Barrett and Wright Receive NIH Funding For Fly Based Vision Sensor

August 7, 2006 - Dr. Steve Barrett and Dr. Cameron Wright of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department were recently awarded $600K over a five year period to continue their investigation of fly inspired machine vision research. The grant is funded as part of the NIH $10.3 million, five-year grant for neuroscience research at UW. The principal investigator for the grant is Dr. Bill Flynn of UW's Neuroscience Program.

Goals for the research are to characterize the early vision processes in the common housefly. The fly’s vision system exhibits some phenomenal properties that if duplicated in electronic systems will provide breakthroughs in developing the next generation of high speed imaging sensors. Over the course of the research grant Barrett and Wright will develop a high resolution model of the vision system, develop a sensor based on the fly’s vision system, and incorporate the sensor into vision systems to perform traditional image processing functions such as segmentation, tracking, and target recognition. They will also incorporate the sensor into various commercial, medical, and military based applications.

Barrett and Wright credit their research success to the past and present group of outstanding graduate students they have mentored. Current graduate student research team members include Leslie Popp (Laramie), John Benson (Gillette), Travis Anderson (Casper), and Gavin Philips (Thermopolis). In addition, they are research team members with UW’s Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE). The COBRE center allows scientists to develop research centers and infrastructure in certain specialty areas.