The future at our fingertips

Volume 9 Number 12 December 9 2013 - January 12 2014

 

Rebecca Scott and Annie Rahilly explore University of Melbourne research pushing the boundaries of computation as we know it, with applications in medicine and life sciences, and a new Centre dedicated to social interactive technologies.

You may not be aware but when you use a smartphone, tablet or games console such as Xbox Kinect, you are using aspects of Natural User Interface (NUI) technologies that enable interaction through body movements, gestures, voice or touch.

In the future, however, we’ll be increasingly engaging with NUI technologies that not only provide easy access to information, but also enhance our social interactions in ways we cannot yet imagine.

Significant developments have already been made with the technology in the health sector, with surgeons now engaging with medical images in operating theatres.

As technology develops, researchers around the world are focused on enhancing the interaction between humans, computers and the digital world to be richer, more natural, intuitive, and to strengthen human relationships.

Australia will play a major role in the development of new social interactive technologies with the opening of the Microsoft Centre for Social Natural User Interface Research at the University of Melbourne.

The new Centre is an $8million collaboration across three years between the founding partners – Microsoft, the University of Melbourne and the State Government of Victoria – and is the first of its kind in the world.

“This new centre will do important work in terms of creating the next generation of computing experiences,” says Professor Frank Vetere, Director of the Centre, who leads the Interaction Design Lab and is Deputy Head (Research) in the University’s Department of Computing and Information Systems.

“Social NUIs, in particular, humanise technology, and are about making technology work for people rather than people working for technology.

“Researchers at the Centre will investigate new forms of interactions, using body movements, gestures and voice, to do things with technology which have not been possible in the past.”

The new Centre will be a focal point for collaboration and ground-breaking research, particularly into the social uses and applications of these new NUI technologies, to make them more natural and intuitive.

It will explore how such technologies can enable new forms of social and collaborative behaviours, including how people communicate, play, learn and work together in different settings: at home, in the workplace, in education environments, health, and public settings such as museums and public spaces.

Microsoft Research Vice-President Tony Hey says that given the University of Melbourne is a world-class institution with a well established reputation in IT research, along with the Victorian Government’s commitment to innovation and to attracting high quality IT research to the state, the partnership was a fantastic collaboration for the new centre.

“This is a world-class research centre, located at a world-class university in a forward-thinking state,” he says. “We’re very excited that research performed here in Australia could one day benefit millions of people around the world.

“Microsoft is committed to creating amazing devices and services that can help people reach their full potential and I am confident the Centre will open the floodgates to innovative social uses of NUI. The potential for social NUI will only be limited by our imagination.”

Professor James McCluskey, Deputy Vice- Chancellor (Research) at the University of Melbourne says the University is proud to be a founding partner of the Centre, able to contribute to the development of new research discoveries in this cutting-edge field, and to work closely with Microsoft to collaborate on new and exciting technologies – “technologies that will ultimately change our lives.”

Academics and PhD students in the Centre will undertake research alongside some of the leading social NUI researchers in the world, and will have the opportunity to spend time at Microsoft’s research centres in Cambridge (UK), Beijing, and Redmond in the USA.

In addition to 28 dedicated positions, the Centre will also welcome researchers with an interest in social NUI from across the Asia Pacific region and around the world.

The idea for the Centre was conceived with expertise and guidance from the late Professor Steve Howard, previous Head of the University’s Department of Computing and Information Systems.

The partners expect the Centre to play an important role in Microsoft’s broader research and development efforts.

“Whatever our investigations discover with NUI, we are sure to create exciting new social experiences with digital technology that will enhance and complement our daily lives,” Professor Vetere says.

One of the areas in which digital capabilities are pushing the boundaries right now is in medicine, where the capture of data and its translation into meaningful information is changing the understanding and practice.

Much of medicine is already data-driven, and the understanding of genetics is also fuelling new discoveries. In response to this, the University of Melbourne has appointed Professor Edmund Crampin to develop the University’s capability in the area of computational biology.

Professor Crampin took up the Rowden White Chair in Systems and Computational Biology earlier this year, and brings with him experience in new fields of research and learning and, hopefully, new answers.

Sitting across three faculties (Melbourne School of Engineering, and the faculties of Science, and Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences) Professor Crampin’s research uses mathematical and computer modeling to investigate cellular processes and molecular pathways underlying complex human diseases.

The use of computational methods has become essential in biological and biomedical research, that with the advent of new measurement technologies, are rapidly becoming data-rich research areas.

“Increased digitalisation has meant we need to re-look at the ways we learn and teach biology and medicine. For me, collaborations across a range of faculties are definitely the right strategy,” Professor Crampin says.

“While my background is in mathematics, physics and quantitative problem-solving, I developed an interest in solving problems related to disease. I wanted to know what goes wrong in cells and what happens to cause these changes; the very fundamentals of biology.”

Professor Crampin’s current research includes using mathematical models of heart cells to understand the development of heart disease, and developing computational approaches to study the network of genetic interactions underlying breast and skin cancers.

Ideally, biomedical scientists would start to talk with computational experts, and bioengineers with physiologists about body function. These conversations would develop during the early years of undergraduate training in the life sciences.

“Imagine a research precinct that brings people together under the one roof with complementary skill sets, quantitative problem solving, experimental measurement, and advanced instrumentation – all willing to talk to each other in a common language,” Professor Crampin says. 

This ‘convergence’ of the life sciences with physical sciences, mathematics and engineering also contributes to projects in biosensor design and biomarker identification, providing new tools for biologists and clinicians.

Looking at medical problems from a quantitative point of view means doctors can computationally make predictions ahead of time.

Professor Crampin believes we are at a great point as we embrace computational thinking with all its possibilities.

“But approach the traditional challenges with our abundant data and computational problem-solving, and anything is possible.”