On the fractal dimension of sea surface backscattered signal at low grazing angle

Fractal analysis of sea surface backscattering signal (sea clutter in radar terminology) represents a novel technique for the study of sea surface roughness. When Kirchhoff's assumption is satisfied, the fractal dimension of the signal is linearly related to the fractal dimension of the sea surface. Moreover, such a relationship is independent of transmitted frequency, polarization, time, space, sea wave propagation direction, incident angle (within the constraint of Kirchoff's assumption) and significant wave height. Nevertheless, for a low grazing angle, the Kirchhoff approximation does not hold and the behavior of the sea clutter fractal dimension cannot be theoretically predicted. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the fractal dimension of the sea clutter at low grazing angle, in order to extend the theoretical results. Moreover, the effects of the presence of a target on the sea surface are analyzed by means of the fractal dimension. Such an analysis is performed by using live recorded clutter data. In detail, the fractal dimension's dependence on space, time, sea wave propagation direction, sea wave height, transmitted polarization and presence of targets is investigated. A discussion on the use of the sea clutter fractal dimension for sea surface monitoring is addressed.     

Cell loading and family scheduling for jobs with individual due dates to minimise maximum tardiness

This paper focuses on cell loading and family scheduling in a cellular manufacturing environment. The performance measure is minimising the maximum tardiness of jobs. What separates this study from others is the presence of individual due dates for every job in a family and also allowing family splitting among cells. Three methods are examined in order to solve this problem, namely mathematical modelling, genetic algorithms (GA) and heuristics. The results showed that GA is capable of finding the optimal solution with varying frequency of 60–100% and it is efficient as compared to the mathematical modelling especially for larger problems in terms of execution times. The heuristics, on the other hand, were easy to implement but they could not find the optimal solution. The results of experimentation also showed that family splitting was observed in all multi-cell optimal solutions and therefore it can be concluded that family splitting is a good strategy for the problem considered in this paper.     

Automatic control of excitation parameters for switched-reluctance motor drives

This paper presents a new approach to the automatic control of the turn-on angle used to excite the switched-reluctance motor (SRM). The control algorithm determines the turn-on angle that supports the most efficient operation of the motor drive system, and consists of two pieces. The first piece of the control technique monitors the position of the first peak of the phase current (/spl theta//sub p/) and seeks to align this position with the angle where the inductance begins to increase (/spl theta//sub m/). The second piece of the controller monitors the peak phase current and advances the turn-on angle if the commanded reference current cannot be produced by the controller. The first piece of the controller tends to be active below base speed of the SRM, where phase currents can be built easily by the inverter and /spl theta//sub p/ is relatively independent of /spl theta//sub m/. The second piece of the controller is active above base speed, where the peak of the phase currents tends to naturally occur at /spl theta//sub m/ regardless of the current amplitude. The two pieces of the controller naturally exchange responsibility as a result of a change in command or operating point. The motor, inverter and control system are modeled in Simulink to demonstrate the operation of the system. The control technique is then applied to an experimental SRM system. Experimental operation documents that the technique provides for efficient operation of the drive.     

Fixed-lag smoother for digital channel equalisation

A new equaliser for digital communication channels, which carries out a discrete-time fixed-lag smoothing of the state vector of the channel, modelled as a tapped delay line of finite length, is proposed. The smoothed estimate uses and improves the filtered estimate of the conventional Kalman-filter equaliser.     

High-resolution ISAR imaging of maneuvering targets by means of therange instantaneous Doppler technique: modeling and performance analysis

Very high resolution inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) imaging of maneuvering targets is a complicated task. In fact, the conventional range Doppler (RD) ISAR technique does not work properly when target motions generate terms higher than the first order in the phase of the received signal relative to each scatterer. This effect typically happens when at least one of these situations occur: (1) very high resolution images are required; (2) the target maneuvers; and (3) the target undergoes significant angular motions (roll, pitch, and yaw). A novel ISAR technique, named range instantaneous Doppler (RID), has been proposed for the reconstruction of very high resolution images of maneuvering targets. In this paper, we analytically show that the RID technique works properly when high-resolution ISAR images are required of maneuvering and/or rolling, pitching, and yawing targets; we also quantify the performance improvement of the RID technique with respect to the RD technique. The problem is tackled from an analytical point of view. First, we define a new model of the ISAR received signal that is valid for maneuvering targets, then we derive and compare the analytical expression of the point spread function (PSF) for the two techniques. Furthermore, we perform a statistical analysis to evaluate the improvement of the RID technique versus the RD technique in terms of spatial resolution. Finally, we prove the effectiveness of the RID technique by simulating the imaging process for two different targets: (1) a ship that undergoes roll, pitch and yaw motions and (2) a fast maneuvering airplane.     

Adaptive Kalman filter equaliser

A new adaptive equaliser for digital communication channels is proposed. It is derived from a state-variable representation of the communication channel by means of the extended Kalman filter technique. The equaliser proposed is structured as two Kalman filters, one estimating the transmitted data symbols, the other the unknown channel parameters.     

Enhanced Antiviral Function of Magnesium Chloride-Modified Heparin on a Broad Spectrum of Viruses

Previous studies reported on the broad-spectrum antiviral function of heparin. Here we investigated the antiviral function of magnesium-modified heparin and found that modified heparin displayed a significantly enhanced antiviral function against human adenovirus (HAdV) in immortalized and primary cells. Nuclear magnetic resonance analyses revealed a conformational change of heparin when complexed with magnesium. To broadly explore this discovery, we tested the antiviral function of modified heparin against herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) and found that the replication of HSV-1 was even further decreased compared to aciclovir. Moreover, we investigated the antiviral effect against the new severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus type 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and measured a 55-fold decreased viral load in the supernatant of infected cells associated with a 38-fold decrease in virus growth. The advantage of our modified heparin is an increased antiviral effect compared to regular heparin.     

Look-up table (LUT) method for inverse halftoning

In this paper we propose look-up table (LUT) based methods for inverse halftoning of images. The LUT for inverse halftoning is obtained from the histogram gathered from a few sample halftone images and corresponding original images. The method is extremely fast (no filtering is required) and the PSNR and visual image quality achieved is comparable to the best methods known for inverse halftoning. The LUT inverse halftoning method does not depend on the specific properties of the halftoning method, and can be applied to any halftoning method. Then, an algorithm for template selection for LUT inverse halftoning is introduced. We demonstrate the performance of the LUT inverse halftoning algorithm on error diffused images and ordered dithered images. We also extend LUT inverse halftoning to color halftones.