Inside Front Cover: Fabrication of Ideally Ordered Nanoporous Alumina Films and Integrated Alumina Nanotubule Arrays by High‐Field Anodization (Adv. Mater. 17/2005)

A simple, low‐cost approach to fabricating large‐area highly ordered nanoporous alumina films in sulfuric acid solutions through a single‐step high‐field anodization, without the assistance of any additional process, is reported on p. 2115 by Chu and co‐workers. The critical high anodizing potential in the adopted electrolyte system increases with the ageing of solutions after a long period of anodization. Correspondingly, the applicable current density for stable anodization rises significantly, thus leading to high‐speed film growth. Uniform porous anodic alumina films in sulfuric acid solutions under a high electric field of 40–70 V and 1600–2000 A m^–2 are achieved.     

Rolling and swaying motion estimation for a mobile robot by using omnidirectional optical flows

Described here is a method for estimating rolling and swaying motions of a mobile robot using optical flow. We have proposed an image sensor with a hyperboloidal mirror for the vision-based navigation of a mobile robot. Its name is HyperOmni Vision. The radial component of optical flow in HyperOmni Vision has a periodic characteristic. The circumferential component of optical flow has a symmetric characteristic. The proposed method makes use of these characteristic to estimate robustly the rolling and swaying motion of the mobile robot. Correspondence to: Y. Yagi e-mail: y-yagi@sys.es.osaka-u.ac.jp     

Shape from Shading with Interreflections Under a Proximal Light Source: Distortion-Free Copying of an Unfolded Book

We address the problem of recovering the 3D shape of an unfolded book surface from the shading information in a scanner image. This shape-from-shading problem in a real world environment is made difficult by a proximal, moving light source, interreflections, specular reflections, and a nonuniform albedo distribution. Taking all these factors into account, we formulate the problem as an iterative, non-linear optimization problem. Piecewise polynomial models of the 3D shape and albedo distribution are introduced to efficiently and stably compute the shape in practice. Finally, we propose a method to restore the distorted scanner image based on the reconstructed 3D shape. The image restoration experiments for real book surfaces demonstrate that much of the geometric and photometric distortions are removed by our method.     

1.3-μm InP-InGaAsP lasers fabricated on Si substrates by waferbonding

1.3-μm InP-InGaAsP lasers have been successfully fabricated on Si substrates by wafer bonding. InP-InGaAsP thin epitaxial films are prepared by selective etching of InP substrates and then bonded to Si wafers, after which the laser structures are fabricated on the bonded thin films. The bonding temperature has been optimized to be 400°C by considering bonding strength, quality of the bonded crystal, and compatibility with device processes. Room-temperature continuous-wave (RT CW) operation has been achieved for 6-μm-wide mesa lasers with a threshold current of 39 mA, which is identical to that of conventional lasers on InP substrates. Additionally, the lasers fabricated on Si have exhibited higher output powers than the lasers on InP, which is due to higher thermal conductivity of Si substrates. From these results, the wafer bonding is thought to be a promising technique to integrate optical devices on Si and implement optical interconnections between Si LSI chips     

不同掺杂对可加工陶瓷二次电子发射及沿面闪络特性的影响

固体绝缘材料的表面特性极大地影响着其真空沿面闪络特性,长期以来这一现象极大地制约着真空绝缘系统的整体性能,限制了高压电真空设备的发展进程.本文针对一种具有良好加工性能及表面耐电特性的低熔点可加工微晶玻璃陶瓷引入真空绝缘的背景,在不明显降低可加工性能的前提下,通过在可加工陶瓷原材料内掺杂不同的低二次电子发射系数金属氧化物...     

Fabrication of alumina films with laminated structures by ac anodization

Anodization techniques by alternating current (ac) are introduced in this review. By using ac anodization, laminated alumina films are fabricated. Different types of alumina films consisting of 50–200 nm layers were obtained by varying both the ac power supply and the electrolyte. The total film thickness increased with an increase in the total charge transferred. The thickness of the individual layers increased with the ac voltage; however, the anodization time had little effect on the film thickness. The laminated alumina films resembled the nacre structure of shells, and the different morphologies exhibited by bivalves and spiral shells could be replicated by controlling the rate of increase of the applied potentials.     

Multi-objective genetic algorithm for solving N-version program design problem

N-version programming (NVP) is a programming approach for constructing fault tolerant software systems. Generally, an optimization model utilized in NVP selects the optimal set of versions for each module to maximize the system reliability and to constrain the total cost to remain within a given budget. In such a model, while the number of versions included in the obtained solution is generally reduced, the budget restriction may be so rigid that it may fail to find the optimal solution. In order to ameliorate this problem, this paper proposes a novel bi-objective optimization model that maximizes the system reliability and minimizes the system total cost for designing N-version software systems. When solving multi-objective optimization problem, it is crucial to find Pareto solutions. It is, however, not easy to obtain them. In this paper, we propose a novel bi-objective optimization model that obtains many Pareto solutions efficiently.We formulate the optimal design problem of NVP as a bi-objective 0–1 nonlinear integer programming problem. In order to overcome this problem, we propose a Multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA), which is a powerful, though time-consuming, method to solve multi-objective optimization problems. When implementing genetic algorithm (GA), the use of an appropriate genetic representation scheme is one of the most important issues to obtain good performance. We employ random-key representation in our MOGA to find many Pareto solutions spaced as evenly as possible along the Pareto frontier. To pursue improve further performance, we introduce elitism, the Pareto-insertion and the Pareto-deletion operations based on distance between Pareto solutions in the selection process.The proposed MOGA obtains many Pareto solutions along the Pareto frontier evenly. The user of the MOGA can select the best compromise solution among the candidates by controlling the balance between the system reliability and the total cost.     

Heavy metal precipitation by polycation-polyanion complex of PEI and its phosphonomethylated derivative

The removal of various heavy metal ions such as Cu2+, Co2+, Zn2+, Ni2+ and Pb2+ from aqueous solutions by precipitation with polyelectrolyte complex of PPEI and PEI was conducted. Heavy metal binding with PPEI was initially allowed to occur and then upon equilibration, PEI was added to initiate precipitation of the polyelectrolyte complex together with the heavy metal ion. The PPEI-PEI system was found effective for heavy metal scavenging purposes even in the presence of high concentrations of non-transition metal ions like Na+. Heavy metal concentration may be reduced beyond emission standards for industrial wastewaters. The PPEI-PEI polyelectrolyte complex was found to be more effective than traditional precipitation methods for the treatment of a representative electroless Ni plating waste solution.     

Deep Phenotyping of Superficial Epidermolytic Ichthyosis due to a Recurrent Mutation in KRT2

Superficial epidermolytic ichthyosis (SEI) is an autosomal dominant inherited ichthyosis. SEI is caused by mutations in KRT2 and frequently shows erythroderma and widespread blistering at birth. We report the clinical manifestations of two patients from a Japanese family with SEI caused by a hotspot mutation, p.Glu487Lys, in KRT2. In addition, we summarize previous reports on SEI patients with the identical mutation. One of the two patients had disease onset at the age of 7 months. The other patient’s age of onset is unknown, but it was in childhood. Neither of the two patients showed erythroderma. To perform deep phenotyping, we studied the age of onset and the frequency of erythroderma in 34 reported SEI cases with the p.Glu487Lys mutation, including the present cases. Among the cases with sufficient clinical information, 44.4% of the cases that were due to p.Glu487Lys in KRT2 occurred at birth. Erythroderma was observed in 11.1% of the cases with p.Glu487Lys in KRT2.     

40 Gbit/s packet bit error ratio and loss real-time measurement for ultrahigh-speed packet switched network

A novel packet bit error rate (BER) and loss measurement method and system is proposed. A proposed 40 Gbit/s packet BER and loss measurement system is expressed in detail. A 40 Gbit/s BER and loss measurement with various conditions is demonstrated experimentally. In real time, only the payload part of a packet and burst stream with fluctuated guard time is evaluated. The BER and packet loss of a randomly received packet sequence due to routing and buffering can be also evaluated by the measurement system. A 10 Gbit/s packet BER and loss measurement with optical label switching, buffering, and preamble-free optical packet 3R are demonstrated experimentally.