Effective Reduction of Horizontal Error in Laser Scanning Information by Strip‐Wise Least Squares Adjustments

Though the airborne laser scanning (ALS) technique is becoming more popular in many applications, horizontal accuracy of points scanned by the ALS is not yet satisfactory when compared with the accuracy achieved for vertical positions. One of the major reasons is the drift that occurs in the inertial measurement unit (IMU) during the scanning. This paper presents an algorithm that adjusts for the error that is introduced mainly by the drift of the IMU that renders systematic differences between strips on the same area. For this, we set up an observation equation for strip‐wise adjustments and completed it with tie point and control point coordinates derived from the scanned strips and information from aerial photos. To effectively capture the tie points, we developed a set of procedures that constructs a digital surface model (DSM) with breaklines and then performed feature‐based matching on strips resulting in a set of reliable tie points. Solving the observation equations by the least squares method produced a set of affine transformation equations with 6 parameters that we used to transform the strips for adjusting the horizontal error. Experimental results after evaluation of the accuracy showed a root mean squared error (RMSE) of the adjusted strip points of 0.27 m, which is significant considering the RMSE before adjustment was 0.77 m.     

A fact-oriented ontological approach to human process modeling for knowledge-intensive business services

Modern business environment emphasizes the role of knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS). As well as the enterprises in any other kinds of industries, business process management (BPM) can be a source of core competency for the enterprises in KIBS industry. However, most of the business processes in KIBS are human processes which are collaborative, innovative, and dynamic, which cannot be supported well by current BPM technologies. Human interaction management (HIM) has emerged as an alternative theory to deal with human processes in KIBS. But, the current ways of process modeling and management in HIM have a problem of complexity, especially in terms of realizing its principle of ‘supportive activity management’. This research adopts fact-oriented ontological approach to address this problem. Based on fact-oriented approach, human-friendly condition modeling and state management during supportive activity management can be achieved.     

Using function-based patent analysis to identify potential application areas of technology for technology transfer

Under the open innovation paradigm, identification of application areas of the internally developed technologies is important to maximize the profits from them. However, many companies have failed to identify opportunity for additional applications. The fundamental reason is that companies have insufficient understanding of the potential applications of their technologies, because different industries use far different technologies and technological terminologies. However, technologies can be linked with outside industries by analyzing them from the functional perspective, because functions used in different industries are generally similar. Therefore, this article proposes a function-based patent analysis to identify the potential application areas of a technology. In general, technologies in a patent are invented for use in a specific industry, and thus a patent can be categorized into a specific industry. By identifying patents which contain a specific function, industries that use the function can be identified. Industries in which the importance of the function is relatively high can be considered as areas in which technologies performing the function have potential to be applied, and the proposed indexes evaluate the relative importance of the function within each industry. Finally, the practical usefulness of the proposed method was verified by identifying the potential areas in which vortex reduction technology can be applied.     

Detecting signals of new technological opportunities using semantic patent analysis and outlier detection

In the competitive business environment, early identification of technological opportunities is crucial for technology strategy formulation and research and development planning. There exist previous studies that identify technological directions or areas from a broad view for technological opportunities, while few studies have researched a way to detect distinctive patents that can act as new technological opportunities at the individual patent level. This paper proposes a method of detecting new technological opportunities by using subject–action–object (SAO)-based semantic patent analysis and outlier detection. SAO structures are syntactically ordered sentences that can be automatically extracted by natural language processing of patent text; they explicitly show the structural relationships among technological components in a patent, and thus encode key findings of inventions and the expertise of inventors. Therefore, the proposed method allows quantification of structural dissimilarities among patents. We use outlier detection to identify unusual or distinctive patents in a given technology area; some of these outlier patents may represent new technological opportunities. The proposed method is illustrated using patents related to organic photovoltaic cells. We expect that this method can be incorporated into the research and development process for early identification of technological opportunities.     

TrendPerceptor: A property-function based technology intelligence system for identifying technology trends from patents

Technology intelligence systems are vital components for planning of technology development and formulation of technology strategies. Although such systems provide computation supports for technology analysis, much effort and intervention of experts, who may be expensive or unavailable, is required in gathering processes of information for analysis. As a remedy, this paper proposes TrendPerceptor, a system that uses a property-function based approach. The proposed system assists experts (1) to identify trends in invention concepts from patents, and (2) to perform evolution trend analysis of patents for technology forecasting. For this purpose, a module of the system uses grammatical analysis of textual information to automatically extract properties and functions, which show innovation directions in a given technology. Using the identified properties and functions, a module for invention concept analysis based on network analysis and a module for evolution trend analysis based on TRIZ (Russian acronym of the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving) trends are suggested. This paper describes the architecture of a system composed of these three modules, and illustrates two case studies using the system.     

First nuclear transmutation of 237Np and 241Am by accelerator-driven system at Kyoto University Critical Assembly

This study demonstrates, for the first time, the principle of nuclear transmutation of minor actinide (MA) by the accelerator-driven system (ADS) through the injection of high-energy neutrons into the subcritical core at the Kyoto University Critical Assembly. The main objective of the experiments is to confirm fission reactions of neptunium-237 (²³⁷Np) and americium-241 (²⁴¹Am), and capture reactions of ²³⁷Np. Subcritical irradiation of ²³⁷Np and ²⁴¹Am foils is conducted in a hard spectrum core with the use of the back-to-back fission chamber that obtains simultaneously two signals from specially installed test (²³⁷Np or ²⁴¹Am) and reference (uranium-235) foils. The first nuclear transmutation of ²³⁷Np and ²⁴¹Am by ADS soundly implemented by combining the subcritical core and the 100 MeV proton accelerator, and the use of a lead-bismuth target, is conclusively demonstrated through the experimental results of fission and capture reaction events.     

Effect of axial reflector on radial uniformity in neutron transmutation doping of silicon

Significant axial variation of radial uniformity is observed in Si-ingot neutron transmutation doping in the flux screening method, and leads to non-uniform resistivity distribution for a certain part of Si-ingot. This axial variation of radial uniformity is caused by the installation of a partial neutron screen which decreases the reaction rates differently in the center and surface at the region not surrounded by the partial neutron screen. For the improvement of the specific distribution of radial uniformity in the axial direction, a new concept of axial reflector is introduced to partly change the reaction rate at a certain region of Si-ingot, and neutron irradiation experiments are carried out at the heavy water neutron irradiation facility in the Kyoto University Research Reactor. Based on the experimental and numerical results, the new axial reflector is proved to be effective for improving the axial variation of radial uniformity.     

Measurement of large negative reactivity of an accelerator-driven system in the Kyoto University Critical Assembly

Large negative reactivity of a subcritical system driven by a pulsed 14 MeV neutron source has been measured in the Kyoto University Critical Assembly. The subcriticality of the accelerator-driven system (ADS) ranged in effective multiplication factor roughly from 0.98 to 0.92, which corresponded to an operational range of an actual ADS proposed by Japan Atomic Energy Agency. As the measurement technique, pulsed neutron method, power spectral analysis for pulsed neutron source, accelerator-beam trip method were employed. From neutron count decay data obtained by the pulsed neutron experiment, not only the prompt-neutron decay constant of fundamental mode but also a higher spatial mode could be derived. The subcriticality was also determined from the fundamental decay constant. The measured cross-power spectral density consisted of a familiar correlated reactor-noise component and many uncorrelated delta-function-like peaks at the integral multiple of pulse repetition frequency. The fundamental prompt-neutron decay constant, i.e., the subcriticality determined from the latter uncorrelated peaks was consistent with that obtained by the above pulsed neutron experiment. However, the magnitude of the former correlated component was reduced with an increase in the subcriticality and eventually this component became almost white at deeply subcritical state ranging in the multiplication factor under 0.95. Consequently, the determination of the decay constant from the correlated component was impossible under such a subcritical state. As data analysis method for the beam trip experiment, both the conventional integral count method and the least-squares inverse kinetics method (LSIKM) were employed. The LSIKM analysis led to the consistent subcriticality with that obtained by the pulsed neutron experiment, while the integral count method significantly underestimated the subcriticality. This underestimation originated from a residual background count, which was maintained after the beam trip. The LSIKM was mostly not influenced by such a slight count rate.     

Optimal Preclinical Conditions for Using Adult Human Multipotent Neural Cells in the Treatment of Spinal Cord Injury

Stem cell-based therapeutics are amongst the most promising next-generation therapeutic approaches for the treatment of spinal cord injury (SCI), as they may promote the repair or regeneration of damaged spinal cord tissues. However, preclinical optimization should be performed before clinical application to guarantee safety and therapeutic effect. Here, we investigated the optimal injection route and dose for adult human multipotent neural cells (ahMNCs) from patients with hemorrhagic stroke using an SCI animal model. ahMNCs demonstrate several characteristics associated with neural stem cells (NSCs), including the expression of NSC-specific markers, self-renewal, and multi neural cell lineage differentiation potential. When ahMNCs were transplanted into the lateral ventricle of the SCI animal model, they specifically migrated within 24 h of injection to the damaged spinal cord, where they survived for at least 5 weeks after injection. Although ahMNC transplantation promoted significant locomotor recovery, the injection dose was shown to influence treatment outcomes, with a 1 × 10⁶ (medium) dose of ahMNCs producing significantly better functional recovery than a 3 × 10⁵ (low) dose. There was no significant gain in effect with the 3 × 10⁶ ahMNCs dose. Histological analysis suggested that ahMNCs exert their effects by modulating glial scar formation, neuroprotection, and/or angiogenesis. These data indicate that ahMNCs from patients with hemorrhagic stroke could be used to develop stem cell therapies for SCI and that the indirect injection route could be clinically relevant. Moreover, the optimal transplantation dose of ahMNCs defined in this preclinical study might be helpful in calculating its optimal injection dose for patients with SCI in the future.