Tag: computer science
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NSF, Industry Consortium Fund Advanced Chip Research
Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond has received two grants totaling $1.75 million from National Science Foundation and the Semiconductor Research Corporation to create more energy-efficient computing devices. Semiconductor Research Corporation is an international technology research consortium of member companies and university research programs. The grants fund research to translate theoretical work on replacing traditional transistor-based…
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Computer Model Tests Effects of Heart Rhythm Drugs
Researchers at University of California in Davis have led the development of a computer model to test the effects of medications for arrhythmia — abnormal heart rhythm — before they are given to patients. The work of the team led by biophysicist Colleen Clancy is described in the 31 August issue of the journal Science…
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Engineers Build Compact, Inexpensive Microscope
Researchers at University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) have built a compact, light-weight microscope that uses holograms instead of lenses. The device is described in a paper published today in the journal Biomedical Optics Express, and a company has been formed to take it to market. The team developing the microscope is led by…
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Cancer Monitor Chip Implant in Development
Biomedical engineers at Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM) in Germany are developing an electronic sensor chip capable of monitoring tumors that are difficult to remove with surgery or growing slowly. The chip operates by determining the oxygen content in a patient’s tissue fluid. A team headed by Bernhard Wolf, professor of medical electronics at TUM, have…
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Small Business Grant Awarded for Blood Vessel Drug Database
HemoShear LLC, a biotechnology company in Charlottesville, Virginia has been awarded a Phase 2 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant award from National Institutes of Health (NIH). The grant of up to $4.3 million will fund profiles of the effects of 50 known drugs on the human blood vessel system. The database will help predict…
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Human Energy Harvesting Technology Developed, Commercialized
Engineers at University of Wisconsin in Madison have created a technology that harvests and converts energy from normal human activities like walking into electrical power for portable electronic devices. The work of Tom Krupenkin and J. Ashley Taylor appears in a paper in the journal Nature Communications, and is the basis of a company formed…
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Computer Model Helps Pinpoint Cancer Cell Targets
Medical and computer scientists in Israel and the U.K. have developed a computer model of cancer cell metabolism, which can help predict which drugs are lethal to cancer cells. Their work was part of a research study reported online last week in the journal Nature (paid subscription required). Many cancer drugs are now designed to…
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Radio Antennas Embedded in Clothing Developed, Licensed
Ohio State University engineers in Columbus have developed a process to sew radio antennas directly into clothing, using plastic film and metallic thread. Their work was published recently in the journal IEEE Antennas and Wireless Propagation Letters (paid subscription required), and licensed to a Virginia company for commercialization. Research engineering professor Chi-Chih Chen says the…
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Scheme Protects Against Wireless Network Security Breach
Computer scientists at MIT have devised a method for plugging a security gap in wireless networks that allows attackers to hijack log-on signals from network devices. MIT faculty Nickolai Zeldovich and Dina Katabi, with postdoc Nabeel Ahmed and grad student Shyam Gollakota presented their findings and demonstrated the system earlier this month at the Usenix…
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Monitors to Prevent Elderly Falls Before They Happen
Grants from the National Science Foundation’s Smart Health and Wellbeing Program are funding development of a sensor-based system to detect the risks of falls by frail elderly people. One of the grants, to Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, will involve collaboration between the school’s engineering and gerontology departments; a smaller grant will fund similar engineering work…