INCORPORATING PRACTICAL AND SYNTHESIS CONTENTS IN UNDERGRADUATE CONTROL EDUCATION

This paper revisits the effort over the last decade in making undergraduate control education more useful and attractive to both the control engineers and the engineers at large. With the help of further coverage in new textbooks, more practical and synthesis contents in the control courses have been incorporated. Gaps still exist, particularly in the areas of PID control and auto‐tuning, fuzzy control, overall control strategy, control structure and systems thinking, and these will be elaborated. A major challenge is in the coverage of more practical and synthesis contents in the introductory common control course for all engineers. How this may be resolved is discussed. Finally, the need for new teaching approaches such as the use of interesting case studies and the use of problem‐based learning will be outlined.     

A survey of CSCW systems

Over the last decade, computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) has emerged as an identifiable research area that focuses on the role of the computer in group work. CSCW is a generic term which combines the understanding of the nature of group working with the enabling technologies of computer networking, systems support and applications. The paper examines the classes of system which have emerged to support cooperative working. A framework for characterising and describing CSCW systems is presented and four major classes of cooperative system identified. Each of these classes of cooperative system are examined highlighting their general characteristics and applicability to CSCW.     

分布系统中多米诺效应的分析与消除

分布系统中发生故障后,错误信息在进程间的传播,以及由此引起的系统恢复过程中的多米诺效应是分布系统容错恢复技术所面临的最重要与最困难的问题.目前各种研究工作偏重于具体的系统动态恢复技术.本文的研究重点在于首次揭示多米诺效应本身固有的数量特征及其与分布系统技术参数间的联系,给出多米诺效应动态消除技术,引入系统额外开销的下限,并针对动态技术的缺点,探讨多米诺效应的静态消除技术,为解决困难开辟新途径.     

Multivariable controller design in an adaptive control scheme

A multivariable control system design approach in the frequency domain is presented. The issue of control system redesign in an adaptive control scheme is discussed. Expert system techniques have been used for the automated design of controllers for multivariable systems. Design knowledge has been represented using rules, facts and objects. The design process consists of a sequence of operations obtained by heuristics and experience in the the design techniques. An automated design session of a multivariable plant using the expert system demonstrates that the expert system appears to work well in its prototype implementation.     

Pole shifting for matrices over real algebras

Pole shifting of multivariable control system over finite dimensional real algebras is studied. The main results are expressed in terms of the minimal polynomial of A + BF, where F is a feedback.     

Validation of a Three-Dimensional Computational Fluid Dynamics Model of a Contact Tank

A three-dimensional (3D) computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model of a contact tank is presented in this paper. The model results are compared against 3D velocities and flow through curve (FTC) data, representing a tracer concentration profile, from a 1:8 scale physical model. The objective is to demonstrate that CFD models can simulate both the FTC and the 3D velocity field quite well. Simultaneous validation of velocities and FTC is important in ascertaining the predictive capabilities of CFD models, as physical model studies indicate that different baffle arrangements can lead to similar FTCs. Therefore, a good prediction of only FTC, as presented in previous 3D CFD model studies, does not necessarily imply a correct simulation of the flow field.     

Multi-User MIMO Mobile CDMA Uplink System Employing Turbo Coding and Joint Detection Through a Multipath Rayleigh Fading Channel

In this paper, a generalized multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna system that can be fitted to the uplink of a wireless communication system is considered for the general case of multi-user. At the transmitter, the information bits are Turbo coded, then interleaved and passed through a serial-to-parallel converter. The channel is assumed bad urban suffering from multipath Rayleigh fading resulting in inter-symbol and multiple access interferences (ISI and MAI). At the front-end of the receiver, a number of receiving antennas are used followed by a joint multi-user estimator based on the Minimum Mean Square Error Block Linear Equalizer (MMSE-BLE).Computer simulations demonstrate a significant performance improvement in both single user and multi-user cases.This paper depends in parts on that presented at the 11th European Wireless Conference, Cyprus, Nicosia, pp. 187–192, April 2005. Yasmine A. Fahmy was born in Guiza, Egypt, on June 4, 1976. She received the B.Sc., M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Communication and Electronics engineering from Cairo University, Egypt on 1999, 2001 and 2005 respectively. She is presently an assistant professor at Cairo University, Egypt. Her current field of interest is wireless communication and channel estimation. Hebat-Allah M. Mourad received her B.Sc., M. Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical communication engineering from Cairo University, Egypt, in 1983, 1987 and 1994 respectively. Since 1983, she has been with the Department of Electronics and Communications, Faculty of Engineering, Cairo University, and is currently associate professor there. Her research interests include optical fiber communications, mobile and satellite communications. Emad K. Al-Hussaini received his B.Sc degree in Electrical Communication Engineering from Ain-Shams University, Cairo, Egypt, in 1964 and his M.Sc and Ph.D. degrees from Cairo University, Giza, Egypt, in 1974 and 1977, respectively. From 1964 to 1970, he was with the General Egyptian Aeroorganization. Since 1970, he has been with the Department of Electronics and Communications, Faculty of Engineering, Cairo University, and is currently professor there. He was a research fellow at Imperial College, London, UK, and at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA, in the academic years 1976/1977 and 1981/1982, respectively. In 1990, he received the Egyptian national encouragement award for outstanding engineering research. He has written several papers for technical international journals and conferences. His research interests include signal processing, fading channel communication, modulation, and cellular mobile radio systems. Dr Al-Hussaini is a senior member of IEEE. He is listed in Marquis Whos Who in the World and in the IBC (International Biographical Center, Cambridge) for outstanding people of the 20th century.     

Cost effective second generation AC-modules: Development and testing aspects

In the framework of the European research project PV2GO, a new AC-module inverter was developed, taking into account all relevant aspects from a European market's point of view (standards, market, application, and research and development goals). The project goal was to achieve the overall system costs of 3 Euro per Wp for a modular plug-and-play photovoltaic system. For the photovoltaic-module, a standard 130-Wp Eurosolare module was chosen. The research and development (R&D) goal was to develop an advanced DC-control system consisting of a state-of-the-art programmable digital device and an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) for the AC-control of the inverter. According to the topology concept, thermal and magnetic designs were optimized with regard to production technology and packaging for large-scale production. The new AC-modules were tested in a number of field-test sites in various parts of Europe and their reliability was assessed through Highly Accelerated Stress Tests. Efficiency and power quality have been tested in the laboratory. Further in the PV2GO project an optimization study of the manufacturing process of the new generation of AC-modules for high volume output was done. Another task was the pre-certification procedure to assure compliance with the European guidelines and standards.     

PV system sizing using observed time series of solar radiation

Sizing represents an important part of photovoltaic system design. This paper describes a sizing procedure based on the observed time series of solar radiation. Using a simple geometrical construction, the sizing curve is determined as a superposition of contributions from individual climatic cycles of low daily solar radiation. Unlike the traditional methods based on loss-of-load probability, the reliability of supply enters in this method through the length of the time series of data used in the analysis. The method thus resembles techniques used in other branches of engineering where extreme values are considered as functions of certain recurrence intervals.     

In situ regeneration of the Ni-based catalytic reformer of a 5 kW PEMFC system

The paper reports the results of on-site regeneration catalytic bed of the natural gas reformer in a 5 kW PEM fuel cell system. The Ni catalyst previously poisoned by sulphur from the available natural gas, could be re-activated by injection of pure water steam, following the method developed for industrial reformers using the same metal catalyst: this method was shown to be perfectly efficient, provided no natural gas was fed during the operation. Results of the tests conducted are presented and discussed in relation to published data on S-sorption on Ni surfaces.