Christof Koch, the Lois and Victor Troendle Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology and professor of computation and Michael Ortizneural systems has been elected fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Richard Murray has been invited to receive the title of Doctor of Technology from the Faculty Board of the Engineering Faculty LTH at Lund University in Sweden on June 1, 2007. This award is being given to acknowledge Murray's contributions to the exchange of students and personnel between LTH and Caltech as well as joint development of courses and teaching material.

A research team of neuroscientists from Caltech and UCLA have found that a single neuron can recognize people, landmarks, and objects—even letter strings of names ("H-A-L-L-E-B-E-R-R-Y"). "Our findings fly in the face of conventional thinking about how brain cells function," says Christof Koch, the Lois and Victor Troendle Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology and Professor of Computation and Neural Systems.

Caltech mechanical engineering graduate student and former president of the Neuromorphic Engineering Students' Society AnnMarie Polsenberg Thomas participated in a panel discussion exploring the connection between art and science in conjunction with AxS, an exhibit now showing at the Armory Center for the Arts in Pasadena. Read more...

Richard Andersen, the James G. Boswell Professor of Neuroscience, has been named to the National Academy of Sciences. Membership in the National Academy of Sciences is considered one of the most important honors that a scientist can achieve. Read more...

CNSE student Michael Campos' recent paper was accepted by the Journal of Neurophysiology. Entitled "The supplementary motor area encodes reward expectancy in eye movement tasks," the paper's co-authors include: Boris Breznen, K. Bernheim and CNSE Investigator Richard Andersen. (pdf 872KB)

NESS (Neuromorphic Engineering Students’ Society) is pleased to announce the new co-presidents for 2004-2005 are Gwyneth Card from Dickinson Lab, Tim Chung from Control and Dynamical Systems (Murray) and Alan Hampton from Adami Lab.

2nd Annual Caltech/JPL Robotics Conference for Middle School Students and Educators—Saturday, December 3, 2005
This unique event is intended to introduce students to the world of robotics and provide educators with robotics-related teaching resources. This year's conference focused on the exciting field of underwater research and exploration and how robots are dramatically changing the way this is accomplished. Students working in teams of two developed their own concept of an underwater robot and design and presented a poster illustrating their concept during a poster session at the conference. Caltech graduate students acted as mentors, offering advice and resources to the middle school students in the field of robotics.
The conference was held on the campus of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, California on Saturday, December 3, 2005, from 10 am to 3 pm.

Caltech mechanical engineering graduate student and former president of the Neuromorphic Engineering Students' Society Ann Marie Polsenberg participated in a panel discussion exploring the connection between art and science in conjunction with AxS, an exhibit now showing at the Armory Center for the Arts in Pasadena. Polsenberg Thomas is also teaching an introductory robotics class for teenagers at the Armory. Read the article in the Pasadena Star News, Sunday July 10, 2005

Christof Koch, Troendle Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology, will give an Earnest C. Watson Lecture entitled The Quest for Consciousness: A Neurobiological Approach, at 8 p.m. on November 10, in Beckman Auditorium.

Ali Hajimiri, Associate Professor of Electical Engineering, has been named among the 2004 list of the world's 100 Top Young Innovators by Technology Review, MIT's Magazine of Innovation.

CNSE 10th Anniversary Symposium, November 8-9, 2004
In preparation for the next phase of our life as a center, the CNSE welcomed back alumni who have gone on to work in related areas at other academic institutions or companies. We looked at where we’ve come from, how our work as a center has influenced both industry and the field of Neuromorphic Systems Engineering, but the main focus of the event was to look forward to our future opportunities. The theme of the celebration was "Intelligent Autonomous Machines" —our chosen focal point for the coming years.

Demetri Psaltis has received an $8 million grant from DARPA to establish the Center for Optiofluidics Integration at Caltech, which will work on building optical devices for imaging, fiber optics, communications and other applications. Optofluidics is expected to have a broad impact on areas such as telecommunications, biophotonics and biomedical engineering, and robot and machine vision. (Press Release)

Richard Andersen, and his colleagues describe a method they have used to read monkeys' brain signals to accurately determine the animals' movement goals and preferences. (Star News Article) (Science Now Article)

Nine local highschool students have been invited to attend the 2004 IEEE International Conference on Fuzzy Systems to present the results of research they have been conducting at the Jisan Research Institute. They will attend the conference in Budapest, Hungary this July 25-30.

Tender Lands grand opening – a Pasadena city-wide celebration of nature through art. Members of the CNSE are collaborating on projects with the Art Center College of Design (installation at the Williamson Gallery, Art Center) and the Pasadena Symphony (presentation of two high-definition films accompanied by live orchestral music and followed by a discussion led by CNSE graduate student Ann Polsenberg). Opening October 9.

Opportunities for You in Science and Engineering! An open house for high school students, including under represented minority students, to offer them a more intimate look at our undergraduate programs. Co-hosted by CNSE, CSEM, and the Caltech Outreach Office, October 23, 2004.

New books by CNSE members:
The Quest for Consciousness – A Neurobiological Approach by Christof Koch, 2003, Roberts & Company Publishersot

Opportunites for You In Science and Engineering: Open House for High School Students was held on May 10, 2003

Industry Day! May 15, 2003 Machine Awareness and Learning

CNSE partners with the Art Center College of Design for NEURO exhibit opening in April 2003

CNSE professor Ali Hajimiri’s High Speed Integrated Circuits group has developed radar-on-a-chip: a single silicon chip that runs at 24GHz and has a wide variety of possible applications including built-in radar for automobiles to reduce the number of accidents that occur in poor weather conditions.

Members of the MEMS lab, led by CNSE professor Yu-Chong Tai have successfully designed and produced a stand-alone integrated chip capable of Electrospray Ionization-Mass Spectrometry (EMI-MS). Routine medical tests that require biochemical analysis of fluids can be impossible to carry out in some situations (for example, in space). Because this new devices requires such small samples and low fluid flow, the effects of zero-gravity are no longer an issue. The medical applications for future generations of this and similar devices are numerous and revolutionary. To find out more, click here! (pdf)

Focused Workshop:
"Research Trends and Needs in the Automotive Industry" scheduled for October 24th.

CNSE Industry Speaker Series
Commences Monday, September 10th, 2001.

Entrepreneurial Fellowship Program
Caltech receives NSF award to establish Entrepreneurial Fellowship Program.


7th Annual Industry Conference held jointly with Caltech's Lee Center for Advanced Networking on May 16 and 17.

Sojourn to the Woods
Annual CNSE Retreat, October 6-7,2001

The annual CNSE Retreat -- for faculty, post-docs, students, and staff -- will be held at Big Bear Lake again this year.

CNSE Goes Global
The Economist: Mead and Neuromorphic Engineering (September 2001)

The September 20, 2001 issue of the Technology Quarterly in the British weekly The Economist profiles Carver Mead ("the creative process is like a itch that has to be scratched...") -- and in a separate article delves into neuromorphic engineering and the work of CNSE alumnus Reid Harrison (now at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City) and Professor Christof Koch.

Picks from the CEO of Broad Daylight Inc.
Fast Company, August 2001

Louise Kirkbride, the CEO of Broad Daylight, Inc. has some favorite websites (as recently reported in Fast Company) -- she's into wine, Antarctica, and you guessed it -- the Center for Neuromorpic Systems Engineering!

USA Today Reports on New Technology Stars
National Press Coverage

In USA Today (April 9, 2001, op-ed) find an interesting piece entitled Technology stars align for creation of next big thing, which comments on work done in the CNSE in the larger context of engineers being the future's true innovators.

Sensor Networks
7th Annual Industry Conference

The Center's 7th Annual Industry Conference was held jointly with Caltech's Lee Center for Advanced Networking on May 16 and 17.

New Post-Degree Program in Entrepreneurship
Caltech Entrepreneurial Fellows Program Underway!

The goal of Caltech's Entrepreneurial Fellowship Program (EFP) is to help entrepreneurs transition from their academic careers into the business world. It is a post-degree program for students previously trained in science, engineering, or design to adapt their skills to the development of commercial products in a start-up environment. Recent Caltech graduates, including graduating seniors, current Art Center College of Design students, as well as Caltech post-docs are welcome to apply. The program will engage students in an intense, 9 - 12 month period of entrepreneurial activity. The first group of Fellows has been chosen for fellowship beginning in July 2001.

Transitioning Our Technology
New Start Ups

NetAnima is a company founded by two CNS postdocs, Steffen Egner and Christian Scheier. NetAnima develops digital video analysis methods for use in scientific, educational and business projects.

Their core product, MediaAnalyzer, is currently used to track eye, head, and pointing movements in several scientific projects. The company currently targets the scientific community, butwill expand to the ecommerce and educational markets.

realMOVES is a new company formed by two ERC graduate students, Enrico Di Bernardo and Luis Goncalves in the Center's Vision Group. The studenta are the winners of Caltech's second annual $20K Business Plan Competition initiated by entrepreneur Glen Hightower.

realMOVES is developing video capture and software methods that will allow computer characters to move realistically, in real time. The company sees the video and computer games markets as their initial targets.

A second company, Synthetic Sound Systems, won the $10K prize for a product which will create a high level language allowing musicians to mix sounds using words to describe the sounds and effects desired.

Press Notices

Computer magazine, the organ of the IEEE Computer Society, published in its March 2000 issue an article about Cyrano Sciences' handheld electronic nose. The article mentions that the company is working with instrument manufacturers such as Welch Allyn and Hewlett Packard to develop devices tailored to specific applications. Among the uses mentiones are medical diagnostics, testing for food freshness and the detection of toxic chemicals.

Cyrano Sciences is a Caltech spinoff based on the technologies developed in the laboratories of Professor Rod Goodman of the Center for Neuromorphic Systems Engineering and Professor Nathan Lewis of Caltech's Chemistry Department.