Measurements of small-scale fading and path loss for long range RF tags

RF modulated backscatter (RFMB), also known as modulated radar cross section or sigma modulation, is a RF transmission technique useful for short-range, low-data-rate applications, such as nonstop toll collection, electronic shelf tags, freight container identification and chassis identification in automobile manufacturing, that are constrained to have extremely low power requirements. The small-scale fading observed on the backscattered signal has deeper fades than the signal from a traditional one-way link of the same range in the same environment because the fading on the backscattered signal is the product of the fading on the off-board-generated carrier times the fading on the reflected signal. This paper considers the continuous wave (CW) type of RFMB, in which the interrogator transmitter and receiver antennas are different. This two-way link also doubles the path loss exponent of the one-way link. This paper presents the cumulative distribution functions for the measured small-scale fading and the measured path loss for short ranges in an indoor environment at 2.4 GHz over this type of link.     

Pilot Reduction Using Spatial and Temporal Correlation in Massive MIMO-OFDM Systems

Wireless Personal Communications - In MIMO-OFDM systems, the base station sends pilot signals for channel estimation at receivers. Since the number of pilots is proportional to the number of...     

Hydraulics of Tangential Vortex Intake for Urban Drainage

A tangential vortex intake is a compact structure that can convey storm water efficiently as a swirling flow down a vortex dropshaft. It has been studied in physical models and successfully employed in urban drainage and hydroelectric plant applications, but a comprehensive account of the key flow characteristics has not been reported and a theoretical design guideline of a tangential intake is not available. In this study the hydraulics of tangential slot vortex intakes is investigated via extensive experiments. It is found that the flow in the tapering and downward sloping vortex inlet channel is strongly dependent on the geometry of the inlet and dropshaft. Under some conditions, hydraulic instability and overflow can occur, rendering the design ineffective. It is shown that the hydraulic stability depends on the discharge at which flow control shifts from upstream to downstream (Qc), as well as the free drainage discharge (Qf). A theoretical design criterion for stable flow is developed in terms of Qf and Qc as a function of the vortex inlet geometry. For a “stable” design, the flow in the tapering inlet evolves from supercritical flow to subcritical flow smoothly as the discharge increases. Fifteen different tangential vortex intake models are tested. The experimental observations are in excellent agreement with the theoretical prediction. The present study provides a general guideline for designing a tangential vortex intake that can convey the flow smoothly without unstable fluctuating flow associated with a hydraulic jump.     

Effects of competitor and natural organic matter characteristics on the equilibrium sorption of 1,2-dichlorobenzene in soil and shale

The competitive sorption behaviors of 1,2-DCB in binary solute systems in four natural sorbents having natural organic matter (NOM) matrixes of different physicochemical characters were investigated in batch reactors. Specifically, the study focused on investigating how the extent of 1,2-DCB competitive sorption depends on (i) the rigidity of NOM matrixes as assessed by the efficiency of chemical oxidation and (ii) the closeness of competitor structure to that of the primary solute. The chemical oxidation and elemental composition results suggest that the shale NOM is the most reduced and condensed, the peat was the most oxidized and amorphous, and two surface soils had intermediate NOM structures. Four chlorinated benzenes and phenanthrene were used as competing solutes. All five chemicals exhibited competition against 1,2-DCB in all sorbents, including the peat, but the extent of competition varied significantly. Little difference in the extent of competition with 1,2-DCB was observed for the various chlorinated benzenes even though some were liquids and some were solids at the experimental temperature. All of the chlorobenzenes were more effective competitors than phenanthrene. The shale showed markedly different competition features from the other sorbents, with a much smaller competitive effect at a given sorbed volume of competitor. However, normalizing sorbed competitor volumes by the capacity of the adsorption domain in the Polanyi-Manes single-solute partition-adsorption model (V0) produced qualitatively similar competitive behavior for each solute; displacement of 1,2-DCB increased with increasing sorbed competitor volumes up to V0, and little additional competition occurred beyond that point. The extent of competition was positively correlated with the maximum adsorption capacity and the fraction of "hard" and "soot" carbon contents as assessed by chemical and thermal oxidation methods. These findings indicate that competition is associated with voids in the NOM structure, that these voids are likely present within the condensed ("hard" plus "soot") carbon domain, and therefore that diagenetic alteration of NOM plays a central role in determining competitive sorption characteristics for hydrophobic contaminants.     

Detecting plagiarized mobile apps using API birthmarks

This paper addresses the problem of detecting plagiarized mobile apps. Plagiarism is the practice of building mobile apps by reusing code from other apps without the consent of the corresponding app developers. Recent studies on third-party app markets have suggested that plagiarized apps are an important vehicle for malware delivery on mobile phones. Malware authors repackage official versions of apps with malicious functionality, and distribute them for free via these third-party app markets. An effective technique to detect app plagiarism can therefore help identify malicious apps. Code plagiarism has long been a problem and a number of code similarity detectors have been developed over the years to detect plagiarism. In this paper we show that obfuscation techniques can be used to easily defeat similarity detectors that rely solely on statically scanning the code of an app. We propose a dynamic technique to detect plagiarized apps that works by observing the interaction of an app with the underlying mobile platform via its API invocations. We propose API birthmarks to characterize unique app behaviors, and develop a robust plagiarism detection tool using API birthmarks.     

Dietary influences on nonexercise physical activity and energy expenditure in C57BL/6J mice

It is well established that the lack of physical activity can lead to weight gain or obesity. However, there is limited information on influences of diet components on physical activity. Thus the purpose of this study was to investigate the role of major dietary components on energy expenditure by affecting nonexercise physical activity in C57BL/6J mice. All mice were assigned to 1 of the following 4 dietary groups based on their body weight and baseline physical activity; low fat/normal protein, high fat/normal protein, low fat/low protein, or low fat/high protein. After 3 mo, the highest weight gain was observed in animals fed with high-fat/normal-protein diet, and the caloric intake was significantly lower in low-fat/high-protein diet-fed mice compared to other groups. However, there were no significant changes in nonexercise physical activity during experimental periods in all groups. The respiratory quotient and energy expenditure were not significantly different among the dietary groups. These findings suggest that diet-induced obesity is not explainable by levels of physical activity and energy expenditure. PRACTICAL APPLICATION: The understanding the link between diet and nonexercise physical activity would provide important knowledge that will potentially assist appropriate food choices to control obesity and its related health problems.     

The influence of natural organic matter rigidity on the sorption, desorption, and competitive displacement rates of 1,2-dichlorobenzene

The influence of natural organic matter (NOM) rigidity on the sorption, desorption, and competitive displacement rates of 1,2-Dichlorobenzene (1,2-DCB) was evaluated using batch reactor experiments with two surface soils (Yolo and Forbes) and a shale (Ohio). Previous characterization suggests that the shale NOM is the most reduced and condensed, the Yolo soil is the most oxidized and amorphous, and Forbes soil has an intermediate NOM structure. The rate study for each sorbent was conducted under the same reactor parameters, and 1,2-DCB mass-transfer rates were determined using the distributed first-order mass-transfer rate model based on the gamma probability density function. To measure competitive displacement rates, 1,2,4-trichlorobenzene (1,2,4-TCB) was delivered as a competitor after 34 days pre-equilibration. Higher fractions of contaminant subject to instantaneous mass transfer and much faster rates of approach to apparent sorption equilibrium are found in Yolo soil when compared with Forbes soil and the shale. The size of the instantaneously desorbing fraction thus appears inversely related to the hard carbon fraction. In the NOM compartment where mass transfer is rate-limited, rate coefficient distributions are shifted toward lower rates for desorption and competitive displacement of 1,2-DCB in Ohio shale, followed by Forbes soil. Sorption and desorption rate distributions are almost the same for the shale, while desorption rates are a few times greater than sorption rates in Yolo and Forbes soils. Mass-transfer coefficients for competitive displacement are considerably slower than those for desorption in Forbes soil and the shale. However, the mass-transfer rates for the two processes seem to be similar in Yolo soil, which has a NOM matrix comprising a relatively larger soft organic carbon fraction. The concept of "solute induced softening" is discussed as a mechanistic rationale for the experimental observations.     

Distributed Topology Construction in ZigBee Wireless Networks

Topology control is one of the important techniques in wireless multi-hop networks to preserve connectivity and extend the network lifetime. This is more significant in ZigBee, since the address assignment scheme is tightly coupled with topology construction. For example, there can be orphan nodes that cannot receive the network address and isolated from the network due to predefined network configurations. In this paper, we propose a distributed topology construction algorithm that controls the association time of each node in order to solve the orphan node problem in ZigBee as well as construct an efficient routing tree topology. The main idea of the distributed topology construction algorithm is to construct primary backbone nodes by propagating the invitation packets and controlling the association time based on the link quality. Since the dynamically selected primary nodes are spread throughout the network, they can provide backbone to accept the association requests from the remaining secondary nodes which are majority in a network. In the performance evaluation, we show that the proposed topology construction algorithm effectively solves the orphan node problem regardless of network density as well as provides efficient tree routing cost comparable to the approximation algorithm for degree constrained minimum routing cost tree (DC-MRCT) problem.     

Convolutional spectral shaping

A new spectral shaping technique, convolutional spectral shaping (CSS), is introduced. In CSS, equivalence classes of possible sign bit sequences are represented by a coset of a convolutional code and a search through the trellis of the code is used to pick a sequence from the selected coset to approximate a target spectral shape for transmission. Simulation results are included to illustrate the performance of CSS. A version of CSS has been adopted by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in the pulse code modulation (PCM) modem standard V.90