Learning to Pinpoint Emerging Software Vulnerabilities. This project aims to develop learning-based software vulnerability detection techniques to improve the reliability and security of modern software systems. The existing techniques relying on conventional yet rigid software analysis and testing techniques are ineffective and/or inefficient when detecting a wide variety of emerging software vulnerabilities. The outcomes of this project will be a deep-learning-based detection approach and an ....Learning to Pinpoint Emerging Software Vulnerabilities. This project aims to develop learning-based software vulnerability detection techniques to improve the reliability and security of modern software systems. The existing techniques relying on conventional yet rigid software analysis and testing techniques are ineffective and/or inefficient when detecting a wide variety of emerging software vulnerabilities. The outcomes of this project will be a deep-learning-based detection approach and an open-source tool that can capture precision correlations between deep code features and diverse vulnerabilities to pinpoint emerging vulnerabilities without the need for bug specifications. Significant benefits include greatly improved quality, reliability and security for modern software systems.Read moreRead less
Transcription factor – enhancer – promoter based regulatory networks. This project aims to develop new understanding on how multicellular organisms (including humans) develop, and how mutations in distant regions of the genome can affect human traits. The way the human genome is interpreted by the cellular machinery is still a mystery. We have a reference sequence and know where the majority of coding genes are, but we are far from understanding how the genome is regulated to generate the divers ....Transcription factor – enhancer – promoter based regulatory networks. This project aims to develop new understanding on how multicellular organisms (including humans) develop, and how mutations in distant regions of the genome can affect human traits. The way the human genome is interpreted by the cellular machinery is still a mystery. We have a reference sequence and know where the majority of coding genes are, but we are far from understanding how the genome is regulated to generate the diversity of cell types in our bodies. Enhancer regions interact with proximal promoters to regulate gene expression level and tissue-specificity. This project aims to develop transcriptional regulatory network models using high throughput chromatin interaction data and expression perturbation to link promoter and enhancers genome-wide.Read moreRead less
Automation of metric temporal reasoning. A major contemporary engineering concern is to ensure the predictable and robust operation of computer systems involving software, hardware, and human users. The need for systematic and careful construction of such systems requires the development of formal methods based on a dense view of time rather than the traditional step-by-step models.
automated strategic reasoning. Formal methods are used to ensure robust correct behaviour in design and implementation of computer systems. Traditional models of computer operation involve a linear sequence of behaviour but today’s systems are complex interactions between many components including the environment of the system and human users. Thus analysis is done via a logical game between components where each is trying to meet its specified requirements regardless of what others do: formalis ....automated strategic reasoning. Formal methods are used to ensure robust correct behaviour in design and implementation of computer systems. Traditional models of computer operation involve a linear sequence of behaviour but today’s systems are complex interactions between many components including the environment of the system and human users. Thus analysis is done via a logical game between components where each is trying to meet its specified requirements regardless of what others do: formalisms include branching time and competing coalitions of agents. This project is to take early advantage of recent breakthroughs in automated logical reasoning with such models by the investigator to deliver general practical techniques of system development and verification.Read moreRead less
Next generation high throughput lipidomics using adaptive modelling. This project aims to develop a unique high-throughput method to capture the lipidomic profile of human plasma suitable for large human population screening. Lipids are fundamental to every biological system, but our understanding of their regulation in humans have been largely superficial. By incorporating a new lipidomics approach, with genomic data, this project aims to expand our understanding of human biology by identifying ....Next generation high throughput lipidomics using adaptive modelling. This project aims to develop a unique high-throughput method to capture the lipidomic profile of human plasma suitable for large human population screening. Lipids are fundamental to every biological system, but our understanding of their regulation in humans have been largely superficial. By incorporating a new lipidomics approach, with genomic data, this project aims to expand our understanding of human biology by identifying regulators of lipid metabolism. The large diversity in humans necessitate sufficient sample sizes to identify true genetic regulators, but to date techniques capturing phenotypic data (lipids) have been largely limited. It is anticipated that this study will identify new regulators of lipid metabolism in humans.Read moreRead less
Formal Specification and Realisation of Dynamic Reconfiguration in FPGA-based Systems. The project aims are:
to significantly advance our understanding of the key concepts needed to successfully exploit dynamic, run-time reconfigurable computing, a technology that is now becoming increasingly available due to developments in FPGA (Field Progammable Gate Array) devices, and
the development of an innovative high-level programming environment that will include a language, associated design method ....Formal Specification and Realisation of Dynamic Reconfiguration in FPGA-based Systems. The project aims are:
to significantly advance our understanding of the key concepts needed to successfully exploit dynamic, run-time reconfigurable computing, a technology that is now becoming increasingly available due to developments in FPGA (Field Progammable Gate Array) devices, and
the development of an innovative high-level programming environment that will include a language, associated design methodologies, compilation techniques, and run-time support that will make dynamic reconfigurable computing accessible to a wide community of potential users.
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Novel Bioinformatics approaches for genetics and data linkage. The research project will involve creation of novel data and communications formats to fulfil the vital task of integrating the vast heterogeneous biological resources available. We will apply this new infrastructure to a large data linkage project. In parallel, we will undertake methodological research in informatics to design high throughput research methods and tools to analyse and visualise genetic data. These will be applied to ....Novel Bioinformatics approaches for genetics and data linkage. The research project will involve creation of novel data and communications formats to fulfil the vital task of integrating the vast heterogeneous biological resources available. We will apply this new infrastructure to a large data linkage project. In parallel, we will undertake methodological research in informatics to design high throughput research methods and tools to analyse and visualise genetic data. These will be applied to linkage disequilibrium mapping and haplotyping in human, animal and plant diseases. Improving informatics integration and designing novel methods and implementations of algorithms will be beneficial to local and international researchers in a range of fields.Read moreRead less
Who’s who in the plant gene world? As many more plant genomes are sequenced, the bottleneck is being able to interrogate and translate this data into applications for crop improvement. This project will develop and apply a population graph database, hosting genome data for the world’s major crops and their wild relatives, allowing the characterisation of gene diversity on an unparalleled scale. Analysis of this data will reveal the presence/absence and sequence diversity for classes of genes for ....Who’s who in the plant gene world? As many more plant genomes are sequenced, the bottleneck is being able to interrogate and translate this data into applications for crop improvement. This project will develop and apply a population graph database, hosting genome data for the world’s major crops and their wild relatives, allowing the characterisation of gene diversity on an unparalleled scale. Analysis of this data will reveal the presence/absence and sequence diversity for classes of genes for important agronomic traits including disease resistance, flowering time and legume nitrogen fixation which will enable plant breeders to identify and apply novel genes and allelic variants for use in breeding programmes, accelerating the production of improved crop varieties.Read moreRead less
IDENTIFYING CONTROL ELEMENTS IN CHLOROPLAST GENE EXPRESSION. Energy from sunlight is captured by photosynthesis in plants, providing the basis for the terrestrial food chain. This process takes place in chloroplasts, subcellular structures that derived from photosynthetic bacteria a billion years ago. Chloroplasts have their own DNA, containing genes encoding the most important photosynthetic proteins. This project aims to provide the world’s best resources for the study of chloroplast genes. In ....IDENTIFYING CONTROL ELEMENTS IN CHLOROPLAST GENE EXPRESSION. Energy from sunlight is captured by photosynthesis in plants, providing the basis for the terrestrial food chain. This process takes place in chloroplasts, subcellular structures that derived from photosynthetic bacteria a billion years ago. Chloroplasts have their own DNA, containing genes encoding the most important photosynthetic proteins. This project aims to provide the world’s best resources for the study of chloroplast genes. In the process, we will discover how these important genes are regulated to provide photosynthetic proteins in the right amounts, in the right cells, at the right time. The knowledge and resources gained will facilitate improvement of photosynthetic function in future agricultural crops.Read moreRead less
Optimal Robust Fitting under the Framework of LP-Type Problems. The project aims to develop algorithms to support the development of robust and accurate computer vision systems. Real-world visual data (images, videos) is inherently noisy and outlier prone. To build computer vision systems that work reliably in the real world, it is necessary to ensure that the underlying algorithms are robust and efficient. The project aims to devise novel algorithms that can compute the best possible result giv ....Optimal Robust Fitting under the Framework of LP-Type Problems. The project aims to develop algorithms to support the development of robust and accurate computer vision systems. Real-world visual data (images, videos) is inherently noisy and outlier prone. To build computer vision systems that work reliably in the real world, it is necessary to ensure that the underlying algorithms are robust and efficient. The project aims to devise novel algorithms that can compute the best possible result given the input data in a short amount of time. The expected outcomes would support the construction of reliable and accurate computer vision-based systems, such as large-scale 3-D reconstruction from photo collections, self-driving cars and domestic robots.Read moreRead less