The Chancellor of the University of Sydney, Her Excellency Professor Marie Bashir AC CVO, has announced the reappointment of Dr Michael Spence as the Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Sydney.

Her announcement follows the decision of the University's Senate to offer Dr Spence another five-year appointment. His second term will commence on 1 July 2013.

"I am delighted that the University of Sydney has secured the services of Dr Spence for a further period," Professor Bashir said. "He has made a significant contribution to the University and even in a time of fiscal challenge has brought about major improvements, successfully leading our new strategic direction and collaboratively driving change for the better in many areas."

"He has personally guided and supported the development and implementation of an Indigenous education strategy and the social inclusion policy, the launch of a new MBA in the Business School, and brought in record levels of philanthropy for an Australian university," the Chancellor said.

In his first term as Vice-Chancellor, Dr Spence initiated a number of significant changes including the development and implementation of a new five-year strategic plan for which he was commended in an independent audit by the federal government's Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) in 2012.

Dr Spence, who took up his position in July 2008, is the University's 25th Vice-Chancellor. He had previously held one of four senior positions at the University of Oxford as head of the Social Sciences Division.

He is a graduate of the University of Sydney with First Class Honours in English, Italian and Law (BA (Hons) '85 and LLB (Hons) '87). He is internationally recognised as a leader in the field of intellectual property theory.

Alumnus Professor Ron Grunstein from the Sydney Medical School will dedicate some of the $50,000 he received for winning the 2012 Royal Prince Alfred Foundation Medal to study how sleep disorders can predict the development of neurological disorders such as Parkinson's disease.

"About three decades ago, it was apparent there was a link between people who act out their dreams during REM sleep, such as thrashing about, cycling, hitting walls etc, but we are now looking for specific markers that allow us to much more accurately predict which of those people might develop Parkinson's disease, and perhaps delay or prevent its progression,'' Professor Grunstein said.

"We have very few prodromal [early symptom] markers of Parkinson's, yet over a 10-year period about 60 to 70 percent of those people who act out during REM sleep will develop the disease. The money from this award will allow us to do brain imaging on these people."

The 2012 Royal Prince Alfred Hospital Foundation Medal was awarded to Professor Grunstein for his work on sleep disorders, particularly his research on the metabolic and neurobiological links between sleep problems and Parkinson's disease.

"The economic cost of insomnia is billions of dollars in lost productivity, absenteeism, and increased rates of depression. Why we sleep, what happens when we don't sleep, what are the consequences for society - it is a huge challenge."

Professor Grunstein has worked at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital since 1988, is a staff specialist physician in respiratory and sleep medicine, has an honorary appointment in respiratory and sleep medicine at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney, and heads the Sleep and Circadian Research Group at the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research.

A number of University of Sydney students and alumni are among the 115 outstanding researchers in Australia to receive 2012 Churchill Fellowships, which gives them the funds needed to develop their research and expertise overseas before implementing their findings in Australia.

Established in 1965 after the death of Sir Winston Churchill, the Churchill Trust has awarded more than 3,700 Australians with Churchill Fellowships worth around $20,000 each.

This year, 2011 Young Alumni Award winner Corey Payne (BCom '07) has been awarded a Fellowship for his research into new, culturally diverse programs that build ambition and aspiration in youth of low socioeconomic status or disadvantaged backgrounds, inspiring them to continue their academic studies. Payne will carry out his research in South Africa, Spain, Brazil and the UK.

Sydney Law School graduate, Jason Prince (MCrim '94), will use the Fellowship to examine the emerging use of facial recognition systems and facial image comparison procedures by police in Israel, the Netherlands, the UK, the US and Canada, and Jennifer Turpin (BA '82 BVArts '89 DipVArts '91) will be researching environmental public artworks in contemporary and historic cultures in Japan, India and Italy.

Music researchers Benjamin Ward (BMus (Perf)) and Carolyn Watson (BMusEd '96) have each received Fellowships that will take them to the US and Europe. Ward will be undertaking a comparison of the diverse approaches to the double bass in the major orchestras of Europe and Britain, and Watson will commence a comparative study of operatic and symphonic chorus performance practice and training methods.

Arts graduate Alicia Talbot's (BA '93) Fellowship will take her to Italy, Croatia and the UK to research alternative modes of dramaturgical development and performance to enrich theatre making in an Australian context, and Louise Zarmati (BA '80 DipEd '81) will use her Fellowship to study innovative museum and heritage education programs that use archaeological excavation methods to engage primary and secondary students in the study of history in the UK, Croatia and the US.

Linda Sheahan (BA '97 MBBS '01) is headed to the US, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland to explore the interface between palliative care and physician assisted suicide/voluntary euthanasia, and Senthorun Sunil Raj (BA (Hons) '11) will be investigating how sexual orientation and gender identity refugee claims are being pursued by specialist caseworkers in the US and the UK.

It took five hours to answer the complex mathematical problems, but a team of young algorithm whizzes from the Faculty of Engineering and IT and Faculty of Science have taken out this year's South Pacific Regional Collegiate Programming Contest.

The ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC) is an annual multi-tier, team-based programming competition conducted in three stages at tertiary institutions across the globe.

Dr Vincent Gramoli, from the School of Information Technologies, says: "This annual event is the oldest and probably the most prestigious programming contest in the world."

The 'Brogrammers' team, comprising students, Giles Gardam, George Karpenkov and Bin Zhou, and coached by Dr Gramoli, programmed the computer code solving eight complex real-world problems within the time limit. The team was allowed to use just one computer, racing against the clock to solve problems of logic and strategy.

They successfully collaborated to rank the difficulty of the problems, deduce the requirements, design test beds, and build software systems that solve the problems under the intense scrutiny of expert judges.

Mathematics and Statistics honours degree student Giles Gardam credits the team's win to regular practice and input from their coach.

"By the day of the competition we were operating like a well-oiled machine. Regular team practice is essential. You're very unlikely to succeed unless you can work together and understand each other's code and ideas. We also looked back critically on how we performed in each practice competition, to focus on our weaknesses and iron out the kinks in our method."

Dr Gramoli says: "Quite literally they are the cream of the crop and potentially the world's brightest problem-solvers.

"For a well-versed computer science student, some of the contest problems require precision only. Others require a knowledge and understanding of advanced algorithms."

The Brogrammers will now participate in the Annual World Finals of the ACM ICPC to be held in St Petersburg, Russia next year.