Shannon Bohle holds the Master in Library and Information Science (MLIS) degree and is a professional librarian and archivist.Her background includes approximately 15 years of work experience in informal education (library, archive, museum) and formal education (K-16). She is a writer, editor and presenter. Shannon has over 50 publications in various media formats. During her graduate study for the MLIS, she completed a project relating to the history of the U.S. Space Shuttle Program at NASA Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio.
Nominated by Riyaaz Shaik, RSDE – Microsoft Research
Prior to obtaining her graduate degree, Shannon worked at the Neil Armstrong Air & Space Museum assisting with the education programming and working as a tour guide. Later, Shannon worked with the collection of one of the founding members of NACA (the precursor to NASA) located in the Oberlin College Archives.
Shannon then served for a year at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory as the archivist of a living Nobel Prize winning scientist’s collection (James D. Watson, co-discoverer with Crick and Wilkens of the structure of DNA) in the area of molecular biology. This included the official compilation of his books in translation in 26 languages.
She has lectured on molecular biology digital resources at the University of California, Berkeley (2007) and science archives and history at the University of Oxford (2008).
Her publishing background includes Technical Reviewer (along with Brion Vibber, Chief Technical Officer, Wikimedia Foundation) for MediaWiki (O’Reilly, 2008), a bestselling book in Library and Information Science Automation, and editorial duties for two books published by Cambridge University Press (2004-5) as well as three other books. Shannon’s creative approach toward digital libraries and computing can be found in Library Journal.
Recently, Shannon was awarded a full scholarship for three years to attend the University of Cambridge in the UK, where she plans to complete her Ph.D. in the History and Philosophy of Science.
Additional accomplishments are noted in Marquis’ Who’s Who in American Education, Marquis’ Who’s Who of American Women, Marquis’ Who’s Who in America, and Marquis’ Who’s Who in the World.
VIRTUAL LIFE
Shannon is the founder of the Women in Science, Tech & Medicine group in Second Life, sponsoring speakers who emphasize the roles of women in STEM careers. Past lectures included female role models such as geneticist and Nobel laureate, Barbara McClintock.
She or her avatar has appeared in numerous science and technology publications and participated in talks with people including: Nature, Discover Magazine, The BBC, Bill Nye the Science guy, Jeremy Bailenson, Nobel laureates (former Chancellor of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory James D. Watson, NASA Astrophysicist John C. Mather, Professor at the Université Paris-Sud Albert Fert, former President of Caltech, David Baltimore) as well as astronauts.
Space and Astrophysics
Shannon presently serves at the volunteer Director of the Library and Archives at NASA CoLab in Second Life, a public-private collaboration with NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It is the first library or archives in a synthetic immersive environment recognized by the Library of Congress (MARC Code: CaPsLAN). The project received various media coverage, including an article on CNN’s website. Her Second Life machinima video, “Can Results from Planck Prove the Inflation Paradigm?” with physics Nobel laureate John C. Mather, received a special showing at the Nobel Museum in Sweden. Mather’s research led to strong empirical support to The Big Bang Theory. After the video, Dr. Mather was a speaker to a sizable audience in Second Life at NASA e-Education island and Stella Nova. A second machinima video, with physics Nobel laureate Albert Fert also aired on the NobelPrize.org channel.
Shannon has co-presented about the library at National Defense University during the Federal Consortium of Virtual Worlds conference (2010), and it also gained attention at the Defense Technical Information Center conference. She presented “The Neil A. Armstrong Library and Archives: That’s One Small Step for a Virtual World Library, One Giant Leap for Education” at the 2010 Virtual Worlds Best practices in Education Conference with this Slidecast that has over 4,500 views.
Shannon presented at the national convention for The Mars Society about Mars in Second Life. She was awarded the Linden Prize “Top 10″ in 2010 by Linden Lab’s CEO to “formally recognize the best of-the-best” for having “greatly enhanced and changed thousands of lives around the world.” For her Linden Prize nomination, she was recognized as a distinguished alumnus from Kent State University. Shannon also co-sponsored and organized a machinima contest for the National Space Society.
Digital Preservation
Shannon has lectured on the subject of machinima at two conferences, Innovation for Libraries in the 21st Century (2010) and the 2011 Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education, having written a Best Practices Guideline in accordance with The National Archives and Records Administration Guidelines for Audio and Visual Materials. She is the leader of the Archivists of Second Life group, and her avatar made the cover of The Metropolitan Archivist (New York City).
Molecular Biology, Bioinformatics, and 3D Data Visualization
Shannon’s 3D visualization of p53 protein using data from the Protein Data Bank was published on the website of the journal Nature.
Engineering, Robotics, and Artificial Intelligence
Shannon is a member of the IEEE Virtual Worlds Standard Working Group and chaired/organized/co-sponsored the National Robotics Week IEEE events in Second Life. She delivered a hands-on tutorial on the Artificial Intelligence Markup Language (AIML) during National Robotics Week. Her robotic design won Honorable Mention in the international Gogbot 2010 Singularity Art & Design Show held in the Netherlands.
Her current project “Curiosity AI” was a winner in a White House Challenge for Artificial Intelligence. Specifically she won second place in “AI Concept Exploration” in the DoD/US Army’s international 2011 Federal Virtual Worlds Challenge, including a check for $3,000, an engraved trophy, a ribbon, and a medallion from the DoD / US Army for “Simulation, Training & Research.” Curiosity AI explores how artificial intelligence can communicate R&D concepts to be used in our future exploration of Mars. Curiosity AI focuses on a human controlling one AI which then controls many other AIs. Specifically, it proposes the use of a UAV flying hovercraft such as the Embla UAV. A UAV hovercraft like this would be capable of speeds of 50 miles per hour or more and would not limited by difficult terrain and could also navigate into caves on Mars and the Moon. The videos depicting a futuristic Mars Embla swarm were published in February (in a new media format on YouTube), and a presentation given at the IEEE Oregon Virtual Worlds Symposium on March 11, and submitted (as part of a larger project) for an AI contest in December of 2010.
In terms of defense applications, the project simulates how one human could operate many drones, including swarms. According to Tim Owings, deputy project manager for Unmanned Aircraft Systems Project Office, “Right now, it takes two Soldiers to operate an unmanned aircraft,” he said. “We want to take that to one-to-one and even to one-to-four. We will need higher levels of autonomy in our unmanned aircraft systems if an operator controls multiple vehicles” (March 24, 2011). Shannon also had a chance to demonstrate the project and be on a panel discussing “The Future of AI” at the 2011 Defense Gametech Conference in Orlando and the 2011 Federal Consortium of Virtual Worlds at National Defense University in Washington, DC. Currently she is volunteering to help develop the OpenSim project, MOSES (Military Open Simulator Enterprise Strategy).
Serious Games Background:
* DoD/Army — MOSES/STTC: http://107.7.21.240:8002/wifi
* DoD/Army, Nature Publishing Group, & NASA JPL — Second Life: https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/User:Archivist_Llewellyn
* IEEE — http://www.metaversestandards.org/index.php?title=User:Shannonb
* Tech@State — http://tech.state.gov/profile/ShannonBohle
Saket Singh Kaurav says:
May 27, 2011 at 12:41 am
Shannon Bohle is deserving candidate for the outstanding award. This will encourage her to introduce new innovative ideas in the field of library science. This appreciation will allow her to extract science and technology from library to in-front of world using Virtual World. We all should encourage her.
with regards
Saket Singh Kaurav
Robert E. Bennett says:
May 27, 2011 at 4:20 pm
I know Shannon from her work at the Lima Public Library in Lima, Ohio. She provided me with significant assistance on a research project concerning the last flight of Amelia Earhart. With her guidance, the Library was able to create a display of the collected works concerning the famed aviator and her navigator Fred Noonan. I would give her five stars for reference research.
James Davis says:
May 31, 2011 at 11:45 am
Shannon is a skilled craftsman in the realm of AI and Virtual Environments. I highly suspect she will be a significant contributor to next generation reference librarians. Her work on bridging virtual AI Agents into specific knowledge domains is impressive and I look forward to reading about Shannon’s future successes.
Nyra M. Bottley says:
June 12, 2011 at 12:05 am
Shannon Bohle is a dynamic lady and I highly recommend her for this award. I am working on my MBA currently in a Project Risk Management class, and Shannon assisted me with my research for my project on the Human Genome Project.
Click here to vote before Virtual Worlds Day, August 20, 2011.
