iGBL Programme Announced

The  programme for this year’s Irish Conference on Game Based Learning (iGBL), in Cork City, on the 27th and 28th of June, has been announced.

Download or browse the programme at https://www.igbl-conference.com/programme/

Formerly Irish Symposium on Game-Based Learning, the IGBL conference, provides a forum for all stakeholders interested in exchanging ideas, projects, and best practice on the use of games and game-based approaches to support motivation, learning, and change. It is a forum for students, teachers,  researchers, or companies to meet and share this enthusiasm for this platform

This year the event is being keynoted by Brenda Romero, who needs no introduction. In her keynote Brenda will explore the power of games to educate using both her own work as well as the work that was carried-out on the game Cybersquad to teach girls about cyber security.

 

AR/VR PhD opportunity (Dublin)

The deadline for this position has now passed. Please do not apply.

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PhD Research Opportunity TU Dublin School of Media
Diagnostic Applications of Mixed/Augmented Reality Visualisation of MRI Scans

Application Deadline: June 30, 2019 PhD
Start Date: September 2019

Objectives of project:
This project is a cross-institute (Technological University Dublin & Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience) research study into the use of virtual reality/augmented reality in the medical space – specifically to identify and map areas of brain structures for teaching/diagnostic applications.

Proposed research direction will be to improve and extend current 2.5D brain nerve tract visualisation and analysis and overall user experience of current state-of-the-art MRI diagnostic tools to full 3DVR for visual/algorithmic based edit/query/analysis of brain structures. The project aims to develop and test a diagnostic/teaching prototype able to investigate the potential strengths and advantages of Mixed/Virtual Reality technologies for medical applications. Stipend and academic fee waiver.

The successful applicant will receive a stipend of €16,000 per annum through TU Dublin’s College of Arts & Tourism Postgraduate Research Scholarship Scheme for the project’s duration (up to a maximum of four years).

The cost of EU academic fees will be covered for the duration of the project (subject to successful annual evaluations). Non-EU applicants are eligible to take up the project; however, they will be required to fund the fee differential.

The aforementioned stipend and EU academic fee waiver constitute part of a scholarship, and not part of a contract of employment. The successful candidate will be a student, rather than an employee of TU Dublin. The candidate

Essential:
Candidates will be either:
• a Masters graduate in computer science, computer game development, or related computing discipline awarded at 2.1 or higher; and/or,
• an outstanding (minimum upper 2:1) Bachelors in computer science, computer game development, or related computing discipline with evidence of high quality research potential.

Desirable:
• Background, knowledge or experience in Unreal Engine or Unity3D gaming engine(s).
• Background, knowledge or experience in C#, C++, or JavaScript programming.
• Background, knowledge or experience in HTC Vive, Oculus Rift (or similar) 3DVR gaming technologies.
• Background, knowledge or experience in User Experience/Interface Design, particularly for Interactive Applications

How to apply:
Completed applications and requests for further information submitted directly to Basil Lim by email at basil.lim@dit.ie

A complete application includes:
i) A full curriculum vitae – including qualifications, experience, list of publications

ii) A personal statement outlining motivations for pursuing PhD research (maximum 1000 words), and,

iii) A sample of the candidate’s written work (these will not be returned)

Incomplete applications will not be considered.

///Advert posted 17th June, 2019.

Digit Games acquired

Digit Game Studios has been acquired by Los Angeles-based Scopely in May 2019 for an undisclosed sum.

Digit, which employes around 70 people in Dublin, was founded in 2012 and specialises in mobile games.

The companies recently collaborated on the Star Trek franchise, which reportedly generated $50m in revenue in the first four months of its availability.

Scopely was already a minority shareholder in Digit, with other backers including Enterprise Ireland, Delta Partners and ACT Venture.

l-r: David McGovern, Richard Barnwell and Fergus Duggin, Digit Founders.                            by City Headshots Dublin

 

For more see:

  1. RTE news  https://www.rte.ie/news/business/2019/0509/1048509-digit-scopely-gaming/
  2. the Irish Times – https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/dublin-based-digit-games-acquired-by-scopely-1.3886970
  3. Also https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/irish-games-developers-going-boldly-into-new-frontiers-1.3757603
  4. https://www.digitgaming.com/

 

Deep Learning PhD opportunity (Dublin)

The deadline for this position has now passed. Please do not apply.

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PhD Research Opportunity TU Dublin School of Media
Automatic Updating of Crowd-sourced Maps Using Deep Learning

Application Deadline: June 30, 2019
PhD Start Date: September 2019

Objectives of project: 
Pattern matching in raster digital imagery using machine learning has received a lot of recent attention but automatic updating of crowd-sourced vector maps using these techniques is still an open problem. Today, VGI maps like OSM are well populated with built environment data – how to keep them up-to-date in a timely manner is the main research question, with plenty of scope to develop new techniques for automating this process.

To address this problem, we propose a novel change/damage detection system using satellite imagery and deep learning techniques (multi-layered neural networks) in order to automate the updating of freely available online crowd-sourced maps like OpenStreetMap (OSM). We ensure the quality of information added by our automated system is up to standard by using inter-rater reliability statistics. Stipend and academic fee waiver.

The successful applicant will receive a stipend of €16,000 per annum through TU Dublin’s College of Arts & Tourism Postgraduate Research Scholarship Scheme for the project’s duration (up to a maximum of four years).

The cost of EU academic fees will be covered for the duration of the project (subject to successful annual evaluations). Non-EU applicants are eligible to take up the project; however, they will be required to fund the fee differential.

The aforementioned stipend and EU academic fee waiver constitute part of a scholarship, and not part of a contract of employment. The successful candidate will be a student, rather than an employee of TU Dublin.

Essential:
Candidates will be either:
• a Masters graduate in computer science, spatial information science, or related geospatial discipline awarded at 2.1 or higher; and/or,
• an outstanding (minimum upper 2:1) Bachelors in computer science, spatial information science, or related geospatial discipline with evidence of high quality research potential.

Desirable:
• Background, knowledge or experience in spatial databases, OSM Editing/Overpass API.
• Background, knowledge or experience in image processing, GIS application development.
• Background, knowledge or experience in machine learning.

How to apply: 
Completed applications and requests for further information submitted directly to Dr. James D. Carswell by email at jcarswell@dit.ie

A complete application includes:

i) A full curriculum vitae – including qualifications, experience, list of publications

ii) A personal statement outlining motivations for pursuing PhD research (maximum 500 words), and,

iii) A sample of the candidate’s written work (these will not be returned).

Incomplete applications will not be considered

///Advert posted 17th June, 2019.