A part of the effort in the US to reign in healthcare expenses, a major effort has been initiated to move to Electronic Health Records (EHRs), from the previous paper-based records. Various government agencies have been charged with supporting this effort. This article reports on work underway at the Information Technology Laboratory of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), to develop test methods, protocols and specifications for EHR interoperability.

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This article reviews a variety of technological support in Assisted Ambient Living (AAL), that can help a Visually Impaired (VI) person to achieve greater independence of movement in public environments.

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Researchers at Proteus Digital Health, Inc. have developed a digital health technology that determines when medications have been ingested and can wirelessly provide this information in a confidential way to patients and designated caregivers, health providers, and researchers.

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Cochlear Implants (CIs) have a long history of development and deployment. This article presents an overview of the anatomy and physiology of the cochlea and the implications for CIs. One important concept is the spectral analysis of incoming sound that is performed by the physical characteristics of the Basilar Membrane, which extends the length of the cochlea. While current CI implementations seek to mimic this function, they discard much of the temporal analysis that the mammalian cochlea performs, according to the authors.

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BTHS is the newest member of the Monmouth County Vocational School District's (MCVSD) Career Academy Division. MCVSD Academies are a collection of theme-based public schools that are open to all 8th grade students who want to apply in Monmouth County, NJ. The admission process is extremely competitive, with only 80-85 students accepted into the program each year out of the many that applied throughout Monmouth County.

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In this interview, Sagar mentions how he more-or-less happened to take a class in control theory, because of a scheduling conflict as an undergraduate. He discovered that he was attracted to the field because of its mathematical elegance. His distinguished career, while generally within the envelope of 'control theory' has been an adventure in applying that body of knowledge to a wide range of application areas.

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By late 2012, the Argus II visual prosthesis may be approved for sale in the United States. Already available in Europe, the first commercially available device of its kind has caused excitement.

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In a new IEEE Spectrum "Techwise Conversations" video presentation, Steven Cherry interviews Dr. Lav Varshnev of IBM, who points out that new research has found a neurobiological basis for understanding logarithmic compression in the brain. The concept has been around for over 100 years (in the Weber-Fechner law describing perceived sensitivity to stimuli), but now is being used in a variety of new ways.

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The authors of this paper draw a comparison between two case studies in biological imaging which seem far different in scope and technique. The two studies used quite different techniques, and the ratio of the physical sizes of the biological samples are on the order of 105. But they rely on methods of analysis and modelling that are remarkably similar.

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