Light Workout: Optogenetics Stimulates Mouse Muscles ...

Light has been used to effectively stimulate muscle movement in mice optically, rather than electrically.

In a study involving bioengineered mice whose nerve-cell surfaces are coated with special light-sensitive proteins, researchers at Stanford University were able to use light to induce normal patterns of muscle contraction.

The new approach allows scientists to more accurately reproduce muscle firing order, making it a valuable research tool. The investigators, from Stanford’s schools of medicine and of engineering, also believe this technique could someday spawn practical applications, from restoring movement to limbs paralyzed by stroke or spinal-cord or brain injury, to countering spasticity caused by cerebral palsy.
 

The study, published online Sept. 26 in Nature Medicine, employed optogenetics technology, which involves the insertion of a specialized gene derived from algae into the genomes of experimental animals. This gene encodes a light-sensitive protein that situates itself on nerve-cell surfaces. Particular wavelengths of light can trigger nerve activity in animals endowed with these proteins, modifying nerve cells’ firing patterns at the experimenters’ will.  The light is delivered via fiber-optic cables causes a mouse's brain cells to fire.
 

ref: Photonics.com Bio Technology Newsletter

Antony Joe Christo, C.V. Karthick Kumar and Praveen Rajadurai of final year ECE won second prize for their project  on "Vehicle Status Monitoring" in the PROJECT SHOW CASE  in Parikrama'10 conducted in Saranathan College of Engineering, Tiruchirapalli.

Congrats!!!

A Guest Lecture was organised by the Department Of Electronics and Communication Engineering on 1st October 2010 in the conference hall for the Pre-Final Year students. The resource person was Dr. A. Thenmozhi, Dept. of ECE, Thiagarajar College of Engineering, Madurai. The programme commenced with the welcome address given by Asst. Prof. Mr. R. M. Manickam. The resource person shared her views on 'Transmission Lines, Cavity Resonators and Wave Guides'. she explained the students about loading of cables and Stub matching techniques. In the second session she focused upon the types of waveguides, distortions and wave guide cavity resonators. The presentation was continued with Smith chart and its applications. Towards the end, there was an open discussion with the students, through which the students clarified their doubts. 110 students along with the faculty members got benefited through this programme.. The programme came to an end with the vote of thanks proposed by Ms. Juhi of III year ECE.

Deepthy Venkatachalam and M. Sadashaya of Second Year ECE won first prize in the technical event V-Haunt in RACE '10 on 1st October, 2010. RACE'10 was the National Level Technical Symposium conducted by Velammal College Engineering and Technology, Madurai. Congratulation to the winners!

A latest invention by MIT Media Lab is a new robot that is able to show various facial expressions such as 'slanting its eyebrows in anger', or 'raise them in surprise', and show a wide assortment of facial expressions while communicating with people.

This latest achievement in the field of Robotics is named NEXI as it is framed as the next generation robots which is aimed for a range of applications for personal robots and human-robot teamwork.

DESIGNING

The head and face of NEXI were designed by Xitome Design which is a innovative designing and development company that specializes in robotic design and development. The expressive robotics started with a neck mechanism sporting 4 degrees of freedom (DoF) at the base, plus pan-tilt-yaw of the head itself. The mechanism has been constructed to time the movements so they mimic human speed. The face of NEXI has been specially designed to use gaze, eyebrows, eyelids and an articulate mandible which helps in expressing a wide range of different emotions.

The chassis of NEXI is also advanced. It has been developed by the Laboratory for Perceptual Robotics UMASS (University of Massachusetts), Amherst. This chassis is based on the uBot5 mobile manipulator. The mobile base can balance dynamically on two wheels. The arms of NEXI can pick up a weight of up to 10 pounds and the plastic covering of the chassis can detect any kind of human touch.

CYNTHIA BREAZEAL: HEAD OF THE PROJECT

This project was headed by Media Lab's Cynthia Breazeal, a well known robotics expert famous for earlier expressive robots such as Kismet. She is an Associate Professor of Media Arts and Sciences at the MIT. She named her new product as an MDS (mobile, dextrous, social) robot.

FEATURES OF NEXI

Except a wide range of facial expressions, Nexi has many other features. It has self-balancing wheels like the Segway transporter, to ultimately ride on. Currently it uses an additional set of supportive wheels to operate as a statically stable platform in its early stage of development. It has hands which can be used to manipulate objects, eyes (video cameras), ears (an array of microphones), and a 3-D infrared camera and laser rangefinder which support real-time tracking of objects, people and voices as well as indoor navigation.

A Guest lecture by Prof. Dr. A. Thenmozhi is organized for the benefit of third year Electronics and Communication Engineering students on 1st October 2010 in the conference hall of main block at 10am.

Dr. Thenmozhi is working as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering in Thiagarajar College of Engineering, Madurai.  She will deliver her lecture  on Transmission Lines, Cavity Resonators and Waveguides.

Anju. K and Infanta Priyadharshini. F of III year ECE won second prize in PEACE'10,  the Project Display Contest held by Anna University, Trichy on 17th September 2010. The title of the Project was “ S shaped Metameterial Antenna for Wireless Application” There are a total of 60 projects out of which they got second prize. A number of techniques are available to improve antenna gain like antenna array, Yagi antenna and disk antenna etc. But there are problems with antenna volume, weight and cost. In the above mentioned project new methods to improve antenna gain using metamaterial technology was proposed. This S- Shaped antenna exibits its negative permitivity by means of its structure for WiMAX applications. Slotted antenna for multinand frequency applications was also designed.  This project was guided by one of the lecturers of Electronics and Communication Department Ms. Anandhimeena.

Congratulations to the winners !

The Model Exam for IV year ECE commences on 20/9/10
             Portion                 All Five Units
          Timing                  9:00 Am to 12:00 Noon
           Hall No                 Main Block (MCO1, MC 2A) 
 

DATE                            SUBJECT

20/9/10                        EMBEDDED SYSTEMS

22/9/10                        OPTICAL COMMUNICATION NETWORKS

24/9/10                        MICROWAVE ENGINEERING

27/9/10                        TELECOMMUNICATION SWITCHING NETWORKS

29/9/10                        MEDICAL ELECTRONICS

1/10/10                        PROFESSIONAL ETHICS AND HUMAN VALUES

                 B E S T   W I S H E S !!!
 

The following students of  II year Electronics and Communication Engineering department had made their mark in MATECH 2010 conducted by the department of Mathematics recently.  There were a total of 20 teams.

TECH QUIZ

M. SabarishBabu & R. Robin Richard  - First Prize

MATH MAGIC

N. Nivetha & U. Saradha         - First Prize

TPDE QUIZ

B. Haritha & J. Anitha              - First Prize

Congratulations to the winners!

A guest lecture was organized for the Final Year students of Electronics and Communication and Information Technology. The programme commenced with the welcome address delivered by R.M. Manickam, Assistant Professor of Electronics and Communication. He introduced the resource person and instructed the students to make use of this opportunity and interact with the resource person.

The dynamic resource person M. Senthil Vinoth, Director, HDL Solutions spoke about the overview of embedded system, what are the ongoing projects and the research possibilities. He call for the attention of the students to a practical oriented approach in engineering and the difference between traditional and application oriented embedded systems. Embedded systems span all aspects of modern life and he quoted many examples of their use.