links for 2009-01-11

• Computational Technology for Effective Health Care: Immediate Steps and Strategic Directions
  'The National Library of Medicine launched this study to support the engagement of individuals from the computer science research community in meeting two challenges posed by health care information technology: identifying how today’s computer science-based methodologies and approaches might be applied more effectively to health care, and explicating how the limitations in these methodologies and approaches might be overcome through additional research and development.'
  (tags: research biomedical+informatics bioinformatics healthcare+policy health+IT health+informatics)
• Touchless SDK - Home
  'The Touchless SDK enables developers to create multi-touch based applications using a webcam for input. Touch without touching.'
  (tags: research programming ui touchscreen usability api)
• UC Davis News & Information :: Billion-Point Computing for Computers
  'A powerful computing tool that allows scientists to extract features and patterns from enormously large and complex sets of raw data has been developed by scientists at the University of California, Davis, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The tool -- a set of problem-solving calculations known as an algorithm -- is compact enough to run on computers with as little as two gigabytes of memory.'
  (tags: bioinformatics research)
• Schools tap '21st-century skills' | csmonitor.com
  'In a knowledge economy, the reasoning goes, the ability to articulate and solve problems, to generate original ideas, and to work collaboratively across cultural boundaries is growing exponentially in importance. The challenge for schools is to find ways to shift from traditional rote learning and teach these skills, while still doing due diligence to the three R's. The good news about 21st-century skills, advocates say, is that they can be integrated into core subjects.'
  (tags: education collaboration)
• US security experts fear 'cybergeddon' - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
  'Cyber attacks pose the greatest threat to the United States after nuclear war and weapons of mass destruction, and they are increasingly hard to prevent, FBI experts say.'
  (tags: health+IT IT+infrastructure information+security)