News from Inria

fOSSa conference 2012, origins of open source

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 10:08:29 GMT

Inria & EuraTechnologies are happy to announce you the fOSSa 2012 Edition! fOSSa conference will take place on the 4, 5, 6th December 2012 in Lille, France, nearby London, Paris and Brussels.

Thanks to the quality of our speakers & attendees, thanks to our open & pragmatic approach, more than 250 people came each year; more than 100 articles in the press & webzines talk positively about the conference content... fOSSa conference is playing a predominant role in the OSS arena year after year.

This year, the conference will address:

Education,
Research & Innovation,
fOSSarcheology - History of the Free Software/Open Source movement,
Movie Revolution OS,
Digital Native Generation, Openness,
Open Arts & Open Hardware,
Licences,
Community management,
Workshops. (Many code developement training sessions are scheduled -> Gnome, Mozilla, LibreOffice, Pharo, SpagoBI, ROS framework, Elgg & Social Network Usages, etc.)

"What marks the difference between fOSSa and other events is the air that you breath there. An event organized by passionate people, with passionate attendees as well … and great speakers. Every year you can get some presentations of greater international events in advance (I remember the year of Arduino, to give you an example).”

Gabriele Ruffatti - SpagoWorld Blog 2012.

This year fOSSa welcomes various well-known free and open source software figures such as Tristan Nitot (Mozilla Europe), Laurent Chemla (digital activiste), Colin de la Higuera (SIF), Stephane Grumbach (Inria), Alexis Kauffmann et Christophe Masutti (FramaSoft), Laurent Grisoni (Inria), Hugobiwan Zolnir (digital artist), Roberto Di Cosmo (IRILL), Mark Atwood (Open Stack, HP), Dave Neary (RedHat), Sebastien Heyman (Gephi), Joanmarie Diggs (Gnome), Scott Wilson (Apache), Dan Shearer (Edinburg Academy), Andrew Katz (Moorcrofts).

SuperComputing 2012: a must in computing

Mon, 12 Nov 2012 11:06:59 GMT

The global community of scientific computing has assembled in Salt Lake City, and will remain there until 16 November. Inria, a committed member of this event, established in 1988, has participated for nearly 20 years by sending its specialising in high performance computing (HPC).

"This year we are engaged in a nationwide operation (C2S@Exa) for the 2012 SuperComputing conference and are involving Inria teams from different sites (Bordeaux, Grenoble, Nancy and Sophia Antipolis)", said Brice Goglin, Research Scientist with the Inria Runtime project team at the Inria Bordeaux - Sud-Ouest Research Centre. "SuperComputing only directly covers a few of the 20 subjects researched at Inria, but some of our other teams researching other subjects participate in the conference because digital simulation and high performance computing now affect many aspects of society," he says.

Networking is a priority

Working to develop software that makes supercomputers more user-friendly, Brice admits to attending this unmissable international conference more as a means of meeting the key figures of scientific computing than exhibiting his research. "We need to closely follow developments in technology," he says, admitting to having special agreements with manufacturers such as Intel, so as to be able to provide computational software as soon as the manufacturer releases any new product. "We are confident that we can develop tools upstream, but are obviously not allowed to get started as long as the release of the product has not been made official" he confirms, noting that the SuperComputing conference is an opportunity for numerous manufacturers to present their products. Expected announcements include: a new Intel processor dedicated to scientific computing, or new generations of NVIDIA processors based on completely different technologies. "The battle is raging between manufacturers of conventional all-purpose processors that can do everything, just not very quickly (Intel), and manufacturers who design processors based on video game graphics cards which can only do certain things, but quickly (NVIDIA)" summarises Brice, noting that it is unclear today what the future holds in the realm of processor technology.

Trends

"Paradoxically, as computers become more powerful and more complex, the challenge is to make users feel that they are easier to use," says Brice Goglin. Manufacturers of new products focus primarily on effective computing power but little on making the product user-friendly. Many projects have been proposed to simplify users' lives through the software they use. "Computing resources available through cloud computing are also among the trends in the shift towards sustainable development and energy savings," he observes. For visitors to its booth, Inria has prepared presentations involving: energy issues, programming languages, simulations of futuristic machines for modifying software, and much more!

Lastly, Inria will give its partners a chance to present, live from its booth. Follow events throughout the entire week on the conference website.

André Seznec wins first Intel Research Impact Medal

Fri, 19 Oct 2012 14:52:37 GMT

André Seznec, leader of team-project ALF at Inria Rennes, received the first Intel Research Impact Medal from the Intel Labs Academic Research Office.

Metadata for a better understanding of the past

Fri, 5 Oct 2012 18:17:07 GMT

2014 marks the centenary of the First World War. But how can such an event be commemorated when the relevant historical resources are scattered throughout the whole of Europe and historians have not yet been able to conduct an exhaustive study of all of them? Laurent Romary explains how, with the CENDARI project, computational sciences can provide a solution to this problem and come to the aid of all social sciences.

What is CENDARI and what is your goal?

CENDARI is a European project that strengthens collaboration between computational science researchers and historians, with the aim of networking archives from various corners of the continent. This initiative is part of the DARIAH infrastructure project, which aims to promote cooperation on methodologies and tools to aid research in social sciences. Inria is a stakeholder as I am one of its three co-directors. CENDARI focuses on history - specifically, the medieval period and the First World War. Historians studying both periods find it difficult to access archive data, which is spread out across Europe. They are faced with two problems. The first is the great diversity of documentary resources. Materials concerning the First World War, for example, include posters, billboards, audio and video archives, books, objects, artefacts, clothing, and maps. All these materials are scattered across Europe - in France, of course, but also in Serbia, Poland, Russia, and elsewhere. As the entire European continent was impacted by the event, historical resources exist everywhere. The second obstacle is unequal knowledge of the available resources. For example, the German federal archives, with their very precise explanatory texts, are very well known, whereas we know almost nothing about the archives in Serbia. The positive point is that we can draw inspiration from successful initiatives across Europe, an excellent example being the Czech National Library's medieval Manuscriptorium, and replicate them elsewhere.

What are the tangible benefits for researchers?

Imperial War Museum archives

Our goal is to use computational sciences to help other sciences - in this case, social sciences. The idea is to enable researchers to connect to all the European data, so as to be able to search for information about a particular place, period or person. With regard to the First World War, we should be able to trace the itinerary of a Russian general in a certain period, or know how the inhabitants of a village around Verdun lived during the Second Battle of the Aisne. We can make the same transposition for the medieval period, to understand how it was that the same person came to be cited in several parchments across Europe.
To do this, we are combining two complementary Inria research themes. I am responsible for modeling the metadata associated with the archives. A documentary archive is only usable if it is described precisely using what we call metadata. I work to ensure that these descriptors used to identify the contents of the archives are integrated in a unified repository in which all the data are standardised, identifying places, people, etc. in a uniform way. Here again, there are two challenges. The first is: what do we describe? At what level of granularity? A region? A place? A locality? The second is: how can we describe such different elements in a harmonised way? International standards such as the Text Encoding initiative (TEI) or Encoding Archival Description (EAD) are used to describe videos, for example, by placing "tags" in their descriptions. By using this mass of information and integrating it in an enormous database, we will reach a stage where information is extracted automatically. The second aspect of Inria's work, coordinated in this project by Jean-Daniel Fekete of the Aviz team, concerns the viewing of this information. Faced with such a huge amount of data, it is essential to be able to search intelligently, with an intuitive interface that allows users to filter results automatically by period or geographical area, or to isolate a particular event.

How will your work help other researchers in social sciences?

The European Commission asked us to focus on the history of the Middle Ages and the First World War as this would allow us to start working on specific examples. We are getting historians to conduct research using the system we have built, and their feedback will tell us whether the interface is too simple or too complex, how to change it, and how easy they find it to use. We are observing, for example, how they look for instances of two people being present in the same place, or how they link a military decision to actions in the field. This enables us to refine the model before we expand its use, as it is clear that our generic data archive exploration tools can be applied to other periods, as well as to social sciences other than history.
At present, for the two periods assigned to us, we are concentrating on exhaustive identification of the available archives in Europe, collecting as much information as possible and standardising the data on which we are testing our methods as best we can. In parallel, we are going to launch a joint initiative with two other DARIAH projects: EHRI on the Holocaust and ARIADNE on archaeology. Our working methods are similar even though they are aimed at different research communities. As the integration of European data into a single repository is a long process, we want to establish synergies between our respective areas of expertise now, rather than waiting for the finalisation of our projects in four years' time.

“A theater of memory in the digital environment”

Emiliano Degl'Innocenti, Digital Humanist, responsible for the Digital and Multimedia Lab at Società Internazionale per lo Studio del Medioevo Latino and Fondazione Ezio Franceschini

As a medievalist and historian of philosophy I'm fascinated by the history of mnemotechnique as an attempt to manage increasing amounts of data and knowledge (unmanageable for an individual with the simple aid of his natural memory) with artificial means. The long lasting history of western middle ages is dotted with a number of attempts to increase one's natural memory through systems of artificial memory. I've also noticed that many of our expectations and attitudes towards the digital information and the digital environment as a whole, are related to the same needs to deal with a vast amount of information of growing complexity.

Finally as a researcher in the field of digital humanities, I faced for years, every day, the gap between humanists (e.g.: medievalists) with their own disciplinary traditions, their contents and their expectations, and IT specialists. I believe that due to its nature and goals, CENDARI is the place to develop a new and more effective type of collaboration between humanists (historians, archivists, librarians, etc..) and IT specialists. Since this starting phase in the CENDARI project, specialists coming from both traditional and IT-related disciplines are supposed to work closely and share content, workflows and goals in order to create a completely new experience for users willing to do research in the digital environment. I still believe that, in particular for Medieval Studies, what can radically change the research horizon, is the shift from the database-centric-era to a new kind of digital noosphere. More interoperable data, semantic annotation and integration with different sources, the creation of a complex systems of knowledge management: a theater of memory in the digital environment to manage, enhance and preserve our cultural heritage, with the sensitivity of the medieval philosophers, and the tools of the digital age.

Thierry Priol, Director of European Partnerships

Wed, 3 Oct 2012 10:40:41 GMT

Thierry Priol began his role as Director of European Partnerships on 1 October 2012. His previous position was Deputy Scientific Director in the Research Department and the European Partnership Department in charge of "networks, systems and services, distributed computing". He takes over from Jean-Pierre Banâtre.

Tools for getting more out of brain imaging

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 11:06:21 GMT

Brain imaging has made a great deal of progress in recent years, providing more and more data and with an increasingly high level of quality. Developing reliable, high-performance tools to improve the use of these images is now vital. Inria has an important role to play in this respect. The Parietal team is presenting four articles on this subject at MICCAI 2012, as well as contributing to four specialist workshops and running a demonstration at the Inria stand.

Bertrand Thirion, Parietal team leader, Inria Saclay–Île-de-France

What have been the big advances in brain imaging in recent years?

Brain imaging has made a lot of progress thanks to improved equipment performance and the development of increasingly sophisticated image analysis techniques. The advent of high-field MRI makes it possible to obtain excellent images of brain activation. Today, the resolution of such images is 1 mm, as against 3 mm just 5 years ago. The data are therefore of higher quality and enable more detailed study of the functional connections between the different regions of the brain.
This study is facilitated by the development of new techniques for analysing these images, which are producing increasingly precise models of cortical connections. These techniques are based upon fairly complex calculation methods which still require improvement.
A third important aspect of this research field is currently being developed with the emergence of databases containing immense quantities of data about the brain, which are only growing as the years go by. I think that a major challenge for the future is to create the tools necessary to manage these imaging databases.

What kinds of tools are necessary to make use of these huge databases?

We need to develop computerised tools that allow us to reuse these data, such as for meta-analysis. This is useful, for example, when we wish to compare data obtained via different protocols or to combine data from similar experiments in order to confirm a result or establish more precise and more objective hypotheses. The main difficulty involved in producing these kinds of tools is knowing how to manage the information associated with the images, particularly the protocol used to obtain them. Once the data have been organised, learning technologies come into their own by automatically identifying characteristics common to a large number of data items. At the Inria stand at MICCAI, our team will present a demonstration of a software program that offers the tools necessary for such an approach: scikit-learn.
Another challenge for computer scientists is to be able to use images from a different modality (anatomical, functional, etc.) to offer fuller and more precise information about a part of the brain. At MICCAI, we are presenting a project concerning ways of pooling two sources of information: one supplied via functional imaging, concerning dynamic formation of activation networks, and the other provided by the diffusion MRI, concerning the fibres connecting the various regions of the brain. The goal is to combine the two types of images to establish a link between the main fascicles of brain fibers and the activation networks and thus build a better model. It is also possible to use one method to guide interpretation of another.

Can we envisage medical applications of these advances?

In the medium term, this work will be used to study patient cohorts - for example, to identify risk markers for neurodegenerative diseases with a view to diagnosis and prognosis.

Efficient, modular tools to aid interpretation of medical images

Fri, 28 Sep 2012 10:18:41 GMT

Medical imaging, scans and MRIs provide a lot of data, but identifying the development of an illness or detecting a slow-growing tumour is no easy task. The Galen team is developing algorithms designed to help doctors identify these changes as early as possible. The team's work focuses essentially on methodology and has been successfully applied in a number of contexts, as demonstrated by the significant contribution of its researchers to MICCAI’2012 and previous symposia.

Nikos Paragios, Galen team leader, Inria Saclay–Île-de-France research centre

You are presenting four projects at MICCAI 2012: what do they have in common?

Our contribution to all four articles is a methodological one. We design intelligent programs capable of helping doctors to interpret medical data better in order to identify and treat illnesses. Over the last ten years or so, we have developed a general data analysis framework based on graph theory which can be used to produce solutions offering a good level of optimality and short calculation times. It can also be applied to problems concerning different types of data, illnesses or populations. The work has a direct impact on practices, as we are solving scientific problems that are very close to clinical preoccupations. Our solutions have given rise to technology transfers and are already being used in hospitals.

And two of your contributions directly concern the interpretation of patient images?

The first project, conducted in conjunction with Montpellier University Hospital and the company INTRASENSE, concerns the detection of brain tumours and, more specifically, type II gliomas, using data provided by patient scans or MRIs. Our approach makes it possible to establish correspondences between a diseased brain and a healthy brain so as to detect any anomalies, and to establish the timing of these correspondences in order to monitor the changes in the tumour. The tools that we have developed help the doctor to identify the tumour and to decide on the right time to operate.
A second project, conducted with doctors from Henri Mondor and La Pitié Salpêtrière Hospitals as well as the Institut de Myologie, applies the graph methodology to measure the muscle volume of patients suffering from myopathies. These diseases cause muscle to decay and be replaced by fat. By establishing correspondences in time between scans or MRIs, doctors can not only track the development of the disease but also identify the affected muscles in order to better target treatments, such as gene therapy.

What are the intended applications of the other two projects you are presenting at MICCAI?

One of them applies the methodology to cell populations in an experiment conducted by biologists and computer scientists at Houston University. In this case, graph theory is used to identify the active genes in a mouse cell by establishing correspondences with a base model.
In the last project, the methodology plays a less incongruous part. General Electric must develop ultra-fast scanners adopting a smart sensor motion system that reduces acquisition time - and thus the time for which patients are exposed to radiation - but still produces the same quality of image. To this end, sophisticated reconstruction tools have been developed (sparsity/parsimonious methods) which will use graph theory to take into account the movements of the patient or of organs such as the heart, in order to reduce reconstruction artefacts.

Ivan Laptev: Advancing Computer Vision

Thu, 27 Sep 2012 11:41:27 GMT

Ivan Laptev is one of the four INRIA candidates selected for a European Research Council (ERC) grant in the young researchers category 2012. His subject, “Computer Vision”, aims to mimic the human visual system thanks to algorithms that analyse motion, detect events and recognise objects in video sequences. He explains his work to us in more detail and outlines some potential applications.

“Computer vision is a branch of computer science related to several disciplines including mathematics, cognitive science, computer graphics and machine learning. Its goal is to interpret images and video in a way similar to the human visual system and develop algorithms to this end,” says Ivan.
The ERC grant, worth 1.5 million euros, will help Ivan and his colleagues develop their research and in particular go beyond simple object recognition to something that is more useful. For instance, in a street scene, the developed algorithm would not only identify cars and people as distinct objects, but also actually predict what these objects might do next. This would be done by analysing interactions between the objects and developing statistical models that describe these interactions.

Constructing statistical models

Ideally, irrelevant information, or “noise”, would be weaned out from a scene, so that it did not interfere with interpretations. “We would learn what is relevant by observing many people interacting with the same object in videos of events that go on for a relatively long period of time - such as house parties, or a house being cleaned - recorded with a static camera,” explains Laptev. Such data would be used to construct statistical models that describe how people typically interact with particular types of objects or scenes. One example could be a kitchen model that would help identify a person sitting on a stove as something unusual and potentially dangerous.
“Simply labelling images is not enough,” he says. “We would like computers to be able to interpret complex scenes in videos, like when people open doors, sit down, shake hands and all manner of other activities, in order to recognise their intentions and alert them if they were about to do something potentially dangerous, as in the model above. We would also like to be able to suggest useful actions they could take in a given scene.”

Analysing real films and videos

Until recently, such analyses were performed under constrained conditions, with students in Ivan’s group acting out well-defined roles. The research has now reached the stage where a computer can successfully analyse real film and video footage.
So what are the potential applications of this research? “INA in France and the BBC in the UK are very interested in our work because it might help them index the vast amount of videos these organisations have in their archives,” said Ivan. “The same could be done for videos on YouTube, where content is increasing everyday.
“Healthcare could also benefit – for example, monitoring elderly people to prevent accidents by predicting hazardous situations. Intelligent cameras in the home could also make our lives easier, by, for instance, recording where we left our keys last night so we would not have to waste time looking for them in the morning.”

About Ivan Laptev:

Ivan is currently at INRIA Paris-Rocquencourt, a unit of the French National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control. He is working with the WILLOW research group, associated with the Informatics Department of Ecole Normale Supérieure, led by Jean Ponce. He did his PhD at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, in the Computer Vision and Active Perception Laboratory (CVAP).

Neuroimaging and computing for better diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease

Thu, 27 Sep 2012 08:49:11 GMT

Inria is organising MICCAI 2012, the 15^th International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention, which takes place from the 1st to the 5th of October.

We spoke to Prof. Giovanni Frisoni, neurologist at IRCCS Fatebenefratelli in Italy, and Inria researcher Marco Lorenzi, both of whom are presenting a paper about brain image analysis for better diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.

When analysing brain images, doctors look for regions of the brain that show abnormal amounts of atrophy, which can be caused by neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s. A new computer analysis method to help better analyse these images, devised by Marco Lorenzi, is based on an existing dynamic model that now includes time-sequenced cerebral images.

A virtual neuroimaging laboratory

The researchers are developing a “virtual laboratory” of sorts for imaging the brains of patients with Alzheimer’s disease. They are currently analysing around 1000 images (taken from 300 patients and 200 control subjects) but hope to have ten times as many images soon. Analyses on databases of this size require high-performance computing and a number of user-friendly algorithms.

“We can ‘see’ if a patient has Alzheimer’s by looking at the images and by using so-called imaging biomarkers,” explains Prof. Frisoni. “Such techniques are very recent and it will take another five years or so, we believe, before patients can routinely be diagnosed this way. There are three main biomarkers: the first is brain atrophy (which is the most dramatic phenomenon) because the tissue in some parts of the brain can shrink by up to 30%, even in the early stages of the disease. We can see this shrinking using high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging.

The second marker is glucose hypometabolism in some brain regions, while the third is the accumulation of beta-amyloid plaques in the cortex. Both these phenomena can be seen with PET. “For instance, we can observe the plaques, thought to be the main culprit behind Alzheimer’s, by injecting small molecules into the brain that selectively bind to the amyloid.”

Better understanding Alzheimer’s disease

Marco Lorenzi has a degree in mathematics and writes the complex algorithms and software to help doctors like Prof. Frisoni better analyse the digital brain images by focusing on the biomarkers. These algorithms will also allow researchers to understand the mechanisms behind Alzheimer’s, and in particular how the brain structure changes as the disease progresses.

“Our main challenge is that the numerical tools we develop must address the needs of doctors at all times, and the mathematics should always target the clinical problem,” explains Marco. “We must thus work in close collaboration and provide each other with constant feedback.”

Marco will finish his PhD by the end of this year. “During my PhD, we succeeded in developing a set of instruments that have shown promising results when it comes to analysing digital brain images of Alzheimer’s disease patients,” he says. “These instruments are mainly based on non-rigid registration of magnetic resonance images - a computational technique for modelling the structural changes of the brain through deformations of its shape and size. In particular, we have improved how the model statistics are computed, something that will help us better understand the pathology. We have also developed different methods for interpreting the disease and for quantifying its severity in a given patient. This might help a doctor to see which of his patients has Alzheimer’s and at what stage it is, so he can take the appropriate action.”

Avoiding costly clinical trials

The main goals of the research are to use the software and images to help develop effective drugs that stop the progression of the disease - or better still, preventative drugs that might be given to healthy subjects.

“Pharmaceutical companies currently develop drugs by undertaking large clinical trials. In the case of Alzheimer’s, these can involve hundreds of patients that are followed over a time period of several years,” explains Prof. Frisoni. “This is expensive and time-consuming. By analysing a large number of images with the help of specific algorithms and by using the specific biomarkers mentioned above, we might be able to reduce the number of patients studied by ten-fold and the time span to months rather than years.”

DigiCosme Laboratory of Excellence opens

Tue, 11 Sep 2012 17:30:44 GMT

To mark the inaugural conference of the DigiCosme Laboratory of Excellence (Labex) on 12 and 13 September 2012, we take a look back at the origins and ambitions of this project in an interview with the lab's coordinator, Christine Paulin-Mohring.

The DigiCosme* Labex did not just materialise out of thin air ...

Since the 2000s, various changes have taken place that have improved the structure of computer science research and training activities at the Plateau de Saclay.
Inria's arrival was an initial turning point, promoting cooperation between the École Centrale, the École Polytechnique, ENS Cachan and Université Paris-Sud through joint project teams. This resulted in the Joint Computer Science Research Cluster (PCRI). These Inria projects were unique in their long-term approach. The researchers saw each other regularly, working together and taking advantage of their proximity to each other, over long periods (around ten years on average). Then came the Digiteo stage, with an extension of collaborations to other partners, such as the CEA List institute. The Labex should allow the computer science structure to be strengthened at a time when the laboratories involved are coming closer together geographically. It comprises 300 researchers and the same number of PhD students, spread among the sites of 11 institutions: the French atomic energy commission (CEA), the French national centre for scientific research (CNRS), the École Polytechnique, Supélec, Inria, Université Paris-Sud, the École Centrale Paris, ENS Cachan, ENSTA ParisTech, the Institut Mines-Télécom, and, finally, Université de Versailles St Quentin.

In principle, a Labex has to be multidisciplinary, yet you have chosen to focus on computer science ...

It's true that an interdisciplinary structure was one of the criteria, but evidently not the most decisive one, as our selection shows. By choosing to create a single-discipline Labex, we are not giving up on interdisciplinary collaboration. As part of the Idex (initiative of excellence), teams can continue to pursue cross-disciplinary research with biologists, physicists, etc. We already have fruitful relations with physics labs enabling us to observe computing systems as physical systems.
However, unlike other disciplines such as physics or mathematics, information and communication sciences are still a young discipline. They have to find their place and be recognised as a science in their own right, even if they do play an important role in helping other sciences. Computer scientists are most often drawn towards interfaces with other disciplines, but they must promote recognition of their own core discipline. We are witnessing explosive growth in the information society—that is clear—but if we want to reap the benefits, we must think deeply and come up with new models. So what we wanted to do with this Labex was defend the core of information sciences.
We do not seek to cover every issue. Rather, it is about working on fundamental areas, such as programming, data and communications, that lie at the core of our discipline. We have tried to identify challenges in each of these areas. At present, the main challenge is in relation to data, which are increasingly numerous, heterogeneous and distributed. We have also moved from the era of stand-alone computers to that of decentralised systems. The models change and the algorithms are modified as a result.

Does this return to the core mean you will be working solely with computer scientists? Or will you call upon other skills?

In fact, we will essentially be working on projects of a limited scale, as that ensures maximum researcher involvement. From a university point of view, the information and communication aspects of networks are not covered by the same sections or even the same laboratories. The Labex strengthens the synergies between these two fields, which lie at the heart of modern-day information systems. However, we also want to draw on skills from other disciplines. Digital systems have grown in size so much that the observation and modelling techniques used with them are getter closer to physics. Collaborations with physicists are therefore an obvious choice. We also want to develop links with social sciences.

You are focusing on the core of computer science: does that mean you will be preferring theoretical research to the applied variety?

I wouldn't make that distinction. In computer science, there is very little distance between theoretical and applied research. All the themes we have proposed are directly linked to applications. Certification and correction problems, for example, range from sensors to the most elaborate abstract models and are based on advanced logical and algorithmic results.

* The project was endorsed by the French national research agency (ANR) under the name DigiWorlds. Due to a conflict with a registered trademark, this name was abandoned in September 2012 and the Labex was renamed 'DigiCosme'.

An expert in multi-institutional work

After studying at the ENS de Jeunes Filles, which she entered in 1982, Christine Paulin-Mohring submitted a thesis, prepared in partnership with Inria and the ENS, at Université Paris 7 in 1989. 'I have always worked in a multi-institutional environment! ' As a research scientist at the CNRS and then a computer science professor at Université Paris-Sud in 1997, she took part in the first joint projects between laboratories. With her former PhD supervisor, she set up the first joint team between Inria and the LIP, a CNRS laboratory at ENS-Lyon. This team would become one of the first joint projects under the Inria Futurs programme, which would also involve Paris-Sud, the CNRS and the Ecole Polytechnique.

Excerpt from the interview with Christine Paulin-Mohring concerning 'a Labex for a discipline without boundaries: computer science', published on the Paris-Saclay Media site

Marie Doumic-Jauffret: modelling amyloidosis

Tue, 4 Sep 2012 17:40:55 GMT

Marie Doumic-Jauffret is one of 4 Inria candidates selected in the young researcher category for the ERC European call for projects 2012. Her project, called Skipper, aims to improve understanding of amyloidosis, a group of diseases that includes prions and Alzheimer’s, in order to help biologists identify therapeutic solutions.

How did you get into research at Inria?

Marie Doumic-Jauffret: I was not planning to go into research. Some dream of a career in research at a very early age, but that was not my case at all! After studying applied mathematics I did a thesis in partial differential equations applied to lasers. But I wanted a pragmatic job, something to do with what I saw as the "real world". So I decided to look at engineering. That's how I ended up running the engineering department of the VNF (Voies Navigables de France) for 3 years, overseeing the construction of dams and sluice gates.

I learned a lot there. After three years in that position I thought I was ready to do research in the same operational manner. I also realized that my thesis, which seemed rather abstract at the time, had been used by others to conduct laser simulations. In 2007, as I was an engineer at Ponts et Chaussées, I was able to join Inria on secondment. I joined the BANG team, because of its applications in biology which fascinated me.

What is the subject of your ERC Skipper project?

Marie Doumic-Jauffret: It involves applying a family of equations some members of the BANG team are working on, and that describe the evolution of time among populations, to the modelling of amyloidosis. This category of diseases, such as prion diseases or Alzheimer's, is characterised by deposits of protein aggregates in brain tissue. For a reason we do not fully understand, these proteins change configuration and become capable of polymerisation and of clinging to one other and forming large starch-like aggregates, hence the name amyloid fibrils. This polymerisation process is similar to the mechanisms observed by the team during the division and growth of cells or bacteria, to the extent the polymers grow by adding monomers and divide by splitting. Thanks to technological progress, biologists have accumulated an enormous amount of data that needs to be fully exploited. I hope that my mathematical models can help them by highlighting new data in the scales they already have, that will allow them to take full advantage of these scales and identify those that provide the most information.

This is a multi-disciplinary project. Do you work with biologists?

Marie Doumic-Jauffret: It is absolutely necessary to ensure the relevance of the model developed. An Inra biologist, Human Rezaei, who is specialized in prions, is involved in the project. His participation allows us to compare the model to results of in vitro experiments, but that is not all. This relationship is scientifically enriching for both of us. The mathematician's point of view leads the biologist to ask more questions and explore new leads. Conversely, the biologist submits unusual mathematical problems, revealing a new aspect of an equation that has already been studied in great depth. It is not always easy because we tend to reason according to the logic of our respective fields, but it is very stimulating. However, this requires a real investment, in terms of time, which is generally not recognised in each discipline. Accepting multi-disciplinary profiles is one of Inria’s greatest strengths. The fact that the ERC appreciates this interaction with the field of biology confers a form of recognition to this multi-disciplinary approach and a certain freedom in our research. That said, I haven't become a biologist at all and I still belong in applied mathematics!

"The challenge consists of modelling polymerisation using partial and aggregated data"

Applying partial differential equations to biology is a relatively recent approach because the problems are much more complex than in physics. Consequently it is very difficult to "match" a model to an experiment. It has to be streamlined so that it is simple enough to be studied and complex enough to capture the essence of biological behaviour. But that is not the only difficulty. In the case of amyloidosis, there are many measurements that are partial or aggregated, such as the measurement of total polymers over time. The challenge lies in developing models that can be confirmed or refuted based on this data. To achieve this, Marie Doumic-Jauffret uses partial differential equations (models of growth/fragmentation/coagulation) and compares this method with statistical and probabilistic approaches – a confrontation rich in information and well-adapted to this type of problem – as well as inverse problem techniques that use measurements of a phenomenon to select which model it obeys. In the Skipper project, research is applied to proteins, but the methods developed should be universal enough to produce results in other fields.

Philippe Nain, Chairman of Inria's Evaluation Committee

Mon, 3 Sep 2012 10:59:38 GMT

Following the advice of Inria's Scientific Committee, the Chairman and CEO Michel Cosnard has appointed Philippe Nain as Chairman of Inria's Evaluation Committee, with effect from 1 September 2012.

Leader of the Maestro project-team at Sophia Antipolis - Méditerranée, Philippe Nain takes over from Gérard Berry, who was recently appointed Professor at the Collège de France. Philippe Nain will be assisted by Hélène Barucq and Nicolas Sendrier, Vice-Chairpersons of the Evaluation Committee with effect from 1 September 2012.

Bruno Wierzbicki, Director of Human Resources

Fri, 31 Aug 2012 10:31:52 GMT

Bruno Wierzbicki has been appointed as Director of Human Resources starting from 1 September 2012. He will be replacing Muriel Sinanidès.

Bruno Wierzbicki, a former air force officer who was previously Director of Human Resources at the General Council of the Oise department, becomes Inria’s new Director of Human Resources. “I am enthusiastic about joining this great institute. The way the institute operates is not unlike the way the air force does, with a central HRD and HR services at the regional centres.” Human resources are his real passion, and he is involved in many activities outside of work that bear a relation to his field. He regularly teaches at Science Po in Rennes, and has also taught at the Universities of Paris VIII and Paris XIII, as well as IGS (a school that specialises in HR). He is a member of ANDRH (the French national association of HRDs) and serves on the editorial committee of the association’s review, for which he writes articles and works on special reports. He is active on the Internet, writing articles for the website rhinfo.com.

His background

After completing a preparatory course for entrance to an engineering school, Bruno Wierzbicki joined the air force. He obtained an engineering degree from the Air Force Academy in Salon-de-Provence and became a fighter pilot. He then pursued his career in the army as an officer, taking on various responsibilities in management and project leadership. Eventually he turned his attention to Human Resources. “It is something that relates to my innermost values.” He trained at the Sorbonne where he obtained a Master’s degree in Human Resources. Bruno then gradually became involved in the Air Force’s Department of Human Resources, where he was put in charge of the mobility of 45,000 non-commissioned officers and members of the air force. Later, he joined the Defence Ministry’s HRD as operational lead of a mission to harmonise HR processes in the ministry’s departments and armed forces. Bruno Wierzbicki finally set aside his uniform and left the military world to enter the world of local government as Human Resources Manager for the General Council of the Oise département in France. He spent a little less than two years there before joining Inria.

ERC Junior grantee Sylvain Lefebvre presents ShapeForge, a project with style

Tue, 31 Jul 2012 17:09:36 GMT

Sylvain Lefebvre is one of four Inria candidates selected in the young researcher category for the 2012 ERC European call for projects. His project, named ShapeForge, will make it possible to produce, quite literally, everyday objects or pieces of furniture from given examples, taking inspiration from their style.

You are passionate about computer-generated images. What do you seek in these virtual worlds?

I've always been fascinated by the idea of actually being involved in producing the world around us and of building virtual worlds and exploring them interactively. I used to create video games as a hobby before getting inspired for my research work. My aim has always been to make it as easy as possible to design such worlds, while still producing richly detailed images. Until 2010, when I joined the Alice team in Nancy, I worked on improving the textures used in computer graphics—images that give the illusion of different materials such as wood or marble. More specifically, since my thesis at Inria Grenoble, during my postdoctoral work at Microsoft Research in the United States, and then as a member of the Reves team at Sophia-Antipolis, we have been developing methods of "example-based texture generation".

What does that mean?

Instead of providing tools to paint textures, these methods make use of algorithms capable of generating textures that resemble a given sample and reproducing it on a large scale. I initially worked on stochastic textures as these account for the majority of materials to be imitated. Since 2009, I have taken an interest in structured textures, such as building frontages with repetitive window layouts, doors with a specific design, ironwork, and so on. When these textures are produced by artists in graphics studios using retouched photographs, they require many hours of repetitive work to design entire towns, adapting the scale of the façades, door shapes, etc. Our algorithm is able to generate these various textures using a single example. It is already providing some good results.

How did you make the transition from texture to geometry?

The idea is quite simple: geometry is, by definition, structured, like the textures I work with. Just as we reproduce various structured textures using examples, I had the idea of reproducing the different geometries of objects, creating a bench in Louis XV style, for example, using a Louis XV chair. With this kind of example-based generation of objects, we can take inspiration from all kinds of everyday objects, such as pieces of furniture, crockery or even staircases and hand rails, and so on. We will, of course, be able to use these design methods in video games. However, my ERC project is more ambitious than that. Working on the basis that 3D printers, which are becoming more widespread, let just about anyone produce objects very simply, I want to design algorithmic methods to create new objects automatically while complying to a certain style. These objects won't be film props, but actual objects! We will be able to use them in our daily life.

Is this where the virtual world moves back into the real world?

Exactly. An increasing number of methods used to design and produce objects, until now reserved for professional designers, are being made available to the general public. This new bridge between the virtual and the real should have a considerable impact on our daily lives. My goal is to create a top-flight European team working in this field.

ShapeForge: a scientific and algorithmic challenge

The main difficulty with this project is combining approaches that are very different in nature: algorithms from computer graphics which are used to build forms and textures using examples are combined with digital optimisation methods which make sure that the real object complies with the function it is assigned. Thus, to produce a Louis XV bench, on the basis of a Louis XV chair, you need to not only capture the appearance of the example but also formalise the characteristics of a bench (the flat surface of the seat, its dimensions, and its height) as well as its mechanical properties to ensure that it is solid enough. You then need to find, from among all the shapes that can be produced from a single example, the one that best complies with the various criteria. This all has to be done rapidly enough for the user to be able to interact with the system. The transition from virtual to real is an amazing scientific and algorithmic challenge.!

Stéphane Redon: Inventing engineering on an atomic scale

Mon, 30 Jul 2012 14:37:07 GMT

Stéphane Redon is one of four Inria candidates selected in the young researcher category for the 2012 ERC European call for projects. His project, named ADAPT, develops adaptive mathematical and algorithmic methods to produce nanosystem CAD software that aims to be as generic as the benchmark macroscopic CAD software Catia, developed by Dassault Systèmes.

Where does this passion for all things nano come from?

Stéphane Redon: I've always been attracted to lots of different things at the same time. In fact, that's what I liked about the École Polytechnique—the opportunity to learn as much about maths as economics, physics or biology. It's also what draws me to nanosciences, which have held my attention since 2005 and where you get to work with biologists, physicians and chemists, along with specialists in pharmaceutics and materials.

You insist on the fact that your software for the virtual prototyping of nanoscopic objects will be generic and adapted to all of these disciplines. How is that possible?

S.R: I know that it could come across as something of a paradox. Contrary to software for the prototyping of aircraft, cars or any other manufactured products, we have much less room for manoeuvre when it comes to choosing a design on a nano scale. The physical constraints are much more powerful. For example, the distances between atoms cannot be arbitrary and molecular conformations are governed by complex laws. In spite of this, dynamic molecular simulation can be used to represent proteins, polymers, and materials in a unified manner, like a set of interacting particles.

How did you manage to simplify this painstaking approach?

S.R: By using a so-called adaptive system, which helps concentrate calculations on only one part of the system—the most important part, i.e. where atoms move the most. In 2008, we started to develop our own software, known as SAMSON, as part of an ANR (French national research agency) project. SAMSON is used for virtual experiments. For example, it allows the user to modify the geometry of a molecule and visualise its new stable configuration in real time.

What do you intend to do with your ERC grant?

S.R: In early 2011, we introduced the "adaptive Hamiltonian" theory, which is used to formalise adaptive particle simulations in a rigorous manner. First and foremost, this theory proves that, although these simulations are adaptive, they can be used to predict properties that concern biologists, physicians, and the like. The ERC grant will help us develop the theory and design a whole set of related simulation algorithms. For example, we will need to identify which simplification parameters to select in order to speed up a maximum number of calculations and check which size of molecules our method works on. We will integrate all the algorithms thus developed into SAMSON. My aim is to make SAMSON an open development environment for nanosystem design around which a community of users and developers may arise. My grant will provide me with the resources needed. With €1.5 million, I intend to build up my team and, over five years, recruit three doctoral students, two postdoctoral students, and an engineer. A serene working environment.

Proof by Hamiltonian, an idea rich in its simplicity

Hamiltonian is a mathematical operator that can be used to describe a system of particles. It is the sum of the kinetic energy (energy linked to particle movement) and the potential energy (energy linked to interaction between particles). Stéphane Redon's stroke of genius was to modify the Hamiltonian—to turn it into an adaptive Hamiltonian—so that the mass of each particle is dependent on its kinetic energy. In its simplest version, the slower a particle moves, the greater mass it will be assigned, until infinity, thus blocking the movement of the particle in question. This is an ingenious and rigorous way of determining where and how calculations need to be concentrated.

Edwin Chacon Golcher a specialist engineer in computational plasma physics

Wed, 25 Jul 2012 14:17:49 GMT

Edwin Chacon Golcher is a specialist engineer member of the Inria project-team Calvi, a joint Inria / University of Strasbourg research team. The project-team in which he belongs, is devoted to the mathematical and numerical study as well as to the visualization of different problems arizing mostly from plasma physics and beam physics.

Born in Costa Rica, he migrated to the United States to become a scientist. He achieved his goal. Learn more about his cursus and work.

Matthias Gallé wins the accessit thesis prize

Mon, 23 Jul 2012 10:44:25 GMT

Matthias Gallé, former PhD student within the Symbiose team at Inria, won the accessit thesis prize for his works in the field of bioinformatics.

How did you get to the field of bioinformatics ?

The aspect of computer science which probably attracts me the most is the opportunity of doing interdisciplinary research.  More and more areas are becoming flooded by an increasing amount of data, and informatics is becoming crucial to get information out of this data (let's not even speak of doing this efficiently). This is particularly true for biology, and more specifically, molecular genetics. In addition there is the baffling fact that the fundamental information which is transmitted takes the form of a sequential string. The possibility of measuring the information content of these sequences is very appealing to me (as it was at the beginning of my thesis). Although since Turing biology had a strong attractions to computer scientists I think that at the current stage we are only scratching the surface of what can be achieved using computational methods. 

You just got the accessit thesis prize for your work within the Symbiose team at Inria. Can you tell us about your PhD?

As I mentioned, I was interested in studying other sciences through an informatics lens. During my master (in theoretical computer science, done at the FaMAF (University of Córdoba, Argentina)) I spent a semester at the U. of Campinas (Brazil) where I took a course on bioinformatics. This fueled my interest, which was further increased by an Internship programme from Inria, which I did at Symbiose with François Coste (who then became my main PhD advisor). At that stage I knew I wanted to pursue a PhD and the combination bioinformatics+France+good relationship with François settled my decision. I was funded by an Inria CORDI grant. The general idea of the thesis was to model genetic sequences with context-free grammars, inspired by what had been done in natural language processing. After the start of the PhD, we obtained funding for a collaboration Inria/CNRS - MINCyT (the argentinean science agency). Thanks to this we could do some mutual visits and exchange ideas with Gabriel-Infante López (who would become my co-advisor) and his teams who works, besides other things, developing parsing methods for natural-language texts. My final dissertation was on a combinatorial problem called the Smallest Grammar Problem, which is the problem of finding a smallest context-free grammar that generates exactly one sequence. We applied this to compress DNA sequences, to approximate Kolmogorov Complexity (an incomputable measure of randomness of a given sequence) and to discover structures in DNA. 

Following this award how do you see the rest of your career?

Having lived in several different countries I had several cultural shocks during my life, but none surprised me so much as the one that waited for me when I joined the Xerox Research Centre Europe. From applying computational theoretical ideas to bioinformatics, I started to use statistical methods on natural language and other kind of data (Xerox is involved in huge businesses likes transportation, health care and customer care to name just a few) with a more application oriented goal in mind. The differences in language, research communities and motivations are subtle but nevertheless important.  At the same time, there is much that can be transferred from one application domain (like molecular genetics) to another (like natural language processing). The same applies inside a domain (like machine learning), where very different approaches exist to solve the same task. I am enjoying finding research opportunities in this process and to adapt ideas, data structures and algorithms from one side to the other.  As I said in the beginning, I love the interdisciplinary doors that computer science opens. But to be able to explore them one has to be willing to stand on the threshold and to listen to both sides.

First digital school book "Computer and Digital Sciences"

Mon, 16 Jul 2012 16:59:48 GMT

The subject Computer and Digital Sciences will become part of the French high-school system’s scientific program this coming September! For this purpose, Gilles Dowek has created the first digital school book dedicated to teaching this subject!

This school book intended for the computer and digital science specialty within the scientific high-school program has been written by Gilles Dowek and prefaced by Gérard Berry, two major actors in this subject area, and is accessible online. The purpose of the book is to offer and present tools for facilitating the teaching of this new specialty. The book is a reference work covering basic knowledge and know-how, as well as operational insights, and is organized around the four basic concepts of computer science.

The Eyrolles publishing house has decided to sell the paper edition at a low cost, while offering the digital version online free of cost to help teachers prepare their classes. This decision is an example of a new economic model in the digital age!

Cryptography and coding for greater digital security

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 17:58:57 GMT

Inria's dynamic approach to science is due in part to its policy of regularly renewing its project teams. Indeed, every four to eight years, the teams must present a new research project. This offers an opportunity to come up with a new theme, a new team leader, a new name, new profiles, etc. A few months after the Tanc team evolved to form the Grace research project, we met with Daniel Augot, the new team leader, to discuss the implications of this change.

Can you explain the fields concerned by the Grace team (Geometry, arithmetic, algorithms, codes and encryption)?

We are interested in cryptography as a means of protecting data, communications, and machines against attacks through the use of algorithms and computing protocols, but also coding as a way of preventing random incidents. Our concern is applying the appropriate level of protection for the need, because preventing the random cause of a failure is not the same as warding off a hacker. We could say that it is better to envisage the worst possible scenarios and be capable of dealing with anything, but that would be very heavy in terms of energy and speed for applications that don’t necessarily require them. So, we base our work on an intermediate case, meaning that we predict several problems, but not that everything would go wrong at once. In this intermediate case, coding is sufficient, whereas in a worst case scenario, cryptography is required. For example, it isn't very important if a telephone conversation is interrupted, but it is vital that the commands transmitted inside a nuclear power plant be clearly understood and authenticated.

In this context, what was the interest of transforming the Tanc team into Grace?

François Morain had been in charge of Tanc for several years. There had been a lot of changes in staff: Andreas Enge left for the Bordeaux centre, Benjamin Smith and I joined the team, Alain Couvreur was recruited in 2011...Moreover, François became a professor at École Polytechnique in 2009, which is a lot of work, and so that's why I became team leader.
In terms of research themes, I contributed, with algebraic coding, a new field of application to the existing themes of Tanc.

Redundancy can be found everywhere, like when you spell your name saying “A as in Alpha, B as in Bravo"

Hence the Grace team was created in January 2012. A new researcher, Françoise Lévy-dit-Vehel, is now part of the team. She is going to reinforce the theme of algebraic coding and represents this synergy that exists with ENSTA, whose students will be joining the Saclay platform in September 2012.
All these reasons, the changes in staff and the new research themes, made it legitimate to change the team, name, and leader.

Can you give us more details regarding the team’s research work?

The team is organised around three fields of research. The first one is algorithmic number theory and its application to cryptography. We write programmes to determine the factorisation and primality of numbers, that is to say we break down a large quantity of prime numbers (a number that can only be divided by itself and 1). The fundamental problem is finding the exact level of difficulty in factorisation.

The second theme is curve-based cryptography, with research on the construction of new curves for public-key cryptography. Cryptography is not all there is to data security, but it's at the heart. To encrypt a message, you can use a RSA-type key or elliptical curve. RSA encryption is routinely used, for example, in Internet security, credit card transactions, or generating an electronic certificate for your tax returns. The choice between these two methods is a question of performance, in terms of speed and key size.

Finally, the third theme is coding, where the same curves are used to produce more effective codes. This field traditionally falls within the purview of telecommunications, but increasingly we can observe coding in computing: distributed computing, database replication, peer-to-peer systems, etc. We are working, for example, on the most effective implementation of an algorithm for decoding algebraic codes in worst case scenarios.
One problem that can be solved by algebraic coding is, for example, distributed storage, that is to say a file broken down into lots of little sections on several servers, and ensuring that if one or more servers fail, you can find the data thanks to the principle of redundancy applied in this case.
Another application of our research is a contract with the DGA (Direction Générale de l'Armement) for encryption. This could allow a lighter implementation of algorithms, lighter calculations for mobile components, decreased use of cell phone battery power and faster Internet transmissions.

What is redundancy?

The principle of error correction is redundancy, that is to say entering more data than required. If one part of the message is corrupted, it is still possible to recreate it. An individual therefore transmits more than a "pure" message. It is this additional part that we call redundancy, for example when you spell your name saying "A as in Alpha, B as in Bravo…". There is a fundamental compromise between the redundancy introduced, which should be short, and error resistance, which needs to be strong. For redundancy, we also want a level of "dispersion". If you used "Brava" instead of "Bravo", communication would be poor because Alpha and Brava are too similar phonetically. Alpha is easier to distinguish from Bravo, which disperses "A" and "B" more effectively.

Cédric Villani pays tribute to Henri Poincaré

Tue, 3 Jul 2012 09:36:03 GMT

The year 2012 marks the centennial of the death of Henri Poincaré. With its partners, the Henri Poincaré Institute has decided to pay tribute to its eponymous mathematician by organising a series of events taking place throughout the year 2012. Cédric Villani will give a public lecture on 19 September in Lille. This lecture is an opportunity to create awareness among the general public of two major scientific revolutions that took place at the end of the 19th century.

Who is Cédric Villani ?

He is the director of the Henri Poincaré Institute and a professor at the Claude Bernard Lyon 1 University. In 2010, he received the Fields Medal, the world’s highest distinction in mathematics, at the international congress of mathematics held in Hyderabad (India). A professor of mathematics at the École Normale Supérieure of Lyon and director of the Henri Poincaré Institute (UPMC/CNRS), his research covers analysis, probabilities, statistical physics and, more recently, differential geometry. Cédric Villani has received prizes for his work on kinetic theory relating to the Boltzmann equation and on optimal transportation.

Henri Poincaré in the eyes of Cédric Villani :

"Henri Poincaré is not an immortal mathematician merely due to having been appointed to the Académie française, but so remains after one hundred years as a result of his immense efforts having contributed to laying the foundations of whole areas of science: chaos theory and dynamic systems, automorphic functions theory, topology, etc.

The range and diversity of his contributions are such that a full presentation of his work would quickly become an interminable inventory. Often seen as the last researcher to master all the mathematical sciences, he was also a physicist, engineer, astronomer and philosopher. Member of the most prestigious European academies of science, and adored by the French public, he embodies a universality to which modern science intensely aspires." Quoted from the blog Regards-citoyens.com

Axellience prize winner of the 14th national competition for assistance in the creation of innovative businesses

Tue, 26 Jun 2012 15:51:10 GMT

The start-up Axellience, a spin-off from the Inria Lille Nord - Europe Research Centre, is the prize winner of the national competition for assistance in the creation of innovative businesses and technologies.

Created after three years of research and development on powerful technologies for the acceleration and automatisation of software development, Axellience is one of the prize winners having presented a “development creation” project.

Axellience was first selected by a regional committee in April 2012 and subsequently received a favorable opinion from the national committee, which was held in Paris on 20 June and chaired by Michel Rollier, chairman of the Michelin group. The prize will be presented officially to Axellience on 5 July by Geneviève Fioraso, Minister of Higher Education and Research.

The funds received (125,000 euros in the form of subsidies) will contribute to the financing of Axellience’s Research and Development program (over 1 million euros invested in total).

The software programs offered by Axellience are help tools for the development of business applications. Axellience’s solutions make development teams more productive as a result of using automatic code-generating technologies based on models. The editor expects to commercially launch its solution in the course of 2013.

The solutions of Axellience

A personalised tool

Based on the needs expressed by the teams in terms of development assistance tools, Axellience can build a personalised tool designed for rapid implementation and devoid of additional constraints. The return on investment of a fully-fledged industrialisation can be measured over the very short term.

About the national competition for assistance in the creation of innovative businesses and technologies

Ce concours est organisé par le Ministère de l’Enseignement Supérieur et de la Recherche en partenariat avec Oséo. Créé en 1999, le dispositif permet d’accompagner financièrement des projets innovants dans deux catégories : projets « en émergence » (nécessitant une phase de maturation) et projets « création développement » (dont la preuve de concept est établie). Trois entreprises de la région Nord Pas-de-Calais sont lauréates en 2012 dans la catégorie « création développement ».

En treize ans, le concours national d'aide à la création d'entreprises de technologies innovantes a permis la création de près de 1400 entreprises, dont 80% sont toujours en activité. Véritable tremplin pour les jeunes talents et l'innovation, il est le premier dispositif d'amorçage en France et assure avec succès son rôle de détection de projets de création d'entreprises innovantes...

RFID breaks the box office

Mon, 25 Jun 2012 21:20:04 GMT

A conundrum: A delivery pallet contains 50 boxes: how can you know their content without opening them or using x-rays? By using their Radio Frequency Identification Device (RFID) tags and their radio signals! Too expensive to be used on a massive scale, one can reduce their cost by printing them on the packaging boxes. From storage to product distribution, the entire production chain gains in terms of efficiency and environmental impact.

You have certainly already seen them: they are often used as anti-theft devices on packaging. Very simple, the RFID tags have only two elements: a coiled metal antenna wire and a chip. These tags can be read by means of radio signals from a distance of a couple of centimeters to tens of meters. The chip has no battery and cannot emit spontaneously. However, as soon as the chip enters the electromagnetic field of a reader, it receives a sufficient amount of energy to transmit the information it contains.

The metal antenna represents almost 99% of the surface of a classic RFID tag. A recent technology, Decartag, makes it possible to print the antenna on packaging paper or boxes, with environment-friendly conductive ink. This method is more ecological as there is no residual metal antenna when the box is recycled or destroyed: only the tiny chip needs to be dealt with. The automatic identification of the boxes and their content becomes possible - the entire logistics chain can reduce its costs and environmental impact, as inventory, dispatch and counting of the packaged products are accelerated.

Decartag is the result of the Decarte (DEvelopment of Electronic CARTons) project, which receives FUI (Fonds Uniques Interministériels - Unique interministerial funds) financial support granted to applied research projects bringing together competitiveness clusters, major corporations, SMEs or research laboratories. Decarte brings together several public and private actors, including Inria, IEMN, the Maud competitiveness cluster, and the Cartonneries de Gondardennes. It received a prize in December 2009 and a European RFID Award in March 2012.

This RFID printing technology only costs about 5 euro cents per item (about half of the price of the classic technology). It can be used on books or magazines, and it stores more information than ordinary tags (Code QR). This opens wide perspectives for users of NFC reader phones, which are gaining in popularity daily...

Zakaria Habibi, first winner of the Paul Caseau thesis prize

Wed, 20 Jun 2012 16:13:43 GMT

This year, the Academy of Technology and EDF created a prize in memory of Paul Caseau, a founding member of the Academy of Technology and director of EDF’s Studies and Research. Zakaria Habibi, a post-doctoral student in the Simpaf project team (a joint team with CNRS and Lille 1 University), is the first winner of this prize in recognition of his thesis defended in 2011 in the domain of digital modeling and simulation. The prize was presented on 18 June at the Collège des Bernardins.

Zakaria Habibi was not planning on a career in industrial research when he pursued his mathematical studies at the Hassan II University in Casablanca, Morocco. “Only mathematics interested me and I was not thinking about my professional future,” he admits. It was after he completed his masters that he felt a need to enter the “real” world and embark on a mathematical career. He then planned on becoming an engineer and looked for an academic program with a large focus on mathematics. “Naturally, I decided to turn to France, as I knew the language and the engineering schools there are known to provide solid training in mathematics, digital modeling, scientific computation, etc.; contrary to Morocco, where they focus either on computer science or on financial mathematics, for example, subjects which were too far removed from my centres of interest.”

He started graduate studies in applied mathematics and modeling at the Ecole Polytechnique of Clermont-Ferrand. Two years later he obtained his diploma, having taken a step back to reassess possible applications of mathematics to meteorology, energy and transportation. “I greatly enjoyed scientific computation and numerical analysis and I understood that an education in engineering would not enable me to attain expert knowledge.” He therefore set out to find a team and a thesis supervisor in this domain. Grégoire Allaire, the vice president of the applied mathematics department of the Ecole Polytechnique, responded positively to his application and suggested a subject funded by CEA. “By coincidence, I was doing an internship with this body during which I had come to discover nuclear energy and the mathematical applications related to this domain.” Co-supervised by Anne Stietel, member of the nuclear energy management committee (DEN) of CEA, he completed his thesis within DM2S/SFME, one of DEN’s laboratories.

I could go to the laboratory concerned by the subject for information and I was completely hooked!

A powerful motivation that carried Zakaria Habibi to his thesis defense three years later, in December 2011. At the end of his thesis period, which he carried out within an academic setting, he did not feel entirely ready to embark upon industrial research. He therefore applied for a post-doctoral position within the Simpaf project team in Lille, which has a very high reputation in the field of homogenisation, the topic of his thesis. Antoine Gloria, the head of the team, suggested he work on a project dealing with storage of nuclear waste, in direct contact with ANDRA staff. “Doing a post-doctoral was a way to make an ideal transition from academic research to industrial research. Working with Simpaf’s researchers is both an opportunity and a pleasure. I hope to maintain ties with the team in my future activities.” For the time being, he does not know what he will do when his post doc ends in October. He feels that the prize received for his thesis work also represents a key to rapidly open paths to the future. “People become more interested in what you are doing, which leads to more opportunities for contact. But it is also a burden, because you must prove that you deserve it every day!”

Contribute to optimising the operations of nuclear reactors so they may produce more energy and less waste

In order to design 4^th generation nuclear reactors providing better performance, researchers model the reactor’s core to analyse its thermal behavior. However, as the core’s structure is very heterogeneous (mixture of fluid and solid particles), the parameters (thermal conductivity, speed, etc.) vary greatly. The computations are very heavy and require infinite times whereas the engineers need to perform them routinely. The homogenisation method makes it possible to satisfactorily solve this problem by adopting average values for the parameters, a kind of macroscopic image of a group of microscopic variable activities.

The work of Zakaria Habibi has consisted in widening and adapting the homogenisation model used in 2D to thermal transport models in 3D (real-world geometry of a reactor core) where this method cannot be used directly, which has required combining this approach with other mathematical methods. Another original contribution of this work has been the taking into account, in a mathematically rigorous manner, the transfer by means of radiation and the greatly varying thermal sources. For instance, he has shown that it is necessary to implement corrections at the microscopic level (corrector of the second order) for these large variations, for the sake of obtaining results more in line with the physical reality of the phenomena. Zakaria Habibi has validated all these approaches in a stationary world, corresponding to the nominal operation of a reactor, and has extended them to a transitory mode corresponding to a normal stopping of the core.

Smartly Segmenting TV For VOD

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 11:13:30 GMT

It looks like a well-polished on-the-shelf HTML5 application. “But keep in mind that TexMix is actually a scientific demonstrator! warns research engineer Sébastien Campion. Our main goal was to gather and display the various findings of our research team. So we essentially packed into a single piece of software all these algorithms that TexMex scientists came up with in recent years. A lot of this research was financed through the Quæro European project.”

Transcript-based Video Delinearization

As a preliminary step, a television newscast was recorded over a period of one month. “Then, in a fully automated fashion, TexMix was able to extract information from this corpus of files and lay out an interface allowing the viewer to browse the content.” The different news topics are displayed through clickable thumbnails on a timeline. As soon as a video is been played, a subtible starts ticking. “This unpunctuated string of words illustrates our first research axis : speech-to-text. The newsfeed thematic segmentation is not image-based but soundtrack-based. We detect the lexical breaks in the wordflow. We spot when the speaker switches from say politics to sports. This is the innovative approach that our sequence splitting hinges upon. Researcher Guillaume Gravier has contributed a lot to this field.” The strategy comes handy for a variety of further purposes as it brings huge content-based navigation capabilities.
“Just roll over a thumbnail and relevant keywords will pop up: plane crash, Indonesia, fog... The viewer knows instantly what the news report is about. These keywords are then fed to search engines such as Google, Bing or Yahoo!. We retrieve say the 100 first pages of results that we then re-process for ranking refinement. We end up with a selection of highly relevant links that point either to the very same story on the web or to additional information. By so doing, the user can access further information on the topic if need be.” With the content now duly identified, Texmix can also retrieve other videos on the same topic and thus offer a hypervideo navigation mode. “The relevant news reports are instantly displayed as clickable thumbnails on the timeline. By sliding the cursor, one can also limit or extend the selection to a desired time span. A week instead of a month for instance.”

Named-entity Recognition

The second research theme deals with named-entity recognition. “Grappling with proper names such as patronyms or toponyms can prove very tricky.” Indianapolis might end up being misinterpreted for Indian police. “Hence the need for more robust methods such as the ones proposed by Christian Raymond and Julien Fayolle. Once these entities are correctly identified, we have a grasp of the whos and the wheres. This knowledge opens the door to real-time geolocalization. Using a Google Map, TexMix can now pinpoint all the locations mentioned in the newscast” thus offering another modality for browsing content.
On top of all this, comes an image comparison function. “Take the example of a graph in the news showing poll ratings for a coming election. You might want to check other polls done throughout the whole campaign. So you are looking for similar graphs, similar images. TexMix offers that capability through a simple button.” Again, clickable thumbnails pop up in a jiffy. “The retrieval here took a mere 7 milliseconds for a base of 1.5 million frames. But we have another demo running about as fast with 10 million images. Such swift retrieval within huge bases is the hallmark of recent algorithms developed by researcher Hervé Jégou. It's the third research axis highlighted in the application.”
This ability to quickly plow through large-scale video bases is a sine qua non for the automated exploitation of television archives accumulated over decades by institutions such as the French National Audiovisual Institute. “Documentalists there are growing fond of our tool.” But the technology has also spurred the interest of a major French network. “They would like to see how TexMix could be of use for enhancing the user experience of their programs. A bilateral collaboration is being discussed for further work in this field.”

"The same mathematical tool can be used in both neurophysiology and quantum physics"

Tue, 5 Jun 2012 17:26:27 GMT

One year after the launch of the Geco team, it's time to take stock of its research work with the team's leader, Mario Sigalotti.

The team's work concerns the geometric control of systems. For us, a system is a family of laws governing evolutions over time. Controlling it consists in selecting a series of evolutionary laws in such a way that the final state is reached and certain criteria are met. To do this, we use differential geometric tools. These are well-suited to the study of evolutions under constraints: the evolution of a clock with two hands, with two angles as parameters, can therefore be envisaged like a curve on a doughnut. Our specificity in this area is that we focus our analyses on trajectories and families of trajectories. Optimising a trajectory, for example, can mean choosing one that reduces a distance, but also much more than that! Other criteria such as time or energy can also be taken into account. What is of interest is that the mathematical tool we are working on can be applied to three completely different fields of research.

Combining mathematics and neurophysiology may allow us to help people with limited mobility

One surprising application, for example, in the field of neurophysiology, consists in identifying the "costs" optimised by the brain during certain activities like, for example, moving the arms, legs or eyes... We unconsciously perform movements that are optimised according to our aim and therefore we study what comes naturally in order to reproduce it artificially. To do this, we analyse test subjects as they perform specific tasks, like pointing at an object with their arm, for example. Within this movement different muscles are activated and deactivated one after the other to achieve fluid locomotion. We try to find the criteria the brain uses to perform these movements. In the future, our work with neurophysiologists could help people with limited mobility by allowing them to effectively coordinate the activation of deficient muscles.

An image that has been adulterated and automatically reconstructed by a computer

Another form of optimisation concerns understanding vision and above all how the visual cortex works. For example, when we see a curve interrupted by a blank or a triangle with a missing angle our brain tends to fill in the image. It does this in an intelligent way and not by merely using a criteria minimising the distance between the closest points. In these cases we create algorithms inspired by how the brain works in order to recreate these images. Thanks to this biomimicry, a computer can also intelligently interpret interrupted or blurred images we submit to it.

The two other applications of our mathematical approach based on trajectory analysis are more abstract. We contribute significant help in the particular case of control systems based on quantum physics where control tools that require measurements cannot be applied because any measurement of the system influences its state. Thanks to the action of lasers pointed at molecular components we can modify its evolution by developing ad hoc tools.

We are also working on controls for switched systems, a class of systems that mix continuous and discrete dynamics. To understand the interaction between these two dynamics the simplest example is the automobile. The different speeds of the stick shift are in the discrete dynamic, i.e. there is a finite number of possibilities, while the directions the steering wheel can take are in the continuous dynamic, i.e. we cannot assign them a precise value; there is a continuity of values. For a system that combines these two dynamics it is essential to control the entire system by taking into account all of its parameters. We are particularly focused on its stability.

Veronica Uquillas Gomez, best female hope

Mon, 4 Jun 2012 10:05:32 GMT

At the annual MoVES event, Veronica Uquillas Gomez, a doctoral student at the Free University of Brussels and Lille 1 University, received the 2011 award for the most promising female researcher. She has been a member of the Rmod team since 2009.

Veronica Uquillas Gomez comes from Ecuador, where she studied computer engineering at the Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral. It was there that she began to develop software. After completing her master’s degree, she was invited to work on a PhD thesis at Brussels / Lille 1. Currently, she is working under joint supervision with the Free University of Brussels, a set-up that has allowed her to join the Rmod team in Lille.

“MoVES is a Belgian network working with international partners, universities and acknowledged scientists,” she says. “I was therefore greatly honored to receive the Most Promising Young Researchers Award, and I am proud of what I have accomplished so far.” The award will help her make herself and her research better known.

Travail de recherche © Inria

Veronica Uquillas Gomez assures us that her research is merely the tip of the iceberg. “My work is in line with the objectives of Rmod – especially by providing an infrastructure using visual tools for the handling of the historical data of a software package, in order to achieve better understanding of the changes made in the software. This important issue had not been dealt with before.”

She adds: “I greatly enjoy my research subject, as it deals with a very concrete problem facing developers every day. Furthermore, I have the support of the Pharo community, standing by to assess the tools I develop.”

It pleases me very much to know that my work can help developers improve their working methods.

“Computer science exists to solve problems and helps us think in more abstract ways,” she adds. “Teaching the subject earlier on, in high school for instance, would be a good idea, as it could help us dispel the sometimes negative image computer science has.” She therefore believes that the new Computer and Digital Sciences subject that will be offered to French high-school students as of September 2012 is a step in the right direction.

Short biography of VeronicaUquillas Gomez

30 May 1977: birth in Ecuador
1995-2001: Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral (ESPOL), bachelor’s degree in computer engineering
2002-2005: Software engineer at MYSTELA corporation
2003-2007: Lecturer at ESPOL
2005-2007: Lecturer at Université d'Espiritu Santo, Ecuador
2007-2008: Free University of Brussels, master’s degree in software engineering (with highest honor)
2008 to present: Free University of Brussels / Inria Lille – Nord Europe / Lille 1, doctoral thesis in Computer Science and Software Engineering

Short biography of VeronicaUquillas Gomez

I know who you will meet this evening!

Tue, 29 May 2012 14:44:33 GMT

Discovering links between individuals using the Wi-Fi fingerprints of their mobile devices

Wi-Fi technology, available in the vast majority of mobile phones, tablets, laptops and other computing devices we use in our daily lives, has enabled widespread use of new applications and services. However, this technology has a number of issues related to privacy loss, exacerbated by its ubiquity. Our research, published in [1], shows how the information freely transmitted by the Wi-Fi protocol can be used to discover links between people i.e. whether they are family, friends, colleagues etc.

Wi-Fi and privacy

Wi-Fi protocol has the potential to leak personal information. Wi- Fi capable devices commonly use active discovery mode to find the available Wi-Fi access points (APs). This mechanism includes broadcast of the AP names to which the mobile device has previously been connected to, in plain text, which may be easily observed and captured by any Wi-Fi device monitoring the control traffic. The combination of the AP names belonging to any mobile device can be considered as a Wi-Fi fingerprint, which can be used to identify the mobile device user. Our research investigates how it is possible to exploit these fingerprints to identify links between users i.e. owners of the mobile devices broadcasting such links.

Discovering linked individuals

We have used an approach based on the similarity between the Wi-Fi fingerprints, which is equated to the likelihood of the corresponding users being linked. When computing the similarity between two Wi-Fi fingerprints, two dimensions need to be considered :

The number of network names in common. Indeed, sharing a network is an indication of the existence of a link, e.g. friends and family that share multiple Wi-Fi networks.
The rarity of the network names in common. Some network names are very common and sharing them does not imply a link between the users. This is the case for public network names such as McDonalds Free Wi-Fi, or default network names such as NETGEAR and Linksys. On the other hand, uncommon network names such as Griffin Family Network or Orange-3EF50 are likely to indicate a strong link between the users of these networks.

Utilising a carefully designed similarity metric, we have been able to infer the existence of social links with a high confidence: 80% of the links were detected with an error rate of 7%.

Who should worry about it

Owners of smartphones are particularly exposed to this threat, as indeed these devices are carried on persons throughout the day, connecting to multiple Wi-Fi networks and also broadcasting their connection history.

What can be done to prevent the linking

There are a number of industry and research initiatives aiming to address Wi-Fi related privacy issues. The deployment of new technology i.e. privacy preserving discovery services, would necessitate software modifications in currently deployed APs and devices. The obvious solution to disable active discovery mode, comes at the expense of performance and usability, i.e. with an extended time duration for the Wi-Fi capable device to find and connect to an available AP. As a possible first step, users should be encouraged to remove the obsolete connection history entries, which may lower the similarity metric and thus reduce the ease of linkage.

Our paper illustrating this study will be presented in the WoWMoM’12 conference. This work was done in collaboration with NICTA researchers.

New interoperability testing service for Health IT

Thu, 24 May 2012 16:59:38 GMT

IHE-Europe launches the first vendor-neutral service to test the interoperability of software used by healthcare information systems. The move features a technology transfer from French research center Inria to software testing provider Kereval.

Berlin. Vienna. Pisa. Barcelona. Bordeaux. Once a year, somewhere in Europe, vendors of healthcare information systems convene for a weeklong session of interoperability testing better known as Connectathon. This gathering is the most perceptible action of IHE-Europe, a non-profit association dedicated to jacking up interoperability in health information and communication technology (HICT). At stake: seamless patient care and the rise of e-health. For over 5 years, Inria has been closely associated to this endeavor. A development team was purposedly assembled in its Rennes research center, in Brittany, under leadership of IHE Technical Project Manager Eric Poiseau. Its major achievement is Gazelle, a set of open source tools designed to facilitate testing.
With this software now well on track, IHE has announced a reshuffle and the creation of IHE-Services. “Being a research center, Inria doesn't operate a service provider, Poiseau remarks. So right from the outset, it was understood that after reaching maturity, we would have to externalize and find a durable solution. All options were bandied about. Outsourcing to India was not my favorite. Creating a company from scratch was an option but we would have needed a certification within two years. Meanwhile, I had coordinated the HITCH project whose purpose, on behalf of the European Commission, was to draw a road map for certification, labeling and accreditation in interoperability testing. Such notions imply the implementation of a Quality Management System. That happens to be precisely the core expertise of Kereval.”

Nested a stone throw away from Rennes, this independent and certified software testing provider boasts a 10-year experience qualifying software for a variety of clients such as car manufacturers, banks and telecom carriers. “Entering the healthcare market has always been a goal, Kereval's founder Abdel Tamoudi explains. Under the deal, we will work as a contractor for IHE-Europe on a 3-year basis, using the Gazelle technology. Meanwhile, the four members of the R&D team will leave Inria and join our staff. A Kereval's quality engineer will also be assigned to the effort.” The task is essentially two-fold: improve the tools and organize the yearly Connectathon. Next edition will take place May 21-25 in Bern, Switzerland.
Why was Kereval selected over several of its European competitors? “Our company is recognized as a specialist in improving software quality, Tamoudi says. But our proximity to Inria was also key. It is worth noting that this relationship with the research center helps to keep valuable skills in the region. That proves all the more important as we expect HICT activities to thrive in the coming years. For us, this is a tremendous opportunity. Kereval is now poised to become the reference company for healthcare interoperability testing in Europe. This new visibility will also help us to market our other services such as load or security testing.” As Poiseau puts it: “We bring them the market. They bring us quality management. It is a win-win situation.”
A cogent illustration of that, is the recent tender to supply a demonstrator of the Electronic Medical Record to ASIP Santé, the French e-health agency. “We are both being subcontracted, Tamoudi explains. IHE-Europe will take care of the interoperability while we, the bug hunters, will deal with the quality testing.”

Polychronous Modeling for Multi-core Embedded Systems

Thu, 24 May 2012 12:11:41 GMT

Researchers from Inria and VirginiaTech work together on polychronous programming paradigms that could help design critical embedded software for multi-core architectures. Part of this open source technology will be used by the US Air Force, as French scientist Jean-Pierre Talpin explains

“Sandeep Shukla? He is so good that when he applied to a post-doc position in Espresso, my research team, here in Rennes, France, in 2001, I immedialtely knew it would be better to hire him as a researcher right away and he was indeed given this opportunity”, French scientist Jean-Pierre Talpin recalls. But the Indian-born specialist of embedded software engineering eventually went to UC Irvine. Later on, he joined VirginaTech where he was to found the Fermat Laboratory.
“Nevertheless, we had built a link. First, we started a NSF-Inria collaborative program and then the longer Balboa project. In 2008, Sandeep joined us for a sabbatical. He really got embedded into our team. He had countless talks with researchers Loïc Besnard, Paul Le Guernic and Thierry Gautier. He wanted to understand what our development platform is really about. He was willing to use it, eager to work on it.”

Polychrony

And this is how Polychrony happened to cross the Atlantic. “Virginia Tech is working with the US Air Force Laboratory. Sandeep Shukla has started to build a domain-specific programming environment for embedded software architecture design that will be based on the model of computation and communication of our tool set. Loïc Besnard, the real architect of Polychrony, went there in order to help them use the source. Things are working really well so far.”
The software is being used in many different contexts. “Not just because of the modeling technology but because of our positioning. Indeed, we do not consider Polychrony as a end-user environment, but rather as a lot of experience of algorithms and methodologies that we wish to apply to any specific scenari we deem suitable. Virginia Tech's scenario is one such typical example. They will build an end-user environment that will embark some of the algorithms that are packed inside our toolbox.”
For next year, Talpin expects “a joint project between Espresso, Virginia Tech and the US Air Force Lab. For us, that is obviously not a common scheme.” But Polychrony happens to be an open source technology. And that is a sine qua non for the USAF. “They don't want any piece of software for which they can't access the source code.”   The collaboration might soon extend to yet another research team: the Embedded Systems Group of Kaiserslautern University. “Such partnership would be good as each of us brings very specific contributions. The ESG develops an Esterel-based synchronous programming environment. It's an imperative programming language. Espresso supplies Polychrony, a data flow networks specification environment. And Virginia Tech proposes a new approach and application scenario for putting things together. The three of us exchange a great deal. This will yield a lot of novelty in the field.”

Contradictory discussions

What makes the collaboration yet more fruitfull is the fact that researchers don't even agree on everything. “We have some dogmatical confrontation, you could say. On some technical aspects, Sandeep's views differ significantly from our own perspectives. There are really original. But it's good, sometime, to shake what is regarded as the common knowledge. Lately, for instance, we had some contradictory discussions on the concept of causality, the relation of cause and effect between events in a system. This plays an key role in developing embedded software. There are different approaches to the issue. Sandeep takes advantage of the so-called constructive semantics which has been developed in other synchronous languages. On the other hand, our environment has been developed around a concept of causality graph. It is more efficient in term of analysis time but it is less precise. We renounce to some precision in favor of speed. Comparing both avenues will be precisely the subject of our next publication.”   In the mean time, Espresso and Virginia Tech have started yet another project: Polycore. “The trend is to try to catch up with multicore architectures. They are getting cheaper and hitting the hardware market right now. They become common in large embedded architectures. But I think the formal methods that were employed for embedded software design are not poised to benefit concurrent programming. Most of them are based on a strict synchronous model of computation best suitable for static scheduling on mono-processor. I believe that an environment like Polychrony is very well suited to address concurrent deterministic executions of programs on multicore executions. This is actually the core added value that we wish to put forwards in this project.”

More Efficient Software Modernization through MDE

Thu, 24 May 2012 11:05:08 GMT

Nantes-based AtlanMod research team and Mia-Software company team up on MoDisco, an open source project bound to improve the development of model-driven tools for the reverse engineering of legacy systems. As researchers Jordi Cabot and Hugo Brunelière explain, the experience has also reshaped part of their partner's business model.

“Mia Software [a subsidiary of Sodifrance] specializes in software modernization, sums up AtlanMod's leader and MDE specialist Jordi Cabot. Working at the code level, they take legacy systems —say in COBOL for instance— and they re-engineer them towards some new technology. That's their core activy. At some point, they entered in contact with us. They thought that maybe they could use a better approach for modernization. Indeed, more efficient refactoring of legacy software means more money as one can reduce the number of people working on a given modernization project. They soon realized that modelling technologies could bring them such productivity gain.”
Why? “Because models provide a better view of the system that you are working with. Everything gets simplified as you abstract all the tedious details that you don't care about. You end up with models that prove far easier to understand and manipulate. Then you can change the model to meet the new requirement of the system. From this model, you can automatically generate the new code in a new technology. Like I said, the abstraction makes the system more understandable. It helps focussing on what is important. Not the details.”
“The collaboration between Mia Software and our research team goes way back, adds R&D engineer Hugo Brunelière. We used to work on different topics together, but not specifically on modelling and refactoring. This particular partnership was initiated through Modelplex”, a European project aiming at developping an open solution that would suit the industry's MDE requirements. AtlanMod's major contribution to Modelplex was the creation of MoDisco, a reverse engineering-oriented tool. “What we provide here is an intermediate layer, Cabot explains. In essence, MoDisco stays independent from the legacy technology. You can plug any technology, get the model out of it and start from this representation. In contrast, all other tools go from one specific legacy technology to a specific kind of model on a specific kind of modeling language. They provide a point-to-point solution. They are made for one task only. You just can't use them for anything else.”

Refactoring the business model

Noteworthingly, MoDisco is an official project for reverse engineering within the Eclipse Foundation, the famous open source software development environment and community. “For a couple of years now, the MoDisco distribution has been made available through the Eclipse simultaneous release, Brunelière explains. The idea is that several Eclipse projects try to synchronize in order to release several compatibles versions at the same time. You could call that a bundle. Mia Software mostly worked with its own set of proprietary tools. But, at some point, they decided it was good for them to join this open source community and help by investing the time of several of its employees. Indeed, they contributed a great lot to MoDisco, committing no less than four persons to this effort. They even released as open source part of their own technology like their Java support for instance. They thought that the visibility they would gain by contributing to the project could bring them more clients. They could not sell the tool, but on the other hand, they would provide the service that goes with it. Obviously it was quite a change from their usual fully proprietary business model.”
“It was decidedly a complex issue for them, Cabot confirms. MoDisco is purely open source. There is no money involved in all of this. Nonetheless there really is a benefit to be shared. As a research group, we usually can't put the final touch to a software. More than often, a researcher is lucky when he ends up with enough of a prototype to butress his publications. After reaching such point, usually, he just forgets about it. He has neither time nor staff to put a nice interface or publish an exhaustive documentation to the software. A company is far better suited for that task of putting a nice finish on the code. So, in the end of the day, we both benefit from this partnership. Mia Software becomes the official service provider for MoDisco while AtlanMod becomes the official research team in model reverse engineering.”

Lean and Go in Virtual Worlds

Wed, 23 May 2012 16:52:16 GMT

Scientists from Inria and Insa Rennes come up with a trampoline-like innovative VR interface for pedestrian navigation. Making a joystick of the human body as a whole is what Joyman is all about.

When Hong Kong schoolboys came across the Joyman, in December 2011, the Siggraph Asia Emerging Technologies Exhibition turned to a funfair. “Our stand was crowded all right the whole week long, researcher Julien Pettré marvels. This hefty enthusiasm was shared by laymen and pros alike.” At first sight, the Joyman looks like a trampoline. But no bouncing is involved. It suffices for the user to lean and he will be navigating accordingly in a virtual scene displayed either on a screen or on a head mounted display. A safeguard prevents any fall and allows to lean unhesitatingly. “An inertial sensor measures the central board inclination, co-inventor Maud Marchal explains. Control laws then retrieve these parameters and transform the angle of the platform into virtual walking.” Et voilà.
“The Joyman is slightly peripheral to our research, Pettré comments. It was born from the need to interact with pedestrian simulation. We wanted to enable the user to walk in a virtual world and amble through the crowd realistically. In this field, science is still a lot of work away from reaching the perfect match between virtuality and reality."

In the course of their experiments, the two scientists hit upon a stumbling block. “Our VR room is obviously too small for accomodating any lengthy real walk in connection to a simulation.” One possible solution is the treadmill. “Some are pretty cutting edge. In Germany, the Cyberwalk is a omni-directional treadmill that even compensates for lateral walk and systematically brings back the walker plum in the middle. But this is a 11-tonne outfit whereas our aim is to come up with a much simpler device” ...and a lighter price tag.
Things clicked one day when Pettré and Marchal saw a Segway rolling through campus. “The light went on as we came to realize that this was precisely what we needed for navigating into virtual worlds. Indeed, this machine moves forward when the user shifts his weight forward on the platform. Those who have tried it find it to be a very intuitive way of moving. In addition, it is a balance-based device. Human walk has been much studied by neuroscience. It relies on three senses. Vision. Proprioception —which the sense of body efforts. And lastly the sense of balance. Also known as equilibrioception. These senses mobilize three sensory systems, e.g., visual, somatosensory and vestibular. The human body mixes all three in order to control the walk. Most interfaces use proprioception. Say joysticks for instance. But they are not immersive at all.Treadmills preserve the perception of the walk. But perception of acceleration is lost. There was simply a lack of an interface that would preserve the sens of balance.”
Can Joyman help to deliver realistic locomotion trajectories in the virtual environment? “Despite of its simplicity, there are good reasons to think that yes indeed.” Why? “Because the user really moves his own body to control his virtual movement,” Pettré supplies.
“Having said that, the control laws that govern the interface can be modified according to the targeted use, Marchal adds. We can stick to a realistic restitution if we solely aim at validating our research on human locomotion. But we might as well want to deliver additional sensory illusions, like the feeling of a fast acceleration in the context of a ski simulator for instance.”

Market savvy

Is it to say that the Joyman will hit the game stores next to the Wii shelves? “Obviously, that's the first idea that comes to mind, Pettré remarks. The interface is well suited for that. Nevertheless, it might not be the best target for a technology transfer as the game scene is a highly competitive play ground. By the way, this is why having an industrial partner becomes all the more interesting. Thanks to their market expertise, vendors are better positioned to find the ideal outlet.”
In order to give their invention a future, the Rennes-based scientists are teaming up with Immersion. “This French company is a major international player both in terms of distribution and conception of VR interfaces. They already have had an experience of working with Inria through researcher Martin Hachet and Bordeaux 1 University. Mutual trust prevails. For us, they are the ideal partner.”
Among other possible applications, physiotherapy might also be of interest. “For instance, the Joyman could be used to help cure patients with balance disorder. We would like to explore this avenue through a collaborative project that remains to be mapped out.”

François Baccelli has been awarded the 2012 Simons Foundation Math+X Chair

Mon, 21 May 2012 09:12:46 GMT

By accepting the Simons Foundation Math+X Chair at the University of Texas at Austin, François Baccelli will be able to expand his field of research into new directions. For several years now, he has been working at the interface of stochastic geometry, information theory and wireless network modelling.

François Baccelli's scientific project consists of expanding his field of research to network information theory and devising tools for the design of massively-dense-wireless-network protocols and architectures.

"These new research directions require appropriate resources, which I could unfortunately not acquire from the ERC, EIT ICT Labs or the ANR. The idea is therefore to use the Simons Chair to move this scientific project forward, while continuing to work with the Inria Trec project team, which is at the origin of this field of research", explains François Baccelli.

François Baccelli has been a member of the French Academy of Sciences since 2005 and Head of the Inria Trec project team (collaborating with the ENS) for the past twelve years. He is a specialist in stochastic network theory and communication network modeling.

A new research centre for the Simons Foundation

The Simons Foundation has also recently announced the creation of a new Institute for the Theory of Computing at the University of California, Berkeley, which will be led by Richard Karp.

BlobSeer : A Storage System For The Exascale Era

Thu, 10 May 2012 17:07:15 GMT

The ever-increasing size of data threatens to impair the efficiency of cloud services as well as science-oriented High Performance Computing (HPC). BlobSeer is an innovative storage system designed to improve massively parallel data access through a versioning device for concurrent manipulation of binary large objects (BLOBs). This approach prompted a keen interest from Microsoft, IBM and SAP, as Rennes-based Inria researcher Gabriel Antoniu explains.

The exabyte? One quintillion bytes, short scale. A 1000-fold increase over the previous 1015 landmark. A quantum leap that current database technology simply can't cope with. A pressing problem as data factories keep on churning out fast-growing volumes. The syndrome even has a name: Big Data. In conjunction to this inflation, comes another phenomenon: science is going data-centric. Genomics, oceanography, astronomy and alikes are mining ever more information from huge data warehouses. So much so that, according to the late Jim Gray of Microsoft “it is worth distinguishing data-intensive science (...) as a new, fourth paradigm for scientific exploration” following computational, theoretical and empirical eras.
“Exaflop computers will be available for HPC by 2020, then clouds will follow the trend, predicts Gabriel Antoniu, head of KerData research team. But faced with heretofore unknown scales, current data-management tools are showing their limitations. Today's architectures rely upon centralized storage of metadata. That's precisely what bottlenecks their performance. Hundreds of thousands of files are being simultaneously created and updated. This resource-consuming process proves tremendously expensive. It hinders the overall efficiency of hardware. BlobSeer is a data storage system that contributes to solving this data-management problem. Its hinges upon a versioning method for concurrent manipulation of BLOBs that helps to sustain a high throughput despite massively parallel data access.”

Storage Backend For MapReduce

The method offers a storage backend for MapReduce applications. Popularized by Google to support distributed computing on clusters, MapReduce acts as a double-filter. “It first extracts the data of interest (Map) and then aggregates the results (Reduce). But by so doing, it generates a lot of parallel data accesses. This access is what BlobSeer can ease.”
Among several solutions that implement the MapReduce programming model on clouds, the most famous is Hadoop. Developed by the Apache Foundation, this open source framework is being used by web giants such as Yahoo, FaceBook or Amazon. “When using BlobSeer instead of its own file system (HDFS), the software delivers significantly better performance. In the future, cloud services might be interested in using Hadoop with our alternative component.” And IBM might be one of them. "We have partnered through an ANR-sponsored research project in this field.” More recently, the German software company SAP has expressed similar interest in evaluating this approach.
Also on researchers' front burner is TomusBlobs, a BlobSeer version for Azure, Microsoft's cloud infrastructure. “That's currently the project on the fastest track within the company's Cloud Research Initiative. Results have been presented to Henrique Malvar, Chief Scientist at Microsoft Research and to Tony Hey, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft Research Connections during their recent visits to our joint center near Paris. Benchmark shows a significantly faster throughput: 3 times in write and 2.5 times in read.”

Also At System Level

But BlobSeer isn't solely a solution for efficiently storing and managing application data. “It can also be of use at system level for deploying and storing images of virtual machines on a cloud. You might have to deal with hundreds or thousands of VM instances simultaneously. But since deployment relies on a centralized achitecture, this preliminary step waxes time-consuming.”
Once this VM is up and running, comes the crash contingency plan. One must be able to restart from a consistent state. Hence the need for snapshotting. “Again, this implies a massively concurrent access to data. Instead of relying on centralized storage of checkpoints, BlobSeer can provide a distributed repository. The cloud user will benefit from fast concurrent reads during deployment and fast concurrent writes during backups. This BlobSeer's VM function is of particular interest to cloud service providers. In partnership with Argonne National Laboratory, we illustrate this capability through Nimbus,” an open-source toolkit dedicated to providing Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) to the scientific community.
Meanwhile researchers have started to explore yet another fallow plot. “Pyramid is a data access management method that borrows abundantly from BlobSeer but deals more specifically with array-oriented storage. Instead of BLOBs, we will focus on multidimensional data. In the HPC context, many scientific applications rely on such parallel array processing. But there again, concurrent access has reached its limitations.”

A Common Vibe About SHM

Thu, 10 May 2012 15:58:44 GMT

An Inria research team dedicated to coupling physical modeling with statistics, I4S develops new methods to improve Structural Health Monitoring, i.e. computerized damage detection on bridges, buildings, or wind turbines. Researchers Laurent Mevel and Michael Döhler explain how their algorithmic technology was successfully transferred to the Danish SVS, the leading software vendor in the field of operational modal analysis.

There used to be a time when monitoring the fatigue of civil engineering structures was mostly a matter of human assessment and visual inspection. But the advent of sensor-based monitoring is fast superseding the legwork of yore. Generously peppered all over the bridges or embedded in more complex structures, huge banks of sensors now deliver real-time continuous information about their structural integrity: vibrations, thermal expansion, creep...   But such data flow soon turns into deluge. Coupled with the complexity of the structures themselves, the large number of measurement points proves a hard nut to crack. It calls for computationally efficient algorithms that can nimbly overcome the high dimensionality of the parameters. This happens to be precisely the focus of I4S, a Rennes-based Inria research team that specializes into statistical inference for Structural Health Monitoring. SHM in the trade parlance.   Under a royalty agreement, Inria scientists have partenered with SVS, a Danish vendor whose flagship software ARTeMIS is the leading solution for operational modal analysis throughout the world. “Our algorithmic engine and its latest updates have been embodied into this software, I4S leader Laurent Mevel explains. Not only is there a perfect match between this company's commercial activity and what our own research is all about, but in addition we both share the very same viewpoint on what the field should be.” One of the core notion in this research is that when sensors are moved from one place to another, the data resulting from these different and non-simultaneous measurement setups should not be analyzed separately anymore. Instead, data should be merged. The setups should be processed in only one step through a smarter computing.

An extra step toward software

But “having this in print in a scientific publication is just one part of the job, Mevel says. Showing that our methods really work and can fit the existing industrial environment requires an extra step. Namely: software development. That's a crucial part of technology transfer. We really work hand-in-glove with SVS in this endeavor. Their tool, ARTeMIS was modified so that we now can plug into it and test our prototypes very easily.”
Also instrumental in this effort was German PhD student Michael Döhler who spent six months in the company's headquarter in Aalborg, Denmark, testing new algorithms. “Being primarily interested in applied mathematics, this experience was obviously a great opportunity for me to tackle real industrial problems with a hands-on approach. If you come up with a tentative solution, you know right away if it is workable or not.”
Döhler was recently bestowed the First Prize of the Fondation Rennes 1 for his PhD work in the Matisse Doctoral School of Rennes 1 University. Shortly before, he was also awarded the Prize of Excellence 2011 in the context of the IRIS FP7 european project. He will now spend 10 months at Northeastern University Boston before heading back to Germany for an additional year of postdoctoral research at BAM, the German Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing.

Wind turbines

“We hope Michael's sojourn in Germany will give us the opportunity of a rapprochement with BAM, Mevel remarks. The Germans share our views on the field. They have even tested some of our algorithms. And they have done a lot of work on wind turbines, which is also the current focus of our research.” With thousands of windmills mushrooming all over Europe, this new green energy industry will soon need an efficient SHM system to keep an eye on its vastly scattered power units. “But a wind turbine is way more complex than a bridge. Monitoring such structures remains very challenging.”

Analysing images helps reveal the mysteries of glass formation

Wed, 9 May 2012 14:51:19 GMT

An original partnership has gathered the Parietal team, specialised in computational analysis of brain images, and the Glass surfaces and interfaces laboratory (CNRS/Saint-Gobain) around an original project aimed at solving the mysteries of glass formation. One of the aims behind this research, published on the website of The Journal of the American Ceramic Society, is to produce high-quality glass at lower temperatures than those currently used in industry.

Even though it is one of the oldest materials known to man, glass has still not revealed all of its secrets. Indeed, even though we know it can be made with a granular mixture of two thirds silica sand and one third sodium and calcium carbonates heated to 1,500° C over several days, the way these different raw materials interact to form glass has remained a mystery.

To solve it, researchers have observed this reaction in progress for the very first time, thanks to tomography x-ray imaging developed at the synchrotron in Grenoble. It is in the statistical approach to the analysis of these images that the expertise of Gaël Varoquaux from the Parietal team has been extremely useful. Indeed, the speed of acquisition required to capture this dynamic deteriorated the quality of the images with less contrast between grains and more "noise". Analysing the images was particularly difficult. The challenge consisted in segmenting the grains, that is to say, automatically detaching them from the background, as well as separating them from each other, and identifying the materials they are made up of: silicate, calcium carbonate or sodium carbonate. An additional difficulty was the volume of data: 1 billion voxels (contraction of volumetric pixel or a 3D pixel) per image and a one thousand-image film per experiment.

Therefore researchers were able to observe contacts between the components present and the transformation of granular matter into molten glass. These unique images demonstrate the importance of contacts between different types of grains. It is these grains that determine whether the reactions that lead to the production of molten glass are triggered or not. For example, according to the presence or absence of these contacts, calcium carbonate can either be incorporated in a highly active liquid or produce crystalline flaws. Researchers were also surprised by the high reactivity of sodium carbonate in a solid state: it is highly mobile before the melting of materials increases the number of contacts between the other grains, which encourages reactions.

Now researchers are preparing to test different mixtures and study the influence of grain size and composition on reaction speed at the microscopic level. They hope to find new "recipes" that reduce the quantity of flaws produced when glass starts to form and find new manufacturing techniques that are faster and use less energy. Moreover, they hope to develop imaging and data processing methods that will allow researchers and manufacturers to visualise the transformation of other reactive granular mixtures involved in the production of glass and other materials.

Using digital technology to combat Alzheimer’s

Wed, 9 May 2012 13:08:24 GMT

To monitor elderly people at home, particularly those suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, in order to care for them better: that is the ambition of Inria’s ‘Stars’ research team, which designs digital models of human behaviour based on data acquired through patient observation.

Led by researcher François Brémond, Stars is a founding member of the university host team CoBTek (Cognition Behaviour Technology), led by psychiatrist Professor Philippe Robert, who is also the coordinator of the Centre Mémoire de Ressources et de Recherche (CMRR) at Nice University Hospital. To date, around one hundred experiments have been conducted at the CMRR with elderly people who are healthy or suffering from dementia.

As the population ages, the number of dependent people is going to increase considerably in the years to come. Factor in the people suffering from Alzheimer's disease and other neurodegenerative illnesses, and we have a real social problem.

The Stars and CoBTek teams will help us to understand better how Alzheimer's affects the daily life of its sufferers and will enable us to identify, and above all quantify in an objective way, its impact on the behaviour of these people. The researchers have developed a new software platform that not only enables analysis of video data, but will also eventually pair these video data with audio data and recordings made by other types of sensors (physiological, for example), such as actimeters.

The Behaviour Analysis system implemented by the Stars team shows the analysis of the universal movements, the most basic of which are changes in posture (such as standing up or sitting down), walking and falling. During the experiments, the patient is placed in a room that resembles a normal room in a house. He or she is observed while carrying out certain free tasks, such as preparing a hot drink or a meal, or during a ‘rest’ activity, such as reading a book or watching the television. These activities are filmed live and the patients’ behaviour analysed by specially designed software.

‘Among other things, we are studying the loss of certain functionalities in a patient,’ explains François Brémond. ‘For example, whether or not he or she is capable of organising and executing a specific task, as well as long periods of inactivity (of the kind that may follow a fall, for instance). We are moving past the limits of current activity recognition systems, as we can objectively measure a whole range of movements from daily life.

The activity analysis programs are either written on-site or found in open-source form. Stars-CoBTek also works with a company that is developing specialist algorithms for detecting when someone falls (Link Care Services) and with robotics experts. We should also note that the teams are taking part in the Az@Game project, selected as part of the French government’s Future Investments programme for the development of the digital economy, which aims to develop interactive games (Serious Games) for the use of Alzheimer’s sufferers, as well as professional and family carers.

Eventually, the platform will improve patient care by providing additional information to doctors and other healthcare professionals. It could also help and reassure family members, who often lack the means to deal with the illness. One of the objectives of the project is to enable dependent people to continue living in their own homes. The reasons for this are socio-economic – it is less expensive for the State and, what is more, patients prefer to stay in their own environment rather than having to use a care home or a similar establishment.

Questions for Professeur Philippe Robert

What made you decide to work with Stars?

CobTek is a university host team that is developing new information and communication technologies in several health-related fields. Our research focuses, among other things, on Alzheimer's disease and on ways of preventing dependence and loss of autonomy. Our partnership with Stars allows us to mix theoretical and clinical research - a first in this field.

What specific contribution does the Stars research make to the treatment of Alzheimer’s and other cognitive disorders?

It assesses behaviour, autonomy and cognitive processes such as memory and language. Assessment is now much more objective, compared to the days when we had to interview the patient’s spouse or friends and family to find out about his or her day-to-day behaviour.

Computer science offers deeper understanding of sound

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 16:30:08 GMT

Philippe Manoury, born in Tulle (in the French department of Corrèze) in 1952, is Professor of Music at the University of San Diego in California. He has been named Best Composer of the Year at the 2012 French Victoires de la Musique Classique for his opera La nuit de Gutenburg, composed using Antescofo software. This tool was developed by Arshia Cont, a researcher at Inria and Ircam.

Do you consider yourself a pioneer exploring new musical avenues?

All composers have been pioneers. Bach, Wagner, Debussy and all the others were innovative in their own way. They were not happy to make do with what already existed.

Why did you decide to work with computers?

It goes back to the seventies, at the very beginning of computer science. I had started working at Inria on punched cards. At the time, I was looking for a certain mathematical formalism, such as the calculation of probabilities, Markov chains, etc. In addition to mathematical formalism, I was very interested in the creation of new sound synthesis systems. That is to say, creating sounds that instruments are unable to produce. We are used to using the same instruments repeatedly. I find that new sound synthesis systems help us avoid the excessive standardisation of instruments.

What avenues for musical creation are opened up by computer science?

Before musical computing, experimental electronic music had been developed by composers such as Karlheinz Stockhausen in 1953. Many things had already been invented at the time. Computer science only came later, by offering the possibility of writing music.

What role does computer science play in the creation of music?

In the past, there were electronic compositions on one side, and instrumental compositions on the other. Computer science has enabled a greater coexistence between instrumental and electronic music. It can be used to analyse instrumental sounds and transform them using high-performance techniques.

In your opinion, writing has brought harmony and polyphony to music. What could computational technologies contribute to music?

Philippe Manoury - © Pauline de Mitt

Deeper understanding of sound. Thanks to computer science, we have realised that the world of sound is much more complex than what we had imagined in the past. Thus, new forms of writing could be developed, just as harmony was an innovation in its time. The first treatise on harmony was produced in 1722 by Jean-Philippe Rameau, who was able to derive the principles of harmony from the natural harmonics. Today, we can imagine theories adapted to our current understanding of sound.

Does one compose in the same way when working with computers?

No! When I compose instrumental music, I write on the score and hear the music in my head. Because I know how an orchestra works. I was educated like that: it's cultural. Electronic sound is less cultural and less standardised, since it's relatively new. Therefore, one cannot compose in the same way. It is vital to experiment with electronic sounds to replace this memory that we lack.

Is the relationship between music and computer science the same in France and in the United States?

I would say that it's the relationship to music that's different. In the United States, contemporary musical creation does not exist outside of the university. Americans are quite conservative when it comes to music. In the United States, no thought is spared for aesthetics that is not directly related to technique. That is the main difference between Americans and Europeans.

What do you expect from computational technologies in your future compositions?

I expect more progress in the audio recognition of musical structures. The ear can easily identify melodies, chords, rhythm and musical forms. Computer science is still far from achieving that. That would make it possible to more accurately synchronise music with instruments.

Furthermore, it is becoming necessary to stabilise computational technologies to a certain extent, since they are developing a bit too quickly. The musical notation I use to compose still works, although it dates back to the 11th century. But a computer programme only works for two years.

Lastly, La nuit de Gutenberg relates the history of writing, from its invention through to the Internet. Did Antescofo, the software tool you used to compose that opera, enable you to perfectly relate the technological developments undergone by writing?

Yes, most certainly. To me, Antescofo is one of the best inventions in musical computing of the last ten years. This programme can create polyphony and heterogeneous musical times like never before. Antescofo can create music in a form that closely resembles traditional writing. In music, the concept of time is relative. Contrary to other computer programmes, Antescofo makes it possible to express the relative nature of heterogeneous musical times.

Studying natural hazards to understand and prevent risks

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 14:42:47 GMT

We met with Jacques Sainte-Marie, researcher in the Bang project team at the Inria  Paris–Rocquencourt research centre.

Can you tell us about the subject of your research?

Our research work concerns natural hazards (tsunamis, swells, erosion, floods, etc.) and industrial risks (dam failures, pollution) associated with physical phenomena that are both complex and hard to describe.

We are therefore interested in stratified flows (where flow is not vertically uniform), for example variable density flows (thermohaline stratification for oceans). Stratification can also be related to the presence of pollutants, biological species and sediments in the water. We also study the interactions arising when fluid comes into contact with structures (swell in a harbour).

We endeavour to develop good models for these complex flows; these models must be adapted to the physical phenomena studied, effectively simulated and approved. The models derived from fluid mechanics, typically the Navier-Stokes equations, enable a description of the hydrodynamics (wave and current propagation).

The team's research programme is focused on modeling, mathematical and computational analysis, and the simulation of models that are less complex than the Navier-Stokes equations, but break away from the traditional hypotheses that one finds in so-called "shallow" flow models. However, the analysis and simulation of these models are delicate operations and strong points in the team's research work.

What societal challenges does this research help meet?

Map of seabed off the coast of Japan with the epicentre of the March 2011 earthquake (red circle) - © Bang - Inria

Our objective is to provide simulating and forecasting tools for the above-mentioned phenomena. These tools can be used to size structures (dams, dykes) to handle sea flooding or other scenarios.

We are currently working on problems related to the interaction of hydrodynamics and biology. Water contains biological species that are transported by the fluid, but also live, grow and carry out photosynthesis within the fluid. In addition to hydrodynamics, the issue is therefore to offer an accurate representation of the biological quantities which often have varying time constants that differ from those of hydrodynamics. The benefits of this research are widespread, such as for forecasting ocean carbon capture or producing biofuels based on micro-algae cultivated in ponds. This research work is carried out in collaboration with the Biocore IPT. Furthermore, the project we have jointly proposed for the exploitation of micro-algae, entitled GREENSTARS, is one of the winners of the "Institute of Excellence on Carbon-Free Energies" call for projects.

Are there currently any concrete applications? If so, what partners are you collaborating with?

The computational simulation models and tools that we are developing are regularly transferred to researchers in geoscience, hydraulics and other fields, as well as industrial partners such as EDF R&D and the SME Naskeo.

As such, an extended Saint-Venant model that we developed has been implemented in the EDF simulation codes and is being used to prevent risks associated with flood waves.

Our team is working in partnership with the French Ministry for Ecology and Sustainable Development (for which I work). At the application level, we have 3 types of partners:

partners in the academic world, such as the IPGP (Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris - Paris Institute of Earth Physics), INRA, oceanographic laboratories, etc.
industrial partners, such as EDF and Naskeo (www.naskeo.com)
public services in charge of coastal and port developments and the management of natural risks, including flooding

Olivier Temam, recognized for his Franco-Chinese collaboration.

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 10:01:48 GMT

Olivier Temam, Senior Research Scientist at Inria and leader of the ByMoore exploratory action, has been recognized twice (in 2010 and 2011) as part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ “International Talents Program”, for his cooperation with ICT (Institute of Computing Technology) in Beijing. And in February, his former PhD student, Zheng Li, himself received an award for research excellence for his PhD thesis. This prize is awarded by the Chinese government to Chinese students who have obtained their theses abroad, and there are about 500 recipients among the tens of thousands of Chinese PhD students (in all scientific disciplines) graduating abroad every year. Olivier Temam has recently established a joint team with ICT (YOUHUA) within the framework of the Franco-Chinese Lab for Computer Science, Automation and Applied Mathematics (LIAMA) after first setting up an INRIA associate team. Olivier talks us about the rationale and benefits of this collaboration.

Could you remind us of Moore’s law and the challenges researchers face in pushing its boundaries?

Moore’s law (by Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel) is actually a prediction stating that the size of transistors can be halved approximately every 18 to 24 months. This reduction in the size of transistors offers two benefits: an increase in the number of transistors per unit of surface area and an increase in the (switching) speed of transistors. These two properties are, to a large extent, the reason for the performance increase of computers over the past 40 years.
This increase has also been considered to be one of the main drivers of economic growth for the last twenty years or so. However, since 2004, the sector has experienced a number of technology shocks, which have seriously called into question our ability to continue to improve the performance of processor architectures. First of all, constraints associated with power consumption and the dissipation of heat have greatly restricted the increase of processor speed (clock speed), forcing us to turn to multi-core architectures, where the improvement in performance stems from parallelism. Nevertheless, because of new, and ever more stringent, power constraints, even the multi-core option is now being challenged. This will force us to design heterogeneous multi-core architectures, i.e., combinations of cores and accelerators. Accelerators are specialized circuits which can each execute only a limited set of algorithms, unlike cores, but they can be far more efficient, energy-wise, than cores. In the future, there is a strong possibility that a lot of the computing heavy lifting will be done by such accelerators, for both general-purpose and embedded systems.

What are the key research issues you are working on with ICT ?

Initially, we attempted to answer the following question: while it is already difficult for the majority of programmers to create applications for multi-core architectures, what kind of environment could be designed to facilitate the programming of heterogeneous multi-core architectures, which are even more complex? The key point is that the non-expert end-user should not be exposed to the complexity of such architectures, while still being able to take advantage of their potential performance. We are working on a programming environment capable of reconciling these seemingly contradictory goals for accelerator-based architectures.

At the same time, we also attempted to answer the following question: what kind of accelerators should we be designing? The main difficulty is to resolve the tension between the custom nature of accelerators and their utilization in architectures meant to tackle a broad range of applications. For this reason, we are developing a special form of reconfigurable architectures, more energy efficient and easier to program than current FPGAs thanks to their coarse granularity and their specific control circuit. This work is conducted in partnership with ICT, as well as the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) and the joint NTU (Singapore)-Rice (US) laboratory.

Why choose China as a partner for these topics?

Inria usually tries to partner with the leading academic and industrial players of each domain. In the domain of architectures and compilation, Inria’s teams work with many American and European universities as well as with large industrial groups (Intel, ARM and STMicroelectronics, etc.). ICT is not only China’s most advanced academic institution in the field of architecture and compilation, but it has also founded the company Loongson Technologies, which many consider as a future major player in the domain of computing architectures. The position of ICT/Loongson as an emerging academic and industrial player makes them more open to both external partnerships and new approaches (such as the introduction of accelerators) than more established organizations. Therefore, there is a real opportunity, right now, to establish a special relationship with what will certainly become a major player in the domain over the coming years.

When the problems of physicists help mathematicians make progress

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 16:41:30 GMT

Last February, Antoine Gloria received, with honors, his accreditation to advise doctoral theses. With the members of the Simpaf project team, for which he was deputy director, he is launching a new research team dealing with the mathematical problems raised by physics.

Throughout the history of science, physics and mathematics have stimulated each other, physics being a fertile source of inspiration for mathematics, which in return provides a language and conceptual framework. “With Felix Otto, the director of the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig (Germany), after slightly more than three years of research, we provided an answer to a problem that had remained unresolved for over thirty years: the quantification of random homogenization, a mathematical theory facilitating numeric simulation of materials presenting random heterogeneities at a very small scale, such as composite materials.”

Physicists use this homogenization process to assess the effective properties, such a thermal conductivity or elasticity. From a mathematical point of view, this means modeling a material whose relationship between the microscopic and macroscopic levels would tend towards zero, in other words a material carrying only the trace of its microstructures. This is very effective for materials presenting periodic heterogeneities, such as Kevlar or carbon fibers. However, the theory needed to be improved for the random case as the calculation of the effective properties was much too long. This is the case for several composite materials or industrial problems such as oil extraction (which takes place in a heterogeneous porous environment). “The homogenization methods allow for the calculation of an averaged result. Like for a distant image for which one has no need to know the color of each pixel. We have developed digital methods enabling calculation of approximations of the coefficients used for homogenized equations. We also know how to estimate the level of error.”

Together with Italian researchers¹ and colleagues from Inria Rocquencourt² , Antoine Gloria has applied this method to calculate the energy density (the deformations experienced depending on the force applied) of rubber, a material made up of a network of polymer chains.

« Starting with our discrete model based on these polymer chains, we obtained a continuous elasticity model in perfect conformity with our tests. Our model makes it possible to simulate all deformation scenarios (uniaxial, biaxial, triaxial…), even those that cannot be accessed by means of mechanical testing. »

In a general manner, this allows physicists to better fathom the influence of the microstructure on the properties, as in this case for rubber.

Cempi Center of Excellence Laboratory

All the researchers of the Simpaf project team, some ten full-time staff, will work within the framework of the centre of excellence laboratory “European center for mathematics, physics and their interaction” (Cempi), a winner of the latest tender for investing for the future projects in February 2012. Led by Stephan De Bièvre, a member of Simpaf, this project brings together about one hundred people from different laboratories (Lille 1 University/CNRS): the Painlevé mathematics laboratory (to which the Simpaf team is associated) and the Laser physics, atoms and molecules laboratory (PhLAM). The research will be organized along three lines: the interface between mathematics and physics, in particular the study of complex behavior such as attenuation and interference in non-linear optical systems such as fiber optics; the interface between physics and biology; the interface between mathematics and theoretical computer science. The Inria researchers will work on the first line of research, by applying the approach developed within Simpaf and the future team replacing it in the specific domain of fiber optics.

1Roberto Alicandro et Marco Cicalese (Cassino and Naples Universities)

2Marina Vidrascu, Patrick Le Tallec et François Lequeux

Nelly Bencomo: "Inria is an institute of choice for conducting research"

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 17:27:12 GMT

Nelly Bencomo is from Venezuela but lived in the United Kingdom for over ten years before coming to France. After receiving her PhD from Lancaster University (United Kingdom), she was awarded a European Marie Curie Fellowship to implement a two-year research project within the Arles project team regarding "requirements-aware systems".

Can you describe your project?

My research is focused on requirements-aware systems and the project is called "requirements@runtime". The idea of the project is to have computer systems that are capable of self-analysis in order to adapt to new situations. When I was at the Central University of Venezuela (Universidad Central de Venezuela), I conducted research in software engineering in a mathematics laboratory and I also taught software engineering, probability, statistics and object-oriented simulation. In Lancaster, I conducted research in model-driven engineering within the middleware research group.

Why did you choose France for your Marie Curie research position?

I like France, and the idea of coming to Paris in particular was tempting. I already speak Spanish and English, and French seemed very useful to form new networks. Cultural openness is important for an academic who travels, attends conferences and international workshops, and works on European projects.

Why did you choose Inria, and in particular the Arles research team in Rocquencourt, for your Marie Curie research position?

Inria is an institute of choice for conducting research. When I was an assistant in Venezuela, my university's main relations were with France. Several of my colleagues came to France to complete their PhDs, and some of them participated in research activities in collaboration with Inria. Furthermore, Inria enjoys a solid reputation at Lancaster University.

With regard to the Arles project team, it was really the best team for me. I have worked in the field of middleware from a software engineering perspective, and this team gives me the opportunity to continue with this work and, in addition, to include more professional methods in my research. Valérie Issarny, the Arles manager, is a renowned researcher in this sector. The team is also very open to my own research interests, and I hope they have found my profile to be of benefit to them. I see it as a symbiotic partnership.

What do you expect from this Marie Curie research position?

My objective is to become known as an internationally respected researcher in my fields of interest. Then, if all goes well, I should receive a tenured academic appointment. I aspire to become a lecturer in the United Kingdom or France. I like Inria so much that a tenured appointment as a researcher and group leader would be fantastic! It's tempting, but there is also a lot of competition. I'll have to wait and see.

Mireille Régnier : 'Contributing to knowledge of the human genome through computing fascinated me'

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 09:38:01 GMT

For the first annual Maths Week, March 12-18, the theme was "Women and Maths". It offered an opportunity to interview three researchers and team leaders at Saclay, with three different profiles and careers, but who all chose to discuss with us their choice to work in science and research. This week we met with Mireille Régnier, head of the Amib project-team.

Maths has always been like a game for me. I remember how I won the mental arithmetic contest in primary school. I really liked that kind of exercise. In secondary school I spent my time in maths class trying to demonstrate Fermat's Last Theorem i.e. finding the positive integers that satisfy the equation xⁿ + yⁿ = zⁿ . I can't even remember where I had stumbled on that, in one of the many books I read no doubt, but it was of interest to me because it involved integers and I enjoyed working with integers. I liked to count, play with figures, work around constraints and find a solution...What amused me was the playful side. You try to do something, you see if it works and then you adapt it to reach your goal.

In secondary school I wasn't only interested in maths. On the contrary, I was really keen on history for example, but I couldn't imagine making a career of it. When we were selecting courses of study at the end of secondary school, my maths teacher even told my parents I was more of a liberal arts type! But I still chose maths in high school and since I was in a girl’s school where the teachers didn't push the students to study science, it was an unusual choice of study for me and my four sisters.

Concerning my career path, I think I was lucky to grow up in an exceptional family environment. My mother earned her baccalaureate and went on to university, which was rare for her generation. When the New Maths were introduced in school, which led to some heated debates, she organised, in the context of the school board, courses for the parents so they could help their children with the homework. My father wanted his daughters to have the best education available. Even though both of them had a liberal arts background, my parents were convinced that the future was in science.

So, in a nutshell, I loved maths, I studied maths and in life it's important to do what you love! I followed a traditional path, from prep school to the ENS (École Normale Supérieure) where I did a Bachelor in physics before going back to maths. What was interesting at the ENS was the mix of disciplines, with people studying Russian, history, literature. We'd cross paths at the cafeteria. There was an exchange of ideas and I made good friends in other fields.

Then I did a teaching degree in mathematics and an internship in Russian at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the USSR because I loved this language and had been studying it since secondary school and it was very hard to get a visa without an administrative invitation. In Russia I met two very important people: first of all my husband, who was taking the same course, and Bernard Lang, from Iria (editor's note: this was before Inria became a national research institute), who has since become a specialist in open source software, and who very easily convinced me in the plane on the way back home to do a DEA (former Master) in computer science. Then he spent a great deal of time helping me choose the right DEA, at Orsay, and then debugging my programmes over the phone. At the time I was the only person using the card machine at the ENS and I also liked to go over to Polytechnique to use their text editor, which at the time (!) was a major innovation! I naturally shifted from maths to computing. In fact I like solving problems and seeing an elegant solution. But in computing, if you have a problem you want an effective solution, that is to say, you're not happy with just saying there is a solution, you have to construct it too and I really enjoy constructing a solution.

We have a huge number of problems to explore
where computing plays an essential role in advancing biology

During my DEA I had two professors who helped determine the next step in my career. As I found Jean Vuillemin's courses on algorithms absolutely wonderful I searched for a thesis on the subject. And because I was lucky enough to meet Philippe Flajolet, an expert in computing and combinatorics, I did my thesis with him. It was important to meet him at that time, when a lot of things were falling into place. Then I was recruited by Iria, before I even defended by thesis. In terms of research themes, my specialisation was determined by a series of encounters and singular circumstances. I took part in a conference where I was questioned on a problem of combinatorics and word algorithms and I delved into the subject Then in 1987, François Mitterrand asked the president of Iria, Alain Bensoussan, to produce a report on the link between computing and biology and I was among the people designated to write this report. The (tenuous) link with my field was that words are sequences of letters just like the genome (simply speaking)... It was a very arduous task to understand these problems so quickly, even though we were well-received by the biology labs. This report offered an opportunity to discover a wide range of applications for my research, of problems that needed solving, while sequencing of the human genome was just getting started. I therefore decided to pursue this path.

From my point of view, what was important was not to talk about health, or medicine; it was the human genome that fascinated me. There was talk of it in the papers. It was really exciting to be a part of a project like that. As for computing, there were some interesting problems in combinatorics, regarding the sequences at first and now regarding the structures. And then in 2001, the sequencing was finished earlier than planned, but it had opened the door to many other fascinating fields, like biotechnologies, DNA chips... The simultaneous development of technologies and potential applications led to a boom in new problems, like regulating genes, predicting structures, their interactions, systems biology, annotation constraints with the sheer amount of data... We still have a huge number of problems to explore where computing plays an essential role in advancing biology.

Research theme: Biology and computing

The Amib team studies structural biology and more specifically RNA molecules, proteins and their interactions. Cellular processes, a function of these interactions, are studied in systems biology. The algorithmic is based on formal methods, stochastic properties and combinatorics. Annotation, organisation of experimental data and extraction of relevant knowledge from large databases comprise a third research stream, along with software development.

Catherine Bonnet: "When I was 17, I couldn't imagine doing anything but maths all the time"

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 10:19:25 GMT

I had a taste for maths right from the start. In secondary school and high school it was my favourite subject. I liked cut and dried things, where you started with a problem and ended up with a clear and irrefutable answer. When I was 17, I couldn't imagine doing anything but maths all the time. It was my passion, but afterwards I wondered what I could really do professionally and how I could make a living! At the time I didn't know you could do research in maths, so I thought about being a maths teacher...

When I was in college I started with a Bachelor in maths, but then I went on to do a Master in applied mathematics because I wanted to get into a field that involved problem solving as I started to consider becoming an engineer. In keeping with that idea I did a thesis on a subject applied to aeronautics, on a way to reduce the mathematical model of the Dauphin helicopter. It was a theme in high-level engineering, but all the techniques existed already. I just refined the theory using a specific example, but without being certain it could be applied to another one. I wasn't universal, but a highly specific solution. What interested me was a theory that could be used to solve any case,I felt the need to develop new methods, to do academic research. So I decided to do another thesis. I was interested in a specific case, the reduction of models in finite dimension (using 7 equations instead of 15 to describe a system). I opened the problem to switch to infinite dimension (a vector defined by an infinite number of points). After working briefly as a maths professor at a university, I did two post-doctoral assignments that really changed my career.

During my first Marie Curie post-doc in England I worked with a real "purist" in maths. He was meticulous, with this real love of research in and of itself, this taste, this curiosity, this enthusiasm that you feel when you find something. It wasn't very much, but working with someone like that, after I had just completed my thesis, it means working with someone who is like you and takes pleasure in making progress, understanding more, someone who isn't worried about hastily publishing an article he isn't completely satisfied with. He was someone capable of taking out a piece of paper on a train station platform and saying "I was thinking about your problem the other day..."

My second post-doc assignment was at the Rocquencourt centre, with Michel Sorine. After pure mathematics, it allowed me to avoid being stuck in a self-feeding cycle where you're interested in 1,000 little mathematical problems in a field where they may never come up and to focus on something. I had never worked in control before so Michel Sorine had to teach me everything I needed to know about control systems. He put me back in a context, reminding me that we do all this work to control systems and in the end they should work. At that moment in my career path, even if I already had a taste for solving practical problems, it was an important stage to work with such a personality.

I think that in order for our progress to have an impact
we need to know how to go outside the world of maths
and communicate with other fields.

After that I was hired by Inria for the same project. In this job I could explore the limits of theoretical techniques while working, at the same time, on concrete examples in fact. I have always loved applying mathematical techniques to universal questions, things everyone can use, this piling up of knowledge where anyone can use the results in the end. But for me it's not a contradiction to love solving problems too. The important thing is to do it in a "clean" way, that is to say if the problem is too difficult in the beginning and you make an approximation to solve it, if you're not capable of measuring the approximation to offer a precise answer, that is of no interest to me.

In my field of control, I don't want to do maths for maths sake, without any real connection to applications. That seems simple enough, but it's easy to fall into this trap with maths, where when you're solving a problem you’re tempted to solve a very similar one where you just change the hypotheses a little and so on...You mustn't go round and round in your bubble, focusing on problems that feed themselves. You can do a lot without venturing outside the world of maths, but I think for our progress to have an impact at a certain point we need to go outside and communicate with other fields. The rift between pure and applied maths doesn't mean much because, in the end, vis-à-vis your colleagues, you are always in the applied field of someone or the theoretical field of someone else. What's exciting within our own team is the convergence of very different and highly complementary techniques to solve the same problem.

Shortly after being recruited by Inria, in 1996-97, I discovered the Femmes et maths (Women and Maths) association. It was thanks to a forum for young mathematicians, organised once a year at the time, which I simply attended because my best friend was presenting a project along with other doctoral students. After the sessions on research techniques, there were more open sessions and discussions, on women and science, their place in history and in society. And in the end I experienced it as a space for discussion where you could share your conceptual vision of women’s roles. There was a mix of experiences, a feeling that something was coming to a head, something active, in the search for why and how we had all ended up there. There was more than a militant side to it; we knew there was everything to be done and that we needed to commit to welcoming new women researchers each year. The founders had created the association in 1987, when the ENS (Écoles Normales Supérieures) started opening mixed classes, when we there was a shift from entire graduating classes of young female mathematicians to just a few young women in these mixed classes. We couldn't understand why all of a sudden there were hardly any young women in these top engineering schools. Today female researchers really need to mobilise to keep the association alive, because there is a growing need but not enough volunteers to make it work. At the same time it is increasingly difficult to integrate this type of commitment in the career paths we have now. And yet, we know that initiatives like these encounters between doctoral students and seasoned researchers or the "Girls and maths, a brilliant equation" days, organised with Animath for secondary and high school students, always have a positive impact.

Research theme: Controlling interconnected systems in complex environments

A system is a set of components that is subject to an input, that is to say a command, and produces an output or, in other words, a result. For a system to produce the desired response it needs to be controlled and that requires an appropriate mathematical formula. In the Disco team we work on complex environments, on connection failures, loss of data or integrating the human factor in control loops. The type of mathematical tool can be helpful, for example, in the treatment of acute myeloid leukaemia, where the system is the patient and the control is the medication. Thanks to our contribution in mathematics, we can see whether administering one type of medication or another will produce the desired output, that is to say, if the cell population returns to the normal level.

A new algorithm for more secure cryptographic exchanges

Fri, 9 Mar 2012 11:13:24 GMT

Last December in Seoul the article "Counting points on genus 2 curves with real multiplication" by Pierrick Gaudry (LORIA/Caramel project-team), David Kohel (Institut de Mathématiques de Luminy) and Benjamin Smith (Grace team, formerly Tanc) won (jointly) the prize for best article at AsiaCrypt 2011, one of the three most important international conferences on cryptology.

"Counting points on genus 2 curves with real multiplication" demonstrates a real step forward in the field of cryptography. The need to encipher information to transmit it securely is increasingly felt in the digital world, to establish secure communications, to prove identities on line or even to sign digital documents. To do this, the most common method used is a public-key cryptosystem, which is the opposite of a private-key system where the two parties who wish to exchange information must also exchange their private keys. In the case of public-key systems, each instance, for example each digital signature, is based on one example of a very difficult mathematical problem and the system's security depends entirely on the difficulty involved in solving it. To ensure the difficulty of these problems "point counting" algorithms are used to verify the security of the future cryptosystem.

The state of the art in public-key cryptography was based, until now, on problems with elliptical curves. Google, for example, uses them for its secure web pages. Recently, researchers have focused on genus 2 curves as an improved version and a successor to elliptical curves. Yet while genus 2 curves have wonderful theoretical properties, there was a significant obstacle preventing their practical use: in many cases (particularly the case of the prime field) their point counting algorithms are simply far too slow. By way of comparison, it is possible to count the number of points on an elliptical curve in just a few seconds. Up until now the same calculation with a genus 2 curve required several hours, which made them impossible to use as well as to experiment with.

In this paper, the researchers presented a new algorithm for a practical class of genus 2 curves that represents a radical improvement in point counting performance. Indeed, the new algorithm works so well that it shattered the world record in counting points on genus 2 curves (in the case of the prime field). Thanks to this innovation in computing security, it is now easier to construct appropriate genus 2 curves for modern cryptosystems.

Inria Lille is taking part in three Equipex projects

Tue, 6 Mar 2012 16:13:46 GMT

Named FIT, iDive, and Ligan, all three of these facilities-of-the-future projects (“Equipex”, for “Equipements d’Excellence”), selected from over 600 proposals through the two calls for projects, are involving all researchers at Inria Lille to various degrees. For the teams, recognition and new opportunities are guaranteed.

FUN is preparing the Internet of the future

Five Inria teams, including Fun in Lille, are partners of the FIT (Future Internet of Things) Equipex that will make it possible to carry out very large scale testing on the future Internet technologies, which are largely based on mobile communicating objects embedded in vehicles, parcels, industrial equipment, clothing, etc. A real breakthrough. FIT will bring together three research platforms, two existing ones to which Inria contributed (PlanetLab, a network of computers set up in 2003 to test services on the Internet, and SensLab, which, since mid-2010 has enabled sensor networks to be tested), and a “radio-cognitive” third platform that will be set up to test radio propagation between mobile communicating objects. This represents overall funding of €3.7 million for Inria over a period of nine years out of the €5.8 million earmarked for the Equipex through the French government’s 'Future investments' programme.

The FIT national network will ultimately involve over 300 computers, thousands of sensors of various power levels, and hundreds of robots. With access being unrestricted and free of charge, it will enable a large number of users, be they researchers or users from industry, to test technologies and applications of future products. “Setting up such a platform is a genuine technological challenge, in particular in terms of making these dispersed tools compatible and enabling the resources to be reserved by the various users through a unified access system," explains Nathalie Mitton, in charge of the Fun team. “In this respect, SensLab, which is already a network of four platforms, constitutes valuable experience.” Indeed, SensLab is used by 174 users from 26 different countries, mostly French researchers but also American and German researchers, and around ten industrial users, such as Orange, Atos, Thales, and Alcatel Lucent, as well as a range of SMEs and startups.

This opens up new research & development opportunities, for instance in the fields of robots, radio, and home automation.

By joining FIT to form the Embedded Communicating Object (ECO) part of the project, SensLab is changing scale: the sensor platforms of Grenoble, Lille, and Strasbourg will be extended and connected to two new platforms set up by the HiperCom team in Paris and by Institut Télécom. Ultimately, ECO will bring together 2300 sensors (half of which are already installed in SensLab), and over 300 robots, some of which will foreshadow robots for exploring sites impossible for humans to access, such as nuclear sites, volcanoes, etc. Resources of this scale make it possible to do experiments under real service conditions on algorithms for communications and for self-organisation between sensors that the researchers have developed and tested previously under simulation conditions. Europe is expecting a great deal from these experiments and is participating in funding for FIT. “FIT is a genuine follow-on from SensLab,” says Nathalie Mitton, in conclusion. "By pooling new resources and new know-how in this way, our work will be more visible and will assuredly interest new users."

Laurent Grisoni, head of the Mint project team, partner of the iDive Equipex

« It took about one year to set up this project for a technological platform bringing together over 50 researchers. Its funding (€3.6 million) is a strong political encouragement to forging closer ties between digital technologies and human and social sciences, in particular art and science. The platform will make it possible to study how artists and the public use and interact with digital images, with the feature of being a multi-disciplinary platform: psychologists, artists and art historians will re-appropriate technologies such as touch-sensitive screens so as to study how they interact with digital visual content, around what is known as "Visual Studies”. This is taking the Mint developments on to new gesture-based interaction systems. From the outset, Mint has been working in a spirit of partnership in its fields of application. iDive should bring us new contacts and some fine scientific problems to study with a unique facility that is to be located in Tourcoing: a unique high-visual-density virtual reality room, and a large-size touch-sensitive and gesture-based interaction wall. »

Hélène Touzet, Bonsai project team leader, supporting the Ligan Equipex for any problems of analysis of sequencing data.

« The funding for Ligan (€8 million) will make it possible to install latest-generation high-throughput sequencers on the Lille sequencing platform, thereby speeding up research into multifactorial diseases having genetic components such as Alzheimer’s disease, diabetes, or certain cancers. Our team, who are specialised in developing algorithms for analysing genomes and biological sequences, could, for example, help develop new software, supplementing the existing standard software. We will be there whenever we are needed, ready to offer our methodological skills. This might also open up scientific opportunities to us, with applications specific to the human genome. »

The NiConnect project: understanding the brain, even in a resting state

Tue, 6 Mar 2012 11:17:07 GMT

NiConnect is a Future Investments project that just been approved a few weeks ago. Gaël Varoquaux, the project's young promoter and member of the Parietal team, explains the aims of this research programme in bioinformatics.

Can you present the area of expertise concerned by NiConnect?

The project concerns questions in the fields of neuroscience and medicine. Our basic tool is therefore a standard MRI for examining brain activity. The first step consists of recreating a "film" using different snapshots of the brain provided by the MRI in functional imaging mode. This means we can see the oxygen consumed by each part of the brain. We can also determine which activated areas consume more, how long each zone is active, the intensity, etc. Many experiments in cognitive sciences are based on a stimulus (thinking about a particular action or object) and an analysis of the subject's brain in reaction to it. As a result of these experiments, it is possible to determine a functional architecture of the brain.

What is unique about NiConnect is that it analyses the brain in a resting state while it executes "background tasks”, according to Andreas Kleinschmidt, an Inserm researcher and member of the project team. In the absence of stimuli, there is still an architecture that manages the brain. Fortunately, when we shift into sleep mode, the brain does not just switch off. However, there have not been many studies of how the areas that govern the normal execution of these activities are activated. Our role is to offer computing and statistical tools to extract these resting state architectures and analyse their variability in a quantitative way. This is important research in applied mathematics and the NiConnect project represents the result of many years of work on the subject.

Working on the brain in its resting state allows us to help
people who otherwise would not easily have access to an MRI

We can question the interest of analysing the way the brain works in its resting state, especially because the subjects, since they do not receive instruction, are free to think of many things, making analyses even more difficult. However, it is possible to perform our analyses on sedated subjects, for example, on a patient with Parkinson's disease who would otherwise have difficulty controlling his or her movements and could not have an MRI. Our goal is to help people who would not generally have access to this type of test. In the long term, we hope to extend our work to people in an unconscious state and perhaps improve prognoses for coma patients, for example.

Can you tell us in more detail about the different research themes of NiConnect?

The project is organised around several stages. First, we need to produce a software programme that clinical researchers can use to analyse MRI images. Above all, we need to consolidate the available basic research and create a robust tool based on all of this knowledge. This means we need to recruit three engineers over the next four years. After that, when we have capitalised on existing research, we want to develop new models and algorithms for modelling the resting state. For this part, we are working with the CATI (Centre Analyse et Traitement d’Images) and the CEA, which is a data processing centre for the French Alzheimer Plan, as well as a small scientific computing firm called Logilab.

During a second stage, we are going to automatically analyse a significant database of standard cerebral images in order to calibrate our models. More specifically, we want to automatically analyse these images in partnership with the Inserm functional imaging laboratory at Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital in Paris and try to detect anomalies, but only those resulting from pathologies. In an image, we should be able to distinguish a real neurological problem from a scanner malfunction. By correcting the algorithm that reacts poorly in the second case, the software will gradually allow practitioners to focus exclusively on real problems.

Cerebral areas and their interactions understood using MRI of the resting brain, © Inria

Finally, the third theme is our participation in an on-going clinical trial dedicated to Parkinson's disease conducted at Henri Mondor Hospital with the neurosurgeon Stéphane Palfi. This is a test for a new treatment, which has been validated with several patients. Today we have reached a more important stage, with a trial involving around twenty patients. It involves a large number of different measurements, including cerebral images. There is a lot of "background noise" in the data, that is to say it is hard to analyse because of all the interference, which is a real statistical hurdle. Our goal in this particular case is to offer doctors more reliable information so they can make the right decisions.

The first stage allows us to create the tool, the second to calibrate it, and the third to test it in a real situation. This is a comprehensive project where the different stages follow each other, but with periods that overlap to allow for feedback, adjustments, and review of previous points. This is very important because we are communicating with people with very different cultures, and we need to understand each other in order to achieve a result that works. Another fundamental point is that all the partners know each other already. We are all from the Paris area so we can meet on a regular basis and find a way forward.

Being in charge of such a project right after being recruited as a research scientist is rather uncommon, isn't it?

Yes, and I am still amazed! I have had a rather atypical career path, as I started out in physics. My first post-doctoral work in Florence was on quantum physics! Then I wanted to tackle more open-ended problems and work on complex systems like the brain. I took some time to think about the next step in my career and left for the United States, where I worked in a private scientific software firm, which happened to make applications for neuroscience. When I returned to France, I contacted the Parietal team in order to do another post-doc project. I then did a third one to perfect my mastery of the field, once again at Neurospin, but this time in an Inserm team. And now I've been hired on in Bertrand Thirion's team.
This winding path has given me special skills, particularly modelling in physics and conducting experiments on real problems.

The fact I am the youngest member of the team
has not stopped me from leading the project,
because my background made me the best person to coordinate NiConnect.

But I am still amazed because I was just recruited in October 2011, and the deadline for submitting the project was the beginning of November! Work had started before that of course, but it was still a lot of responsibility to take on so soon. Being the youngest member of the team hasn't stopped me from taking the lead, because this really is my area of expertise. That does not mean there aren't more senior members, who are also working on the project, it's just that my particular career path made me the best person to coordinate it.

We knew we would be selected because we are addressing an important problem and we had formed a strong partnership. But nothing was certain, because the project is rather atypical, since traditionally research in statistics and algorithms consist of developing algorithms and models, and we are taking this much further. In our project, we are saying we need to go beyond this to have an impact, that is to say we need to go out in the field and make a real effort in software engineering so that we can make it work with a large mass of data. So we are delighted the project was accepted, because this means we have the means to consolidate and apply real data. This is just the beginning. The project was only approved a few weeks ago, and the team will be finally up and running when we have recruited the engineers and post-doc researchers we need.

The Mint team has participated in experimental Naphtaline Orchestra

Mon, 5 Mar 2012 16:11:24 GMT

Ez3kiel, artists-in-residence at Lille, gived an experimental performance blending electronic and symphonic music, video and innovative technology. The Mint research team, which associates Inria, the CNRS, and Université Lille 1, participated in the concert, on February 19 in Lille.

The group, accompanied by the Symphonistes Européens, performed a rewritten, rearranged symphonic version of their album Naphtaline on February 19 at the Théâtre Sebastopol.

Members of the group and the orchestra, which is directed by Stéphane Babiaud, have been meeting regularly since September 2011 to prepare and rehearse for Naphtaline Orchestra. The concert will include projections of images and videos. EZ3kiel worked with the Mint research team, a joint team with the CNRS and Université Lille1, to develop an application that displays images in response to gestures made by the conductor. The team specialises in gestures for man-machine interaction and applies multiple methods for registering user movements.

What's EZ3kiel ?

EZ3kiel is an electronic music group constantly seeking the experimental. Since its creation, EZ3kiel has developed a graphic identity in parallel with its music. Their concerts are spectacular shows that weave their visual elements into the music. The graphic identity of the group blends current and cutting-edge techniques. Screens placed between the musicians play an active role in the performance and complement the lighting and sound. Light is used to artistic effect against soundscapes stripped of video, creating spacious luminous

Paul Jolie appointed Chief Officer for Resources and Service Administration

Fri, 2 Mar 2012 11:51:51 GMT

Paul Jolie has been appointed Chief Officer for Resources and Service Administration with effect from 1st March. He replaces Hervé Mathieu, who has been appointed as advisor to the CEO.

A graduate of the Ecole Polytechnique, Paul Jolie began his career as a public servant, working as a researcher at the CNET (the national centre for telecommunications research), which at the time was a state-run body. He led European implementation of SIM card standards. When the DGT (Délégation Générale des Télécommunications) became France Telecom, he worked as a sales director and then as a financial director at regional level (with responsibility for Lower Normandy and then Burgundy), before returning to the CNET, now FTR&D, first as assistant centre director, then as strategy, monitoring and partnerships manager, and finally as senior research scientist for New Business Models. He then returned to Orange Mobile France in a strategy management role. Before joining Inria, he was Deputy Director of Information Systems at the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

As Chief Officer for Resources and Service Administration and a member of the Inria general management team, Paul Jolie assists Michel Cosnard in the organisation and operation of research support activities and in the administration of all of the resources available to the institute. He also acts as Inria’s representative to its supervising ministries in matters relating to the organisation and administration of the institute.

Helping ordinary citizens understand public data

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 16:29:00 GMT

Three Frenchmen have been designated to receive a Google Research Award 2011. Jean-Daniel Fekete, leader of the Aviz team and specialised in the visualisation of large datasets, is among the laureates, with a project at the heart of access to public data.

What does this prize mean for you?

Jean-Daniel Fekete: The Google Research Award is a bit special to the extent it is intended to fund research that interests Googleand is awarded after evaluating a project. The project my team proposed concerns the visualisation of large datasets and assessing the techniques used to do this, a subject that interests Google in the context of its open data approach: Google Public Data. This service proposes all sorts of data that can be downloaded, as well as visualisation systems to explore it more easily. Consequently we have a lot of common interests and we have already discussed similar topics. In a way this prize formally recognises our cooperation and the interest Google has in the team's work.

Could you tell us more about the aim of your project?

J.-D.F. : We have observed that, paradoxically, web users visiting sites rich in data spend very little time browsing them. The question is: how can we make them spend enough time on a site to understand the data? This is an important issue at a time when access to public data should allow citizens to form an opinion, for example concerning distribution of the national budget. In this project we start with the hypothesis that for this data to really be accessible, that is to say comprehensible, access alone is not enough. We must also present it in a way that allows the citizen to appropriate it, i.e. understand the data, compare it to various alternatives, etc.
This is very interesting on a scientific level because up until now visualisation only addressed people with extremely specific professional questions, in science or economics for example. A web user who visits a site doesn't necessarily have a specific question at first. This means we have to find the right ways to present data and the methods to attract and encourage them to stay on the site.
Google is very interested in generalising this approach, which would allow it to develop the site as a framework for other specialised applications.

Which applications are you targeting?

J.-D.F. : We are working on applications that are of interest to the general public. Our first application will concern the French presidential elections in 2012. Then we will work on the national budget, followed by pollution, etc. The approach consists in creating a site that makes the data as accessible and attractive as possible with the help of Jérémie Boy, a student in design and graphic arts, who is starting a thesis on this project. Then this will allow us to test different "engagement" techniques by studying their impact on site use.

What sort of information are you providing for the elections?

J.-D.F.: We are starting with the fact that people need contextualised information. For example, we used surveys to identify the type of question French people are asking about the elections. One of these concerns the candidates' backgrounds, which led us to work on their life profiles. But we also propose an active approach. For example, the web user can indicate the points he feels are essential, like healthcare or unemployment, in order to obtain the positions of the different candidates on these issues or to find out which candidate is closest to his personal views. The Aviz website, elections2012.aviz.fr, will be accessible at the end of February.

Brigitte Rozoy: 'At uni, I discovered with delight that maths were more than an assimilation - they were a thought process'

Fri, 24 Feb 2012 17:45:56 GMT

I was a good student in high school and my parents would never have understood if I had chosen to do anything other than science! I was rather gifted for maths. I found it amusing, but not very interesting. I preferred biology or physics. But since I didn't have good marks in biology, and I was not good at all in physics-chemistry lab, I chose maths, a bit as a fall-back solution. It was also complicated because there was this strong family imaginary, an uncle who was a brilliant mathematician and who had died young, and so it was difficult to summon the confidence to do maths with this legacy. One of my brothers, a year younger than me, chose to pursue maths too, but also in a roundabout way.

After high school, much to my surprise, maths became exciting, which I wasn't expecting at all! I found myself dealing with real problems, for example continuity or the existence of real irrational numbers. We weren't dealing with computing or control, but really the concepts and thought process. So I did a Bachelor, a Master and then a teaching degree. This would allow me to finance my studies if I went on to teach ten years after that. Then I was hired as a research assistant and I soon joined a research institute dedicated to teaching mathematics (IREM) where I served as director. At the time, with the introduction of the "new maths" in secondary schools, there was a real sociological problem in teacher training. I spent almost ten years working on these questions with teachers in secondary schools and higher education. It was a very rewarding experience

Computing as a science
is the intellectual adventure of our century

In the 80s I made a new discovery through logic, computing, and I really developed a passion for the field. I was very happy with this change of direction because for me computing as a science is really the intellectual adventure of our century. As Gilles Dowek once said, mankind has experienced several giant steps, several revolutions: speech, writing, printing and computing. These four upheavals have had an equal impact on the evolution of mankind and have fundamentally and irreversibly modified its future.

As a research professor in Avignon and then Caen, I experienced the rise of computing and the significant development of teaching and research in the field at universities. There were plenty of things to discover, plenty of room and enthusiasm. I worked hard and learned a lot. I found my research topic and did a doctoral thesis. Suddenly I found myself 10 years behind everyone else, but I also had many curious and passionate colleagues. I got lucky and landed a job as a professor at Paris Sud.

I know I took a winding, unconventional path, but I am very pleased with the choices I made, that I explored various new and intriguing fields, on both a personal and scientific level. This only reinforced my attachment to teaching, research and universities.
Moreover, I was lucky enough to have some very positive opportunities. In fact, I was highly involved in research administration, in universities at every level, but also within the Ministry of Research and Higher Education. This gave me another perspective on how universities and research work, a global, strategic vision on a national and international level.

Now that I am close to retiring, I am currently in charge of an Inria team on an interim basis. In fact Franck Cappello created the Grand-Large team in which I worked before he headed off to the United States to set up the Inria-Illinois Petascale Computing Joint Lab at Urbana-Champaign. As the project that will soon take over, I hope, for Grand-Large is not fully mature, I accepted to oversee the transition, until Laura Grigori's project is up and running. For me, my role now consists in passing the torch. I try to help the new generation benefit from opportunities that are as rich and inspiring as those I experienced.

Research theme: large distributed systems and high-performance computing

I first became interested in the theory of formal languages, then in the mathematical aspects of parallelism and distribution. Computers had been sequential for a long time, that is to say they performed one function at a time. But now that we know how to organise them in a network they can work "parallel" to each other. To do this we need to control traffic and communications, to avoid blocking the system. In the 90s there was an important shift because behind all this there was the advent of the Internet and communication on a global scale! Then in the years 2000 very, very large networks appeared and the Grand-Large team was set up to study these questions in depth. The idea is to create systems for large numbers of machines working together, like, for example, the Grid'5000 project, which aims to harness 5000 machines across France. This raises complex issues, in particular regarding resistance to failures and scientific computing. Finally, since 2010 we have been working with Laura Grigori, Joffroy Beauquier and the entire team on the fields of High Parallel Computing (HPC) and large distributed systems.

Until 11 March, nominate your candidates!

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 09:55:28 GMT

On 14 June in Paris, the "Inria Awards" ceremony will take place for the second consecutive year. After Gérard Huet, Bruno Levy, Stéphane Donikian... who will be the 2012 prize winners? In your immediate surroundings, perhaps you know a researcher or a team of scientists whose research results, vision, action, and originality of approach contribute to advances in computer sciences and mathematics for the development of our society. Inria invites you to nominate your candidates.

Prize winners will be named by Michel Cosnard, Chairman and CEO of Inria, after examination in the management committee, expanded to deputy scientific directors with regard to the Grand Prize and the Young Researcher Award, and to Dassault Systèmes representatives for the Inria – Dassault Systèmes Award for Innovation. Following this step, prize winners will be invited to a prestigious ceremony on 14 June to receive their prize. A fine tribute to the digital world's contributors whom you help us to distinguish.

Grégoire Allaire, EADS Foundation Prize winner

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:56:57 GMT

Grégoire Allaire, a researcher in the Défi team, which is hosted by the CMAP (Centre de Mathématiques Appliquées) on the École Polytechnique campus, was awarded the EADS Foundation Prize (science and engineering) on November 22, 2011.

Created in 2007 by the EADS Foundation, this annual award recognises the work of researchers in computer science and its applications in the field of aerospace. It recognises the originality, quality and significance of research carried out in a French laboratory that helps maintain a particularly fruitful collaboration with industry and/or makes a major contribution to subjects with an outstanding impact in terms of applications.

Grégoire Allaire, professor at the École Polytechnique (Palaiseau)

His research concerns shape optimisation using either homogenisation, as it relates to composite materials, or level set functions to vary the geometry and topology of shapes. This work combining topological and algorithmic optimisation has allowed him, and his team, to develop digital methods for calculating the most robust shapes of a structure for a given quantity of material. These algorithms are used every day in industry.

Competition in programme proving

Wed, 1 Feb 2012 14:49:19 GMT

Six of the 29 participating teams occupied the top slots at the end of the programme proving competition organised for VSSTE 2012 (Verified Software: Theories, Tools and Experiments), which took place on January 28-29 in Philadelphia. Jean-Christophe Filliâtre and Andrei Paskevich, two of the competition organisers and members of the LRI (laboratory for computer science) and Proval team, told us more about the competition and its implications.

You organised a programme proving contest. Is this type of challenge something new in the field of research?

Jean-Christophe Filliâtre

Jean-Christophe Filliâtre: In the very specific field of programme proving, organising such a competition is something new. The first one was held in 2010 and the one we have just organised with Aaron Stump from the University of Iowa for VSTTE 2012 is the third of its kind. However, this type of academic competition has existed for many years in other areas. For example, they have been held for the last 15 years in automatic proving.

What is the purpose of these competitions?

J.-C.F.: These competitions are designed to help advance the theories and tools researchers are developing. By having people work on identical and well-written problems we offer the basis for comparing approaches and tools that are sometimes radically different. Later on, these problems also serve as a reference that allows us to more easily assess a system’s performance.
Furthermore, the competition offers higher visibility for the most effective tools. For example, after this year's results were announced, the winners were invited to present their tools at the conference and demonstrate how they translated the written problem into programmes and formal specifications. We want to encourage researchers to read the finalists’ solutions and examine these tools, which they are not necessarily familiar with.

What does the competition consist of?

Andrei Paskevich

Andrei Paskevich: We have tried, through the 5 proposed problems, to cover the various aspects of the programmes we want to test in real life: problems concerning data structures, symbolic manipulation (combinatorial logic) or traditional algorithms such as finding the shortest path on a graph. This doesn't involve inventing a new algorithm as is the case in most of the highly popular programming competitions that have been around for a long time. In our problems the algorithms already exist and can even be rather simple and highly conventional. The challenge lies in being able to formally demonstrate that the algorithms are accurate, that the programmes run without any errors and that they do indeed calculate what they are supposed to, that is to say they meet user expectations. And that can be very complicated!

Can you comment on the results?

A.P.: There were a lot of excellent solutions and we decided to select 6 finalists. The two gold medals were awarded to the ACL2 system, developed at the University of Texas, and KIV, developed at Augsburg University. One interesting point is that the proposed solutions are based on approaches and tools that are very different from each other. Another point worth emphasising is that some of the most effective tools are not really new. ACL2, for example, has been used for more than 20 years and is well-known in the fields of mathematical, programme or electronic circuit proofing. Knowing that this tool was highly convincing in solving new problems submitted during the competition could, for example, encourage a young researcher who is new in the field to take an interest in this tool and the techniques associated with it. It is also important to point out that there are very recent systems, around for less than two years, that produce excellent results, such as Dafny, for example, developed by Microsoft Research.

Competition winners

The 29 competing teams - an excellent level of participation - had 48 hours to solve 5 problems submitted by the organisers. 6 finalists were selected for a medal:

Gold medallists:

System: ACL2 (University of Texas at Austin, USA)
- Participants: University of Texas, USA / Centaur Technology, USA
System: KIV (Institut für Informatik, Augsburg University, Germany)
- Participants: Institut für Informatik, Augsburg University, Germany

Silver medallists:

System: PVS (Stanford Research Institute, USA)
- Participants: Stanford Research Institute, USA
System: Dafny (Microsoft Research, USA)
- Participants: Microsoft Research, USA / ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Bronze medallists:

System: VCC (Microsoft Research, USA)
- Participants: Microsoft Research, USA
System: Dafny (Microsoft Research, USA)
- Participants: Carnegie Mellon University, USA / ETH Zurich, Switzerland

Inria's skills furthering the surgery of the future

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 22:39:45 GMT

Inria is participating in three of the six projects selected as part of the "Future Investments" programme organised by the French Ministry of Higher Education and Research and launched in 2010. These projects are all being carried out within university health institutes combining care, research and training (IHUs). We take a closer look at MIX-Surg, Strasbourg's IHU for image-guided minimally invasive surgery, with Stéphane Cotin, whose team, Shacra, is a key contributor to the project.

What is the aim of the MIX-Surg IHU?

Stéphane Cotin: IHUs are intended to boost research activity in relation to hospital applications for very specific fields, in which there is already a recognised skill base to work from. Strasbourg is known for its expertise in abdominal and pelvic laparoscopic surgery, in particular as a result of Ircad [research institute against digestive cancer], which is chaired by Professor Jacques Marescaux. In this context, MIX-Surg aims to develop and prepare for marketing technologies to facilitate the surgical procedure. Technology transfer will take place via industry partners involved in the projects or specifically created start-ups. One of the interesting things about this approach is that it enables us to integrate a cost-effectiveness impact analysis: in order to move forward, it must be demonstrated that the technologies developed will be beneficial to patients but also that they will offer practical advantages for surgeons and not represent an undue expense in relation to the expected benefits.

What is Inria's role within this new IHU?

S.C.: Inria is a founding member of MIX-Surg. It plays a central role, as the IHU is resolutely focused on new technologies. Inria's involvement was actually an obvious decision, as we have in fact been working together for a number of years. For example, Nicolas Ayache (leader of the Asclepios team and member of the IHU's scientific board) and I worked together on the very first project to combine surgery and computing, with Professor Jacques Marescaux a little over ten years ago.

Minimally invasive surgery has been practised since the nineties; what is different about the approach developed within this IHU?

S.C.: This approach brings together aspects of imagery, simulation, modeling, and even robotics. Let's take the example of laparoscopic liver surgery, which is directly related to our team's work. At present, surgeons are able to view the surface of the liver, thanks to a micro-camera, but not the vascular network, which they must be careful not to section, nor the internal tumour that they want to excise. They are obliged to estimate the location of the tumour on the basis of patient data collected prior to the operation, in a liver which undergoes considerable deformation during the procedure. We can help surgeons, through techniques that combine simulation and augmented reality, by superimposing details on the view of the surgical field, which will enable them to see through the liver, as if it were transparent, to view the tumour and blood vessels. In order to be useful, this information must reflect reality and take into consideration the deformation of the organ during the surgical procedure. This requires the use of 3D models of tumours and the vascular network based on pre-operative examinations. These models are then deformed virtually, on a real-time basis, to ensure that the 3D model superimposed on the image during the operation corresponds to the reality at all times.

And where does robotics come in?

S.C.: This convergence between medical imaging, simulation and modeling can also integrate aspects of robotics. For example, the interventional radiology used in the treatment of liver tumours consists in inserting a needle or electrode through the abdominal wall and liver until it reaches the tumour, which it then destroys through the use of heat, cold or drug treatments. The difficulty lies in determining the best route for the instrument and then monitoring, and if necessary correcting, its positioning during the operation. By combining imagery with our skills in simulation and robotics, we can guide the needle using a robot, so that the route is followed more accurately, and the instrument inserted in a more gradual and steady manner, and synchronised with the imaging systems. Once again, this involves modeling and simulating the liver and the way it moves with the patient's breathing, and is deformed by the insertion of the needle, etc.

A very ambitious project

With support from the University of Strasbourg, the Inserm and the Strasbourg teaching hospital, the MIX-Surg IHU will officially be inaugurated at the beginning of 2012. Many people are already working at the site, although the building which is to house the IHU will not be completed for another two years. With 17 hybrid operating rooms dedicated to treatment, training and research, the institute will bring together researchers, clinicians and imaging equipment. This unique and stimulating environment located within a fast-growing medical and university hub is already attracting high-level interest from around the world: 7 leading medical organisations and 33 industrial operators have already agreed to be actively involved in the project. With growth in the international market for minimally invasive hybrid procedures being estimated at 8% per year on average (i.e. €37 billion in 2014), the IHU will also promote the development of French start-ups in this field.

Marie-Paule Cani wishes to make 3D virtual creation available to all

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 15:19:54 GMT

Thanks to the Advanced Grant awarded to her by the European Research Council (ERC), aimed at experienced researchers, Marie-Paule Cani, a university professor at the INP Grenoble, will finance five years of research into the design of animated virtual shapes within the framework of her IMAGINE team, shared with Inria Grenoble and with the Jean Kuntzmann laboratory (CNRS and Universities of Grenoble). She hopes to make the digital tool as intuitive as simply using pen and paper, and much more efficient.

What is the computer-aided design of animated shapes?a

Marie-Paule Cani : This involves using a computer and computer graphics to design three-dimensional moving shapes, characters, industrial prototypes, virtual scientific models, or any other type of digital model. Making digital creation tools truly intuitive is a crucial scientific field. For, surprising as it may seem in the digital age, paper, pencil and clay remain the prerequisite tools of choice for sketching new shapes, even for those intended to be fine-tuned using software.

Why is this out of reach?

M.-P.C. : Creating new means of expression implies the design of methods focused upon users, which adapt to their creative capacity as opposed to the contrary. This requires new model types for moving shapes, able to respond to interaction gestures in an intuitive manner.

How do you think you will achieve this goal?

M.-P.C. : We have already provided proof of the concept within the framework of my former project-team, Evasion (2003-2011). We designed an intelligent model enabling realistic trees to be drawn rapidly in virtual landscapes: their morphogenesis is imposed by their silhouette, which the user sketches in 2D with several resolutions. The details, created in 3D, are automatically replicated on the tree. My aim is to apply this type of approach to a variety of fields, in the creation of clothing for example; based on simple 2D sketches on images of characters, this will mean generating their 3D developable surface, finding their pattern and automatically adapting them to other morphologies My ERC grant enables me to finance five PhD students, five post-doctoral students and one engineer for five years, and 30 months of research visits by guest professors.

Why are you interested in this virtual creativity?

M.-P.C. : Quite simply, in parallel to my scientific studies, I have always been passionate about drawing and sculpture. After my mathematical aggregation, I undertook a thesis in computer graphics. So it's no accident that I'm now exploring the possibilities presented by digital tools to offer greater creativity.

Creating an expressive virtual pencil to draw in 3D

Inria/Evasion

In this example, the clothing creator produces the outline of a sketch, which is transformed to dress a 3D dummy - Inria/Evasion
In her ERC project, known as Expressive, Marie-Paule Cani suggests using digital tools, computers or graphical tablets, to sketch, then refine, three-dimensional shapes with more realism and simplicity than a pencil. Instead of using the standard computer-graphics techniques leading to software that requires several years of training, she offers to develop top-level dynamic models: representations of shapes and movements capable of handing control to the user, whilst helping them obtain the best possible result. To achieve this, she will need to combine computer graphics, under its simulation and geometry components, with human-machine interaction and cognitive sciences.

2011 successful applicants

In the "Young researchers" category, Remi Gribonval (Metiss, Rennes), Andreas Enge (Lfant, Bordeaux), Xavier Rival (Abstraction, Rocquencourt) and Erwan Faou (Ipso, Rennes) received a grant, which will enable them to build a team. In the "senior researchers" category, the projects by Marie-Paule Cani (Evasion, Grenoble), Nicholas Ayache (Asclepios, Sophia Antipolis) and Dale Miller (Parsifal, Saclay) were those selected by the ERC.

Nicholas Ayache: "Medical Imagery and I.T.: the personalised digital patient"

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 11:01:27 GMT

Nicholas Ayache is the 2011 winner of an ERC grant worth 2.5 million Euros, aimed at experienced researchers. With many years of commitment to researching the analysis and simulation of medical images, he will now be able to rise to a major challenge: to design digital models of organs and pathologies enabling the incorporation of a patient's medical images and the simulation of the progress of their pathology and the suitability of the treatments before they are applied.

What is the objective of the research that you proposed to the ERC?

Medical imagery has made exceptional progress over the last 30 years. Today it enables the structural and functional properties of tissues and organs to be captured on various scales: macroscopic for organs, microscopic for cells and even nanoscopic on a molecular scale. Current research into imagery aims to assist the clinician in the analysis of this ever-increasing volume of information by integrating the entirety of this data into multi-scale, multimodal 3D images (obtained through a variety of techniques).

The ERC MedYMA project intends to go one step further by integrating the temporal dimension too, in order to take into consideration the dynamic properties of an organ e.g. cardiac movement, the dynamics of a disease, and indeed the growth of a cancerous tumour or the atrophy of cerebral regions due to Alzheimer's disease. In the first example, the objective is to be able to determine as soon and as accurately as possible whether a movement anomaly exists. The two remaining examples involve quantifying the progression of the disease observed between two examinations. It also enables medical staff to determine more swiftly the effectiveness of a treatment in order to change it swiftly if necessary, or indeed to make use of the simulation to estimate, in advance, the most suitable treatment for the patient's disease.

What makes the project original? The scientific challenge?

To incorporate all of this data, we suggest adjusting biophysical models in order to make them specific to each patient. These generic models are thus personalised thanks to the medical images. They are constructed from the physical and biological properties of the organs or tissues, taking account of the statistical variability existing between individuals. One original aspect of the ERC MedYMA is the construction of computer-generated medical images based on these biophysical models. These computer-generated images will make it possible to validate the analysis algorithms developed during the project, but also to design new analysis algorithms based on modern I.T. learning methods. These computer-generated images will therefore need to be as realistic as possible: this is one of the major scientific challenges of this project!

The computer analysis of the medical images, by exploiting biophysical and statistical models of living beings, enables better interpretation of the patient's medical examinations, simulation of the development of a disease and the effectiveness of a therapy to be predicted.

In partnership with the Inria Sisyphe, Macs and Reo teams, the Asclepios team has already developed an initial biophysical model of the heart, based on the organ's geometry and on its electrophysiological and mechanical properties. The ERC MedYMA project will make it possible to improve this personalised virtual heart model, in order to help quantify normal movement and detect anomalies (arrhythmia, heart failure, etc.). It may also be used to simulate a therapy (radiofrequency ablation, fitting of a pace-maker, etc.) and to predict the expected benefits for the patient. Indeed, today around 30% of patients fitted do not receive the real benefits of their pace-maker. In oncology - another of our fields of application together with neurology and cardiology - it is hoped that the models will enable the target of the radiotherapy or surgery to be refined by taking better account of the non-visible infiltration of the tumour by the simulation.

How is this grant going to assist you in this undertaking?

The ERC grant makes it possible to plan over a longer period than usual, and therefore to conduct more fundamental research, with very few administrative constraints. It will mainly finance PhD students, as well as several post-doctoral researchers and engineers as, above all, it involves research into algorithmics and applied mathematics, with a small amount of software engineering. This work will be conducted within the Asclépios team, whose expertise - the researchers Hervé Delingette, Xavier Pennec and Maxime Sermesant are involved in the project - will contribute to the success of the undertaking. The grant will also facilitate work with our academic and clinical partners in France as well as in Europe and the United States, particularly with France's three new university health institutes (IHU), with which we collaborate for modelling of the heart (Bordeaux), the brain (Pitié-Salpêtrière in Paris) and the digestive system (Strasbourg). Industrial partners will also be involved throughout the project. This is an indispensable element in order to ensure effective transfer of innovations.

Creating virtual patients upon request

The creation of a generic patient model within MedYMA should constitute a break in the capacities for automatic interpretation of medical images and in clinical practices. These models, built based on the biophysical properties of organs and knowledge of pathologies, enable the creation of virtual hearts, livers and hearts, and the simulation of the occurrence and development of pathologies such as tumours, arrhythmias, atrophies, etc.
These computer-generated images may be generated at will and in very large quantities in order to establish larger, more varied databases than the patient database that are most often incomplete and difficult to access. For example, it is possible to grow tumours by modifying the proliferation and infiltration parameters in order to obtain a very extensive range of intermediate cases.
Such databases are of interest in order to test the reliability of image-analysis and diagnosis-assistance software. They are also of interest in leading the software designed in order to refine their detection capacity through learning on numerous cases. Another application envisaged consists of generating computer images covering the largest possible number of cases in order to coordinate a medical version of a flight simulator for pilots. Practitioners may in this way be confronted, during the course of their training, with extreme, highly-varied or extremely rare situations, providing them with the most extensive expertise possible.

2011 successful applicants

In the "Young researchers" category, Remi Gribonval (Metiss, Rennes), Andreas Enge (Lfant, Bordeaux), Xavier Rival (Abstraction, Rocquencourt) and Erwan Faou (Ipso, Rennes) received a grant, which will enable them to build a team. In the "senior researchers" category, the projects by Marie-Paule Cani (Evasion, Grenoble), Nicholas Ayache (Asclepios, Sophia Antipolis) and Dale Miller (Parsifal, Saclay) were those selected by the ERC.

Serge Abiteboul named ACM Fellow

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 22:42:38 GMT

Serge Abiteboul, head of the Webdam project funded by the ERC (European Research Council) is now among the "fellows" of the prestigious international Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).

The ACM works on an international level to promote computer science and has just published a list of 46 new fellows. These 46 people are recognised for their contributions to computer science, which are a source of fundamental knowledge in the field and many technological innovations in industry, trade, health, leisure and education. These individuals, from the world's leading universities, firms and research laboratories, have all been recognized for helping to promote innovation and maintain competitiveness in a digital era.

Serge Abiteboul has led the Webdam project since 2008 (created within the framework of an ERC grant) and is one of the 46 ACM members to become a new fellow. He owes this distinction to his work on database theory and practices. According to Alain Chesnais, president of the ACM, Serge Abiteboul is one of "those men and women who are intellectuals and eminent practitioners in the field of computing and engineering and who change the way the world lives and works". He is among those "who knew how to master computing tools in order to tackle the important challenges facing populations around the world and create solutions that improve our society in the areas of health, communications, cybersecurity, robotics, trade, industry and leisure".

Most new fellows are from leading North American universities. Among institutions outside North America, Inria's Saclay - Île-de-France centre is listed, thanks to Serge Abiteboul, alongside Aarhus University (Denmark), the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the Tokyo Institute of Technology and the National University of Singapore.

ERCIM NEWS devotes two articles to research taking place in Lille

Wed, 4 Jan 2012 13:58:18 GMT

The magazine ERCIM News has made ‘Evolving Software’ the special theme of its 88th edition, to which two researchers from our Lille centre have contributed.

Stéphane Ducasse, leader of the Rmod team, which aims to facilitate the remodularisation of object-oriented applications, has written an article entitled "An environment for dedicated software analysis tools".

Laurence Duchien, leader of the Adam project team, has applied his knowledge of CAPucine, a line of context-aware service-oriented software products for mobile applications. The Adam team's research work focuses on concepts and tools that make it possible to adapt applications and middleware in multi-scale distributed environments.

About ERCIM News

ERCIM is a consortium of European research bodies working in the fields of IT and mathematics, of which Inria is a member.

Inria works on ALMA, the world’s largest radio telescope project

Fri, 9 Dec 2011 14:08:40 GMT

Inria and ALMA (Atacama Large Millimeter / submillimeter Array), alongside the CNAM (Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, the French National Academy for Arts and Crafts), are working together to design the man-machine interfaces that will control the revolutionary radio-telescope currently being built in the Atacama desert, to the north of Chile.

Located on the table-top flat Chajnantor, at an altitude of 5,000 metres, the observatory will offer researchers and astronomers the chance to study various phenomena related to the creation of the universe. Once complete, ALMA will be the largest astronomical observatory in the world, with 66 high-precision antennas. This ambitious project is an international partnership of various European, North American and Asian countries, in cooperation with the Republic of Chile.

Inria’s In Situ team and ALMA have been working side-by-side for the past 2 years on the design and development of the telescope’scontrol interfaces. Indeed, the sheer complexity of this telescope requires the use of advanced technologies in the interactive visualisation of datasets.

With excellent results in these first two years working together, Michel Cosnard, Inria CEO, and Thijs de Graauw, ALMA director, signed an agreement protocol on 30^th November 2011, strengthening the bonds between the two institutions. This cooperation forms a part of the Communication and Information Research & Innovation Center (CIRIC) that Inria will open in Chile early 2012, alongside 9 universities in the country.

Inria wishes you a very happy new year

Thu, 8 Dec 2011 10:23:18 GMT

The mission and commitment of all our researches is to invent the new digital world. We are sending you our best wishes for 2012 and encourage you to continue this discovery.

Find out what the French think of digital technology: 1st edition of the survey entitled "The French and the digital world"

Dale Miller: “Making proof universal”

Tue, 6 Dec 2011 12:49:07 GMT

As the beneficiary of an ERC Advanced Grant for experienced researchers, Dale Miller has embarked on the difficult path of establishing proof. His aim? In this field, which is highly abstract but which has a definite impact on the real world, he wishes to standardise proof systems and issue certificates for such systems in order to promote greater confidence in them.

One thing of which Dale Miller is convinced is that the securing of ERC funding is going to help both him and Parsifal, his project-team, make significant progress along the long path towards proof. And this progress is set to benefit everyone! This proof is somewhat akin to the Holy Grail for computer-science and mathematics researchers. How can it be proved that a software program or an electronic circuit does exactly what is expected of it, and that it does so under the conditions and in compliance with the specifications that presided over its creation? To prove the validity of a program featuring several million code lines, it is sometimes necessary to design a new program, itself composed of several hundred thousand code lines…

It is a subject that is far from trivial. Digital systems are multiplying in number, and not just in the fields of leisure activities or entertainment, where the user can restart the system themselves in the event of an error, or manage without a particular function if it is affected by a bug. Today, codes and programs guide, control and automate many tasks that have an impact on our daily lives, and that cannot tolerate malfunctioning of any kind. The launch of a rocket that is to release a communications satellite supposed to work autonomously for fifteen or so years must be made 100% reliable. Likewise, in the monitoring of the temperature of an incubator or the heart rate of a patient who has just undergone heart surgery, there is no room for faults. Not to mention airliners, bank transaction systems, telecommunications, etc. In addition, there is the question of security: how can we protect all of these digital objects from viruses and malicious attacks?

Dale Miller has been working on these subjects for quite some time. After achieving a Ph.D. in mathematics at the university of Carnegie Mellon, he became a computer-science professor and researcher. He first worked in the United States, and then in Europe, where his subject, computational logic, has met with great interest within research circles. He was particularly attracted by the cities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, Genoa, Pisa and Siena, but it is in France that he has finally settled. An American married to an Italian, he moved to the Paris region in 2002 when he took on the roles of senior research scientist at the Inria Saclay centre and professor at the Ecole Polytechnique. His level of French does not quite measure up to his commitment to French research, “I’d have to leave the lab if I wanted to speak French properly”, he says. It is true that he is surrounded by a very cosmopolitan team on a daily basis: a German, an American, an Indonesian, Dutch, Italians... and French nationals, and that in research the working language remains English!

The idea is to create a market place where it will be possible to exchange and share the proof systems developed in different locations.

He mentions the Tower of Babel, not in reference to the multilingualism of his environment, but rather to describe the situation as regards proof. “No standard exists within this field. Every time proof is needed that a system works, a budget and a student are required in order to develop a verifier of the system's property proofs. Moreover, this verifier is designed on an ad hoc basis and functions for a single system only. At times it does not even work for the subsequent version of the same system!” The most explicit counter example is that of text files: “ever since the invention of html language, it has been possible for files to be read by any browser. This is what we wish to achieve within the field of proof.”

His idea: to perform “computer-science chemistry”, that is, use the atoms of existing inferences to develop molecules of inferences. In other words, to offer certified proof-system modules in order to be able to compose an arbitrary system... “The idea is to create a market place where it will be possible to exchange and share the proof systems developed in different locations.” In order to achieve this, Dale Miller envisages issuing “proof certificates”; this is the purpose of the ProofCert project that won him the ERC grant. “The subject is actually very abstract, but it has a definite impact on the real world and on our lives...”
he concludes.

ProofCert, certifying proof!

Dale Miller spent three years fine-tuning the ProofCert project within different symposiums and with funding agencies before being awarded the ERC Advanced Grant, worth 2.2 million Euro for a period of five years as of January 2012. In concrete terms, this will enable the recruitment of PhD students and post-doctoral researchers and the invitation of numerous researchers within the field.
In short, ProofCert aims to standardise proof systems, certify them, index them in a library and make them available on a market place. “The idea is to instil confidence in existing proof systems so that people can discuss and share their work in these domains”, explains Dale Miller, “rather like in the field of viruses and anti-viruses, which is very dynamic and very cooperative today”.

Successful applicants 2011

In the "Young researchers" category, Remi Gribonval (Metiss, Rennes), Andreas Enge (Lfant, Bordeaux), Xavier Rival (Abstraction, Rocquencourt) and Erwan Faou (Ipso, Rennes) received a grant, which will enable them to build a team. In the "senior researchers" category, the projects by Marie-Paule Cani (Evasion, Grenoble), Nicholas Ayache (Asclepios, Sophia Antipolis) and Dale Miller (Parsifal, Saclay) were those selected by the ERC.

The Tara Expedition: plankton tells us a lot about our climate

Fri, 2 Dec 2011 15:07:36 GMT

Saturday September 5, 2009. The Tara vessel leaves Lorient for a two and a half year expedition across the world’s oceans. This expedition is the first attempt to carry out a global study of marine plankton. The aim is to increase our knowledge of this ecosystem, by studying its biodiversity and by better understanding its key role in regulating the climate. A specialist in DNA sequencing and bioinformatics, Laurent Noé, a member of the Bonsai project team, talks about the expertise of his team on this voyage.

What are Bonsai’s research topics?

Laurent Noé: The field of bioinformatics has expanded enormously over the past twenty years. This expansion has been accompanied by major developments in molecular biology in terms of sequencing, transcriptome profiling and proteomics technologies, which provide access to a wealth of information. This data provides an unprecedented opportunity to clarify the function of both the genome and the cell. The main aim of Bonsai is to develop IT tools for analysing genomes and sequences on a large scale. This includes defining combinatorial models and efficient algorithms, implementing robust and distributed software and validating biological data. The majority of our research projects are undertaken in partnership with biology research teams.

The Bonsai team "boosts" the DNA sequencing of marine plankton

What is the aim of the Tara expedition?

Laurent Noé : Scientists have recently discovered the importance of plankton for our climate: not only can the size and nature of the plankton population be very rapidly affected by climatic variations, it can also, in turn, influence the climate by altering the absorption of carbon. Against a background of rapid physical and chemical changes, such as the acidification currently observed in the world’s oceans, there is an urgent need to predict the development of plankton. Furthermore, these micro-organisms have created several hundred metres of sediment on the ocean floors, which allows us to go back in time, to the Earth’s first oceans, and to understand the history of our biosphere. The extracted data will first be filtered and then analysed.

What is the role of Bonsai in this project?

The Bonsai team is involved in the Mappi project, which itself forms part of the Tara project. The Mappi project brings together four different partners: Génoscope, the LIAFA, the LIFL and the IRISA. The last three are informatics research groups, whose expertise is 100% relevant to the data to be processed and the techniques to be developed. Each of the organisations is a specialist in one of the project’s topics: indexation structures, algorithms for the sequences, distributed and parallel algorithms, analysis of biological sequences, etc. These groups will put forward new algorithms and develop open source software, which will facilitate the analysis of samples passed on by the Tara vessel every eight weeks. Génoscope, one of the Tara project’s major partners, will first sequence the DNA and RNA samples for marine protists (small eukaryotic organisms present in plankton) gathered in various locations around the world. They will then undergo bio-informatic processing. However, the existing software used by Génoscope is not suitable for the project’s current requirements. The sequencers used produce vast quantities of small sequences, amounting to several terabytes. The quantity of data to be aligned and assembled is so large that it creates a real bottleneck for these new technologies. The fastest current software (such as Blast) is not able to be scaled up in terms of supercomputing time. It’s at this stage of the project that Bonsai steps in, by attempting to make filtering quicker. The aim is to provide methods that are more algorithmically more efficient, in order to make the analysis of plankton samples easier and more accurate.

How do you work?

Laurent Noé :The main aim is to find out what we have in this "mixture"; i.e. the quantity and type of organisms based on DNA and RNA samples. In this case, the samples are made up of millions of sequences. The major difficulty lies in assembling these small fragments and attributing them to a species. To do this, similarities need to be detected, which is an eminently complicated problem at this level. There are a number of possible methods: you can carry out an overall analysis, look for similarities between these sequences and known sequences; you can use a "classifier", a tool that allows you to attribute a type to a sequence on the basis of similarities. The aim is always to reduce computing time.

There is an urgent need to predict the development of plankton

What could this kind of "decoding" mean for the future?

Laurent Noé :Better understanding and witnessing the development of the species, anticipating the consequences for our climate by protecting, on the one hand, the plankton population, and, on the other, its influence on our climate by means of carbon absorption. These are all issues that may appear abstract, but which are actually incredibly real when set against a background of rapid physical and chemical changes.

Inauguration of the PCRI

Thu, 1 Dec 2011 10:31:42 GMT

In the heart of the Moulon district of the Saclay campus, the PCRI, a joint research centre in computer science, was inaugurated on Wednesday November 9th 2011 in the presence of Laurent Wauquiez, the French Minister of Higher Education and Research. The new 6,000 m² building will house almost all the research teams from the Computer Science Laboratory (LRI), the Paris-Sud/CNRS joint research unit and several other project teams from the Inria Saclay -Ile de France centre. The themes concerned by the PCRI researchers and research-lecturers cover a wide range of topics in computer science, from fundamentals to applications.

The following people spoke at the inaugural ceremony:

Marie-Claude Gaudel, Emeritus Professor at Paris-Sud University and leader of the project behind the creation of PCRI
Guy Couarraze, President of Paris-Sud University
Michel Cosnard, Chairman and CEO of Inria
Jérôme Guedj, President of the Essonne General Council
Isabelle This Saint Jean, Vice President in charge of Higher Education and Research for the Ile-de-France Regional Council
Laurent Wauquiez, French Minister of Higher Education and Research

Some trends and challenges for the 2.0 years

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:32:21 GMT

According to the Inria/TNS Sofres survey conducted this year, nearly one French person in two declared they could not do without social networks. Such interest on its own proves what a success the social web is, although success is not without an increase in private data now present in cyberspace. A thorough grasp of interaction tools and controlling one’s web image are becoming major challenges for tomorrow’s web, both for individuals and companies… as well as a challenge for researchers developing social web management tools.

Interview with Fabien Gandon, researcher at Inria and Frédéric Cavazza, social media consultant.

What does ‘social web’ mean for you?

© Frédéric Cavazza

Fred Cavazza: when I talk about the social web or social media, I mean all the platforms, services and technologies that stimulate conversations and social interaction on the web and on mobiles. The web has always been social for me. It began as e-mails and then had personal web pages and then friend sites. However, usage has become extremely intensive since 2005 and the advent of web 2.0, because a network effect has been created. We go there because everyone else is on it. The network’s value rises with the number of users. Its success is based in part on the fact that the French today are more at ease with computing tools and are well equipped in computer and smartphone terms.

Fabien Gandon: I associate the emergence of the social web with the moment the web opened up to writing in the mid-90s with wikis and then forums and blogs, etc. In striving to make producing and publishing content easier, the opening-up process has crystallised social activities around content such as concerts and photographs or around networking. The funny this is that the initial web project at the end of the 1980s planned for reading and writing, but only viewing was deployed at the time for technical and cultural reasons. This means the social web started off as a by-product of the rediscovery of the “writable” web. This was a change in practice. We talked about content consumers in 1990; now we talk about “consum’actors”, a new concept according to which the user is now at all times a potential actor in the process. All web applications enabling action and interaction between users now form the landscape of the social web.

What are the current trends?

Fred Cavazza: I have noticed that the number of content producers is falling over time. The game is more professional, so to speak, with content produced by professionals, semi-professionals or the like. Most web users are involved only in reacting or sharing. Of the 25 million French using social media, only 0.5% actually produce content.

Fabien Gandon: It may also be that non-professional contributions are still increasing, but have been eclipsed by the explosion of professional content, in particular viral marketing productions. Networks such as MySpace and Jamendo provide access to networks specialising in amateurism, in a manner of speaking.

Of the 25 million French using social media, only 0.5% actually produce content.

What do today’s web users expect?

Fred Cavazza: There are still latent needs arising from the increasingly complex presentation of social platforms and how they are integrated in websites as a whole. Services are being developed, for example Neiio, which aims to make the social web simpler by providing help or support. Another latent need concerns tools to control one’s image on networks.

Fabien Gandon: I think users are increasingly aware of the risks arising from exposing information about their private life and now request the right to be forgotten. Some have reacted by unsubscribing from applications or even using the “suicide machine” application to delete their accounts. It is, however, very difficult because today’s web suffers from total recall; each click is memorised... Furthermore, free services are rare and a web user’s privacy can be traded on; for example, the installation of a game can be contingent on accessing the gamer’s GPS.

Fred Cavazza: Privacy is an illusion even without the social web. We can find out a huge amount of things about you using your credit card, public transport pass or mobile telephone, etc. I like to say that we have an information shadow made of all the tracks we leave on the web, but you would need to be very cunning to know how to use them for marketing purposes.

Fabien Gandon: I agree to an extent. However, your bank statement alerts you about what it says about your privacy; you can always decide to pay in cash, for example. On the web, even if you use passwords, each mouse click is stored and analysed. To use your metaphor, everyone should be able to see his or her shadow. This is the absolute condition for a right to be forgotten. Centralising personal data is in itself a danger; it gives applications such as Facebook a monopoly and huge power. It runs against the concept upheld by the W3C of a highly distributed and neutral web. Other applications can be developed that do respect these principles. One example is Diaspora, an open-source platform that competes with Facebook.

we have an information shadow made of all the tracks we leave on the web

What are the technological challenges arising from the social web today?

Fabien Gandon: The major scientific challenge relating to social networks is to analyse the gigantic mass of data they generate. This means efficient tools are needed to manage, use and process them to create services, but also to remove tracks (as dictated by the right to be forgotten), ensure confidentiality and the possibility for everyone to express themselves and interact on the web and ensure simple interfaces. It is now possible with the semantic web tools on which we are working. However, an even greater inter-disciplinary challenge is to build complete applications that make it possible for every party involved to know what is being given and received consciously. This requires progress in computing but also in ergonomics, for example.

The major scientific challenge relating to social networks is to analyse the gigantic mass of data they generate.

Fred Cavazza: It would indeed be interesting for service providers to be able to collect, analyse and automatically interpret all facts and gestures recorded on networks so as to generate value-added services for users, advertisers and retailers as well as web users. Companies like Hunch are working on this in the USA, but I don’t know whether such an approach would be tolerated in France.

What is your vision of the social web in 2020?

Fred Cavazza: That’s a tricky question for a field where the timeframe for change is one or two years! I think we’re heading for a richer and more omnipresent web because everything done on-line will be automatically notified to people that web user has selected… Automatic notifications are beginning on Facebook but I think they will become more widespread. All our actions and gestures will be relayed and stored on the web. This is a pervasive presence through the social web.

Fabien Gandon: All you have to do is look at where the web was in 2001 to see how dangerous an exercise predicting is! I also think that a diffuse web is a clear and inevitable tendency. With the deployment of the Internet of objects each of our actions on an object (e.g. a refrigerator) will be echoed on the web and vice versa (webTV, home automation, enhanced reality, etc.). Our social exchanges will also be routed via these new channels. We can talk about hyper-connection.

Another tendency will have users working for specific applications known as “human computing”. For example, ESP game and other GWAPs use gaming to have gamers label image bases. Millions of web users could be used by on-line applications, sometimes without knowing it. Once again, the ethics of the issue must be considered…

...a diffuse web is a clear and inevitable tendency

Another challenge for 2020 is not to widen the digital divide between those with the know-how and equipment and those without. The risk here is that with the system growing increasingly complex, it is based on high-tech infrastructures, which will make it increasingly difficult to stick to simple usage.

Is the pervasive expansion of the social web compatible with sustainable development, i.e., mindful of consumption of raw materials and energy?

Fabien Gandon: Web development does not necessarily mean web growth, i.e. a constant increase in networks, exchanges or machines. It can be developed more intelligently by offering fewer connections, but at the right time and in the right format and by not keeping all the data, as is currently the case. Generally speaking, we cannot increase capacity ad infinitum within paying a reasonable environmental and energy cost. People must also avoid saturating! The web’s development will need to take account of psychological, social and cultural aspects.

Objects that are able to communicate

Thu, 24 Nov 2011 16:28:24 GMT

Nathalie Mitton is the leader of the Pops project team at the Inria Lille – Nord Europe Research Centre. She obtained her habilitation to advise doctoral theses in a rapidly expanding field: the internet of objects. RFID tags and sensor networks – what is the current focus of researchers’ efforts?

What is the internet of objects and how does the subject of your research fit in with it?

Nathalie Mitton: The internet of objects is an extremely vast field, which deals with the ability to make objects communicate via a network. Objects can be connected directly to the network or be equipped with sensors (cameras, microphones, radar trackers, thermal sensors, etc.) or RFID tags, which transmit their data via wireless links. My field of research relates more specifically to RFID and sensor networks. RFID tags are made up of a chip and an antenna, which contain, for example, information about the manufacture of a product and which allow it to be tracked. These tags don’t have any batteries. You need a reader to power them and to be able to read the data they contain.

Unlike RFID tags, sensors have a battery and are able to transmit data at any time. Sensor networks are made up of a group of sensors that communicate with each other. They are used in particular for environmental monitoring, for example to monitor volcanic activity, using seismic sensors, or to identify outbreaks of forest fires using temperature sensors. They can also be used to detect changes in structures or to monitor hospital patients’ vital signs.

What are the main scientific challenges associated with RFID?

Nathalie Mitton: Creating these networks requires a great deal of research into the hardware. The sensors need to be designed to be small, inexpensive, use very little energy and have a limited impact on the environment. The batteries also need to be small, as well as biodegradable and able to last as long as possible. We need to design tiny antennae, which are able to transmit a clear signal that is relatively undisrupted by obstacles. Other challenges in terms of hardware are emerging for specific uses. For example, biologists would like to use sensors to be able to track wild animals, such as penguins. In this case, the sensors would also need to be able to withstand the cold, water and salt. There are the same concerns for RFID tags, with additional specific challenges associated with their use. They must, for example, be able to withstand washing, for RFID tags attached to clothing, and sterilisation, for those placed on surgical instruments.

In addition, there are algorithmic challenges, which affect us more directly and which relate to intended applications. A particular challenge relating to the use of RFID tags is to successfully read the greatest possible number of tags in the least possible time, in order to be able to rapidly identify a set of pallets moving along a conveyor, for example. Another objective is to limit conflicts between readers, in order to improve the reading rate, as, when reader signals overlap, they fail to recognise the tag signal. There are also a number of security issues: it is important to ensure that RFID tags on garments or in the bags of passers-by cannot be read by just anyone. These chips are currently deactivated at the till. However, manufacturers that have monitored the object’s entire life using the chip would like to be able to receive this information as part of their after-sales service. Integrating a password would be one option, but would not be sufficient to protect privacy. We are seeking an alternative solution.

… and for sensor networks?

Nathalie Mitton: One challenge for sensor networks is to find the best way of ensuring that these sensors communicate effectively. Due to their short range, they cannot directly send data gathered to their base station, which could be some distance away. They have to make use of relays - in this case, other sensors located between them and their base station.

The aim is to devise algorithms that would allow these sensors, with extremely limited computing, memory and power capacities, to identify the most appropriate recipient sensor for their data, in order for it to arrive safely. I am concentrating specifically on this aspect by studying self-organisation algorithms. These algorithms enable sensors, when dropped by a plane onto a volcano, to identify other neighbouring sensors and recognise which links to maintain with these other sensors, by means of very simple calculations. They also make it possible for sensors to recognise when to switch to standby in order to save power and which data to send, at what intervals (as infrequently as possible) in order to extend their battery life.

What is the next stage for these networks?

Nathalie Mitton: At present, new components, known as actuators, are being incorporated into sensor networks. While the sensor gathers information about the environment, the actuator is able to have an effect on the same environment. For example, when the sensor detects an increase in temperature caused by fire, the actuator triggers the operation of fire hoses. These actuators may be capable of moving about, like little robots. By combining sensors and actuators in a fleet of robots, it is possible to monitor a specific event.

Another stage involves testing our algorithms on a large number of sensors, in order to test their reliability. Thanks to experimental platforms, it is possible to load the code to be tested automatically onto all the sensors or actuators at the same time — rather than one-by-one — via a web interface, and to use tools to analyse the test and gather a large volume of data, on the consumption of nodes, for example. We are currently working on the Senslab platform, created in 2009 and combining 1,024 sensors on four sites (Lille, Grenoble, Rennes and Strasbourg). Senslab will soon form part of the FIT excellence-in-equipment project, which will incorporate sensors and actuators, among other components. This new equipment will allow us to test all our new algorithms.

Self-organised networks

Without any visibility, how is it possible to select the appropriate neighbouring sensor able to convey data to the necessary destination, and ignore all other sensors, while at the same time ensuring that this will not result in another sensor that is more remote from the base no longer being to reach its recipient (i.e. the same base station)? This is the problem faced by researchers working on sensor networks. Within these networks, data reaches the base station by “short hopping” from one sensor to another. These are known as multi-hop radio connections. To resolve this problem, they use local algorithms, which are based on information relating to what takes place between neighbours: I can talk to A and B and I know that A and B can talk to each other. I can therefore forget about A because I know that I can talk to it via B. It goes without saying that the problem becomes substantially more complicated when the sensor is displaced by water, for example, or is attached to an animal that is moving about!

Mazyar Mirrahimi: Towards quantum systems engineering

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 22:34:56 GMT

Mazyar Mirrahimi of the Sisyphe team, in collaboration with the group led by Serge Haroche and Jean-Michel Raimond of the ENS and Pierre Rouchon of the Ecole des Mines de Paris, recently co-wrote an article published in Nature which has garnered some attention. Interview with an automation engineer fascinated by problems related to quantum physics.

What is your professional background?

Mazyar Mirrahimi: I completed my first year of higher education in mathematics in Iran, then I came to France to enrol at the Ecole Polytechnique, following regularly held on-site interviews. The majority of Iranian students go to the United States, but I was drawn to the highly varied programme of the Ecole Polytechnique, since I enjoyed mathematics without being certain that I wanted it to become my profession.

In the course of my studies at the Ecole Polytechnique, I was able to meet my future supervisor, Pierre Rouchon, a mathematician and automation engineer at the Ecole des Mines. He had recently developed an interest in automation problems at a quantum level. He helped me become acquainted with physics, in particular by following the course offered by Serge Haroche at the Collège de France (Chair in quantum physics) with whom we subsequently worked and got published in Nature. At the end of my PhD, after being recruited by Inria in 2006, I acquired some working experience at Caltech in the United States, in a physics laboratory renowned for having carried out the first experiments in quantum automation. This gave me the opportunity to link my theoretical work with practical experience.

Where has this interest in quantum computing taken you?

Mazyar Mirrahimi : Upon my return to France, the group led by Serge Haroche and Jean-Michel Raimond at the ENS had just conducted very interesting experiments on quantum system control and, more specifically, on the non-destructive measurement of the state of a quantum field trapped in a microwave cavity, a problem that has inspired a great deal of research over the last twenty years.

In order to control a standard system, we first measure the system and then proceed based on what we have observed. For example, a radiator thermostat observes the room's temperature and, based on this temperature and the thermostat setting, will either continue or stop heating. If particles or a quantum system were controlled in this manner, the very fact of observing would disrupt the phenomenon. The experiment conducted at the ENS aimed to observe the state of a quantum field without disrupting it.

The following step consisted of using this information to control the state of the field in order to stabilise it, with a specific number of photons. This is where we come into the picture. We provided an algorithm to estimate the state of the system based on measurements that are partial, imperfect and corrupted by "experimental noise", and which subsequently makes it possible to control the state of the system in order to stabilise it around the desired quantum state.

Does the ability to control a system's quantum state pave the way for the quantum computer?

Mazyar Mirrahimi : The experiment conducted with the ENS group was the first real-time feedback control experiment on a quantum system. This demonstrates the possibility of stabilising these quantum states, which are the basic elements, to enable the robust processing of quantum information. That said, in order to progress towards a genuine quantum computer, we need to link several of these quantum systems together, which seems very difficult for this type of quantum optics device. This problem has led researchers in the field of mesoscopic physics to favour low-temperature superconducting circuits. I am currently at Yale University for one year, where I am working with the group led by Michel Devoret (Professor at Yale and Chair of Mesoscopic Physics at the Collège de France) on certain experiments with a view to creating logic gates and quantum computer memories. We can sense the emergence of a systems engineering which obeys quantum laws, i. e. "quantum engineering".

What other fields could be influenced by this quantum engineering?

Mazyar Mirrahimi : There is a broad spectrum of possible applications, in particular in metrology to improve the accuracy of measurements, as has been done for the atomic clock. One could, for example, consider improving magnetic field amplitude measurements and stabilising the amplitude. Some applications, such as quantum cryptography and quantum communication, are based on these same laws and are easier to obtain. Industrial prototypes already exist that communicate information via optical fibres using quantum encryption by polarisation of light photons.

What are your plans after Yale?

Mazyar Mirrahimi : The Yale group is conducting experiments on superconducting circuits, and I came here to learn about the tools and principles of this mesoscopic physics. This group, led by Michel Devoret, is also working with a physics laboratory at the ENS. Upon my return, I would like to continue working on these experiments with this laboratory.

A more intelligent wheelchair

Thu, 17 Nov 2011 16:09:20 GMT

The aim of the Franco-English Sysiass project is to design an intelligent wheelchair that is able to provide patients with improved mobility, as well as facilitate care in hospital or at home. It is financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) as part of an Interreg programme ("IV A 2 Mers").

Designing a wheelchair that is able to adapt to a user’s specific disabilities, as well as his/her level of fatigue, and allowing his/her medical records to be updated at any time is the aim of the Sysiass Project (2010-2013), which brings together researchers from the Ecole centrale de Lille, the ISEN in Lille and the Universities of Kent and Essex in the UK, as well as the University Hospitals of Kent and the Institut catholique de Lille. “The English teams have expertise that complements our own. We had been working with the University of Kent on an autonomous navigation project for mobile robots and boats, so it was quite natural to continue working together on this project and to involve researchers from the University of Essex, who are working on the design for new human-machine interfaces for electric wheelchairs,” explains Annemarie Kökösy from the ISEN in Lille, which is coordinating Sysiass.

We must be sure that we are meeting real needs, which is why users are involved in the project, allowing them to specify their needs and test the devices.

Annemarie Kökösy

The main focus of the project is to be able to adjust a wheelchair’s degree of autonomy — from driving assistance to autonomous navigation — depending on the user’s capabilities, and also to ensure that the device can be fitted on standard existing wheelchairs. “We have based our approach on the fact that disabled people wish to retain control of driving their wheelchairs, as far as possible,” underlines Annemarie Kökösy. An initial driving assistance prototype has already been produced and is currently being tested by the Fondation de Garches and the CIC-IT Department of the Raymond Poincaré Hospital in Garches. This prototype slows the wheelchair down when approaching hazardous obstacles and stops it if the user has not given the command him/herself, and provides visual feedback allowing the hazard to be located. The second anticipated scenario is semi-automatic operation, with the wheelchair itself avoiding an obstacle if the user has not done anything, and automatically passing through doorways. With requirements varying significantly depending on the user, researchers have launched a European survey with the aim of identifying needs. This will allow them to incorporate all the solutions in the same device. “The results of the survey will be available in January or February, but I am already seeing initial feedback emerge for a third scenario: the possibility of allowing the wheelchair to guide itself to the location indicated to it, by voice command, for example.”

Less progress has been made on the two other aspects of the project. One relates to the design of a secure communication module, a speciality of the team in Kent. This will allow hospital personnel and home care workers to easily share information contained in patients’ medical records and to update these records at the point of care. The other aims to invent alternative control systems to the joystick, in order to improve the autonomy of tetraplegic patients, for example. The Essex team is working specifically on a voice interface and an interface that works by detecting eye movements.

A by-product of networking by those involved in the Sysiass Project: working with medical personnel and users is revealing numerous other needs, in terms of improving the lives of disabled people, both in hospital and at home. “It offers the opportunity for engineering students to work on small projects, such as designing a voice control system for smartphones or for television remote controls. Sysiass has launched an initiative, which may lead to other larger scale projects!”

L’automatique au service du handicap

“I always say that control engineering develops software for hardware,” says Jean-Pierre Richard, Non-A team leader, member of the Lagis-CNRS and professor at the Ecole Centrale de Lille. “This means that control engineering is both omnipresent and invisible to users.” Therefore, you will not be surprised to discover that this discipline has also been involved in the Sysiass Project. Indeed, an automatic or semi-automatic wheelchair needs to know how to make the right movements to avoid obstacles or pass cleanly through a doorway. It also needs to be able to determine its location, detect obstacles and create a map of its environment. The first obligation falls within the scope of control theory and the second within signal processing. These are two areas in which Non-A researchers are developing theories and algorithms, the applications of which could lie equally in the management of a hydro-electric dam or in economic or robotic systems, the team’s application of choice.

It is very important to be able to establish a connection between our theoretical approach and its actual implementation, in an application taken as far as the prototype stage.

The Sysiass Project has already led to the publication of a significant result at this year’s ICRA (International Conference on Advanced Robotics), regarding the possibility of determining a location using a single “landmark” or reference point instead of the three previously deemed essential for calculating a position. The trick is to make use of the movement pattern (for the boat, robot or, in this case, the wheelchair), to reconstruct missing data, as well as to very rapidly reconstruct sensor signal drifts, which is one of the team’s specialities. The wheelchair is able to identify fixed points in its environment (doors, cupboards), which are all absolute landmarks but which, during the course of its movement, may be lost from sight: even then, it can continue to determine its location using only one of these points. “For us as researchers, the interesting challenge is to progress as far as making a physical version of the device. This requires a genuine managerial link with the teams of engineers at the ISEN, which have the necessary development expertise. This is possible for Inria as the Institute is keen to develop applications that are useful to society.”

French people and the New Digital World

Tue, 8 Nov 2011 12:58:29 GMT

See below the detailed results of the survey on “French people and the New Digital World” in images.

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How much do French people understand of the digital world?

Mon, 7 Nov 2011 10:25:10 GMT

Health, industry, transport, agriculture, communication, the environment… no field has escaped the profound impact of digital sciences and technology – inventions that are moulding the contours of a “New World” today. This daily reality, at once invisible, diverse and omnipresent, raises a fundamental question: how much do French people understand of the digital world in which they live?

Inria together with TNS SOFRES has launched a large-scale survey to find an answer to this question, and in the coming years follow the French population’s evolution with regards to this rapidly changing world.

Key points that emerged from this study

The French are receptive to this New World

French people are mostly rather confident (64% of the people who were questioned) and curious (71%) about the advantages, benefits and influence of digital technology in their everyday life.

Six types of digital travellers

Not all French people have the same perception of the world shaped by digital sciences. Some have already made this New World their own, while others refuse an “all-digital” lifestyle.

The great explorers (18%) : Digital pioneers and always ahead of the pack, they are the first specimens of homo digitalis. Truly in possession of this New World, they move about it with ease, and are constantly looking for new places to discover.

The pragmatic adventurers (16%) : They travel with speed over the territories opened up by the great explorers, following a pragmatic approach above all. Curious and open-minded, realistic about its potential, they are also aware of everything that gave structure to the “world before”, and put the emphasis on being responsible in their explorations.

The apprentice travellers (20%) : They have just embarked on the ways of the New World. They are adventurous and enthusiastic, but seldom dare to venture upon unexplored paths.

The prudent hikers (16%) : They know that they live in a changing world, but are cautious of the territories they are discovering and only make limited use of their own discoveries.

The digital recalcitrant (10%) : Watching the developments of this New World with a wary eye, they make use of new technologies, but do not like the consequences. These new places make them nostalgic and they dream of returning to the world they knew before, and all that was comfortable and familiar about it.

The happy home-bodies (16%) : The digital world is far from being indispensable to them. They seldom if ever encounter it in their daily existence, and make no effort to be informed of developments in this field. Yet, they are not opposed to development and are willing to alter their judgement if faced with concrete examples of use.

Do our test to find out in which group you belong >> (in French)

An influence seen as positive for the individual and those around him

Innovations that have become indispensable in everyday life
In reply to the question: “Are there innovations that have changed your life and without which you can no longer get by?” most French people answered “yes”, with regards to their personal facilities:

59% can no longer get by without their mobile telephone,
56% without the Internet,
52% without search engines,
51% without their personal computer.

Beneficial to personal development
As far as individual fulfilment and interaction with the outside world is concerned, digital technology is seen as something beneficial:

87% of French people feel that digital technology has very positive consequences regarding access to knowledge,
62% regarding the possibility to satisfy their interests,
56% regarding the advantages for their work.

More mixed sentiments regarding the relational aspect

31% of French people regret the consequences that digital technology has on their family relationships,
34% when it comes to their love life.

A fragmented view due to a real lack of information

From health to communication, digital sciences have had an impact on all areas of activity. Though French people have a positive opinion of the way digital technology affects certain sectors, they sometimes find it abstract and do not always consider it useful.

Recognised advantages considered useful in fields that are “mass-market” oriented

Health: for 88% of the French, digital technology is useful in healthcare.
Communication: 87% of the French recognise the progress made in terms of digital technology, smart objects, and communication through social networks.
Teaching: for 79% of French people, digital technology has become indispensable in education.
Transport: 75% of French people are aware of the benefits of digital sciences for instance in the field of embedded technologies on planes, cars, rockets or trains.

A less clear view of other areas where this technology is nevertheless very useful

The environment: only 16% of the French consider digital technology to be very useful in this field
Agriculture: more than 26% of French people think that digital technology is of little or no use in this field

Agriculture and digital technology…

A variety of equipment used in agriculture today is equipped with digital sensors. For example, those installed in stables to monitor cows that are about to calve, and that are linked up to the farmer’s television screen or digital tablet. Or humidity sensors built into a silage cutter that precisely measure the percentage of dry matter in maize, as an indicator of the quality of conservation of fodder. Finally, yield meters can be found on harvesters, or inclination meters to correct the vehicle’s steering system on a slope.

Progress that too often remains unknown…
Although 59% of French people describe themselves as well informed, progress in terms of digital technology still seems to lack visibility.

55% of the French think that we shall never be able to communicate through thought.
25% of the French think that a surgeon will never be able to perform an operation from a distance.
25% of the French think that cars will never be able to drive on their own.

The future of digital technology?

Go further or stop everything? Opinions vary between the two…
French people are hesitant and somewhat divided when it comes to the question of “developing digital technologies”, with:

43% of them considering that things are fine they way they are today,
32% thinking that we should go much further still,
16% feeling that we’ve already gone too far.

Important issues at stake
While 80% of all French people are in favour of giving as many people as possible access to digital technologies, they are concerned about the impact, especially on their private lives.

92% feel that it is important that privacy should be more protected on the Internet.
89% consider it necessary to supervise children’s use of the Internet.
74% wish to see a code of ethics or conduct put in place, particularly in fields such as robotics and bioinformatics.

Lastly, 80% of them consider it worthwhile and necessary to make room for digital sciences at school, giving it the same importance as chemistry of physics. A first step is being made in this direction with the introduction of a “computer and digital science” option in high school as from 2012…

The "New Digital World"

Through its research and relationships with the industrial sector, Inria participates in the development of the New Digital World. It thus wants to further the public debate on societal issues related to digital technologies and provide “travellers of the digital world” with the right tools to tackle these new horizons.

Meet those doing scientific research in Aquitaine at the 2011 Aquitec Trade Show

Wed, 2 Nov 2011 18:21:39 GMT

On 3, 4 and 5 February, 2011, Inria will be in attendance at the Aquitec trade show, the leading fair in south-west France for guidance, job roles, employment, training and education alongside Aquitaine's three other public science and technology institutions (EPSTs).

By meeting CNRS (French National Centre for Scientific Research), INSERM (French National Institute for Health and Medical Research), INRA (French National Institute for Agricultural Research) and Inria itself, find out about working in public-sector research, a modern and often international working environment that is intellectually motivating and encourages independence.

Joining forces for more rewarding discussions

This year, INRA (French National Institute for Agricultural Research) is joining CNRS (French National Centre for Scientific Research), INSERM (French National Institute for Health and Medical Research) and Inria, the National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control. Together, these four institutions have decided to share information relating to the diversity of jobs available in scientific research as broadly as possible. Whether regarding the different recruitment procedures for each organisation, or the educational background needed to apply, visitors to the stand will find answers to all their questions.

With around 80% of the job roles carried out coming from different profiles, research does not just pay lip service to diversity

The way scientific research operates means extremely varied profiles need to work together. In fact, for a researcher to be able to conduct research, there are on average four engineers, technical staff or assistants in supporting roles, both to build and manage research projects and to help with technical implementation and administrative procedures. From the experimentation facilities to secretarial services, a whole set of skills is in place to ensure quality research. In addition, the many job roles that are involved in scientific research contribute to the creativity and competitiveness of the research teams in our institutes.

Use the Conference and the events on offer to the public to talk with institute staff

On Thursday, 3 February, a special conference on research jobs will take place, attended by scientists, engineers and technicians who will describe how they were recruited and their experiences within the institutions represented at the show.
In the Science jobs area, the Human Resources departments from the 4 institutions will inform attendees about all the arrangements for competitive entry and other recruitment, and offer help in applying.
This jobs area will also enable some smaller research teams to explain their jobs in an entertaining way by producing some simplified laboratory activities/demonstrations (e.g. making balls of DNA from tomatoes, interaction with humanoid robots, etc.). The four institutions accordingly hope to stimulate the public's curiosity enough to begin discussion and work on the career paths of potential candidates.

How to Skype without being seen!

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 17:04:09 GMT

Skype is a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) solution used by hundreds of millions of people the world over. Inria researchers (Stevens Le Blond, Arnaud Legout and Walid Dabbous) in partnership with a team at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University have demonstrated that a malicious user could invade the privacy of any Skype user.

What is the security breach you have highlighted in Skype?

Arnaud Legout : we have shown that individuals without any specific resources and especially without legal permission could tie in a social identity to an IP address. We worked with researchers at the Polytechnic Institute of New York University to show that in using Skype it was possible not only to connect a social identity with an IP address but also that movements by Skype users could be tracked along with their BitTorrent downloads. Skype users cannot detect this attack, which is not blocked by privacy protection settings currently available.

Is this security breach easy to exploit?

Arnaud Legout : we demonstrated that it was possible to track somewhere in the region of 10,000 Skype users every hour at a cost in the region of €400 per week without optimisation. This means it is even possible to identify users behind NATs (Network Address Translations in internal networks) or IPv6/IPv4 gateways. Consequently, anyone with IT skills can track Skype user movements and their BitTorrent downloads (with details about downloaded content). There is therefore reason to fear industrial espionage or malicious use of personal information because on-line activity, travel and social interaction between users can be transparent for whomever knows how to track Skype users.

The breach arises from the fact that these services use peer-to-peer communication. Should the technology change?

Arnaud Legout : simply put, two security breaches have been brought to light. The first concerns the very nature of peer-to-peer (P2P) communications, which makes it possible to exchange data with anyone. It is currently impossible for a P2P protocol user to block all communication. The simple act of establishing a connection between two peers (even if the connection is immediately closed) is enough to make the other peer’s address visible. The other breach relates to the use of directories used in VoIP protocols. A directory can find the name of a person and call him or her. Even if this person then refuses the call, P2P communication has been established and is sufficient to make the IP address visible.
This simplified explanation shows that the security breach stems from the open nature of the Internet. It is consequently difficult to offer a quick and global response to this type of attack. We are starting an ambitious project to study solutions that could make such attacks difficult whilst upholding the open and non-monitored ideals of the Internet.

In the meantime, what kind of protection is available?

Arnaud Legout : using Skype or BitTorrent is not in itself a risk of privacy invasion. However, it is more dangerous if Skype and BitTorrent clients remain active all the time when not in use. Specifically, all you have to do is terminate the Skype client to make localisation impossible for the attack we have described – provided that the client was not launched in the 72 hours preceding the attack. It is therefore recommended to terminate the Skype client if there is network activity you wish to keep confidential or if you wish to move around without being located.

Social identity and IP address

A social identity is the set of all the information used to identify a person (surname, first name, etc.). An IP address is the network ID used for all communication over the Internet. This means that by looking at Internet traffic it is possible to know that a user with a given IP address is viewing a specific website and downloading specific content.
It is difficult, however, to tie in an IP address with a social identity and thus put a name to specific on-line activity. In practice, to link a name with Internet activity, a formal request must be made to the user’s ISP (Internet service provider). In fact, only the ISP has the information matching IP addresses to social identities. Without legal evidence, it is very difficult to obtain such information from the ISP. This is particularly the case when the party making the request is not in the same country as the person to be identified. Major Internet corporations such as Google and Facebook can also make the connection, although they are bound by non-disclosure rules and subject to laws protecting user privacy. The confidence of their users and their continuing activity are contingent on such requirements.

Best paper at GECCO conference

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 14:23:42 GMT

The Genetic and Evolutionary Computation Conference (GECCO) conference is the major and most selective yearly conference on evolutionary computation. The paper "Local-Meta-Model CMA-ES for Partially Separable Functions'', of Zyed Bouzarkouna (IFP and Tao project-team), Anne Auger (Tao project-team) et Didier Yu Ding (IFP), obtained the best paper award in the Evolution Strategies / Evolutionary Programming track.

In the context of black-box optimization of numerical objective functions, stochastic search algorithms explore the search space in a random manner and face the so-called curse of dimensionality: the search space volume grows exponentially with the dimension. Consequently problems solved rarely have more than a few hundred of variables. When the problem has some structure like partial separability, exploiting this structure allows to break this curse of dimensionality and hence solve problems with a larger number of variables. This paper is the first to propose an efficient way to exploit partial separability as problem structure within the CMA-ES optimization algorithm coupled with meta-models. It opens the way for other research in this direction.

Inria creates centre in Chile

Wed, 5 Oct 2011 09:25:12 GMT

The project to build a research and innovation centre in Chile (the Communication and Information Research and Innovation Center - CIRIC) has been given the go-ahead and will start in 2012. Inria submitted this project as part of a programme for the creation of ‘international centres of excellence for competitiveness’ in Chile.

During Chilean technology transfer week, the Chilean economic development agency CORFO announced that Inria’s project to create a research and innovation centre had been selected.

The CIRIC will allow scientists from different fields to work closely together and provide a support structure for technology transfer. It will make it possible to introduce a research and development culture into universities in partnership with business, in order to bolster Chile’s competitiveness in computational science and technologies, particularly through the creation of ‘spin-offs’ and technology transfer to large companies and SMEs.

... introducing a research and development culture into universities in partnership with business...

The Centre will be based in Santiago, with a branch in Valparaíso. It will initially be built in partnership with nine Chilean universities. It will focus on three lines of research and development selected by CORFO:

Internet and telecommunications networks,
Management of natural resources,
Hybrid energy sources.

Through the CIRIC, Inria’s project-teams will be able to draw on additional human resources: researchers, PhD students, post-doctoral researchers, young engineers and experts in technology transfer. The research themes chosen will enable the institute to develop new expertise in these fields in an environment with excellent potential for technology transfer to industry.

The purpose of the CIRIC is to host and catalyse all of Inria’s collaborations in Chile and provide the institute with an initial base in Latin America. It will be open to new partnerships in both Latin America and Europe, particularly with those European institutions setting up a base in Chile as part of the programme, notably the Fraunhofer Institute from Germany and CSIRO ( Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) from Australia.

Franco-Chilean research in computational science

This project, submitted in 2009, is part of a long tradition of collaboration between France and Chile in applied mathematics and computer science. For over 20 years, Chilean universities have been taking part in research led by Inria, which, in return, trains a large number of Chilean students every year. The bilateral support programmes for joint scientific projects are very active. In 2001, Inria signed a bilateral agreement with CONICyT (Comisión Nacional de Investigación Científica y Tecnológica), which has resulted in more than 25 students completing their PhD thesis in an Inria team. Between 2006 and 2010, 23 cooperation projects between Chile and Inria have been launched, involving some forty Chilean researchers and producing 64 joint publications. This year, of the 67 associate teams supported by Inria that involve foreign partners, six are working with Chile, out of a total of nine associate teams in Latin America.

Fête de la science 2010

Mon, 3 Oct 2011 17:59:55 GMT

Celebration of the French Science Festival (Fête de la science) in all our research centres, portraits of researchers on the Pantheon : there is a lot of news to cover for the inauguration of our new "Inria.fr" website...

For the French science festival (Fête de la science), Inria invites you to visit its centres and meet with researchers. A host of events will be organised, from Scientific discovery paths in Lille to a scientific village in Rennes and an open house at the Inria Grenoble – Rhône Alpes centre. You can find the detailed programme of events in the web pages dedicated to each research centre.

During this national science festival, the artist Pierre Maraval will honour researchers through an exhibition entitled "1000 chercheurs parlent d'avenir" (1,000 researchers discuss the future) During the week of October 18-24, he will project portraits of 1,000 researchers on the facade of the Pantheon in Paris, each accompanied by their vision of the future, summed up in a single phrase. Among them you will find 26 Inria researchers and their 26 enthusiastic or poetic promises for a brilliant digital world.

We hope you enjoy browsing our new website and visiting our centres.

Happy Science Festival!

Guiding the visually impaired with augmented reality audio

Mon, 3 Oct 2011 11:17:27 GMT

The WAM project team has developed a mobile augmented reality audio application to help guide the visually impaired when using public transport. Real-life experiments in Grenoble focusing on improving the independence of disabled people have been conducted.

The application developed by the WAM project team is intended to help the visually-impaired move around both inside and outside buildings and to facilitate public transport access by using web and mobile phone technologies.

Follow the strip on the ground in a straight line for 45 metres

Warning: tram line on your right

In 5 metres, veer right and follow the strip on the ground

The application for mobiles puts the user in an augmented reality sound environment that combines voice announcements with a spatial range and guiding by 3D audio pointer. It also makes it easier to identify one’s location with localised bearings in the environment (informative POIs):

Quick fast food restaurant

Grenoble railway station

In addition, the system uses 3G connections to access public transport web services and thus provides real-time audio information on connecting service possibilities at each stop along with estimated wait times.

The application does not use GPS, instead employing a system for locating the person based on a smartphone inertial system that integrates the route taken. The system can be adapted to the walking pace of each individual thanks to dynamic calibration, and can readjust its position throughout the route. The system is accurate in terms of the number of steps taken, irrespective of the distance travelled, provided that the environment is structured (pavements, pedestrian crossings, gangways and corridors, etc.).

Preliminary experiments were conducted during the third “Accessibility Month” event hosted by the city of Grenoble. This event is intended to make the general public more aware of disability issues through various activities organised throughout October 2011: theme-based city walks, exhibitions, events, conferences and round table sessions are all part of the program.

The demonstration held at the SNCF railway station brought an end to the No. 7 route using public transport and which focused on the theme of “using hi-tech to find one’s way”.

Autonomie project: high-tech helps handicapped people

The application was developed as part of the Autonomy project, approved by the Minalogic competitiveness cluster and co-financed by the European Union. The project brings together researchers (Inria, UJF), small businesses (Raisonance, Ivès), major groups (STMicroelectronics, STEricsson) and local operators (SEMITAG, Grenoble Alpes Métro).

Measuring mercury concentration through synthetic bacteria

Tue, 27 Sep 2011 10:48:31 GMT

To design and produce a biosensor that can detect and measure the concentration of mercury in water: that is the ambitious aim of the eleven Grenoble students taking part in the 8th edition of the international synthetic biology competition iGEM.

More than 150 teams are participating in the 2011 iGEM (International Genetically Engineered Machines) competition, including, for the first time, a team from Grenoble. These eleven students from different disciplines will present a project in the environmental field, designing and producing a biosensor that can detect and measure the concentration of a pollutant – namely mercury – in water.

In order to complete their project, they must use DNA fragments listed in a standards library – ‘BioBricks’ – to build a system with new biological functions. Having designed and tested their system, they must produce it and get it to work in living cells.

The bacteria built using the ‘BioBricks’ behave differently according to the mercury concentration. If integrated in a test plate, this new biological system would, once a sample was added to the plate, allow a visual reading of the quantity of mercury in the sample.

The students are working closely with the seven Grenoble laboratories, which are providing high-level supervision. The Inria Ibis team, for instance, is playing an active role in the project, providing guidance to the students on the modelling of the bacterial systems. In synthetic biology, modelling is essential, as it allows the evolution of the system to be assessed with all the parameters taken into account. It also makes it possible to perform test constructions and therefore to predict the behaviour of the system before it is manufactured.

The Grenoble iGEM team will present its project at the preliminary round in Amsterdam on 1 and 2 October 2011. Only a few teams will then be selected to take part in the final in Boston and compete for the Grand Prize.

iGEM - International Genetically Engineered Machines

Run by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston since 2003, the international competition iGEM (International Genetically Engineered Machines) gets undergraduate university students involved in synthetic biology projects.

This discipline, which combines elements of biology, engineering, chemistry and computer science, aims to use engineering principles to design, build and synthesise new biological systems or functions.

All the work produced as part of the competition is freely available.

Thom Dunning, a successful collaboration

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 16:59:31 GMT

On June the 27th, The Joint Laboratory for Petascale Computing (JLPC), formed by the University of Illinois and Inria, held its fifth workshop in Grenoble. Thom Dunning, director of the Institute for Advanced Computing Applications and Technologies and the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) at the University of Illinois, explains why this collaboration is a success.

You started JLPC lab with Inria in 2009. How does this collaboration take place?

Thom Dunning: A very important aspect of the collaboration is the joint workshops we hold every 6 months. They are primarily focused on reporting on progress that has been made in existing projects and looking for new opportunities. And new opportunities arise all the time as we better understand the issues associated with petascale computing. The other major activity is the exchange of students and senior researchers in Illinois and in the various Inria laboratories in France. They can range from 3 days to weeks and months. Joint teams call each other quite frequently and work on joint publications, joint presentations at various conferences, develop software made available for the larger scientific community... And we often involve other research groups, for example in Japan or in France.

This year, the JLPC launched the G8 “Enabling Climate simulation at extreme scale” project. How did it start?

Thom Dunning: At the end of 2010 we started discussing the issues associated with climate modeling. Climate modeling has always taxed the most powerful computers we have because the models are very complex and involve coupling many different components together, with unique computer science issues associated with those simulation tasks. This discussion that came up is a typical way that collaborative projects start with: somebody has an idea, it is discussed with colleagues, the discussion gets deeper and deeper and finally a research pathway opens up.

Since the beginning of the collaboration with Inria through the JLPC Lab, which results did you get?

Thom Dunning: This joint work is addressing a richer set of problems than I had originally anticipated: fault tolerance and resilience, optimizing numerical libraries for petascale and exascale computing, new programming models and run-time environments for Blue Waters, the petascale computing system that will be installed beginning 2012 at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications, in Illinois.

The problems we tackle are so difficult that we need people with a broad range of expertise and different viewpoints.

What new opportunities have arisen for the last workshop in June?

Thom Dunning: One of the problems that have arisen these last years is: how can we improve the efficiency of I/O (input/output to disks)? Blue Waters will have about 20 petabytes of disk storage. Moving 20 petabytes of data back and forth can be a very time consuming task. An Inria/Illinois joint research project was recently established in this area.

With Blue Waters, will you continue the collaboration with Inria?

Thom Dunning: Yes. Some of the ideas of the joint lab are very good, but testing at scale really needs to be done. We are also looking at the technologies that will be used for exascale computing, for example GPUs: simplified types of processors that can execute instructions much faster than traditional CPUs. There is quite a bit of work to do on an application to enable it to make full use of the architecture of the GPU.

What is the contribution of Inria teams to your research?

Thom Dunning: Their work is both complementary and supplementary. The problems we tackle are so difficult that we need people with different expertise, experience and viewpoints. The bridges we build between the experience Inria teams have, especially in numerical libraries and resilience, and our expertise in programming models, communication libraries, I/O and GPU create a very rich knowledge environment.

Franco-American Collaborative Research Is Awarded American Prize

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 15:23:33 GMT

Matthieu Dorier received the second prize at the ACM Student Research Competition, held in conjunction with the International Conference on Supercomputing, in Tucson (Arizona), from 1st to 3rd June, 2011. He was awarded this prize while doing a Masters internship at the Joint Laboratory for Petascale Computing-JLPC, a joint laboratory set up by Inria and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

What was the focus of the work for which you received this award?

Matthieu Dorier: My research work focuses on the interaction between large-scale simulations and storage systems. My proposed approach limits the impact that writing data has on the computations performed by the simulation. In this case, I worked with a simulation of tornadoes, generating a colossal amount of data which must be stored efficiently. This approach could also be adapted to other areas, such as astrophysics or nuclear fusion simulations.

Can you tell us about your three-month internship at the Inria-Urbana-Champaign joint laboratory?

Matthieu Dorier: It was a very pleasant environment, offering optimal work conditions, and the people I worked with, including Franck Cappello, one of my internship supervisors, were all very supportive. In my PhD thesis which I will start in September, I intend to further develop my research within the framework of this collaborative effort, so I will be completing a number of further internships at UIUC. This will allow me to have access to American HPC platforms, and frequent contact with the research world in the United States, without having to worry about the time difference...

How do you see this collaborative effort between Inria and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign?

Matthieu Dorier: One of the objectives of the joint lab is to provide solutions for the efficient operation of the next supercomputer from the NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications), Blue Waters. France has a good candidate supercomputer (ranked among the top ten worldwide), but the United States has numerous very powerful supercomputers. Our papers will always have a lesser impact than those papers presenting experiments using hundreds of thousands of computing cores. This is a shame for France, and is why we need to collaborate with U.S. teams as we do via this "joint lab."

A productive partnership based on high performance computing

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 12:05:03 GMT

As the fifth workshop of the Inria-Urbana-Champaign joint lab (Joint Laboratory on Petascale Computing-JLPC) came to an end in Grenoble, Franck Cappello, its co-director, took stock of the activities of this institution dedicated to high-performance computing. Two years after its creation, it was now time to review its most emblematic results and to present its current research on climate and the international G8 Exascale project, with which the joint laboratory is associated.

To decide upon the best publications resulting from research conducted at the JLPC, Franck Cappello relies on the selections made by Supercomputing. This major conference dedicated to intensive supercomputing has chosen "4 publications among 352 papers submitted. One of these articles concerns a fault tolerance system which presents the first large-scale simulation results of the earthquake of March 11, 2011, in Japan."

On the subject of software development, Franck Cappello note "the success of a Masters internship which resulted in an ACM award (student competition)." The research of Matthieu Dorier, the student in question, focuses on a tornado simulation application. This example underscore the quality of the training provided in an environment that brings together all research stakeholders on the same campus. Franck Cappello also attributed these positive results to the participation of expert teams on both sides of the Atlantic, and the presence of a permanent Inria researcher at Urbana. "This allows us to detect potential opportunities for collaboration, to facilitate our discussions and to resolve potential deadlocks much more quickly."

These positive results are due to the participation of expert teams on both sides of the Atlantic.

These various factors have contributed to the renown of the joint laboratory beyond France and the United States. Among more than 80 projects submitted in response to the G8 Exascale call for proposals, one of the six selected projects on climate simulation using high-performance computing was from the joint laboratory. The Exascale supercomputer "will accurately answer questions such as: what changes should we expect as regards sea levels and ocean currents? (...) Some applications are already running with a 10 kilometers grid resolution. For Exascale, our aim is a 1 kilometers grid. This entails a very large increase of the grid and a need to multiply our computing power by a factor of 1000."

Franck Cappello notes that the United States was several steps ahead in this area. So, he considers it desirable for Europe at present "to successfully join forces with American partners, trying to achieve a good balance and benefits for both sides."

Andreas Enge : Computational tools serving mathematics

Thu, 22 Sep 2011 16:15:59 GMT

This year anew, four young researchers form Inria have got a grant from the very selective European Research Council, ERC, to take the lead of a five year long exploratory research with a budget of 1 to 1.5 million Euros. Interview with one of the prize-winners, the mathematician and computer specialist, Andreas Enge, head of the Inria project-team Lfant in Bordeaux.

What is the subject of your project funded by the ERC ?

Andreas Enge : We aim at mixing mathematics with computer science, particularly Numbers Theory and algebraic geometry. Pure mathematicians who want to solve a problem often need computations. For example they can calculate many particular cases to identify common patterns and extract ideas on theorems to be demonstrated.

But most of the time, they just use low-efficiency methods that only work on small examples. I believe that one needs to use the theoretical progress realized in computer science to provide powerful tools to help mathematicians. This approach is essential to solve abstract mathematical problems as well as to realize efficient software.

In my project we are interested among others in mathematical objects that require Numbers Theory and geometry. And that will probably be part of the design of 3^rd millennium cryptosystems.

What is the originality of your approach?

AE : My idea is to combine theoretical computer science results, among others Complexity Theory and certificates to prove the correctness of calculus, to serve mathematics and symbolical arithmetic.

In the meantime, the results will be validated by freely available implementations. This requires two different areas of expertise that are hard to find together. My colleagues in Lfant project-team are perfect examples for these skills. We are part of a computer science and automatic research center and at the same time, we are members of the Mathematics Institute of Bordeaux and its team on Numbers Theory known throughout the world.

Mathematicians need computer-implemented algorithms and I think it is time to add more computer science to the story.

How did you get into computer science and become a head of an Inria research-team?

AE : I have always been very motivated by applicative aspects since I enjoy the idea that high range mathematics can provide something tangible that others will be able to use whether in security of information or throughout software distribution.

I have specialized in computer science during my studies in mathematics at Augsburg University and I wrote my thesis about security of hyperelliptic cryptosystems.

When a research team from Ecole Polytechnique that focused especially on cryptology offered me a post-doctoral position, I was very tempted, all the more so that I am a huge Francophile. When in France, the possibility of getting a permanent job in an Inria research team was very attractive to me, with the prospect of focusing completely on my research.

How do you plan on using your ERC grant?

AE : My purpose is to strengthen the team and make it last. The grant will allow me to hire 3 post-doctoral students, possibly recruiting them abroad, which is important because the double skill (both mathematics and computer science) is very rare everywhere. The fact of not being pressured by organisms’ schedules for applications will help me attract them… Perhaps will they be willing to stay in the team then! I have also planned to hire a research engineer for 5 years to help us with the development of the software PARI/GP made by the team and that will be used by mathematicians throughout the world. In addition, I will put up the money for a thesis and organize a couple of symposiums in Bordeaux.

Cryptology : The third generation will be at crossroads between mathematics and computer science.

The cryptographic system that currently provides safety for credit cards, online purchases or any other https-protected website dates back from the seventies. It is based on the existence of two keys, one of them public, meant to cipher the message and the other one private, only known by the receiver and the only one capable of deciphering it.

To design such a system, one needs to identify procedures that are easy in a way, but difficult in the other. For example, it is easy (for a computer!) to find the result of the multiplication of two numbers of over 300 digits but it is very difficult to find back those numbers from the result of 600 digits.

It appears that pure mathematics offer solutions to this type of problems. The following generation of cryptosystems that provide electronic passport or identity cards security has switched multiplications for operations on elliptic curves, sophisticated objects from algebraic geometry.

Andreas Enge goes further: 3^rd generation systems that would use even more complex curves. The whole point is to get to know what level of security those curves can provide and how to find concrete curves keeping those promises of security with most efficiency. Mathematicians’ work that cannot be made without computers and calculus will probably require new algorithms and huge computation capacity.

Successful applicants 2011

The world’s best scientists in the field of parallel computing gathered in Bordeaux

Thu, 22 Sep 2011 15:38:08 GMT

3 days of conferences, 2 days of workshops, the 2011 edition of Euro-Par, the reference symposium about parallel computing in Europe, which took place from the 29th of August to the 2nd of September, gathered over 330 international scientists from the field for high quality meetings at the core of the Aquitanian Basin.

Technically advanced subjects with very concrete applications.

It is often difficult for the general public to grasp notions of High Performance Computing (HPC). Yet this side of computer science has revolutionized our everyday life. Did you know for example that the Ipad 2 was as powerful as the most powerful supercomputer created in 1985? In this field, things run fast… really fast!

This is why computer science researchers from all over the world meet on a regular basis in order to build up future collaborations that will give birth to significant progress in the field.

Nowadays, scientists from various fields (medicine, food-processing, industries, and so on) manage to simulate at a molecular level thanks to an optimized use of parallel machines with hundreds of thousands of processors.

A symposium known throughout the world with its area’s best scientists.

“Rock stars” from the scientific field such as Pete Beckman, Alessandro Curioni or Toni Cortes, could give an overview of their works and share about it with the scientific community.

A real catalyst for future proposals, this type of meetings contributes in making of Aquitania a fertile land for computer science.

Inria and its partners (CNRS, University of Bordeaux, Labri, IBM, the UCB and the Regional Council of Aquitaine) are very pleased about the success of this meeting and the richness of exchanges.

Please note that this year; the "Euro-Par Achievement Award" presented by the steering committee of Euro-Par has rewarded Michel Cosnard, CEO of Inria for his whole contribution to the field.

The “popularization” of the web is transforming social relationships

Tue, 20 Sep 2011 17:27:30 GMT

Internet of the New opportunities, new challenges, new risks and new fears are emerging. The Internet of the future, gradually taking shape right now in the research field, has generated numerous debates concerning among other things the protection of privacy.future

A debate between Anne-Marie Kermarrec (Senior Research Scientist) and Dominique Cardon (Sociologist).

What are the great milestones of the Internet of the future? What is the major challenge?

Anne-Marie Kermarrec: : Internet usage has changed considerably over the years. Originally reserved for military personnel, it was subsequently used by academic staff. Later, the general public also gained access to it, initially as readers and consumers and today as content producers in their own right, leaving traces and information each time they go online.

Dominique Cardon: This “popularization” of the web is also changing our social behaviour. Back in the pioneering days, the Internet was reserved for a select group of people, most of whom were highly educated. However, with the emergence of social networks in the mid-2000s, all web users now have the possibility to become both readers and participants, thanks to the convergence of communication and publication media technologies. As the pioneers saw it, the web was a completely separate world. Today, it cannot be denied that it has become part of our everyday lives. Our real and virtual lives are increasingly converging.

Anne-Marie Kermarrec: These changes were neither planned nor anticipated. They have left us with some real problems, particularly in terms of data confidentiality and privacy protection. Although the Internet was originally designed as a "web" to limit the risk of the network being destroyed in the event of an attack, the fact nevertheless remains that the data is centralised in the hands of a number of major companies such as Google and Facebook. As this change had not been planned for from a legislative viewpoint, the confidentiality guarantees provided by these companies are relatively weak or even non-existent. Faced with the danger of a "Big Brother" situation emerging, it is now vital to conceive the Internet from something other than a technical angle and to initiate major changes by encouraging the decentralisation of data. The goal must be to bring about the disappearance of "central authorities" possessing complete information about individuals.

Dominique Cardon: The risk is not limited to companies taking control. The centralisation of information can also take place at a state level. We can easily imagine the possibilities for political misbehaviour which arise from such a situation.

Anne-Marie Kermarrec: This problem is central to the work which we are currently undertaking at Inria. Faced with such a danger, we need technology capable of decentralising web functions. Typically, rather than using a search engine on the Internet, the user has a function which, at a given moment, combines several services in order to provide the best possible response.

Moving from an Internet run by companies to an Internet focused on its users.

In other words we will be moving from an Internet run by companies to an Internet focused on its users, in which the services will be combined according to needs, within a precise framework and for a given timeframe. Technically, the task before us is a complex one but is by no means insurmountable. This move to a user-centric Internet must also open up new perspectives regarding the filtering of information – another key challenge for the Internet of the future. Between emails, blogs, websites and chat rooms, today’s web users are drowning under a sea of information. I don't have any solutions to propose here, but it is clear that we need to find a way of optimising the circulation of information and filtering it to ensure greater relevancy.

Dominique Cardon: Where individuals are concerned, today’s Internet has brought with it some major social repercussions. The dream of democratisation on the part of the pioneers (everyone communicating with everyone) has not become reality. The reason for this is fairly simple. Although the Internet facilitates contact in the virtual world, the principles governing social relationships have remained the same. In other words, in both the virtual world and the real world, people only communicate when they have shared interests. The result is that the Internet has not broken down social and cultural barriers. The groups remain the same. The key players and extroverts of the virtual world are the same as those in the real world whereas the shy and thoughtful types, who nevertheless exist as a real-world group, are disappearing in the virtual world. Other changes likely to have major social consequences are currently underway. Our relationship to paper-based written material is declining while our relationship to writing in general is being transformed. Web users are faced with overabundant information while the numerous economic models generated by the Internet have trouble existing alongside the older models. And these changes are accompanied by the new risk of surveillance and tracking.

Although centralisation brings with it no positive benefits, it must be remembered that interpersonal, decentralised surveillance will also have an effect upon our societies.

I share Anne-Marie Kermarrec’s opinion of the dangers of data centralisation, but I am even more alarmed by the phenomenon of interpersonal surveillance, which has been particularly heightened through the use of social networks. In a more or less consensual manner, web users are publishing enormous amounts of information and are monitoring one another. The boundary between private discussions and public content has not yet been truly established. Collecting data about a given individual is therefore relatively simple and such information can then be used out of context. As an example, a private conversation may be viewed by a recruiter and used to the advantage or detriment of a possible candidate. The relationship between parents and their children may also be affected. To sum up, although centralisation brings nothing positive for us, interpersonal and decentralised surveillance also looks set to turn our society upside down.

Joseph Paradiso: “There are pieces of ubiquitous sensing technology already out there”

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 18:00:11 GMT

Director of the Responsive environments group in the MIT Media laboratory, Joseph Paradiso was invited to the IN’tech seminar about ambient intelligence on the 30^th of June in Grenoble. He presented the revolutionary work of the Media Lab on Living with Ubiquitous Sensing and Dynamic Responsive Media.

How do you feel about this IN’tech seminar?

Joseph Paradiso: There were many academics and companies with different expertise and ideas. It’s very stimulating to see these perspectives being exchanged. Personally, I presented the big challenge for Media Lab: how to connect the nervous systems of the people to the nervous systems of electronic sensors which are penetrating everything (the cities, the dwellings…). Some of my colleagues like Edward Boyden work on brain-computer interfaces, but this is still in the future. Right now, we’re looking at different means of browsing sensor networks with a virtual world. Last year we imported a detailed cap model of the Media Lab into a game environment, so that the sensor data shows up as animations in the Media Lab. You can make the walls translucent, see the temperature of every office, the people moving all over the Media Lab, you can get some idea of audio levels. If you have an ID badge you see the way the people move around the building.

We’re going to do this at a larger scale in Media Lab, working with Schneider on lighting too...

What are the prospects for these technologies?

©Inria

Joseph Paradiso: We begin to look at virtual world as a way to mediate the sensor data. For people doing any kind of building or site management, this is a vital tool. We’ve worked with large energy companies on workers’ safety. We’re also looking at energy saving sensors. In the building we have set up an area where all the air conditioning is controlled by a system linked to a portable device that measures temperature, how you’re moving, and your sense of comfort. We saved about 25% of energy. We’re going to do this at a larger scale in Media Lab, working with Schneider on lighting too. We also do a lot of wearable electronics. We put wearable sensors on a big American sports team’s players in order to ascertain performance and try to predict and prevent injury. In addition, we’re looking at the wearable signals that may be relevant for people doing physical therapy and sports medicine.

Is there a cultural difference between Europe and the United States in the way the users adopt these technologies?

Joseph Paradiso: In the USA people love new gadgets, they love to adopt new technologies, but sometimes they aren't aware of the intended purposes. The Europeans try to do things that are good for everybody. Energy saving is a good example. But I think you have to value both approaches. It works best if you take the best of all.

Do you think that a product with wearable sensors could be accepted in Europe?

Joseph Paradiso: Yes, people in Europe would get things like this. Sports teams all over the world use technologies. The Nike Plus is one example of non professional use, inspired by all the work we did on the shoes with sensors. People can look on how much weight they’re going to lose, how far they can run… There are pieces of technology already out there, but I think it’s just the beginning. I can see markets that will appeal to people. And one thing I’m intrigued by is music generated from motion. In 1997 we put the first sensors in people’s shoes and let the music come from them as they dance. Now I can also do that with a mobile phone.

In the future, what could a world with ubiquitous displays look like?

Joseph Paradiso: We’ll probably have wearable displays, like glasses. How is information going to come to you? It could be channels, your avatar talking directly to you, or words that appear as you walk. But before we get there, I think we’re going to use displays in the environment.

Joëlle Coutaz: "The applications of ambient intelligent are limitless"

Co-leader of the IN’Tech seminar “Ambient intelligence: evolution or revolution?”, Joëlle Coutaz focused her studies at the Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble on the software aspects of human-computer interfaces. Overview.

How did the IN’Tech ambient intelligence seminar go?

Joëlle Coutaz: We had around a hundred enthusiastic participants. Local players who work in this field or who are starting to explore it found it to be an interesting and rewarding day. There were also a number of curious professionals, who see a clear future for the interconnection between machines and digital services.

What is your vision for ambient intelligence technologies?

Joëlle Coutaz: They can offer adapted services that fit individual needs in all circumstances, but technical delivery requires us to overcome the numerous challenges facing different disciplines such as computing, services and networks. There are physical devices to be invented, major software to be designed and technologies to be integrated etc. In the future, I would like everyone to be able to buy small sensors and components that they can assemble and program themselves, even without realising it.
On the other hand, sociologists will need to help predict future uses. In the beginning, we thought about utility; now, in our societies, we are increasingly talking about wellbeing and desirability.

What are the current applications for ambient intelligence?

Joëlle Coutaz: There are products in the fields of homecare for the elderly, energy saving, security and building automation. In the long term, the applications are limitless! To achieve this, people have to trust the technologies and the technologies have to respect this trust.

How do you view American researchers in the ambient intelligence field?

Joëlle Coutaz: America is the leader in the ambient intelligence field. Mark Weiser coined the phrase “ubiquitous computing” in 1988, and Europe followed suit with the “Disappearing Computer” project in… 1998! Europe is not bad at coming up with ideas, but the Americans are always way ahead in terms of execution. This is thanks to the huge investment they receive from industry and thanks to their multi-disciplinary approach. In France, we are too hesitant to take risks.

The Rmod team takes the first prize for technological innovation

Mon, 12 Sep 2011 15:21:38 GMT

The FUEL software developed by the Rmod project-team has won first prize at the 8th edition of the Technology Innovation Awards (European Smalltalk User Group 2011).

The prize was awarded to the Rmod project-team at the ESUG 2011 conference for their FUEL software. All candidates were given the opportunity to present their systems in a dedicated session held on Monday August 22, 2011. Following the presentations, those attending the conference were able to vote for their favourite project.

Fuel Software
Fuel is a generic, open-source software program that enables the user to serialize and deserialize objects based on a serialization algorithm.

Reflecting on the collaboration between the Mint project team and Le Fresnoy

Mon, 5 Sep 2011 17:05:23 GMT

The MINT team, which works on methods and tools for gestural interaction, joined forces with Alexandre Maubert, an artist from the Studio National des Arts Contemporains Le Fresnoy, to work on the "Monade" piece. Laurent Grisoni, Mint project team-leader, tells us more about this adventure.

What made you accept this collaboration?

Laurent Grisoni: Today’s new generation of adults were born into the world of digital technology. This concerns all areas of the population. We therefore wanted to get closer to the artistic community, to work with them on installations presenting issues that are related to aspects the team is working on. It’s about promoting MINT's research work, and also facing new technological challenges. Furthermore, these collaborations are an opportunity for us to rise to challenges that are of real interest with regard to our research work.

Have your colleagues been surprised by this collaboration?

Laurent Grisoni: Working with people from "outside" the scientific community generally poses the risk of teams losing their focus, which is why the reaction to this type of project is frequently one of caution. Nevertheless, attitudes have begun to change. Even if the work process is difficult to implement, collaborating with the field of digital art is highly motivating. Furthermore, projects that produce technologically convincing results bring a certain dynamic to other fields of application, which helps justify these projects. Past projects also help legitimize future collaborations.

What difficulties did you come up against with Monade?

Laurent Grisoni: A research team needs to adopt a knowledge-building logic, which does not necessarily correspond to the artist’s rationale. A compromise therefore needs to be found between the artist’s approach and the team’s work. For this reason, it is essential to explicitly distinguish between what is feasible, without presenting any risk, and what might be possible (and therefore not entailing a concrete commitment). Likewise, it is important to make oneself clearly understood when the project is not feasible. This requires scientists to make a significant effort with regards to translating technological terminology. But this is an exercise that we are not often faced with.

Do you have any other projects underway?

Laurent Grisoni: There’s a project with the music group, EZ3kiel. This is also a project relating to gestural interaction, but we can’t say any more about it for the time being... a concert is being planned for a date between now and next summer.

SADCO: optimisation on a pan-European scale

Mon, 5 Sep 2011 10:15:18 GMT

To mark the first SADCO summer school, we interview its coordinator, Hasnaa Zidani, from the Commands project team, which is developing this project focusing on optimal control. Hasnaa explains why she wants to train young researchers through this programme.

Why did you decide to undertake this type of European project?

Hasnaa Zidani : Firstly, we wanted to make training through research for PhD students and post-doctoral researchers the core of the project. This seventh FPRTD (framework programme for research and technological development) is vast. We focused on Marie Curie projects and more specifically on an ITN (or “initial training network”). The idea is to help career development for young researchers through a collaborative research project undertaken by multiple European partners. To talk in concrete terms, the project officially began on 1 January 2011 and will last four years involving 11 partners, three of which from industry. The project has received extensive financing to train 25 PhD students and post-doctoral researchers. A personalised research and training programme has been devised for each young scientist within his or her parent structure. Our project stands out by requiring these researchers to spend six months working with another project partner. This means that they are integrated in collaborative projects from the outset, in addition to their professional relations on a day-to-day basis with colleagues from other structures or when another team visits, which ensures genuine exchanges and a very rewarding experience in human and scientific terms. And of course, not only is there training; there’s also research! Project partners boast varied and complementary expertise in production, defence, etc. All this expertise will contribute to doctoral and post-doctoral training.

What exactly is the SADCO research theme?

H. Z. : In the SADCO project (which stands for “Sensitivity Analysis for Deterministic Controller Design”) we focus on optimisation and specifically on optimal control systems. This means we attempt to establish the rules and control strategies for complex and dynamic systems (those which change over time and in space). The aim is to optimise specific measurements to ensure better performance. Optimal control is a mathematical tool that can be applied to many fields, such as avionics by optimising rocket trajectories, the automotive industry by minimising collision impact, telecoms to establish a satellite’s optimal position and energy through intelligent resource management.

Optimal control can be used in avionics, the automotive industry and energy resource management

We work on optimising and even changing systems, but these are always dynamic systems, which are very complex to manage. For example, when calculating a shuttle orbit there are vast numbers of parameters to be taken into account every second. Closer to home, optimal control can be used on your hybrid car to determine when the electric or combustion engine should be used so as to manage the vehicle’s available energy more efficiently. Optimising dynamic systems has been a very active research field for several decades. More and more applied and theoretical benefits are constantly being found. Current technology is looking for increasingly complex robust systems offering ever-greater performance.

What is the aim of an event like the summer school for this type of project?

H. Z. : Our partners are committed to collaborative research projects and also to joint training activities. We had a first kick-off event in March 2011: a day focusing on an industrial workshop organised by Astrium for applications in the aerospace sector. The next two days really were the project launch with a meeting of all our partners featuring over a hundred registered participants. The combination of theory and practice was particularly interesting and rewarding. The presentation of research programmes from Europe’s leading industrial operators was a major motivation for young graduates to join ambitious projects, offering as it did a vision of the challenges facing industry tomorrow and of the mathematical tools which must be developed to overcome them. The commitment at team level was clear. As for the summer school, the aim is still to share and to enhance collaboration. There will accordingly be classes on specific aspects of optimal control and its mathematical analysis, along with presentations by well-known OC specialists. Young researchers will also have an opportunity to present their own work and thus share with their colleagues. Our aim is for everyone to leave with new ideas. We will know that discussions have been rewarding if, like the last time, once the summer school is over, researchers continue to share equations and diagrams on a board!

Astos, industrial partner of SADCO

Dipl.-Ing. Sven Weikert Head of Development and Site Manager Stuttgart

Astos Solutions is specialized on mission analysis and control problems in the aerospace domain. Further key working areas are safety&risk analyses , UAVs and solutions for situational awareness centres. Our optimization, simulation and analysis software ASTOS is an ESA reference software.

Our simulation and analysis domain is very much correlated with mathematical problem formulations and numerical methods. Non-linear programming is used by the aerospace industry since decades. However, many problems require advanced mathematical solutions. Here engineers gain from the support of applied mathematicians with a fundamental technical background. Since several years Astos Solutions has a fruitful cooperation Prof. Bueskens from the University of Bremen and Matthias Gerdts (university of the Bundeswehr, Munich). Due to our working field it is important for us to cultivate such contacts to the mathematical community. The SADCO project is the ideal platform to do this and to get also new contacts and potential partners for industrial and ESA projects. SADCO is also an opportunity to give young mathematical experts an understanding of typical engineering problems. Problems that are sometimes different from typical problems of mathematicians.
Therefore we see SADCO also as a platform that allows us to influence the education of young professionals.

Providing solutions for more secure exchanges

Fri, 2 Sep 2011 09:58:59 GMT

The Secsi project-team (a joint team with the Specification and Verification Laboratory (LSV), the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the ENS-Cachan) works on verifying cryptographic protocols, such as those used for e-commerce or ATMs, and installing intrusion detection tools in IT systems, so as to alert users to any potentially malicious actions. As three of its members apply for their habilitation to advise doctoral theses, we take a closer look at the research work of this team.

Stéphanie Delaune: "In terms of tools to protect anonymity, it’s a whole new field"

Our identity and personal information about us is stored on a variety of media, and protected by cryptographic protocols. Whether it be via e-commerce or our bank cards, we believe we are aware of all the situations in which encrypted exchanges are in place to protect us. However, new faults are frequently discovered, and more in-depth research is thus a constant requirement. Did you know, for example, that the person sitting next to you in an airport lounge could find out your identity from the chip in your biometric passport? Electronics is playing an increasingly important role in our lives, leading to ever more frequent information exchanges, which must be protected. In the future, cars will be able to communicate with each other, providing information on traffic jams or stopping distances, but it is important to ensure that they don't also offer ill-intentioned persons the opportunity to find out your address or monitor your driving habits. All such new applications pose new challenges.
Until recently, I worked mainly on issues of confidentiality and authentication for applications such as those used in e-commerce or ATMs. But today, our digital identity covers a much broader spectrum, and the mathematical verification techniques that are currently used to protect confidentiality cannot simply be transferred to the protection of anonymity. We need to adapt our existing solutions – it’s a whole new field. The protection of privacy will represent an ever greater challenge in the years to come.
My next steps? I have been appointed Head of the French National Research Agency VIP project (Verification of Indistinguishable Properties), due to start in January 2012.

Steve Kremer: "Through the application of mathematics, we can create a protocol that more closely resembles real-life models"

Security protocols are designed to guarantee confidentiality, authentication and anonymity. They are being used in ever more diverse fields, such as recently in the context of electronic voting. In 2011, Europe saw internet voting made available in parliamentary elections in Switzerland and Estonia as well as in local and regional elections in Norway.

Our work involves formalising and analysing security protocols via automated processes. This requires us to model the protocol, write it in a formal, mathematical language, and then describe exactly what each of its different properties should represent. If we look at the example of electronic voting, the issue of anonymity might seem fairly obvious at first glance. But if there is a unanimous vote, then we will be able to tell which way everyone voted… So it really is essential to be very precise, and to cover all possibilities. We ensure that attackers can’t get information on the votes cast, but also that voters themselves don’t give away information: it is important to preserve anonymity, even if the voter in question has no objection to making the content of their vote public.
More recently, I have been working on the computational correction of our models. As I mentioned, we start by modelling a protocol and then we verify it, but in so doing, we deviate somewhat from the program as it will run in reality. For example, we might project our own ideal of a potential attacker, as it is up to us to define the various actions that he might carry out. There is of course always the risk that we will fail to consider potential threats, which then aren’t included in the model. With the use of cryptographic devices, the description of the protocol will be more precise, and we will be able to simulate attackers able to discover secrets or run arbitrary algorithms, for example. This will enable us to develop more robust proofs, using a more precise model which should in theory take into account more potential attacks.
My next steps? I will be joining the Cassis project-team at the Nancy – Grand-Est Centre as of 1 September 2011.

Graham Steel: "We are working on defining a new security standard for smart cards"

All smart cards work on the basis of a specific application programming interface (API). The system is designed to ensure that the cryptographic key never needs to leave the card - it can encrypt and decrypt, but all this is done internally, within the chip. The API therefore covers all of the execution commands which can be sent to the smart card.
For 26 years, the most commonly used API has been PKCS 11, which is used in particular by banks. In 2003, it was manually proven that attacks were possible on this model, and this was then confirmed using a model checker in 2008. But correcting security failings is no simple matter, particularly when you consider that the implementation of this standard model can vary significantly, and that each situation brings its very own risks of attack… It is actually very difficult to develop a secure configuration using PKCS 11.
To address this, we first suggested changes to the models, so as to gradually eliminate certain threats of attack. We were hoping to perfect the existing model. But as a result of our work, we began instead to design a new standard, offering a much higher level of security, together with fewer possible variations in implementation, which thus reduces risk even further. Our work aims not only to break the protocols, but also to find new solutions. We hope to soon be able to offer a new model, which will be easier to use.

Test of time award for Dale Miller (Parsifal)

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 12:11:42 GMT

Dale Miller, leader of the Parsifal project-team, has been awarded during the LICS 2011 conference (June in Toronto) for a paper he wrote in 1991.

The test of time award which is given during the LICS conference aims at rewarding papers which have had an influence since their publication, twenty years earlier. Thus, Dale Miller got this award for his paper Logic Programming in a Fragment of Intuitionistic Linear Logic which he wrote in 1991 with his student Hosh Hodas.

Logic Programming in a Fragment of Intuitionistic Linear Logic :

This is one of the first explorations of logic programming style proof search in Girard's linear logic. The paper radically changed the perception of what logic programming might be, on the heels of linear logic changing the perception of what logic might be. In contrast to the traditional intuitionistic basis of logic programming, this new foundation permitted "stateful" (eg. modelling database updates) and "resourceful" (eg. in linguistic models) declarative models.

A “suggestion box” for technology transfer and innovation in Europe

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 10:36:49 GMT

From 28 to 30 January, the Inria Rennes – Bretagne Atlantique research centre is hosting its partners in the FITT project for a second working session. Objectives: promote continued discussions between partners, exchange experiences and know-how and identify priority projects.

Information and communication science and technology (ICST) are considered to be one of the main driving forces of the knowledge economy for building the future in our European countries. Commercial applications of research in ICST and the resulting technology transfers are becoming essential. That said, developing new products and services based on the work of researchers is not always an easy thing to do. Many ideas never make it to the marketplace due to a failure to identify promising work early on, to transfer it over into concrete projects and to organise commercial applications for it. How can we improve commercial outlets for research and technology transfer in Europe? This is the problem being addressed by the FITT project (Fostering Interregional Exchange in ICT Technology Transfer).

In order to close the gap between research and industry, the European Union has launched the FITT project. This project brings together in various task forces specialists in technology transfer and innovation from seven ICST research institutions of North-Western Europe. The objective of these groups is to define, by April 2011, a “toolkit” that consolidates the procedures, approaches, techniques and best practices in this field. This “toolkit” is intended to serve as the basis for a programme of trans-national professional training dedicated to professional applications of research and to technology transfer.

From 28 to 30 January, the Inria Rennes research centre is hosting its partners for another working session. In the course of various workshops, this session will help promote cooperation and exchanges between the partners that were initiated in Stuttgart in April 2008. Its ultimate goal is to identify a certain number of problems to be given first priority. Each problem identified will be subjected to more intense work over the coming months in the aim of finding solutions, defining strategies and indicators or coming up with recommendations. One of the workshops will be directed by Kjell Hakan-Narfelt, an internationally renowned specialist on the subject of technology transfer.

Parameter estimation : how to use incomplete biological data ?

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 09:36:07 GMT

Modelling biological systems, in particular at the level of the dynamics of cellular processes, is the objective of the IBIS team. Biological data are becoming ever more plentiful, but their use in estimating the mathematical parameters of a model remains an especially difficult problem. Sara Berthoumieux, a PhD student in the IBIS team, tells us about her work on the subject, carried out as part of her thesis.

What are your principal avenues of research?

Sara Berthoumieux: We are working on modelling biological systems, in particular gene networks and metabolic networks. We are using dynamic models that explain the development of these systems over time. For my thesis, we were particularly interested in metabolic networks. Metabolism involves all the chemical reactions allowing energy to be produced from nutrients in the environment, as well as all the proteins necessary for cell development and growth. We studied the metabolism of the bacterium Escherichia coli. This bacterium is widely studied in biology because it is easy to culture. It is therefore well understood, which facilitates modelling. The purpose of this research is to study the metabolism for a better comprehension of the processes, with prospects in particular for biotechnology applications involving E. coli.

What difficulties have been encountered?

Sara Berthoumieux: The main difficulty lies in obtaining values for the mathematical parameters of the model. These are coefficients which enable reactions to be quantified. They are essential in construction of the model. But these parameters are not directly measurable, as most of the time they are not linked to a biological quantity. We must therefore estimate them from biological data on the output of the model, in particular here the metabolite concentrations, components of the chemical reactions and fluxes of these reactions. It should be noted that it is very difficult to measure these values precisely, as metabolic reactions are very fast and the metabolites of the compounds are unstable. This necessitates the use of relatively recent, sophisticated measurement techniques with very powerful measurement apparatus. These new techniques yield a large amount of information, but it contains a great deal of noise due to the significant experimental uncertainties. In addition, it contains a lot of missing data; this is highly problematic in estimating the parameters of the model. Our work therefore consisted of proposing a method for estimating parameters adapted to the model we are studying, to facilitate the use of large biological data sets, even if these data are incomplete and imprecise.

Can you tell us a little more about this method of estimating parameters?

Sara Berthoumieux: We searched in the literature of biological data on metabolites and selected the largest existing data set, published in an article in the journal Science in 2007. To estimate the parameters, we consider the missing data to be random variables, the distribution of which is specified starting from observed data. To estimate the values of parameters starting from these data, we have adapted a standard method from the literature. In addition, we calculate a margin of error called the confidence interval for each parameter. However, we noted that even using the largest existing data set and a valid method, the confidence intervals obtained do not always allow precise estimates of parameter values to be obtained. At present, it is still very difficult to obtain experimental data that are sufficiently precise and abundant for calibration of quantitative models of large metabolic networks!

This work was carried out jointly with the Biometry and Evolutionary Biology Laboratory (LBBE). The model studied was designed especially for the article by Matteo Brilli, currently a post-doctoral researcher in the Inria Bamboo project team.

Sara Berthoumieux has won the Ian Lawson Van Toch Memorial Award f at ISMB/ECCB 2011.

The ISMB/ECCB 2011 conference, to be held from 15 to 19 July 2011 in Vienna, Austria, is one of the most important gatherings in bioinformatics. For this 2011 edition, the 19th international conference on Intelligent Systems for Molecular Biology (ISMB) is being organised jointly with the 10th European Congress of Conservation Biology (ECCB). The main objective is development and application of advanced computational methods for biological problems. The conference brings together scientists in computer science, molecular biology, mathematics, statistics and other related fields to offer a programme reflecting the diversity of disciplines within bioinformatics and computational biology.

Sara Berthoumieux has won the Ian Lawson Van Toch Memorial Award for the paper "Identification of metabolic network models from incomplete high-throughput datasets".

The second French representative at this conference is also an Inria research scientist: Eric Tanier, a member of the Baobab team of the Biometry and Evolutionary Biology Laboratory: "Mapping ancestral genomes with massive gene loss: a matrix sandwich problem".

Modelling the temporal, spatial, and evolutionary dynamics of biological cells

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 09:13:37 GMT

At the interface between IT and life sciences, the Beagle team, in the process of being created, is interested in modelling the properties of living cells to understand the evolution of these properties and their role in the interactions between cells and their environment. Guillaume Beslon, professor at INSA, Lyon, and manager of the future team presents the research directions and scientific issue.

What are the research directions of the future Beagle team?

Guillaume Beslon : In general, we are interested in how a cell interacts with its environment. A cell is considered as a network of entities that process information. We try to understand the mechanisms by which the cell receives information, integrates it, reacts to it, and how these mechanisms are put in place during evolution. Briefly, it approaches the functional and historical roots of the complexity of biological systems. Our analysis therefore comes at different scales: that of the life of cells and that of their evolution.

Our first research direction concerns "digital evolution". Our simulation software enables us to construct a model of an organism, with its genome, its proteins, and the conditions of its evolution - parameters of competition and variation (mutations). A scalable loop then enables us to "create" numerous generations of these "virtual bacteria", and to observe the structures that emerge. By subsequently varying the conditions, we can attribute a given structure to a given evolutionary condition. Our AEVOL software enables us, for example, to simulate the evolution of a genome and understand why we observe such diversity in the genetic structures.

A second research direction, with a more functional approach, concentrates on "digital cell biology". We are particularly interested in the impact of spatial constraints on the organisation, movement, and chemical reactions of cell and membrane components. Modelling and simulation enables us to test the influence of certain characteristics of the cell, such as the position of receptors or diffusion constraints, on the way in which a cell receives, processes, and reacts to information.

What are the scientific issues linked to this work?

Guillaume Beslon : This theme is shared with other disciplines but the IT methods are yet to be developed. In effect, if the questions are related to life sciences, we do not yet know how to accurately represent the cell digitally and to use these models to answer questions of biology. The key to achieving this will be found primarily in IT.

The models that Beagle will work with represent a simplification of reality in an attempt to provide answers. These models are therefore by nature always a reduction of the object. They are not false, because they are constructed to respond to a specific problem and are interpreted as a function of these specificities - ideally by the people who created them. What is important is that a model be useful, bringing us new insight into an object, and resulting in new questions. A model is just a tool for constructing a theory.

What are the motivations for this research?

Guillaume Beslon : We carry out research at the interface of several disciplines. Of course, certain of our studies are expected to have consequences in medicine (obesity, insulin resistance, or nosocomial infections, for example), but this is not an immediate goal. The Beagle team wishes above all to work on the fundamental questions of biology. As such, consider as an example our work on evolution, which continues the direction of the theory of Darwin. We search to understand the implications of this theory. In a sense, we attempt to pierce the mystery of life, approaching the question of its origin and evolution.

From the point of view of digital sciences, new modelling methods could lead to new genetic algorithms. Finally, in the long term, the research we intend to carry out could lead to new calculation methods inspired by the biological model.

Understanding blood cell production to better treat dysfunctions

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 08:58:58 GMT

The Dracula team, created in January 2011 in partnership with the CNRS and the Claude Bernard Lyon 1 University, is the first team to be installed in the new Inria Lyon La Doua site. At the interface between mathematics and life sciences, the team brings together mathematicians and biologists to model blood cell production. Mostafa Adimy, Inria research director and head of the Dracula team, presents the scientific issues and application domains.

What is the research theme of the Dracula team?

Mostafa Adimy: The goal of the Dracula team is to explore different approaches to multiscale modelling, to better understand the phenomena at work in hematopoiesis (blood cell production). Hematopoiesis is the process of manufacturing and control, in the bone marrow, of blood cells (red cells, white cells and platelets) from stem cells. Thanks to the interactions between proteins, these cells renew and differentiate themselves, and only when they reach maturity are they released into the bloodstream. Our approaches are multiscale because they take into account at the same time the intra- and the extra-cellular networks, together with the dynamics of cell populations.

We are concentrating in the first instance on the production of red cells, where the mechanisms are better understood by biologists, but this multiscale modelling applies equally to the immune system, where the major players are the white cells. Notably, in the context of the FINOVI foundation, we are working on a model of the immune response that describes both the control mechanisms triggering the activation of cells in the immune system and the dynamics of cell populations reacting to an infection.

What are the scientific issues linked to this work?

Mostafa Adimy: Positioned at the interface between mathematics and biology, we are confronted with two types of difficulty. On one side, the biological data evolves constantly, and new understanding challenges or modifies the established models. On the other side, modelling constrains us to simplify a very complex process, moving away from the reality, but enabling us to reach a certain understanding of the process.

The challenge is therefore to combine the two approaches, biological and numerical, to obtain a better understanding of the mechanisms at work in normal hematopoiesis and pathological hematopoiesis. Therefore, we are testing different types of model, mainly based on partial differential equations, to gain a better understanding on the causes of destabilisation in cell populations. The biologist partners of the team carry out the experiments necessary to refine the models.

What are the possible applications?

Mostafa Adimy : Hematopoiesis one of the most stable biological processes. However, it can happen that its behaviour is altered, leading to blood disorders such as leukaemia. Our work finds a direct application in a better understanding of these illnesses and therefore in better treatments. We work in direct collaboration with oncologists specialising in leukaemia at the Edouard Herriot hospital in Lyon.

Our models are physiological: we analyse the consequences of an illness and not its causes. It is an approach more qualitative than quantitative. We are searching to understand how anomalies are generated. Based on these observations, we try to construct a model that reproduces the anomalies and we look for the parameters that are responsible for them.

What is your motivation for this research subject?

Mostafa Adimy: This research direction began rather by accident at the University of Pau with two DEA (master 2) students, Laurent Pujo-Menjouet and Fabien Crauste, who are today members of the Dracula team. Over time, they pursued the subject in their theses, worked with the teams doing the earliest work on the theme such as M. Mackey's team at McGill University in Canada and G. Webb's team at Vanderbilt University in the USA, and then they were recruited to Lyon.

I then initiated a collaborative research activity (ARC ModLMC) for modelling a type of leukaemia, which involved teams at Inria Bordeaux and Rocquencourt, as well as teams from the CNRS and INSERM in Lyon. Creation of a team to research modelling of hematopoiesis happened quickly due to the strong momentum in the subject, the concentration of specialists in Lyon, and the interest in the issue for society.

Compared with my previous activities, I am concentrating more on the application of my mathematical research. We do, nevertheless, pursue fundamental mathematics, as we concentrate on the qualitative analysis of the equations obtained. Mathematical study enables us to place the models on a sound theoretical footing.

Signature of a framework agreement between Inria and ONERA

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 16:00:12 GMT

Inria has just signed a partnership agreement with the French Aerospace Lab. The Institute, conducting basic and applied research for the aeronautics and space sectors, is interested in establishing synergies with other research institutions. In the field of information processing and systems, Inria is a perfect match.

On Wednesday, January 14, the two institutes made a commitment to jointly develop cooperative activities in terms of research, the promotion and training of researchers. These collaborative efforts will be in the form of “common projects”, with participation of researchers belonging to both establishments and in which each institute will contribute to the required material resources on an equal basis.

At Inria, thirteen research project teams are already committed to, or interested in, partnerships with ONERA involving the following topics in particular:

fluid mechanics,
digital methods
mathematical modeling of electro-acoustics
digital simulation of plasmas,
meshings
optimization of aerodynamic shapes,
stochastic modeling (calculations involving the laws of probability or special statistics),
robotics (parallel cable robots, autonomous robots such as airborne drones, etc.).
parallel computation,
surveillance (video detectors).

This agreement strongly expresses the interdisciplinary nature of computer science research with other fields of research. It is fully in line with Inria’s partnership strategy as documented in framework agreements with its academic partners and other institutions, universities or national technical institutes.

Alexandre Maubert : "I wanted to add a participatory dimension for the spectator”

Mon, 29 Aug 2011 15:07:34 GMT

The Mint project team has worked with artist Alexandre Maubert on a work entitled Monade. The piece was shown at the Panorama exhibition hosted by the Le Fresnoy Studio National d'Art Contemporain from 9 June to 24 July and uses gesture detection and virtual reality.

Monade in brief?

Alexandre Maubert: Monade is a video installation projected onto two screens placed back to back. The image takes us through a very large gated community to the north of Buenos Aires (North Delta), a micro-society where 30,000 people live under optimal protection.

How did your collaboration with the Mint project team come about?

Alexandre Maubert: I presented this film at Transdigital, held at Le Fresnoy last year. There was an impressive reaction in the theatre. Laurent Grisoni (leader of the Mint project team) and Christophe Chaillou (a member of Mint) were present. So things really happened quite naturally, as my project involved gestural detection and research in this area. The Mint team had liked my film the previous year, and so the collaboration took shape spontaneously. In addition, Laurent Grisoni and his team had already worked with students from Le Fresnoy the previous year and wanted to repeat this experience

Have you previously worked with a research team like Mint?

Alexandre Maubert: This is the first time that I have worked with a large laboratory. What was fantastic was that I arrived with completely wild ideas, and little by little, the technical side of things began to have a strong influence on the filming of Monade. A sound recording system was created taking account of the possibilities of the installation. The aim and the parameters of the installation were taken into account during filming. I concentrated on gestural detection. The Mint team made it possible to map the human body in real time and without calibration, so as to be able to remix the sound of the installation, allow the actors to speak, silence them, remix the ambiance, the sound effects, etc., all using gestures.

Working with a scientific team resembles working with a film crew

I really enjoy taking media out of its usual environment, and here I wanted to move film into the arena of the exhibition, to give a participatory dimension back to the spectator. When we are watching a film, there is an aspect of interaction with the film, but of a more emotional nature, of reflection, what effect the film has on us. Through Monade, I wanted to involve the body of the spectator in the narration and the sound development of the film.

How do you involve the spectator?

Alexandre Maubert: Aside from the participatory dimension possible through gestures that affect the shots, the music and the sounds, everything was filmed in subjective view. At times, the subjective view transforms into a medium shot when other characters arrive. So we are at the same time in an exploration and on a stroll. Throughout my work I have considered the representation of territory and the idea of community. This is the concrete realisation of many of my ideas, many of my wishes.

To use film in the arena of the exhibition, while involving the spectator’s body in an interactive dimension with the idea of recreating an exploration, an experience, a projection of his stroll, his reprensentation and his discovery of North Delta. There are a tremendous number of film references. For example, I used a whole scene from Cocteau’s Orphée, where Heurtebise drags Orpheus between the world of the living and the world of the dead.

As for the other scripts I wrote, they involve reflections on memory and our comprehension of the world. What also interested me in this phenomenon is that we come back to a physical and territorial separation of the social classes. And there, what is interesting is that an artistic gesture allows us to pass from one world to another. I also wanted the installation to convey to us the fact that this passage from one world to the other is impossible except by fictionalising it. Every eighteen minutes the two worlds are reversed on each side of the inst

allation, without ever being on the same side. The loop ends at the entrance to the gated community. We leave one community to enter the second. These two worlds are in essence completely different.

How did the technical constraints affect the project?

Alexandre Maubert : When you are working with a film crew, you have the cameraman who handles the image for you, the sound engineer, and even if all the ideas are ultimately yours, it’s the talent and expertise of your team that make it all possible. With a scientific team I approached the work in the same way. I arrived with ideas, intentions, and I wanted them to bring me everything they had to offer in terms of ideas, design, technical possibilities, and even in terms of distribution. To surpass what had been possible while observing the schedule and the budget. That involves an enormous number of things. Sixty people worked on the project over the year (image, sound, construction of the structure, installation).

All the elements are interdependent and necessary. I had come with my sound engineer to meet Samuel Degrande (a member of the Mint project team) and see how the sound mixing and recording could work effectively with his program and the development of the interface. They did not simply settle for managing the gestural detection part but also handled everything that allows a very high definition video to be read, the ten or so different soundtracks, the control of the speech of the characters and the localisation of their position in space. All this represented a great deal of work, and I am delighted with the way it all worked out.

The Inria Evaluation Report was submitted to the Minister of Research

Fri, 26 Aug 2011 14:50:50 GMT

The Visiting Committee, comprised of international specialists responsible for evaluating the Institute has just submitted its report. The committee produced a strategic and organizational analysis that found Inria to be especially worthy of praise. It has also issued a series of recommendations that constitute significant challenges for the Institute for the future.

On Friday, February 20, in Paris, Jean-Claude Latombe, President of the Visiting Committee, and Michel Cosnard officially presented the Inria External Evaluation Report to Valérie Pécresse, Minister of Research.
This report consolidates the analyses done by this group of high-level specialists comprised of leading figures from prestigious international universities or institutions and one industry representative. The committee met from December 18 to 20, 2008, to analyze and evaluate the operations, activity and strategic planning of the Institute. This type of external evaluation has been included in Inria’s operations since 2002 and the Institute thus serves as a precursor. The evaluation’s main concern is with how research is organised within the Institute. During two days of investigations, the presentations and discussions that took place concerned the Institute’s strategic planning, organisation, growth, academic and industrial partnerships, its research work and its technology transfer policy. These thus constitute a milestone report on the Institute's progress in the context of its four-year contract with the government.
The report compares Inria to research institutes worldwide in the field of ICST and has clearly ranked it among the best.
“The report represents an objective assessment of our system of research. All of Inria’s indicators have shown improvement. I am extremely pleased and offer my sincere congratulations to the Institute,” stated Valérie Pécresse during her concluding remarks.

In brief, the conclusions of the 2008 report

The analysis in a nutshell

Inria has successfully managed the priorities in its 2003-2007 Strategic Plan. It has made good progress toward achieving most of the objectives set out in its 2006-2009 four-year contract.
The Institute has achieved significant growth without sacrificing quality.
It has established fruitful partnerships with other research and training institutions, not only in computer science, but also in other disciplines.
The Inria model (project-teams) is a remarkably good way to convert the creativity of its researchers into a consistent overall strategy.
Inria has successfully implemented all the elements in its chain of innovation, from basic research to technology transfer, by way of applied and collaborative research.

Main Recommendations

Give serious consideration to the pay scales of the researchers, which are not competitive with those of comparable institutions in other developed countries.
Take a more distinctive position in terms of research and technology, especially in relation to universities that are becoming increasingly independent. Major interdisciplinary projects and at-risk research must become key components of the future identity of Inria through greater involvement granted to teams from a variety of disciplines other than the ICST.
Emphasize among its critical missions the production of knowledge useful for dealing with major societal and environmental problems (health, energy, education, security, etc.) and stand out as a major player committed to the resolution of these problems.
Gauge Inria’s development in qualitative terms (attractiveness, impact) and not just in quantitative ones (size and number of researchers). If available resources are to be maintained and expanded, they must be devoted more to increasing wages, improving research infrastructure, stimulating cutting-edge research and developing multidisciplinary projects.

Other recommendations cover a variety of aspects, including

Avoiding overly frequent evaluations
Entrusting responsibility for projects to new researchers
Reinforcing the synergies between Computer Science and Applied Mathematics
Making a more pro-active contribution to the teaching of ICST in secondary schools
Diversifying communication channels with industry
Developing external partnerships in the field of hardware and more commonly used telecommunications technologies.

The Game of Go, technology territory for many fields

Fri, 26 Aug 2011 13:57:36 GMT

As part of the Inter-Regional Program of the European Union and invited to the 2009 Taiwan Open, the MoGo project coordinated by Olivier Teytaud of the TAO project team broke a new record by producing the best worldwide performance to date in Go 19x19. This parallelized algorithm can be used, beyond the game of Go, to solve a wide range of problems.

In 1997, for the first time, a computer defeated Garry Kasparov, the world chess champion. The game of Go, however, had until recently been a field limited to humans. More complex than chess, with more than 10 to the 600th power possible plays, meaning more than the number of particles in the universe, the game of Go is a remarkable school for strategy. In this game, where humans had enjoyed a clear superiority, the computer managed to come up to the level of a professional Go player.
However, since current programs are still too weak to defeat high-level players, they are given an advantage: they play a certain number of moves in a row at the beginning of the game, which corresponds to handicap stones for the professional player. MoGo’s progress through a series of victories must thus be measured mainly in terms of the reduced number of handicap stones for professional players. At the 2009 Taiwan Open (February 10-13, 2009), MoGo thus won a game for the first time with only 7 handicap stones, played against a top-ranking player, Zhou Junxun, an extremely renowned player of the 9th Pro Dan and winner of the 2007 LG Cup, as well as a game at 6 handicap stones against another professional player, Li-Chen Chien.
At the heart of this international competition, MoGo, a product of French research in computer science, is thus able to show the results of three scientific or technological advances:

First of all, the so-called Bandits Manchots (“One-Armed Bandits”) algorithms made it possible (partially) to explore the space of possible moves. They thereby revolutionized the world of planning in an uncertain universe.
Secondly, the evaluation of positions is based on Monte-Carlo algorithms, simulating the behavior of a low-level stochastic player but without any bias.
Lastly, the parallelism on a large scale (with, in particular, GRID’5000) served to provide the computational power required for a Monte-Carlo evaluation to give sufficiently precise results.

These evolutions thereby enabled new applications of this algorithm. In addition to the game of Go, the software used is based on innovative technologies that can be used in many fields, especially in the conservation of resources, which is crucial for environmental problems.
In reality, the game of Go poses scientific problems that are very difficult to solve. Even if the game is determinist in theory, meaning that it can be programmed without any special difficulties, it would take an astronomical amount of computation time to obtain the solution. However, in this case the parallel algorithms allow one to use the computational grids and solve problems concerning the sequencing of possibilities and of planning. The sequencing of possibilities amounts, for example, to thousands of millions and the objective is to find the most efficient order in this mass of possibilities. The game of Go is thus a good model for developing and testing new techniques for solving this type of sequencing problem.

DESCARWIN ANR wins the 7th annual international planning competition

Wed, 24 Aug 2011 16:55:47 GMT

The DAE_X planning system, developed by the DESCARWIN ANR (French National Research Agency), has won 1^st prize in the 7^th annual International Planning Competition (IPC) in the Deterministic Temporal Satisficing track.

This international competition is organised once every two years in the context of the ICAPS congress (International Conference on Automated Planning and Scheduling). The purpose of the competition is to provide a forum for empirical comparisons of planning systems, to launch new challenges for the scientific community by testing the limitations of current systems, to propose new research avenues and, finally, to provide the basis for reference problems as well as formal representation rules in order to facilitate the assessment and comparison of planning systems.

Divide and Evolve (DAE), a combination of Descartes and Darwin, is a planning system that optimises a "divide and conquer" strategy using an evolutionary algorithm. The main components of DAEx are: the principle of sequential space of states decomposition, an evolutionary algorithm controlling the decomposition process and an embedded planner X, used to consecutively solve successive sub-problems resulting from the decomposition proposed by the evolutionary algorithm. The version that was submitted to the competition was DAE_YAHSP , the instantiation of DAE_X with the heuristic planner YAHSP. The combination of DAE and YAHSP results in a clear distinction of roles: after several attempts YAHSP quickly sends back a solution while DAE applies its optimisation strategy through successive evolutions.
The DAE_X planner is developed within the framework of the DESCARWIN ANR project, which brings together Thales Research & Technology (Pierre Savéant and Johann Dréo), Inria Saclay – Île-de-France (Marc Schoenauer, Tao project team) and ONERA Toulouse (Vincent Vidal).

Best Paper Award GECCO 2011

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 14:54:44 GMT

The ACM GECCO 2011 conference awarded Best Paper Awards to Malika Mehdi, Jean-Claude Charr, Nouredine Melab, El-Ghazali Talbi (Dolphin team, CNRS-Inria-Lille1) and Pascal Bouvry (University of Luxembourg) for the article, "A Cooperative Tree-based Hybrid GA-B&B Approach for Solving Challenging Permutation-based Problems".

The work presented offers an original approach based on cooperation between two complementary types of combinatorial optimization methods: genetic algorithms and exact tree-based methods such as Branch-and-Bound. The implementation of this approach with ParadisEO and its experimentation on Grid’5000 led to the optimal solution of difficult instances of the quadratic 3D assignment problem (Q3AP) for the first time.

Joseph Sifakis to give a lecture on embedded systems

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 11:34:31 GMT

On Tuesday, 10 March, Joseph Sifakis, winner of the 2007 Turing Prize, research director at CNRS and holder of the Schneider-Inria-Digiteo industrial chair, will give a lecture at the Academy of Science on the topic of embedded systems – new challenges in computer science, which Inria has made one of its priorities.

As part of the lecture series, “Research Challenges of the 21st Century", organised by the Academy of Science, Joseph Sifakis will discuss the problems and challenges facing computer science in seeking to improve embedded systems.

Embedded systems are small components but are becoming ever more a part of many objects in our daily lives. They are found in cars, vacuum cleaners, rockets and satellites. They perform a simple, precise task: ensuring that their host apparatus works properly. As they multiply in number and uses, they are having to meet requirements related to space allowances, energy consumption and especially robustness. The slightest failure in any of these respects can have disastrous consequences ranging from the breakdown of cars to the explosion of rockets. To deal with these constraints, researchers are pursuing work to improve their knowledge of embedded systems. Their studies involve the design of tools for analysis that combine both physical and computational methods.

Joseph Sifakis has participated in the development of a methodology for the enumeration and verification of computational models. The nature and quality of his work earned him the Turing Prize in 2007. Based on his experience in this field, he will present as part of his lecture the strengths and weaknesses of current models in the interest of improving them. As a reminder, Joseph Sifakis is a research director at the CNRS, also directs the Verimag laboratory and has held the Schneider-Inria-Digiteo industrial chair since 2008.

Lecture Programme

"Embedded Systems – New Research Challenges for Computer Science"
by Joseph Sifakis

Embedded systems are components that combine software and hardware and ensure vital operating features. They are characterised by continuous interaction with their physical environment. Their applications include many fields such as transportation, telecommunications, energy distribution and use in electrical and electronic products.
We currently do not have a theoretical framework that allows us to take into account both functional and extra-functional requirements during the design of embedded systems.

In order to understand and study the behaviour of these systems, one must be able to combine engineering methods based on physics and the methods of computer science. As a matter of fact, Computer Science draws on discrete computational models that are independent of time and physical resources.
Extending Computer Science by incorporating into it the paradigms of disciplines based on classical physics today constitutes a major challenge for computer science research.

Four aspects of this challenge will be discussed:

unifying analytical models and discrete computational models.
building systems by combining components.
ensuring system features are built-in in order to overcome the complexity and current limitations on post-facto verification.
ensuring the predictability of interactive systems behaviour in order to overcome the uncertainty inherent in their dynamic behaviour.

In conclusion, a few fundamental differences between the two disciplines and their consequences will be discussed.

Reference :
T.A. Henzinger and J. Sifakis. The Discipline of Embedded Systems Design Computer, October 2007, pp. 32-40.

Inria's CyCab sets out to conquer the roads of Finland

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 09:58:07 GMT

Today, at the beginning of the 21st century, pollution and congested roads are the scourge of our cities. To tackle these problems, Inria research laboratories have developed the CyCab, a small autonomous car packed with a multitude of the latest cutting-edge technological solutions. Among its many talents, the CyCab boasts the ability to avoid obstacles placed in its path.

The sound of horns hooting, air pollution, congested streets and roads and noise pollution all add to the stress of the city and have a negative impact on the quality of life in urban areas. To tackle these problems, the European Union launched the CityMobil Project, aimed at developing innovative public transportation systems. The ultimate goal of this is to render life in the city more attractive. One of these solutions, designed to complement bus and metro services, is the cybercar: an autonomous and "clean" car.

These new, alternative vehicles can move around on their own. They are the result of an incredible technological development achieved by Inria's Rocquencourt Research Centre and researchers in the IMARA project-team, who have been working on a prototype, known as the CyCab, for over ten years. The originality of the CyCab lies in the fact that it is driverless. Its movements and operations are controlled by computer. This computer analyses the information transmitted to it by sensors and makes decisions: go forward, stop, turn left or right, etc. The information it needs comes from three different sources: perception, navigation and communication. The CyCab sees the road and adapts its actions accordingly. To do so, it is equipped with a laser and a camera which enable it to both follow road markings and avoid any obstacles, however tiny. To pinpoint its position in real time, the vehicle has an advanced and highly precise GPS system. Each CyCab also communicates via the Web. This means that the vehicles can share information so that they can follow one another at a small distance, or surf the Web and gather real-time traffic information so that they can avoid traffic jams.

During one of the events organised as part of the European CityMobil Project, the inhabitants of Vantaa, in Finland, had a chance to try out this little marvel of modern technology for themselves. In front of Vantaa City Hall, the potential of these revolutionary vehicles could be "test driven" on a 500m full-scale route.

Visitors were able to call one of the three vehicles from a terminal or mobile phone and be taken to a stop along the route. Finland, Norway, Clermont-Ferrand and La Rochelle in France... The IMARA team's CyCab is "on tour" until 2011. Vélib’ and other city cycle hire schemes may turn green with envy!