Restoring sight ― with photonics

Talk about changing life for the better: We've been hearing a lot lately about work by Daniel Palanker's group at Stanford University in restoring sight with a retinal prosthesis using a photovoltaic chip. In the video above, Palanker details the wireless system in the BiOS Hot Topics session at SPIE Photonics West last January.

The Stanford method is intended for people experiencing retinal degenerative disorders. It uses a photocell sub-retinal implant and an external projection system to relay images from an outside camera using near-infrared (IR) light directed to the photocell array, which is made from a thinned silicon safer that is flexible enough to match the contour of the eye.

The surgical implant is a simple procedure, and provides the patient with a near-normal gaze angle. Using light in the IR spectrum avoids complications from viable retina tissues.

Research team member James Loudin received the Pascal Rol Foundation Award, sponsored by Topcon Advanced Biomedical Imaging Lab, at Photonics West in 2011 in recognition of the work.

Read more about the work in the Stanford University press release or view the abstract and access the group's latest publication in the SPIE Digital Library.

Who's teaching photonics now?

It's Shaman, a great horned owl, naturally, featured in the video above with handler Sunni Robertson, a lead educator guide at the San Diego, California, Zoo. Robertson was presenting at what has become a very popular session at the SPIE Smart Structures and Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) symposium each spring.

Staff from the San Diego Zoo Animal Ambassadors program participate in a session on biomimicry and bioinspiration, demonstrating how studying animals can inspire ideas for solving design problems. In the case of the owl, insights for optical design were gained from studying how owls' eyes function, and for acoustics as well. Engineers looking for a way to reduce noise of Japan's high-speed trains as they travel through cities and across the countryside found answers in examining the construction of the owl's wings.

The zoo's biomimicry education program dovetails with a conference on Biomimetics, Bioinspiration, and Bioreplication, chaired in 2012 by Ahklesh Lahktakia of Pennsylvania State University.

In addition to gaining inspiration from owls, engineers and scientists are finding ideas for sensors in studying spider legs, for prosthetic muscles in honeycombs, and for broadband communications in the nanoscale structures that create camouflage for silvery fish in the ocean.

Pho-what-nics?

That's it! Science teachers in Nepal (above) learned more about teaching optics and photonics during a recent workshop presented through the Active Learning in Optics and Photonics (ALOP) program. The program is one of the ways volunteers sponsored by UNESCO, SPIE, and other organizations help share an understanding of the field and its importance.

Lasers cut the fabric for our clothing, and etch communication pathways on the chips in our computers and mobile devices. We make phone calls and send data over the internet via wireless broadband and fiber optic networks. LEDs light our streets and rooms, remote sensing systems assess ocean health and monitor water tables, disasters, and weather systems, and light diagnoses and treats diseases.

The fruits of photonics are everywhere. The products of optics are omnipresent. And yet, if you have ever been introduced as an optics and photonics researcher or developer, you know that blank looks are also common.

The terms simply are not household words, certainly not in the way that, say, “biology,” “chemistry,” and “physics” are.

Beyond the slight awkwardness inherent in explaining what “photonics” means (and the irony, when explaining “photonics” to someone who has just been accessing the internet on his mobile tablet …) the real problem is that a lack of understanding on the part of taxpayers and policy makers can impede progress toward new solutions for the challenges facing the world.

If the value is not understood, an endeavor is not likely to earn public funding and resources. And without the public side engaged in the vital public-private partnership, the pace of innovation slows and its vision is narrowed – and a major source of economic vitality is desiccated.

Photonics innovations feed economic growth through enabling new products and business sectors, and the industry is responsible for a significant number of high-value jobs.

In Europe, for example, the number of photonics jobs is estimated at approximately 290,000. The Photonics21 2011 Leverage Report details how many more related jobs are enabled by photonics technology and what that activity contributes to the economy. Extrapolate those numbers around the world, and you see some very impressive impacts.

Organized efforts are one way to promulgate an understanding of optics and photonics technology.

Last week, Photonics21 members at their annual meeting in Brussels talked with European Commission officials about the importance of photonics innovation.

Later this month, volunteers sponsored by SPIE will join hundreds of others to lobby in Washington, D.C., as part of the Science-Engineering-Technology Working Group Congressional Visits Day program. (View the video below for a look at last year's event.)

But you don’t have to go to Brussels or Washington or anywhere out of town to help share an understanding of the importance of the field of optics and photonics.

Tell your friends and family about your work, offer to speak at your Rotary Club or in your child’s classroom, judge or launch a science fair. Use your own stories, and find more in resources such as the Photonics for a Better World series in the SPIE Professional magazine.

Like photonics, inspiration is everywhere.

Here’s looking at you: remote sensing from space

Those eyes in the sky are seeing plenty. Researchers are finding more and more ways to use that data to solve the world’s great challenges and even save lives.

An article in the latest issue of The Scientist detailed several recent projects. Among them:

“With funding from NASA, Frank Muller-Karger, director of the Institute for Marine Remote Sensing at the University of South Florida, and his colleagues purchased more than 1,400 Landsat 7 images acquired between 1999 and 2003 in order to outline and classify the world’s shallow-reef ecosystems. Completed in 2007, the Millennium Coral Reef Mapping Project produced the first uniform map of all the coral reefs around the world at a 30-meter-pixel resolution. The United Nations’ World Conservation Monitoring Centre is now refining the map in order to use it for global conservation efforts.”

The information the team has gathered is also useful for fish and wildlife managers and others with interests in monitoring ocean water quality. Muller-Karger is one of the authors of a paper to be presented next month at SPIE Defense, Security, and Sensing in Baltimore on new products using satellite data for monitoring the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

A recent article in the SPIE Newsroom detailed another USF team’s work in monitoring the Deepwater spill. See images from their work here:

The Scientist article also describes using tracking of ocean temperatures off the Horn of Africa and of greening vegetation inland that enabled prediction and control of an outbreak of deadly Rift Valley fever in Kenya, Somalia, and Tanznaia; studies of the impact of invasive goats and vegetation on native birds and plants in Hawai’i; and a chance study of ocean grazing halos with valuable applications in managing fish stocks.

There are some common threads throughout these stories. One of them is NASA, in the news this week in connection with a new book by Hayden Planetarium Director Neil deGrasse Tyson, who also is an advisor to NASA and other space organizations, and next year will host the revived television series “Cosmos.”

Tyson wants people in general to get excited about space exploration, and would like to see increased funding for NASA programs along with that. But part of his ultimate goal isn’t about space research in particular. Just as space exploration accelerated science and technological progress during the so-called “space race” of the 1960s, Tyson sees scientific exploration and discovery as the driver for progress in the 21st century.

“The nations that embrace innovation in science and technology are the ones who will lead the world,” he said in an interview posted yesterday in the Cosmic Log. Noting the many spin-offs from spaceflight -- from satellite weather forecasting to to Tang and Teflon -- he said, "Spin-offs are great, but that's not even what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a culture that wants to dream about tomorrow, and make tomorrow happen today.”

And, he noted in an interview on The Daily Show last night, “Scientists and engineers are the ones who enable tomorrow to happen today.”

Boldly going where no space telescope has gone before: the James Webb

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will go farther into space -- that “final frontier” -- and add to scientific knowledge in ways no previous space telescope has done before.

Even before the telescope's completion and launch, the process of developing its sensors and other technology is already having an impact in fields such as laser eye surgery and manufacturing.

Check out these new SPIE Newsroom videos to hear first-hand from NASA scientists Joe Goodman and Lee Feinberg about JWST and how work on the telescope will, as Feinberg says, continue to “serve humanity for a long time.”

First, Joe Howard: "JWST blazes new trails in optical design."

And next, Lee Feinberg: "JWST technologies already bearing fruit."
 

Read more about the project on the NASA JWST website.

How many innovations do you use every day that began as space technologies?

Hands-on science: chemicals required

Cover of a 1950s-era chemistry set, as featured in an EDN blog by Paul Rako.

Do you know a child who is the proud possessor of a science kit? As much as you may love the idea of kids playing with science, maybe you shouldn’t feel too excited for them. As Paul Rako noted in a recent  EDN blog (“When kids really had fun with science”), today’s kits are not what they used to be. For example, one of the illustrations in his blog shows a newer chemistry kit proclaiming that it contains “no chemicals”!

Actually, after reading in Paul’s blog and his reader’s comments about what one could do with 1950s-era kits, it’s clear that while today’s kits have less potential for pyrotechnics and high-voltage excitement, that might be a good thing in some ways.

But it also brings to mind some comments made last summer by Marc Nantel, Associate Vice President of Niagara Research at Niagara College Canada, a Senior Member of SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, and Chair of the Society's Education Committee. Marc is dedicated to advancing photonics R&D, and also very dedicated to advancing photonics education and STEM education (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) in general.

He is one of many educators who have become concerned about studies suggesting that the next generation is developing with inadequate skills in science and mathematics.

Marc noted that the fact that it is harder for young people to get a hands-on understanding of electronics these days doesn’t help. For example, he said, think of the old-style television or radio set. When it wasn’t working, you could take the back off and check the tubes or the wiring, and often figure out what needed fixing -- and then fix it, learning something about electronics in the process. You can’t do that with your new high-definition TV or your smartphone, not without already having the right diagnostic equipment and proper training.

So the chemistry kit may not come with chemicals, and a curious youngster can’t learn about electronics these days by taking them apart. Nonetheless, Paul Rako’s readers’ comments offered some interesting ideas about how to learn about science, with varying levels of hazard and ingenuity.

How did you explore science as a child? What sort of homegrown opportunities do today’s kids to have fun with science these days?

Remote sensing at work: Organic crops, wetlands monitoring, coal mining, and more

Remote sensing technologies provide solutions to numerous and varied problems around the world. Here are six recent applications:

How can a remote yet vital wetland be monitored?

Problem: The socio-economically vital Sudd wetland in southern Sudan’s Nile River swamps is threatened by overgrazing and by loss of vegetation during the wet season. But its remoteness and inaccessibility due to civil war prevents field studies.

Solution: Using geospatial data-authoring software to quantify wetland cover changes, researchers from Ain Shams University in Cairo developed a process to interpret Landsat-generated imagery, map land-cover types and compare the images to produce change-detection maps. Read more in the team’s article in the SPIE Newsroom. 

What happens to land stability after coal is mined?

Problem: Extracting coal from underground mines generally leads to subsidence of the overlaying land within days or sometimes years. Local governments need information about land subsidence to ensure that miners are staying within permitted areas and to monitor environmental effects. However, conventional field monitoring is expensive and time-consuming, and mountainous or inhospitable terrain can make it difficult or even impossible.

Solution: Researchers from the National Remote Sensing Center of China and the Center for Earth Observation and Digital Earth of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have reported on a method of monitoring land subsidence with multi-band differential synthetic aperture radar interferometry (DInSAR). Air- or spaceborne detectors scan Earth's surface with radio waves to create a topographical map of the ground, and DInSAR compares SAR interferometry data taken hours, days or years apart to show subtle topographical changes. Read the team’s article in the SPIE Newsroom.

Are those crops organic?

Problem: Organic agriculture provides healthy food and protects the environment by avoiding the widespread dissemination of chemicals. Products may be labeled “organic” only if they are produced according to established standards, undergo an evaluation and pass a yearly inspection.

Solution: Because conventional and organic crops are treated differently, their characteristics are also different. The European Space Agency (ESA) is working with Ecocert, an organic certification organization, to use satellite images to spot these differences and support the certification process. This new space-based approach for organic farming was developed by Keyobs, VISTA and the University of Liège under the guidance of Ecocert, as part of an ESA Earth Observation Market Development project. Read more in the SPIE Professional article.

From Prague

Among papers presented at SPIE Remote Sensing in Prague this fall that examined the oceans were the following reports from the Mediterranean Sea, the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean. (The papers were published in the SPIE Digital Library, with open-access abstracts and full papers available by subscription, rental or pay-per-view.)

Is surface runoff decreasing ocean fish stocks?

Problem: Surface runoff from land can affect ocean fish stocks by inhibiting the vitality of chlorophyll in phytoplankton in the water.

Solution: A team from the University of Malta and the European Commission Joint Research Centre statistically compared ocean color values from satellites with values collected in the field. Ocean color can be used to gauge the productivity of a marine area since it is the measure of suspended chlorophyll pigment. Chlorophyll is found in the microscopic phytoplankton which are the basis of marine food webs. Access the team’s paper “A first attempt at testing correlation between MODIS ocean colour data and in situ chlorophyll -- measurements within Maltese coastal waters” in the SPIE Digital Library, and read the Times of Malta article on the work.

How does an oil spill affect fish reproduction?

Problem: In the Gulf of Mexico, oil and dispersant chemicals left after the Deepwater Horizon spill covered critical fish spawning and larval areas. Oil on the sea surface and the timing of its occurrence likely impacted the developing eggs and larvae of bluefin tuna, blue marlin and other fishes whose eggs concentrate in the sea surface microlayer (SML) ? the topmost millimeter. The SML also concentrates petroleum, petroleum-derived hydrocarbons, tar, pesticides, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), heavy metals and plastics. Exposure to oil and oil dispersants causes acute toxicity, narcosis and eventual death in marine fish larvae. Surface oil has been detected in 100% of the northernmost whale shark sightings, 32.8 % of the bluefin tuna spawning area and 38 % of the blue marlin larval area.

Solution: Researchers from Ocean Research and Conservation Association and the Florida Institute of Technology used biogeographical analyses to gain insights on these impacts. The research team georeferenced historical ichthyoplankton surveys and published literature to map targeted spawning and larval areas in the Gulf with daily satellite-derived images. Read more about the work in their paper “Potential impacts of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on large pelagic fishes.”

What damage did the earthquake and tsunami cause?

Problem: Depending on its magnitude and location, an earthquake may have unexpectedly complex impacts, and affected areas may be difficult to access in order to assess the damage.

Solution: After the 9.0-magnitude earthquake off the Pacific Coast of Japan on 11 March 2011, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) provided images acquired by the Advanced Land Observing Satellite (ALOS) to national and local governments of Japan, to aid in disaster recovery and restoration. JAXA also received and analyzed more than 5,000 scenes via the International Disaster Charter and Sentinel Asia, and supported the governments through its Disaster Management Support Systems Office. Read more about the JAXA team’s efforts in their paper “Disaster monitoring for Japan Earthquake with satellites by JAXA.”

Remote sensing is indeed at work around the world, monitoring impacts of human activity and natural phenomena to help improve quality of life.