A spectral detection method has been developed for achieving spectral resolution beyond the diffraction limit of the spectrograph providing a vast potential improvement in spectral resolution compared to the current standard. Previous attempts at high resolution spectrophometers used high quality optics and highly grooved diffraction grating to spread light as much as possible; however, narrowing the effective spectral spread function and spectral range of the instrument. Fourier transform (FT) spectrometers equipped with exotic slow-light chambers provide many meters of optical delay, possess extremely high resolution and extremely broad spectral ranges, but at the expense of prohibited measurement times per sample that would not be suitable for dynamic studies. In contrast to weak noise performing FT spectrometers and in absence of specialized and expensive equipment, this method can detect subtle peak fluctuations arising from conformational changes and binding using only a standard spectrometer and charged-couple device CCD array to simultaneously achieve high spectral resolution and broad spectral.   One configuration that could be envisaged is making rapid measurements of Surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) spectra to visualize and interpret slight variations resulting from molecule conformational change, ionization, and interactions that may give insights into its photophysical and photochemical properties. Many fluorophores, such as Acridine Orange, have excitation and emission spectra depending upon their local chemical environment. Using this method, it may be possible to measure very slight shifts in fluorescence emission spectra that may indicate how the fluorophore is binding to a target and thus give insight into both the fluorophore’s and binding target’s chemical structure. By exploiting a measurement modality such as one might find in photo-activated localization in microscopy (PALM), it is possible to obtain superresolved spectra of these fluorophores that may give information about their bound and unbound states, or local chemical environments. (more...)

This invention provides an efficient method for executing transactions on a storage device (e.g., a disk or solid-state disk) by using special support in the storage device for making a set of updates atomic and durable. The storage device guarantees that these updates complete as a single indivisible operation and that if they succeed, they will survive permanently despite power loss, system failure, etc. Normally, transactions are implemented entirely in software using techniques such as write-ahead logging. This requires multiple IO requests to the storage device to write data to a log, write a commit record, and write back the data to its permanent addresses. Instead, the storage device performs these operations directly at storage device controllers. As a result, transactions execute with lower latency and consume less communication bandwidth between the host and the storage device. In addition to performance improvements, this invention provides a unique interface which allows the application to manage the logs used by the hardware. The logs are stored as regular files in the file system, so the application can extend or truncate the log files to match the working set of its transactions. The interface also allows the application to specify the log address of an update. Consequently, a transaction can see its own updates before commit by reading back the data from the correct addresses in the log. These two features, namely scalability and transparency, help higher-level software provide robust and flexible transactions. Our invention can be used in existing write-ahead logging schemes for databases, replacing software-only implementations and significantly reducing the complexity of storage management. (more...)

With the cost of sequencing the human genome dropping exponentially it will soon be economical for individuals to get the results of paternity tests, personal medicine analyses and even genetic matching or compatibility tests without the expense or trouble of elaborate laboratory procedures. Additionally, researchers from UCI’s Genomics and Computer Science departments have developed a safe and secure methodology and infrastructure to conduct these tests, safely and securely and all done via mobile devices. (more...)

Many crystalline materials can be grown on foreign substrates; but for their intended applications, materials often need to be either free from the substrate or transferred to a different substrate. One such example is where there is a need to obtain a device structure where a direct bandgap semiconductor (e.g., GaAs) is combined on silicon, or to place an optically active material on an optically transparent or a highly thermally conductive substrate. (more...)

Pain assessment is essential and crucial to effective pain management in the clinical setting. Without adequate and continuous pain assessment, pain therapies may not be tailored to patient needs, and pain continues unrecognized, underestimated, and poorly controlled. Pain assessment has generally relied on patient self-report. Unfortunately, age, gender and racioethnicity of patients may affect clinical interpretation of patient verbal reports of pain and subsequent pain management. Importantly, self-report is not a viable option for infants, very young children and/or persons with cognitive, sensory, psychiatric or physical disabilities. The most common reason for the under-treatment of pain in U.S. hospitals is a failure of clinicians to assess pain and pain relief. Mismanagement of pain has resulted in morbidity, including hyperalgesia, somatization and poor neurofunctional outcomes. Inadequate control of procedurally-related pain in children contributes to conditioned anxiety and stress responses to future interventions and procedures, higher pain intensities and diminished analgesic effectiveness with subsequent procedures, noncompliance and avoidance of medical care, and predisposition to persistent or chronic pain states. Untreated pain may also contribute to morbidity and mortality by impeding recovery, exacerbating injury, preventing healing, prolonging hospitalization, and delaying treatment leading to death. In contrast, adequate pain management interventions have been demonstrated to reduce not only reported pain but also medication use, patient re-hospitalization rates and length of hospital stay. (more...)

University of California researchers have developed a method for reducing electronic 1/f noise in graphene devices used for high speed applications and biological and chemical sensors.  Using a novel method of irradiating the channel regions of graphene devices with electron beams with proper irradiation dosage, the 1/f noise in a graphene device is suppressed.   (more...)

3D displays are increasingly popular in consumer and commercial application. Many such displays show 3D images to viewers wearing special glasses, while showing an incomprehensible double image to viewers without glasses. These stereoscopic displays provide a different image to the viewer’s right and left eyes to produce a three-dimensional (3D) percept. The most popular 3D display paradigm shows a pair of images on the same screen, intended for the viewers’ left and right eyes. The lenses of special shuttered or polarized “stereo glasses” pass images to the correct eye. A viewer not wearing these glasses sees both images superimposed; creating a “ghosted” double-image where two copies of objects appear overlaid.  Implementation of 3D displays has increased drastically, moving from a niche product a few years ago to mass market acceptance today with applications in entertainment, medical imaging, and engineering visualization. Currently, 3D glasses are required to view 3D images, but they’re not always desired by the user; in part due to the expense and in part because they interfere with other activities.  (more...)

A novel type of non-volatile NAND logic device for use in signal processing, digital storage and computation. (more...)

Present-day digital audio workstations (DAWs) have allowed the home enthusiast to achieve professional quality audio production. Artificial reverberation algorithms allow the user to render sounds as if they had been recorded in a particular acoustic space. This could be for the purpose of naturalistic spatialization or for aesthetic purposes specific to a piece of music. Convolution reverberators are among the most realistic methods available and can accurately reproduce the reverberation of a particular acoustic space, as described by an impulse response. Current methods for impulse response measurement are highly susceptible to environmental noise, require specialized equipment, and can be difficult for non-experts to operate. (more...)

Flash, SSD, and Storage Class (SCM) technologies stand to replace magnetic disk technology as the mainstay for high end applications. However, magnetic disk technology will continue to play an important role in large storage systems, due to the sheer amount of data to be stored, the attractive cost-to-capacity ratios of disks, and the high steaming throughput. Although, disk drives offer decent performance (especially when accessing large blocks of data) and very low cost per GB, they are mechanic-electrical devices with moving parts, which subjects them to relatively high annual failure rates. This failure rate contributes to a heightened sensitivity in assessing liability associated with the loss of data; resulting in some companies using triplication of disk storage devices to protect data (e.g., internet searches). While replication offers operational advantages, the storage overhead and its associated costs in hardware, maintenance, and energy is too large.  (more...)

UC San Diego inventors have developed error-correcting codes that allow for double- and triple-error correction. These codes can be applied to communications and memory storage, especially for write-once memory.Additionally, UC San Diego inventors have developed codes for write-once memory that allows for two writes in an efficient manner. This invention can be applied to make more efficient use of flash memory, or other types of write-once memory devices.The research behind these inventions can be reviewed at these links. http://itw2010dublin.org/cs_memories.htm http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-10/uoc--usd102510.php (more...)

The new methodologies developed by UCSC researchers undertake the unique challenges of synthesizing the resonant grids in high performance systems.    Chip design methodology enhances the usefulness of resonant clock by achieving additional power savings, along with residual benefits through the automation of current hand tuned processes.   The on-chip clock distribution network (CDN) consumes in excess of 35% of total chip power and occasionally as much as 70%. Experimental results, in using this methodology, show CDN power savings as much as 80%. The power savings along with automation enhancement feature are technology improvements which will enable enhanced IC performance. (more...)

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UC San Diego inventors designed a portable, quick‐setup, ultra‐narrow bezel, tiled display wall module. It allows very fragile display arrays to be shipped without damage and setup in minutes. University inventors have developed a means to mount two to eight of these displays (per module) in a frame and, with either motors or hydraulics, raise and/or lower this frame into a padded custom‐designed shipping case with casters. (more...)

Given here is an innovative multiple sub-carrier selection diversity receiver architecture for WLAN OFDM systems with multiple antennas. With a small increase in analog complexity, it is shown that significant gain can be achieved by the proposed technique over selection diversity for WLAN OFDM systems. The technique requires only a single A/D and DFT, which eases the baseband hardware requirements significantly. (more...)

Current computing systems typically do not store information about the provenance or origins of the files they contain. More specifically, the information sources used to create the file is also unknown. UCI researchers have developed GARM, a new tool for tracing data provenance and enforcing data access policies with arbitrary binaries. (more...)

Digital electronic devices continue to evolve rapidly; whereas the development of methods to power these devices has been comparably minimal. Lithium-ion batteries are frequently used in handheld devices, however their performance degrades over repeated usage. Electrochemical capacitors (ECs), or supercapacitors, have recently advanced and are now being considered as an alternative to traditional batteries. ECs offer considerable advantages over traditional batteries in that they can be charged in about 1 second, and can be recharged and discharged hundreds of thousands of times without a decline in performance. ECs have not been successfully commercialized, however, since the conventional battery can store more charge for a given volume. (more...)

Organic light emitting diode (OLED) screens provide vibrant, high-definition images that can easily be seen from almost any angle. Their thin organic light emitting layer is only a few microns thick, replacing the bulky glass layer used in traditional liquid crystal displays (LCDs). Limitations common to LCDs, such as pixel aperture size do not exist in OLED panels. Also, OLEDs do not require a backlight, making screens thinner, lighter, and more power efficient. Furthermore, when compared to LCD or plasma screens, OLED technology is more effectively manufactured. Despite the numerous advantages, the limited lifetime of OLEDs has hindered their commercialization. Specifically, there is a tradeoff between design efficiency and device lifetime. Research efforts have mostly focused on using a tandem cell design to improve lifetime; however, improvement has been minimal. (more...)

Inventors at UCSD have invented a method for a multimedia information retrieval system and method including a method and system for automatic format conversion. This invention is especially useful in the field of multimedia information systems and more particularly to encoding/decoding techniques. The invention includes a data structure that is associated with each multimedia bitstream. The data structure identifies the encoding format, e.g., compression technique, used in the multimedia bitstream which is originated by a contents server. An automatic format conversion process then queries information from the client system (requester) and also receives the data structure identifying the encoding format. The client information identifies the decoding format. The automatic format conversion determines the transcoding process required for converting the bitstream from its encoded format to the format recognized by the client system. The format conversion process of the present invention also determines whether or not decoding is required before transcoding is performed thereby saving processing time and computer resources in those cases where decoding is not required. Moreover, the format conversion process also automatically determines the computer memory size required to perform the transcoding process thereby saving computer memory resources. The format converter can be implemented in software as an application and can also be integrated within a data access server. The data access server can be integrated within the client system or within the contents server. The format converter of the invention is particularly useful for electronic devices coupled in a communication network where the encoding format of the sender may not be compatible with the decoding format of the receiver, thereby requiring transcoding between the formats. This is an issued patent - 6,463,445. Licenses are available. (more...)

A novel method for the display of 2-D spatial data has been devised. Methods for zooming data usually involve loss of data, either by removing the data from screen real-estate or by obscuring regions by zoomed windows. Methods for eliminating these losses - for example "fish-eye" zooming - lead to distortion of the data. This new method allows for Lossless zooming of data Regions of undistorted, magnified data Automated variable magnification based on spatial data density. This technology will benefit customers displaying geographic data, or using geographic information systems, desktop and publication software, computer-aided design (CAD) software, medical imaging systems, and the customers of other commercial ventures interested in the display of two-dimensional information. (more...)

UC San Diego inventors have devised a novel motion estimation technique with applications in the following (and more) areas: Frame Rate Conversion - for example, NTSC to HDTV video rate conversion. Compression - for example, in MPEG2, MPEG4, H.26L, etc. Image registration and other image processing techniques that require motion estimation. This technique is a highly efficient method that can compute all possible motion vectors. (more...)

This invention is related to two-dimensional page-oriented  storage, and the signal processing techniques required to reliably detect the written data. The disclosed method performs better than other methods because it can approach theoretical limits of performance with moderate computational complexity. (Other methods either can't approach theoretical limits, or are too computationally costly to reach this method's level of performance.) (more...)

A new audio coding method was developed that allows efficient decomposition of audio signal into periodic and noise components. The components can be recombined after processing operations, such as compression or editing, to reconstruct a modified version of the audio signal. The sound model can be used also to store and modify clips of sounds for synthesis applications, such as concatenative synthesis of speech or music. (more...)

Researchers from UC San Diego have designed a method that represents an advance in the area of accurate spatial processing of sounds. The invention is especially useful in reproducing spatially-significant sounds within a confined area (such as a concert hall, small club, or large arena) without specialized speaker placement. (more...)

University researchers have invented a way to leverage a set of largely commodity Ethernet switches to support the full bisection bandwidth of clusters of scalable size, even with tens of thousands of compute nodes. The invention uses an approach that requires no modifications to the end host network interface, operating system, or applications, and so it is fully backward compatible with Ethernet, IP, and TCP. This invention presents a reasonable alternative to increasing bandwidth using specialized hardware and communication protocols (such as Infiniband or Myrinet). The invention meets the following design goals: Scalable interconnection bandwidth: an arbitrary host in the data center can communicate with any other host in the network at the full bandwidth of its local network interface. Economically scaleable: just as personal computers became the basis for large-scale computing environments, this invention can leverage cheap off-the-shelf Ethernet switches the basis for high-performance large-scale data center networks. Backward Compatibility: existing data centers, which almost universally leverage commodity Ethernet and run IP, can take advantage of this new interconnect architecture with no modifications. Packaging and cabling efficiency: the topology must not introduce complexities to the hardware configuration and management. (more...)

UC San Diego inventors have come up with novel computer vision techniques for identification of facial attractiveness. The measure of attractiveness can be tuned to an individual, in contrast to other techniques which base the measure on an average of many people. The invention has been implemented in a working prototype, and a pilot study has already been conducted.You can read more at this link: http://mplab.ucsd.edu/~jake/fgr08_attractiveness.pdf (more...)

University researchers have invented a method for providing different levels of quality of service (QoS) at the level of the web server. This allows for the follow benefits: 1) Allows for higher quality of service to paying customers 2) Can provide different QoS based on user priority or content priority 3) Provides for a complementary revenue model where paying customers receive more responsive service. (more...)

University researchers have written powerful software for the molecular modeling of protein. The Fast Atomic Density Evaluation (FADE) and Pairwise Atomic Density Reverse Engineering (PADRE) programs deduce molecular shape using the local density of atoms at points within a few Angstroms of the molecular surface. FADE uses Fast Fourier Transforms and convolution integrals to rapidly calculate the distribution of atomic neighbors. PADRE poses the question of atomic density as an inverse problem based on a one-dimensional integral of Lennard-Jones potentials. A primary advantage of atomic density methods is their computational efficiency. FADE can analyze molecular shape in seconds, while other methods may take minutes or hours. FADE and PADRE can deduce surface shape features, such as crevices and protrusions. FADE is also able to do detailed analysis of shape complementarity for docked complexes. The ability to determine regions of strong shape match or mismatch in an interface is very useful to computer-aided drug design. In addition to research, atomic density methods offer an ideal tool for learning about the shape features of molecules. The basic ideas underlying density methods can be understood intuitively, and integration within existing packages for molecular visualization would be a great aid to students studying protein structure-function relationships. For more information please see the website http://www.sdsc.edu/CCMS/FP/ (more...)

The latest video compression standard (MPEG-4) has moved the wireless industry one step closer to the world of high quality multimedia services. Commercial wireless MPEG-4 video codec systems can already support up to Level 3 of the MPEG Simple Visual Profile. However, the issue of how to effectively transport such high quality multimedia streams across fluctuating radio channels remains a challenge because highly compressed data is very susceptible to low quality fluctuating channel conditions. Advancement in adaptive antenna array technologies such as BLAST, makes it possible to support sustainable bit rate (SBR) conduits in a practical manner. However the use of multiple antennas introduces another dimension of variation - the diversity or different fading levels among sub-channels. (more...)