Search For Lectures

Design and Build in China - Broc Smith
6:00 PM – Alliant Energy-Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall - Broc Smith has over twenty years of experience in costume, prop and stage design and construction, and theatre performance. He began working in Asia in 1992, beginning with exhibitions and events in Singapore. He helped create China's first world-class water park in Shanghai, interiors for Asia's largest aquarium in Pudong, and was a principle designer for Happy Valley Beijing, China's largest theme park to date. Smith has been a senior designer for multinational companies as well as an independent freelancer. The author of The Tragic Kingdom, he is currently the Design Director for Longri Landscape Company based in Shenzhen. Part of the Technology, Globalization & Culture Series.

Climate Change: What Could Happen and What Can Earth's Past Tell Us? Bette Otto-Bliesner
8:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Bette Otto-Bliesner is a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. She uses computer-based models of Earth's climate to investigate past climate change and climate variability across a wide range of time scales. She is particularly interested in the naturally forced climate change of the glacial-interglacial cycles of the last million years. Otto-Bliesner was a lead author on the Fourth Assessment Report generated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Al Gore in 2007. She received her PhD in meteorology from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Sigma Xi Lecture and part of the Live Green! Sustainability Lecture Series and Women in STEM Series.

Understanding Diversity and Complexity - Scott Page
6:00 PM – Alliant-Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall - Scott E. Page is a fresh voice in the long-running debate on affirmative action. His book The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools and Societies uses mathematical modeling and case studies to show how variety in staffing produces organizational strength. He argues that a creative environment with individuals from different backgrounds and life experiences is essential to progress and productivity. Scott Page is director of the Center for the Study of Complex Systems at the University of Michigan where he serves as Leonid Hurwicz Collegiate Professor of Complex Systems, Economics, and Political Science. His other books include Complex Adaptive Systems and the forthcoming Diversity and Complexity.

Crossing Arizona - Film and Panel Discussion
7:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Crossing Arizona is an in-depth look at the divisiveness that occurs when immigration and border policy fails everyone. Heightened security in California and Texas has pushed the number of illegal border-crossers into the Arizona desert to an estimated 4,500 a day. Most are men in search of work, but increasingly they are women and children seeking to reunite with their families. Crossing Arizona examines this crisis through the eyes of those directly affected, including ranchers who own the land, humanitarian groups attempting to save lives, farmers who depend on the illegal work force, political activists, and armed citizen patrols. The film was directed by Joseph Mathew and Daniel DeVivo. A discussion led by Iowa State faculty and graduate students will follow the 75-minute film.

Who's Afraid of International Trade? Pietra Rivoli
6:00 PM – Alliant Energy-Lee Liu Auditorium, Howe Hall - Pietra Rivoli is the author of The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy, which takes readers from cotton farms in Texas to factories in China to labor unions in the American South to used-clothing vendors in Tanzania. The book explores not only the market forces but also the social dimensions of a global economy. Rivoli is a professor at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University and has special interests in social justice issues in international business and in China. She has a PhD in finance and international economics from the University of Florida. Part of the Technology, Globalization & Culture Series.

Investments in Our Future: Exploring Space through Innovation and Technology - Robert Braun
11:00 AM – Alliant Energy-Lee Liu Auditorium, 1140 Howe Hall - NASA Chief Technologist Robert Braun will speak about NASA's efforts to open up the solar system for robotic and human exploration. He will also discuss the impact space research and technology may have on broader societal challenges in energy, environment and national security. Braun has more than twenty years of experience in design and analysis of planetary exploration systems, including several robotic space flight systems for the exploration of Mars. He was appointed NASA Chief Technologist in February 2010 and is the David and Andrew Lewis Professor of Space Technology in the Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. The T. A. Wilson Lecture in Aerospace Engineering.

Immersive Landscapes - Andrea Cochran
6:00 PM – Kocimski Auditorium, 101 College of Design - Andrea Cochran is the principal of Andrea Cochran Landscape Architecture in San Francisco. Her work is known for the careful consideration of site, climate and existing architecture and blurring the line between the natural and built environment. The firm has won a large number of national and regional awards, including Honor Awards in general and residential design from the American Society of Landscape Architects, the Allegheny Public Square Design Competition for the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh, a National Grand Award for Affordable Housing from Residential Architect Magazine, and a National Green Building Award from the American Institute of Architects. Work by Cochran and her firm has been published in several books, including Andrea Cochran: Landscapes and New Garden Design. She has a Master of Landscape Architecture from Harvard University. The P. H. Elwood Lecture in Landscape Architecture.

Crossing Arizona - Documentary
8:00 PM – South Ballroom, Memorial Union - Crossing Arizona is an in-depth look at the divisiveness that occurs when immigration and border policy fails everyone. Heightened security in California and Texas has pushed the number of illegal border-crossers into the Arizona desert to an estimated 4,500 a day. Most are men in search of work, but increasingly they are women and children seeking to reunite with their families. Crossing Arizona examines this crisis through the eyes of those directly affected, including ranchers who own the land, humanitarian groups attempting to save lives, farmers who depend on the illegal work force, political activists, and armed citizen patrols. The film was directed by Joseph Mathew and Daniel DeVivo. Join us Wednesday, October 20 at 8:15 pm for a discussion of Crossing Arizona led by Iowa State faculty and graduate students. It follows the 7:00 pm screening of the film in the Great Hall: More Information

Family Farms in Russia and U.S.-Russian Collaboration - Vladimir Plotnikov
7:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Senator Vladimir Plotnikov, a member of the Upper Chamber of the Russian Parliament, is president of the Association of Private Farmers and Cooperatives of Russia (AKKOR) and has a Ph.D. in economics. AKKOR works to protect the rights and interests of small- and medium-sized Russian farmers and represents farmers associations and partnerships in the Russian Federation. The organization also coordinates farmers' entrepreneurial activity in order to increase the efficiency of farming, enhance the quality of life in rural communities, and make sure that farming is recognized as an important component of the Russian economy. The Iowa Farm Bureau Federation is working with AKKOR to revive programs established between Iowa and Russian farmers. Part of the World Affairs Series.

Food Security in an Era of Climate Change - M.S. Swaminathan
12:00 PM – Ensminger Room, 1204 Kildee Hall - Indian agricultural scientist M.S. Swaminathan is often recognized as the father of the Green Revolution in India. He is the first recipient of the World Food Prize, in 1987, for spearheading the introduction of high-yielding wheat and rice varieties among farmers of that nation. His research ultimately helped India end its reliance on grain imports. Swaminathan studied agriculture in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, earned a Ph.D. in plant genetics from Cambridge, and continued his research in the United States. He began as a scientist with the Indian Agricultural Research Institute in the 1960s and subsequently held such positions as director general of the International Rice Research Center and chairman of the National Commission on Farmers for the Government of India. Swaminathan currently serves as chairman of the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation, holding its UNESCO Cousteau Chair in Ecotechnology. Part of the Global Agricultural Program's Feeding the World Seminar Series and part of the World Affairs Series.