Fractional-order unstable pole-zero cancellation in linear feedback systems

As a very well-known classical fact, non-minimum phase zeros of the process put some limitations on the performance of the feedback system. The source of these limitations is that non-minimum phase zeros cannot be cancelled by unstable poles of the controller since such a cancellation leads to internal instability. The aim of this paper is to propose a method for fractional-order cancellation of non-minimum phase zeros of the process and studying its properties. It is specially shown that the proposed cancellation strategy increases the phase and gain margin without leading to internal instability. Since the systems with higher gain and phase margin are easier to control, the proposed method can be used to arrive at more effective controls, which is also verified by the simulation results.     

Concurrent impact of chipping and pitting damages in a locomotive power transmission system

Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology - The reliability of power transmission systems in locomotives directly impacts trains’ availability and running safety. The failure of gears,...     

Buckling loads of CFRP composite cylinders under combined axial and torsion loading – experiments and computations

During the years 1994 through 1999, a European research project under the title “Design and Validation of Imperfection-Tolerant Laminated Shells” (DEVILS) was carried out. In this project, 11 European partners were involved. A goal of the project was an analytical and experimental study of the buckling behavior of thin-walled carbon fibre reinforced polymer (CFRP) laminated shells under combined axial and torsion loading. An additional aim was to compose a guideline for the dimensioning of such shells. This paper deals with the experimental and the analytical work conducted by DLR (Institute of Structural Mechanics, Braunschweig), ETH Zürich (former Institute of Lightweight Structures and Ropeways) and EMPA Dübendorf (Department of Polymers/Composites) in that project. The study was aimed at the determination of buckling loads of circular cylindrical shells of different laminate lay-ups. Nine shells were tested at DLR in Braunschweig for axial compression and at EMPA in Dübendorf under axial load and under combined axial compression and superimposed torsion. To determine the geometrical quality, the internal and the external surfaces of the specimens were mapped. ETH used photogrammetry and laser scanning prior to loading, while EMPA applied coordinate measurements for the unloaded shells and Moiré projection to monitor the lateral deflection of the cylindrical wall during loading and after buckling. At DLR, strain measurements were performed to assess regularity of the load distribution throughout the loading. The investigation showed that buckling loads of cylinders which are imperfection-sensitive under axial loading may not be so sensitive to combined loads. Furthermore, it was found that the stiffness eccentricity of the laminate played a significant role on the magnitude of the axial buckling load, while for combined loads this effect was somewhat reduced. This paper contains the results of those tests and also the comparison with results of analytical investigations and FE modeling; the obtained data can be used as benchmark reference.     

Application-aware virtual paths insertion for NOCs

Network-on-chip (NoC) has rapidly become a promising alternative for complex system-on-chip architectures including recent multicore architectures. Additionally, optimizing NoC architectures with respect to different design objectives that are suitable for a particular application domain is crucial for achieving high-performance and energy-efficient customized solutions. Despite the fact that many researches have provided various solutions for different aspects of NoCs design, a comprehensive NoCs system solution has not emerged yet. This paper presents a novel methodology to provide a solution for complex on-chip communication problems to reduce power, latency and area overhead. Our proposed NoC communication architecture is based on setting up virtual source–destination paths between selected pairs of NoCs cores so that the packets belonging to distance nodes in the network can bypass intermediate routers while traveling through these virtual paths. In this scheme, the paths are constructed for an application based on its task-graph at the design time. After that, the run time scheduling mechanism is applied to improve the buffer management, virtual channel and switch allocation schemes and hence, the constructed paths are optimized dynamically. Moreover, in our design the router complexity and its overheads are reduced. Additionally, the suggested router has been implemented on Xilinx Virtex-5 FPGA family. The evaluation results captured by SPLASH-2 benchmark suite reveal that in comparison with the conventional NoC router, the proposed router takes 25% and 53% reduction in latency and energy, respectively besides 3.5% area overhead. Indeed, our experimental results demonstrate a significant reduction in the average packet latency and total power consumption with negligible area overhead.     

Training based, moving digital filter method for real time heat flux function estimation

In this paper the neural networks is utilized to estimate the “filter coefficients” needed to estimate heat flux in a particular system. In developing the training phase of the network inspiration is drawn from the Burgraff's exact solution of the IHCP as well as the filter method. Thus, the estimation phase neither requires any temperature field nor the sensitivity coefficients calculations. The neural network used in this work is a 2-layer perceptron. It is shown via classical triangular heat flux test cases that the method can yield very accurate, very efficient as well as stable estimations.     

Buckling of polymer pipes under internal pressure

In this work, the buckling phenomenon of slender pressurized pipes under concentrically applied indirect axial force is experimentally and theoretically investigated. The axial force is applied via a frictionless piston. The deformation trend of a polyvinylchloride pipe sample under this compressive axial force is monitored by means of a number of strain gauges. The strain readings are processed by a computer equipped with strain processing software. The buckling modes as well as the buckling load of the system are thus experimentally determined. To describe the stability behaviour of the pipe analytically, several theoretical models are employed and the buckling phenomenon in such a pressurized pipe is analytically ascertained. Numerical values for the critical buckling loads are also obtained. The experimental and theoretical buckling studies are correlated. Through these correlations, the buckling of pressurized pipes under indirect axial pressure is substantiated and an appropriate theoretical model to describe the phenomenon is established.     

Content-based image database system for epilepsy

We have designed and implemented a human brain multi-modality database system with content-based image management, navigation and retrieval support for epilepsy. The system consists of several modules including a database backbone, brain structure identification and localization, segmentation, registration, visual feature extraction, clustering/classification and query modules. Our newly developed anatomical landmark localization and brain structure identification method facilitates navigation through an image data and extracts useful information for segmentation, registration and query modules. The database stores T1-, T2-weighted and FLAIR MRI and ictal/interictal SPECT modalities with associated clinical data. We confine the visual feature extractors within anatomical structures to support semantically rich content-based procedures. The proposed system serves as a research tool to evaluate a vast number of hypotheses regarding the condition such as resection of the hippocampus with a relatively small volume and high average signal intensity on FLAIR. Once the database is populated, using data mining tools, partially invisible correlations between different modalities of data, modeled in database schema, can be discovered. The design and implementation aspects of the proposed system are the main focus of this paper.     

On generalized conjugate analogy for spatial rods

The inherent duality relationships in the linear differential equations of arbitrarily curved and pretwisted rods is examined in this paper and thereby the well known conjugate beam analogy of Mohr, for straight rods, is generalised for arbitrarily curved rods. By means of some simple examples the application of this duality is illustrated.