Sonia's Bio and Abstract

BIO

 Sonia Seetharaman is an undergraduate at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. She will be graduating in December 2008 with a B.S. in Biophysics and a concentration in French.

In addition to her coursework in both theoretical and applied science, Seetharaman has taken an academic interest in scholarly multimedia, using applications such as Adobe Flash , FinalCut Pro, and Adobe AfterEffects to animate, visualize and present academic subjects. She is currently working on an interactive, interdisciplinary research project on the concept of the garden in Western Europe.

Seetharaman has also worked as a peer mentor with the Institute for Multimedia Literacy at USC, teaching and helping other undergraduate students to use multimodal approaches in an academic realm. In the summer of 2007, she was a volunteer with the PBS production Wired Science, a television show which uses visual media to present recent technological innovations. Seetharaman hopes to apply these experiences to future jobs by utilizing visual as well as textual approaches in scientific study, in both the research and educational communities.

To Be or Not To Be: A Study of Duality in Science and Religion 

Duality is an inherent concept in the human mind. When we create, we create in twos; everything has an opposing counterpart. To Be or Not To Be is a presentation of this fact, which manifests in both the practicalities of science and the intricacies of religion.

The project is a visually engaging presentation of dualities that have occurred in various sciences and religions. The user navigates through a series of short videos, which elucidate the complexities of each duality presented. The information, while thorough, presents the material in a way that is relatively easy to understand without alienating the user through complex mathematics or the like.

After the user has navigated through all of the information, they are presented with the final conclusion, but not before answering various questions relating to the researched areas. The conclusion brings to light, through the user’s answers, the common thread which unites these diverse dualities and the nature of human cognition.