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30 December 2019 | Story Thabo Kessah | Photo Thabo Kessah
Gavin Dollman
Gavin Dollman is involved in virtual prospecting for fossils using a drone.

Gavin Dollman is one of the young researchers selected for the international research programme funded through the US-SA Higher Education Network. This prestigious programme is aimed at giving PhD candidates and their supervisors the opportunity to regularly travel to the USA and spend time at participating US universities where their co-promoters will be based.

“The University Staff Doctoral Programme (USDP) has allowed me to bring my idea of collaborative science to fruition. It’s an exciting opportunity,” Dollman said.

Dollman added that his PhD studies would focus on the machine and deep learning for prospecting for palaeontology. He is studying with the Appalachian State University. Other participating universities are Montana and Colorado State.

He has also had the privilege to work alongside a team of Geologists and Paleontologists from the universities of Birmingham, Zurich and Oxford in a project under the auspices of the University of the Witwatersrand’s Evolution Studies Institute (ESI) on a site in rural Eastern Cape.

“My role within this massive project is to perform a detailed survey of the sites and the surrounding area for later analysis. I used a drone known as the DJI Phantom 3 Pro with which I took hundreds of pictures that were later put together to create a detailed map,” he said.

“The maps allowed for virtual prospecting by the team and will in the long term serve as the basis for a predictive fossil model for the area.”

Dollman is a lecturer in the Department of Computer Science and Informatics on the Qwaqwa Campus.

News Archive

UFS closes pedestrian entrances to improve safety on campus
2010-08-05

The University of the Free State (UFS) will remove pedestrian gates on its Main Campus in an extra effort to improve safety on this campus.

It was decided to implement this plan because the campus covers a huge area and people who are not part of the campus community hang around on the campus, sometimes causing damages. This idea is also strongly supported by students, in particular with regard to the removal of the pedestrian thoroughfares close to the hostels.

The following pedestrian gates will not be removed:

- The pedestrian thoroughfares on both sides of the DF Malherbe Gate (next to the Faculty of Health Sciences). Both the main gate and the pedestrian thoroughfares at the DF Malherbe Gate remain open 24 hours a day.
- The pedestrian thoroughfares at the Badenhorst Street Gate (close to Roosmaryn Residence). The Badenhorst Gate is not open 24 hours a day, but the pedestrian thoroughfare will remain open 24 hours a day.

The following pedestrian thoroughfares will be removed with effect from 1 September 2010:

- The pedestrian thoroughfare to the east of Pellies Park
- The pedestrian thoroughfare to the west of Pellies Park (directly behind JMB Hertzog Residence)
- The turnstile between the Kovsie Church and the Wynand Mouton Gate
- The pedestrian thoroughfare behind the tennis courts
- The pedestrian thoroughfares behind the rugby fields

A request was also directed at the Kovsie Church to close down the pedestrian thoroughfare between the Kovsie Church and the UFS. This gate will then be opened during church activities.

From 1 September 2010, the personnel of Security Services will regularly patrol the fences. Trespassers that flatten the fencing to enter the campus will be prosecuted.

Students, personnel and visitors are encouraged to make use of the main entrance gates of the UFS. These include the Main Gate (in Nelson Mandela Drive), the Wynand Mouton Gate (in DF Malherbe Drive), the DF Malherbe Gate (in Wynand Mouton Drive), the Badenhorst Street Gate (close to Roosmaryn Residence) and the Furstenburg Gate (in Furstenburg Road).

Media Release:
Mangaliso Radebe
Assistant Director: Media Liaison
Tel: 051 401 2828
Cell: 078 460 3320
E-mail: radebemt@ufs.ac.za
5 August 2010

 

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