news from the lab 2012

Physics/Astronomy - Computer Science/Telecom - 22.02
Fiber Optics in Computer Screens
A single fiber-optic can light up computer screens. This innovation put in place by a spin-off, brings energy savings of 30% while boosting processors. “Slim as a hair, powerful as 100 LEDs”: the advantages of this technology have the allure of a slogan.

Computer Science/Telecom - Media Sciences/Political Sciences - 3.01
Communication within the animal kingdom
An experiment shows that communication systems can evolve differently within the same species and even the same environment. Performed using robots, this research can enable a better understanding of communication within the animal kingdom.

Business/Economics - Computer Science/Telecom - 16.09.2011
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree - or does it?
Research has shown that contrary to what was thought from previous studies, spin-outs don't systematically set up shop near their parent companies. To stay or to leave, what's the best strategy? “I was really surprised, when doing this research, to find that 50% of spin-outs don't necessarily establish themselves near the parent company,” observes Christopher Tucci from EPFL.

Computer Science/Telecom - 30.06.2011
Memory breakthrough for the first time
For the first time, scientists have demonstrated that a relatively new memory technology, known as phase-change memory (PCM), can reliably store multiple data bits per cell over extended periods of time.

Computer Science/Telecom - 14.06.2011
From a Bachelor’s project to the top of the charts
Aelios is an application that was developed by Bachelor students. Two weeks after its launch, it topped download charts in Switzerland and Germany. EPFL computer science student Andrea Coiro developed a weather application for Apple's iPad for his Bachelor's project.

Medicine/Pharmacology - Computer Science/Telecom - 6.06.2011
Remote diagnosis for medical ultrasound
An ultrasound machine has been transformed into a telediagnosis tool. Specialists in other hospitals can see images in real time, pinpoint the exact zone they're coming from, and interact. Making a diagnosis using ultrasound images often requires advice from experts in other hospitals, particularly in neurology.

Computer Science/Telecom - Environmental Sciences - 4.05.2011
Robots learn sharing
An evolutionary robotics experiment supports Hamilton's rule of altruism and improves swarm robotics collaboration as a result. Using simple robots to simulate genetic evolution over hundreds of generations, researchers shed light on one of the most enduring puzzles in biology: Why do most social animals, including humans, go out of their way to help each other?

Computer Science/Telecom - Medicine/Pharmacology - 1.04.2011
Schwangerschaftstest per Smartphone
1. APRIL! Schwangerschaftstests sind teuer und die Ergebnisse oft unsicher. Forschende haben nun eine Applikation für Smartphones entwickelt, mit der eine Schwangerschaft kostengünstig und sicher nachgewiesen werden kann.

Computer Science/Telecom - 28.02.2011
Supercomputers with the size of sugar cubes
Energy consumption poses a critical challenge in the development of next-generation supercomputers and IT systems. Within the next 10 years, IBM scientists and developers aim to build computers featuring exascale computing performance, but with an absolute energy consumption that is not much higher than that of today's largest systems.

Computer Science/Telecom - Psychology - 27.05.2010
Der Computer erkennt Gefühle
Das Start-up-Unternehmen nViso entwickelt ein System, das durch die Analyse von Gesichtsausdruck und Augenbewegungen Emotionen erkennt. Ziel der Forschenden ist es, innovative Lösungen im Marketingbereich zu entwickeln.

History/Philosophy - Computer Science/Telecom - 7.04.2010
Die Vergangenheit mit Silizium entziffern
Die Schrift der alten Maya bleibt geheimnisvoll. Von den rund 800 Hieroglyphen ist bis heute ein Fünftel nicht entschlüsselt. Ein Computerprogramm lässt nun rasche Fortschritte erwarten. Gesprochenes verfliegt, Geschriebenes bleibt.

Medicine/Pharmacology - Computer Science/Telecom - 27.01.2010
Die Ergotherapie von morgen findet am Computer statt
Nach Hirnverletzungen müssen Patienten Bewegungen neu einüben. Neuerdings helfen ihnen dabei Computergames: Computerwissenschaftler/innen entwickeln die Ergotherapie von morgen. Von den ersten Apple-Heimcomputern bis zur virtuellen Realität – der Computerwissenschaftler Kynan Eng (35) hat die Entwicklung der Informatik und der Computergames hautnah mitverfolgt.

Mathematics - Computer Science/Telecom - 13.01.2010
New record in the area of prime number decomposition of cryptographically important numbers
An international team of scientistshas obtained the prime factors of the RSA challenge number RSA-768, using the Number Field Sieve. The calculation took less than 2000 core years on modern CPUs. Extrapolating the trend from previous records in this area (512-bit in 1999, 663-bit in 2005, and the current 768-bit in 2009), it is reasonable to expect that 1024-bit keys will exhibit a similar degree of vulnerability within the next decade.

Computer Science/Telecom - Life Sciences - 3.11.2011
Evolution: Zuvorderst stehen hat Vorteile
Eine gross angelegte internationale Genealogie-Studie in einer kürzlich besiedelten Region von Quebec zeigt, dass Vorläufer am Rande einer Kolonisierungswelle einen selektiven Vorteil hatten: ihre Gene sind heute vorherrschend in der ganzen Population zu finden.