The 11th Universities High Voltage Network Colloquium (UHVnet), 2018 is hosted by the Tony Davies High Voltage Laboratory, University of Southampton. The UHVnet Colloquium provides an ideal platform for Postgraduate Students and Early Career Researchers to present their work to others within the UK’s High Voltage (HV) Engineering community. The event offers a combination of oral and poster sessions in any of the following areas: • High Voltage AC and DC Plant and Systems • Measurement and Condition Monitoring • Dielectric Materials and their AC or DC Applications • Theory, Models and Simulation • Data Interpretation and Diagnostics • Assessing the Sustainability of Power Networks

The UHVnet 2018 will be held in Winchester on January 15th to 16th. A call for abstracts can be found here: uhvnet.org.uk/abstracts.pdf

And the website is here: www.uhvnet.org.uk

The UHVnet was set up in 2004, by a group of universities (which currently includes, The University of Southampton, Staffordshire University, Cardiff University, Glasgow Caledonian University, Leicester University, Liverpool University, The University of Manchester and The University of Strathclyde). The UHVnet was formed to further the interests of high voltage research within the United Kingdom. Specific objectives of the group include raising the awareness of the research capabilities of group members to UK high-voltage related industry, particularly manufacturers and electricity supply companies.

Senior Software Developer Christopher Gutteridge has been recognised for his outstanding contribution to IT innovation by the UK eInformation Group (UKeiG).

The Systems, Information and Web programmer, who has spent two decades at the University of Southampton since first undertaking a degree in Computer Science, was presented the UKeiG’s Jason Farradane Award at the Internet Librarian International conference in London on Wednesday 18th October.

Chris has been instrumental in pioneering open data services at the University of Southampton and has been involved in many projects over the years that have information at their core. The Jason Farradane Award recognises his contribution to the profession and for pioneering new and innovative ways to derive value from information.

Chris says, “I’m delighted to have been honoured with this accolade. The opportunity to work on innovative and interesting projects is what has kept me working at the University for 20 years, and I hope to keep Southampton at the forefront of advances in information science for many years to come.â€?

Chris is a member of the Web and Data innovation team in iSolutions, the University’s IT department. The team works closely with Electronics and Computer Science to provide innovative services for the University.

Early in his career, Chris was the lead developer of the EPrints platform, an open-source software package building repositories that met the needs of libraries and enabled them to support researchers in green open access archiving. The flexible system was adopted by universities across the country and to date the registry of open access repositories contains 645 active EPrints repositories, of which 121 are in the UK.

Chris next turned his attention to open data and was recognised with the Times Higher Education award for Outstanding ICT initiative of the Year in 2012. He has since founded data.ac.uk as a place to stimulate discussion between UK universities on the subject of open data. Recent creative uses of data have also included using LIDAR data to create a detailed replica of his home town of Ventnor, Isle of Wight, in Minecraft.

Chris was presented the Jason Farradane Award by UKeiG Chair David Ball on the second day of the library innovation conference at Olympia London.

The UKeiG is a forum for information professionals, users and developers of electronic information resources. It promotes the effective application and management of electronic information, offering a range of resources including seminars and workshops.

A major review of the UK’s burgeoning Artificial Intelligence (AI) industry, co-led by Professor Dame Wendy Hall, has set out proposals for how Government, academia and industry can work together and increase use of AI across the economy.

The report, Growing the Artificial Intelligence Industry in the UK, analyses the UK’s current capability in this area and sets out bold proposals for how the UK can stay ahead of the competition and ensure the adoption of cutting-edge AI brings with it substantial benefits for people and businesses across the country.

Dame Wendy, Regius Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton and Director of the Web Science Institute, is particularly keen to ensure that it is used to “inform the establishment of initiatives and programmes to help us extract the most value from AI for the country; that includes an emphasis on increasing and improving our skill levels to prepare the workforce for the number of jobs the industry will need for the futureâ€?.

“I was very honoured to be asked to co-chair this review at a time when AI is set to make major changes to the way we live and work,â€? Dame Wendy continued. “AI has been around for a very long time as a concept and this latest surge of technological development is likely to see automation continue to escalate and accelerate in every walk of life. Now is the time for us all - scientists, researchers, entrepreneurs and the government - to come together and address the issues about how AI is going to impact society and seek ways to ensure that we’re able to deliver the great breakthroughs the technology has the potential to deliver.â€?

The review, co-lead by Jérôme Pesenti, Chief Executive of BenevolentTech, highlights how AI can boost UK productivity, and has the potential to add £630 billion to the UK economy by 2035. The report makes 18 recommendations for how to make the UK the best place in the world for businesses developing AI to start, grow, and thrive.

The report’s recommendations for how Government, academia and industry can work together will now be carefully considered in discussions towards an Industrial Strategy sector deal between Government and the AI industry.

Professor Bashir Al-Hashimi, Dean of Physical Sciences and Engineering, added, “I am delighted that our Regius Professor of Computer Science has been in a key leadership position for this Government review, which will be an important component for the continuing development of AI in the UK. Our Faculty and its Department of Electronics and Computer Science have critical expertise in AI and will make a significant contribution to the implementation of the AI review recommendations. We have already invested in new academics and we plan to invest further.â€?