Traction control design for off-road mobility using an SPH-DAE cosimulation framework

Multibody System Dynamics - We describe an analytical framework implemented in a general-purpose mobility simulation platform for enabling the design of control policies for improved rover mobility...     

The uncertainty interaction problem in self-adaptive systems

Software and Systems Modeling - The problem of mitigating uncertainty in self-adaptation has driven much of the research proposed in the area of software engineering for self-adaptive systems in...     

Cyclopean geometry of binocular vision

The geometry of binocular projection is analyzed in relation to the primate visual system. An oculomotor parameterization that includes the classical vergence and version angles is defined. It is shown that the epipolar geometry of the system is constrained by binocular coordination of the eyes. A local model of the scene is adopted in which depth is measured relative to a plane containing the fixation point. These constructions lead to an explicit parameterization of the binocular disparity field involving the gaze angles as well as the scene structure. The representation of visual direction and depth is discussed with reference to the relevant psychophysical and neurophysiological literature.     

Puffer fish and its consumption: To eat or not to eat?

This systematic review was done to examine the substantial increase in the number of intoxication cases in puffer fish associated with tetrodotoxin. In the past 5 years, 430 cases of intoxication and 52 deaths associated with puffer fish have been reported worldwide. It has also been verified that puffer fish have migrated to different regions, which has led to a negative environmental impact. Based on the information obtained herein, consumption of puffer fish should be legally limited, although it still remains very popular in several regions with negative social and economic impacts.     

Demodulation techniques for the amplitude modulated laser imager

A new technique has been found that uses in-phase and quadrature phase (I/Q) demodulation to optimize the images produced with an amplitude-modulated laser imaging system. An I/Q demodulator was used to collect the I/Q components of the received modulation envelope. It was discovered that by adjusting the local oscillator phase and the modulation frequency, the backscatter and target signals can be analyzed separately via the I/Q components. This new approach enhances image contrast beyond what was achieved with a previous design that processed only the composite magnitude information.     

Motion Panoramas

In this paper we describe a method for analysing video sequences and for representing them as mosaics or panoramas. Previous work on video mosaicking essentially concentrated on static scenes. We generalize these approaches to the case of a rotating camera observing both static and moving objects where the static portions of the scene are not necessarily dominant, as it has been often hypothesized in the past. We start by describing a robust technique for accurately aligning a large number of video frames under unknown camera rotations and camera settings. The alignment technique combines a feature‐based method (initialization and refinement) with rough motion segmentation followed by a colour‐based direct method (final adjustment). This precise frame‐to‐frame alignment allows the dynamic building of a background representation as well as an efficient segmentation of each image such that moving regions of arbitrary shape and size are aligned with the static background. Thus a motion panorama visualizes both dynamic and static scene elements in a geometrically consistent way. Extensive experiments applied to archived videos of track‐and‐field events validate the approach. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Using a pattern recognition approach to disaggregate the total electricity consumption in a house into the major end-uses

The method presented in this paper shows a promising potential for application in residential buildings. The results prove that the whole-house electricity consumption can be disaggregated into its major end-uses, using a pattern recognition approach and only one sensor installed on the main electric entrance of the house. It also required a one-time submetering of the target appliances during the training period, of about a week, to find the electric characteristics of appliances. The results are provided in terms of daily load profiles, energy consumption and energy contribution of selected appliances. The proposed method was tested with monitored data from 3 weeks: (i) the training period of 1 week in October, (ii) the near-to-date testing period of 1 week in November and (iii) the far-to-date testing period of 1 week in January. For instance, the difference between monitored and estimated contribution is, for the month of October 1996, as follows: (i) 13 kW h or $0.85 for the DHW heater and (ii) 6 kW h or $0.36 for the refrigerator. The overall difference for both appliances does not exceed $1.25 for the month of October, for a total electricity bill of 912 kW h and $60.60, which appears to be acceptable for every homeowner. The errors in evaluating the daily energy consumption is between −10.5% and 15.9% for both the DWH heater and the refrigerator.     

Aggregation of Tetrakis(4-methylpyridyl)porphyrin and tetrakis(4-sulphonatophenyl)porphyrin in water

The homo- and heteroaggregation of two oppositely charged water soluble porphyrins, tetrakis(4-methylpyridyl)porphyrin, TMPyP and tetrakis(4-sulphonatophenyl) porphyrin, TSPP has been studied by means of absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy in phosphate buffered saline. All experimental results on TSPP are consistent with a monomerdimer equilibrium (ΔH = −19.6 and ΔS = 19.3 kJ mole⁻¹). The absorption spectrum of the TSPP dimer was obtained from a global fit of a set of spectra to the monomer dimer model. TMPyP does not aggregate at concentrations up to 10⁻⁴M . Changes in the fluorescence spectrum of TMPyP upon dilution are due to adsorption phenomena. 1:1 heteroagregates of both porphyrins cannot be characterized in water solution due to extreme small solubility. A 2:1 heteroaggregate is detectable in solution. It is proposed to exploit the extreme small solubility of heteroaggregated oppositely charged porphyrins to increase the selective retention of porphyrins provided there is an initial selectivity of ether component.     

Selective single pulse femtosecond laser removal of alumina (Al2O3) from a bilayered Al2O3/TiAlN/steel coating

We studied surface modification of a double layer protective coating on steel induced by single fs laser pulse irradiation in ambient air. The outer alumina (Al₂O₃) layer, which protects against aggressive environments, was 1.7 μm thick and the titanium aluminum nitride (TiAlN) layer in contact with the steel surface had a thickness of 1.9 μm. The pulses (λ = 775 nm, τ = 200 fs) were generated by a Ti:sapphire laser source. The pulse energy was varied from 0.32 μJ to 50 μJ, corresponding to an incident laser fluence of 0.11 J cm^− 2 to 16.47 J cm^− 2. The surface damage threshold was found to be 0.20 J cm^− 2 and the alumina layer removal was initiated at 0.56 J cm^− 2. This selective ablation of alumina was possible in a wide range of fluences, up to the maximum applied, without ablating the TiAlN layer beneath.