BarraCUDA – a Fast Sequence Mapping Software using Graphics Processing Units

High-throughput DNA sequencing (HTS) instruments today are capable of generating millions of sequencing reads in a short period of time, and this represents a serious challenge to current bioinformatics pipeline in processing such an enormous amount of data in a fast and economical fashion. Modern graphics cards are powerful processing units that consist of hundreds of scalar processors in parallel in order to handle the rendering of high-definition graphics in real-time. It is this computational capability that we propose to harness in order to accelerate some of the time-consuming steps in analyzing data generated by the HTS instruments. We have developed BarraCUDA, a novel sequence mapping software that utilizes the parallelism of NVIDIA CUDA graphics cards to map sequencing reads to a particular location on a reference genome. While delivering a similar mapping fidelity as other mainstream programs , BarraCUDA is a magnitude faster in mapping throughput compared to its CPU counterparts. The software is also capable of supporting multiple CUDA devices in parallel to further accelerate the mapping throughput. BarraCUDA is designed to take advantage of the parallelism of GPU to accelerate the mapping of millions of sequencing reads generated by HTS instruments. By doing this, we could, at least in part streamline the current bioinformatics pipeline such that the wider scientific community could benefit from the sequencing technology. BarraCUDA is currently available at http://seqbarracuda.sf.net

Fast-switching phase gratings using in-plane addressed short-pitch polymer stabilized chiral nematic liquid crystals

We demonstrate a fast-switching (sub-millisecond) phase grating based upon a polymer stabilized short-pitch chiral nematic liquid crystal that is electrically addressed using in-plane electric fields. The combination of the short-pitch and the polymer stabilization enables the diffraction pattern to be switched “on” and “off” reversibly in 600 µs. Results are presented on the far-field diffraction pattern along with the intensity of the diffraction orders as a function of the applied electric field and the response times.

Fast L0-based sparse signal recovery

This paper develops an algorithm for finding sparse signals from limited observations of a linear system. We assume an adaptive Gaussian model for sparse signals. This model results in a least square problem with an iteratively reweighted L2 penalty that approximates the L0-norm. We propose a fast algorithm to solve the problem within a continuation framework. In our examples, we show that the correct sparsity map and sparsity level are gradually learnt during the iterations even when the number of observations is reduced, or when observation noise is present. In addition, with the help of sophisticated interscale signal models, the algorithm is able to recover signals to a better accuracy and with reduced number of observations than typical L1-norm and reweighted L1 norm methods. ©2010 IEEE.

BarraCUDA - a fast short read sequence aligner using graphics processing units.

BACKGROUND: With the maturation of next-generation DNA sequencing (NGS) technologies, the throughput of DNA sequencing reads has soared to over 600 gigabases from a single instrument run. General purpose computing on graphics processing units (GPGPU), extracts the computing power from hundreds of parallel stream processors within graphics processing cores and provides a cost-effective and energy efficient alternative to traditional high-performance computing (HPC) clusters. In this article, we describe the implementation of BarraCUDA, a GPGPU sequence alignment software that is based on BWA, to accelerate the alignment of sequencing reads generated by these instruments to a reference DNA sequence. FINDINGS: Using the NVIDIA Compute Unified Device Architecture (CUDA) software development environment, we ported the most computational-intensive alignment component of BWA to GPU to take advantage of the massive parallelism. As a result, BarraCUDA offers a magnitude of performance boost in alignment throughput when compared to a CPU core while delivering the same level of alignment fidelity. The software is also capable of supporting multiple CUDA devices in parallel to further accelerate the alignment throughput. CONCLUSIONS: BarraCUDA is designed to take advantage of the parallelism of GPU to accelerate the alignment of millions of sequencing reads generated by NGS instruments. By doing this, we could, at least in part streamline the current bioinformatics pipeline such that the wider scientific community could benefit from the sequencing technology.BarraCUDA is currently available from http://seqbarracuda.sf.net.

Fast-switching phase gratings using in-plane addressed short-pitch polymer stabilized chiral nematic liquid crystals

We demonstrate a fast-switching (sub-millisecond) phase grating based upon a polymer stabilized short-pitch chiral nematic liquid crystal that is electrically addressed using in-plane electric fields. The combination of the short-pitch and the polymer stabilization enables the diffraction pattern to be switched on and off reversibly in 600 μs. Results are presented on the far-field diffraction pattern along with the intensity of the diffraction orders as a function of the applied electric field and the response times. © 2011 American Institute of Physics.

Gaussian processes for fast policy optimisation of POMDP-based dialogue managers

Modelling dialogue as a Partially Observable Markov Decision Process (POMDP) enables a dialogue policy robust to speech understanding errors to be learnt. However, a major challenge in POMDP policy learning is to maintain tractability, so the use of approximation is inevitable. We propose applying Gaussian Processes in Reinforcement learning of optimal POMDP dialogue policies, in order (1) to make the learning process faster and (2) to obtain an estimate of the uncertainty of the approximation. We first demonstrate the idea on a simple voice mail dialogue task and then apply this method to a real-world tourist information dialogue task. © 2010 Association for Computational Linguistics.

Safety implications of reactivity variations in fast thorium ADSRs

Nuclear power generation offers a reliable, low-impact and large-scale alternative to fossil fuels. However, concerns exist over the safety and sustainability of this method of power production, and it remains unpopular with some governments and pressure groups throughout the world. Fast thorium fuelled accelerator-driven sub-critical reactors (ADSRs) offer a possible route to providing further re-assurance regarding these concerns on account of their properties of enhanced safety through sub-critical operation combined with reduced actinide waste production from the thorium fuel source. The appropriate sub-critical margin at which these reactors should operate is the subject of continued debate. Commercial interests favour a small sub-critical margin in order to minimise the size of the accelerator needed for a given power output, whilst enhanced safety would be better satisfied through larger sub-critical margins to further minimise the possibility of a criticality excursion. Against this background, this paper examines some of the issues affecting reactor safety inherent within thorium fuel sources resulting from the essential Th90232→Th90233→Pa91233→U92233 breeding chain. Differences in the decay half-lives and fission and capture cross-sections of 233Pa and 233U can result in significant changes in the reactivity of the fuel following changes in the reactor power. Reactor operation is represented using a homogeneous lumped fast reactor model that can simulate the evolution of actinides and reactivity variations to first-order accuracy. The reactivity of the fuel is shown to increase significantly following a loss of power to the accelerator. Where the sub-critical operating margins are small this can result in a criticality excursion unless some form of additional intervention is made, for example through the insertion of control rods. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A fast 600-V Tandem PiN Schottky (TPS) rectifier with ultra-low on-state voltage

The Tandem PiN Schottky (TPS) rectifier features lowly-doped p-layers in both active and termination regions, and is applied in 600-V rating for the first time. In the active region, the Schottky contact is in series connection with a transparent p-layer, leading to a superior forward performance than the conventional diodes. In addition, due to the benefit of moderate hole injection from the p-layer, the TPS offers a better trade-off between the on-state voltage and the switching speed. The active p-layer also helps to stabilise the Schottky contact, and hence the electrical data distributions are more concentrated. Regarding the floating p-layer in the termination region, its purpose is to reduce the peak electric fields, and the TPS demonstrates a high breakdown voltage with a compact termination width, less than 70% of the state-of-the-art devices on the market. Experimental results have shown that the 600-V TPS rectifier has an ultra-low on-state voltage of 0.98 V at 250 A/cm 2, a fast turn-off time of 75 ns by the standard RG1 test (I F=0.5A, I R=1A, and I RR=0.25A) and a breakdown voltage over 720 V. It is noteworthy that the p-layers in the active and termination regions can be formed at no extra cost for the use of self-alignment process. © 2012 IEEE.