Mark F. Bocko - US grants

The present generation of resonant mass gravitational radiation detectors are limited in sensitivity by the electromechanical transducers which convert the antenna vibration to an electrical signal which may be analyzed to search for candidate gravitational wave events. Professor Bocko is developing a superconducting - radio frequency transducer in an effort to improve the sensitivity of existing gravitational radiation antennae. The same transducer scheme may be used to continuously monitor a very small, but macroscopic, mechanical resonator he is working to achieve a sensitivity level at which one may explore the quantum mechanical limits of weak force detection. The results of these experiments may have a profound influence on quantum measurement theory and will serve as a guide in the development of the practical applicator of quantum measurement theory to ultra-low noise measurements.

The Rochester group will pursue a program of research related to improving the sensitivity of acoustic gravitational wave detectors. They will concentrate on improving electromechanical transducers to extract signals from antennas. They will also explore technology needed for greatly improved detectors of the future. This work will contribute to the ongoing efforts around the world to seek gravitational waves predicted by Einstein to come from cataclysmic astronomical events throughout the universe.

The research focus of this project will be on the testing of low acoustic loss material for the construction of a massive "Truncated Icosahedron Gravitational-wave Antenna" (TIGA). The most promising TIGA fabrication process identified so far is to explosively bond a number of aluminum plates to build up a large block of aluminum from which to machine the TIGA. U.S. Industry has the capability to produce such material. The main emphasis of the research will be to test the acoustic loss of samples at cryogenic temperatures and attempt to find a fabrication process and post-fabrication processing that will allow the intrinsic low acoustic loss of aluminum to be retained in samples prepared by this technique. This characterization of this new material will be an important input for the planning of the next generation of acoustic gravitational-wave receivers throughout the world.

EEC-9700794 ABSTRACT This award provides funding to the University of Rochester under the direction of Dr. Marc J. Feldman, for the support of a Combined Research-Curriculum Development project entitled, "High-Performance Digital Electronics Using Superconducting Integrated Circuitry Technology." This project is aimed toward students who seek careers in both the superconductor and semiconductor integrated circuitry industry. The superconducting electronics "industry" is still quite small, limited to specialized niche applications, however superconducting electronics provides an ideal training ground for engineers preparing to join the forefront of semiconductor electronic and integrated circuitry technology; the design principles and testing methodology employed in superconducting circuitry development will clearly have a growing importance to semiconductor technology as current trends toward faster and lower power semiconductor circuits continue. A two-semester lecture/laboratory course will be developed for Senior undergraduate and beginning graduate students. Superconducting digital electronics is presently practiced at a modest level of integration, thousands of active elements, so that students may manage the entire development and testing of a superconducting integrated circuit with state-of-the-art performance.

This project involves research to enable musical tele-presence employing high performance communication networks and audio-video immersive environments. The goal is to create the impression of "being in the same room" for geographically separated users offering complete and immediate two-way visual and auditory contact to enable two or more musicians at different locations to freely interact musically. Three linked "tele-presence" studios being developed at the University of Rochester will be employed to understand the sources and effects of latency in musical interactions arising from acoustic, electronic and network factors under two-way real-time links. The controlled links between the studios will allow for gradated stages between the controlled situation of a dedicated local network to the more congested state of the Internet2 and the wider Internet. Building upon existing research, the limits of tolerance for latency in musical situations will be explored for various available network protocols, important Quality of Service issues and tradeoffs found in each will be investigated, and fault tolerant data transmission applications that employ data interleaving will be developed. Resources of the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music will help guide this development from the end-user perspective. Ultimately the development of musical tele-presence will create an infrastructure through which music lessons and master classes by the best instructors can be simulcast in an interactive way. Performers could rehearse, perform and record together over the Internet, and chamber music groups could form unencumbered by geographical distances.

This Sensor proposal focuses on addressing the limitations of large scale wireless networks of
imaging sensors, namely limitations of sensor power and network bandwidth and human limitations
in the capability to absorb and integrate large amounts of image data. The ideal system provides
the user with an integrated view from the multiple imagers, providing the feeling of being there
along with the capability to navigate the space while allowing the network to run unattended for
long periods of time. Achieving these goals requires a cross-layer design that encompasses all levels
from the application to the hardware.
Intellectual Merit: We propose developing adaptable low power imagers, distributed image
fusion algorithms, and an overarching sensor management protocol. The imagers will be able to
capture scenes with adaptable resolution, both spatially and in terms of image bit-depth, and
perform compression for a fraction of the power required by existing systems. To present the
image data to the user in a more integrated fashion, we will develop image mosaicking algorithms
that work with uncalibrated cameras and non-planar scenes. Finally, we will develop intelligent
sensor management techniques that use application-level information to appropriately configure the
sensors and the network itself.
Broader Impacts: (1) Providing a being there experience will have a profound impact on
distance-based viewing applications, from surveillance to tele-presence. (2) The PIs are committed
to training students and will integrate this research with their teaching. (3) The cross-disciplinary
nature of this research and the potential for high societal impact will hopefully attract students
from under-represented groups. (4) The PIs will develop a sensor network tutorial and use this
with the demonstration image-based sensor network to spark the interest of the community in this
exciting field of study.

The goal of the work supported under this grant is to use LIGO to search for a background of gravitational radiation that originated in the Big Bang. An analogous background of electromagnetic origin was discovered fifty years ago, but it originated at a much later time in the evolution of the Universe. This search takes advantage of LIGO's high sensitivity at gravitational wave wavelengths that are sub-multiples of the interferometer arm length. In addition, at such wavelengths, the gravitational signal has a distinct spectral shape that can facilitate its identification in the presence of a much higher level of instrumental noise.
The discovery of this effect would make possible a look at the earliest epoch of the cosmos and would drastically impact the understanding of our world. The analysis of the LIGO data to search for this effect requires algorithm development and large scale computing. This is ideal training for young scientists and students who thereby acquire skills valuable in all sectors of technology and of and its applications in our society.

Internet mediated telepresence has the potential to transform society by eliminating the physical barriers to collaboration. However, it has yet to reach the ideal of providing a medium-transparent, immersive visual and audio link between remote locations. The goal of this project is to begin to address issues and tradeoffs between latency minimization and quality of service in the context of Internet mediated musical collaboration. Specifically, the PI will focus on real-time distributed musical rehearsal and performance, which is highly demanding in terms of both audio/video quality of service and communication latency. The technical challenge to be tackled in this project is related to the development of efficient and reliable multimedia Internet protocols linked with low-latency multimedia compression. The PI will employ and build upon the ITU-T developed H.323 open standards to address the interplay between, and joint optimization of, the compression methods and the transport protocols. The team, which includes researchers from the University of Rochester (including its Eastman School of Music), from the University of Miami (including its Frost School of Music), and from Wright State University, will develop a test-bed system linking the three sites that will be capable of supporting three-way musical collaboration. Because the ultimate success of this interdisciplinary project, which involves multimedia coding and immersive environments, depends upon the experience of the end-users (musicians), a key component of the work is involvement of musicians not only in final assessment of the technology, but also from the earliest stages in the technical developments.

Broader Impacts: The impact of this research extends beyond its benefits to distance music collaboration and education. In addition to bringing music into the lives of members of underrepresented groups, the project also will enable individuals with physical limitations and those who are geographically isolated to participate in a range of essentially interpersonal activities from scientific and engineering collaboration to health care delivery and, of course, to joint artistic endeavors. The PI will seek to maximize the impact of the work by building upon existing widely accepted open videoconferencing standards.

IIS - 0752768
SGER: New Representations of Musical Sound
Bocko, Mark F.
University of Rochester

This SGER project proposes a new representation for encoding musical performances capable of capturing expressive and syntactic components of the performance and extending the ability to manipulate, analyze musical digital information. By focusing on the twin themes of music representation and recognition, new fundamental concepts will be developed that will enable the development of new tools to acquire, organize, and interpret musical knowledge. The project team has backgrounds in music theory and performance, engineering, signal processing, and physics and will conduct a number of interrelated projects that contribute to the main goal of developing a new musical language. Performance techniques of master musicians (performance professors at the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music) will be recorded and studied with the goal of identifying the parametric representations that most accurately and compactly depict the music. From these a more robust representation of musical sounds and performance descriptors will be developed.

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The overall objective of the proposed study is to develop and evaluate an Automated Device for Asthma Monitoring (ADAM). Accurate symptom monitoring is the cornerstone of appropriate asthma management. Symptom monitoring informs patient decisions to initiate necessary self-management behaviors (e.g., adjust medication, alter activity level, alter the surrounding environment or seek medical assistance) as well as the providers'decisions regarding an appropriate treatment course. Current guidelines highlight the importance of ongoing symptom monitoring in improving asthma outcomes and reducing asthma-related disability. Lack of objectivity and poor accuracy have called into question existing symptom monitoring approaches including the use of self-reported symptom monitoring and peak flow meter readings. Adolescence has been recognized as the most challenging period in symptom monitoring primarily due to poor symptom perception and inadequate adherence confounded by developmental characteristics. Therefore, this study specifically targets adolescents. Specific aims are: (1) To develop a biomedical device system, ADAM, that can facilitate non-intrusive, valid and reliable monitoring of asthma symptoms based on the parameters of asthma symptoms including wheeze and cough;(2) To evaluate measurement accuracy and validity of ADAM;and (3) To evaluate the acceptability of ADAM by the study population. This study consists of two phases, a Development Phase and a Validation Phase. During the Development Phase, parameters of wheezes and cough will be identified from the breath sound samples collected from adolescents with active asthma symptoms (N=24). A purpose-built device will be designed for continuous symptom monitoring in real-life environments applying technology that enables selective capturing of wheeze and cough based on the identified parameters as well as activity levels. The device will employ a mobile phone as a platform where raw data inputted from a microphone and a wireless accelerometer are automatically processed, analyzed and stored. Participants will be able to review the summary of data displayed on the screen of the mobile phone. Measurement Theory and Signal Detection Theory guide the research design and analytic approaches of the Validation Phase. For the Validation Phase, data will be collected from an asthma group (n=40) and a non-asthma group (n=40). Accuracy and validity of ADAM will be evaluated using multiple statistical methods including Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve and correlational analyses, multilevel modeling, and the growth model. Data from ADAM will be compared with Forced Expiratory Volume at 1 second, exhaled fractional nitric oxide, and data from questionnaires including the Asthma Control Test, asthma daily diary, visual analogue scale of symptom perception, and quality of life. User acceptability of the device will be assessed using both research-devised questionnaire and semi-structured qualitative interview. We anticipate that this new device will be reliable and clinically useful, and will improve adolescents'adherence to symptom monitoring. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Asthma is the leading chronic health condition in adolescents. While adequate treatments based on accurate symptom monitoring can prevent or substantially reduce asthma-related negative health consequences, symptom monitoring typically is inadequate or misleading. This study aims to develop and test an innovative device to substantially improve symptom monitoring for adolescents through the application of advanced technology that enables capturing of breath sounds such as wheeze and cough along with activity levels on a daily basis.

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The current application was developed in response to FOA (PA-08-212: "Methodology and Measurement in the Behavioral and Social Sciences") and is designed to further advance measurement and analytic methods for capturing multiple levels of individual adaptation in the family through the collaborative expertise of an interdisciplinary network of scientists from disciplines of Developmental Psychopathology, Cardiology, Communications, Electrical Engineering, and Computer Science. Furthermore, as an illustration of the potential utility of these methodological and quantitative advances, we test the viability of our multi-level quantification of psychophysiological reactivity as a potential mechanism that informs pathways between adolescent exposure to family conflict and their psychological adjustment within the broader developmental psychopathology framework. The condensed specific aims of the research application are: (1) develop more feasible and economical wireless systems for validly capturing physiological and behavioral processes underlying emotional reactivity during family interaction tasks, (2) test the psychometric properties of the wireless, ambulatory physiological and paralinguistic measures in relation to the standard assessments of these domains currently used in the literature, (3) investigate the utility for new latent variable growth modeling approaches for modeling functioning in multi-level systems, and (4) guided by predictions from a developmental process model, examine whether multi-system assessments of psychophysiological constructs are developmentally meaningful by examining predictors and sequelae of individual differences in individual components of reactivity in developmental process models. To achieve these aims, the research team will utilize observational paradigms of mothers and preadolescents in interaction with one another with two assessments occurring over the span of one year. The information derived with respect to adolescent emotional reactivity in the context of the family and links to developmental outcomes as well as the methods to be developed in the present application will be of substantial interest to several NIH institutes cutting across different mission priorities and research objectives. In particular, the assessment tools for modeling multiple levels of analysis constructs and associated developmental, physical and mental health outcomes will be of relevance to both NICHD and NIMH. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The methodologies produced from this project will have important public health significance through the derivation of new methods for investigating patterns of regulation of emotional reactivity in adolescents during conflict from multiple levels of analysis. Furthermore, this project will enhance greater understanding of how emotional reactivity in the family informs pathways between adolescent exposure to family conflict and their socio-emotional and stage-salient adjustment.

Creative skills have been identified as most valuable for future workers across domains, given the expectation that intelligent machines will increasingly replace routine tasks currently performed by people. The creative design process also is changing due to advances in technology, in particular, artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR). What are the creative skills needed for the future workforce, and how can these be best developed and nurtured? This project addresses this question by exploring how advances in AI and AR/VR technology are changing the emerging occupation of artist-technologist. As experts in both arts and technology who see no barriers between these two fields, artist-technologists are in a unique position to design previously inconceivable media products with relevance and applications not only for the arts and entertainment, but many other fields such as education, health care, marketing and new product development.

The project involves a diverse group of researchers and practitioners with relevant expertise in the arts, AI, AR/VR, engineering, learning sciences, education, business, entrepreneurship, career education, ethics, and disability in an exploratory study of how specific applications of AR/VR and AI may affect artist-technologists? creative process, professional identity, overall work experience, preparation, and related equity and inclusion issues. The initial focus of the project is on musicians and composers, and will expand to other artistic endeavors. At the core of the study are exploratory conversations with key stakeholders (conducted in the tradition of customer discovery interviews promoted by NSF's Innovation Corps program), followed by three task forces drawing implications and identifying issues worthy of further research for enhancing future artist-technologists? design process at the human-technology frontier (future technology focus), effectively preparing future artist-technologists to make best use of AI and AR/VR in their work (future workers focus), and increasing access to this occupation by underrepresented populations (future work focus), respectively. A series of team learning experiences and touch-point events informs this collaborative work, while also supporting the project team in developing the needed cross-disciplinary expertise and strategies.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.