Wolfson Microelectronics WM831x customisable power management IC family has been selected to support the EMMA Mobile 1 multimedia processor from Renesas Electronics, a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions.

With limitless configurability, low quiescent power consumption and high efficiency,WM831x family is tailored to meet the requirements of each specific application, and Renesas Electronics' EMMA Mobile 1 processor provides lower power consumption and high functionality to meet the needs of portable multimedia devices.

A complete support package, which includes an evaluation board and software support, allows manufacturers to quickly develop their next generation of portable products using the EMMA Mobile 1. Limitless configurations also mean that the WM831x family is ideal for use in a wide range of consumer products, enabling manufacturers to consolidate one PMIC solution across their whole product portfolio, making life simpler for product designers.

"Wolfson is delighted to be working with Renesas Electronics, and the adoption of the WM831x family on the EMMA Mobile platform strengthens Wolfson's position as one of the world's leading power management suppliers," says Dr Jess Brown, power management product line manager at Wolfson who is happy to boast that "the WM831x PMIC family provides a highly integrated solution which enables the designer to fully utilise the performance of the application processor."


Wellcome-Wolfson awards £4.8m to Dundee new centre
The University of Dundee has been given a grant of £4.88m from the Wellcome-Wolfson Capital Awards initiative to help expand its life
sciences base (above). Over £30m is being invested into large-scale university infrastructure projects courtesy of the Wellcome-Wolfson Capital Awards initiative.

The scheme is intended to facilitate internationally competitive,
leading-edge biomedical research in a way that would not otherwise be
possible. The projects that have been funded include both new buildings
and refurbishment.

The Dundee award is to Professor Mike Ferguson (right) , for a new Centre for Translational and Interdisciplinary Research at the College of Life Sciences.

“Our Centre for Translational and Interdisciplinary Research will do two things,” said Professor Ferguson. “It will double our capacity in drug discovery, allowing us to translate more basic biomedical research towards real patient benefit, and it will bring mathematicians, physicists and computational biologists and computational chemists into immediate contact with each other, and with our experimentalists, to bring interdisciplinary solutions to biological and medical problems.”

The Centre is expected to cost some £12.5m in total. Currently the
University is developing proposals to complete the fund package needed. The planned centre would sit alongside the impressive
Life Sciences complex at Dundee which already includes the Wellcome
Trust Biocentre and the Sir James Black Centre.

The biennial Capital Awards initiative was launched in 2007 to follow
the successful Joint Infrastructure and Science Research Innovation Fund partnerships. It provides funding to successful applicants for large
scale projects in partnership with the host institution.

This year, the Wellcome Trust and the Wolfson Foundation are working in partnership  to fund the initiative. Together, the two charities are
providing over £30m of investment in UK research infrastructure. Under the initiative, universities from across UK, including three in Scotland, have been awarded funding of between £3-5m.

"World-class science needs to be supported by world-class infrastructure,which requires significant
investment," says Sir MarkWalport, director of the
 Wellcome Trust. "The Capital Awards partnership between the Wellcome Trust and the Wolfson Foundation will provide an important injection of cash into our universities at a time when they face uncertainty about future capital funding."

"The programme attracted a strikingly high standard of applications and
we are delighted to be funding such exceptional projects," says Paul
Ramsbottom, Chief Executive of the Wolfson Foundation. "It is also a
great pleasure to be working again with the Wellcome Trust, and the
partnership is of particular importance when universities are facing
challenging financial circumstances."

The full list of recipients, including in-principle awards, is:
●       Principal Investigators: Professor Colin Ingram, Newcastle
University. £4.88m. Centre for Translational Systems Neuroscience
●       Principal Investigator: Professor Alan Stitt, Queen's University
Belfast £4.80m. Development of a Vision Science Research Building
●       Principal Investigator: Professor Andrew Hattersley, Peninsula
College of Medicine, Exeter & Plymouth Universities £4.75m
Exeter Centre for Translational Medicine
●       Principal Investigator: Professor Mike Ferguson, University of Dundee £4.88m. Centre for Translational and Interdisciplinary Research
●       Principal Investigator: (lft) Professor David Porteous, University of Edinburgh.  £3.46m. Institute of Genetics & Molecular Medicine
●       Principal Investigators: Professors James Neil  (lft) &  Massimo Palmarini (rgt), University of Glasgow £4.80m Integrating Veterinary and Human Virology in the Centre for Virus Research
●       Principal Investigators: Professor Simon Duckett, University of York. £4.36m. Centre of Hyperpolarisation in Magnetic Resonance Imaging.