2015 STUDENTS: REPORTS & COLLECTIONS

Curtis Sera — NAIST – Nara, Japan

Virtual high-throughput biochemical screening offers a cost-effective alternative to the more common empirical testing of millions of compounds. However, virtual screening is often limited by highly specific setup requirements and complex user interfaces. Hydra is an HTML5 and JavaScript based program previously created by our group which ameliorates this issue by displaying ligand-macromolecule models calculated by virtual screening programs in a simple online interface. This project seeks to further improve the accessibility of virtual screening offered by Hydra through completion of its file accepting capabilities, optimization of its molecular viewer, addition of annotated compound list saving, and the creation of an application programming interface.

PROGRESS REPORTS:

Nimish Pratha — in Collaboration with NAIST – Nara, Japan

Bile reuptake transporters have garnered significant interest in recent years as important therapeutic targets because their inhibition promotes synthesis of bile acids and therefore removal of cholesterol from the system, an effect desirable in the treatment of hypercholesterolemia and diabetes. I aim to utilize a structure-­based virtual screening method deployed on the PRAGMA grid network via cloud-based virtual machines to search libraries of ligands in an effort to identify novel inhibitors of one of these transporters, the apical sodium-­dependent bile acid transporter (ASBT). I intend to contribute to the healing of those affected with these diseases through this research.

PROGRESS REPORTS:

Richard Hsiao — NICT, Osaka, Japan

My project focuses on creating a disaster management application for use on Scaled Amplified Group Environment (SAGE2). SAGE2 is a middleware that facilitates collaboration on a shared display environment. Thus, geographically distributed groups can work together in large shared displays to analyze large volumes of information and solve problems. At the end of the research, a browser-based application that can actively pinpoint areas of interest during disasters, both spatially and temporally, over a shared interactive environment will be developed.

PROGRESS REPORTS:

Michelle Wu — NICT, Osaka, Japan

This research project aims to investigate how linking up a person's emotions, as measured by an EEG scanner developed in NICT, can be supported by a virtual reality application, which the user experiences through a 200-inch glasses-free 3D HD display (also developed in NICT). Emotions are invisible entities, so the end goal is to build an artistic dynamic virtual environment, complete with audio and visual components, representative of the user's emotional state. Accompanied by samples of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's music, the environment will be comprised of particles, appearing in gradients of colors and moving at fluctuating speeds dependent on the type of emotion detected. Further exploration will be conducted as to whether or not placing the user in an environment constructed from his or her emotions can have a therapeutic effect (for example, induce the user to cheer up when he or she becomes aware of feeling unhappy). The capabilities of this visual application will depend on which emotions can be distinguished with the EEG scanner.

PROGRESS REPORTS: