Measurement development for cultural characteristics of mobile Internet users at the individual level

Culture plays an important role in how an information technology is developed and used. However, few studies attempt to identify the cultural traits most relevant to the specific technology being examined. The main purpose of this study is to develop measures for cultural characteristics of individual users with a specific information technology, the mobile Internet. We propose measures for four cultural characteristics important in the context of the mobile Internet, which are expected to be widely used in the future. The proposed measures were verified empirically through online surveys conducted in seven countries. The results indicate that the measures have high validity and reliability, as well as comparability among the seven countries. The paper ends with a discussion of the study’s limitations and implications.     

Sensing and gait planning of quadruped walking and climbing robot for traversing in complex environment

In this paper, a general study on improving adaptability of quadruped walking and climbing robot in complex environment is presented. First, a sensing system composed of range and gyroscope sensors in a novel arrangement is developed. By combining the sensing signals and the internal state of the robot, the surface geometry of the environment is sufficiently reconstructed in real-time. Secondly, a planning algorithm for the robot to overcome the reconstructed environment is conducted. Based on the reshaped surface, the planning algorithm not only provides the exact body trajectory and foot positions but also the adaptability of the robot in a specific environment. A method to improve the adaptability of the walking and climbing robot is also introduced. Thanks to the adherent ability of the robot, the center of gravity of the robot is allowed to move outside the support polygon to increase the reach-ability of the next swing leg. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed approach is verified by the performances of the experiments in complex environments using a quadruped walking and climbing robot named MRWALLSPECT IV.     

Oxidation Resistance Coating of LSM and LSCF on SOFC Metallic Interconnects by the Aerosol Deposition Process

Conductive La_0.8Sr_0.2MnO₃ (LSM) and La_0.6Sr_0.4Co_0.2Fe_0.8O₃ (LSCF) layers with a thickness of ∼10 μm were deposited on ferritic stainless steel (SS) by the aerosol deposition method, for use as an oxidation resistance-coating layer in the metallic interconnector of a solid oxide fuel cell. The coated layers were fairly dense without pores or cracks, and maintained good adhesion even after oxidation at 800°C for 100 h. The surface of the bare SS after annealing at 800°C for 100 h was covered with Cr₂O₃ and Fe₃O₄ oxide scales, and the electrical conductivity was sharply decreased. However, the LSM- and LSCF-coated SSs showed a surface microstructure with almost no oxidation and maintained good electrical conductivity after annealing at 800°C for 100 h. The area-specific resistance (ASR) of LSM- and LSCF-coated alloys after 100 h of oxidation at 800°C was 20.6 and 11.7 mΩ·cm², respectively.     

Simplified P–M interaction curve for square steel tube filled with high-strength concrete

The purpose of this study is to propose simplified strength equations that can be conveniently used to establish a P–M interaction curve of square concrete filled tubes (CFTs) with concrete strength of up to 100 MPa. The method presented in the author's previous study [Choi Y-H, Foutch DA, LaFave JM. New approach to AISC P–M interaction curve for concrete filled tube beam-columns. Eng Struct 2006;28(11):1586–98] was used as a basic unified formula for pure steel members and CFT ones, and a parametric study was performed to determine the contribution of the concrete, which were expressed by two variables: a normalized maximum moment, α, and the axial load ratio at the maximum moment, β. The two variables were formulated with respect to tube width-to-thickness ratio (b/t) and relative concrete compressive strength to yield strength of the steel tube (f′_c/F_y). Then, the proposed method were compared to experimental data found in literatures, which showed greatly improved results in terms of accuracy and amount of computation, when compared to the current AISC design methods.     

Effect of high pressure treatments combined with various levels of κ-carrageenan on cold-set binding in restructured pork

This study investigated the effects of high pressure processing and κ-carrageenan on cold-set binding in restructured pork meat. High pressure (>200 MPa) combined with carrageenan level higher than 1.5% caused increased breaking force and tensile strength ( P  < 0.05). Increasing the pressure level caused a continuous κ-carrageenan network in the junctions between meat particles, as confirmed by scanning electron microscopy imaging. With regard to the water binding properties, all treatments showed moisture content ranging between 74% and 76%. Increases in pressure levels and holding times tended to improve the water-holding capacity (WHC) of restructured pork; however, the κ-carrageenan concentration showed no relation with WHC. Cooking loss decreased significantly ( P  < 0.05) with increases in both pressure level and κ-carrageenan concentration. By increasing pressure levels, both the L ^*- and a ^*-values increased, but the b ^*-value showed no significant difference ( P  > 0.05) among the treatments, with the exception of 100 MPa for 30 min. The addition of κ-carrageenan had no effect on colour ( P  > 0.05). Therefore, the results indicate that pressure above 200 MPa and addition of 1.5% carrageenan has potential use in cold-set meat restructuring.     

Decompositions of bubbly flow PIV velocity fields using discrete wavelets multi-resolution and multi-section image method

Currently, wavelet transforms are widely used for the analyses of particle image velocimetry (PIV) velocity vector fields. This is because the wavelet provides not only spatial information of the velocity vectors, but also of the time and frequency domains. In this study, a discrete wavelet transform is applied to real PIV images of bubbly flows. The vector fields obtained by a self-made cross-correlation PIV algorithm were used for the discrete wavelet transform. The performances of the discrete wavelet transforms were investigated by changing the level of power of discretization. The images decomposed by wavelet multi-resolution showed conspicuous characteristics of the bubbly flows for the different levels. A high spatial bubble concentrated area could be evaluated by the constructed discrete wavelet transform algorithm, in which high-leveled wavelets play dominant roles in revealing the flow characteristics.     

Fuzzy QFD for supply chain management with reliability consideration

Although many products are made through several tiers of supply chains, a systematic way of handling reliability issues in a various product planning stage has drawn attention, only recently, in the context of supply chain management (SCM). The main objective of this paper is to develop a fuzzy quality function deployment (QFD) model in order to convey fuzzy relationship between customers needs and design specification for reliability in the context of SCM. A fuzzy multi criteria decision-making procedure is proposed and is applied to find a set of optimal solution with respect to the performance of the reliability test needed in CRT design. It is expected that the proposed approach can make significant contributions on the following areas: effectively communicating with technical personnel and users; developing relatively error-free reliability review system; and creating consistent and complete documentation for design for reliability.     

Direct adaptive control with integral action for nonminimum phase systems

This note presents a direct adaptive control scheme for nonminimum phase systems where controller parameters are estimated from the recursive least-squares algorithm. Some additional auxiliary parameters are obtained from the proposed polynomial identity,, and a local convergence is guaranteed without any extra conditions. Integral action is incorporated into the adaptive controller to eliminate the steady-state error, and to satisfy a condition of the unique solution for the polynomial identity as well.