MCUBE

Objective:

The proposed research aims to interface mathematics with experiments and develop next generation instrumentation devices, with strong scientific and technological bearing as well as socio-economic impact. Scientific discovery relies upon the ability to cleverly devise controlled experiments that precisely sample a system"s states. Such states reveal invariants and can be predictively modelled. The system"s full characterisation requires experimental tools capable of observing hidden (unstable) invariant states, inaccessible to standard measurements. The present project will develop such a tool with both electronics and electrophysiological setups; it will have direct scientific impact, with industrial and clinical applications. Real-time tracking of these hidden states will provide unprecedented results in the use and development of mathematical paradigms within experimental setups, thus bringing mathematics closer to real-world phenomena, and to experiments. Ultimately it will yield the development of novel intelligent tools that explore and make use of unstable states. This technology will be then transferred to biological systems for alternative clinical therapies such as intelligent closed-loop deep-brain stimulation devices to treat neurodegenerative diseases like epilepsy. It will also impact experimentalists, giving them access to novel states suggesting new experimental paradigms. In the long term, we plan to commercially exploit the developed technologies by targeting specific industries (e.g. electronics) and developing a clinical apparatus.