2007 RSL Retreat at Asilomar

Posted 09:40 AM, September 04, 2007, by jaruiz

2005 RSL Retreat

At the first Radiological Sciences Laboratory Retreat in 1999, our keynote speaker was Ronald Bracewell, PhD, from the Department of Electrical Engineering at Stanford. Dr. Bracewell received the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers' Heinrich Hertz Medal in 1994 for his pioneering work in antenna aperture synthesis and image reconstruction as applied to radio astronomy and to computer-assisted tomography. Scientists use Bracewell's algorithm, developed for radioastronomical reconstruction from fan-beam scans, to reconstruct tomographic images on commercial CT scanners.

2006 RSL Retreat

Last year, our keynote speaker was Herb Abrams, MD, emeritus professor of radiology at Stanford. He is a world-renowned authority in diagnostic radiology and the impact of ionizing radiation and nuclear weapons. Dr. Abrams was the founding vice president of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, which received the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize. At our retreat, he spoke about the biological effects of ionizing radiation. We also attended a workshop on "The Art of Negotiation"; a discussion about the "State of the Lab"; and a "Town Hall Meeting." In addition, each RSL group also developed their own introduction. To view Dan Spielman's group introduction, P.I.M.P. (Person into More Than Protons), please go to http://www.stanford.edu/~pritib/PIMP.wmv. Of course, our retreat would not have been complete without our BBQ and challenging "Jeopardy Game"--complete with categories such as "Name That Patent."

Our keynote speaker this year will be Thorne Lay, PhD, professor in the Earth Sciences Department and director of the Center for Studies of Imaging and Dynamics of the Earth at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He will be speaking on geophysics and geophysical imaging. Our second speaker will be Kelly Skeff, MD, PhD, professor of medicine (general internal medicine) who will discuss various ways to evaluate teaching skills as an introduction to a larger program that his group offers on good teaching practices. Dr. Skeff received the Abraham Flexner Award for Distinguished Service to Medical Education, which was established in 1958 by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) "to recognize extraordinary individual contributions to medical schools and to the medical education community as a whole."

This year's retreat will be from Wednesday, September 19, through Thursday, September 20, at Asilomar: 800 Asilomar Ave, Pacific Grove, CA (http://www.visitasilomar.com/destination.aspx). After a bag lunch on the beach on Sept. 19th, the retreat will begin at about 1:00 PM, and it will adjourn at about 3:00 PM on the 20th. There is a bonfire a scheduled for Wednesday night at 8:30 PM.

About 45 people attended our first retreat and the largest group we have had so far was in 2005 when the staff, faculty, and students of the Molecular Imaging Program at Stanford (MIPS) joined us, and we totaled 115 people! For 2007, 90 people plan to attend so far.