving son, Joseph, donated over 2,000 items from his father’s collection—sculptures, paintings and decorative arts—to the National Gallery of Art.

The Catalogue of Paintings itself was donated to Special Collections in 1961. It is number 17 of an edition of 250. Widener gave this signed book to Aliene Ivers Robinson. One wonders how it made its way into the possession of the Droutzkoys.

plate2
In the same case is volume three of the 12 volume set of Cérmonies Et Coutumes Religieuses De Tous Les Peuples Du Monde: Représentées Par Des Figures Dessinées De La Main De Bernard Picart [Religious Ceremonies and Customs of All the Peoples of the World: Illustrated by Hand Drawn Pictures by Bernard Picart]. The text, in French, is by Jean Frederick Bernard of Amsterdam; the engraved illustrations, as noted in the title, are the work of Bernard Picart. This large volume was published in Paris in 1807.

Picard and Bernard intended to document the rituals and ceremonies of all the religions known at the time. Cérmonies Et Coutumes Religieuses …, volume three, discusses the Greeks and Protestants. It is opened to show text on the right and three illustrations on the left page. Two of the illustrations show ceremonies on Pentecost in The Hague (Netherlands) and Schmerhorn (Germany); the third illustration is titled “The Kings’ Star Carried (or on Parade) through Amsterdam[Netherlands].” The three Kings are likely the Magi. Falvey’s Digital Library has all 12 volumes of this edition digitized.

The series of Cérmonies Et Coutumes was first published between 1723 and 1737. Picart was a famous 18th century engraver. Cérmonies Et Coutumes is the first work undertake such a broad view of the known religions, and it was reprinted several times. Falvey’s set is a later reprint. For the significance of Cérmonies Et Coutumes, see The Book That Changed Europe.

The second case holds two additional books donated by the Droutzkoys: Shelley and Keats As They Struck Their Contemporaries: Notes Partly From Manuscript Sources by Edmund Blunden, and an untitled photograph album. Shelley and Keats … was published as an edition of 310 copies in London in 1925. Falvey’s copy is number five, and it is signed by Blunden, the editor; by the designer, Wyndham Payne; and by the publisher, binder and typographer, Cyril W. Beaumont. Payne also designed the cover, a wallpaper-like pattern, as well as the decoration of the title page. Prince Droutzkoy donated this book in 1960.

The most fascinating book in this small exhibit, for this writer, is the photograph album. Bang says, “This appears to be a photograph album containing original photographs of the city of Florence.” The album is opened to two photographs, one of the Piazza Santa Croce and the other of the cloister of the church of Santa Croce and the Pazzi Chapel designed by Brunelleschi. In the lower left margin of each photograph is “Edizione Brogi.” The photographs seem to be albumen prints.

A bit of research provided additional information: Giacomo Brogi (1822-1881), an Italian photographer, founded a company in Florence which published photographs. In the late 1800s the company employed 85 people. Brogi photographed not only Florence but also other sites in Italy, and he traveled to the Middle East in 1868. Giacomo Brogi had shops in Florence, Naples and Rome.

Carlo Brogi, retrieved from http://www.giacomobrogi.it

Carlo Brogi, http://www.giacomobrogi.it

His son, Carlo Brogi (1850-1920), continued the business after his father died. Carlo Brogi sold both his own and his father’s photographs under the label “Edizione Brogi Firenze.” This writer speculates that the photographs on display date from the 1880s and that the album may have been purchased as a souvenir of someone’s trip in a time, very unlike ours, when few people owned cameras.

One wonders where and when Prince and Princess Droutzkoy acquired these books. And did they purchase them as collector’s items, or did they enjoy them for their aesthetic appeal?

The exhibit will remain on display for the duration of the conservation of “The Triumph of David.” Small though it is, the display is fascinating and well worth a very detailed examination. And if the conservators are working on “The Triumph of David” during your visit, feel free to enter the fenced area for a closer look and to ask questions. The conservators are very gracious about sharing their knowledge.


imagesArticle by Alice Bampton, digital image specialist and senior writer on the Communication and Service Promotion team. 


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Nor’easter vs. Clipper: What’s the Difference Between These Dreaded Winter Storms?

 

We hear these terms on weather reports, but do we really know what they mean? (I certainly didn’t although I remember friends arguing about which way nor’easters move.) Both are storms and both can impact our area. What are they and how do they differ?

A nor’easter (sometimes called a northeaster) forms at sea, within 100 miles of the Atlantic coast. It is named for the direction of the powerful winds that bring these storms ashore. Nor’easters are most common from September through April although they also occur at other times.

Nor’easters, with winds often reaching hurricane-force, make landfall from New England through the mid-Atlantic regions. Unlike hurricanes, nor’easters are not named. These storms bring frigid temperatures, powerful winds, coastal flooding and blizzards. Notable nor’easters include the Great Blizzard of 1888 and the “Perfect Storm” of 1991.

A clipper (more accurately an Alberta Clipper), however, forms inland as a low-pressure system in Alberta, Canada. These winter storms move southeast into the Canadian plains and the Great Lakes before eventually moving off shore into the Atlantic Ocean—sometimes as far south as the Baltimore/Washington area. Clippers bring quick bursts of snow (one to three inches, with more in the mountains), colder temperatures and gusty winds (35-45 mph). Clippers occur most often from December through February.

There we have it: both are primarily winter storms created by low-pressure systems, both occur most often in fall through spring, both bring wind and snow although in different degrees. However, their points of origin are quite different: the clipper develops inland and moves offshore; the nor’easter begins offshore and moves inland. Let’s hope we’ve seen the last of both of these this winter.

Dig Deeper

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
Cambridge Guide to the Weather (2000). Ross Reynolds.
Weather: How It Works and Why It Matters (2000). Arthur R. Upgren.
The Weather Sourcebook: Your One-Stop Resource for Everything You Need to Feed Your Weather Habit (1994). Ronald L. Wagner.


imagesArticle and photos by Alice Bampton, digital image specialist and senior writer on the Communication and Service Promotion team. 


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What We Were Reading in 2014

Though we’re not a public library, sometimes we get asked about what types of items were charged out the most. Of course, those may not always be the most popular items. So, taking a look back at the rapidly fading year 2014, finds the New York Times bestseller, Me Before You by JoJo Moyes, charged out as many times as any of our works. This is followed by perennial favorites, such as the The Holy Bible: New International Version-Containing the Old Testament and the New Testament, Oxford Spanish Dictionary, Mckay’s Modern Italian-English and English-Italian Dictionary, The Grammar Book: an ESL/EFL Teacher’s Course, Advanced Engineering Mathematics, The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution (now also online), Phaedo, Catch-22, Ulysses, Lolita, Beloved: a novel and Catcher in the Rye.

Screenshot 2014-12-12 10.51.18

Popular this year too was the New York Times bestseller Flash Boys, followed by titles such as Gone Girl: a novel, the Gabriel García Márquez novel, El Coronel No Tiene Quien le Escriba, All Names Have Been Changed, Organic Chemistry as a Second Language: First Semester Topics (second semester topics not as popular), Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches (2014), The Fault in Our Stars, and The Laramie Project.

Screenshot 2014-12-12 10.51.45

Popular leisure reading material this year can be summed up in one sentence (more or less): Good News, for the Best of Me, in America’s Great Game, don’t Blink but Would It Kill You to Stop Doing That since 1345, or do you want a Casual Vacancy because you’ll have No Easy Day if you’re an Alchemist, English German Girl or a Racketeer.

Some of the most selected movies this year include perennial favorites like Citizen Kane; Groundhog Day; 2001, A Space Odyssey; and The Tree of Life. Other movies, The Corporation, Taxi to the Dark Side, Adaptation, Nun’s Story and La Jetée Sans Soleil were also charged out several times.

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Very requested subjects and books borrowed through our interlibrary loan and E-ZBorrow services were The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, The Goldfinch: a Novel, and books about counseling, statistics, public speaking and science fiction.

Screenshot 2014-12-12 10.51.56

Happy holidays from all of us to all of you – and we hope Santa puts some of your favorite reading material in your stocking. But if not, you know the first place to visit once you get back on campus! Click here for Christmas and New Year break hours.


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The Library Invites Intellectual Property Lawyer, Statistics Education Director and You to Discuss "Open Access" Issues

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Join us this week for Open Access Week events,
and we welcome your response to our survey below!

Open Access Week is a global event for inspiring the academic community to advance the open-access movement. Open access embraces two key complimentary ideas: scholarship should be freely available on the web, AND it should be free of permission barriers for legitimate uses. The Budapest Open Access Initiative (2002) is probably the most often quoted definition of “open access”:

By “open access” to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.

Since that definition was penned, much progress has been made by individual scholars, universities, scholarly societies, publishers and national and international bodies for making open access to scholarship a reality. So many journals have gone or been established as open access that we need a Directory of Open Access Journals. Furthermore, traditional subscription journal publishers such as Taylor & Frances, Wiley, Springer and Elsevier offer authors fee-based options to make their articles open access, what some might consider an effort to co-opt the open-access movement. Institutional repositories for archiving all forms of scholarship from articles to data and born digital artifacts, many open, have proliferated on campuses big and small around the globe.

Screenshot 2014-10-17 12.55.42

Additionally, open access mandates by funders requiring that the results of research be made publically available for free are becoming the norm (for a database of funder mandates see SHERPA/JUIET).  Faculties at top universities such as Harvard University,  Duke University and the University of California System have adopted institutional  open access policies which typically address depositing scholarship in an institutional repository and granting rights to scholarship (See Coalition of Open Access Policy Institutions.)

Open Access Week is a good time to examine your thoughts on how open access impacts your own scholarly practice and what initiatives you would like to see Villanova University take regarding to open access. The best way to do that is by joining a conversation or by taking our open access survey!

OA-survey-button

Falvey Memorial Library and the Office of Research and Graduate Programs will participate in Open Access Week with two events, both lunch hour brown bag participatory lectures. On Tuesday, Oct. 21, 1-2 p.m., in Falvey room 204, Michael Posner, PhD, director, Center for Statistics Education and Linda Hauck, business liaison librarian, will discuss “Open Data Trends: Policies, Privacy and Preserving Data Integrity.”

Posner, Hauck, Leytes, Fogle

Posner, Hauck, Leytes, Fogle

On Friday, Oct. 24, 1-2 p.m., in room 205, Dina Leytes, practice group chair, Intellectual Property and New Media, at Griesing Law, LLC, and Nikolaus Fogle, subject librarian for philosophy, will discuss “Author Rights: When and How Can You Archive, Share and Own Your Published Work?”

Open Access Week is an international event being held for the eighth time. It provides “an opportunity for the academic and research community to continue to learn about the potential benefits of open access, to share what they’ve learned with colleagues, and to help inspire wider participation in helping to make open access a new norm in scholarship and research.”

To learn more about open access from local viewpoints, attend one or both of the events to be held in Falvey on Oct. 21 and 24.


Article by Linda Hauck, MS, MBA, (pictured) business librarian and team coordinator for the Business Research team.


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‘Cat in the CAVE

CAT-STAX

 I’m Michelle Callaghan, a first-year graduate student at Villanova University. This is our new column, “‘Cat in the Stacks.” I’m the ‘cat. Falvey Memorial Library is the stacks. I’ll be posting about living that scholarly life, from research to study habits to embracing your inner-geek, and how the library community might aid you in all of it.


Today at 2:00, Villanova’s CAVE is officially open. In honor of opening day, this week’s blog post will be all about immersive virtual reality—for those of us who might not even know where to begin thinking about the creative and academic applications of virtual environments.

Disclaimer: I’m not an expert. I’m a virtual reality noob. I’m writing this with no in-depth technical expertise—just a whole lot of geeky excitement. But I do play (and, by way of literary theory, study) video games, and my personal interest in virtual reality’s possible applications is heavily biased towards, well, play. And by “play” I don’t mean to imply the installment is only for entertainment (nor do I think its entertainment and audio/visual/tactile immersion possibilities should be minimized, especially for the arts and humanities). I mean “play” as in stepping inside a world and getting your hands virtually dirty, like a kid in a sandbox.

But before we talk Earth science and data visualization, whet your VR palette with the incredibly cool Tilt Brush (aka “Microsoft Paint for the Year 2020”).

Depending on your hobbies, you might have already heard about the VR movement in video games a la Oculus Rift  and Project Morpheus. These are headset-based immersive mechanisms, while the CAVE is quite literally a virtually immersive walk-in cave. Still, if you want to explore discussion of virtually reality without scholarly pressure, the gaming community is a good place to start.

If you feel like you’re ready to brave the technical background and scholarly applications of virtual reality, The Verge posted a feature video on The Virtual Reality CAVE, featuring UC Davis’s setup, KeckCAVES. A little digging into UC Davis’s ongoing projects, which include applications in Earth science, data visualization, and responsive media, is a fun way to get your feet wet!

Based on a little internet reading, the possibilities of virtual reality in scholarly, scientific and creative application are innumerable—but are not all fully realized, or even drafted. And that’s the cool part: if this is the forefront of a new wave, this is your chance to brainstorm, too.

How could you imagine immersive virtual reality used in your field of study?

 


Michelle Callaghan, Graduate Assistant, Communication and ServicArticle by Michelle Callaghan, graduate assistant on the Communication and Service Promotion team. She is currently pursuing her MA in English at Villanova University.


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Villanova’s Automatic Virtual Environment Opens Oct. 2

Imagine stepping into a room-sized enclosure, donning a pair of 3D glasses, and having the experience of touring the basilicas in Rome or exploring Philadelphia’s Eastern State Penitentiary or standing in the Sistine Chapel—all without leaving the Library. Well, technically Falvey Hall, which was the Villanova College Library before Falvey Memorial Library was built, will house this new facility, called the Villanova CAVE.

What does CAVE mean?

CAVE stands for Cave Automatic Virtual Environment. You may be asking, “Then, what does that “Cave” stand for?” MerriamWebster.com has your answer. The University’s version of this technology is called “the Villanova CAVE.

The Villanova CAVE allows participants to become virtually immersed in a setting in which they can move about and even walk to either side of the 3D image of an object, such as a statue or sign, as though they were in the actual setting. For historical sites that have begun to deteriorate, such as the Eastern State Penitentiary, it preserves them for posterity. For sites of limited space, such as the Santa Rosa Necropolis under Vatican City that cannot accommodate large groups, the Villanova CAVE allows 10-15 people at a time to examine that location.

How does it work?

The Villanova CAVE enclosure—18’ wide, 10’ deep, 7.5’ high—has scrims that form three of its walls and a ceiling. These scrims, rear-projected HD screens, display a unified 3D image.

The Villanova CAVE can also be configured to display a 3D image on three walls and its floor, instead of its ceiling. To minimize shadows from viewers, strategically placed projectors create the floor imagery. An opening, where the fourth wall would be, gives users access to the CAVE. Users wear 3D glasses to achieve an immersive experience. The Villanova CAVE also includes sound.

In addition to the CAVE’s capability to display images and video, this immersive studies system will, in the future, also include a multi-camera component for capturing images and video. Assistant Professor and Director Engineering Entrepreneurship Edmond Dougherty is constructing a robotic camera unit that will not only record images and video but also stream live, immersive video into the Villanova CAVE. This unit will hold several cameras mounted in a spherical array (software combines the cameras’ input into a single 3D image or video). This camera unit includes lights and microphones.

How will this system benefit Villanova?

University professors will have the ability to record artifacts, settings, and events to be studied—unencumbered by distance, climate, or time of day—by their students on campus. Faculty may also include such recordings when developing their course curriculums.

Non-Villanova researchers, aka “off-campus collaborators,” will have the opportunity to access to this immersive studies system for their own research projects. This collaboration with non-Villanova researchers illustrates a trend in which academic libraries provide environments called “collaboratories.”

Speaking of collaboration, Frank Klassner, PhD, associate professor of computing sciences and director of the University’s Center of Excellence in Enterprise Technology (CEET) teamed up with Professor Dougherty and then-Library-Director Joe Lucia to write the proposal to the National Science Foundation (NSF). Together they garnered a $1.67 million NSF grant: “the largest NSF research grant ever awarded to the University.”


Gerald info deskArticle by Gerald Dierkes, senior copy-editor for the Communication and Service Promotion team and a liaison to the Department of Theater.


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Last Modified: October 1, 2014

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