Learning Respiratory System Function in BME Studies by Means of a Virtual Laboratory: RespiLab

One of the career areas included in the field of Biomedical Engineering (BME) is the application of engineering system analysis: physiologic modeling, simulation, and control. This paper describes a virtual laboratory and related practical sessions designed for the analysis and the study of the human respiratory system. The laboratory is based on the compilation of several models described in the literature. Presented application has been built using MATLAB/Simulink and Easy Java Simulations (EJS), combining good computation capabilities that are completely interactive. The virtual laboratory is designed in order to understand the operation of the respiratory system under normal conditions and pathological situations, and to predict respiratory variables at different levels of ventilator stimuli and conditions. The presented virtual laboratory has been used and evaluated by students of the Master of Science degree on BME. Experience has shown that this virtual laboratory is a very useful tool for learning the complex response of the human respiratory system.     

Biomedical engineering in China. A look at the growth of the BMESociety, and advanced education

In 1978 the Chinese Institute of Electronics asked Dr Qin to organise the Chinese Biomedical Engineering Society. Looking back on 14 years of the Society's history, 13 conferences have been held, and more than 600 technical papers presented. Student paper competitions stimulated students and young investigators to attend the conference and join the Society. The authors also discuss formal BME education including accreditation and curricula. The universities which have BME programs can be mainly classified into two categories: (1) universities of science and engineering, (2) universities of medical science. The curricula can also be divided into: (1) engineering oriented, and (2) clinically oriented. Most engineering oriented curricula are based on electronic engineering around a central task of instrumentation design. Besides the engineering courses, basic anatomy and physiology are offered for the purpose of communication with physicians. Most clinical oriented curricula are executed in medical schools, they are based on the applications of medical instruments and computers, but the hospital internship is a special required subject. Todays typical BME faculty differs quite significantly from the faculties that began the BME effort in China. Members tend to be interdiciplinarians, capable of understanding a broad range of areas. A significant number are bearers of graduate degrees, both bachelors and masters, from both inside and outside of China. Nearly 300 students are presently enrolled in the country's biomedical engineering programs     

Optimizing the delivery of content in physiology instruction

Most biomedical engineering (BME) programs appreciate the need to provide their students with knowledge in the field of systems physiology. One objective in teaching systems physiology to undergraduate or graduate BME students should be to provide them with enough understanding of physiology that they can acquire what further understanding they need as such a need arises later in life. An instructional goal should therefore be to provide a solid framework in physiology from which learning through self-instruction is enhanced. With the preceding reasoning in mind, a project is underway in the VaNTH (Vanderbilt University; Northwestern University; University of Texas at Austin; and Health. Science and Technology at Harvard/MIT) Engineering Research Center (ERC) to define certain key concepts in systems physiology that we feel are essential in the training of BME students. We believe that in planning a curriculum in BME it is more meaningful to define the key concepts (e.g., homeodynamics, emergent properties, etc.) that one should seek to cover in a systems physiology course or course sequence than to specify the particular systems in which one would cover these concepts. The latter might be constrained by local expertise or by other local biases. We propose that, if students are presented with the key concepts well, their ability to generalize them to new systems should be greatly eased, promoting self-learning.     

Teaching Rigid Body Mechanics Using Student-Created Virtual Environments

This paper describes a recent effort to use student-created virtual environments to teach rigid body dynamics to electrical and computer engineering senior-level undergraduates and first-year graduate students. Many of these students have no background in dynamics except for their freshman year physics course. The approach described here relies on students creating their own virtual environments, takes roughly four to five weeks of instruction, and fits within the scope of other courses that may require electrical and computer engineering students to be familiar with dynamics. The background required consists of only basic linear algebra and ordinary differential equations. By the end of the pilot class, the majority of students were able to expertly model and animate high degree-of-freedom systems, such as slip-steered vehicles, helicopters, submarines, balancing unicycles, motorcycles, and puppets. A core component of the learning philosophy is that by providing students with a venue for creating their own virtual laboratories, they are able to promote their own learning. This paper summarizes the basic material presented to students, some of the virtual environments they chose to implement with only minimal guidance, and three instruments used to assess the effectiveness of the class architecture.     

虚拟仪器技术及其在电力系统中的应用

虚拟仪器在电力系统中的应用越来越广泛 ,主要介绍了虚拟仪器的发展过程 ,虚拟仪器的软件与硬件的基本构成原理 ,并介绍了一个虚拟仪器在直流系统的蓄电池监控中的实例。通过介绍 ,可以断定虚拟仪器在电力系统具有广泛的应用前景 ,是今后一段时间的发展方向     

Ms. Biomedical Engineer: A New Professional Opportunity for Women

Biomedical Engineering (BME), the application of engineering concepts and technology to living systems, is expected to experience explosive growth in the next decade. The effective introduction of technology, by well trained engineers, will alter the practice of medicine and made access to the health care system viable for all 220,000,000 United States residents. The activities of the biomedical research engineer employed by the university and the development engineer employed by biomedical industry are discussed. In addition, the duties of the clinical engineer employed in a hospital and who deals with problems relating to patient care is presented. Three curricular approaches to preparing for the biomedical profession, " classical," "interdisciplinary," and " new discipline," are outlined. Factors which make BME a desirable occupation for women are emphasized.     

虚拟仪器测量不确定度研究

对虚拟仪器的测量不确定度进行了研究.首先分析了虚拟仪器的结构及工作原理,详细论述了其测量不确定度的来源.着重研究了测量不确定度的评定方法,特别是不确定度分量的估计和合成不确定度的计算.强调了传感器环节带来的不确定度的根本性意义,指出虚拟仪器的B类不确定度必须用标准仪器进行校验.以多次测量取均值测直流电压的实例说明了多次测量取均值会将测量精度大大提高.该方法已经在某低频电参数综合校准设备中应用,验证了其正确性.     

Stand-alone laboratory sessions in sensors and signal processing

Real laboratory experiments can help students to gain a better understanding of theoretical problems. Great efforts are needed, however, to improve the quality of laboratory sessions, and a large number of tutors are usually required. Moreover, students may lose time because of hardware failure or an inefficient experimental setup. Several educational tools (based on virtual instruments) have been developed allowing for optimized time scheduling and remote access to laboratory sessions. Drawbacks related to hardware failure have not, however, been seriously addressed. This paper proposes an educational tool made up of a user-friendly interface controlling experimental boards. It basically consists of an array of optical sensing devices connected to suitable conditioning circuits, which are interfaced to a virtual instrument by means of a data acquisition system. To solve the previously mentioned drawbacks, a solution based on both pre-cabled hardware and PC-based measurement stations has been adopted. Moreover, the ability to configure self-educational tasks optimizes time scheduling for students during laboratory activities. The proposed system allows students to improve their knowledge in the field of optical sensing devices, virtual instrumentation, data acquisition systems, and signal processing. The paper describes an application of the tool as a simple system for surface recognition. This application is one of the laboratory tasks performed in measurement classes during this engineering course at the University of Catania, Catania, Italy.     

基于VXI总线的虚拟仪器系统

虚拟仪器技术和VXI总线是当前测试控制领域的热门话题,基于VXI总线的虚拟仪器系统也广泛地应用于各个领域。首先对虚拟仪器做了简单的介绍（包括：产生、特点、结构和分类）,可知总线技术与虚拟仪器的分类息息相关。通过对基于几种不同类型总线的虚拟仪器的分析可知,基于VXI总线的虚拟仪器系统仍占有这个领域内的主导地位,并且虚拟仪器将向着网络化方向发展。     

基于虚拟仪器技术的电能质量分析仪校准检测系统设计与应用

设计了基于虚拟仪器技术的电能质量分析仪校准检测系统,并将其应用于多种电能质量分析仪的校准检测。系统采用LabVIEW编程实现,通过虚拟仪器软件体系(virtual instruments software architecture,VISA)库函数组件、可编程仪器标准命令(standard commands for programmable instruments,SCPI)、仪器自带驱动以及所需的硬件接口卡和数据总线来完成PC机与各相关仪器之间的数据通信。系统功能包括标准源设置、仪器控制和测量数据的存储分析。实验和计算结果表明,该系统可以完成各项电能质量指标的校准检测,在实际校准检测中,显著提高了校准检测的效率,减小了人员误差。     

可互换虚拟仪器的体系结构

近年来，虚拟仪器技术在快速发展的计算机、微电子和数字信号处理技术的推动下取得了长足发展。但是由于现代自动测试系统的复杂度不断增加，同时对系统测试性能的要求也越来越高，目前已有的虚拟仪器软件标准已不能完全解决用户对系统性能、仪器可互换性等方面的要求。由可互换虚拟仪器联盟制订的“实现仪器可互换性的软件标准”大大节省了用户在测试系统开发和长期维护上投入大量的时间和资金，呈现出很好的发展前景。     

虚拟仪表在装甲车辆信息化改造中的应用

为综合运用虚拟仪表技术、总线技术、多路数据实时采集技术,把装甲车辆的现有仪表融入整车的信息化管理体系中,在不干扰车载原有仪表正常工作的情况下,实现了现有仪表传感器信息的精确提取,各信息通过总线传入车载监控中心,以虚拟仪表的形式实现动态显示,为乘员准确了解全车各项重要参数信息、及时进行了战场决策提供了可靠的数据支持。     

虚拟仪器在实验教学中的应用

介绍了虚拟仪器技术以及虚拟仪器的硬件和软件的基本构成原理,提出将虚拟仪器技术应用于电力系统继电保护实验教学中.设计了一套继电保护虚拟仪器系统,并在此基础上对零序保护和距离保护进行了仿真实验,实验结果表明,把虚拟仪器技术应用于电力系统实验教学中具有广泛的前景,是今后一段时间的发展方向.     

关于虚拟仪器开发工具的比较与选取

随着虚拟仪器日益广泛的应用,支持虚拟仪器开发的各种工具也迅速发展起来,因此需要非常慎重取舍才能获得最佳效果.为使虚拟仪器开发者能更快更高效地选择适当的开发工具,本文将当前流行的虚拟仪器开发工具进行分类、分析和比较研究.首先将其总体分为两类:基于通用编程软件和基于图形化语言,然后根据各类开发工具在虚拟仪器开发方面的特点进行论述,同时给出相关实例,最后得出,对于虚拟仪器的开发,常需要根据开发项目的实际,结合各种开发工具各自的优势,进行混合编程,方可达到良好的效果.     

Health simulation - Surgery for dummies

The 3D graphics enable students and surgeons alike to access the eye (left) or middle ear as if they were in theatre with authentic physical and virtual representations of the instruments. The Voxel-Man temporal bone surgical simulator enables surgeons to practice their moves in a 3D simulation of middle ear. This is the first of several minimally invasive or keyhole simulators. The Voxel-Man simulator can be used to present real patient data derived from a computed axial tomography (CAT) scan. EyeSi, an intraocular surgery simulator produced by VRMagic enables surgeons to practice their moves in a 3D simulation of the eye. Haptica's ProMIS enables surgeons to practice their moves in a 3D simulation of the laparoscopy - operating in the abdominal cavity with long instruments and pictures provided by end- view cameras and lights, all pushed through small incisions.     

LXI模块化测试平台技术及其应用

LXI(LAN eXtensions for Instrumentation)是继机架堆叠式GPIB仪器、VXI/PXI虚拟仪器之后的新一代基于以太网络LAN的自动测试系统模块化构架平台标准.本文简述了虚拟仪器技术和自动化测试系统的发展历程,通过论述传统自动化测试系统的存在问题与发展要求,以太网络技术与仪器测量要求的差异,以及目前以太网络及IEEE1558的技术突破,阐述了LXI技术的起因、主要特点,给出了基于LXI模块搭建的合成仪器测试系统的工作原理,最后阐述了LXI模块化测试平台在虚拟仪器和自动测试领域的应用展望.     

基于Nimbus的IVI-COM仪器驱动设计

随着虚拟仪器的快速发展,可互换性虚拟仪器(IVI)成为虚拟仪器的发展主流,其可互换性满足了测试系统对独立于硬件的需求。借助第三方工具Nimbus Driver Studio组件实现IVI-COM仪器驱动从初始设计到最后部署的整个开发过程,并提供IVI-COM仪器驱动的应用举例。     

基于虚拟仪器的E-Gas性能测试系统设计

针对传统仪器在电子节气门(E-Gas)性能测试中存在的不能自定义和灵活性差等不足,本文将虚拟仪器技术引入到E-Gas性能测试中,开发了基于虚拟仪器的E-Gas性能测试系统。本系统灵活地运用了PID控制策略和虚拟仪器开发软件,实现了E-Gas任意开度的高速控制和切换。实际的E-Gas产品测试证明,通过调节PID算法的参数,系统可以对不同的E-Gas产品完成开度全开时间参数、全闭时间参数、任意位置时间参数和冲击性能的测试,测试的时间精度可达0.1ms。系统运行稳定,使用方便。     

虚拟仪器中软误差的分析与研究

虚拟仪器测量中存在着"软误差",这类误差严重时会影响到测量数据的真实度和测量精度.在设计多波形相位差计的测试仿真过程中,由于"软误差"的影响,出现了测量数据异常和产生了粗大误差的严重后果.通过对时域、频域和测量数据的分析,找出了"软误差"产生的原因.实验结果表明,采取有效措施可减小系统中的这类误差.分析与研究虚拟仪器技术测量中的"软误差"问题,对提高虚拟仪器的性能指标有着一定的实际意义.