The ResearchChannel is a collaborative partnership of research universities and corporate research divisions dedicated to broadening the access to and appreciation of our individual and collective activities, ideas and opportunities in basic and applied research.
Guest Author: Monica Mallini-Rourke
The Internet and television have converged into a new medium for knowledge dissemination—the ResearchChannel.
The Research Channel allows scholarly lectures, presentations and seminars to be collected into a video archive for viewing on demand.
It began as the University of Washington’s (UW) public television channel in Seattle. Collaborations with other universities broadened the reach of the channel. Inspired by audience response and a university’s desire to increase exposure to its research projects, UW and IBM proposed the concept of ResearchChannel in 1997:
"A collaborative partnership of research universities and corporate research divisions dedicated to broadening the access to and appreciation of our individual and collective activities, ideas and opportunities in basic and applied research."
Member institutions, including Virginia Tech, may submit content to ResearchChannel for broadcast, at no cost, while retaining ownership and copyright control of the content. Programs are scheduled to air in various time slots over a one to two year period, and are retained in the Internet archive indefinitely, unless the owner of the content requests otherwise.
ResearchChannel is distributed by direct broadcast satellite, cable television and multicast (Internet distribution as scheduled broadcast feeds). Programs are also available from the website archives as video-on-demand unicasts. Viewers may select from various quality levels according to their Internet connection bandwidth. Content is not downloadable, but it may be accessed from the host server at any time. Viewers may search the archives by program title, series, subject, keyword or institution.
In a recent workshop conducted for Virginia Tech, ResearchChannel executives discussed engaging the general public in ongoing research. Due to satellite distribution to cable television systems, ResearchChannel is available in 13 million homes, and has a surprisingly strong lay-person viewing audience.
Currently, ResearchChannel is not hosting any programs from Virginia Tech, which presents a unique opportunity for the Alexandria Research Institute (ARI) to take the lead in 21st century knowledge dissemination. In the future, when lecture series, seminars, or round table discussions occur, they can be videotaped, professionally edited by Virginia Tech’s Video/Broadcast Services department, and submitted to ResearchChannel.
Programs should be designed to fill 30, 60, or 90 minute time-slots, which means that the maximum run time is 28.5 minutes, 58.5 minutes, or 88 minutes, respectively.
ResearchChannel also airs short programs and informational spots up to two minutes in length. For example, a statement of a university’s traditions and research areas is appropriate. Two-minute programs can receive a lot of airtime and are an excellent means to convey a message to the public.
ResearchChannel provides seminars to assist members in producing quality programs. The best programs are informative, entertaining and stimulate interest in the institution and research sponsor. For people who want to learn the finer points of videotaping a lecture for a worldwide audience, ResearchChannel will hold several production workshops at its upcoming Annual Meeting, October 11-13, 2003 in Indianapolis, just prior to the Internet2 Fall Member Meeting.
For more information, please visit: http://www.researchchannel.org
Combined Heat and Power Development in Virginia Workshop
The Alexandria Research Institute (ARI) held a Distributed Energy Resources workshop entitled “Combined Heat and Power Development in Virginia ” May 30, 2003.
The session, which was arranged under ARI's Critical Infrastructure and Modeling Program (CIMAP), addressed the technical and market potential of commercial and institutional sector Combined Heat and Power (CHP) development in Virginia. The workshop paid particular attention to the environmental implications for the Commonwealth's ozone non-attainment jurisdictions
“Exploitation of northern Virginia’s CHP potential in theory could result in substantial emissions benefits, particularly with ‘credit’ for the thermal energy contribution, and could help the region more quickly achieve NAAQS air quality standards,” said CIMAP 's Michael Willingham, the workshop coordinator and ARI adjunct professor. "However, the realization of this potential must answer to both regulatory concerns and the economic interests of the various stakeholders.”
To address the issues, the workshop focused on four elements:
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Evaluating the commercial and institutional CHP market potential in Virginia's major non-attainment jurisdictions.
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Describing Federal, regional, state-level (Virginia and other) and local regulatory initiatives and/or constraints affecting the adoption of CHP.
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Discussing appropriate business models and associated benefits streams (financial and environmental) for principal stakeholders affected by CHP implementation.
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Identifying necessary and appropriate measures required for development of CHP-responsive regulatory policies in Virginia.
The invited audience included local officials from the northern Virginia,
Fredericksburg and Richmond non-attainment areas, Virginia legislators
and key commercial and institutional sector stakeholders. For more information,
please contact Michael Willingham or visit:
http://www.cimap.vt.edu/workshop/03/index.htm
For more information, please contact Michael
Willingham or visit:
http://www.cimap.vt.edu/workshop/03/index.htm
Copyright ARI 2003
Alexandria Research Institute
A Virginia Tech Enterprise
206 N. Washington St.,
Suite 400
Alexandria, VA 22314
Phone: (703) 518-8080
Fax: (703) 518-8085
