Report on the Session on Virtual Laboratory and Virtual Library
(i)
Professor G. Olalere Ajayi - Session Coordinator
Director, Information Technology and Communication Unit (INTECU), Obafemi Awolowo
University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
(ii) Mr. Gunther Cyranek, UNESCO, Regional Information and Informatics Adviser, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Topic: Virtual Laboratory Approach- The case study of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) on the Implementation of a Virtual Systemwide Livestock Programme (vSLP).(iii) Dr. Enrique Canessa, International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), Trieste, Italy.
Topic: Data Networking and Distance Collaboration: Steps towards Virtual Laboratories and Virtual Libraries.(i) In the Pre-90s era scientific research in developing countries was attractive and stimulating to young graduates because of adequate remuneration, good social services and provision of research facilities. From the 1990s, forces against research were identified as Economic recession, poor remuneration, and military incursion into governance. This situation has led to the brain-drain of scientists and other professionals from Africa. The TWAS Conference Dakar Declaration 1999 called for the transformation of brain-drain to brain-gain by the use of ICT. The unprecedented facilities offered by ICT therefore provide an excellent platform for the use of the Virtual Laboratory and Virtual Library technology for the resuscitation of research and development activities in Africa.
(ii) The VL Expert Meeting held
at the Iowa State University, U.S.A. in May 1999 adopted the following definition
for VL. “an electronic workspace for distance collaboration and experimentation
in research or other creative activity, to generate and deliver results using
distributed information and communication technologies” VL also embraces concepts
such as research collaboration carried out over a distance, remote computing
and data and application sharing.
(iii) An overview of the VL tools given in the presentation include amongst others:
(a) Whole Earth Telescope (WET) Research
(b) Meta-Analysis of Vitamin A data: Ten countries (developed and developing) are involved in this distance scientific collaboration that started two years ago involving two to six scientists in each country. The project is sponsored by the International Life Sciences Institute ILSI) Washington D.C., coordinated by Prof. D. Thurniran, N. Ireland, Centre for Diet and Health. Collaboration is mainly by e-mail.
(c) Central Laboratory at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
The Central Laboratory has sophisticated equipment for scientific research. The equipments can be classified into: Analytic Section, Photomicroscopy section, General equipment section. A separate Centre hosting a 9MV FN Tandem Accelerator exists on the campus. Computer Network facilities and full Internet and Network connectivity through the University OAUNET shall be provided in order to operate it as a Virtual laboratory.
(d) Participation of OAU scientists in the climatological conference that took place at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics, ICTP, Trieste, Italy in 1999 on real time basis using low bandwidth technology.
(vi) VL for developing countries will depend on the availability of adequate information networks.
The VL can therefore be used for :(vii) Training aspect was also discussed. Training required for VL includes: training for network provision, training in VL technology, training of scientists on the use of the VL facilities
(ii) Development of database of thesis and dissertations from African Universities.
(v) Conclusions on VL and Virtual Libraries are as follows:(a) DATAD Pilot Project of the Association of African Universities (AAU): establishment of a Database of African Theses and Dissertations, involving 11 African countries.
(b) UN-ECA CODI data Project: development of databases format for provision as contents on the Internet.
The paper dealt with two major issues:
(i) Various definitions
of digital divide were discussed including the simple definition as the dividing
line between “those who have and those who have-not access to the net”. There
is no agreed definition i.e. digital divide is divided! Some country realities
in industrialized countries were highlighted, such as “The importance of bridging
the digital divide and creating digital opportunity for all Americans – White
House Educational Press Release April, 2000.”
(ii) The low level of contribution of scientists from developing countries
was analyzed looking at the Los Almos e-print archives, which incorporate 25,000
new electronic papers a year on topics ranging from non-linear dynamics to computer
science. The result is that only 1.14% of considered cond-matter e-prints and
2% of he-th were the fruit of purely “South” collaborative efforts. These figures
corroborated the trends that have been observed for scholarly publishing in
referred journals (2%) of the total scientific production from less-developed
countries. It was felt in the discussion on the paper that consideration of
the high level physics subjects might not give a general picture of the contribution
of scientists from the developing countries to research publications. However
the observation in this paper under scores the decline in scientific research
activities in the developing countries in the 1990’s as a result of the economic
recession and consequent currency devaluation.
(iii) Digital divide was also considered in terms of Quality of Service
in form of the available bandwidth to scientific communities in developing countries,
especially insufficient basic infrastructures in Africa.
The solution of digital divide should incorporate issues such as creativity
(and impact into society), (profession specific, on-site, troubleshooting) training,
meaningful contents (relevant to different communities using different languages),
open source, security, etc. It should also consider synchronous and asynchronous
collaboration, multicasting audio/visual data, moving work forward (world-wide)
in many new diverse ways (e.g. new economy), etc.
The following were suggestions for IT solutions to bridge the Digital Divide.
1. Basic System for Collaborative Work (BSCW}, which can be entirely Web based and freely available at bscw.gund.de, and can supports asynchronous (not simultaneous) and synchronous cooperation over the Internet or Intranet. Advantages include sharing of documents by workgroups (platform independent), no need to install extra software (web browser required), access BSCW workspaces, browse folders and download documents to your local system just like “normal” Web pages, BSCW informs of new relevant events in a shared workspace and uploading documents to shared workspace via Web browser.
2. Virtual Network Computing (VNC) : Freely available at www.uk.research.att.com/vnc
Remote display system to view a
computing ‘desktop’ environment not only on the machine where it is running,
but from any where on the Internet and from a wide variety of machine architectures.
In practice, prototypes like VNC and BSCW are rarely used due to its unnatural
work process for people, not flexible enough, potential users in some cases
do not want to learn and may not be supported by adequate IT staff. Experience
shows that smaller, simpler approach that adapt to the needs of the researchers
is more popular.
3. VL and Globalization of Science and Technology: The advent as well
as the growth of digital communications and information technology has accelerated
the globalization of science. VL require tools featuring the most advanced techniques
of instrument control, data sharing, collaboration in an “electronic commons,”
and the rapid dissemination of results to an international audience of scholars,
economic actors, and the public via electronic publishing. Such incipient structures
promise to become powerful assets to educate new generations of scholars.
4. VL Communication Tool Classes
5. Human Genome Project – funded by the US National Institute of Health since 1990, featuring flexibility of access to personnel, laboratory facilities, expertise, geographical presence, scale-up and scale-down facilities, was cited as another example of VL.
(iv) Observation and Conclusions
It seems unlikely that virtual laboratories
will be widely adopted by developing country scientists in the near future.
One reason is the lack of adequate computing literacy in the academic community
of countries that are new to the Internet. This is usually correlated with a
lack of understanding of the potential offered by the network as a tool for
spreading information (and contrast with its use for accessing information generated
elsewhere to overcome scientific isolation). One implication is that it is essential
to familiarize the scientific communities with the use of Internet and of the
many freeware tools that are currently available.
Other important factors to consider are the human diversity, generational differences,
and human relations based on the geographical location (and hence time difference)
of partners in the virtual sessions. The electronic realm should meet the needs
of the whole virtual community, old and young, avoiding an overload of information,
asynchronicity and unnecessary usage complications.
The administration of virtual laboratories should be simplified so that they
can be run by scientists for the scientists in their own countries.
UNESCO’s additional interest in VL include: integration of developing countries into the international scientific efforts avoiding information isolation and reduction of “brain drain” from developing countries. The VL technology is adequate to serve the objectives of the UN Commission for Science and Technology for Development (UNCSTD) such as the establishment of North-South and South-South research networks, information exchange networks, research coordination networks and research policy consultation networks. The motivations to use VL technologies include: increasing the size and scale of efforts, combination of results from different facilities, gains in scientific productivity, benefitting from available scarce scientific instruments and regional participation. The philosophy in the design of VL toolkits should include reduction in the required skills and expenses to set up, use and maintainance of a VL and provision of tools for limited infrastructure. The categories of VL can be summarized as large facility VL, scientific capacity VL and Project driven VL.
A report was given of the VL Workshop, which took place at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), Addis Ababa in February, 2000. The workshop dealt with subjects such as Virtual Networks, Virtual Laboratories and the implementation of a virtual Systemwide Livestock Programme (vSLP), which is interdisciplinary dealing with feed resources, natural resource management and policy issues. The programme consists of geographically dispersed partners and projects, managed by the Livestock Programme Group (LPG) part of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) www.cgiar.org
The virtual SLP network plans to collect together information and knowledge, share and exchange information and knowledge as well as provide facilities to communicate with each other and with SLP stakeholders. The programme will also provide mutual backup through the exchange of expertise, methodologies, data sets, literature, etc as well as train SLP members in, for example, manual development courses, training resources and distance learning. The vSLP network will also be used to mobilise resources, integrate and sythesize information around specific issues and bring geographically dispersed people with common interests and problems together for research work. The vSLP laboratories will address specific research tasks, make SLP research more efficient and cost effective, allow the collection of data for simulation and modelling at multiple sites and also share equipment. The real cost of running a VL will include occasional face-to-face meetings to build confidence, add-on costs such as the cost of all researchers having uniform equipment and sampling methods, as well as training including the use of IT.