Temperature Control of a Regasification System for LNG-fuelled Marine Engines Using Nonlinear Control Techniques

International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems - This paper presents two nonlinear PID (NPID) controllers which control the glycol temperature of a regasification system for LNG-fuelled...     

Moment-Based Angular Difference Estimation Between Two Tomographic Projections in 2D and 3D

This paper introduces a new method for estimating the angular difference between two tomographic projections belonging to a set of projections taken at unknown directions in 2D and 3D. Our method relies on the projection neighbor selection in projection moment space, the calculation of the angular differences between these neighboring projections using moment properties and a projection moment neighborhood graph. The accuracy and the robustness of our method are shown on a test database including fifty 2D and 3D gray-level images at different resolutions and with different levels of noise.     

Fingerskate: Relaxing the Physical Constraint of Two-Finger Touchscreen Operations

Two-finger operations, such as rotation operations and zoom operations, are now standard touchscreen operations. However, these two-finger operations may pose an ergonomic problem when they are performed with one hand. FingerSkate is an interaction technique to mitigate the ergonomic problem of two-finger operations adopting the concept of gesture relaxation. A preliminary study showed that the FingerSkate technique was accepted well by the participants. In particular, a micro-analysis of finger movements during the study showed that FingerSkate was utilized well for large rotations. In a subsequent user study, the effects of two FingerSkate design options, Concurrency and Pivot, were examined. The Concurrency option had a statistically significant effect on performance and task workload for a docking task. The Pivot option had a statistically significant effect on task workload for a puzzle task. More participants preferred the sequential Concurrency option, and most participants preferred the center-of-object Pivot option.     

Interaction of a shock wave with a turbulent boundary layer on a heated surface

The interaction of a shock wave with a turbulent boundary layer has been studied. A stream has been diagnosed using non-invasive visualization (schlieren method). During the investigation the effect of surface heating on the length of boundary layer separation has been studied. It has been discovered that during surface heating the dependence of the length of separation on the temperature ratio is approximated using a linear law.     

A Novel Cogging Torque Reduction Method for Interior-Type Permanent-Magnet Motor

This paper presents a novel design method to reduce the cogging torque of interior-type permanent-magnet (PM) motor. In the design method, the optimal notches are put on the rotor pole face, which have an effect on the variation of PM shape or the residual flux density of PM. Through the space harmonic field analysis, the positions of notches are found, and the optimal shapes of notches are determined by using finite element method. The validity of the proposed method is confirmed by experiments.     

In-vivo human brain molecular imaging with a brain-dedicated PET/MRI system

Advances in the new-generation of ultra-high-resolution, brain-dedicated positron emission tomography-magnetic resonance imaging (PET/MRI) systems have begun to provide many interesting insights into the molecular dynamics of the brain. First, the finely delineated structural information from ultra-high-field MRI can help us to identify accurate landmark structures, thereby making it easier to locate PET activation sites that are anatomically well-correlated with metabolic or ligand-specific organs in the neural structures in the brain. This synergistic potential of PET/MRI imaging is discussed in terms of neuroscience and neurological research from both translational and basic research perspectives. Experimental results from the hippocampus, thalamus, and brainstem obtained with ¹⁸F-fluorodeoxyglucose and ¹¹C-3-amino-4-(2-dimethylaminomethylphenylsulfanyl)benzonitrile are used to demonstrate the potential of this new brain PET/MRI system.     

Statistical modeling of electrochemical removal of sodium in fermented food composts

Electrochemical removal of sodium ion from fermented food composts was analyzed and statistically modeled by response surface methodology (RSM). Empirical models were developed to describe relationships between the operating variables (operation time, current density and water contents) and three responses (removal efficiency, energy expenditure and energy efficiency). Statistical analysis indicated that operation time and current density have significant effect on all responses. Good agreement between predicted and measured values confirmed the usefulness of the model. The models were verified by additional experimental at optimum conditions.     

A study of concurrency control in real-time, active databasesystems

Real-time active database systems (RTADBSs) have attracted a considerable amount of research attention in the past and a number of important applications have been identified for such systems, such as telecommunications network management, automated air traffic control, automated financial trading, process control and military command and control systems. In spite of the recognized importance of this area, very little research has been devoted to exploring the dynamics of transaction processing in RTADBSs. Concurrency control (CC) constitutes an integral part of any transaction processing strategy and, thus, deserves special attention. We study CC strategies in RTADBSs and postulate a number of CC algorithms. These algorithms exploit the special needs and features of RTADBSs and are shown to deliver substantially superior performance to conventional real-time CC algorithms