2013 Honorary Doctorates: two brainstormers' major contributions

The human brain remains a mystery but researchers worldwide are coming ever closer to unraveling its secrets. On 4 February 2013, during its Patron Saint's Day celebration, KU Leuven is conferring seven honorary doctorates on specialists who, each in their own way, have contributed to a better understanding of the brain. Prof. Leon Chua and Prof. Tamas Roska were nominated by Prof. J. Vandewalle for their groundbreaking insights into electronics and information technology.

Some of their major contributions

T. Roska and L.O. Chua, "The CNN universal machine: an analogic array computer," IEEE Trans. On Circuit and Systems II, 40(3), 163-173, 1993. Google Cited by 909. This is a testimony of the impact of the CNN Cellular Neural Network universal chip as an enabling technology. A commercially available 3-dimensional camera computer based on this chip was awarded the "First Prize and the Product of the year" title at the most prestigious international machine vision fair in Europe, the Vision 2003, in Stuttgart, Germany. In addition, the potentials of the CNN universal chip as an ultra-high speed vision computer has attracted many active research groups worldwide, who interacted actively through special sessions at ISCAS and ECCTD, special issues in journal, and at the bi-annual international workshop devoted exclusively to CNN applications (CNNA).

L.O. Chua, "Memristor-the missing circuit element", IEEE Transactions on Circuit Theory, 1971 Google Cited by 533. This paper described for the first time a new fourth circuit element next to the resistor, capacitor, and inductor, namely the memristor. The new name, he coined, is a contraction of memory and resistor, and stresses the functionality of the new circuit element, to exhibit both a resistive operation and an ability to memorize. This invention of the "memristor" in 1971 was long considered as a curiosity and was compared to the missing elements in the Table of Mendeljev. However the major interest in this "postulated" new device came from an HP implementation in nanotechnology in 2008. Since that time many components in various different fields having a pinched characteristic have been reported. Such models may prove interesting validity for studying memory and mind. Research in that direction is under way. "Memristor minds, the future of artificial intelligence" illustrated the idea in a paper published by the New Scientist 8 July 2009. It is fair to say that one can expect a surge of interest in memristor systems by researchers in computational intelligence and biologic information processing. In 2010 Spectrum IEEE published a feature article entitled, " MoNETA: A Mind Made from memristors DARPA's new memristor-based approach to AI consists of a chip that mimics how neurons process information" by Massimiliano Versace and Ben Chandler. Some authors have reported biologic information processing systems using memristive concepts like in ionic channels, where proteins stand at the basis of intertwined memory and information processing in biologic cells in general and in electrically excitable tissues like the brain and the heart.

http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Faculty/Homepages/chua.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_O._Chua
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chua's_circuit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memristor

Prof. Tamas Roska has a long scientific career in electrical circuit theory and design, mainly in Budapest, but with very frequent research stays at UC Berkeley and at Notre Dame University. He is a world-known authority on real time complex visual image processing with cellular neural networks. Following the emergence of chips and multimedia application, the third wave of information technology progress came as the development of mechanics, microelectronics and artificial intelligence. Since his vision as a founding dean of engineering was that these research paths best evolve in an interdisciplinary environment, and so the Faculty of IT's at Pázmány Péter Catholic University was built on this interdisciplinary action. He has shown a sustained creativity and long-term vision to research the capabilities of cellular neural networks for performing complex image processing tasks in real time. He has succeeded in bridging gaps between the biologic image processing and the chip CNN image processing. He and his team in Budapest have proven that this technology can perform impressive real time image processing tasks of navigation, bionic eyeglass, collision avoidance of unmanned aerial vehicles, and mission critical operations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_neural_network

Relevance for our university and its research activities

Since 1976 Prof. J. Vandewalle and his team at ESAT-SCD have excellent interactions with Prof. Chua and Prof. Roska. Joos Vandewalle was as postdoctoral researcher and visiting professor with Prof. Chua at UC Berkeley, CA, USA from 1976 till 1979. There he met also Prof. Roska. He visited his Laboratory in Budapest on a regularly basis, and they performed together 2 EU projects on Cellular Neural Networks. They performed joint editorial work for IEEE CAS Transactions, and joint conference organizations.

Prof. J. Suykens (ESAT, SCD, SISTA, SMC group) visited the lab of Prof. Chua for 3 months in 1996.

There is also an active ERASMUS exchange programme between the Pazmany University and KU Leuven for engineering students. Several members of the ESAT-SCD division wrote joint publications with Prof. Roska and Prof. Chua. They have also been external jury members of several PhD defenses in engineering in the past 10 years.

In 2005-2006 Prof. L.O. Chua was awarded the International Francqui Chair in Belgium and he was visiting the ESAT department for two periods of 3 months in this framework in 2005 and 2006. In a broader sense their work is inspiring for current PhD students working in research environments of IMEC, NERF, ESAT, iMinds, artificial intelligence and biomedical research.

More information

Info on the seven honorary doctorates honored during 2013 Patron Saint's Day : http://www.kuleuven.be/english/news/2013-honorary-doctorates-seven-brainstormers

Info on the ESAT /SCD workshop on February 5th 2013 during which Prof. Chua and Prof. Roska will give distinguished lectures, see http://homes.esat.kuleuven.be/~sistawww/eredoctoraat-brainstormers/index.php

Symposium program: http://homes.esat.kuleuven.be/~sistawww/eredoctoraat-brainstormers/program.php

Registration: http://homes.esat.kuleuven.be/~sistawww/eredoctoraat-brainstormers/registration.php

Research @ SISTA: http://homes.esat.kuleuven.be/~sistawww/eredoctoraat-brainstormers/research.php

Download the major contributions (in PDF)