Walton researcher, Daniel Martins, was recently commended for his presentation at the VistaMilk Internal Conference 2022. Daniel presented his work as part of the two-day conference which took place on 9 and 10 May.
The VistaMilk SFI Research Centre which is co-funded by SFI and the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM), aims to be an agent of growth for the Irish dairy industry by being a world leader in fundamental and translational research for precision pasture-based dairying.
The VistaMilk Internal Conference is an annual event where researchers funded by the VistaMilk SFI Research Centre have the opportunity to share the results of their research with their peers including PhD students, postdoctorates, principle investigators, and site managers. This year’s conference featured seven minute and three minute presentations from 88 speakers, covering topics such as spectroscopy, databases, grass, omics, breeding, and health.
Over 135 people were in attendance, including 13 representatives from SETU. On the final day, six awards were given to the best presentations during the course of the event, of which two were awarded to SETU researchers Daniel Martins and Hao Shi, marking a great achievement and recognition of the work carried out by SETU within VistaMilk.
Daniel Martins is a postdoctoral researcher in the Emerging Networks Laboratory division at Walton Institute. His presentation titled ‘Creating Codes Using Bacterial Communications’ covered the recent results of his bacteria-based molecular communications research, and highlighted his paper published last November at the ACM NanoCoCoA 2021 workshop.
Commenting on the award Dr Deirdre Kilbane, Director of Research at Walton Institute said, “Congratulations to Walton researcher Daniel Martins. This fantastic achievement is a reflection of the excellent research carried out in collaboration with the SFI Research Centre VistaMilk.”
Speaking of the event, Daniel remarked that it was “an interesting opportunity to share experiences and create connections with researchers from other Research Partner Organisations, which will hopefully lead to new collaborations for SETU and VistaMilk in the future.”
Research Overview
Creating Codes Using Bacterial Communications – Daniel Martins
In his research, Daniel Martins introduced the concept of channel coding using bacteria signalling. In typical communications systems channel coding techniques are used to protect the information exchanged among transmitters and receivers against unwanted effects (such as noise and interference) of the media where the information signal is propagated. These techniques ensure that the receivers are able to detect the correct information and no miscommunication happens. Inspired by these techniques, Daniel proposed the use of the molecular concentration produced by two bacterial populations to create codes that will protect the information signal exchanged among them. These codes could enable us to develop molecular communications systems that work for longer distances inside the body of animals and humans, as well as, in soil. To read Daniel’s publication now visit: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3485730.3494039