14th Annual Conference 2018

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The 15th Annual INCOSE SA Conference will be hosted in 2021

14th Annual INCOSE SA Conference 2018

The Stone Age Did not End for a Lack of Stone—Human Innovation Did it
3 - 5 October 2018, CSRI ICC, Pretoria

Technicalprogram1

Technicalprogram1

Technicalprogram1

	Dr Jan-Hendrik Hofmeyr Distinguished Professor of Biocomplexity and Biochemistry, Centre for Complex Systems in Transition, STIAS, University of Stellenbosch The Complexity of Life What distinguishes living from non-living entities? This most basic of biological questions has led to a revolution in way we think about systems and complexity. The fundamental property that distinguishes the quick from the dead is the ability to autonomously synthesise all molecular machinery from nutrients obtained from its environment: a living organism is a molecular factory that can fabricate itself. The story of how this answer to our question was developed is a strand within the more general story of systems science—the key players were Nicholas Rashevsky, Robert Rosen, John von Neuman, Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela. In the hands of Robert Rosen it culminated in a new way of thinking about relations, causality and complexity. Using concepts from the mathematical field of category theory and the old Aristotelean categories of causation, he constructed a formal image of a functional component of any system in terms of a mapping that shows how efficient and formal cause act on material cause (input) to give final cause (output). The functional organisation of any system can be described as a network of such mappings. So doing, Rosen gave us not only a language to talk about the relational structure of any system, but also a way to distinguish simple, complicated and complex systems. Jan-Hendrik (Jannie) Hofmeyr has been a member of the Biochemistry Department since 1975. His research of the past 35 years has been in the field of computational systems biology where his main focus has been the understanding of regulatory design of metabolism. A recent interest is to seek a way of expressing formally the functional organisation of the cell in terms of a theory of molecular fabrication, which could form a theoretical foundation for both systems biology and nanotechnology. This interest has led him to a broader study of complex systems, which he pursued with the late philosopher of complexity Paul Cilliers.
	David Long Founder and President of Vitech Corporation Evolving MBSE to Enable the Digital Future While systems engineering continues to emphasize model-based systems engineering (MBSE), the greater community is shifting its focus to bigger issues—from model-based engineering to digital thread and now to digital engineering. We want to believe that these pieces will naturally come together to create a digital future for engineering, but that is not the case. We can continue to digitize for our own systems engineering purposes failing to consider the greater context and community, creating our own “digital divide” and largely ensuring the irrelevance of systems engineering. Or we can embrace the greater context and leverage digitization of systems engineering as an opportunity to connect disciplines and enable digital engineering—in the process advancing systems engineering as a discipline and delivering true value. It’s the choice of context and purpose, a choice that either furthers a disconnect or embraces the systems perspective to enable the digital future. For over 25 years, David has focused on helping organizations increase their systems engineering proficiency while simultaneously working to advance the state of the art. David is the founder and president of Vitech where he leads the team in delivering innovative, industry-leading methods and software (CORE™ and GENESYS™) to help organizations engineer next-generation systems. He co-authored A Primer for Model-Based Systems Engineering and frequently delivers keynotes and tutorials at industry events around the world. A committed member of the systems community and Expert Systems Engineering Professional (ESEP), David was the 2014/2015 president of INCOSE.
	Dr Pierre Durand Head: Evolution of Complexity Laboratory, University of Witwatersrand Evolutionary Transitions and the Search for LUCA One of the properties of living systems is the tendency, on a macroevolutionary scale, to evolve increasing complexity. For example, a eukaryotic cell emerged from cooperating prokaryote cells. Single eukaryotic cells cooperated to evolve multicellular forms, which in turn can live in social groups such as bees and ants. These increases in biological complexity are called evolutionary transitions (sometimes, evolutionary transitions in individuality) because of the transition from one kind of biological level of complexity to another. We will explore the general mechanisms by which these transitions occur and how the new level of complexity is selected for. One of the evolutionary transitions was the origin of life itself. We will also summarize our current understanding of how life arose. It is now possible to sketch out a general framework, that is supported empirically and by genomic data, of how life arose from abiotic molecules. More specifically, how the very first biologically relevant molecules cooperated to form a primitive genome. This framework gives rise to fundamental questions. What is life and how should it be defined? How will we know when a putative form of life is discovered outside of our own biosphere, that it is actually a living system? By trying to understand the nature of LUCA (the last universal common ancestor) on earth, we can attempt to answer some of these questions. Pierre Durand is an evolutionary biologist at the Evolutionary Studies Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. He holds degrees from Wits University and Kings College, London and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Arizona. His research focus is a curiosity-driven exploration of the evolution of biological complexity. The origin and evolution of primitive molecular networks, programmed death in unicellular organisms and multicellular life are themes in his research laboratory.
	Dr Jeandrew Brink Noble Queries Regarding the Nature of Space-time Gravitational Wave (GW) event GW150914 heralded the beginning of the era of observational GW astronomy. The first ever direct detection of a GW celebrated the collaborative effort of hundreds of Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) scientists and engineers. It was made possible by detailed calculation, sustained funding and systematic technological innovation, envisioned and initiated some 45 years ago. The 2017 Nobel prize in Physics was awarded to Rai Weiss, Barry Barish and Kip Thorne for their decisive contribution to the LIGO detector and observation of GWs. I explore the scientific legacy left by the route to GW detection and some of the lessons learned regarding the nature of gravitation and black hole mergers in the GW events observed so far. One recent GW event in particular stands out—GW170817 was the first ever coincident GW and electromagnetic observation of the merger of what we believe to be two neutron stars. Observed by more telescopes and astronomers around the world than any other event in recorded history, GW170817 gave us a rare glimpse of what occurs when two objects of extreme densities collide in a great fireball. I review some of the highlights of the ever-increasing slew of observations associated with this catastrophic event. A future where GWs can be used to test the theory of General Relativity and possibly resolve some of the fundamental inconsistencies this theory has with Quantum Mechanics beckons like an elusive but tangible mirage on the horizon. I explore some of the approaches to the problem and discuss the role MeerKAT and space-based GW detectors can play in solving one of the greatest fundamental physics puzzles of this century. Dr Brink obtain a PhD in theoretical physics from Cornell University exploring the pulsation modes of neutron stars. For this work she won the Sherman Fairchild Prize Postdoctoral Fellowship at the California Institute of Technology and spent five years working on numerical relativity, testing Einstein's general theory of relativity and LIGO source modelling in Kip Thorne’s research group. She return to South Africa in 2010 and continues to pursue her interest in testing General Relativity using pulsar timing, earth and space-based gravitational wave detectors. She currently serves on the International Pulsar Timing Array Steering Committee and is eager to facilitate SA research involvement in pulsar timing and gravitational wave physics.
	Dr Neil Croft Department of Informatics, University of Pretoria Distributed Ledgers and Blockchain Technology
	Prof John Butler-Adam Editor-in-Chief, The South African Journal of Science, Academy of Science of South Africa

The 14th INCOSE SA Conference will be held at the CSIR International Convention Centre in Pretoria, conveniently situated close to all the central amenities in Pretoria and easily accessible from all major routes in Gauteng.

CSIR ICC Location Map

CSIR ICC By Gautrain

Email: info@incose.org.za