Software makes pictures clearer.

Software helps astronomers see what's hidden in noisy and blurred images of stars and galaxies. Metropolis Data Consultants uses the same techniques to give doctors and the police clearer pictures to work on.

Astronomers use all sorts of telescopes to explore outer space. Some are optical telescopes - bigger and better versions of those you might have at home. Using lenses and mirrors, they make distant objects seem much nearer than they are.

Other telescopes look for radio waves, x-rays and other types of radiation. They give astronomers a different view of the universe - one that deepens their understanding.

But whichever they use, the problem for astronomers is the same. When they're looking at faint objects far out into space, they don't get perfect pictures.

Blur and noise.

To start with, things move. The Earth is rotating, for example, and the satellites that carry telescopes aren't absolutely stationary. Blurring is inevitable.

To make things even worse, some kinds of telescope add noise to the picture. When the image itself is faint, the result is the sort of picture you get when your TV isn't tuned in properly. You can see that something is there but you can't see it clearly.

So how do astronomers create those clear and colourful pictures of galaxies you see in the papers?

The answer is software. It's like the tools amateur photographers used to clean up their digital photos but much more advanced. And some of the most advanced software of its kind was invented on PPARC research projects at the University of Cambridge.

Using advanced mathematics, powerful computers analyse noisy and blurred images to discover the true picture. They can even repair damage to the image caused by defects in the electronics of the camera that took them.

Revealing stars.

PPARC's challenges may look very specific. In our case, it wanted clearer pictures of the stars and galaxies and it wanted them faster. But the solutions we create aren't specific to astronomy. If you look around, it's surprising how many other uses there are.

Clearer pictures.

But astronomers aren't the only people who get pictures that are less than perfect.

Doctors face similar problems, especially when they're using the latest body scanners to examine patients with cancer, arthritis and other illnesses. The signals they look for are weak and, no matter what you do, patients move.

It's a problem for the police as well. Pictures from CCTV cameras are often out of focus or blurred. Suspects don't stand still while their photos are taken and levels of crime are higher when light levels are low.

This started the researchers in Cambridge thinking. Could the techniques used by astronomers give doctors and the police a clearer picture?

They found they could. Supported by PPARC and NESTA - an agency that uses funds from the National Lottery to foster innovation - they refined their tools to get the best results.

In 2003 they set up Metropolis Data Consultants. Today it's working with some of the world's largest companies to make life easier for doctors, the police and other organisations.

The company employs three people and is already making good profits.

MRI scan of mouse brain.

Feature detection.

If you want to find new stars, where do you look? Into space, of course. But how do you pick them out in blurred images awash with light from other sources?

The researchers at the University of Cambridge have solved this problem as well. Using special tools, they can see where stars are hiding.

The same tools have uses in medicine. Cancerous cells and tumours can be hard to spot. Metropolis Data Consultants has worked with GlaxoSmithKline and the Wellcome Trust to come up with a solution.



Posted by: Emily    Source

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