..................................................................................................................................... ith the growing need for analysis and useful ways to employ the huge amount of information now available in many di erent elds, the opening of the HKUST Big Data for Bio Intelligence Laboratory is both a timely and valuable addition to the University’s cross-disciplinary research endeavors. The laboratory, established following a generous donation from industrialist Mr Raymond Chu, will focus on analytic solutions for big data in biology and healthcare, including applications related to biomedicine and sustainable living. It will be co-directed by New Bright Professor of Engineering Prof Qiang Yang, Chair Professor and Head of Computer Science and Engineering, and Prof Yang Wang, Chair Professor and Head of Mathematics, and seek to act as a bridge between academia and practitioners. Research covered will include “deep learning solutions”, which help computers make decisions, and “transductive transfer learning” that allows computer models to be adapted for use in di erent application domains. Exploration will also encompass genetic farming, looking at how to automate and make the process more user-friendly as well as scaling it to enable the use of very large data sources. HKUST President Prof Tony F Chan said he was very grateful to Mr Chu for supporting the laboratory and delighted it would assist the University in providing new insights into the rapidly developing big data research area, which aligns with HKUST’s strategic direction. W 4 IN FOCUS Big Data Solutions to Boost Bio Intelligence Applications he fabrication of microscopically small lasers directly on silicon by Prof Kei May Lau, Fang Professor of Engineering and Chair Professor of Electronic and Computer Engineering, and her group has given the prospect of light-based computing a major boost. The breakthrough, impossible to achieve for over years, saw the integration of subwavelength cavities onto silicon, enabling high-density on-chip light-emitting elements to be created and demonstrated. The advance represents an exciting step forward for the semiconductor industry. Prof Lau, who worked in collaboration with scientists from the University of California, Santa Barbara, Sandia National Laboratories and Harvard University, said such lasers could increase microprocessor capabilities and allow the microprocessors to use much less power, moving photonics and electronics integration on a silicon platform closer to reality and potentially providing a key solution for next-generation green information technology. The lasers used measure just one micron in diameter, and are , times shorter in length and one million times smaller in area than those currently used for commercial applications. Photonics has long been the most energy-e cient and cost-e ective method to transmit large volumes of data over long distances. With the new silicon-based integrated lasers, photonics may be able to be used for short-distance data transmission as well. “These whispering gallery mode lasers are an extremely attractive light source for on-chip optical communications, data processing and chemical sensing applications,” Prof Lau said. The research was published as the cover story in Applied Physics Letters and further highlighted by online media. T Tiny Lasers Show Way to Light-Based Computing Era
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