Insect-vision inspired collision warning vision processor for automobiles

Vision is expected to play important roles for car safety enhancement. Imaging systems can be used to enlarging the vision field of the driver. For instance capturing and displaying views of hidden areas around the car which the driver can analyze for safer decision-making. Vision systems go a step further. They can autonomously analyze the visual information, identify dangerous situations and prompt the delivery of warning signals. For instance in case of road lane departure, if an overtaking car is in the blind spot, if an object is approaching within collision course, etc. Processing capabilities are also needed for applications viewing the car interior such as >intelligent airbag systems> that base deployment decisions on passenger features. On-line processing of visual information for car safety involves multiple sensors and views, huge amount of data per view and large frame rates. The associated computational load may be prohibitive for conventional processing architectures. Dedicated systems with embedded local processing capabilities may be needed to confront the challenges. This paper describes a dedicated sensory-processing architecture for collision warning which is inspired by insect vision. Particularly, the paper relies on the exploitation of the knowledge about the behavior of Locusta Migratoria to develop dedicated chips and systems which are integrated into model cars as well as into a commercial car (Volvo XC90) and tested to deliver collision warnings in real traffic scenarios.Gobierno de España TEC2006-15722European Community IST:2001-3809

Landscape of multi-nucleotide variants in 125,748 human exomes and 15,708 genomes

Multi-nucleotide variants (MNVs), defined as two or more nearby variants existing on the same haplotype in an individual, are a clinically and biologically important class of genetic variation. However, existing tools typically do not accurately classify MNVs, and understanding of their mutational origins remains limited. Here, we systematically survey MNVs in 125,748 whole exomes and 15,708 whole genomes from the Genome Aggregation Database (gnomAD). We identify 1,792,248 MNVs across the genome with constituent variants falling within 2bp distance of one another, including 18,756 variants with a novel combined effect on protein sequence. Finally, we estimate the relative impact of known mutational mechanisms - CpG deamination, replication error by polymerase zeta, and polymerase slippage at repeat junctions - on the generation of MNVs. Our results demonstrate the value of haplotype-aware variant annotation, and refine our understanding of genome-wide mutational mechanisms of MNVs. Multi-nucleotide variants (MNV) are genetic variants in close proximity of each other on the same haplotype whose functional impact is difficult to predict if they reside in the same codon. Here, Wang et al. use the gnomAD dataset to assemble a catalogue of MNVs and estimate their global mutation rate.Peer reviewe

Characterising the loss-of-function impact of 5' untranslated region variants in 15,708 individuals

Upstream open reading frames (uORFs) are tissue-specific cis-regulators of protein translation. Isolated reports have shown that variants that create or disrupt uORFs can cause disease. Here, in a systematic genome-wide study using 15,708 whole genome sequences, we show that variants that create new upstream start codons, and variants disrupting stop sites of existing uORFs, are under strong negative selection. This selection signal is significantly stronger for variants arising upstream of genes intolerant to loss-of-function variants. Furthermore, variants creating uORFs that overlap the coding sequence show signals of selection equivalent to coding missense variants. Finally, we identify specific genes where modification of uORFs likely represents an important disease mechanism, and report a novel uORF frameshift variant upstream of NF2 in neurofibromatosis. Our results highlight uORF-perturbing variants as an under-recognised functional class that contribute to penetrant human disease, and demonstrate the power of large-scale population sequencing data in studying non-coding variant classes. Upstream open reading frames (uORFs), located in 5' untranslated regions, are regulators of downstream protein translation. Here, Whiffin et al. use the genomes of 15,708 individuals in the Genome Aggregation Database (gnomAD) to systematically assess the deleteriousness of variants creating or disrupting uORFs.Peer reviewe

Insect-vision inspired collision warning vision processor for automobiles

Vision is expected to play important roles for car safety enhancement. Imaging systems can be used to enlarging the vision field of the driver. For instance capturing and displaying views of hidden areas around the car which the driver can analyze for safer decision-making. Vision systems go a step further. They can autonomously analyze the visual information, identify dangerous situations and prompt the delivery of warning signals. For instance in case of road lane departure, if an overtaking car is in the blind spot, if an object is approaching within collision course, etc. Processing capabilities are also needed for applications viewing the car interior such as >intelligent airbag systems> that base deployment decisions on passenger features. On-line processing of visual information for car safety involves multiple sensors and views, huge amount of data per view and large frame rates. The associated computational load may be prohibitive for conventional processing architectures. Dedicated systems with embedded local processing capabilities may be needed to confront the challenges. This paper describes a dedicated sensory-processing architecture for collision warning which is inspired by insect vision. Particularly, the paper relies on the exploitation of the knowledge about the behavior of Locusta Migratoria to develop dedicated chips and systems which are integrated into model cars as well as into a commercial car (Volvo XC90) and tested to deliver collision warnings in real traffic scenarios. © 2008 IEEE.Research this work has been partially supported by the Spanish DIVISA Project TEC2006-15722 and EC LOCUST Project IST:200138097.Peer Reviewe

Fast Processor Core Selection for WLAN Modem using Mappability Estimation

Mappability metric and a novel method for evaluating the goodness of processor core and algorithm combinations are introduced. The new mappability concept is an addition to performance and cost metrics used in existing codesign and system synthesis approaches. The mappability estimation is based on the analysis of the correlation or similarity of algorithm and core architecture characteristics. It allows fast design space exploration of core architectures and mappings with little modeling effort. The method is demonstrated by analyzing suitable processor core architectures for baseband algorithms of the WLAN modem. 140400 architecture-algorithm pairs were analyzed in total and the estimated results were similar to the results of more detailed evaluations. The method is not, however, limited to the WLAN modem, but is applicable for digital signal processing in general

Extending platform-based design to network on chip systems

Exploitation of silicon capacity will require improvements in design productivity and more scalable system paradigms. Asynchronous message passing networks on chip (NOC) have been proposed as backbones for billion-transistor ASICs. We present a novel layered backbone-platform-system (BPS) design methodology for development of network-on-chip based products. It combines and extends the distributed, parallel, embedded and platform-based design concepts in order to manage the diversity and complexity of NOCbased systems. The reuse of communication principles in various platforms, the reuse of platforms in product differentiation, and system-level decision-support methods are the cornerstones of our methodology. The presented mappability estimation and workload simulations demonstrate the feasibility of such methods. 1