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WLAP: the Web Lecture Archive Project
Eric Myers
Department of Physics and Astronomy
Vassar College
myers@vassar.eduPrepared for the Teaching with Technology Forum for 2004 at Vassar College
Sample Lectures
- Hiding Infinities - Professor Martinus Veltman describes the work leading to his Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Is it Live or is it Memorex? - Dr. Maureen Mellody describes the physics of hearing and perception, including an explanation of how mp3 compression works, as a part of the Saturday Morning Physics program at the University of Michigan.
- UM-CERN REU presentations - Reports from students who participated in a summer REU program (Research Experiences for Undergraduates) at CERN.
- The Grid: The Future of High Energy Physics Computing? - Dr. Shawn McKee describes plans for using distributed "grid" computing for analysing large quantities of particle physics data.
- Bringing the Web to America - Dr. Paul Kuntz descibes the initial development of the World Wide Web as a tool for distributing information between particle physicists.
... or you can browse the full archive yourself at
Physics and Astronomy Colloquium
Since spring of 2003 the department of Physics and Astronomy at Vassar has held a regular weekly colloquium consisting of:The series began primarily with recorded lectures, but has attracted more live presentations as it has progressed.
- Lectures from Vassar faculty on their current research
- Presentations by students on their summer research (URSI and REU)
- Talks from visiting physicists and astronomers
- Recorded lectures streamed over the Internet from WLAP, Caltech, and Fermilab
Web Lecture Archive Project
- An on-line archive of lectures, tutorials, and other presentations that integrate synchronized slides with streaming video.
- Available to anyone with any web browser and the RealPlayer™ plug-in or application.
- Designed to emphasize clearly readable slides and clear audio, along with video of the speaker to provide sense of presence.
- Contains lectures covering a broad range of physics topics and levels, with some emphasis on particle physics
- Talks from a variety of speakers, ranging from Nobel and Abel laureates to undergraduates doing summer research
- Appropriate for a wide range of audiences, from research physicists to the general public
- Nearly 300 lectures available and growing steadily
- WLAP also develops software for lecture production
Web Lectures at Vassar
- Provides the ability to hear lectures on important topics of current interest from leaders in the field
- Exposes students and faculty to areas of physics not available at Vassar
- Ability to maintain a regularly scheduled event of scholarly interest to the whole department without the overhead of hosting visitors every week.
- Flexibility to change schedule as needed.
- Lectures can be assigned in class instead of or in addition to assigned readings (eg. Physics 375 this semester will watch a lecture from Caltech from the director of the LIGO Laboratory).
- Production is fairly easy, using standard video equipment and processing software and freely available tools. (Might be useful for URSI or for recording faculty research results.)
- A recorded lecture is not as good as a live lecture, but it is better than no lecture at all
I gratefully acknowledge assistance from the entire WLAP Team, especially Jeremy Herr of the University of Michigan. I would like to thank Jane Livingston of Vassar College's office of Computing and Information Services for her assistance in creating the printed version of this poster, and Cristian Opazo for setting up the demonstration station. Acknowledgements
Eric Myers <myers@vassar.edu> 2 April 2004 http://noether.vassar.edu/~myers/talks/WLAP-Poster.html