In This Issue
Winter Issue of The Bridge on Frontiers of Engineering
December 15, 2010 Volume 40 Issue 4
Articles In This Issue
  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorHenry Hess

    Microscopic systems with complex functionalities have been the inspiration for the emerging field of synthetic biology.

    Autonomous systems have helped solve a variety of engineering challenges, from drastic changes in manufacturing processes since the 1950s to the exploration of space and ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorJeffrey Fisher and Mostafa Ronaghi

     Genome sequencing will soon become a standard part of medical care, agricultural practices, drug discovery and approval, and a myriad of other applications

    Genomics emerged as a scientific field after the invention of the original DNA sequencing technique by Fredrick Sanger (Sanger et al., ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorElla M. Atkins

    In the near future, fully autonomous unmanned aircraft systems will be both technologically feasible and safe.

    The next-generation air transportation system (NextGen) will achieve unprecedented levels of throughput1 and safety by judiciously integrating human supervisors with automation ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorMark Campbell

    Aerospace scientists tend not to trust autonomous software for projects on which many years and large sums of money have been spent.

    Automation is now apparent in many aspects of our lives, from aerospace systems (e.g., autopilots) to manufacturing processes (e.g., assembly lines) to robotic ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorElain Chew

     Research at the intersection of engineering and musical performance includes music cognition, expression synthesis, ensemble coordination, and improvisation.

    The mathematical nature of music and its imminently quantifiable attributes make it an ideal medium for studying human creativity and ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorParthasarathy Ranganathan

    New thinking about computer systems is focused on holistic designs that cross traditional boundaries.

    We are entering an exciting era for computer-systems design. In addition to continued advances in performance, next-generation designs are also addressing important challenges related to ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorArmando Fox

    The essence of cloud computing is to make datacenter hardware and software available to the general public on a pay-as-you-go basis.

    Computer science is moving forward so quickly and is so focused on its recent history that we are often surprised to learn that visionary ideas were articulated ...

  • Wednesday, December 15, 2010
    AuthorAndrew Weiner

    Editor's Note

    Every year the NAE U.S. Frontiers of Engineering (FOE) Symposium brings together approximately 100 outstanding engineers, ages 30 to 45, to share ideas and learn about cutting-edge engineering research. A unique feature of FOE symposia is that participants are competitively ...