Neuronal imaging with ultrahigh dynamic range multiphoton microscopy

Multiphoton microscopes are hampered by limited dynamic range, preventing weak sample features from being detected in the presence of strong features, or preventing the capture of unpredictable bursts in sample strength. We present a digital electronic add-on technique that vastly improves the dynamic range of a multiphoton microscope while limiting potential photodamage. The add-on provides real-time negative feedback to regulate the laser power delivered to the sample, and a log representation of the sample strength to accommodate ultrahigh dynamic range without loss of information. No microscope hardware modifications are required, making the technique readily compatible with commercial instruments. Benefits are shown in both structural and in-vivo functional mouse brain imaging applications.R21 EY027549 - NEI NIH HH

Ono: an open platform for social robotics

In recent times, the focal point of research in robotics has shifted from industrial ro- bots toward robots that interact with humans in an intuitive and safe manner. This evolution has resulted in the subfield of social robotics, which pertains to robots that function in a human environment and that can communicate with humans in an int- uitive way, e.g. with facial expressions. Social robots have the potential to impact many different aspects of our lives, but one particularly promising application is the use of robots in therapy, such as the treatment of children with autism. Unfortunately, many of the existing social robots are neither suited for practical use in therapy nor for large scale studies, mainly because they are expensive, one-of-a-kind robots that are hard to modify to suit a specific need. We created Ono, a social robotics platform, to tackle these issues. Ono is composed entirely from off-the-shelf components and cheap materials, and can be built at a local FabLab at the fraction of the cost of other robots. Ono is also entirely open source and the modular design further encourages modification and reuse of parts of the platform

Control System in Open-Source FPGA for a Self-Balancing Robot

Computing in technological applications is typically performed with software running on general-purpose microprocessors, such as the Computer Processing Unit (CPU), or specific ones, like the Graphical Processing Unit (GPU). Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) are an interesting option when speed and reliability are required, but development costs are usually high. Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA) combine the flexibility of software with the high-speed operation of hardware, and can keep costs low. The dominant FPGA infrastructure is proprietary, but open tools have greatly improved and are a growing trend, from which robotics can benefit. This paper presents a robotics application that was fully developed using open FPGA tools. An inverted pendulum robot was designed, built, and programmed using open FPGA tools, such as IceStudio and the IceZum Alhambra board, which integrates the iCE40HX4K-TQ144 from Lattice. The perception from an inertial sensor is used in a PD control algorithm that commands two DC motors. All the modules were synthesized in an FPGA as a proof of concept. Its experimental validation shows good behavior and performance.This work was partially funded by the Community of Madrid through the RoboCity2030-III project (S2013/MIT-2748) and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the RETOGAR project (TIN2016-76515-R)

FlexWAFE - eine Architektur für rekonfigurierbare-Bildverarbeitungssysteme

Recently there has been an increase in demand for high-resolution digital media content in both cinema and television industries. Currently existing equipment does not meet the requirements, or is too costly. New hardware systems and new programming techniques are needed in order to meet the high-resolution, high-quality, image requirements and reduce costs. The industry seeks a flexible architecture capable of running multiple applications on top of standard off-the-shelf components, with reduced development time. Until now, standard practice has been to develop specialized architectures and systems that target a single application. This has little flexibility and leads to high developments costs, every new application is designed almost from scratch. Our focus was to develop an architecture that is suited to image stream processing and has the flexibility to run multiple applications using the same FPGA-based hardware platform. The novelty in our approach is that we reconfigure parts of the architecture at run-time, but without incurring in the time and added constraints penalty of FPGA-partial-reconfiguration techniques. The architecture uses a hierarchical control structure that is well suited to parallel processing, and allows single cycle latency reconfiguration of parts of the processing pipeline. This is achieved using relatively little resources for the distributed control structures. To test the developed architecture a complex film-grain noise reduction algorithm was implemented on an off-the-shelf hardware platform developed by Thomson-Grass Valley. The system meet all the requirements and had very little load on the hierarchical control structures, there is growth headroom for much complexer control demands. The architecture has been ported to other hardware platforms, and other applications have been implemented as well. The run-time reconfigurability has proven to be a key factor in the success of the FlexWAFE.Kürzlich gab es eine Zunahme der Nachfrage nach hochauflösenden digitalen Medieninhalten in den Kino- und Fernsehenindustrien. Derzeit vorhandene Systeme entsprechen nicht den Anforderungen, oder sind zu teuer. Neue Hardware-Systeme und neuer Programmiertechniken sind erforderlich, um den hochauflösenden, hochwertigen, Bildanforderungen zu genügen und Kosten zu verringern. Die Industrie sucht eine flexible Architektur zur Ausführung mehrerer Anwendungen auf Standard-Komponenten, mit reduzierten Entwicklungszeiten. Bis jetzt ist gängige Praxis, spezialisierten Architektur und Systeme zu entwickeln, die eine einzelne Anwendung zielen. Dieses hat wenig Flexibilität und führt zu hohe Entwicklungskosten, jede neue Anwendung ist fast von Grund auf neu konzipiert. Unser Fokus war es, eine für Bild Verarbeitung geeignet Architektur zu entwickeln dass die Flexibilität hat mehrere Anwendungen an dieselbe FPGA-basierte Hardware-Plattform zu laufen. Die Neuheit in unserem Ansatz ist, dass wir Teile der Architektur zur Laufzeit rekonfigurieren, aber, ohne das Zeit und constraints strafe von FPGA Partielle-Rekonfiguration-Techniken. Die Architektur verwendet eine hierarchische Kontrollstruktur, die zur parallel Verarbeitung gut geeignet ist, und Single-Cycle-Latenz Rekonfiguration von Teilen der Verarbeitungs-Pipeline ermöglicht. Dieses wird unter Verwendung relativ weniger Ressourcen für die verteiltes Steuerung Strukturen erzielt. Um das entwickelte Architektur zu testen ein komplexer Film-Korn-Rauschunterdrückung Algorithmus wurde auf einer von Thomson-Grass Valley entwickelt standard Hardware-Plattform umgesetzt. Das System erfüllt alle Anforderungen und hatte sehr wenig Last auf den hierarchischen Kontrollstrukturen, es gibt viel Wachstum Spielraum für viel kompliziertere Steuerunganforderungen. Die Architektur ist zu anderen Hardwareplattformen portiert worden, und andere Anwendungen wurden ebenfalls implementiert. Der Laufzeitreconfigurability ist ein Schlüsselfaktor im Erfolg des FlexWAFE gewesen

Design and implementation of an ETSI-SDR OFDM transmitter with power amplifier linearizer

Satellite radio has attained great popularity because of its wide range of geographical coverage and high signal quality as compared to the terrestrial broadcasts. Most Satellite Digital Radio (SDR) based systems favor multi-carrier transmission schemes, especially, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transmission because of high data transfer rate and spectral efficiency. It is a challenging task to find a suitable platform that supports fast data rates and superior processing capabilities required for the development and deployment of the new SDR standards. Field programmable gate array (FPGA) devices have the potential to become suitable development platform for such standards. Another challenging factor in SDR systems is the distortion of variable envelope signals used in OFDM transmission by the nonlinear RF power amplifiers (PA) used in the base station transmitters. An attractive option is to use a linearizer that would compensate for the nonlinear effects of the PA. In this research, an OFDM transmitter, according to European Telecommunications Standard Institute (ETSI) SDR Technical Specifications 2007-2008, was designed and implemented on a low-cost Xilinx FPGA platform. A weakly nonlinear PA, operating in the L-band SDR frequency (1.450-1.490GHz), was used for signal transmission. An FPGA-based, low-cost, adaptive linearizer was designed and implemented based on the digital predistortion (DPD) reference design from Xilinx, to correct the distortion effects of the PA on the transmitted signal