OpenFLUX: efficient modelling software for 13C-based metabolic flux analysis

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Nielsen Lars K

2009-05-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background The quantitative analysis of metabolic fluxes, i.e., in vivo activities of intracellular enzymes and pathways, provides key information on biological systems in systems biology and metabolic engineering. It is based on a comprehensive approach combining (i tracer cultivation on 13C substrates, (ii 13C labelling analysis by mass spectrometry and (iii mathematical modelling for experimental design, data processing, flux calculation and statistics. Whereas the cultivation and the analytical part is fairly advanced, a lack of appropriate modelling software solutions for all modelling aspects in flux studies is limiting the application of metabolic flux analysis. Results We have developed OpenFLUX as a user friendly, yet flexible software application for small and large scale 13C metabolic flux analysis. The application is based on the new Elementary Metabolite Unit (EMU framework, significantly enhancing computation speed for flux calculation. From simple notation of metabolic reaction networks defined in a spreadsheet, the OpenFLUX parser automatically generates MATLAB-readable metabolite and isotopomer balances, thus strongly facilitating model creation. The model can be used to perform experimental design, parameter estimation and sensitivity analysis either using the built-in gradient-based search or Monte Carlo algorithms or in user-defined algorithms. Exemplified for a microbial flux study with 71 reactions, 8 free flux parameters and mass isotopomer distribution of 10 metabolites, OpenFLUX allowed to automatically compile the EMU-based model from an Excel file containing metabolic reactions and carbon transfer mechanisms, showing it's user-friendliness. It reliably reproduced the published data and optimum flux distributions for the network under study were found quickly ( Conclusion We have developed a fast, accurate application to perform steady-state 13C metabolic flux analysis. OpenFLUX will strongly facilitate and

Sensorless sliding mode torque control of an IPMSM drive based on active flux concept

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

A.A. Hassan

2012-03-01

Full Text Available This paper investigates a novel direct torque control of a sensorless interior permanent magnet synchronous motor based on a sliding mode technique. The speed and position of the interior permanent magnet synchronous motor are estimated online based on active flux concept. To overcome the large ripple content associated with the direct torque, a torque/flux sliding mode controller has been employed. Two integral surface functions are used to construct the sliding mode controller. The command voltage is estimated from the torque and flux errors based on the two switching functions. The idea of the total sliding mode is used to eliminate the problem of reaching phase stability. The space vector modulation is combined with the sliding mode controller to ensure minimum torque and flux ripples and provides high resolution voltage control. The proposed scheme has the advantages of simple implementation, and does not require an external signal injection. In addition, it combines the merits of the direct torque control, sliding mode controller, and space vector modulation besides to the sensorless control. Simulation works are carried out to demonstrate the ability of the proposed scheme at different operating conditions. The results confirm the high performance of the proposed scheme at standstill, low and high speeds including load disturbance and parameters variation.

Activity-based exploitation of Full Motion Video (FMV)

Science.gov (United States)

Kant, Shashi

2012-06-01

Video has been a game-changer in how US forces are able to find, track and defeat its adversaries. With millions of minutes of video being generated from an increasing number of sensor platforms, the DOD has stated that the rapid increase in video is overwhelming their analysts. The manpower required to view and garner useable information from the flood of video is unaffordable, especially in light of current fiscal restraints. "Search" within full-motion video has traditionally relied on human tagging of content, and video metadata, to provision filtering and locate segments of interest, in the context of analyst query. Our approach utilizes a novel machine-vision based approach to index FMV, using object recognition & tracking, events and activities detection. This approach enables FMV exploitation in real-time, as well as a forensic look-back within archives. This approach can help get the most information out of video sensor collection, help focus the attention of overburdened analysts form connections in activity over time and conserve national fiscal resources in exploiting FMV.

Sunspot proper motions in active region NOAA 2372 and its flare activity during SMY period of 1980 April 4-13

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ambastha, A.; Bhatnagar, A.

1988-01-01

Solar Active Region NOAA 2372 was observed extensively by the Solar Maximum Mission (SMM) satellite and several ground-based observatories during 1980 April 4-13 in the Solar Maximum Year. After its birth around April 4, it underwent a rapid growth and produced a reported 84 flares in the course of its disc passage. In this paper, photospheric and chromospheric observations of this active region have been studied together with Marshall Space Flight Center magnetograms and X-ray data from HXIS aboard the SMM satellite. In particular, the relationship of the flare-productivity with sunspot proper motions and emergence of new regions of magnetic flux in the active region from its birth to its disappearance at the W-limb has been discussed. (author). 7 figures, 2 tables, 29 refs

Vertical motions in an intense magnetic flux tube

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Roberts, B.; Webb, A.R.

1978-01-01

The recent discovery of localised intense magnetic fields in the solar photosphere is one of the major surprises of the past few years. Here the theoretical nature of small amplitude motions in such an intense magnetic flux tube, within which the field strength may reach 2 kG is considered. A systematic derivation of the governing 'expansion' equations is given for a vertical slender tube, taking into account the dependence upon height of the buoyancy, compressibility and magnetic forces. Several special cases (e.g. the isothermal atmosphere) are considered as well as a more realistic, non-isothermal, solar atmosphere. The expansion procedure is shown to give good results in the special case of a uniform basic-state (in which gravity is negligible) and for which a more exact treatment is possible. (Auth.)

Hybrid magnetic mechanism for active locomotion based on inchworm motion

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim, Sung Hoon; Hashi, Shuichiro; Ishiyama, Kazushi

2013-01-01

Magnetic robots have been studied in the past. Insect-type micro-robots are used in various biomedical applications; researchers have developed inchworm micro-robots for endoscopic use. A biological inchworm has a looping locomotion gait. However, most inchworm micro-robots depend on a general bending, or bellows, motion. In this paper, we introduce a new robotic mechanism using magnetic force and torque control in a rotating magnetic field for a looping gait. The proposed robot is controlled by the magnetic torque, attractive force, and body mechanisms (two stoppers, flexible body, and different frictional legs). The magnetic torque generates a general bending motion. In addition, the attractive force and body mechanisms produce the robot’s looping motion within a rotating magnetic field and without the use of an algorithm for field control. We verified the device’s performance and analyzed the motion through simulations and various experiments. The robot mechanism can be applied to active locomotion for various medical robots, such as wireless endoscopes. (technical note)

Classical dynamics with curl forces, and motion driven by time-dependent flux

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Berry, M V; Shukla, Pragya

2012-01-01

For position-dependent forces whose curl is non-zero (‘curl forces’), there is no associated scalar potential and therefore no obvious Hamiltonian or Lagrangean and, except in special cases, no obvious conserved quantities. Nevertheless, the motion is nondissipative (measure-preserving in position and velocity). In a class of planar motions, some of which are exactly solvable, the curl force is directed azimuthally with a magnitude varying with radius, and the orbits are usually spirals. If the curl is concentrated at the origin (for example, the curl force could be an electric field generated by a changing localized magnetic flux, as in the betatron), a Hamiltonian does exist but violates the rotational symmetry of the force. In this case, reminiscent of the Aharonov–Bohm effect, the spiralling is extraordinarily slow. (paper)

Prediction of Critical Heat Flux under Rolling Motion

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hwang, Jinseok; Lee, Yeongun; Park, Gooncherl [Seoul National Univ., Seoul (Korea, Republic of)

2013-05-15

The aim to this paper may be summarized as follows: identify the flow regime compare with existing void-quality relationship and void fraction at OAF derived from the vapor superficial velocity obtained by the churn-to annular flow criterion, develop and evaluate the correlation for accurate prediction of CHF ratio under rolling motion. Experimentally measured CHF results from the previous study were not well-predicted by existing CHF correlations developed for wide range of pressure under rolling motion in vertical tube. Specifically, existing correlations do not account for the dynamic motion parameter, such as tangential and centrifugal force. This study reviewed some existing correlation and experimental studies related to reduction and enhancement of CHF and heat transfer and flow behavior under heaving and rolling motion, and developed a CHF ratio correlation for upward flow vertical tube under rolling motion. Based upon dimensionless groups, equations and interpolation factor, an empirical CHF correlation has been developed which is consistent with experimental data for uniformly heated tubes internally cooled by R-134 under rolling motion. Flow regime was determined through the prediction method for annular flow. Non-dimensional number and function were decided by CHF mechanism of each region. Interaction of LFD and DNB regions is taken into account by means of power interpolation which is reflected void fraction at OAF. The suggested correlation predicted the CHF Ratio with reasonable accuracy, showing an average error of -0.59 and 2.51% for RMS. Rolling motion can affect bubble motion and liquid film behavior complexly by combination of tangential and centrifugal forces and mass flow than heaving motion. Through a search of literature and a comparison of previous CHF ratio results, this work can contribute to the study of boiling heat transfer and CHF for the purpose of enhancement or reduction the CHF of dynamic motion system, such as marine reactor.

Engineering uses of physics-based ground motion simulations

Science.gov (United States)

Baker, Jack W.; Luco, Nicolas; Abrahamson, Norman A.; Graves, Robert W.; Maechling, Phillip J.; Olsen, Kim B.

2014-01-01

This paper summarizes validation methodologies focused on enabling ground motion simulations to be used with confidence in engineering applications such as seismic hazard analysis and dynmaic analysis of structural and geotechnical systems. Numberical simullation of ground motion from large erthquakes, utilizing physics-based models of earthquake rupture and wave propagation, is an area of active research in the earth science community. Refinement and validatoin of these models require collaboration between earthquake scientists and engineering users, and testing/rating methodolgies for simulated ground motions to be used with confidence in engineering applications. This paper provides an introduction to this field and an overview of current research activities being coordinated by the Souther California Earthquake Center (SCEC). These activities are related both to advancing the science and computational infrastructure needed to produce ground motion simulations, as well as to engineering validation procedures. Current research areas and anticipated future achievements are also discussed.

Image-based synchronization of force and bead motion in active electromagnetic microrheometry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Park, Chang-Young; Saleh, Omar A

2014-01-01

In the past, electromagnetic tweezers have been used to make active microrheometers. An active microrheometer measures the dynamic mechanical properties of a material from the motion of embedded particles under external force, e.g. a sinusoidal magnetic force generated by a sinusoidal current on a coil. The oscillating amplitude and the phase lag of the motion are then used to estimate the material’s dynamic mechanical properties. The phase lag, in particular, requires precise synchronization of the particle motion with the external force. In previous works, synchronization difficulties have arisen from measuring two parameters with two instruments, one of them being a camera. We solved the synchronization issue by measuring two parameters with a single instrument, the camera alone. From captured images, particles can be tracked in three dimensions through an image-analysis algorithm while the current on the coil can be measured from the brightness of the image; this enables simultaneous synchronization of the phases of the driving current on the electromagnet coil and the motion of the magnetic probe particle. We calibrate the phase delay between the magnetic force and the particle’s motion in glycerol and confirm the calibration with a Hall probe. The technique is further tested by measuring the shear modulus of a polyacrylamide gel, and comparing the results to those obtained using a conventional rheometer. (paper)

Motion of flux transfer events: a test of the Cooling model

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

R. C. Fear

2007-07-01

Full Text Available The simple model of reconnected field line motion developed by Cooling et al. (2001 has been used in several recent case studies to explain the motion of flux transfer events across the magnetopause. We examine 213 FTEs observed by all four Cluster spacecraft under a variety of IMF conditions between November 2002 and June 2003, when the spacecraft tetrahedron separation was ~5000 km. Observed velocities were calculated from multi-spacecraft timing analysis, and compared with the velocities predicted by the Cooling model in order to check the validity of the model. After excluding three categories of FTEs (events with poorly defined velocities, a significant velocity component out of the magnetopause surface, or a scale size of less than 5000 km, we were left with a sample of 118 events. 78% of these events were consistent in both direction of motion and speed with one of the two model de Hoffmann-Teller (dHT velocities calculated from the Cooling model (to within 30° and a factor of two in the speed. We also examined the plasma signatures of several magnetosheath FTEs; the electron signatures confirm the hemisphere of connection indicated by the model in most cases. This indicates that although the model is a simple one, it is a useful tool for identifying the source regions of FTEs.

Flux motion and anisotropy in melt-processed YBa2Cu3O7-δ

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Koblischka, M.R.; Schuster, Th.; Kuhn, H.; Gluecker, M.; Dalen, A.J.J. van; Griessen, R.; Kronmueller, H.

1993-01-01

The melt-processing of YBa 2 Cu 3 O 7-δ - and Bi 2 Sr 2 CaCu 2 O 8+δ -samples offers a promising way to achieve high critical current densities also in bulk materials. This is of main interest for strong current applications of high-T c superconductors. Interesting basic features can also be studied using melt-processed samples, from which good quality crystals can be cut out. For example, such samples make it possible to do measurements in various angular positions without drastically changing the demagnetizing factors along the main crystallographic axes. Usually, most measurements studying the influence of intrinsic pinning have been carried out on thin films (1). To observe flux distributions in superconductors, we use the High Resolution Faraday (HRF) technique. This enables one to local observations of flux distributions, combining a high spatial resolution (∼0.8 μm) with the unique possibility to observe dynamic processes in the flux distribution such as flux motion due to flux creep (2,3). Additionally, torque measurements up to 7 T in the temperature range 10 - 77 K have been carried out on the identical sample for a comparison of the local HRF data with integral critcal current torque data. (orig.)

Bayesian statistics applied to neutron activation data for reactor flux spectrum analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chiesa, Davide; Previtali, Ezio; Sisti, Monica

2014-01-01

Highlights: • Bayesian statistics to analyze the neutron flux spectrum from activation data. • Rigorous statistical approach for accurate evaluation of the neutron flux groups. • Cross section and activation data uncertainties included for the problem solution. • Flexible methodology applied to analyze different nuclear reactor flux spectra. • The results are in good agreement with the MCNP simulations of neutron fluxes. - Abstract: In this paper, we present a statistical method, based on Bayesian statistics, to analyze the neutron flux spectrum from the activation data of different isotopes. The experimental data were acquired during a neutron activation experiment performed at the TRIGA Mark II reactor of Pavia University (Italy) in four irradiation positions characterized by different neutron spectra. In order to evaluate the neutron flux spectrum, subdivided in energy groups, a system of linear equations, containing the group effective cross sections and the activation rate data, has to be solved. However, since the system’s coefficients are experimental data affected by uncertainties, a rigorous statistical approach is fundamental for an accurate evaluation of the neutron flux groups. For this purpose, we applied the Bayesian statistical analysis, that allows to include the uncertainties of the coefficients and the a priori information about the neutron flux. A program for the analysis of Bayesian hierarchical models, based on Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulations, was used to define the problem statistical model and solve it. The first analysis involved the determination of the thermal, resonance-intermediate and fast flux components and the dependence of the results on the Prior distribution choice was investigated to confirm the reliability of the Bayesian analysis. After that, the main resonances of the activation cross sections were analyzed to implement multi-group models with finer energy subdivisions that would allow to determine the

Autonomous Motion Learning for Intra-Vehicular Activity Space Robot

Science.gov (United States)

Watanabe, Yutaka; Yairi, Takehisa; Machida, Kazuo

Space robots will be needed in the future space missions. So far, many types of space robots have been developed, but in particular, Intra-Vehicular Activity (IVA) space robots that support human activities should be developed to reduce human-risks in space. In this paper, we study the motion learning method of an IVA space robot with the multi-link mechanism. The advantage point is that this space robot moves using reaction force of the multi-link mechanism and contact forces from the wall as space walking of an astronaut, not to use a propulsion. The control approach is determined based on a reinforcement learning with the actor-critic algorithm. We demonstrate to clear effectiveness of this approach using a 5-link space robot model by simulation. First, we simulate that a space robot learn the motion control including contact phase in two dimensional case. Next, we simulate that a space robot learn the motion control changing base attitude in three dimensional case.

Active-Flux-Based, V/f-with-Stabilizing-Loops Versus Sensorless Vector Control of IPMSM Drives

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Moldovan, Ana; Blaabjerg, Frede; Boldea, Ion

2011-01-01

. By this control strategy, a fast dynamic speed response, without steady state error and without speed or current regulators, for all AC machines is obtained. The second control method is a sensorless vector control strategy which also has been implemented and tested, just for comparison.......This paper proposes two control methods for Interior Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor (IPMSM) Drives. The first one is a V/f control with two stabilizing loops: one loop based on active flux balance for voltage magnitude correction and a second, based on speed error, with voltage phase correction...

A triboelectric motion sensor in wearable body sensor network for human activity recognition.

Science.gov (United States)

Hui Huang; Xian Li; Ye Sun

2016-08-01

The goal of this study is to design a novel triboelectric motion sensor in wearable body sensor network for human activity recognition. Physical activity recognition is widely used in well-being management, medical diagnosis and rehabilitation. Other than traditional accelerometers, we design a novel wearable sensor system based on triboelectrification. The triboelectric motion sensor can be easily attached to human body and collect motion signals caused by physical activities. The experiments are conducted to collect five common activity data: sitting and standing, walking, climbing upstairs, downstairs, and running. The k-Nearest Neighbor (kNN) clustering algorithm is adopted to recognize these activities and validate the feasibility of this new approach. The results show that our system can perform physical activity recognition with a successful rate over 80% for walking, sitting and standing. The triboelectric structure can also be used as an energy harvester for motion harvesting due to its high output voltage in random low-frequency motion.

Simulation of Field Dependence of Critical Current Densities of Bulk High Tc Superconducting Materials regarding Thermally Activated Flux Motion

Science.gov (United States)

Santosh, M.; Naik, S. Pavan Kumar; Koblischka, M. R.

2017-07-01

In the upcoming generation, bulk high temperature superconductors (HTS) will play a crucial and a promising role in numerous industrial applications ranging from Maglev trains to magnetic resonance imaging, etc. Especially, the bulk HTS as permanent magnets are suitable due to the fact that they can trap magnetic fields being several orders of magnitude higher than those of the best hard ferromagnets. The bulk HTS LREBa2Cu3O7-δ (LREBCO or LRE-123, LRE: Y, Gd, etc.,) materials could obtain very powerful compact superconducting super-magnets, which can be operated at the cheaper liquid nitrogen temperature or below due to higher critical temperatures (i.e., ∼90 K). As a result, the new advanced technology can be utilized in a more attractive manner for a variety of technological and medical applications which have the capacity to revolutionize the field. An understanding of the magnetic field dependence of the critical current density (J c(H)) is important to develop better adapted materials. To achieve this goal, a variety of Jc (H) behaviours of bulk LREBCO samples were modelled regarding thermally activated flux motion. In essence, the Jc (H) curves follows a certain criterion where an exponential model is applied. However, to fit the complete Jc (H) curve of the LRE-123 samples an unique model is necessary to explain the behavior at low and high fields. The modelling of the various superconducting materials could be understood in terms of the pinning mechanisms.

The Importance of Spatiotemporal Information in Biological Motion Perception: White Noise Presented with a Step-like Motion Activates the Biological Motion Area.

Science.gov (United States)

Callan, Akiko; Callan, Daniel; Ando, Hiroshi

2017-02-01

Humans can easily recognize the motion of living creatures using only a handful of point-lights that describe the motion of the main joints (biological motion perception). This special ability to perceive the motion of animate objects signifies the importance of the spatiotemporal information in perceiving biological motion. The posterior STS (pSTS) and posterior middle temporal gyrus (pMTG) region have been established by many functional neuroimaging studies as a locus for biological motion perception. Because listening to a walking human also activates the pSTS/pMTG region, the region has been proposed to be supramodal in nature. In this study, we investigated whether the spatiotemporal information from simple auditory stimuli is sufficient to activate this biological motion area. We compared spatially moving white noise, having a running-like tempo that was consistent with biological motion, with stationary white noise. The moving-minus-stationary contrast showed significant differences in activation of the pSTS/pMTG region. Our results suggest that the spatiotemporal information of the auditory stimuli is sufficient to activate the biological motion area.

Design of a flux buffer based on the flux shuttle

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gershenson, M.

1991-01-01

This paper discusses the design considerations for a flux buffer based on the flux-shuttle concept. Particular attention is given to the issues of flux popping, stability of operation and saturation levels for a large input. Modulation techniques used in order to minimize 1/f noise, in addition to offsets are also analyzed. Advantages over conventional approaches using a SQUID for a flux buffer are discussed. Results of computer simulations are presented

Model-Based Motion Tracking of Infants

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Olsen, Mikkel Damgaard; Herskind, Anna; Nielsen, Jens Bo

2014-01-01

Even though motion tracking is a widely used technique to analyze and measure human movements, only a few studies focus on motion tracking of infants. In recent years, a number of studies have emerged focusing on analyzing the motion pattern of infants, using computer vision. Most of these studies...... are based on 2D images, but few are based on 3D information. In this paper, we present a model-based approach for tracking infants in 3D. The study extends a novel study on graph-based motion tracking of infants and we show that the extension improves the tracking results. A 3D model is constructed...

Magnetic flux motion in (PrxY1−xBa2Cu3O7−δ polycrystal samples sintered in Ar and O2 atmospheres

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. Favre

2016-09-01

Full Text Available We present a comparative study of the magnetic flux motion in ceramic pellets made of (PrxY1−xBa2Cu3O7−δ as a function of their composition and morphology. Samples produced in Ar or O2 atmosphere present noticeable differences in their magnetic response that we explain in terms of their structural parameters. The material’s parameters that most influence the flux dynamics are morphology and oxygen content, that change dramatically with the sintering atmosphere. Moderate changes are also observed as a function of the Pr content. Magnetic pinning efficiency is discussed in terms of intergranular couplings and effective activation energies, estimated from AC-susceptibility and magnetoresistance measurements.

Example-based human motion denoising.

Science.gov (United States)

Lou, Hui; Chai, Jinxiang

2010-01-01

With the proliferation of motion capture data, interest in removing noise and outliers from motion capture data has increased. In this paper, we introduce an efficient human motion denoising technique for the simultaneous removal of noise and outliers from input human motion data. The key idea of our approach is to learn a series of filter bases from precaptured motion data and use them along with robust statistics techniques to filter noisy motion data. Mathematically, we formulate the motion denoising process in a nonlinear optimization framework. The objective function measures the distance between the noisy input and the filtered motion in addition to how well the filtered motion preserves spatial-temporal patterns embedded in captured human motion data. Optimizing the objective function produces an optimal filtered motion that keeps spatial-temporal patterns in captured motion data. We also extend the algorithm to fill in the missing values in input motion data. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our system by experimenting with both real and simulated motion data. We also show the superior performance of our algorithm by comparing it with three baseline algorithms and to those in state-of-art motion capture data processing software such as Vicon Blade.

MotionExplorer: exploratory search in human motion capture data based on hierarchical aggregation.

Science.gov (United States)

Bernard, Jürgen; Wilhelm, Nils; Krüger, Björn; May, Thorsten; Schreck, Tobias; Kohlhammer, Jörn

2013-12-01

We present MotionExplorer, an exploratory search and analysis system for sequences of human motion in large motion capture data collections. This special type of multivariate time series data is relevant in many research fields including medicine, sports and animation. Key tasks in working with motion data include analysis of motion states and transitions, and synthesis of motion vectors by interpolation and combination. In the practice of research and application of human motion data, challenges exist in providing visual summaries and drill-down functionality for handling large motion data collections. We find that this domain can benefit from appropriate visual retrieval and analysis support to handle these tasks in presence of large motion data. To address this need, we developed MotionExplorer together with domain experts as an exploratory search system based on interactive aggregation and visualization of motion states as a basis for data navigation, exploration, and search. Based on an overview-first type visualization, users are able to search for interesting sub-sequences of motion based on a query-by-example metaphor, and explore search results by details on demand. We developed MotionExplorer in close collaboration with the targeted users who are researchers working on human motion synthesis and analysis, including a summative field study. Additionally, we conducted a laboratory design study to substantially improve MotionExplorer towards an intuitive, usable and robust design. MotionExplorer enables the search in human motion capture data with only a few mouse clicks. The researchers unanimously confirm that the system can efficiently support their work.

Flux motion and dissipation in high-temperature superconductors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gray, K.E.; Kim, D.H.

1991-01-01

The effects on flux motion and dissipation of interlayer coupling of the Cu-O planes along the c-axis are considered for the high-temperature superconductors (HTS). It is argued that for the highly-anisotropic HTS, the weak interlayer coupling plays a dominant role that can be described by incoherent Josephson tunneling between superconducting Cu-O bi- or tri-layers. In YBa 2 Cu 3 O 7 , the layers are strongly coupled, presumably because the conducting Cu-O chains short circuit the Josephson tunneling, so that these effects are weak or missing. Recently, the effects of anisotropy and fluctuations on critical current densities, J c (T,H) and the field-induced broadening of resistivity transitions, ρ(T,H), have been studied in high-temperature superconductors (HTS). Although the broadening looks similar for the applied field, H, oriented either parallel to the superconducting Cu-O layers (H parallel ab) or parallel to the c-axis (H parallel c), its width and the detailed shape of ρ(T,H) are different. The explanations given in this paper for the highly anisotropic HTS differ in detail for the two cases, but have a crucial feature in common: they result from fluctuations affecting the Josephson coupling across the interlayer junctions

Calculating the Motion and Direction of Flux Transfer Events with Cluster

Science.gov (United States)

Collado-Vega, Y. M.; Sibeck, D. G.

2012-01-01

For many years now, the interactions of the solar wind plasma with the Earth's magnetosphere has been one of the most important problems for Space Physics. It is very important that we understand these processes because the high-energy particles and also the solar wind energy that cross the magneto sphere could be responsible for serious damage to our technological systems. The solar wind is inherently a dynamic medium, and the particles interaction with the Earth's magnetosphere can be steady or unsteady. Unsteady interaction include transient processes like bursty magnetic reconnection. Flux Transfer Events (FTEs) are magnetopause signatures that usually occur during transient times of reconnection. They exhibit bipolar signatures in the normal component of the magnetic field. We use multi-point timing analysis to determine the orientation and motion of ux transfer events (FTEs) detected by the four Cluster spacecraft on the high-latitude dayside and flank magnetopause during 2002 and 2003. During these years, the distances between the Cluster spacecraft were greater than 1000 km, providing the tetrahedral configuration needed to select events and determine velocities. Each velocity and location will be examined in detail and compared to the velocities and locations determined by the predictions of the component and antiparallel reconnection models for event formation, orientation, motion, and acceleration for a wide range of spacecraft locations and solar wind conditions.

Correlation-based motion vector processing with adaptive interpolation scheme for motion-compensated frame interpolation.

Science.gov (United States)

Huang, Ai-Mei; Nguyen, Truong

2009-04-01

In this paper, we address the problems of unreliable motion vectors that cause visual artifacts but cannot be detected by high residual energy or bidirectional prediction difference in motion-compensated frame interpolation. A correlation-based motion vector processing method is proposed to detect and correct those unreliable motion vectors by explicitly considering motion vector correlation in the motion vector reliability classification, motion vector correction, and frame interpolation stages. Since our method gradually corrects unreliable motion vectors based on their reliability, we can effectively discover the areas where no motion is reliable to be used, such as occlusions and deformed structures. We also propose an adaptive frame interpolation scheme for the occlusion areas based on the analysis of their surrounding motion distribution. As a result, the interpolated frames using the proposed scheme have clearer structure edges and ghost artifacts are also greatly reduced. Experimental results show that our interpolated results have better visual quality than other methods. In addition, the proposed scheme is robust even for those video sequences that contain multiple and fast motions.

Group-based Motion Detection for Energy-Efficient Localisation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alban Cotillon

2012-10-01

Full Text Available Long-term outdoor localization remains challenging due to the high energy profiles of GPS modules. Duty cycling the GPS module combined with inertial sensors can improve energy consumption. However, inertial sensors that are kept active all the time can also drain mobile node batteries. This paper proposes duty cycling strategies for inertial sensors to maintain a target position accuracy and node lifetime. We present a method for duty cycling motion sensors according to features of movement events, and evaluate its energy and accuracy profile for an empirical data trace of cattle movement. We further introduce the concept of group-based duty cycling, where nodes that cluster together can share the burden of motion detection to reduce their duty cycles. Our evaluation shows that both variants of motion sensor duty cycling yield up to 78% improvement in overall node power consumption, and that the group-based method yields an additional 20% power reduction during periods of low mobility.

Development of high flux thermal neutron generator for neutron activation analysis

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Vainionpaa, Jaakko H., E-mail: hannes@adelphitech.com [Adelphi Technology, 2003 E Bayshore Rd, Redwood City, CA 94063 (United States); Chen, Allan X.; Piestrup, Melvin A.; Gary, Charles K. [Adelphi Technology, 2003 E Bayshore Rd, Redwood City, CA 94063 (United States); Jones, Glenn [G& J Jones Enterprice, 7486 Brighton Ct, Dublin, CA 94568 (United States); Pantell, Richard H. [Department of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA (United States)

2015-05-01

The new model DD110MB neutron generator from Adelphi Technology produces thermal (<0.5 eV) neutron flux that is normally achieved in a nuclear reactor or larger accelerator based systems. Thermal neutron fluxes of 3–5 · 10{sup 7} n/cm{sup 2}/s are measured. This flux is achieved using four ion beams arranged concentrically around a target chamber containing a compact moderator with a central sample cylinder. Fast neutron yield of ∼2 · 10{sup 10} n/s is created at the titanium surface of the target chamber. The thickness and material of the moderator is selected to maximize the thermal neutron flux at the center. The 2.5 MeV neutrons are quickly thermalized to energies below 0.5 eV and concentrated at the sample cylinder. The maximum flux of thermal neutrons at the target is achieved when approximately half of the neutrons at the sample area are thermalized. In this paper we present simulation results used to characterize performance of the neutron generator. The neutron flux can be used for neutron activation analysis (NAA) prompt gamma neutron activation analysis (PGNAA) for determining the concentrations of elements in many materials. Another envisioned use of the generator is production of radioactive isotopes. DD110MB is small enough for modest-sized laboratories and universities. Compared to nuclear reactors the DD110MB produces comparable thermal flux but provides reduced administrative and safety requirements and it can be run in pulsed mode, which is beneficial in many neutron activation techniques.

Early capillary flux homogenization in response to neural activation.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Jonghwan; Wu, Weicheng; Boas, David A

2016-02-01

This Brief Communication reports early homogenization of capillary network flow during somatosensory activation in the rat cerebral cortex. We used optical coherence tomography and statistical intensity variation analysis for tracing changes in the red blood cell flux over hundreds of capillaries nearly at the same time with 1-s resolution. We observed that while the mean capillary flux exhibited a typical increase during activation, the standard deviation of the capillary flux exhibited an early decrease that happened before the mean flux increase. This network-level data is consistent with the theoretical hypothesis that capillary flow homogenizes during activation to improve oxygen delivery. © The Author(s) 2015.

Motion-Based pH Sensing Based on the Cartridge-Case-like Micromotor.

Science.gov (United States)

Su, Yajun; Ge, Ya; Liu, Limei; Zhang, Lina; Liu, Mei; Sun, Yunyu; Zhang, Hui; Dong, Bin

2016-02-17

In this paper, we report a novel cartridge-case-like micromotor. The micromotor, which is fabricated by the template synthesis method, consists of a gelatin shell with platinum nanoparticles decorating its inner surface. Intriguingly, the resulting cartridge-case-like structure exhibits a pH-dependent "open and close" feature, which originates from the pH responsiveness of the gelatin material. On the basis of the catalytic activity of the platinum nanoparticle inside the gelatin shell, the resulting cartridge-case-like structure is capable of moving autonomously in the aqueous solution containing the hydrogen peroxide fuel. More interestingly, we find out that the micromotor can be utilized as a motion-based pH sensor over the whole pH range. The moving velocity of the micromotor increases monotonically with the increase of pH of the analyte solution. Three different factors are considered to be responsible for the proportional relation between the motion speed and pH of the analyte solution: the peroxidase-like and oxidase-like catalytic behavior of the platinum nanoparticle at low and high pH, the volumetric decomposition of the hydrogen peroxide under the basic condition and the pH-dependent catalytic activity of the platinum nanoparticle caused by the swelling/deswelling behavior of the gelatin material. The current work highlights the impact of the material properties on the motion behavior of a micromotor, thus paving the way toward its application in the motion-based sensing field.

Orbit-averaged quantities, the classical Hellmann-Feynman theorem, and the magnetic flux enclosed by gyro-motion

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Perkins, R. J., E-mail: rperkins@pppl.gov; Bellan, P. M. [Applied Physics and Materials Science, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125 (United States)

2015-02-15

Action integrals are often used to average a system over fast oscillations and obtain reduced dynamics. It is not surprising, then, that action integrals play a central role in the Hellmann-Feynman theorem of classical mechanics, which furnishes the values of certain quantities averaged over one period of rapid oscillation. This paper revisits the classical Hellmann-Feynman theorem, rederiving it in connection to an analogous theorem involving the time-averaged evolution of canonical coordinates. We then apply a modified version of the Hellmann-Feynman theorem to obtain a new result: the magnetic flux enclosed by one period of gyro-motion of a charged particle in a non-uniform magnetic field. These results further demonstrate the utility of the action integral in regards to obtaining orbit-averaged quantities and the usefulness of this formalism in characterizing charged particle motion.

Communication: On the calculation of time-dependent electron flux within the Born-Oppenheimer approximation: A flux-flux reflection principle

Science.gov (United States)

Albert, Julian; Hader, Kilian; Engel, Volker

2017-12-01

It is commonly assumed that the time-dependent electron flux calculated within the Born-Oppenheimer (BO) approximation vanishes. This is not necessarily true if the flux is directly determined from the continuity equation obeyed by the electron density. This finding is illustrated for a one-dimensional model of coupled electronic-nuclear dynamics. There, the BO flux is in perfect agreement with the one calculated from a solution of the time-dependent Schrödinger equation for the coupled motion. A reflection principle is derived where the nuclear BO flux is mapped onto the electronic flux.

Unwinding motion of a twisted active region filament

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yan, X. L.; Xue, Z. K.; Kong, D. F. [Yunnan Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming 650011 (China); Liu, J. H. [Department of Physics, Shijiazhuang University, Shijiazhuang 050035 (China); Xu, C. L. [Yunnan Normal University, Kunming 650092 (China)

2014-12-10

To better understand the structures of active region filaments and the eruption process, we study an active region filament eruption in active region NOAA 11082 in detail on 2010 June 22. Before the filament eruption, the opposite unidirectional material flows appeared in succession along the spine of the filament. The rising of the filament triggered two B-class flares at the upper part of the filament. As the bright material was injected into the filament from the sites of the flares, the filament exhibited a rapid uplift accompanying the counterclockwise rotation of the filament body. From the expansion of the filament, we can see that the filament consisted of twisted magnetic field lines. The total twist of the filament is at least 5π obtained by using a time slice method. According to the morphology change during the filament eruption, it is found that the active region filament was a twisted flux rope and its unwinding motion was like a solar tornado. We also find that there was a continuous magnetic helicity injection before and during the filament eruption. It is confirmed that magnetic helicity can be transferred from the photosphere to the filament. Using the extrapolated potential fields, the average decay index of the background magnetic fields over the filament is 0.91. Consequently, these findings imply that the mechanism of solar filament eruption could be due to the kink instability and magnetic helicity accumulation.

Monitoring core barrel motion by neutron noise diagnostics

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Por, G.

1985-08-01

The core barrel motion is detected by ionization chambers located around the reactor vessel. The method is based on the measurement of the neutron flux fluctuations. Calculations to determine the direction and the size of the motion are discussed. The identification of core barrel motion and its connection with the error of one of the main circulating pumps in the Rheinsberg nuclear power plant are described. Core barrel motion of 10 Hz with an amplitude less than 50 μm could be diagnozed at the Paks-1 reactor using the Dutch high accuracy evaluation system. (V.N.)

Formation and Initiation of Erupting Flux Rope and Embedded Filament Driven by Photospheric Converging Motion

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Zhao Xiaozhou; Gan, Weiqun [Key Laboratory of Dark Matter and Space Astronomy, Purple Mountain Observatory, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 210008 Nanjing (China); Xia, Chun; Keppens, Rony, E-mail: zhaoxz@pmo.ac.cn, E-mail: wqgan@pmo.ac.cn, E-mail: chun.xia@kuleuven.be, E-mail: rony.keppens@kuleuven.be [Centre for mathematical Plasma Astrophysics, Department of Mathematics, KU Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200B, 3001 Leuven (Belgium)

2017-06-01

In this paper, we study how a flux rope (FR) is formed and evolves into the corresponding structure of a coronal mass ejection (CME) numerically driven by photospheric converging motion. A two-and-a-half-dimensional magnetohydrodynamics simulation is conducted in a chromosphere-transition-corona setup. The initial arcade-like linear force-free magnetic field is driven by an imposed slow motion converging toward the magnetic inversion line at the bottom boundary. The convergence brings opposite-polarity magnetic flux to the polarity inversion, giving rise to the formation of an FR by magnetic reconnection and eventually to the eruption of a CME. During the FR formation, an embedded prominence gets formed by the levitation of chromospheric material. We confirm that the converging flow is a potential mechanism for the formation of FRs and a possible triggering mechanism for CMEs. We investigate the thermal, dynamical, and magnetic properties of the FR and its embedded prominence by tracking their thermal evolution, analyzing their force balance, and measuring their kinematic quantities. The phase transition from the initiation phase to the acceleration phase of the kinematic evolution of the FR was observed in our simulation. The FR undergoes a series of quasi-static equilibrium states in the initiation phase; while in the acceleration phase the FR is driven by Lorentz force and the impulsive acceleration occurs. The underlying physical reason for the phase transition is the change of the reconnection mechanism from the Sweet–Parker to the unsteady bursty regime of reconnection in the evolving current sheet underneath the FR.

Reflections on Students’ Projects with Motion Sensor Technologies in a Problem-Based Learning Environment

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Triantafyllou, Eva; Timcenko, Olga; Triantafyllidis, George

2014-01-01

Game-based learning (GBL) has been applied in many fields to enhance learning motivations. In recent years, motion sensor technologies have been also introduced in GBL with the aim of using active, physical modalities to facilitate the learning process, while fostering social development...... and collaboration (when these activities involve more than one student at a time). The approaches described in literature, which used motion sensors in GBL, cover a broad spectrum of educational fields. These approaches investigated the effect of learning games using motion sensors on the development of specific...... skills or on the learning experience. This paper presents our experiences on the educational use of motion sensor technologies. Our research was conducted at the department of Medialogy in Aalborg University Copenhagen. Aalborg University applies a problem-based, project-organized model of teaching...

Microcontroller based motion control interface unit for double slit type beam emittance monitor for H- ion source

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Holikatti, A.C.; Jain, Rahul; Karnewar, A.K.; Sonawane, B.B.; Maurya, N.K.; Puntambekar, T.A.

2015-01-01

The Indian Spallation Neutron Source (ISNS), proposed to be developed at RRCAT, will use a 1 GeV H - linac and an accumulator ring to produce high flux of pulsed neutrons via spallation process. The development activity of front end of 1H - linac for ISNS is under progress at RRCAT, for which a pulsed H - ion source of 50 keV energy, 30 mA current with pulse width of 500 μs has been developed at RRCAT. In this paper, we present the design and development of a microcontroller based motion control interface unit for double slit type beam emittance monitor for the H - ion source. This is an interceptive type of beam diagnostic device, which is used for the quantitative measurement of transverse emittance and beam intensity profile

Motion Analysis Based on Invertible Rapid Transform

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

J. Turan

1999-06-01

Full Text Available This paper presents the results of a study on the use of invertible rapid transform (IRT for the motion estimation in a sequence of images. Motion estimation algorithms based on the analysis of the matrix of states (produced in the IRT calculation are described. The new method was used experimentally to estimate crowd and traffic motion from the image data sequences captured at railway stations and at high ways in large cities. The motion vectors may be used to devise a polar plot (showing velocity magnitude and direction for moving objects where the dominant motion tendency can be seen. The experimental results of comparison of the new motion estimation methods with other well known block matching methods (full search, 2D-log, method based on conventional (cross correlation (CC function or phase correlation (PC function for application of crowd motion estimation are also presented.

Analyzing locomotion synthesis with feature-based motion graphs.

Science.gov (United States)

Mahmudi, Mentar; Kallmann, Marcelo

2013-05-01

We propose feature-based motion graphs for realistic locomotion synthesis among obstacles. Among several advantages, feature-based motion graphs achieve improved results in search queries, eliminate the need of postprocessing for foot skating removal, and reduce the computational requirements in comparison to traditional motion graphs. Our contributions are threefold. First, we show that choosing transitions based on relevant features significantly reduces graph construction time and leads to improved search performances. Second, we employ a fast channel search method that confines the motion graph search to a free channel with guaranteed clearance among obstacles, achieving faster and improved results that avoid expensive collision checking. Lastly, we present a motion deformation model based on Inverse Kinematics applied over the transitions of a solution branch. Each transition is assigned a continuous deformation range that does not exceed the original transition cost threshold specified by the user for the graph construction. The obtained deformation improves the reachability of the feature-based motion graph and in turn also reduces the time spent during search. The results obtained by the proposed methods are evaluated and quantified, and they demonstrate significant improvements in comparison to traditional motion graph techniques.

SNS Sample Activation Calculator Flux Recommendations and Validation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

McClanahan, Tucker C. [Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Spallation Neutron Source (SNS); Gallmeier, Franz X. [Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Spallation Neutron Source (SNS); Iverson, Erik B. [Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Spallation Neutron Source (SNS); Lu, Wei [Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Spallation Neutron Source (SNS)

2015-02-01

The Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) uses the Sample Activation Calculator (SAC) to calculate the activation of a sample after the sample has been exposed to the neutron beam in one of the SNS beamlines. The SAC webpage takes user inputs (choice of beamline, the mass, composition and area of the sample, irradiation time, decay time, etc.) and calculates the activation for the sample. In recent years, the SAC has been incorporated into the user proposal and sample handling process, and instrument teams and users have noticed discrepancies in the predicted activation of their samples. The Neutronics Analysis Team validated SAC by performing measurements on select beamlines and confirmed the discrepancies seen by the instrument teams and users. The conclusions were that the discrepancies were a result of a combination of faulty neutron flux spectra for the instruments, improper inputs supplied by SAC (1.12), and a mishandling of cross section data in the Sample Activation Program for Easy Use (SAPEU) (1.1.2). This report focuses on the conclusion that the SAPEU (1.1.2) beamline neutron flux spectra have errors and are a significant contributor to the activation discrepancies. The results of the analysis of the SAPEU (1.1.2) flux spectra for all beamlines will be discussed in detail. The recommendations for the implementation of improved neutron flux spectra in SAPEU (1.1.3) are also discussed.

Motion Learning Based on Bayesian Program Learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cheng Meng-Zhen

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The concept of virtual human has been highly anticipated since the 1980s. By using computer technology, Human motion simulation could generate authentic visual effect, which could cheat human eyes visually. Bayesian Program Learning train one or few motion data, generate new motion data by decomposing and combining. And the generated motion will be more realistic and natural than the traditional one.In this paper, Motion learning based on Bayesian program learning allows us to quickly generate new motion data, reduce workload, improve work efficiency, reduce the cost of motion capture, and improve the reusability of data.

Comparison of two Simon tasks: neuronal correlates of conflict resolution based on coherent motion perception.

Science.gov (United States)

Wittfoth, Matthias; Buck, Daniela; Fahle, Manfred; Herrmann, Manfred

2006-08-15

The present study aimed at characterizing the neural correlates of conflict resolution in two variations of the Simon effect. We introduced two different Simon tasks where subjects had to identify shapes on the basis of form-from-motion perception (FFMo) within a randomly moving dot field, while (1) motion direction (motion-based Simon task) or (2) stimulus location (location-based Simon task) had to be ignored. Behavioral data revealed that both types of Simon tasks induced highly significant interference effects. Using event-related fMRI, we could demonstrate that both tasks share a common cluster of activated brain regions during conflict resolution (pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA), superior parietal lobule (SPL), and cuneus) but also show task-specific activation patterns (left superior temporal cortex in the motion-based, and the left fusiform gyrus in the location-based Simon task). Although motion-based and location-based Simon tasks are conceptually very similar (Type 3 stimulus-response ensembles according to the taxonomy of [Kornblum, S., Stevens, G. (2002). Sequential effects of dimensional overlap: findings and issues. In: Prinz, W., Hommel., B. (Eds.), Common mechanism in perception and action. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp. 9-54]) conflict resolution in both tasks results in the activation of different task-specific regions probably related to the different sources of task-irrelevant information. Furthermore, the present data give evidence those task-specific regions are most likely to detect the relationship between task-relevant and task-irrelevant information.

Flux motion in Y-Ba-Cu-O bulk superconductors during pulse field magnetization

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yoshizawa, K; Nariki, S; Sakai, N; Murakami, M; Hirabayasi, I; Takizawa, T

2004-01-01

We have studied the relationship between the magnetization and temperature change in Y-Ba-Cu-O bulk superconductor during pulse field magnetization (PFM). The flux motion was monitored using both Hall sensors and pick-up coils that are placed on a surface of a Y-Ba-Cu-O disc having dimensions of 15 mm in diameter and 0.95 mm in thickness. The peak value of the field was varied from 0.2 to 0.8 T. The effect of the static bias field was also studied in the range of 0-3 T. The temperature of the sample surface was measured using a resistance temperature sensor. The temperature increased with the magnitude of the applied pulsed magnetic field, and the amount of temperature rise decreased with increasing static bias field

Model-based respiratory motion compensation for emission tomography image reconstruction

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Reyes, M; Malandain, G; Koulibaly, P M; Gonzalez-Ballester, M A; Darcourt, J

2007-01-01

In emission tomography imaging, respiratory motion causes artifacts in lungs and cardiac reconstructed images, which lead to misinterpretations, imprecise diagnosis, impairing of fusion with other modalities, etc. Solutions like respiratory gating, correlated dynamic PET techniques, list-mode data based techniques and others have been tested, which lead to improvements over the spatial activity distribution in lungs lesions, but which have the disadvantages of requiring additional instrumentation or the need of discarding part of the projection data used for reconstruction. The objective of this study is to incorporate respiratory motion compensation directly into the image reconstruction process, without any additional acquisition protocol consideration. To this end, we propose an extension to the maximum likelihood expectation maximization (MLEM) algorithm that includes a respiratory motion model, which takes into account the displacements and volume deformations produced by the respiratory motion during the data acquisition process. We present results from synthetic simulations incorporating real respiratory motion as well as from phantom and patient data

Learning Motion Features for Example-Based Finger Motion Estimation for Virtual Characters

Science.gov (United States)

Mousas, Christos; Anagnostopoulos, Christos-Nikolaos

2017-09-01

This paper presents a methodology for estimating the motion of a character's fingers based on the use of motion features provided by a virtual character's hand. In the presented methodology, firstly, the motion data is segmented into discrete phases. Then, a number of motion features are computed for each motion segment of a character's hand. The motion features are pre-processed using restricted Boltzmann machines, and by using the different variations of semantically similar finger gestures in a support vector machine learning mechanism, the optimal weights for each feature assigned to a metric are computed. The advantages of the presented methodology in comparison to previous solutions are the following: First, we automate the computation of optimal weights that are assigned to each motion feature counted in our metric. Second, the presented methodology achieves an increase (about 17%) in correctly estimated finger gestures in comparison to a previous method.

Aeolian dune sediment flux heterogeneity in Meridiani Planum, Mars.

Science.gov (United States)

Chojnacki, Matthew; Urso, Anna; Fenton, Lori K; Michaels, Timothy I

2017-06-01

It is now known unambiguously that wind-driven bedform activity is occurring on the surface of Mars today, including early detections of active sand dunes in Meridiani Planum's Endeavour crater. Many of these reports are only based on a few sets of observations of relatively isolated bedforms and lack regional context. Here, we investigate aeolian activity across central Meridiani Planum and test the hypothesis that dune sites surrounding Endeavour crater are also active and part of region-wide sediment migration driven by northwesterly winds. All 13 dune fields investigated clearly showed evidence for activity and the majority exhibited dune migration (average rates of 0.6 m/Earth-year). Observations indicate substantial geographic and temporal heterogeneity of dune crest fluxes across the area and per site. Locations with multiple time steps indicate dune sand fluxes can vary by a factor of five, providing evidence for short periods of rapid migration followed by near-stagnation. In contrast, measurements at other sites are nearly identical, indicating that some dunes are in a steady-state as they migrate. The observed sediment transport direction was consistent with a regional northeasterly-to-northwesterly wind regime, revealing more variations than were appreciated from earlier, more localized studies. Craters containing shallow, degraded, flat-floored interiors tended to have dunes with high sediment fluxes/activity, whereas local kilometer-scale topographic obstructions (e.g., central peaks, yardangs) were found to be inversely correlated with dune mobility. Finally, the previous, more limited detections of dune activity in Endeavour crater have been shown to be representative of a broader, region-wide pattern of dune motion.

Oxyanion flux characterization using passive flux meters: Development and field testing of surfactant-modified granular activated carbon

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Jimi; Rao, P. S. C.; Poyer, Irene C.; Toole, Robyn M.; Annable, M. D.; Hatfield, K.

2007-07-01

We report here on the extension of Passive Flux Meter (PFM) applications for measuring fluxes of oxyanions in groundwater, and present results for laboratory and field studies. Granular activated carbon, with and without impregnated silver (GAC and SI-GAC, respectively), was modified with a cationic surfactant, hexadecyltrimethylammonium (HDTMA), to enhance the anion exchange capacity (AEC). Langmuir isotherm sorption maxima for oxyanions measured in batch experiments were in the following order: perchlorate >> chromate > selenate, consistent with their selectivity. Linear sorption isotherms for several alcohols suggest that surfactant modification of GAC and SI-GAC reduced (˜ 30-45%) sorption of alcohols by GAC. Water and oxyanion fluxes (perchlorate and chromate) measured by deploying PFMs packed with surfactant-modified GAC (SM-GAC) or surfactant-modified, silver-impregnated GAC (SM-SI-GAC) in laboratory flow chambers were in close agreement with the imposed fluxes. The use of SM-SI-GAC as a PFM sorbent was evaluated at a field site with perchlorate contamination of a shallow unconfined aquifer. PFMs packed with SM-SI-GAC were deployed in three existing monitoring wells with a perchlorate concentration range of ˜ 2.5 to 190 mg/L. PFM-measured, depth-averaged, groundwater fluxes ranged from 1.8 to 7.6 cm/day, while depth-averaged perchlorate fluxes varied from 0.22 to 1.7 g/m 2/day. Groundwater and perchlorate flux distributions measured in two PFM deployments closely matched each other. Depth-averaged Darcy fluxes measured with PFMs were in line with an estimate from a borehole dilution test, but much smaller than those based on hydraulic conductivity and head gradients; this is likely due to flow divergence caused by well-screen clogging. Flux-averaged perchlorate concentrations measured with PFM deployments matched concentrations in groundwater samples taken from one well, but not in two other wells, pointing to the need for additional field testing. Use of

Active motions of Brownian particles in a generalized energy-depot model

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhang Yong; Koo Kim, Chul; Lee, Kong-Ju-Bock

2008-01-01

We present a generalized energy-depot model in which the rate of conversion of the internal energy into motion can be dependent on the position and velocity of a particle. When the conversion rate is a general function of the velocity, the active particle exhibits diverse patterns of motion, including a braking mechanism and a stepping motion. The phase trajectories of the motion are investigated in a systematic way. With a particular form of the conversion rate dependent on the position and velocity, the particle shows a spontaneous oscillation characterizing a negative stiffness. These types of active behaviors are compared with similar phenomena observed in biology, such as the stepping motion of molecular motors and amplification in the hearing mechanism. Hence, our model can provide a generic understanding of the active motion related to the energy conversion and also a new control mechanism for nano-robots. We also investigate the effect of noise, especially on the stepping motion, and observe random walk-like behavior as expected.

Prediction of metabolic flux distribution from gene expression data based on the flux minimization principle.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hyun-Seob Song

Full Text Available Prediction of possible flux distributions in a metabolic network provides detailed phenotypic information that links metabolism to cellular physiology. To estimate metabolic steady-state fluxes, the most common approach is to solve a set of macroscopic mass balance equations subjected to stoichiometric constraints while attempting to optimize an assumed optimal objective function. This assumption is justifiable in specific cases but may be invalid when tested across different conditions, cell populations, or other organisms. With an aim to providing a more consistent and reliable prediction of flux distributions over a wide range of conditions, in this article we propose a framework that uses the flux minimization principle to predict active metabolic pathways from mRNA expression data. The proposed algorithm minimizes a weighted sum of flux magnitudes, while biomass production can be bounded to fit an ample range from very low to very high values according to the analyzed context. We have formulated the flux weights as a function of the corresponding enzyme reaction's gene expression value, enabling the creation of context-specific fluxes based on a generic metabolic network. In case studies of wild-type Saccharomyces cerevisiae, and wild-type and mutant Escherichia coli strains, our method achieved high prediction accuracy, as gauged by correlation coefficients and sums of squared error, with respect to the experimentally measured values. In contrast to other approaches, our method was able to provide quantitative predictions for both model organisms under a variety of conditions. Our approach requires no prior knowledge or assumption of a context-specific metabolic functionality and does not require trial-and-error parameter adjustments. Thus, our framework is of general applicability for modeling the transcription-dependent metabolism of bacteria and yeasts.

Measurement of a thermal neutron flux using air activation; Mesure de flux de neutrons thermiques par activation d'air

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Guyonvarh, M; Lecomte, P; Le Meur, R [Commissariat a l' Energie Atomique, Saclay (France). Centre d' Etudes Nucleaires

1967-07-01

It is necessary to know, in irradiation loops, the thermal neutron flux after the irradiation device has been introduced and without being obliged to wait for the discharge of this device. In order to measure the flux and to control it continuously, one possible method is to place in the flux a coiled steel tube through which air passes. By measuring the activity of argon 41, and with a knowledge of the flow rate and the temperature of the air, it is possible to calculate the flux. An air-circulation flux controller is described and the relationship between the flux and the count rate is established The accuracy of an absolute measurement is about 14 per cent; that of a relative measurement is about 3 per cent. The measurement can be carried out equally well whether the reactor is operating at maximum or at low power. The measurement range goes from 10{sup 9} to lO{sup 15} n.cm{sup -2}.sec{sup -1}, and it would be possible after a few modifications to measure fluxes between 10{sup 5} and 10{sup 15} n.cm{sup -2}.sec{sup -1}. Finally, the method is very safe to operate: there is little risk of irradiation because of the low specific activity of the argon-41 formed, and no risk of contamination because the decay product of argon-41 is stable. This method, which is now being used in loops, is thus very practical. (authors) [French] Sur des boucles d'irradiation il est necessaire de connaitre le flux de neutrons thermiques apres mise en place du dispositif d'irradiation et sans etre oblige d'attendre le detournement de ce dispositif. Pour mesurer le flux et le controler en permanence, une methode consiste a placer sous flux un serpentin en acier dans lequel on fait circuler de l'air. La mesure d'activite d'argon 41 permet de calculer le flux, connaissant le debit et la temperature de l'air. Un controleur de flux par circulation d'air est decrit et la relation entre le flux et le taux de comptage est etablie. La precision d'une mesure absolue est de l'ordre de 14 pour

Using Kinesthetic Activities to Teach Ptolemaic and Copernican Retrograde Motion

Science.gov (United States)

Richards, Ted

2012-06-01

This paper describes a method for teaching planetary retrograde motion, and the Ptolemaic and Copernican accounts of retrograde motion, by means of a series kinesthetic learning activities (KLAs). In the KLAs described, the students literally walk through the motions of the planets in both systems. A retrospective statistical analysis shows that students who participated in these activities performed better on examination questions pertaining to retrograde motion than students who did not. Potential explanations for this result, including the breaking of classroom routine, the effect of body movement on conceptual memory, and egocentric spatial proprioception, are considered.

Primary visual cortex activity along the apparent-motion trace reflects illusory perception.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lars Muckli

2005-08-01

Full Text Available The illusion of apparent motion can be induced when visual stimuli are successively presented at different locations. It has been shown in previous studies that motion-sensitive regions in extrastriate cortex are relevant for the processing of apparent motion, but it is unclear whether primary visual cortex (V1 is also involved in the representation of the illusory motion path. We investigated, in human subjects, apparent-motion-related activity in patches of V1 representing locations along the path of illusory stimulus motion using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Here we show that apparent motion caused a blood-oxygenation-level-dependent response along the V1 representations of the apparent-motion path, including regions that were not directly activated by the apparent-motion-inducing stimuli. This response was unaltered when participants had to perform an attention-demanding task that diverted their attention away from the stimulus. With a bistable motion quartet, we confirmed that the activity was related to the conscious perception of movement. Our data suggest that V1 is part of the network that represents the illusory path of apparent motion. The activation in V1 can be explained either by lateral interactions within V1 or by feedback mechanisms from higher visual areas, especially the motion-sensitive human MT/V5 complex.

FluxPyt: a Python-based free and open-source software for 13C-metabolic flux analyses.

Science.gov (United States)

Desai, Trunil S; Srivastava, Shireesh

2018-01-01

13 C-Metabolic flux analysis (MFA) is a powerful approach to estimate intracellular reaction rates which could be used in strain analysis and design. Processing and analysis of labeling data for calculation of fluxes and associated statistics is an essential part of MFA. However, various software currently available for data analysis employ proprietary platforms and thus limit accessibility. We developed FluxPyt, a Python-based truly open-source software package for conducting stationary 13 C-MFA data analysis. The software is based on the efficient elementary metabolite unit framework. The standard deviations in the calculated fluxes are estimated using the Monte-Carlo analysis. FluxPyt also automatically creates flux maps based on a template for visualization of the MFA results. The flux distributions calculated by FluxPyt for two separate models: a small tricarboxylic acid cycle model and a larger Corynebacterium glutamicum model, were found to be in good agreement with those calculated by a previously published software. FluxPyt was tested in Microsoft™ Windows 7 and 10, as well as in Linux Mint 18.2. The availability of a free and open 13 C-MFA software that works in various operating systems will enable more researchers to perform 13 C-MFA and to further modify and develop the package.

The Effect of Motion Analysis Activities in a Video-Based Laboratory in Students' Understanding of Position, Velocity and Frames of Reference

Science.gov (United States)

Koleza, Eugenia; Pappas, John

2008-01-01

In this article, we present the results of a qualitative research project on the effect of motion analysis activities in a Video-Based Laboratory (VBL) on students' understanding of position, velocity and frames of reference. The participants in our research were 48 pre-service teachers enrolled in Education Departments with no previous strong…

Terahertz Generation & Vortex Motion Control in Superconductors

Science.gov (United States)

Nori, Franco

2005-03-01

A grand challenge is to controllably generate electromagnetic waves in layered superconducting compounds because of its Terahertz frequency range. We propose [1] four experimentally realizable devices for generating continuous and pulsed THz radiation in a controllable frequency range. We also describe [2-4] several novel devices for controlling the motion of vortices in superconductors, including a reversible rectifier made of a magnetic-superconducting hybrid structure [4]. Finally, we summarize a study [5] of the friction force felt by moving vortices. 1) S. Savel'ev, V. Yampol'skii, A. Rakhmanov, F. Nori, Tunable Terahertz radiation from Josephson vortices, preprint 2) S. Savel'ev and F. Nori, Experimentally realizable devices for controlling the motion of magnetic flux quanta, Nature Mat. 1, 179 (2002) 3) S. Savel'ev, F. Marchesoni, F. Nori, Manipulating small particles, PRL 92, 160602 (2004); B. Zhu, F. Marchesoni, F. Nori, Controlling the motion of magnetic flux quanta, PRL 92, 180602 (2004) 4) J.E. Villegas, et al., Reversible Rectifier that Controls the Motion of Magnetic Flux Quanta, Science 302, 1188 (2003) 5) A. Maeda, et al., Nano-scale friction: kinetic friction of magnetic flux quanta and charge density waves, preprint

Predictive local receptive fields based respiratory motion tracking for motion-adaptive radiotherapy.

Science.gov (United States)

Yubo Wang; Tatinati, Sivanagaraja; Liyu Huang; Kim Jeong Hong; Shafiq, Ghufran; Veluvolu, Kalyana C; Khong, Andy W H

2017-07-01

Extracranial robotic radiotherapy employs external markers and a correlation model to trace the tumor motion caused by the respiration. The real-time tracking of tumor motion however requires a prediction model to compensate the latencies induced by the software (image data acquisition and processing) and hardware (mechanical and kinematic) limitations of the treatment system. A new prediction algorithm based on local receptive fields extreme learning machines (pLRF-ELM) is proposed for respiratory motion prediction. All the existing respiratory motion prediction methods model the non-stationary respiratory motion traces directly to predict the future values. Unlike these existing methods, the pLRF-ELM performs prediction by modeling the higher-level features obtained by mapping the raw respiratory motion into the random feature space of ELM instead of directly modeling the raw respiratory motion. The developed method is evaluated using the dataset acquired from 31 patients for two horizons in-line with the latencies of treatment systems like CyberKnife. Results showed that pLRF-ELM is superior to that of existing prediction methods. Results further highlight that the abstracted higher-level features are suitable to approximate the nonlinear and non-stationary characteristics of respiratory motion for accurate prediction.

Custom-designed motion-based games for older adults: a review of literature in human-computer interaction

OpenAIRE

Gerling, Kathrin; Mandryk, Regan

2014-01-01

Many older adults, particularly persons living in senior residences and care homes, lead sedentary lifestyles, which reduces their life expectancy. Motion-based video games encourage physical activity and might be an opportunity for these adults to remain active and engaged; however, research efforts in the field have frequently focused on younger audiences and little is known about the requirements and benefits of motion-based games for elderly players. In this paper, we present an overview ...

Complexity reduction in the H.264/AVC using highly adaptive fast mode decision based on macroblock motion activity

Science.gov (United States)

Abdellah, Skoudarli; Mokhtar, Nibouche; Amina, Serir

2015-11-01

The H.264/AVC video coding standard is used in a wide range of applications from video conferencing to high-definition television according to its high compression efficiency. This efficiency is mainly acquired from the newly allowed prediction schemes including variable block modes. However, these schemes require a high complexity to select the optimal mode. Consequently, complexity reduction in the H.264/AVC encoder has recently become a very challenging task in the video compression domain, especially when implementing the encoder in real-time applications. Fast mode decision algorithms play an important role in reducing the overall complexity of the encoder. In this paper, we propose an adaptive fast intermode algorithm based on motion activity, temporal stationarity, and spatial homogeneity. This algorithm predicts the motion activity of the current macroblock from its neighboring blocks and identifies temporal stationary regions and spatially homogeneous regions using adaptive threshold values based on content video features. Extensive experimental work has been done in high profile, and results show that the proposed source-coding algorithm effectively reduces the computational complexity by 53.18% on average compared with the reference software encoder, while maintaining the high-coding efficiency of H.264/AVC by incurring only 0.097 dB in total peak signal-to-noise ratio and 0.228% increment on the total bit rate.

Example-Based Automatic Music-Driven Conventional Dance Motion Synthesis

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Xu, Songhua [ORNL; Fan, Rukun [University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Geng, Weidong [Zhejiang University

2011-04-21

We introduce a novel method for synthesizing dance motions that follow the emotions and contents of a piece of music. Our method employs a learning-based approach to model the music to motion mapping relationship embodied in example dance motions along with those motions' accompanying background music. A key step in our method is to train a music to motion matching quality rating function through learning the music to motion mapping relationship exhibited in synchronized music and dance motion data, which were captured from professional human dance performance. To generate an optimal sequence of dance motion segments to match with a piece of music, we introduce a constraint-based dynamic programming procedure. This procedure considers both music to motion matching quality and visual smoothness of a resultant dance motion sequence. We also introduce a two-way evaluation strategy, coupled with a GPU-based implementation, through which we can execute the dynamic programming process in parallel, resulting in significant speedup. To evaluate the effectiveness of our method, we quantitatively compare the dance motions synthesized by our method with motion synthesis results by several peer methods using the motions captured from professional human dancers' performance as the gold standard. We also conducted several medium-scale user studies to explore how perceptually our dance motion synthesis method can outperform existing methods in synthesizing dance motions to match with a piece of music. These user studies produced very positive results on our music-driven dance motion synthesis experiments for several Asian dance genres, confirming the advantages of our method.

Example-based automatic music-driven conventional dance motion synthesis.

Science.gov (United States)

Fan, Rukun; Xu, Songhua; Geng, Weidong

2012-03-01

We introduce a novel method for synthesizing dance motions that follow the emotions and contents of a piece of music. Our method employs a learning-based approach to model the music to motion mapping relationship embodied in example dance motions along with those motions' accompanying background music. A key step in our method is to train a music to motion matching quality rating function through learning the music to motion mapping relationship exhibited in synchronized music and dance motion data, which were captured from professional human dance performance. To generate an optimal sequence of dance motion segments to match with a piece of music, we introduce a constraint-based dynamic programming procedure. This procedure considers both music to motion matching quality and visual smoothness of a resultant dance motion sequence. We also introduce a two-way evaluation strategy, coupled with a GPU-based implementation, through which we can execute the dynamic programming process in parallel, resulting in significant speedup. To evaluate the effectiveness of our method, we quantitatively compare the dance motions synthesized by our method with motion synthesis results by several peer methods using the motions captured from professional human dancers' performance as the gold standard. We also conducted several medium-scale user studies to explore how perceptually our dance motion synthesis method can outperform existing methods in synthesizing dance motions to match with a piece of music. These user studies produced very positive results on our music-driven dance motion synthesis experiments for several Asian dance genres, confirming the advantages of our method.

Transendothelial albumin flux: evidence against active transport of albumin

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Siflinger-Birnboim, A.; Del Vecchio, P.J.; Cooper, J.A.; Malik, A.B.

1986-01-01

The authors studied whether albumin is actively transported across cultured pulmonary endothelium by comparing the transendothelial flux of 125 I-albumin from the luminal-to-abluminal side to the flux from the abluminal-to-luminal side. Bovine pulmonary artery endothelial cells were grown to confluence on gelatinized polycarbonated filters separating abluminal from luminal compartments. Each compartment had an albumin concentration of 1 g/100 ml to equalize oncotic pressure gradients. The effect of hydrostatic pressure was eliminated by maintaining an equal level of fluid in both compartments. The transendothelial flux of albumin across the monolayer was measured by placing 125 I-albumin tracer either on the luminal or the abluminal side. Equal fluxes of 125 I-albumin from luminal-to-abluminal side and from abluminal-to-luminal side were observed. The results indicate that the pulmonary endothelium behaves symmetrically for albumin, indicating the absence of active transport of albumin

Novel Motion Sensorless Control of Single Phase Brushless D.C. PM Motor Drive, with experiments

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lepure, Liviu Ioan; Boldea, Ion; Andreescu, Gheorghe Daniel

2010-01-01

A motion sensorless control for single phase permanent magnet brushless d.c. (PM-BLDC) motor drives, based on flux integration and prior knowledge of the PM flux/position characteristic is proposed here and an adequate correction algorithm is adopted, in order to increase the robustness to noise...

Initial clinical evaluation of PET-based ion beam therapy monitoring under consideration of organ motion.

Science.gov (United States)

Kurz, Christopher; Bauer, Julia; Unholtz, Daniel; Richter, Daniel; Herfarth, Klaus; Debus, Jürgen; Parodi, Katia

2016-02-01

Intrafractional organ motion imposes considerable challenges to scanned ion beam therapy and demands for a thorough verification of the applied treatment. At the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT), the scanned ion beam delivery is verified by means of postirradiation positron-emission-tomography (PET) imaging. This work presents a first clinical evaluation of PET-based treatment monitoring in ion beam therapy under consideration of target motion. Three patients with mobile liver lesions underwent scanned carbon ion irradiation at HIT and postirradiation PET/CT (x-ray-computed-tomography) imaging with a commercial scanner. Respiratory motion was recorded during irradiation and subsequent image acquisition. This enabled a time-resolved (4D) calculation of the expected irradiation-induced activity pattern and, for one patient where an additional 4D CT was acquired at the PET/CT scanner after treatment, a motion-compensated PET image reconstruction. For the other patients, PET data were reconstructed statically. To verify the treatment, calculated prediction and reconstructed measurement were compared with a focus on the ion beam range. Results in the current three patients suggest that for motion amplitudes in the order of 2 mm there is no benefit from incorporating respiratory motion information into PET-based treatment monitoring. For a target motion in the order of 10 mm, motion-related effects become more severe and a time-resolved modeling of the expected activity distribution can lead to an improved data interpretation if a sufficient number of true coincidences is detected. Benefits from motion-compensated PET image reconstruction could not be shown conclusively at the current stage. The feasibility of clinical PET-based treatment verification under consideration of organ motion has been shown for the first time. Improvements in noise-robust 4D PET image reconstruction are deemed necessary to enhance the clinical potential.

Initial clinical evaluation of PET-based ion beam therapy monitoring under consideration of organ motion

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kurz, Christopher; Bauer, Julia; Unholtz, Daniel; Herfarth, Klaus; Debus, Jürgen; Richter, Daniel; Parodi, Katia

2016-01-01

Purpose: Intrafractional organ motion imposes considerable challenges to scanned ion beam therapy and demands for a thorough verification of the applied treatment. At the Heidelberg Ion-Beam Therapy Center (HIT), the scanned ion beam delivery is verified by means of postirradiation positron-emission-tomography (PET) imaging. This work presents a first clinical evaluation of PET-based treatment monitoring in ion beam therapy under consideration of target motion. Methods: Three patients with mobile liver lesions underwent scanned carbon ion irradiation at HIT and postirradiation PET/CT (x-ray-computed-tomography) imaging with a commercial scanner. Respiratory motion was recorded during irradiation and subsequent image acquisition. This enabled a time-resolved (4D) calculation of the expected irradiation-induced activity pattern and, for one patient where an additional 4D CT was acquired at the PET/CT scanner after treatment, a motion-compensated PET image reconstruction. For the other patients, PET data were reconstructed statically. To verify the treatment, calculated prediction and reconstructed measurement were compared with a focus on the ion beam range. Results: Results in the current three patients suggest that for motion amplitudes in the order of 2 mm there is no benefit from incorporating respiratory motion information into PET-based treatment monitoring. For a target motion in the order of 10 mm, motion-related effects become more severe and a time-resolved modeling of the expected activity distribution can lead to an improved data interpretation if a sufficient number of true coincidences is detected. Benefits from motion-compensated PET image reconstruction could not be shown conclusively at the current stage. Conclusions: The feasibility of clinical PET-based treatment verification under consideration of organ motion has been shown for the first time. Improvements in noise-robust 4D PET image reconstruction are deemed necessary to enhance the

Combination of Accumulated Motion and Color Segmentation for Human Activity Analysis

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Briassouli Alexia

2008-01-01

Full Text Available Abstract The automated analysis of activity in digital multimedia, and especially video, is gaining more and more importance due to the evolution of higher-level video processing systems and the development of relevant applications such as surveillance and sports. This paper presents a novel algorithm for the recognition and classification of human activities, which employs motion and color characteristics in a complementary manner, so as to extract the most information from both sources, and overcome their individual limitations. The proposed method accumulates the flow estimates in a video, and extracts "regions of activity" by processing their higher-order statistics. The shape of these activity areas can be used for the classification of the human activities and events taking place in a video and the subsequent extraction of higher-level semantics. Color segmentation of the active and static areas of each video frame is performed to complement this information. The color layers in the activity and background areas are compared using the earth mover's distance, in order to achieve accurate object segmentation. Thus, unlike much existing work on human activity analysis, the proposed approach is based on general color and motion processing methods, and not on specific models of the human body and its kinematics. The combined use of color and motion information increases the method robustness to illumination variations and measurement noise. Consequently, the proposed approach can lead to higher-level information about human activities, but its applicability is not limited to specific human actions. We present experiments with various real video sequences, from sports and surveillance domains, to demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.

Combination of Accumulated Motion and Color Segmentation for Human Activity Analysis

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ioannis Kompatsiaris

2008-03-01

Full Text Available The automated analysis of activity in digital multimedia, and especially video, is gaining more and more importance due to the evolution of higher-level video processing systems and the development of relevant applications such as surveillance and sports. This paper presents a novel algorithm for the recognition and classification of human activities, which employs motion and color characteristics in a complementary manner, so as to extract the most information from both sources, and overcome their individual limitations. The proposed method accumulates the flow estimates in a video, and extracts “regions of activity” by processing their higher-order statistics. The shape of these activity areas can be used for the classification of the human activities and events taking place in a video and the subsequent extraction of higher-level semantics. Color segmentation of the active and static areas of each video frame is performed to complement this information. The color layers in the activity and background areas are compared using the earth mover's distance, in order to achieve accurate object segmentation. Thus, unlike much existing work on human activity analysis, the proposed approach is based on general color and motion processing methods, and not on specific models of the human body and its kinematics. The combined use of color and motion information increases the method robustness to illumination variations and measurement noise. Consequently, the proposed approach can lead to higher-level information about human activities, but its applicability is not limited to specific human actions. We present experiments with various real video sequences, from sports and surveillance domains, to demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.

The role of parietal cortex in the formation of colour and motion based concepts

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Samuel William Cheadle

2014-07-01

Full Text Available Imaging evidence shows that separate subdivisions of parietal cortex, in and around the intraparietal sulcus (IPS, are engaged when stimuli are grouped according to colour and to motion (Zeki and Stutters 2013. Since grouping is an essential step in the formation of concepts, we wanted to learn whether parietal cortex is also engaged in the formation of concepts according to these two attributes. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI, and choosing the recognition of concept-based colour or motion stimuli as our paradigm, we found that there was strong concept-related activity in and around the intraparietal sulcus (IPS, a region whose homologue in the macaque monkey is known to receive direct but segregated anatomical inputs from V4 and V5. Parietal activity related to colour concepts was juxtaposed but did not overlap with activity related to motion concepts, thus emphasizing the continuation of the segregation of colour and motion into the conceptual system. Concurrent retinotopic mapping experiments showed that within the parietal cortex, concept-related activity increases within later stage IPS areas.

Using Kinesthetic Activities to Teach Ptolemaic and Copernican Retrograde Motion

Science.gov (United States)

Richards, Ted

2012-01-01

This paper describes a method for teaching planetary retrograde motion, and the Ptolemaic and Copernican accounts of retrograde motion, by means of a series kinesthetic learning activities (KLAs). In the KLAs described, the students literally walk through the motions of the planets in both systems. A retrospective statistical analysis shows that…

FORMATION AND ERUPTION OF A FLUX ROPE FROM THE SIGMOID ACTIVE REGION NOAA 11719 AND ASSOCIATED M6.5 FLARE: A MULTI-WAVELENGTH STUDY

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Joshi, Bhuwan; Kushwaha, Upendra; Dhara, Sajal Kumar [Udaipur Solar Observatory, Physical Research Laboratory, Udaipur 313001 (India); Veronig, Astrid M. [Kanzelhöhe Observatory/Institute of Physics, University of Graz, Universitätsplatz 5, A-8010 Graz (Austria); Shanmugaraju, A. [Department of Physics, Arul Anandhar College, Karumathur, Tamilnadu 625514 (India); Moon, Yong-Jae, E-mail: bhuwan@prl.res.in [School of Space Research, Kyung Hee University, Yongin, Gyeonggi-Do, 446-701 (Korea, Republic of)

2017-01-01

We investigate the formation, activation, and eruption of a flux rope (FR) from the sigmoid active region NOAA 11719 by analyzing E(UV), X-ray, and radio measurements. During the pre-eruption period of ∼7 hr, the AIA 94 Å images reveal the emergence of a coronal sigmoid through the interaction between two J-shaped bundles of loops, which proceeds with multiple episodes of coronal loop brightenings and significant variations in the magnetic flux through the photosphere. These observations imply that repetitive magnetic reconnections likely play a key role in the formation of the sigmoidal FR in the corona and also contribute toward sustaining the temperature of the FR higher than that of the ambient coronal structures. Notably, the formation of the sigmoid is associated with the fast morphological evolution of an S-shaped filament channel in the chromosphere. The sigmoid activates toward eruption with the ascent of a large FR in the corona, which is preceded by the decrease in photospheric magnetic flux through the core flaring region, suggesting tether-cutting reconnection as a possible triggering mechanism. The FR eruption results in a two-ribbon M6.5 flare with a prolonged rise phase of ∼21 minutes. The flare exhibits significant deviation from the standard flare model in the early rise phase, during which a pair of J-shaped flare ribbons form and apparently exhibit converging motions parallel to the polarity inversion line, which is further confirmed by the motions of hard X-ray footpoint sources. In the later stages, the flare follows the standard flare model and the source region undergoes a complete sigmoid-to-arcade transformation.

Optical and Acoustic Sensor-Based 3D Ball Motion Estimation for Ball Sport Simulators †

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sang-Woo Seo

2018-04-01

Full Text Available Estimation of the motion of ball-shaped objects is essential for the operation of ball sport simulators. In this paper, we propose an estimation system for 3D ball motion, including speed and angle of projection, by using acoustic vector and infrared (IR scanning sensors. Our system is comprised of three steps to estimate a ball motion: sound-based ball firing detection, sound source localization, and IR scanning for motion analysis. First, an impulsive sound classification based on the mel-frequency cepstrum and feed-forward neural network is introduced to detect the ball launch sound. An impulsive sound source localization using a 2D microelectromechanical system (MEMS microphones and delay-and-sum beamforming is presented to estimate the firing position. The time and position of a ball in 3D space is determined from a high-speed infrared scanning method. Our experimental results demonstrate that the estimation of ball motion based on sound allows a wider activity area than similar camera-based methods. Thus, it can be practically applied to various simulations in sports such as soccer and baseball.

A Survey of Advances in Vision-Based Human Motion Capture and Analysis

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Moeslund, Thomas B.; Hilton, Adrian; Krüger, Volker

2006-01-01

This survey reviews advances in human motion capture and analysis from 2000 to 2006, following a previous survey of papers up to 2000 Human motion capture continues to be an increasingly active research area in computer vision with over 350 publications over this period. A number of significant...... actions and behavior. This survey reviews recent trends in video based human capture and analysis, as well as discussing open problems for future research to achieve automatic visual analysis of human movement....

Surface EMG signals based motion intent recognition using multi-layer ELM

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Jianhui; Qi, Lin; Wang, Xiao

2017-11-01

The upper-limb rehabilitation robot is regard as a useful tool to help patients with hemiplegic to do repetitive exercise. The surface electromyography (sEMG) contains motion information as the electric signals are generated and related to nerve-muscle motion. These sEMG signals, representing human's intentions of active motions, are introduced into the rehabilitation robot system to recognize upper-limb movements. Traditionally, the feature extraction is an indispensable part of drawing significant information from original signals, which is a tedious task requiring rich and related experience. This paper employs a deep learning scheme to extract the internal features of the sEMG signals using an advanced Extreme Learning Machine based auto-encoder (ELMAE). The mathematical information contained in the multi-layer structure of the ELM-AE is used as the high-level representation of the internal features of the sEMG signals, and thus a simple ELM can post-process the extracted features, formulating the entire multi-layer ELM (ML-ELM) algorithm. The method is employed for the sEMG based neural intentions recognition afterwards. The case studies show the adopted deep learning algorithm (ELM-AE) is capable of yielding higher classification accuracy compared to the Principle Component Analysis (PCA) scheme in 5 different types of upper-limb motions. This indicates the effectiveness and the learning capability of the ML-ELM in such motion intent recognition applications.

Fault-tolerant feature-based estimation of space debris rotational motion during active removal missions

Science.gov (United States)

Biondi, Gabriele; Mauro, Stefano; Pastorelli, Stefano; Sorli, Massimo

2018-05-01

One of the key functionalities required by an Active Debris Removal mission is the assessment of the target kinematics and inertial properties. Passive sensors, such as stereo cameras, are often included in the onboard instrumentation of a chaser spacecraft for capturing sequential photographs and for tracking features of the target surface. A plenty of methods, based on Kalman filtering, are available for the estimation of the target's state from feature positions; however, to guarantee the filter convergence, they typically require continuity of measurements and the capability of tracking a fixed set of pre-defined features of the object. These requirements clash with the actual tracking conditions: failures in feature detection often occur and the assumption of having some a-priori knowledge about the shape of the target could be restrictive in certain cases. The aim of the presented work is to propose a fault-tolerant alternative method for estimating the angular velocity and the relative magnitudes of the principal moments of inertia of the target. Raw data regarding the positions of the tracked features are processed to evaluate corrupted values of a 3-dimentional parameter which entirely describes the finite screw motion of the debris and which primarily is invariant on the particular set of considered features of the object. Missing values of the parameter are completely restored exploiting the typical periodicity of the rotational motion of an uncontrolled satellite: compressed sensing techniques, typically adopted for recovering images or for prognostic applications, are herein used in a completely original fashion for retrieving a kinematic signal that appears sparse in the frequency domain. Due to its invariance about the features, no assumptions are needed about the target's shape and continuity of the tracking. The obtained signal is useful for the indirect evaluation of an attitude signal that feeds an unscented Kalman filter for the estimation of

Unsupervised motion-based object segmentation refined by color

Science.gov (United States)

Piek, Matthijs C.; Braspenning, Ralph; Varekamp, Chris

2003-06-01

For various applications, such as data compression, structure from motion, medical imaging and video enhancement, there is a need for an algorithm that divides video sequences into independently moving objects. Because our focus is on video enhancement and structure from motion for consumer electronics, we strive for a low complexity solution. For still images, several approaches exist based on colour, but these lack in both speed and segmentation quality. For instance, colour-based watershed algorithms produce a so-called oversegmentation with many segments covering each single physical object. Other colour segmentation approaches exist which somehow limit the number of segments to reduce this oversegmentation problem. However, this often results in inaccurate edges or even missed objects. Most likely, colour is an inherently insufficient cue for real world object segmentation, because real world objects can display complex combinations of colours. For video sequences, however, an additional cue is available, namely the motion of objects. When different objects in a scene have different motion, the motion cue alone is often enough to reliably distinguish objects from one another and the background. However, because of the lack of sufficient resolution of efficient motion estimators, like the 3DRS block matcher, the resulting segmentation is not at pixel resolution, but at block resolution. Existing pixel resolution motion estimators are more sensitive to noise, suffer more from aperture problems or have less correspondence to the true motion of objects when compared to block-based approaches or are too computationally expensive. From its tendency to oversegmentation it is apparent that colour segmentation is particularly effective near edges of homogeneously coloured areas. On the other hand, block-based true motion estimation is particularly effective in heterogeneous areas, because heterogeneous areas improve the chance a block is unique and thus decrease the

Integrated thermal infrared imaging and Structure-from-Motion photogrametry to map apparent temperature and radiant hydrothermal heat flux at Mammoth Mountain, CA USA

Science.gov (United States)

Lewis, Aaron; George Hilley,; Lewicki, Jennifer L.

2015-01-01

This work presents a method to create high-resolution (cm-scale) orthorectified and georeferenced maps of apparent surface temperature and radiant hydrothermal heat flux and estimate the radiant hydrothermal heat emission rate from a study area. A ground-based thermal infrared (TIR) camera was used to collect (1) a set of overlapping and offset visible imagery around the study area during the daytime and (2) time series of co-located visible and TIR imagery at one or more sites within the study area from pre-dawn to daytime. Daytime visible imagery was processed using the Structure-from-Motion photogrammetric method to create a digital elevation model onto which pre-dawn TIR imagery was orthorectified and georeferenced. Three-dimensional maps of apparent surface temperature and radiant hydrothermal heat flux were then visualized and analyzed from various computer platforms (e.g., Google Earth, ArcGIS). We demonstrate this method at the Mammoth Mountain fumarole area on Mammoth Mountain, CA. Time-averaged apparent surface temperatures and radiant hydrothermal heat fluxes were observed up to 73.7 oC and 450 W m-2, respectively, while the estimated radiant hydrothermal heat emission rate from the area was 1.54 kW. Results should provide a basis for monitoring potential volcanic unrest and mitigating hydrothermal heat-related hazards on the volcano.

On a PCA-based lung motion model

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Li Ruijiang; Lewis, John H; Jia Xun; Jiang, Steve B [Department of Radiation Oncology and Center for Advanced Radiotherapy Technologies, University of California San Diego, 3855 Health Sciences Dr, La Jolla, CA 92037-0843 (United States); Zhao Tianyu; Wuenschel, Sara; Lamb, James; Yang Deshan; Low, Daniel A [Department of Radiation Oncology, Washington University School of Medicine, 4921 Parkview Pl, St. Louis, MO 63110-1093 (United States); Liu Weifeng, E-mail: sbjiang@ucsd.edu [Amazon.com Inc., 701 5th Ave. Seattle, WA 98104 (United States)

2011-09-21

Respiration-induced organ motion is one of the major uncertainties in lung cancer radiotherapy and is crucial to be able to accurately model the lung motion. Most work so far has focused on the study of the motion of a single point (usually the tumor center of mass), and much less work has been done to model the motion of the entire lung. Inspired by the work of Zhang et al (2007 Med. Phys. 34 4772-81), we believe that the spatiotemporal relationship of the entire lung motion can be accurately modeled based on principle component analysis (PCA) and then a sparse subset of the entire lung, such as an implanted marker, can be used to drive the motion of the entire lung (including the tumor). The goal of this work is twofold. First, we aim to understand the underlying reason why PCA is effective for modeling lung motion and find the optimal number of PCA coefficients for accurate lung motion modeling. We attempt to address the above important problems both in a theoretical framework and in the context of real clinical data. Second, we propose a new method to derive the entire lung motion using a single internal marker based on the PCA model. The main results of this work are as follows. We derived an important property which reveals the implicit regularization imposed by the PCA model. We then studied the model using two mathematical respiratory phantoms and 11 clinical 4DCT scans for eight lung cancer patients. For the mathematical phantoms with cosine and an even power (2n) of cosine motion, we proved that 2 and 2n PCA coefficients and eigenvectors will completely represent the lung motion, respectively. Moreover, for the cosine phantom, we derived the equivalence conditions for the PCA motion model and the physiological 5D lung motion model (Low et al 2005 Int. J. Radiat. Oncol. Biol. Phys. 63 921-9). For the clinical 4DCT data, we demonstrated the modeling power and generalization performance of the PCA model. The average 3D modeling error using PCA was within 1

On a PCA-based lung motion model.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Ruijiang; Lewis, John H; Jia, Xun; Zhao, Tianyu; Liu, Weifeng; Wuenschel, Sara; Lamb, James; Yang, Deshan; Low, Daniel A; Jiang, Steve B

2011-09-21

Respiration-induced organ motion is one of the major uncertainties in lung cancer radiotherapy and is crucial to be able to accurately model the lung motion. Most work so far has focused on the study of the motion of a single point (usually the tumor center of mass), and much less work has been done to model the motion of the entire lung. Inspired by the work of Zhang et al (2007 Med. Phys. 34 4772-81), we believe that the spatiotemporal relationship of the entire lung motion can be accurately modeled based on principle component analysis (PCA) and then a sparse subset of the entire lung, such as an implanted marker, can be used to drive the motion of the entire lung (including the tumor). The goal of this work is twofold. First, we aim to understand the underlying reason why PCA is effective for modeling lung motion and find the optimal number of PCA coefficients for accurate lung motion modeling. We attempt to address the above important problems both in a theoretical framework and in the context of real clinical data. Second, we propose a new method to derive the entire lung motion using a single internal marker based on the PCA model. The main results of this work are as follows. We derived an important property which reveals the implicit regularization imposed by the PCA model. We then studied the model using two mathematical respiratory phantoms and 11 clinical 4DCT scans for eight lung cancer patients. For the mathematical phantoms with cosine and an even power (2n) of cosine motion, we proved that 2 and 2n PCA coefficients and eigenvectors will completely represent the lung motion, respectively. Moreover, for the cosine phantom, we derived the equivalence conditions for the PCA motion model and the physiological 5D lung motion model (Low et al 2005 Int. J. Radiat. Oncol. Biol. Phys. 63 921-9). For the clinical 4DCT data, we demonstrated the modeling power and generalization performance of the PCA model. The average 3D modeling error using PCA was within 1

On a PCA-based lung motion model

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Li Ruijiang; Lewis, John H; Jia Xun; Jiang, Steve B; Zhao Tianyu; Wuenschel, Sara; Lamb, James; Yang Deshan; Low, Daniel A; Liu Weifeng

2011-01-01

Respiration-induced organ motion is one of the major uncertainties in lung cancer radiotherapy and is crucial to be able to accurately model the lung motion. Most work so far has focused on the study of the motion of a single point (usually the tumor center of mass), and much less work has been done to model the motion of the entire lung. Inspired by the work of Zhang et al (2007 Med. Phys. 34 4772-81), we believe that the spatiotemporal relationship of the entire lung motion can be accurately modeled based on principle component analysis (PCA) and then a sparse subset of the entire lung, such as an implanted marker, can be used to drive the motion of the entire lung (including the tumor). The goal of this work is twofold. First, we aim to understand the underlying reason why PCA is effective for modeling lung motion and find the optimal number of PCA coefficients for accurate lung motion modeling. We attempt to address the above important problems both in a theoretical framework and in the context of real clinical data. Second, we propose a new method to derive the entire lung motion using a single internal marker based on the PCA model. The main results of this work are as follows. We derived an important property which reveals the implicit regularization imposed by the PCA model. We then studied the model using two mathematical respiratory phantoms and 11 clinical 4DCT scans for eight lung cancer patients. For the mathematical phantoms with cosine and an even power (2n) of cosine motion, we proved that 2 and 2n PCA coefficients and eigenvectors will completely represent the lung motion, respectively. Moreover, for the cosine phantom, we derived the equivalence conditions for the PCA motion model and the physiological 5D lung motion model (Low et al 2005 Int. J. Radiat. Oncol. Biol. Phys. 63 921-9). For the clinical 4DCT data, we demonstrated the modeling power and generalization performance of the PCA model. The average 3D modeling error using PCA was within 1

Automatic Video-based Analysis of Human Motion

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fihl, Preben

The human motion contains valuable information in many situations and people frequently perform an unconscious analysis of the motion of other people to understand their actions, intentions, and state of mind. An automatic analysis of human motion will facilitate many applications and thus has...... received great interest from both industry and research communities. The focus of this thesis is on video-based analysis of human motion and the thesis presents work within three overall topics, namely foreground segmentation, action recognition, and human pose estimation. Foreground segmentation is often...... the first important step in the analysis of human motion. By separating foreground from background the subsequent analysis can be focused and efficient. This thesis presents a robust background subtraction method that can be initialized with foreground objects in the scene and is capable of handling...

Motion direction estimation based on active RFID with changing environment

Science.gov (United States)

Jie, Wu; Minghua, Zhu; Wei, He

2018-05-01

The gate system is used to estimate the direction of RFID tags carriers when they are going through the gate. Normally, it is difficult to achieve and keep a high accuracy in estimating motion direction of RFID tags because the received signal strength of tag changes sharply according to the changing electromagnetic environment. In this paper, a method of motion direction estimation for RFID tags is presented. To improve estimation accuracy, the machine leaning algorithm is used to get the fitting function of the received data by readers which are deployed inside and outside gate respectively. Then the fitted data are sampled to get the standard vector. We compare the stand vector with template vectors to get the motion direction estimation result. Then the corresponding template vector is updated according to the surrounding environment. We conducted the simulation and implement of the proposed method and the result shows that the proposed method in this work can improve and keep a high accuracy under the condition of the constantly changing environment.

Console video games, postural activity, and motion sickness during passive restraint.

Science.gov (United States)

Chang, Chih-Hui; Pan, Wu-Wen; Chen, Fu-Chen; Stoffregen, Thomas A

2013-08-01

We examined the influence of passive restraint on postural activity and motion sickness in individuals who actively controlled a potentially nauseogenic visual motion stimulus (a driving video game). Twenty-four adults (20.09 ± 1.56 years; 167.80 ± 7.94 cm; 59.02 ± 9.18 kg) were recruited as participants. Using elastic bands, standing participants were passively restrained at the head, shoulders, hips, and knees. During restraint, participants played (i.e., controlled) a driving video game (a motorcycle race), for 50 min. During game play, we recorded the movement of the head and torso, using a magnetic tracking system. Following game play, participants answered a forced choice, yes/no question about whether they were motion sick, and were assigned to sick and well groups on this basis. In addition, before and after game play, participants completed the Simulator Sickness Questionnaire, which provided numerical ratings of the severity of individual symptoms. Five of 24 participants (20.83 %) reported motion sickness. Participants moved despite being passively restrained. Both the magnitude and the temporal dynamics of movement differed between the sick and well groups. The results show that passive restraint of the body can reduce motion sickness when the nauseogenic visual stimulus is under participants' active control and confirm that motion sickness is preceded by distinct patterns of postural activity even during passive restraint.

MAGNETIC FLUX TRANSPORT AND THE LONG-TERM EVOLUTION OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ugarte-Urra, Ignacio; Upton, Lisa; Warren, Harry P.; Hathaway, David H.

2015-01-01

With multiple vantage points around the Sun, Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) and Solar Dynamics Observatory imaging observations provide a unique opportunity to view the solar surface continuously. We use He ii 304 Å data from these observatories to isolate and track ten active regions and study their long-term evolution. We find that active regions typically follow a standard pattern of emergence over several days followed by a slower decay that is proportional in time to the peak intensity in the region. Since STEREO does not make direct observations of the magnetic field, we employ a flux-luminosity relationship to infer the total unsigned magnetic flux evolution. To investigate this magnetic flux decay over several rotations we use a surface flux transport model, the Advective Flux Transport model, that simulates convective flows using a time-varying velocity field and find that the model provides realistic predictions when information about the active region's magnetic field strength and distribution at peak flux is available. Finally, we illustrate how 304 Å images can be used as a proxy for magnetic flux measurements when magnetic field data is not accessible

Airfoil-based electromagnetic energy harvester containing parallel array motion between moving coil and multi-pole magnets towards enhanced power density.

Science.gov (United States)

Leung, Chung Ming; Wang, Ya; Chen, Wusi

2016-11-01

In this letter, the airfoil-based electromagnetic energy harvester containing parallel array motion between moving coil and trajectory matching multi-pole magnets was investigated. The magnets were aligned in an alternatively magnetized formation of 6 magnets to explore enhanced power density. In particular, the magnet array was positioned in parallel to the trajectory of the tip coil within its tip deflection span. The finite element simulations of the magnetic flux density and induced voltages at an open circuit condition were studied to find the maximum number of alternatively magnetized magnets that was required for the proposed energy harvester. Experimental results showed that the energy harvester with a pair of 6 alternatively magnetized linear magnet arrays was able to generate an induced voltage (V o ) of 20 V, with an open circuit condition, and 475 mW, under a 30 Ω optimal resistance load operating with the wind speed (U) at 7 m/s and a natural bending frequency of 3.54 Hz. Compared to the traditional electromagnetic energy harvester with a single magnet moving through a coil, the proposed energy harvester, containing multi-pole magnets and parallel array motion, enables the moving coil to accumulate a stronger magnetic flux in each period of the swinging motion. In addition to the comparison made with the airfoil-based piezoelectric energy harvester of the same size, our proposed electromagnetic energy harvester generates 11 times more power output, which is more suitable for high-power-density energy harvesting applications at regions with low environmental frequency.

Music recommendation according to human motion based on kernel CCA-based relationship

Science.gov (United States)

Ohkushi, Hiroyuki; Ogawa, Takahiro; Haseyama, Miki

2011-12-01

In this article, a method for recommendation of music pieces according to human motions based on their kernel canonical correlation analysis (CCA)-based relationship is proposed. In order to perform the recommendation between different types of multimedia data, i.e., recommendation of music pieces from human motions, the proposed method tries to estimate their relationship. Specifically, the correlation based on kernel CCA is calculated as the relationship in our method. Since human motions and music pieces have various time lengths, it is necessary to calculate the correlation between time series having different lengths. Therefore, new kernel functions for human motions and music pieces, which can provide similarities between data that have different time lengths, are introduced into the calculation of the kernel CCA-based correlation. This approach effectively provides a solution to the conventional problem of not being able to calculate the correlation from multimedia data that have various time lengths. Therefore, the proposed method can perform accurate recommendation of best matched music pieces according to a target human motion from the obtained correlation. Experimental results are shown to verify the performance of the proposed method.

TU-F-BRB-00: MRI-Based Motion Management for RT

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2015-01-01

The current clinical standard of organ respiratory imaging, 4D-CT, is fundamentally limited by poor soft-tissue contrast and imaging dose. These limitations are potential barriers to beneficial “4D” radiotherapy methods which optimize the target and OAR dose-volume considering breathing motion but rely on a robust motion characterization. Conversely, MRI imparts no known radiation risk and has excellent soft-tissue contrast. MRI-based motion management is therefore highly desirable and holds great promise to improve radiotherapy of moving cancers, particularly in the abdomen. Over the past decade, MRI techniques have improved significantly, making MR-based motion management clinically feasible. For example, cine MRI has high temporal resolution up to 10 f/s and has been used to track and/or characterize tumor motion, study correlation between external and internal motions. New MR technologies, such as 4D-MRI and MRI hybrid treatment machines (i.e. MR-linac or MR-Co60), have been recently developed. These technologies can lead to more accurate target volume determination and more precise radiation dose delivery via direct tumor gating or tracking. Despite all these promises, great challenges exist and the achievable clinical benefit of MRI-based tumor motion management has yet to be fully explored, much less realized. In this proposal, we will review novel MR-based motion management methods and technologies, the state-of-the-art concerning MRI development and clinical application and the barriers to more widespread adoption. Learning Objectives: Discuss the need of MR-based motion management for improving patient care in radiotherapy. Understand MR techniques for motion imaging and tumor motion characterization. Understand the current state of the art and future steps for clinical integration. Henry Ford Health System holds research agreements with Philips Healthcare. Research sponsored in part by a Henry Ford Health System Internal Mentored Grant

TU-F-BRB-00: MRI-Based Motion Management for RT

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2015-06-15

The current clinical standard of organ respiratory imaging, 4D-CT, is fundamentally limited by poor soft-tissue contrast and imaging dose. These limitations are potential barriers to beneficial “4D” radiotherapy methods which optimize the target and OAR dose-volume considering breathing motion but rely on a robust motion characterization. Conversely, MRI imparts no known radiation risk and has excellent soft-tissue contrast. MRI-based motion management is therefore highly desirable and holds great promise to improve radiotherapy of moving cancers, particularly in the abdomen. Over the past decade, MRI techniques have improved significantly, making MR-based motion management clinically feasible. For example, cine MRI has high temporal resolution up to 10 f/s and has been used to track and/or characterize tumor motion, study correlation between external and internal motions. New MR technologies, such as 4D-MRI and MRI hybrid treatment machines (i.e. MR-linac or MR-Co60), have been recently developed. These technologies can lead to more accurate target volume determination and more precise radiation dose delivery via direct tumor gating or tracking. Despite all these promises, great challenges exist and the achievable clinical benefit of MRI-based tumor motion management has yet to be fully explored, much less realized. In this proposal, we will review novel MR-based motion management methods and technologies, the state-of-the-art concerning MRI development and clinical application and the barriers to more widespread adoption. Learning Objectives: Discuss the need of MR-based motion management for improving patient care in radiotherapy. Understand MR techniques for motion imaging and tumor motion characterization. Understand the current state of the art and future steps for clinical integration. Henry Ford Health System holds research agreements with Philips Healthcare. Research sponsored in part by a Henry Ford Health System Internal Mentored Grant.

Multivariate Autoregressive Model Based Heart Motion Prediction Approach for Beating Heart Surgery

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fan Liang

2013-02-01

Full Text Available A robotic tool can enable a surgeon to conduct off-pump coronary artery graft bypass surgery on a beating heart. The robotic tool actively alleviates the relative motion between the point of interest (POI on the heart surface and the surgical tool and allows the surgeon to operate as if the heart were stationary. Since the beating heart's motion is relatively high-band, with nonlinear and nonstationary characteristics, it is difficult to follow. Thus, precise beating heart motion prediction is necessary for the tracking control procedure during the surgery. In the research presented here, we first observe that Electrocardiography (ECG signal contains the causal phase information on heart motion and non-stationary heart rate dynamic variations. Then, we investigate the relationship between ECG signal and beating heart motion using Granger Causality Analysis, which describes the feasibility of the improved prediction of heart motion. Next, we propose a nonlinear time-varying multivariate vector autoregressive (MVAR model based adaptive prediction method. In this model, the significant correlation between ECG and heart motion enables the improvement of the prediction of sharp changes in heart motion and the approximation of the motion with sufficient detail. Dual Kalman Filters (DKF estimate the states and parameters of the model, respectively. Last, we evaluate the proposed algorithm through comparative experiments using the two sets of collected vivo data.

Ground-based transmission line conductor motion sensor

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jacobs, M.L.; Milano, U.

1988-01-01

A ground-based-conductor motion-sensing apparatus is provided for remotely sensing movement of electric-power transmission lines, particularly as would occur during the wind-induced condition known as galloping. The apparatus is comprised of a motion sensor and signal-generating means which are placed underneath a transmission line and will sense changes in the electric field around the line due to excessive line motion. The detector then signals a remote station when a conditioning of galloping is sensed. The apparatus of the present invention is advantageous over the line-mounted sensors of the prior art in that it is easier and less hazardous to install. The system can also be modified so that a signal will only be given when particular conditions, such as specific temperature range, large-amplitude line motion, or excessive duration of the line motion, are occurring

Base response arising from free-field motions

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Whitley, J.R.; Morgan, J.R.; Hall, W.J.; Newmark, N.M.

1977-01-01

A procedure is illustrated in this paper for deriving (estimating) from a free-field record the horizontal base motions of a building, including horizontal rotation and translation. More specifically the goal was to compare results of response calculations based on derived accelerations with the results of calculations based on recorded accelerations. The motions are determined by assuming that an actual recorded ground wave transits a rigid base of a given dimension. Calculations given in the paper were made employing the earthquake acceleration time histories of the Hollywood storage building and the adjacent P.E. lot for the Kern County (1952) and San Fernando (1971) earthquakes. (Auth.)

Thermal decomposition of solder flux activators under simulated wave soldering conditions

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Piotrowska, Kamila; Jellesen, Morten Stendahl; Ambat, Rajan

2017-01-01

/methodology/approach: Changes in the chemical structure of the activators were studied using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy technique and were correlated to the exposure temperatures within the range of wave soldering process. The amount of residue left on the surface was estimated using standardized acid-base...... titration method as a function of temperature, time of exposure and the substrate material used. Findings: The study shows that there is a possibility of anhydride-like species formation during the thermal treatment of fluxes containing weak organic acids (WOAs) as activators (succinic and DL...

Modal-pushover-based ground-motion scaling procedure

Science.gov (United States)

Kalkan, Erol; Chopra, Anil K.

2011-01-01

Earthquake engineering is increasingly using nonlinear response history analysis (RHA) to demonstrate the performance of structures. This rigorous method of analysis requires selection and scaling of ground motions appropriate to design hazard levels. This paper presents a modal-pushover-based scaling (MPS) procedure to scale ground motions for use in a nonlinear RHA of buildings. In the MPS method, the ground motions are scaled to match to a specified tolerance, a target value of the inelastic deformation of the first-mode inelastic single-degree-of-freedom (SDF) system whose properties are determined by the first-mode pushover analysis. Appropriate for first-mode dominated structures, this approach is extended for structures with significant contributions of higher modes by considering elastic deformation of second-mode SDF systems in selecting a subset of the scaled ground motions. Based on results presented for three actual buildings-4, 6, and 13-story-the accuracy and efficiency of the MPS procedure are established and its superiority over the ASCE/SEI 7-05 scaling procedure is demonstrated.

Scaling earthquake ground motions for performance-based assessment of buildings

Science.gov (United States)

Huang, Y.-N.; Whittaker, A.S.; Luco, N.; Hamburger, R.O.

2011-01-01

The impact of alternate ground-motion scaling procedures on the distribution of displacement responses in simplified structural systems is investigated. Recommendations are provided for selecting and scaling ground motions for performance-based assessment of buildings. Four scaling methods are studied, namely, (1)geometric-mean scaling of pairs of ground motions, (2)spectrum matching of ground motions, (3)first-mode-period scaling to a target spectral acceleration, and (4)scaling of ground motions per the distribution of spectral demands. Data were developed by nonlinear response-history analysis of a large family of nonlinear single degree-of-freedom (SDOF) oscillators that could represent fixed-base and base-isolated structures. The advantages and disadvantages of each scaling method are discussed. The relationship between spectral shape and a ground-motion randomness parameter, is presented. A scaling procedure that explicitly considers spectral shape is proposed. ?? 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers.

An investigation of the neutron flux in bone-fluorine phantoms comparing accelerator based in vivo neutron activation analysis and FLUKA simulation data

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Mostafaei, F.; McNeill, F.E.; Chettle, D.R.; Matysiak, W.; Bhatia, C.; Prestwich, W.V.

2015-01-01

We have tested the Monte Carlo code FLUKA for its ability to assist in the development of a better system for the in vivo measurement of fluorine. We used it to create a neutron flux map of the inside of the in vivo neutron activation analysis irradiation cavity at the McMaster Accelerator Laboratory. The cavity is used in a system that has been developed for assessment of fluorine levels in the human hand. This study was undertaken to (i) assess the FLUKA code, (ii) find the optimal hand position inside the cavity and assess the effects on precision of a hand being in a non-optimal position and (iii) to determine the best location for our γ-ray detection system within the accelerator beam hall. Simulation estimates were performed using FLUKA. Experimental measurements of the neutron flux were performed using Mn wires. The activation of the wires was measured inside (1) an empty bottle, (2) a bottle containing water, (3) a bottle covered with cadmium and (4) a dry powder-based fluorine phantom. FLUKA was used to simulate the irradiation cavity, and used to estimate the neutron flux in different positions both inside, and external to, the cavity. The experimental results were found to be consistent with the Monte Carlo simulated neutron flux. Both experiment and simulation showed that there is an optimal position in the cavity, but that the effect on the thermal flux of a hand being in a non-optimal position is less than 20%, which will result in a less than 10% effect on the measurement precision. FLUKA appears to be a code that can be useful for modeling of this type of experimental system

A combined system for measuring animal motion activities.

Science.gov (United States)

Young, M S; Young, C W; Li, Y C

2000-01-31

In this study, we have developed a combined animal motion activity measurement system that combines an infrared light matrix subsystem with an ultrasonic phase shift subsystem for animal activity measurement. Accordingly, in conjunction with an IBM PC/AT compatible personal computer, the combined system has the advantages of both infrared and ultrasonic subsystems. That is, it can at once measure and directly analyze detailed changes in animal activity ranging from locomotion to tremor. The main advantages of this combined system are that it features real time data acquisition with the option of animated real time or recorded display/playback of the animal's motion. Additionally, under the multi-task operating condition of IBM PC, it can acquire and process behavior using both IR and ultrasound systems simultaneously. Traditional systems have had to make separate runs for gross and fine movement recording. This combined system can be profitably employed for normative behavioral activity studies and for neurological and pharmacological research.

Ambulatory measurement of knee motion and physical activity: preliminary evaluation of a smart activity monitor

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Malchau Henrik

2006-09-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background There is currently a paucity of devices available for continuous, long-term monitoring of human joint motion. Non-invasive, inexpensive devices capable of recording human activity and joint motion have many applications for medical research. Such a device could be used to quantify range of motion outside the gait laboratory. The purpose of this study was to test the accuracy of the modified Intelligent Device for Energy Expenditure and Activity (IDEEA in measuring knee flexion angles, to detect different physical activities, and to quantify how often healthy subjects use deep knee flexion in the ambulatory setting. Methods We compared Biomotion Laboratory (BML "gold standard" data to simultaneous IDEEA measures of knee motion and gait, step up/down, and stair descent in 5 healthy subjects. In addition, we used a series of choreographed physical activities outside the BML to confirm the IDEEA's ability to accurately measure 7 commonly-performed physical activities. Subjects then continued data collection during ordinary activities outside the gait laboratory. Results Pooled correlations between the BML and IDEEA knee flexion angles were .97 +/- .03 for step up/down, .98 +/- .02 for stair descent, and .98 +/- .01 for gait. In the BML protocol, the IDEEA accurately identified gait, but was less accurate in identifying step up/down and stair descent. During sampling outside the BML, the IDEEA accurately detected walking, running, stair ascent, stair descent, standing, lying, and sitting. On average, subjects flexed their knees >120° for 0.17% of their data collection periods outside the BML. Conclusion The modified IDEEA system is a useful clinical tool for evaluating knee motion and multiple physical activities in the ambulatory setting. These five healthy subjects rarely flexed their knees >120°.

From Cannibalism to Active Motion of Groups

Science.gov (United States)

Romanczuk, Pawel; Schimansky-Geier, Lutz

2008-03-01

The detailed mechanisms leading to collective dynamics in groups of animals and insect are still poorly understood. A recent study by Simpson et. al. suggests cannibalism as a driving mechanism for coordinated migration of mormon crickets [1]. Based on this result we propose a simple generic model of brownian particles interacting by asymmetric, non-conservative collisions accounting for cannibalistic behavior and the corresponding avoidance strategy. We discuss our model in one and two dimensions and show that a certain type of collisions drives the system out of equilibrium and leads to coordinated active motion of groups.[1] Stephen J. Simpson, Gregory A. Sword, Patrick D. Lorch and Iain D. Couzin: Cannibal crickets on a forced march for protein and salt, PNAS, 103:4152-4156, 2006

Transport of Internetwork Magnetic Flux Elements in the Solar Photosphere

Science.gov (United States)

Agrawal, Piyush; Rast, Mark P.; Gošić, Milan; Bellot Rubio, Luis R.; Rempel, Matthias

2018-02-01

The motions of small-scale magnetic flux elements in the solar photosphere can provide some measure of the Lagrangian properties of the convective flow. Measurements of these motions have been critical in estimating the turbulent diffusion coefficient in flux-transport dynamo models and in determining the Alfvén wave excitation spectrum for coronal heating models. We examine the motions of internetwork flux elements in Hinode/Narrowband Filter Imager magnetograms and study the scaling of their mean squared displacement and the shape of their displacement probability distribution as a function of time. We find that the mean squared displacement scales super-diffusively with a slope of about 1.48. Super-diffusive scaling has been observed in other studies for temporal increments as small as 5 s, increments over which ballistic scaling would be expected. Using high-cadence MURaM simulations, we show that the observed super-diffusive scaling at short increments is a consequence of random changes in barycenter positions due to flux evolution. We also find that for long temporal increments, beyond granular lifetimes, the observed displacement distribution deviates from that expected for a diffusive process, evolving from Rayleigh to Gaussian. This change in distribution can be modeled analytically by accounting for supergranular advection along with granular motions. These results complicate the interpretation of magnetic element motions as strictly advective or diffusive on short and long timescales and suggest that measurements of magnetic element motions must be used with caution in turbulent diffusion or wave excitation models. We propose that passive tracer motions in measured photospheric flows may yield more robust transport statistics.

Four-collector flux sensor

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wiegand, W.J. Jr.; Bullis, R.H.; Mongeon, R.J.

1980-01-01

A flowmeter based on ion drift techniques was developed for measuring the rate of flow of a fluid through a given cross-section. Ion collectors are positioned on each side of an immediately adjacent to ion source. When air flows axially through the region in which ions are produced and appropriate electric fields are maintained between the collectors, an electric current flows to each collector due to the net motion of the ions. The electric currents and voltages and other parameters which define the flow are combined in an electric circuit so that the flux of the fluid can be determined. (DN)

Active Control Does Not Eliminate Motion-Induced Illusory Displacement

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ian M. Thornton

2011-05-01

Full Text Available When the sine-wave grating of a Gabor patch drifts to the left or right, the perceived position of the entire object is shifted in the direction of local motion. In the current work we explored whether active control of the physical position of the patch overcomes such motion induced illusory displacement. In Experiment 1 we created a simple computer game and asked participants to continuously guide a Gabor patch along a randomly curving path using a joystick. When the grating inside the Gabor patch was stationary, participants could perform this task without error. When the grating drifted to either left or right, we observed systematic errors consistent with previous reports of motion-induced illusory displacement. In Experiment 2 we created an iPad application where the built-in accelerometer tilt control was used to steer the patch through as series of “gates”. Again, we observed systematic guidance errors that depended on the direction and speed of local motion. In conclusion, we found no evidence that participants could adapt or compensate for illusory displacement given active control of the target.

Motion sickness and tilts of the inertial force environment: active suspension systems vs. active passengers

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Golding, J.F.; Bles, W.; Bos, J.E.; Haynes, T.; Gresty, M.A.

2003-01-01

Maneuvering in vehicles exposes occupants to low frequency forces (<1 Hz) which can provoke motion sickness. Hypothesis: Aligning with the tilting inertial resultant (gravity + imposed horizontal acceleration: gravito-inertial force (GIF)) may reduce motion sickness when tilting is either 'active'

Experimental investigation of irregular motion impact on 4D PET-based particle therapy monitoring

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tian, Y; Stützer, K; Enghardt, W; Priegnitz, M; Helmbrecht, S; Fiedler, F; Bert, C

2016-01-01

Particle therapy positron emission tomography (PT-PET) is an in vivo and non-invasive imaging technique to monitor treatment delivery in particle therapy. The inevitable patient respiratory motion during irradiation causes artefacts and inaccurate activity distribution in PET images. Four-dimensional (4D) maximum likelihood expectation maximisation (4D MLEM) allows for a compensation of these effects, but has up to now been restricted to regular motion for PT-PET investigations. However, intra-fractional motion during treatment might differ from that during acquisition of the 4D-planning CT (e.g. amplitude variation, baseline drift) and therefore might induce inaccurate 4D PET reconstruction results. This study investigates the impact of different irregular analytical one-dimensional (1D) motion patterns on PT-PET imaging by means of experiments with a radioactive source and irradiated moving phantoms. Three sorting methods, namely phase sorting, equal amplitude sorting and event-based amplitude sorting, were applied to manage the PET list-mode data. The influence of these sorting methods on the motion compensating algorithm has been analysed. The event-based amplitude sorting showed a superior performance and it is applicable for irregular motions with  ⩽4 mm amplitude elongation and drift. For motion with 10 mm baseline drift, the normalised root mean square error was as high as 10.5% and a 10 mm range deviation was observed. (note)

Experimental investigation of irregular motion impact on 4D PET-based particle therapy monitoring

Science.gov (United States)

Tian, Y.; Stützer, K.; Enghardt, W.; Priegnitz, M.; Helmbrecht, S.; Bert, C.; Fiedler, F.

2016-01-01

Particle therapy positron emission tomography (PT-PET) is an in vivo and non-invasive imaging technique to monitor treatment delivery in particle therapy. The inevitable patient respiratory motion during irradiation causes artefacts and inaccurate activity distribution in PET images. Four-dimensional (4D) maximum likelihood expectation maximisation (4D MLEM) allows for a compensation of these effects, but has up to now been restricted to regular motion for PT-PET investigations. However, intra-fractional motion during treatment might differ from that during acquisition of the 4D-planning CT (e.g. amplitude variation, baseline drift) and therefore might induce inaccurate 4D PET reconstruction results. This study investigates the impact of different irregular analytical one-dimensional (1D) motion patterns on PT-PET imaging by means of experiments with a radioactive source and irradiated moving phantoms. Three sorting methods, namely phase sorting, equal amplitude sorting and event-based amplitude sorting, were applied to manage the PET list-mode data. The influence of these sorting methods on the motion compensating algorithm has been analysed. The event-based amplitude sorting showed a superior performance and it is applicable for irregular motions with  ⩽4 mm amplitude elongation and drift. For motion with 10 mm baseline drift, the normalised root mean square error was as high as 10.5% and a 10 mm range deviation was observed.

MotionFlow: Visual Abstraction and Aggregation of Sequential Patterns in Human Motion Tracking Data.

Science.gov (United States)

Jang, Sujin; Elmqvist, Niklas; Ramani, Karthik

2016-01-01

Pattern analysis of human motions, which is useful in many research areas, requires understanding and comparison of different styles of motion patterns. However, working with human motion tracking data to support such analysis poses great challenges. In this paper, we propose MotionFlow, a visual analytics system that provides an effective overview of various motion patterns based on an interactive flow visualization. This visualization formulates a motion sequence as transitions between static poses, and aggregates these sequences into a tree diagram to construct a set of motion patterns. The system also allows the users to directly reflect the context of data and their perception of pose similarities in generating representative pose states. We provide local and global controls over the partition-based clustering process. To support the users in organizing unstructured motion data into pattern groups, we designed a set of interactions that enables searching for similar motion sequences from the data, detailed exploration of data subsets, and creating and modifying the group of motion patterns. To evaluate the usability of MotionFlow, we conducted a user study with six researchers with expertise in gesture-based interaction design. They used MotionFlow to explore and organize unstructured motion tracking data. Results show that the researchers were able to easily learn how to use MotionFlow, and the system effectively supported their pattern analysis activities, including leveraging their perception and domain knowledge.

Altered Coupling between Motion-Related Activation and Resting-State Brain Activity in the Ipsilesional Sensorimotor Cortex after Cerebral Stroke

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jianping Hu

2017-07-01

Full Text Available Functional connectivity maps using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs-fMRI can closely resemble task fMRI activation patterns, suggesting that resting-state brain activity may predict task-evoked activation or behavioral performance. However, this conclusion was mostly drawn upon a healthy population. It remains unclear whether the predictive ability of resting-state brain activity for task-evoked activation would change under different pathological conditions. This study investigated dynamic changes of coupling between patterns of resting-state functional connectivity (RSFC and motion-related activation in different stages of cerebral stroke. Twenty stroke patients with hand motor function impairment were involved. rs-fMRI and hand motion-related fMRI data were acquired in the acute, subacute, and early chronic stages of cerebral stroke on a 3-T magnetic resonance (MR scanner. Sixteen healthy participants were enrolled as controls. For each subject, an activation map of the affected hand was first created using general linear model analysis on task fMRI data, and then an RSFC map was determined by seeding at the peak region of hand motion activation during the intact hand task. We then measured the extent of coupling between the RSFC maps and motion-related activation maps. Dynamic changes of the coupling between the two fMRI maps were estimated using one-way repeated measures analysis of variance across the three stages. Moreover, imaging parameters were correlated with motor performances. Data analysis showed that there were different coupling patterns between motion-related activation and RSFC maps associating with the affected motor regions during the acute, subacute, and early chronic stages of stroke. Coupling strengths increased as the recovery from stroke progressed. Coupling strengths were correlated with hand motion performance in the acute stage, while coupling recovery was negatively correlated with the recovery

Flux-based transport enhancement as a plausible unifying mechanism for auxin transport in meristem development.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Szymon Stoma

2008-10-01

Full Text Available Plants continuously generate new organs through the activity of populations of stem cells called meristems. The shoot apical meristem initiates leaves, flowers, and lateral meristems in highly ordered, spiralled, or whorled patterns via a process called phyllotaxis. It is commonly accepted that the active transport of the plant hormone auxin plays a major role in this process. Current hypotheses propose that cellular hormone transporters of the PIN family would create local auxin maxima at precise positions, which in turn would lead to organ initiation. To explain how auxin transporters could create hormone fluxes to distinct regions within the plant, different concepts have been proposed. A major hypothesis, canalization, proposes that the auxin transporters act by amplifying and stabilizing existing fluxes, which could be initiated, for example, by local diffusion. This convincingly explains the organised auxin fluxes during vein formation, but for the shoot apical meristem a second hypothesis was proposed, where the hormone would be systematically transported towards the areas with the highest concentrations. This implies the coexistence of two radically different mechanisms for PIN allocation in the membrane, one based on flux sensing and the other on local concentration sensing. Because these patterning processes require the interaction of hundreds of cells, it is impossible to estimate on a purely intuitive basis if a particular scenario is plausible or not. Therefore, computational modelling provides a powerful means to test this type of complex hypothesis. Here, using a dedicated computer simulation tool, we show that a flux-based polarization hypothesis is able to explain auxin transport at the shoot meristem as well, thus providing a unifying concept for the control of auxin distribution in the plant. Further experiments are now required to distinguish between flux-based polarization and other hypotheses.

STUDY OF THE POYNTING FLUX IN ACTIVE REGION 10930 USING DATA-DRIVEN MAGNETOHYDRODYNAMIC SIMULATION

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fan, Y. L.; Wang, H. N.; He, H.; Zhu, X. S.

2011-01-01

Powerful solar flares are closely related to the evolution of magnetic field configuration on the photosphere. We choose the Poynting flux as a parameter in the study of magnetic field changes. We use time-dependent multidimensional MHD simulations around a flare occurrence to generate the results, with the temporal variation of the bottom boundary conditions being deduced from the projected normal characteristic method. By this method, the photospheric magnetogram could be incorporated self-consistently as the bottom condition of data-driven simulations. The model is first applied to a simulation datum produced by an emerging magnetic flux rope as a test case. Then, the model is used to study NOAA AR 10930, which has an X3.4 flare, the data of which has been obtained by the Hinode/Solar Optical Telescope on 2006 December 13. We compute the magnitude of Poynting flux (S total ), radial Poynting flux (S z ), a proxy for ideal radial Poynting flux (S proxy ), Poynting flux due to plasma surface motion (S sur ), and Poynting flux due to plasma emergence (S emg ) and analyze their extensive properties in four selected areas: the whole sunspot, the positive sunspot, the negative sunspot, and the strong-field polarity inversion line (SPIL) area. It is found that (1) the S total , S z , and S proxy parameters show similar behaviors in the whole sunspot area and in the negative sunspot area. The evolutions of these three parameters in the positive area and the SPIL area are more volatile because of the effect of sunspot rotation and flux emergence. (2) The evolution of S sur is largely influenced by the process of sunspot rotation, especially in the positive sunspot. The evolution of S emg is greatly affected by flux emergence, especially in the SPIL area.

Measurement of angular distribution of neutron flux for the 6 MeV race-track microtron based pulsed neutron source

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Patil, B.J., E-mail: bjp@physics.unipune.ernet.i [Department of Physics, University of Pune, Pune 411 007 (India); Chavan, S.T.; Pethe, S.N.; Krishnan, R. [SAMEER, IIT Powai Campus, Mumbai 400 076 (India); Dhole, S.D., E-mail: sanjay@physics.unipune.ernet.i [Department of Physics, University of Pune, Pune 411 007 (India)

2010-09-15

The 6 MeV race track microtron based pulsed neutron source has been designed specifically for the elemental analysis of short lived activation products, where the low neutron flux requirement is desirable. Electrons impinges on a e-{gamma} target to generate bremsstrahlung radiations, which further produces neutrons by photonuclear reaction in {gamma}-n target. The optimisation of these targets along with their spectra were estimated using FLUKA code. The measurement of neutron flux was carried out by activation of vanadium at different scattering angles. Angular distribution of neutron flux indicates that the flux decreases with increase in the angle and are in good agreement with the FLUKA simulation.

Indirect wrist MR arthrography: the effects of passive motion versus active exercise

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Schweitzer, M.E.; Natale, P.; Winalski, C.S.; Culp, R. [Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, Department of Radiology, Philadelphia, PA (United States)

2000-01-01

Purpose. In the wrist, to determine whether passive motion or active exercise yields a better indirect MR arthrographic effect following intravenous gadolinium administration.Design and patients. Twenty-six consecutive patients were studied by indirect wrist MR arthrography. In half active exercise and in half passive motion was performed. Four regions of interest were studied including the distal radioulnar joint, the radiocarpal joint, the midcarpal joint, and the triangular fibrocartilage. Ranges and means of signal intensity were calculated. Surgical follow-up was performed in 22 patients.Results. The joint fluid intensity was greatest in the distal radioulnar joint. Fluid signal intensity was greater and more consistent in the passive motion group although the results did not achieve statistical significance. Imaging accuracy appeared similar in the two groups and was excellent for the triangular fibrocartilage (100%) and scapholunate ligaments (96%).Conclusion. Active exercise and passive motion yield similar degrees of wrist arthrographic effect, but the effect of passive motion is somewhat more consistent. Preliminary data show good accuracy for internal derangements. (orig.)

Determination of neutron flux with an arbitrary energy distribution by measurement of irradiated foils activity

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ljubenov, V.; Milosevic, M.

2003-01-01

A procedure for the neutron flux determination in a neutron field with an arbitrary energy spectrum, based on the using of standard methods for the measurement of irradiated foils activity and on the application of the SCALE-4.4a code system for averaged cross section calculation is described in this paper. Proposed procedure allows to include the energy spectrum of neutron flux reestablished in the location of irradiated foils and the resonance self-shielding effects in the foils also. Example application of this procedure is given for the neutron flux determination inside the neutron filter with boron placed in the centre of heavy water critical assembly RB at the Vinca Institute (author)

System Development Guidelines From a Review of Motion-Based Technology for People With Dementia or MCI

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Arlene J. Astell

2018-05-01

Full Text Available As the population ages and the number of people living with dementia or mild cognitive impairment (MCI continues to increase, it is critical to identify creative and innovative ways to support and improve their quality of life. Motion-based technology has shown significant potential for people living with dementia or MCI by providing opportunities for cognitive stimulation, physical activity and participation in meaningful leisure activities, while simultaneously functioning as a useful tool for research and development of interventions. However, many of the current systems created using motion-based technology have not been designed specifically for people with dementia or MCI. Additionally, the usability and accessibility of these systems for these populations has not been thoroughly considered. This paper presents a set of system development guidelines derived from a review of the state of the art of motion-based technologies for people with dementia or MCI. These guidelines highlight three overarching domains of consideration for systems targeting people with dementia or MCI: (i cognitive, (ii physical, and (iii social. We present the guidelines in terms of relevant design and use considerations within these domains and the emergent design themes within each domain. Our hope is that these guidelines will aid in designing motion-based software to meet the needs of people with dementia or MCI such that the potential of these technologies can be realized.

Hybrid task priority-based motion control of a redundant free-floating space robot

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cheng ZHOU

2017-12-01

Full Text Available This paper presents a novel hybrid task priority-based motion planning algorithm of a space robot. The satellite attitude control task is defined as the primary task, while the least-squares-based non-strict task priority solution of the end-effector plus the multi-constraint task is viewed as the secondary task. Furthermore, a null-space task compensation strategy in the joint space is proposed to derive the combination of non-strict and strict task-priority motion planning, and this novel combination is termed hybrid task priority control. Thus, the secondary task is implemented in the primary task’s null-space. Besides, the transition of the state of multiple constraints between activeness and inactiveness will only influence the end-effector task without any effect on the primary task. A set of numerical experiments made in a real-time simulation system under Linux/RTAI shows the validity and feasibility of the proposed methodology. Keywords: Base attitude control, Hybrid task-priority, Motion planning, Multiple constraints, Redundant space robot

TU-F-BRB-03: Clinical Implementation of MR-Based Motion Management

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Glide-Hurst, C.

2015-01-01

The current clinical standard of organ respiratory imaging, 4D-CT, is fundamentally limited by poor soft-tissue contrast and imaging dose. These limitations are potential barriers to beneficial “4D” radiotherapy methods which optimize the target and OAR dose-volume considering breathing motion but rely on a robust motion characterization. Conversely, MRI imparts no known radiation risk and has excellent soft-tissue contrast. MRI-based motion management is therefore highly desirable and holds great promise to improve radiotherapy of moving cancers, particularly in the abdomen. Over the past decade, MRI techniques have improved significantly, making MR-based motion management clinically feasible. For example, cine MRI has high temporal resolution up to 10 f/s and has been used to track and/or characterize tumor motion, study correlation between external and internal motions. New MR technologies, such as 4D-MRI and MRI hybrid treatment machines (i.e. MR-linac or MR-Co60), have been recently developed. These technologies can lead to more accurate target volume determination and more precise radiation dose delivery via direct tumor gating or tracking. Despite all these promises, great challenges exist and the achievable clinical benefit of MRI-based tumor motion management has yet to be fully explored, much less realized. In this proposal, we will review novel MR-based motion management methods and technologies, the state-of-the-art concerning MRI development and clinical application and the barriers to more widespread adoption. Learning Objectives: Discuss the need of MR-based motion management for improving patient care in radiotherapy. Understand MR techniques for motion imaging and tumor motion characterization. Understand the current state of the art and future steps for clinical integration. Henry Ford Health System holds research agreements with Philips Healthcare. Research sponsored in part by a Henry Ford Health System Internal Mentored Grant

TU-F-BRB-03: Clinical Implementation of MR-Based Motion Management

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Glide-Hurst, C. [Henry Ford Health System (United States)

2015-06-15

The current clinical standard of organ respiratory imaging, 4D-CT, is fundamentally limited by poor soft-tissue contrast and imaging dose. These limitations are potential barriers to beneficial “4D” radiotherapy methods which optimize the target and OAR dose-volume considering breathing motion but rely on a robust motion characterization. Conversely, MRI imparts no known radiation risk and has excellent soft-tissue contrast. MRI-based motion management is therefore highly desirable and holds great promise to improve radiotherapy of moving cancers, particularly in the abdomen. Over the past decade, MRI techniques have improved significantly, making MR-based motion management clinically feasible. For example, cine MRI has high temporal resolution up to 10 f/s and has been used to track and/or characterize tumor motion, study correlation between external and internal motions. New MR technologies, such as 4D-MRI and MRI hybrid treatment machines (i.e. MR-linac or MR-Co60), have been recently developed. These technologies can lead to more accurate target volume determination and more precise radiation dose delivery via direct tumor gating or tracking. Despite all these promises, great challenges exist and the achievable clinical benefit of MRI-based tumor motion management has yet to be fully explored, much less realized. In this proposal, we will review novel MR-based motion management methods and technologies, the state-of-the-art concerning MRI development and clinical application and the barriers to more widespread adoption. Learning Objectives: Discuss the need of MR-based motion management for improving patient care in radiotherapy. Understand MR techniques for motion imaging and tumor motion characterization. Understand the current state of the art and future steps for clinical integration. Henry Ford Health System holds research agreements with Philips Healthcare. Research sponsored in part by a Henry Ford Health System Internal Mentored Grant.

Thermal, intermediate and fast neutron flux measurements using activation detectors; Mesure des flux de neutrons thermiques, intermediaires et rapides au moyen de detecteurs par activation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Brisbois, J; Lott, M; Manent, G [Commissariat a l' Energie Atomique, Fontenay-aux-Roses (France). Centre d' Etudes Nucleaires

1964-07-01

The problem of neutron flux measurements using activation detectors is studied in the particular case of protection research. It is shown how it possible, it is possible, using a known thermal flux, to organise a coherent calibration system for all the detectors. The rapid neutron detectors are calibrated with respect to a reference detector (phosphorus) in a natural uranium converter; the intermediate neutron detectors with respect to gold in the axial channel of ZOE. This method makes it possible to minimise the errors due to the activation cross-sections. A brief description is given of the counting room of the Pile Safety Study Service, as well of the practical utilisation characteristics of the counters employed. (authors) [French] Le probleme de la mesure des flux de neutrons au moyen de detecteurs par activation est etudie dans le cas particulier des etudes de protections. On montre comment, a partir d'un flux thermique connu, on peut organiser un systeme coherent d'etalonnage de tous les detecteurs. Les detecteurs de neutrons rapides sont etalonnes par rapport a un detecteur de reference (phosphore) dans un convertisseur en uranium naturel; les detecteurs de neutrons intermediaires, par rapport a l'or dans le canal axial de ZOE, Cette methode permet de minimiser les erreurs dues aux sections efficaces d'activation. On decrit sommairement la salle de comptage du Service d'Etudes de Protections de Piles et on indique les caracteristiques d'emploi pratique des detecteurs utilises. (auteurs)

CURRENT BUILDUP IN EMERGING SERPENTINE FLUX TUBES

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pariat, E.; Masson, S.; Aulanier, G.

2009-01-01

The increase of magnetic flux in the solar atmosphere during active-region formation involves the transport of the magnetic field from the solar convection zone through the lowest layers of the solar atmosphere, through which the plasma β changes from >1 to <1 with altitude. The crossing of this magnetic transition zone requires the magnetic field to adopt a serpentine shape also known as the sea-serpent topology. In the frame of the resistive flux-emergence model, the rising of the magnetic flux is believed to be dynamically driven by a succession of magnetic reconnections which are commonly observed in emerging flux regions as Ellerman bombs. Using a data-driven, three-dimensional (3D) magnetohydrodynamic numerical simulation of flux emergence occurring in active region 10191 on 2002 November 16-17, we study the development of 3D electric current sheets. We show that these currents buildup along the 3D serpentine magnetic-field structure as a result of photospheric diverging horizontal line-tied motions that emulate the observed photospheric evolution. We observe that reconnection can not only develop following a pinching evolution of the serpentine field line, as usually assumed in two-dimensional geometry, but can also result from 3D shearing deformation of the magnetic structure. In addition, we report for the first time on the observation in the UV domain with the Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE) of extremely transient loop-like features, appearing within the emerging flux domain, which link several Ellermam bombs with one another. We argue that these loop transients can be explained as a consequence of the currents that build up along the serpentine magnetic field.

Active flux tungsten inert gas welding of austenitic stainless steel AISI 304

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

D. Klobčar

2016-10-01

Full Text Available The paper presents the effects of flux assisted tungsten inert gas (A-TIG welding of 4 (10 mm thick austenitic stainless steel EN X5CrNi1810 (AISI 304 in the butt joint. The sample dimensions were 300 ´ 50 mm, and commercially available active flux QuickTIG was used for testing. In the planned study the influence of welding position and weld groove shape was analysed based on the penetration depth. A comparison of microstructure formation, grain size and ferrit number between TIG welding and A-TIG welding was done. The A-TIG welds were subjected to bending test. A comparative study of TIG and A-TIG welding shows that A-TIG welding increases the weld penetration depth.

Knee Motion Generation Method for Transfemoral Prosthesis Based on Kinematic Synergy and Inertial Motion.

Science.gov (United States)

Sano, Hiroshi; Wada, Takahiro

2017-12-01

Previous research has shown that the effective use of inertial motion (i.e., less or no torque input at the knee joint) plays an important role in achieving a smooth gait of transfemoral prostheses in the swing phase. In our previous research, a method for generating a timed knee trajectory close to able-bodied individuals, which leads to sufficient clearance between the foot and the floor and the knee extension, was proposed using the inertial motion. Limb motions are known to correlate with each other during walking. This phenomenon is called kinematic synergy. In this paper, we measure gaits in level walking of able-bodied individuals with a wide range of walking velocities. We show that this kinematic synergy also exists between the motions of the intact limbs and those of the knee as determined by the inertial motion technique. We then propose a new method for generating the motion of the knee joint using its inertial motion close to the able-bodied individuals in mid-swing based on its kinematic synergy, such that the method can adapt to the changes in the motion velocity. The numerical simulation results show that the proposed method achieves prosthetic walking similar to that of able-bodied individuals with a wide range of constant walking velocities and termination of walking from steady-state walking. Further investigations have found that a kinematic synergy also exists at the start of walking. Overall, our method successfully achieves knee motion generation from the initiation of walking through steady-state walking with different velocities until termination of walking.

Implied motion because of instability in Hokusai Manga activates the human motion-sensitive extrastriate visual cortex: an fMRI study of the impact of visual art.

Science.gov (United States)

Osaka, Naoyuki; Matsuyoshi, Daisuke; Ikeda, Takashi; Osaka, Mariko

2010-03-10

The recent development of cognitive neuroscience has invited inference about the neurosensory events underlying the experience of visual arts involving implied motion. We report functional magnetic resonance imaging study demonstrating activation of the human extrastriate motion-sensitive cortex by static images showing implied motion because of instability. We used static line-drawing cartoons of humans by Hokusai Katsushika (called 'Hokusai Manga'), an outstanding Japanese cartoonist as well as famous Ukiyoe artist. We found 'Hokusai Manga' with implied motion by depicting human bodies that are engaged in challenging tonic posture significantly activated the motion-sensitive visual cortex including MT+ in the human extrastriate cortex, while an illustration that does not imply motion, for either humans or objects, did not activate these areas under the same tasks. We conclude that motion-sensitive extrastriate cortex would be a critical region for perception of implied motion in instability.

SU-E-J-181: Effect of Prostate Motion On Combined Brachytherapy and External Beam Dose Based On Daily Motion of the Prostate

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Narayana, V; McLaughlin, P [Providence Cancer Center, Southfield, MI (United States); University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (United States); Ealbaj, J [University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (United States)

2015-06-15

Purpose: In this study, the adequacy of target expansions on the combined external beam and implant dose was examined based on the measured daily motion of the prostate. Methods: Thirty patients received an I–125 prostate implant prescribed to dose of 90Gy. This was followed by external beam to deliver a dose of 90Gyeq (external beam equivalent) to the prostate over 25 to 30 fractions. An ideal IMRT plan was developed by optimizing the external beam dose based on the delivered implant dose. The implant dose was converted to an equivalent external beam dose using the linear quadratic model. Patients were set up on the treatment table by daily orthogonal imaging and aligning the marker seeds in the prostate. Orthogonal images were obtained at the end of treatment to assess prostate intrafraction motion. Based on the observed motion of the markers between the initial and final images, 5 individual plans showing the actual dose delivered to the patient were calculated. A final true dose distribution was established based on summing the implant dose and the 5 external beam plans. Dose to the prostate, seminal vesicles, lymphnodes and normal tissues, rectal wall, urethra and lower sphincter were calculated and compared to ideal. On 18 patients who were sexually active, dose to the corpus cavernosum and internal pudendal artery was also calculated. Results: The average prostate motion in 3 orthogonal directions was less than 1 mm with a standard deviation of less than +2 mm. Dose and volume parameters showed that there was no decrease in dose to the targets and a marginal decrease in dose to in normal tissues. Conclusion: Dose delivered by seed implant moves with the prostate, decreasing the impact of intrafractions dose movement on actual dose delivered. Combined brachytherapy and external beam dose delivered to the prostate was not sensitive to prostate motion.

Image-based motion compensation for high-resolution extremities cone-beam CT

Science.gov (United States)

Sisniega, A.; Stayman, J. W.; Cao, Q.; Yorkston, J.; Siewerdsen, J. H.; Zbijewski, W.

2016-03-01

Purpose: Cone-beam CT (CBCT) of the extremities provides high spatial resolution, but its quantitative accuracy may be challenged by involuntary sub-mm patient motion that cannot be eliminated with simple means of external immobilization. We investigate a two-step iterative motion compensation based on a multi-component metric of image sharpness. Methods: Motion is considered with respect to locally rigid motion within a particular region of interest, and the method supports application to multiple locally rigid regions. Motion is estimated by maximizing a cost function with three components: a gradient metric encouraging image sharpness, an entropy term that favors high contrast and penalizes streaks, and a penalty term encouraging smooth motion. Motion compensation involved initial coarse estimation of gross motion followed by estimation of fine-scale displacements using high resolution reconstructions. The method was evaluated in simulations with synthetic motion (1-4 mm) applied to a wrist volume obtained on a CMOS-based CBCT testbench. Structural similarity index (SSIM) quantified the agreement between motion-compensated and static data. The algorithm was also tested on a motion contaminated patient scan from dedicated extremities CBCT. Results: Excellent correction was achieved for the investigated range of displacements, indicated by good visual agreement with the static data. 10-15% improvement in SSIM was attained for 2-4 mm motions. The compensation was robust against increasing motion (4% decrease in SSIM across the investigated range, compared to 14% with no compensation). Consistent performance was achieved across a range of noise levels. Significant mitigation of artifacts was shown in patient data. Conclusion: The results indicate feasibility of image-based motion correction in extremities CBCT without the need for a priori motion models, external trackers, or fiducials.

FPGA-Based Real-Time Motion Detection for Automated Video Surveillance Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sanjay Singh

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Design of automated video surveillance systems is one of the exigent missions in computer vision community because of their ability to automatically select frames of interest in incoming video streams based on motion detection. This research paper focuses on the real-time hardware implementation of a motion detection algorithm for such vision based automated surveillance systems. A dedicated VLSI architecture has been proposed and designed for clustering-based motion detection scheme. The working prototype of a complete standalone automated video surveillance system, including input camera interface, designed motion detection VLSI architecture, and output display interface, with real-time relevant motion detection capabilities, has been implemented on Xilinx ML510 (Virtex-5 FX130T FPGA platform. The prototyped system robustly detects the relevant motion in real-time in live PAL (720 × 576 resolution video streams directly coming from the camera.

Vibration-based damage detection in wind turbine blades using Phase-based Motion Estimation and motion magnification

Science.gov (United States)

Sarrafi, Aral; Mao, Zhu; Niezrecki, Christopher; Poozesh, Peyman

2018-05-01

Vibration-based Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) techniques are among the most common approaches for structural damage identification. The presence of damage in structures may be identified by monitoring the changes in dynamic behavior subject to external loading, and is typically performed by using experimental modal analysis (EMA) or operational modal analysis (OMA). These tools for SHM normally require a limited number of physically attached transducers (e.g. accelerometers) in order to record the response of the structure for further analysis. Signal conditioners, wires, wireless receivers and a data acquisition system (DAQ) are also typical components of traditional sensing systems used in vibration-based SHM. However, instrumentation of lightweight structures with contact sensors such as accelerometers may induce mass-loading effects, and for large-scale structures, the instrumentation is labor intensive and time consuming. Achieving high spatial measurement resolution for a large-scale structure is not always feasible while working with traditional contact sensors, and there is also the potential for a lack of reliability associated with fixed contact sensors in outliving the life-span of the host structure. Among the state-of-the-art non-contact measurements, digital video cameras are able to rapidly collect high-density spatial information from structures remotely. In this paper, the subtle motions from recorded video (i.e. a sequence of images) are extracted by means of Phase-based Motion Estimation (PME) and the extracted information is used to conduct damage identification on a 2.3-m long Skystream® wind turbine blade (WTB). The PME and phased-based motion magnification approach estimates the structural motion from the captured sequence of images for both a baseline and damaged test cases on a wind turbine blade. Operational deflection shapes of the test articles are also quantified and compared for the baseline and damaged states. In addition

FLUX CANCELLATION AND THE EVOLUTION OF THE ERUPTIVE FILAMENT OF 2011 JUNE 7

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yardley, S. L.; Green, L. M.; Williams, D. R.; Van Driel-Gesztelyi, L.; Valori, G.; Dacie, S., E-mail: stephanie.yardley.13@ucl.ac.uk [Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London, Holmbury St. Mary, Dorking, Surrey RH5 6NT (United Kingdom)

2016-08-20

We investigate whether flux cancellation is responsible for the formation of a very massive filament resulting in the spectacular eruption on 2011 June 7. We analyze and quantify the amount of flux cancellation that occurs in NOAA AR 11226 and its two neighboring active regions (ARs 11227 and 11233) using line-of-sight magnetograms from the Heliospheric Magnetic Imager. During a 3.6 day period building up to the eruption of the filament, 1.7 × 10{sup 21} Mx, 21% of AR 11226's maximum magnetic flux, was canceled along the polarity inversion line (PIL) where the filament formed. If the flux cancellation continued at the same rate up until the eruption then up to 2.8 × 10{sup 21} Mx (34% of the AR flux) may have been built into the magnetic configuration that contains the filament plasma. The large flux cancellation rate is due to an unusual motion of the positive-polarity sunspot, which splits, with the largest section moving rapidly toward the PIL. This motion compresses the negative polarity and leads to the formation of an orphan penumbra where one end of the filament is rooted. Dense plasma threads above the orphan penumbra build into the filament, extending its length, and presumably injecting material into it. We conclude that the exceptionally strong flux cancellation in AR 11226 played a significant role in the formation of its unusually massive filament. In addition, the presence and coherent evolution of bald patches in the vector magnetic field along the PIL suggest that the magnetic field configuration supporting the filament material is that of a flux rope.

Patient-Centered Robot-Aided Passive Neurorehabilitation Exercise Based on Safety-Motion Decision-Making Mechanism

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lizheng Pan

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Safety is one of the crucial issues for robot-aided neurorehabilitation exercise. When it comes to the passive rehabilitation training for stroke patients, the existing control strategies are usually just based on position control to carry out the training, and the patient is out of the controller. However, to some extent, the patient should be taken as a “cooperator” of the training activity, and the movement speed and range of the training movement should be dynamically regulated according to the internal or external state of the subject, just as what the therapist does in clinical therapy. This research presents a novel motion control strategy for patient-centered robot-aided passive neurorehabilitation exercise from the point of the safety. The safety-motion decision-making mechanism is developed to online observe and assess the physical state of training impaired-limb and motion performances and regulate the training parameters (motion speed and training rage, ensuring the safety of the supplied rehabilitation exercise. Meanwhile, position-based impedance control is employed to realize the trajectory tracking motion with interactive compliance. Functional experiments and clinical experiments are investigated with a healthy adult and four recruited stroke patients, respectively. The two types of experimental results demonstrate that the suggested control strategy not only serves with safety-motion training but also presents rehabilitation efficacy.

A Trap Motion in Validating Muscle Activity Prediction from Musculoskeletal Model using EMG

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wibawa, A. D.; Verdonschot, N.; Halbertsma, J.P.K.; Burgerhof, J.G.M.; Diercks, R.L.; Verkerke, G. J.

2016-01-01

Musculoskeletal modeling nowadays is becoming the most common tool for studying and analyzing human motion. Besides its potential in predicting muscle activity and muscle force during active motion, musculoskeletal modeling can also calculate many important kinetic data that are difficult to measure

A video-based system for hand-driven stop-motion animation.

Science.gov (United States)

Han, Xiaoguang; Fu, Hongbo; Zheng, Hanlin; Liu, Ligang; Wang, Jue

2013-01-01

Stop-motion is a well-established animation technique but is often laborious and requires craft skills. A new video-based system can animate the vast majority of everyday objects in stop-motion style, more flexibly and intuitively. Animators can perform and capture motions continuously instead of breaking them into increments and shooting one still picture per increment. More important, the system permits direct hand manipulation without resorting to rigs, achieving more natural object control for beginners. The system's key component is two-phase keyframe-based capturing and processing, assisted by computer vision techniques. With this system, even amateurs can generate high-quality stop-motion animations.

Statistical mechanics of flux lines in high-temperature superconductors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dasgupta, C.

1992-01-01

The shortness of the low temperature coherence lengths of high T c materials leads to new mechanisms of pinning of flux lines. Lattice periodic modulations of the order parameters itself acts to pin vortex lines in regions of the unit cell were the order parameter is small. A presentation of flux creep and flux noise at low temperature and magnetic fields in terms of motion of simple metastable defects on flux lines is made, with a calculation of flux lattice melting. 12 refs

Flux Pinning in Superconductors

CERN Document Server

Matsushita, Teruo

2007-01-01

The book covers the flux pinning mechanisms and properties and the electromagnetic phenomena caused by the flux pinning common for metallic, high-Tc and MgB2 superconductors. The condensation energy interaction known for normal precipitates or grain boundaries and the kinetic energy interaction proposed for artificial Nb pins in Nb-Ti, etc., are introduced for the pinning mechanism. Summation theories to derive the critical current density are discussed in detail. Irreversible magnetization and AC loss caused by the flux pinning are also discussed. The loss originally stems from the ohmic dissipation of normal electrons in the normal core driven by the electric field induced by the flux motion. The readers will learn why the resultant loss is of hysteresis type in spite of such mechanism. The influence of the flux pinning on the vortex phase diagram in high Tc superconductors is discussed, and the dependencies of the irreversibility field are also described on other quantities such as anisotropy of supercondu...

sEMG during Whole-Body Vibration Contains Motion Artifacts and Reflex Activity

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Karin Lienhard

2015-01-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this study was to determine whether the excessive spikes observed in the surface electromyography (sEMG spectrum recorded during whole-body vibration (WBV exercises contain motion artifacts and/or reflex activity. The occurrence of motion artifacts was tested by electrical recordings of the patella. The involvement of reflex activity was investigated by analyzing the magnitude of the isolated spikes during changes in voluntary background muscle activity. Eighteen physically active volunteers performed static squats while the sEMG was measured of five lower limb muscles during vertical WBV using no load and an additional load of 33 kg. In order to record motion artifacts during WBV, a pair of electrodes was positioned on the patella with several layers of tape between skin and electrodes. Spectral analysis of the patella signal revealed recordings of motion artifacts as high peaks at the vibration frequency (fundamental and marginal peaks at the multiple harmonics were observed. For the sEMG recordings, the root mean square of the spikes increased with increasing additional loads (p < 0.05, and was significantly correlated to the sEMG signal without the spikes of the respective muscle (r range: 0.54 - 0.92, p < 0.05. This finding indicates that reflex activity might be contained in the isolated spikes, as identical behavior has been found for stretch reflex responses evoked during direct vibration. In conclusion, the spikes visible in the sEMG spectrum during WBV exercises contain motion artifacts and possibly reflex activity.

A low cost PSD-based monocular motion capture system

Science.gov (United States)

Ryu, Young Kee; Oh, Choonsuk

2007-10-01

This paper describes a monocular PSD-based motion capture sensor to employ with commercial video game systems such as Microsoft's XBOX and Sony's Playstation II. The system is compact, low-cost, and only requires a one-time calibration at the factory. The system includes a PSD(Position Sensitive Detector) and active infrared (IR) LED markers that are placed on the object to be tracked. The PSD sensor is placed in the focal plane of a wide-angle lens. The micro-controller calculates the 3D position of the markers using only the measured intensity and the 2D position on the PSD. A series of experiments were performed to evaluate the performance of our prototype system. From the experimental results we see that the proposed system has the advantages of the compact size, the low cost, the easy installation, and the high frame rates to be suitable for high speed motion tracking in games.

Complex Human Activity Recognition Using Smartphone and Wrist-Worn Motion Sensors.

Science.gov (United States)

Shoaib, Muhammad; Bosch, Stephan; Incel, Ozlem Durmaz; Scholten, Hans; Havinga, Paul J M

2016-03-24

The position of on-body motion sensors plays an important role in human activity recognition. Most often, mobile phone sensors at the trouser pocket or an equivalent position are used for this purpose. However, this position is not suitable for recognizing activities that involve hand gestures, such as smoking, eating, drinking coffee and giving a talk. To recognize such activities, wrist-worn motion sensors are used. However, these two positions are mainly used in isolation. To use richer context information, we evaluate three motion sensors (accelerometer, gyroscope and linear acceleration sensor) at both wrist and pocket positions. Using three classifiers, we show that the combination of these two positions outperforms the wrist position alone, mainly at smaller segmentation windows. Another problem is that less-repetitive activities, such as smoking, eating, giving a talk and drinking coffee, cannot be recognized easily at smaller segmentation windows unlike repetitive activities, like walking, jogging and biking. For this purpose, we evaluate the effect of seven window sizes (2-30 s) on thirteen activities and show how increasing window size affects these various activities in different ways. We also propose various optimizations to further improve the recognition of these activities. For reproducibility, we make our dataset publicly available.

Kinematic model of some types of motion of matter in active regions

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Platov, Yu.V.

1983-01-01

The kinematics of matter motion in variable magnetic fields of active regions on the Sun in the MHD approximation of a strong field and cold plasma is investigated. It is shown that the variation of sunspot magnetic moments lead to the development of different active phenomena in the solar atmosphere. The development of such phenomena at first can occur at the phase of active region growth, when new sunspots together with developed sunspots emerge in an active region or relative motions take place in a sunspot group

ROBUST MOTION SEGMENTATION FOR HIGH DEFINITION VIDEO SEQUENCES USING A FAST MULTI-RESOLUTION MOTION ESTIMATION BASED ON SPATIO-TEMPORAL TUBES

OpenAIRE

Brouard , Olivier; Delannay , Fabrice; Ricordel , Vincent; Barba , Dominique

2007-01-01

4 pages; International audience; Motion segmentation methods are effective for tracking video objects. However, objects segmentation methods based on motion need to know the global motion of the video in order to back-compensate it before computing the segmentation. In this paper, we propose a method which estimates the global motion of a High Definition (HD) video shot and then segments it using the remaining motion information. First, we develop a fast method for multi-resolution motion est...

Localized, Non-Harmonic Active Flap Motions for Low Frequency In-Plane Rotor Noise Reduction

Science.gov (United States)

Sim, Ben W.; Potsdam, Mark; Kitaplioglu, Cahit; LeMasurier, Philip; Lorber, Peter; Andrews, Joseph

2012-01-01

A first-of-its-kind demonstration of the use of localized, non-harmonic active flap motions, for suppressing low frequency, in-plane rotor noise, is reported in this paper. Operational feasibility is verified via testing of the full-scale AATD/Sikorsky/UTRC active flap demonstration rotor in the NFAC's 40- by 80-Foot anechoic wind tunnel. Effectiveness of using localized, non-harmonic active flap motions are compared to conventional four-per-rev harmonic flap motions, and also active flap motions derived from closed-loop acoustics implementations. All three approaches resulted in approximately the same noise reductions over an in-plane three-by-three microphone array installed forward and near in-plane of the rotor in the nearfield. It is also reported that using an active flap in this localized, non-harmonic manner, resulted in no more that 2% rotor performance penalty, but had the tendency to incur higher hub vibration levels.

Trained neurons-based motion detection in optical camera communications

Science.gov (United States)

Teli, Shivani; Cahyadi, Willy Anugrah; Chung, Yeon Ho

2018-04-01

A concept of trained neurons-based motion detection (TNMD) in optical camera communications (OCC) is proposed. The proposed TNMD is based on neurons present in a neural network that perform repetitive analysis in order to provide efficient and reliable motion detection in OCC. This efficient motion detection can be considered another functionality of OCC in addition to two traditional functionalities of illumination and communication. To verify the proposed TNMD, the experiments were conducted in an indoor static downlink OCC, where a mobile phone front camera is employed as the receiver and an 8 × 8 red, green, and blue (RGB) light-emitting diode array as the transmitter. The motion is detected by observing the user's finger movement in the form of centroid through the OCC link via a camera. Unlike conventional trained neurons approaches, the proposed TNMD is trained not with motion itself but with centroid data samples, thus providing more accurate detection and far less complex detection algorithm. The experiment results demonstrate that the TNMD can detect all considered motions accurately with acceptable bit error rate (BER) performances at a transmission distance of up to 175 cm. In addition, while the TNMD is performed, a maximum data rate of 3.759 kbps over the OCC link is obtained. The OCC with the proposed TNMD combined can be considered an efficient indoor OCC system that provides illumination, communication, and motion detection in a convenient smart home environment.

Very high flux steady state reactor and accelerator based sources

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ludewig, H.; Todosow, M.; Simos, N.; Shapiro, S.; Hastings, J.

2004-01-01

With the number of steady state neutron sources in the US declining (including the demise of the Bnl HFBR) the remaining intense sources are now in Europe (i.e. reactors - ILL and FMR, accelerator - PSI). The intensity of the undisturbed thermal flux for sources currently in operation ranges from 10 14 n/cm 2 *s to 10 15 n/cm 2 *s. The proposed Advanced Neutron Source (ANS) was to be a high power reactor (about 350 MW) with a projected undisturbed thermal flux of 7*10 15 n/cm 2 *s but never materialized. The objective of the current study is to explore the requirements and implications of two source concepts with an undisturbed flux of 10 16 n/cm 2 *s. The first is a reactor based concept operating at high power density (10 MW/l - 15 MW/l) and a total power of 100 MW - 250 MW, depending on fissile enrichment. The second is an accelerator based concept relying on a 1 GeV - 1.5 GeV proton Linac with a total beam power of 40 MW and a liquid lead-bismuth eutectic target. In the reactor source study, the effects of fissile material enrichment, coolant temperature and pressure drop, and estimates of pressure vessel stress levels will be investigated. The fuel form for the reactor will be different from all other operating source reactors in that it is proposed to use an infiltrated graphitic structure, which has been developed for nuclear thermal propulsion reactor applications. In the accelerator based source the generation of spallation products and their activation levels, and the material damage sustained by the beam window will be investigated. (authors)

PC based system for absolute neutron flux-spectrum measurements. Final report for the period 1 April 1994 - 15 December 1997

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dobrea, D.

1998-01-01

When measuring absolute neutron flux-spectra, thin detector foils are irradiated in a neutron field. The absolute activity of isotopes generated by activation or fission reactions (fission products) is then measured, using an efficiency calibrated high resolution gamma-ray spectroscopy system, and the absolute reaction rates for their production is determined. Finally the flux-spectrum is determined based upon the reaction rate values. A general method to obtain flux-spectra from the reaction rate is the unfolding method. The above process involves computations of photopeak area, reaction rate, flux perturbation corrections and flux-spectrum. The PC's are well suited for the data processing system outlined above. Using available interfaces, the PC's can be involved even in the data acquisition. Graphical facilities allow decision upon the data processing flow

Motion of a compact toroid inside a cylindrical flux conserver

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Jarboe, T.R.; Henins, I.; Hoida, H.W.; Linford, R.K.; Marshall, J.; Platts, D.A.; Sherwood, A.R.

1980-10-13

Compact toroids have been generated in a cylindrical resistive flux conserver. They are observed to rotate so that their major axis is perpendicular to the axis of the flux conserver. Subsequently they remain stationary and their magnetic fields decay with a time constant of about 100 ..mu..s. This is the first observation of the predicted tipping mode and its saturation when no external fields are present. The compact toroids contain toroidal fields and are initially prolate in shape.

Motion of a compact toroid inside a cylindrical flux conserver

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jarboe, T.R.; Henins, I.; Hoida, H.W.; Linford, R.K.; Marshall, J.; Platts, D.A.; Sherwood, A.R.

1980-01-01

Compact toroids have been generated in a cylindrical resistive flux conserver. They are observed to rotate so that their major axis is perpendicular to the axis of the flux conserver. Subsequently they remain stationary and their magnetic fields decay with a time constant of about 100 μs. This is the first observation of the predicted tipping mode and its saturation when no external fields are present. The compact toroids contain toroidal fields and are initially prolate in shape

The microscopic investigation of structures of moving flux lines by ...

Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

Abstract. We have used a variety of microscopic techniques to reveal the structure and motion of flux line arrangements, when the flux lines in low Tc type II superconductors are caused to move by a transport current. Using small-angle neutron scattering by the flux line lattice (FLL), we are able to demonstrate directly the ...

Stability and Bifurcation in Magnetic Flux Feedback Maglev Control System

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wen-Qing Zhang

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Nonlinear properties of magnetic flux feedback control system have been investigated mainly in this paper. We analyzed the influence of magnetic flux feedback control system on control property by time delay and interfering signal of acceleration. First of all, we have established maglev nonlinear model based on magnetic flux feedback and then discussed hopf bifurcation’s condition caused by the acceleration’s time delay. The critical value of delayed time is obtained. It is proved that the period solution exists in maglev control system and the stable condition has been got. We obtained the characteristic values by employing center manifold reduction theory and normal form method, which represent separately the direction of hopf bifurcation, the stability of the period solution, and the period of the period motion. Subsequently, we discussed the influence maglev system on stability of by acceleration’s interfering signal and obtained the stable domain of interfering signal. Some experiments have been done on CMS04 maglev vehicle of National University of Defense Technology (NUDT in Tangshan city. The results of experiments demonstrate that viewpoints of this paper are correct and scientific. When time lag reaches the critical value, maglev system will produce a supercritical hopf bifurcation which may cause unstable period motion.

Companion classroom activities for "stop faking it!" force and motion

CERN Document Server

Robertson, William C

2011-01-01

Never has it been so easy for educators to learn to teach physical science with confidence. Award-winning author Bill Robertson launched his bestselling Stop Faking It! series in 2002 with Force and Motion--offering elementary and middle school teachers a jargon-free way to learn the background for teaching physical science with confidence. Combining easy-to-understand if irreverent explanations and quirky diagrams, Stop Faking It! Force and Motion helped thousands of teachers, parents, and homeschoolers conquer topics from Newton s laws to the physics of space travel. Now Companion Classroom Activities for Stop Faking It! Force and Motion proves an ideal supplement to the original book or a valuable resource of its own. The hands-on activities and highly readable explanations allow students to first investigate concepts, then discuss learned concepts, and finally apply the concepts to everyday situations. Robertson's wit and humor are sure to keep students and teachers entertained while they tackle topics ...

Notes on neutron flux measurement

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Alcala Ruiz, F.

1984-01-01

The main purpose of this work is to get an useful guide to carry out topical neutron flux measurements. Although the foil activation technique is used in the majority of the cases, other techniques, such as those based on fission chambers and self-powered neutron detectors, are also shown. Special interest is given to the description and application of corrections on the measurement of relative and absolute induced activities by several types of detectors (scintillators, G-M and gas proportional counters). The thermal arid epithermal neutron fluxes, as determined in this work, are conventional or effective (West cots fluxes), which are extensively used by the reactor experimentalists; however, we also give some expressions where they are related to the integrated neutron fluxes, which are used in neutron calculations. (Author) 16 refs

Autophagic flux is highly active in early mitosis and differentially regulated throughout the cell cycle.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Zhiyuan; Ji, Xinmiao; Wang, Dongmei; Liu, Juanjuan; Zhang, Xin

2016-06-28

Mitosis is a fast process that involves dramatic cellular remodeling and has a high energy demand. Whether autophagy is active or inactive during the early stages of mitosis in a naturally dividing cell is still debated. Here we aimed to use multiple assays to resolve this apparent discrepancy. Although the LC3 puncta number was reduced in mitosis, the four different cell lines we tested all have active autophagic flux in both interphase and mitosis. In addition, the autophagic flux was highly active in nocodazole-induced, double-thymidine synchronization released as well as naturally occurring mitosis in HeLa cells. Multiple autophagy proteins are upregulated in mitosis and the increased Beclin-1 level likely contributes to the active autophagic flux in early mitosis. It is interesting that although the autophagic flux is active throughout the cell cycle, early mitosis and S phase have relatively higher autophagic flux than G1 and late G2 phases, which might be helpful to degrade the damaged organelles and provide energy during S phase and mitosis.

Unified theory of dislocation motion including thermal activation and inertial effects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Isaac, R.D.; Granato, A.V.

1979-01-01

Transition-state rate theory has generally been used to explain the temperature dependence of the flow stress of a crystal. However, the existence of a change in the flow stress during the superconducting transition indicates the presence of inertial effects in which dislocations overcome obstacles mechanically rather than thermally. It is shown here that the thermally activated and the inertial overcoming of obstacles are not unrelated but can both be derived from principles of stochastic motion. This leads to a theory of dislocation motion that includes both thermal activation and inertial effects. It is also shown that a distribution of activation energies must be considered to account for the experimental data

Robust object tracking techniques for vision-based 3D motion analysis applications

Science.gov (United States)

Knyaz, Vladimir A.; Zheltov, Sergey Y.; Vishnyakov, Boris V.

2016-04-01

Automated and accurate spatial motion capturing of an object is necessary for a wide variety of applications including industry and science, virtual reality and movie, medicine and sports. For the most part of applications a reliability and an accuracy of the data obtained as well as convenience for a user are the main characteristics defining the quality of the motion capture system. Among the existing systems for 3D data acquisition, based on different physical principles (accelerometry, magnetometry, time-of-flight, vision-based), optical motion capture systems have a set of advantages such as high speed of acquisition, potential for high accuracy and automation based on advanced image processing algorithms. For vision-based motion capture accurate and robust object features detecting and tracking through the video sequence are the key elements along with a level of automation of capturing process. So for providing high accuracy of obtained spatial data the developed vision-based motion capture system "Mosca" is based on photogrammetric principles of 3D measurements and supports high speed image acquisition in synchronized mode. It includes from 2 to 4 technical vision cameras for capturing video sequences of object motion. The original camera calibration and external orientation procedures provide the basis for high accuracy of 3D measurements. A set of algorithms as for detecting, identifying and tracking of similar targets, so for marker-less object motion capture is developed and tested. The results of algorithms' evaluation show high robustness and high reliability for various motion analysis tasks in technical and biomechanics applications.

Improvements in electron beam monitoring and heat flux flatness at the JUDITH 2-facility

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Weber, Thomas, E-mail: weber.th@gmx.de [Forschungszentrum Jülich, Institute of Energy and Climate Research, Jülich (Germany); Bürger, Andreas; Dominiczak, Karsten; Pintsuk, Gerald [Forschungszentrum Jülich, Institute of Energy and Climate Research, Jülich (Germany); Banetta, Stefano; Bellin, Boris [Fusion for Energy, Josep Pla, 2, Torres Diagonal Litoral B3, 08019 Barcelona (Spain); Mitteau, Raphael; Eaton, Russell [ITER Organization, Route de Vinon-sur-Verdon, CS 90 046, 13067 St Paul Lez Durance Cedex (France)

2015-10-15

Highlights: • Monitoring of the much faster electron beam motion by IR camera through a synchronized frame triggering. • Estimation of the heat flux generated by electron beam guns based on calorimetry and FEM simulations. • Consideration of the inclined electron beam loading of rectangular-shaped objects. - Abstract: Three beryllium-armoured small-scale mock-ups and one semi-prototype for the ITER first wall were tested by the electron beam facility JUDITH 2 at Forschungszentrum Jülich. Both testing campaigns with cyclic loads up to 2.5 MW/m{sup 2} are carried out in compliance with the extensive quality and management specifications of ITER Organization (IO) and Fusion for Energy (F4E). Several dedicated calibration experiments were performed before the actual testing in order to fulfil the testing requirements and tolerances. These quality requests have been the motivation for several experimental setup improvements. The most relevant results of these activities, being the electron beam monitoring and the heat flux flatness verification, will be presented.

Improvements in electron beam monitoring and heat flux flatness at the JUDITH 2-facility

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Weber, Thomas; Bürger, Andreas; Dominiczak, Karsten; Pintsuk, Gerald; Banetta, Stefano; Bellin, Boris; Mitteau, Raphael; Eaton, Russell

2015-01-01

Highlights: • Monitoring of the much faster electron beam motion by IR camera through a synchronized frame triggering. • Estimation of the heat flux generated by electron beam guns based on calorimetry and FEM simulations. • Consideration of the inclined electron beam loading of rectangular-shaped objects. - Abstract: Three beryllium-armoured small-scale mock-ups and one semi-prototype for the ITER first wall were tested by the electron beam facility JUDITH 2 at Forschungszentrum Jülich. Both testing campaigns with cyclic loads up to 2.5 MW/m"2 are carried out in compliance with the extensive quality and management specifications of ITER Organization (IO) and Fusion for Energy (F4E). Several dedicated calibration experiments were performed before the actual testing in order to fulfil the testing requirements and tolerances. These quality requests have been the motivation for several experimental setup improvements. The most relevant results of these activities, being the electron beam monitoring and the heat flux flatness verification, will be presented.

A motion sensing-based framework for robotic manipulation.

Science.gov (United States)

Deng, Hao; Xia, Zeyang; Weng, Shaokui; Gan, Yangzhou; Fang, Peng; Xiong, Jing

2016-01-01

To data, outside of the controlled environments, robots normally perform manipulation tasks operating with human. This pattern requires the robot operators with high technical skills training for varied teach-pendant operating system. Motion sensing technology, which enables human-machine interaction in a novel and natural interface using gestures, has crucially inspired us to adopt this user-friendly and straightforward operation mode on robotic manipulation. Thus, in this paper, we presented a motion sensing-based framework for robotic manipulation, which recognizes gesture commands captured from motion sensing input device and drives the action of robots. For compatibility, a general hardware interface layer was also developed in the framework. Simulation and physical experiments have been conducted for preliminary validation. The results have shown that the proposed framework is an effective approach for general robotic manipulation with motion sensing control.

General rigid motion correction for computed tomography imaging based on locally linear embedding

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Mianyi; He, Peng; Feng, Peng; Liu, Baodong; Yang, Qingsong; Wei, Biao; Wang, Ge

2018-02-01

The patient motion can damage the quality of computed tomography images, which are typically acquired in cone-beam geometry. The rigid patient motion is characterized by six geometric parameters and are more challenging to correct than in fan-beam geometry. We extend our previous rigid patient motion correction method based on the principle of locally linear embedding (LLE) from fan-beam to cone-beam geometry and accelerate the computational procedure with the graphics processing unit (GPU)-based all scale tomographic reconstruction Antwerp toolbox. The major merit of our method is that we need neither fiducial markers nor motion-tracking devices. The numerical and experimental studies show that the LLE-based patient motion correction is capable of calibrating the six parameters of the patient motion simultaneously, reducing patient motion artifacts significantly.

Scattered Data Processing Approach Based on Optical Facial Motion Capture

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Qiang Zhang

2013-01-01

Full Text Available In recent years, animation reconstruction of facial expressions has become a popular research field in computer science and motion capture-based facial expression reconstruction is now emerging in this field. Based on the facial motion data obtained using a passive optical motion capture system, we propose a scattered data processing approach, which aims to solve the common problems of missing data and noise. To recover missing data, given the nonlinear relationships among neighbors with the current missing marker, we propose an improved version of a previous method, where we use the motion of three muscles rather than one to recover the missing data. To reduce the noise, we initially apply preprocessing to eliminate impulsive noise, before our proposed three-order quasi-uniform B-spline-based fitting method is used to reduce the remaining noise. Our experiments showed that the principles that underlie this method are simple and straightforward, and it delivered acceptable precision during reconstruction.

Production of high-specific activity radionuclides using SM high-flux reactor

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Karelin, Ye.A.; Toporov, Yu.G.; Filimonov, V.T.; Vakhetov, F.Z.; Tarasov, V.A.; Kuznetsov, R.A.; Lebedev, V.M.; Andreev, O.I.; Melnik, M.I.; Gavrilov, V.D.

1997-01-01

The development of High Specific Activity (HSA) radionuclides production technologies is one of the directions of RIAR activity, and the high flux research reactor SM, having neutron flux density up to 2.10 15 cm -2 s 1 in a wide range of neutron spectra hardness, plays the principal role in this development. The use of a high-flux reactor for radionuclide production provides the following advantages: production of radionuclides with extremely high specific activity, decreasing of impurities content in irradiated targets (both radioactive and non-radioactive), cost-effective use of expensive isotopically enriched target materials. The production technologies of P-33, Gd-153, W-188, Ni-63, Fe-55,59, Sn-113,117m,119m, Sr- 89, applied in industry, nuclear medicine, research, etc, were developed by RIAR during the last 5-10 years. The research work included the development of calculation procedures for radionuclide reactor accumulation forecast, experimental determination of neutron cross-sections, the development of irradiated materials reprocessing procedures, isolation and purification of radionuclides. The principal results are reviewed in the paper. (authors)

Dynamo generation of magnetic fields in three-dimensional space: Solar cycle main flux tube formation and reversals

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yoshimura, H.

1983-01-01

Dynamo processes as a magnetic field generation mechanism in astrophysics can be described essentially by movement and deformation of magnetic field lines due to plasma fluid motions. A basic element of the processes is a kinematic problem. As an important prototype of these processes, we investigate the case of the solar magnetic cycle. To follow the movement and deformation, we solve magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations by a numerical method with a prescribed velocity field. A simple combination of differential rotation and global convection, given by a linear analysis of fluid dynamics in a rotating sphere, can perpetually create and reverse great magnetic flux tubes encircling the Sun. We call them the main flux tubes of the solar cycle. They are progenitors of small-scale flux ropes of the solar activity. This shows that magnetic field generation by fluid motions is, in fact, possible and that MHD equations have a new type of oscillatory solution. The solar cycle can be identified with one of such oscillatory solutions. This means that we can follow detailed stages of the field generation and reversal processes of the dynamo by continuously observing the Sun. It is proposed that the magnetic flux tube formation by streaming plasma flows exemplified here could be a universal mechanism of flux tube formation in astrophysics

Uncertainty analysis of scintillometers methods in measuring sensible heat fluxes of forest ecosystem

Science.gov (United States)

Zheng, N.

2017-12-01

Sensible heat flux (H) is one of the driving factors of surface turbulent motion and energy exchange. Therefore, it is particularly important to measure sensible heat flux accurately at the regional scale. However, due to the heterogeneity of the underlying surface, hydrothermal regime, and different weather conditions, it is difficult to estimate the represented flux at the kilometer scale. The scintillometer have been developed into an effective and universal equipment for deriving heat flux at the regional-scale which based on the turbulence effect of light in the atmosphere since the 1980s. The parameter directly obtained by the scintillometer is the structure parameter of the refractive index of air based on the changes of light intensity fluctuation. Combine with parameters such as temperature structure parameter, zero-plane displacement, surface roughness, wind velocity, air temperature and the other meteorological data heat fluxes can be derived. These additional parameters increase the uncertainties of flux because the difference between the actual feature of turbulent motion and the applicable conditions of turbulence theory. Most previous studies often focused on the constant flux layers that are above the rough sub-layers and homogeneous flat surfaces underlying surfaces with suitable weather conditions. Therefore, the criteria and modified forms of key parameters are invariable. In this study, we conduct investment over the hilly area of northern China with different plants, such as cork oak, cedar-black and locust. On the basis of key research on the threshold and modified forms of saturation with different turbulence intensity, modified forms of Bowen ratio with different drying-and-wetting conditions, universal function for the temperature structure parameter under different atmospheric stability, the dominant sources of uncertainty will be determined. The above study is significant to reveal influence mechanism of uncertainty and explore influence

Bayesian calibration of reactor neutron flux spectrum using activation detectors measurements: Application to CALIBAN reactor

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cartier, J.; Casoli, P.; Chappert, F.

2013-01-01

In this paper, we present calibration methods in order to estimate reactor neutron flux spectrum and its uncertainties by using integral activation measurements. These techniques are performed using Bayesian and MCMC framework. These methods are applied to integral activation experiments in the cavity of the CALIBAN reactor. We estimate the neutron flux and its related uncertainties. The originality of this work is that these uncertainties take into account measurements uncertainties, cross-sections uncertainties and model error. In particular, our results give a very good approximation of the total flux and indicate that neutron flux from MCNP simulation for energies above about 5 MeV seems to overestimate the 'real flux'. (authors)

Gating treatment delivery QA based on a surrogate motion analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chojnowski, J.; Simpson, E.

2011-01-01

Full text: To develop a methodology to estimate intrafractional target position error during a phase-based gated treatment. Westmead Cancer Care Centre is using respiratory correlated phase-based gated beam delivery in the treatment of lung cancer. The gating technique is managed by the Varian Real-time Position Management (RPM) system, version 1.7.5. A 6-dot block is placed on the abdomen of the patient and acts as a surrogate for the target motion. During a treatment session, the motion of the surrogate can be recorded by RPM application. Analysis of the surrogate motion file by in-house developed software allows the intrafractional error of the treatment session to be computed. To validate the computed error, a simple test that involves the introduction of deliberate errors is performed. Errors of up to 1.1 cm are introduced to a metal marker placed on a surrogate using the Varian Breathing Phantom. The moving marker was scanned in prospective mode using a GE Lightspeed 16 CT scanner. Using the CT images, a difference of the marker position with and without introduced errors is compared to the calculated errors based on the surrogate motion. The average and standard deviation of a difference between calculated target position errors and measured introduced artificial errors of the marker position is 0.02 cm and 0.07 cm respectively. Conclusion The calculated target positional error based on surrogate motion analysis provides a quantitative measure of intrafractional target positional errors during treatment. Routine QA for gated treatment using surrogate motion analysis is relatively quick and simple.

Facial motion parameter estimation and error criteria in model-based image coding

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Yunhai; Yu, Lu; Yao, Qingdong

2000-04-01

Model-based image coding has been given extensive attention due to its high subject image quality and low bit-rates. But the estimation of object motion parameter is still a difficult problem, and there is not a proper error criteria for the quality assessment that are consistent with visual properties. This paper presents an algorithm of the facial motion parameter estimation based on feature point correspondence and gives the motion parameter error criteria. The facial motion model comprises of three parts. The first part is the global 3-D rigid motion of the head, the second part is non-rigid translation motion in jaw area, and the third part consists of local non-rigid expression motion in eyes and mouth areas. The feature points are automatically selected by a function of edges, brightness and end-node outside the blocks of eyes and mouth. The numbers of feature point are adjusted adaptively. The jaw translation motion is tracked by the changes of the feature point position of jaw. The areas of non-rigid expression motion can be rebuilt by using block-pasting method. The estimation approach of motion parameter error based on the quality of reconstructed image is suggested, and area error function and the error function of contour transition-turn rate are used to be quality criteria. The criteria reflect the image geometric distortion caused by the error of estimated motion parameters properly.

Anomalous high-frequency wave activity flux preceding anomalous changes in the Northern polar jet

Science.gov (United States)

Nakamura, Mototaka; Kadota, Minoru; Yamane, Shozo

2010-05-01

Anomalous forcing by quasi-geostrophic (QG) waves has been reported as an important forcing factor in the Northern Annular Mode (NAM) in recent literatures. In order to shed a light on the dynamics of the NAM from a different angle, we have examined anomalous behavior of the winter jets in the upper troposphere and stratosphere by focusing our diagnosis on not the anomalous geopotential height (Z) itself, but on the anomalous change in the Z (dZ) between two successive months and preceding transient QG wave activity flux during the cold season. We calculated EOFs of dZ between two successive months at 150hPa for a 46-year period, from 1958 to 2003, using the monthly mean NCEP reanalysis data. We then formed anomaly composites of changes in Z and the zonal velocity (U), as well as the preceding and following wave activity flux, Z, U, and temperature at various heights, for both positive and negative phases of the first EOF. For the wave forcing fields, we adopted the diagnostic system for the three-dimensional QG transient wave activity flux in the zonally-varying three-dimensional mean flow developed by Plumb (1986) with a slight modification in its application to the data. Our choice of the Plumb86 is based on the fact that the winter mean flow in the Northern Hemisphere is characterized by noticeable zonal asymmetry, and has a symbiotic relationship with waves in the extra-tropics. The Plumb86 flux was calculated for high-frequency (period of 2 to 7 days) and low-frequency (period of 10 to 20 days) waves with the ultra-low-frequency (period of 30 days or longer) flow as the reference state for each time frame of the 6 hourly NCEP reanalysis data from 1958 to 2003. By replacing the mean flow with the ultra-low-frequency flow in the application of the Plumb86 formula, the flux fields were calculated as time series at 6 hour intervals. The time series of the wave activity flux was then averaged for each month. The patterns of composited anomalous dZ and dU clearly

Experience gained from high heat flux actively cooled PFCs in Tore Supra

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Grosman, A.; Bayetti, P.; Brosset, C.; Bucalossi, J.; Cordier, J.J.; Durocher, A.; Escourbiac, F.; Ghendrih, Ph.; Guilhem, D.; Gunn, J.; Loarer, T.; Lipa, M.; Mitteau, R.; Pegourie, B.; Reichle, R.; Schlosser, J.; Tsitrone, E.; Vallet, J.C.

2005-01-01

The implementation of actively cooled high heat flux plasma facing components (PFCs) is one of the major ingredients required for operating the Tore Supra tokamak with very long pulses. A pioneering activity has been developed in this field from the very beginning of the device operation that is today culminating with the routine operation of an actively cooled toroidal pumped limiter (TPL) capable to sustain up to 10 MW/m 2 of nominal convected heat flux. Technical information is drawn from the whole development up to the industrialisation and focuses on a number of critical issues, such as bonding technology analysis, manufacture processes, repair processes, destructive and non-destructive testing. The actual experience in Tore Supra allows to address the question of D retention on carbon walls. Redeposition on surfaces without plasma flux is suspected to cause the final 'burial' of about half of the injected gas during long discharges

Modification of Turbulence Structures in a Channel Flow by Uniform Magnetic Fluxes

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, D.; Choi, H.; Kim, J.

1997-11-01

Effects of electromagnetic forcing on the near-wall turbulence are investigated by applying a uniform magnetic flux in a turbulent channel flow in the streamwise and spanwise directions, respectively. The base flow is a fully developed turbulent channel flow and the direct numerical simulation technique is used. The electromagnetic force induced from the magnetic fluxes reduces the intensity of the wall-layer structures and thus drag is significantly reduced. The wall-normal and spanwise velocity fluctuations and the Reynolds shear stress decrease with the increased magnetic flux in both directions. The streamwise velocity fluctuations increase with the streamwise magnetic flux, whereas they decrease with the spanwise magnetic flux. It is also shown that the spanwise magnetic flux is much more effective than the streamwise magnetic flux in reducing the skin-friction drag. Instantaneous Lorentz force vectors show that the flow motions by the near-wall vortices are directly inhibited by the spanwise magnetic flux, while they are less effectively inhibited by the streamwise magnetic flux. Other turbulence statistics that reveal the effects of the applied magnetic forcing will be presented. ^* Supported by KOSEF Contract No. 965-1008-003-2 and ONR Grant No. N00014-95-1-0352.

Fluxes by eddy correlation over heterogeneous landscape: How shall we apply the Reynolds average?

Science.gov (United States)

Dobosy, R.

2007-12-01

Top-down estimates of carbon exchange across the earth's surface are implicitly an integral scheme, deriving bulk exchanges over large areas. Bottom-up estimates explicitly integrate the individual components of exchange to derive a bulk value. If these approaches are to be properly compared, their estimates should represent the same quantity. Over heterogeneous landscape, eddy-covariance flux computations from towers or aircraft intended for comparison with top-down approach face a question of the proper definition of the mean or base state, the departures from which yield the fluxes by Reynolds averaging. 1)≠Use a global base state derived over a representative sample of the surface, insensitive to land use. The departure quantities then fail to sum to zero over any subsample representing an individual surface type, violating Reynolds criteria. Yet fluxes derived from such subsamples can be directly composed into a bulk flux, globally satisfying Reynolds criteria. 2)≠Use a different base state for each surface type. satisfying Reynolds criteria individually. Then some of the flux may get missed if a surface's characteristics significantly bias its base state. Base state≠(2) is natural for tower samples. Base state≠(1) is natural for airborne samples over heterogeneous landscape, especially in patches smaller than an appropriate averaging length. It appears (1) incorporates a more realistic sample of the flux, though desirably there would be no practical difference between the two schemes. The schemes are related by the expression w¯*a*)C - w¯'a¯')C = w¯'ã¯)C+ wtilde ¯a¯')C+ wtilde ¯ã¯)C Here w is vertical motion, and a is some scalar, such as CO2. The star denotes departure from the global base state≠(1), and the prime from the base state≠(2), defined only over surface class≠C. The overbar with round bracket denotes average over samples drawn from class≠C, determined by footprint model. Thus a¯')C = 0 but a¯*)C ≠ 0 in general. The

PET Motion Compensation for Radiation Therapy Using a CT-Based Mid-Position Motion Model: Methodology and Clinical Evaluation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kruis, Matthijs F.; Kamer, Jeroen B. van de; Houweling, Antonetta C.; Sonke, Jan-Jakob; Belderbos, José S.A.; Herk, Marcel van

2013-01-01

Purpose: Four-dimensional positron emission tomography (4D PET) imaging of the thorax produces sharper images with reduced motion artifacts. Current radiation therapy planning systems, however, do not facilitate 4D plan optimization. When images are acquired in a 2-minute time slot, the signal-to-noise ratio of each 4D frame is low, compromising image quality. The purpose of this study was to implement and evaluate the construction of mid-position 3D PET scans, with motion compensated using a 4D computed tomography (CT)-derived motion model. Methods and Materials: All voxels of 4D PET were registered to the time-averaged position by using a motion model derived from the 4D CT frames. After the registration the scans were summed, resulting in a motion-compensated 3D mid-position PET scan. The method was tested with a phantom dataset as well as data from 27 lung cancer patients. Results: PET motion compensation using a CT-based motion model improved image quality of both phantoms and patients in terms of increased maximum SUV (SUV max ) values and decreased apparent volumes. In homogenous phantom data, a strong relationship was found between the amplitude-to-diameter ratio and the effects of the method. In heterogeneous patient data, the effect correlated better with the motion amplitude. In case of large amplitudes, motion compensation may increase SUV max up to 25% and reduce the diameter of the 50% SUV max volume by 10%. Conclusions: 4D CT-based motion-compensated mid-position PET scans provide improved quantitative data in terms of uptake values and volumes at the time-averaged position, thereby facilitating more accurate radiation therapy treatment planning of pulmonary lesions

Variability of the Lyman alpha flux with solar activity

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lean, J.L.; Skumanich, A.

1983-01-01

A three-component model of the solar chromosphere, developed from ground based observations of the Ca II K chromospheric emission, is used to calculate the variability of the Lyman alpha flux between 1969 and 1980. The Lyman alpha flux at solar minimum is required in the model and is taken as 2.32 x 10 11 photons/cm 2 /s. This value occurred during 1975 as well as in 1976 near the commencement of solar cycle 21. The model predicts that the Lyman alpha flux increases to as much as 5 x 10 11 photons/cm 2 /s at the maximum of the solar cycle. The ratio of the average fluxes for December 1979 (cycle maximum) and July 1976 (cycle minimum) is 1.9. During solar maximum the 27-day solar rotation is shown to cause the Lyman alpha flux to vary by as much as 40% or as little as 5%. The model also shows that the Lyman alpha flux varies over intermediate time periods of 2 to 3 years, as well as over the 11-year sunspot cycle. We conclude that, unlike the sunspot number and the 10.7-cm radio flux, the Lyman alpha flux had a variability that was approximately the same during each of the past three cycles. Lyman alpha fluxes calculated by the model are consistent with measurements of the Lyman alpha flux made by 11 of a total of 14 rocket experiments conducted during the period 1969--1980. The model explains satisfactorily the absolute magnitude, long-term trends, and the cycle variability seen in the Lyman alpha irradiances by the OSO 5 satellite experiment. The 27-day variability observed by the AE-E satellite experiment is well reproduced. However, the magntidue of the AE-E 1 Lyman alpha irradiances are higher than the model calculations by between 40% and 80%. We suggest that the assumed calibration of the AE-E irradiances is in error

Airborne particulate concentrations and fluxes at an active uranium mill tailings site

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sehmel, G.A.

1978-01-01

Direct measurements of airborne particulate concentrations and fluxes of transported mill tailing materials were measured at an active mill tailings site. Experimental measurement equipment consisted of meteorological instrumentation to automatically activate total particulate air samplers as a function of wind speed increments and direction, as well as particle cascade impactors to measure airborne respirable concentrations as a function of particle size. In addition, an inertial impaction device measured nonrespirable fluxes of airborne particles. Caclulated results are presented in terms of the airborne solid concentration in g/m 3 , the horizontal airborne mass flux in g/(m 2 -day) for total collected nonrespirable particles and the radionuclide concentrations in dpm/g as a function of particle diameter for respirable and nonrespirable particles

Charged particle motion in a time-dependent flux-driven ring: an exactly solvable model

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Luan, P-G; Tang, C-S

2007-01-01

We consider a charged particle driven by a time-dependent flux threading a quantum ring. The dynamics of the charged particle is investigated using a classical treatment, a Fourier expansion technique, a time-evolution method, and the Lewis-Riesenfeld approach. We have shown that, by properly managing the boundary conditions, a time-dependent wavefunction can be obtained using a general non-Hermitian time-dependent invariant, which is a specific linear combination of initial angular-momentum and azimuthal-angle operators. It is shown that the linear invariant eigenfunction can be realized as a Gaussian-type wavepacket with a peak moving along the classical angular trajectory, while the distribution of the wavepacket is determined by the ratio of the coefficient of the initial angle to that of the initial canonical angular momentum. From the topologically nontrivial nature as well as the classical trajectory and angular momentum, one can determine the dynamical motion of the wavepacket. It should be noted that the peak position is no longer an expectation value of the angle operator, and hence the Ehrenfest theorem is not directly applicable in such a topologically nontrivial system

Robot motion control in mobile environment

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

Iliya V Miroshnik; HUANG Xian-lin(黄显林); HE Jie(贺杰)

2003-01-01

With the problem of robot motion control in dynamic environment represented by mobile obstacles,working pieces and external mechanisms considered, a relevant control actions design procedure has been pro-posed to provide coordination of robot motions with respect to the moving external objects so that an extension ofrobot spatial motion techniques and active robotic strategies based on approaches of nonlinear control theory canbe achieved.

Bayesian calibration of reactor neutron flux spectrum using activation detectors measurements: Application to CALIBAN reactor

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Cartier, J. [Commissariat a l' Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives CEA, DAM, DIF, F-91297 Arpajon (France); Casoli, P. [Commissariat a l' Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives CEA, DAM, Valduc, F-21120 Is sur Tille (France); Chappert, F. [Commissariat a l' Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives CEA, DAM, DIF, F-91297 Arpajon (France)

2013-07-01

In this paper, we present calibration methods in order to estimate reactor neutron flux spectrum and its uncertainties by using integral activation measurements. These techniques are performed using Bayesian and MCMC framework. These methods are applied to integral activation experiments in the cavity of the CALIBAN reactor. We estimate the neutron flux and its related uncertainties. The originality of this work is that these uncertainties take into account measurements uncertainties, cross-sections uncertainties and model error. In particular, our results give a very good approximation of the total flux and indicate that neutron flux from MCNP simulation for energies above about 5 MeV seems to overestimate the 'real flux'. (authors)

Radiographic x-ray flux monitoring during explosive experiments by copper activation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Goosman, D.R.

1986-01-01

During radiographic experiments involving explosives, it is valuable to have a method of monitoring the x-ray flux ratio between the dynamic experiment and an x-ray taken of a static object for comparison. The standard method of monitoring with thermoluminescent detectors suffers the disadvantages of being sensitive to temperature, shock, uv radiation, cleanliness and saturation. A flux monitoring system is being studied which is not subject to any of the above disadvantages and is based upon the 63Cu(photon,n)62Cu reaction. The 62Cu has a 10 min half life and is counted by a nuclear pulse counting system within a few minutes of an explosive test. 170 microcoulomb of 19.3 MeV electrons hitting 1.18 mm of Ta produces x-rays which illuminate a 0.8mm thick by 1.6 cm diameter Cu disk placed 46 cm from the Ta. The activated Cu is placed in a counting system with a window between 400 to 600 keV and produces about 42,500 counts in the first 100 sec. counting period. Less than 0.2% of the initial activity is due to other reactions. Photo-induced neutrons in Be parts of the system are shown to produce a negligible effect in the Cu. The main disadvantage of the Cu activation is its sensitivity to electron energy. Monte-Carlo calculations of the excitation function for our accelerator are shown, along with excitation functions for three other configurations

Radiographic x-ray flux monitoring during explosive experiments by copper activation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Goosman, D.R.

1986-01-01

During radiographic experiments involving explosives, it is valuable to have a method of monitoring the X-ray flux ratio between the dynamic experiment and an X-ray taken of a static object for comparison. The standard method of monitoring with thermoluminescent detectors suffers the disadvantages of being sensitive to temperature, shock, UV radiation, cleanliness and saturation. We are studying an additional flux monitoring system which is not subject to any of the above disadvantages and is based upon the 63 Cu(photon,n) 62 Cu reaction. The 62 Cu has a 10 min. half-life and is counted by a nuclear pulse-counting system within a few minutes of an explosive test. 170 MicroCoulomb of 19.3 MeV electrons hitting 1.18mm of Ta produces X-rays which illuminate a 0.8mm thick by 1.6cm diameter Cu disk placed 46cm from the Ta. The activated Cu is placed in a counting system with a window between 400-600 keV and produces about 42500 counts in the first 100 sec counting period. Less than 0.2% of the initial activity is due to other reactions. Photo-induced neutrons in Be parts of the system are shown to produce a negligible effect in the Cu. The main disadvantage of the Cu activation is its sensitivity to electron energy. Monte-Carlo calculations of the excitation function for our accelerator are shown, along with excitation functions for three other configurations

A novel flux estimator based on SOGI with FLL for induction machine drives

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zhao, Rende; Xin, Zhen; Loh, Poh Chiang

2016-01-01

by the initial conditions with no need for the magnitude and phase compensation. Because the dc and harmonic components are inversely proportional to the speed in the estimated flux, the performance of the single SOGI-based estimator become worse at low speed. A multiple SOGI-based flux estimator is the proposed......It is very important to estimate flux accurately in implementing high-performance control of AC motors. Theoretical analysis has been made to illustrate the performance of the pure-integration-based and the Low-Pass Filter (LPF) based flux estimators. A novel flux estimator based on Second......-Order General Integrator (SOGI) with Frequency Locked-Loop (FLL) is investigated in this paper for induction machine drives. A single SOGI instead of pure integrator or LPF is used to integrate the back electromotive force (EMF). It can solve the problems of the integration saturation and the dc drift caused...

Use of CITATION code for flux calculation in neutron activation analysis with voluminous sample using an Am-Be source

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Khelifi, R.; Idiri, Z.; Bode, P.

2002-01-01

The CITATION code based on neutron diffusion theory was used for flux calculations inside voluminous samples in prompt gamma activation analysis with an isotopic neutron source (Am-Be). The code uses specific parameters related to the energy spectrum source and irradiation system materials (shielding, reflector). The flux distribution (thermal and fast) was calculated in the three-dimensional geometry for the system: air, polyethylene and water cuboidal sample (50x50x50 cm). Thermal flux was calculated in a series of points inside the sample. The results agreed reasonably well with observed values. The maximum thermal flux was observed at a distance of 3.2 cm while CITATION gave 3.7 cm. Beyond a depth of 7.2 cm, the thermal flux to fast flux ratio increases up to twice and allows us to optimise the detection system position in the scope of in-situ PGAA

Inferring 222Rn soil fluxes from ambient 222Rn activity and eddy covariance measurements of CO2

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. van der Laan

2016-11-01

Full Text Available We present a new methodology, which we call Single Pair of Observations Technique with Eddy Covariance (SPOT-EC, to estimate regional-scale surface fluxes of 222Rn from tower-based observations of 222Rn activity concentration, CO2 mole fractions and direct CO2 flux measurements from eddy covariance. For specific events, the regional (222Rn surface flux is calculated from short-term changes in ambient (222Rn activity concentration scaled by the ratio of the mean CO2 surface flux for the specific event to the change in its observed mole fraction. The resulting 222Rn surface emissions are integrated in time (between the moment of observation and the last prior background levels and space (i.e. over the footprint of the observations. The measurement uncertainty obtained is about ±15 % for diurnal events and about ±10 % for longer-term (e.g. seasonal or annual means. The method does not provide continuous observations, but reliable daily averages can be obtained. We applied our method to in situ observations from two sites in the Netherlands: Cabauw station (CBW and Lutjewad station (LUT. For LUT, which is an intensive agricultural site, we estimated a mean 222Rn surface flux of (0.29 ± 0.02 atoms cm−2 s−1 with values  > 0.5 atoms cm−2 s−1 to the south and south-east. For CBW we estimated a mean 222Rn surface flux of (0.63 ± 0.04 atoms cm−2 s−1. The highest values were observed to the south-west, where the soil type is mainly river clay. For both stations good agreement was found between our results and those from measurements with soil chambers and two recently published 222Rn soil flux maps for Europe. At both sites, large spatial and temporal variability of 222Rn surface fluxes were observed which would be impractical to measure with a soil chamber. SPOT-EC, therefore, offers an important new tool for estimating regional-scale 222Rn surface fluxes. Practical applications furthermore include

High heat flux actively cooled plasma facing components development, realization and first results in Tore Supra

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Grosman, A. [Association Euratom-CEA, Centre d' Etudes de Cadarache, 13 - Saint-Paul-lez-Durance (France). Dept. de Recherches sur la Fusion Controlee

2004-07-01

The development, design, manufacture and testing of actively cooled high heat flux plasma facing components (PFC) has been an essential stage towards long powerful tokamak operations for Tore-Supra, it lasted about 10 years. This paper deals with the toroidal pumped limiter (TPL) that is able to sustain up to 10 MW/m{sup 2} of nominal heat flux. This device is based on hardened copper alloy heat sink structures covered by a carbon fiber composite armour, it resulted in the manufacturing of 600 elementary components, called finger elements, to achieve the 7.6 m{sup 2} TPL. This assembly has been operating in Tore-Supra since spring 2002. Some difficulties occurred during the manufacturing phase, the valuable industrial experience is summarized in the section 2. The permanent monitoring of PFC surface temperature all along the discharge is performed by a set of 6 actively cooled infrared endoscopes. The heat flux monitoring and control issue but also the progress made in our understanding of the deuterium retention in long discharges are described in the section 3. (A.C.)

High heat flux actively cooled plasma facing components development, realization and first results in Tore Supra

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Grosman, A.

2004-01-01

The development, design, manufacture and testing of actively cooled high heat flux plasma facing components (PFC) has been an essential stage towards long powerful tokamak operations for Tore-Supra, it lasted about 10 years. This paper deals with the toroidal pumped limiter (TPL) that is able to sustain up to 10 MW/m 2 of nominal heat flux. This device is based on hardened copper alloy heat sink structures covered by a carbon fiber composite armour, it resulted in the manufacturing of 600 elementary components, called finger elements, to achieve the 7.6 m 2 TPL. This assembly has been operating in Tore-Supra since spring 2002. Some difficulties occurred during the manufacturing phase, the valuable industrial experience is summarized in the section 2. The permanent monitoring of PFC surface temperature all along the discharge is performed by a set of 6 actively cooled infrared endoscopes. The heat flux monitoring and control issue but also the progress made in our understanding of the deuterium retention in long discharges are described in the section 3. (A.C.)

Stochastic line motion and stochastic flux conservation for nonideal hydromagnetic models

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Eyink, Gregory L.

2009-01-01

We prove that smooth solutions of nonideal (viscous and resistive) incompressible magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations satisfy a stochastic law of flux conservation. This property implies that the magnetic flux through a surface is equal to the average of the magnetic fluxes through an ensemble of surfaces advected backward in time by the plasma velocity perturbed with a random white noise. Our result is an analog of the well-known Alfven theorem of ideal MHD and is valid for any value of the magnetic Prandtl number. A second stochastic conservation law is shown to hold at unit Prandtl number, a random version of the generalized Kelvin theorem derived by Bekenstein and Oron for ideal MHD. These stochastic conservation laws are not only shown to be consequences of the nonideal MHD equations but are proved in fact to be equivalent to those equations. We derive similar results for two more refined hydromagnetic models, Hall MHD and the two-fluid plasma model, still assuming incompressible velocities and isotropic transport coefficients. Finally, we use these results to discuss briefly the infinite-Reynolds-number limit of hydromagnetic turbulence and to support the conjecture that flux conservation remains stochastic in that limit.

Robotics-based synthesis of human motion

KAUST Repository

Khatib, O.; Demircan, E.; De Sapio, V.; Sentis, L.; Besier, T.; Delp, S.

2009-01-01

The synthesis of human motion is a complex procedure that involves accurate reconstruction of movement sequences, modeling of musculoskeletal kinematics, dynamics and actuation, and characterization of reliable performance criteria. Many of these processes have much in common with the problems found in robotics research. Task-based methods used in robotics may be leveraged to provide novel musculoskeletal modeling methods and physiologically accurate performance predictions. In this paper, we present (i) a new method for the real-time reconstruction of human motion trajectories using direct marker tracking, (ii) a task-driven muscular effort minimization criterion and (iii) new human performance metrics for dynamic characterization of athletic skills. Dynamic motion reconstruction is achieved through the control of a simulated human model to follow the captured marker trajectories in real-time. The operational space control and real-time simulation provide human dynamics at any configuration of the performance. A new criteria of muscular effort minimization has been introduced to analyze human static postures. Extensive motion capture experiments were conducted to validate the new minimization criterion. Finally, new human performance metrics were introduced to study in details an athletic skill. These metrics include the effort expenditure and the feasible set of operational space accelerations during the performance of the skill. The dynamic characterization takes into account skeletal kinematics as well as muscle routing kinematics and force generating capacities. The developments draw upon an advanced musculoskeletal modeling platform and a task-oriented framework for the effective integration of biomechanics and robotics methods.

Robotics-based synthesis of human motion

KAUST Repository

Khatib, O.

2009-05-01

The synthesis of human motion is a complex procedure that involves accurate reconstruction of movement sequences, modeling of musculoskeletal kinematics, dynamics and actuation, and characterization of reliable performance criteria. Many of these processes have much in common with the problems found in robotics research. Task-based methods used in robotics may be leveraged to provide novel musculoskeletal modeling methods and physiologically accurate performance predictions. In this paper, we present (i) a new method for the real-time reconstruction of human motion trajectories using direct marker tracking, (ii) a task-driven muscular effort minimization criterion and (iii) new human performance metrics for dynamic characterization of athletic skills. Dynamic motion reconstruction is achieved through the control of a simulated human model to follow the captured marker trajectories in real-time. The operational space control and real-time simulation provide human dynamics at any configuration of the performance. A new criteria of muscular effort minimization has been introduced to analyze human static postures. Extensive motion capture experiments were conducted to validate the new minimization criterion. Finally, new human performance metrics were introduced to study in details an athletic skill. These metrics include the effort expenditure and the feasible set of operational space accelerations during the performance of the skill. The dynamic characterization takes into account skeletal kinematics as well as muscle routing kinematics and force generating capacities. The developments draw upon an advanced musculoskeletal modeling platform and a task-oriented framework for the effective integration of biomechanics and robotics methods.

MRI-Based Nonrigid Motion Correction in Simultaneous PET/MRI

Science.gov (United States)

Chun, Se Young; Reese, Timothy G.; Ouyang, Jinsong; Guerin, Bastien; Catana, Ciprian; Zhu, Xuping; Alpert, Nathaniel M.; El Fakhri, Georges

2014-01-01

Respiratory and cardiac motion is the most serious limitation to whole-body PET, resulting in spatial resolution close to 1 cm. Furthermore, motion-induced inconsistencies in the attenuation measurements often lead to significant artifacts in the reconstructed images. Gating can remove motion artifacts at the cost of increased noise. This paper presents an approach to respiratory motion correction using simultaneous PET/MRI to demonstrate initial results in phantoms, rabbits, and nonhuman primates and discusses the prospects for clinical application. Methods Studies with a deformable phantom, a free-breathing primate, and rabbits implanted with radioactive beads were performed with simultaneous PET/MRI. Motion fields were estimated from concurrently acquired tagged MR images using 2 B-spline nonrigid image registration methods and incorporated into a PET list-mode ordered-subsets expectation maximization algorithm. Using the measured motion fields to transform both the emission data and the attenuation data, we could use all the coincidence data to reconstruct any phase of the respiratory cycle. We compared the resulting SNR and the channelized Hotelling observer (CHO) detection signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) in the motion-corrected reconstruction with the results obtained from standard gating and uncorrected studies. Results Motion correction virtually eliminated motion blur without reducing SNR, yielding images with SNR comparable to those obtained by gating with 5–8 times longer acquisitions in all studies. The CHO study in dynamic phantoms demonstrated a significant improvement (166%–276%) in lesion detection SNR with MRI-based motion correction as compared with gating (P < 0.001). This improvement was 43%–92% for large motion compared with lesion detection without motion correction (P < 0.001). CHO SNR in the rabbit studies confirmed these results. Conclusion Tagged MRI motion correction in simultaneous PET/MRI significantly improves lesion detection

Gas-Kinetic Theory Based Flux Splitting Method for Ideal Magnetohydrodynamics

Science.gov (United States)

Xu, Kun

1998-01-01

A gas-kinetic solver is developed for the ideal magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) equations. The new scheme is based on the direct splitting of the flux function of the MHD equations with the inclusion of "particle" collisions in the transport process. Consequently, the artificial dissipation in the new scheme is much reduced in comparison with the MHD Flux Vector Splitting Scheme. At the same time, the new scheme is compared with the well-developed Roe-type MHD solver. It is concluded that the kinetic MHD scheme is more robust and efficient than the Roe- type method, and the accuracy is competitive. In this paper the general principle of splitting the macroscopic flux function based on the gas-kinetic theory is presented. The flux construction strategy may shed some light on the possible modification of AUSM- and CUSP-type schemes for the compressible Euler equations, as well as to the development of new schemes for a non-strictly hyperbolic system.

A comparative analysis of signal processing methods for motion-based rate responsive pacing.

Science.gov (United States)

Greenhut, S E; Shreve, E A; Lau, C P

1996-08-01

Pacemakers that augment heart rate (HR) by sensing body motion have been the most frequently prescribed rate responsive pacemakers. Many comparisons between motion-based rate responsive pacemaker models have been published. However, conclusions regarding specific signal processing methods used for rate response (e.g., filters and algorithms) can be affected by device-specific features. To objectively compare commonly used motion sensing filters and algorithms, acceleration and ECG signals were recorded from 16 normal subjects performing exercise and daily living activities. Acceleration signals were filtered (1-4 or 15-Hz band-pass), then processed using threshold crossing (TC) or integration (IN) algorithms creating four filter/algorithm combinations. Data were converted to an acceleration indicated rate and compared to intrinsic HR using root mean square difference (RMSd) and signed RMSd. Overall, the filters and algorithms performed similarly for most activities. The only differences between filters were for walking at an increasing grade (1-4 Hz superior to 15-Hz) and for rocking in a chair (15-Hz superior to 1-4 Hz). The only differences between algorithms were for bicycling (TC superior to IN), walking at an increasing grade (IN superior to TC), and holding a drill (IN superior to TC). Performance of the four filter/algorithm combinations was also similar over most activities. The 1-4/IN (filter [Hz]/algorithm) combination performed best for walking at a grade, while the 15/TC combination was best for bicycling. However, the 15/TC combination tended to be most sensitive to higher frequency artifact, such as automobile driving, downstairs walking, and hand drilling. Chair rocking artifact was highest for 1-4/IN. The RMSd for bicycling and upstairs walking were large for all combinations, reflecting the nonphysiological nature of the sensor. The 1-4/TC combination demonstrated the least intersubject variability, was the only filter/algorithm combination

Effect of Activated Flux on the Microstructure, Mechanical Properties, and Residual Stresses of Modified 9Cr-1Mo Steel Weld Joints

Science.gov (United States)

Maduraimuthu, V.; Vasudevan, M.; Muthupandi, V.; Bhaduri, A. K.; Jayakumar, T.

2012-02-01

A novel variant of tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding called activated-TIG (A-TIG) welding, which uses a thin layer of activated flux coating applied on the joint area prior to welding, is known to enhance the depth of penetration during autogenous TIG welding and overcomes the limitation associated with TIG welding of modified 9Cr-1Mo steels. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a specific activated flux for enhancing the depth of penetration during autogeneous TIG welding of modified 9Cr-1Mo steel. In the current work, activated flux composition is optimized to achieve 6 mm depth of penetration in single-pass TIG welding at minimum heat input possible. Then square butt weld joints are made for 6-mm-thick and 10-mm-thick plates using the optimized flux. The effect of flux on the microstructure, mechanical properties, and residual stresses of the A-TIG weld joint is studied by comparing it with that of the weld joints made by conventional multipass TIG welding process using matching filler wire. Welded microstructure in the A-TIG weld joint is coarser because of the higher peak temperature in A-TIG welding process compared with that of multipass TIG weld joint made by a conventional TIG welding process. Transverse strength properties of the modified 9Cr-1Mo steel weld produced by A-TIG welding exceeded the minimum specified strength values of the base materials. The average toughness values of A-TIG weld joints are lower compared with that of the base metal and multipass weld joints due to the presence of δ-ferrite and inclusions in the weld metal caused by the flux. Compressive residual stresses are observed in the fusion zone of A-TIG weld joint, whereas tensile residual stresses are observed in the multipass TIG weld joint.

FINE-SCALE STRUCTURES OF FLUX ROPES TRACKED BY ERUPTING MATERIAL

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Li Ting; Zhang Jun, E-mail: liting@nao.cas.cn, E-mail: zjun@nao.cas.cn [Key Laboratory of Solar Activity, National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100012 (China)

2013-06-20

We present Solar Dynamics Observatory observations of two flux ropes tracked out by material from a surge and a failed filament eruption on 2012 July 29 and August 4, respectively. For the first event, the interaction between the erupting surge and a loop-shaped filament in the east seems to 'peel off' the filament and add bright mass into the flux rope body. The second event is associated with a C-class flare that occurs several minutes before the filament activation. The two flux ropes are, respectively, composed of 85 {+-} 12 and 102 {+-} 15 fine-scale structures, with an average width of about 1.''6. Our observations show that two extreme ends of the flux rope are rooted in opposite polarity fields and each end is composed of multiple footpoints (FPs) of fine-scale structures. The FPs of the fine-scale structures are located at network magnetic fields, with magnetic fluxes from 5.6 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 18} Mx to 8.6 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 19} Mx. Moreover, almost half of the FPs show converging motion of smaller magnetic structures over 10 hr before the appearance of the flux rope. By calculating the magnetic fields of the FPs, we deduce that the two flux ropes occupy at least 4.3 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 20} Mx and 7.6 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 20} Mx magnetic fluxes, respectively.

Activity and Kinematics of White Dwarf-M Dwarf Binaries from the SUPERBLINK Proper Motion Survey

Science.gov (United States)

Skinner, Julie N.; Morgan, Dylan P.; West, Andrew A.; Lépine, Sébastien; Thorstensen, John R.

2017-09-01

We present an activity and kinematic analysis of high proper motion white dwarf-M dwarf binaries (WD+dMs) found in the SUPERBLINK survey, 178 of which are new identifications. To identify WD+dMs, we developed a UV-optical-IR color criterion and conducted a spectroscopic survey to confirm each candidate binary. For the newly identified systems, we fit the two components using model white dwarf spectra and M dwarf template spectra to determine physical parameters. We use Hα chromospheric emission to examine the magnetic activity of the M dwarf in each system, and investigate how its activity is affected by the presence of a white dwarf companion. We find that the fraction of WD+dM binaries with active M dwarfs is significantly higher than their single M dwarf counterparts at early and mid-spectral types. We corroborate previous studies that find high activity fractions at both close and intermediate separations. At more distant separations, the binary fraction appears to approach the activity fraction for single M dwarfs. Using derived radial velocities and the proper motions, we calculate 3D space velocities for the WD+dMs in SUPERBLINK. For the entire SUPERBLINK WD+dMs, we find a large vertical velocity dispersion, indicating a dynamically hotter population compared to high proper motion samples of single M dwarfs. We compare the kinematics for systems with active M dwarfs and those with inactive M dwarfs, and find signatures of asymmetric drift in the inactive sample, indicating that they are drawn from an older population. Based on observations obtained at the MDM Observatory operated by Dartmouth College, Columbia University, The Ohio State University, and the University of Michigan.

Real-time high-speed motion blur compensation system based on back-and-forth motion control of galvanometer mirror.

Science.gov (United States)

Hayakawa, Tomohiko; Watanabe, Takanoshin; Ishikawa, Masatoshi

2015-12-14

We developed a novel real-time motion blur compensation system for the blur caused by high-speed one-dimensional motion between a camera and a target. The system consists of a galvanometer mirror and a high-speed color camera, without the need for any additional sensors. We controlled the galvanometer mirror with continuous back-and-forth oscillating motion synchronized to a high-speed camera. The angular speed of the mirror is given in real time within 10 ms based on the concept of background tracking and rapid raw Bayer block matching. Experiments demonstrated that our system captures motion-invariant images of objects moving at speeds up to 30 km/h.

Short communication: Assessment of activity patterns of growing rabbits in a flux-controlled chamber

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Irene Olivas

2013-06-01

Full Text Available Flux-controlled and metabolic chambers are often used for nutritional and environmental studies. However, the potential alterations of animal behaviour and welfare are so far not fully understood. In consequence, this study had 2 main objectives: to assess potential alterations of animal activity pattern and time budget inside a flux chamber, and to assess the importance of the “rearing up” behaviour. To this end, 10 growing rabbits of different ages (from 1 to 5 wk of the growing period were housed inside a flux chamber. Their activity was continuously recorded and assessed, determining the frequency and duration of 8 different behaviours: lying, sleeping, sitting, eating, drinking, walking, rearing up and others. Nocturnal rabbit behaviour and time budget were not altered inside the chamber if compared to previously described rabbit activity under conventional cages. In addition, rabbits in this experiment presented a tendency to perform “rearing up” when housed inside the flux chamber.

Evaluation of flux-based logic schemes for high-Tc applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fleishman, J.; Feld, D.; Xiao, P.; Van Dazer, T.

1991-01-01

This paper presents analyses of three digital logic families that can be made using nonhysteretic Josephson junctions, potentially the only kind of Josephson device realizable with superconductors having high transition temperatures. These logic families utilize magnetic flux-transfer and are characterized by very low power dissipation. Rapid Single Flux Quantum (RSFQ) and Phase Mode logic are both based on pulse propagation. The Quantum Flux Parametron (QFP) logic family is based on current latching. Simulations of RSFQ, Phase-Mode, and QFP logic families using high-T c junction parameters are presented to demonstrate the compatibility of these logic families with the new perovskite superconductors. The operation of these logic families is analyzed and the advantages and disadvantages of each are discussed

SHREDI, Neutron Flux and Neutron Activation in 2-D Shields by Removal Diffusion

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Daneri, A.; Toselli, G.

1976-01-01

1 - Nature of physical problem solved: SHREDI is a removal - diffusion neutron shielding code. The program computes neutron fluxes and activations in bidimensional sections (x,y or r,z) of the shield. It is also possible to consider shielding points with the same y or z coordinate (mono-dimensional problems). 2 - Method of solution: The integrals which define the removal fluxes are computed in some shield points by means of a particular algorithm based on the Simpson's and trapezoidal rules. For the diffusion calculation the finite difference method is used. The removal sources are interpolated in all diffusion points by Chebyshev polynomials. 3 - Restrictions on the complexity of the problem: Maxima: number of removal energy groups NGR = 40; number of diffusion energy groups NGD = 40; number of the reactor core and shield materials NCMP = 50; number of core mesh points in r (or x) direction for integral calculation = 75; number of core mesh points in z (or y) direction for integral calculation = 75; number of core mesh points in theta (or z) direction for integral calculation = 75; number of shield mesh points for the neutron flux calculation in r (or x) direction NPX = 200; number of shield mesh points for the neutron flux calculation in z (or y) direction NPY = 200; n.b. (NPX * NPY) le 12000

Control of grid integrated voltage source converters under unbalanced conditions: development of an on-line frequency-adaptive virtual flux-based approach

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Suul, Jon Are

2012-03-15

Three-Phase Voltage Source Converters (VSCs) are finding widespread applications in grid integrated power conversion systems. The control systems of such VSCs are in an increasing number of these applications required to operate during voltage disturbances and unbalanced conditions. Control systems designed for grid side voltagesensor-less operation are at the same time becoming attractive due to the continuous drive for cost reduction and increased reliability of VSCs, but are not commonly applied for operation during unbalanced conditions. Methods for voltage-sensor-less grid synchronization and control of VSCs under unbalanced grid voltage conditions will therefore be the main focus of this Thesis. Estimation methods based on the concept of Virtual Flux, considering the integral of the converter voltage in analogy to the flux of an electric machine, are among the simplest and most well known techniques for achieving voltage-sensor-less grid synchronization. Most of the established techniques for Virtual Flux estimation are, however, either sensitive to grid frequency variations or they are not easily adaptable for operation under unbalanced grid voltage conditions. This Thesis addresses both these issues by proposing a simple approach for Virtual Flux estimation by utilizing a frequency-adaptive filter based on a Second Order Generalized Integrator (SOGI). The proposed approach can be used to achieve on-line frequency-adaptive varieties of conventional strategies for Virtual Flux estimation. The main advantage is, however, that the SOGI-based Virtual Flux estimation can be arranged in a structure that achieves inherent symmetrical component sequence separation under unbalanced conditions. The proposed method for Virtual Flux estimation can be used as a general basis for voltage-sensor-less grid synchronization and control during unbalanced conditions. In this Thesis, the estimated Virtual Flux signals are used to develop a flexible strategy for control of active

Formation of a double-decker magnetic flux rope in the sigmoidal solar active region 11520

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Cheng, X.; Ding, M. D.; Zhang, J.; Guo, Y. [School of Astronomy and Space Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093 (China); Sun, X. D. [W. W. Hansen Experimental Physics Laboratory, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305 (United States); Wang, Y. M. [School of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026 (China); Kliem, B. [Institute of Physics and Astronomy, University of Potsdam, D-14476 Potsdam (Germany); Deng, Y. Y., E-mail: xincheng@nju.edu.cn [Key Laboratory of Solar Activity, National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100012 (China)

2014-07-10

In this paper, we address the formation of a magnetic flux rope (MFR) that erupted on 2012 July 12 and caused a strong geomagnetic storm event on July 15. Through analyzing the long-term evolution of the associated active region observed by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly and the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager on board the Solar Dynamics Observatory, it is found that the twisted field of an MFR, indicated by a continuous S-shaped sigmoid, is built up from two groups of sheared arcades near the main polarity inversion line a half day before the eruption. The temperature within the twisted field and sheared arcades is higher than that of the ambient volume, suggesting that magnetic reconnection most likely works there. The driver behind the reconnection is attributed to shearing and converging motions at magnetic footpoints with velocities in the range of 0.1-0.6 km s{sup –1}. The rotation of the preceding sunspot also contributes to the MFR buildup. Extrapolated three-dimensional non-linear force-free field structures further reveal the locations of the reconnection to be in a bald-patch region and in a hyperbolic flux tube. About 2 hr before the eruption, indications of a second MFR in the form of an S-shaped hot channel are seen. It lies above the original MFR that continuously exists and includes a filament. The whole structure thus makes up a stable double-decker MFR system for hours prior to the eruption. Eventually, after entering the domain of instability, the high-lying MFR impulsively erupts to generate a fast coronal mass ejection and X-class flare; while the low-lying MFR remains behind and continuously maintains the sigmoidicity of the active region.

Formation of a double-decker magnetic flux rope in the sigmoidal solar active region 11520

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cheng, X.; Ding, M. D.; Zhang, J.; Guo, Y.; Sun, X. D.; Wang, Y. M.; Kliem, B.; Deng, Y. Y.

2014-01-01

In this paper, we address the formation of a magnetic flux rope (MFR) that erupted on 2012 July 12 and caused a strong geomagnetic storm event on July 15. Through analyzing the long-term evolution of the associated active region observed by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly and the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager on board the Solar Dynamics Observatory, it is found that the twisted field of an MFR, indicated by a continuous S-shaped sigmoid, is built up from two groups of sheared arcades near the main polarity inversion line a half day before the eruption. The temperature within the twisted field and sheared arcades is higher than that of the ambient volume, suggesting that magnetic reconnection most likely works there. The driver behind the reconnection is attributed to shearing and converging motions at magnetic footpoints with velocities in the range of 0.1-0.6 km s –1 . The rotation of the preceding sunspot also contributes to the MFR buildup. Extrapolated three-dimensional non-linear force-free field structures further reveal the locations of the reconnection to be in a bald-patch region and in a hyperbolic flux tube. About 2 hr before the eruption, indications of a second MFR in the form of an S-shaped hot channel are seen. It lies above the original MFR that continuously exists and includes a filament. The whole structure thus makes up a stable double-decker MFR system for hours prior to the eruption. Eventually, after entering the domain of instability, the high-lying MFR impulsively erupts to generate a fast coronal mass ejection and X-class flare; while the low-lying MFR remains behind and continuously maintains the sigmoidicity of the active region.

Characterizing the Motion of Solar Magnetic Bright Points at High Resolution

Science.gov (United States)

Van Kooten, Samuel J.; Cranmer, Steven R.

2017-11-01

Magnetic bright points in the solar photosphere, visible in both continuum and G-band images, indicate footpoints of kilogauss magnetic flux tubes extending to the corona. The power spectrum of bright-point motion is thus also the power spectrum of Alfvén wave excitation, transporting energy up flux tubes into the corona. This spectrum is a key input in coronal and heliospheric models. We produce a power spectrum of bright-point motion using radiative magnetohydrodynamic simulations, exploiting spatial resolution higher than can be obtained in present-day observations, while using automated tracking to produce large data quantities. We find slightly higher amounts of power at all frequencies compared to observation-based spectra, while confirming the spectrum shape of recent observations. This also provides a prediction for observations of bright points with DKIST, which will achieve similar resolution and high sensitivity. We also find a granule size distribution in support of an observed two-population distribution, and we present results from tracking passive tracers, which show a similar power spectrum to that of bright points. Finally, we introduce a simplified, laminar model of granulation, with which we explore the roles of turbulence and of the properties of the granulation pattern in determining bright-point motion.

Enhanced control of DFIG wind turbine based on stator flux decay compensation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zhu, Rongwu; Deng, Fujin; Chen, Zhe

2016-01-01

For the doubly-fed induction generator (DFIG)- based wind energy conversion system (WECS), the decaying flux and negative flux are the main reasons to cause the DFIG rotor overcurrent, during grid faults. The stator decaying flux characteristics versus the depth and instant of the stator voltage...

Ship motion-based wave estimation using a spectral residual-calculation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Ulrik D.; H. Brodtkorb, Astrid

2018-01-01

This paper presents a study focused on a newly developed procedure for wave spectrum estimation using wave-induced motion recordings from a ship. The particular procedure stands out from other existing, similar ship motion-based pro-cedures by its computational efficiency and - at the same time- ...

Using Load Balancing to Scalably Parallelize Sampling-Based Motion Planning Algorithms

KAUST Repository

Fidel, Adam; Jacobs, Sam Ade; Sharma, Shishir; Amato, Nancy M.; Rauchwerger, Lawrence

2014-01-01

Motion planning, which is the problem of computing feasible paths in an environment for a movable object, has applications in many domains ranging from robotics, to intelligent CAD, to protein folding. The best methods for solving this PSPACE-hard problem are so-called sampling-based planners. Recent work introduced uniform spatial subdivision techniques for parallelizing sampling-based motion planning algorithms that scaled well. However, such methods are prone to load imbalance, as planning time depends on region characteristics and, for most problems, the heterogeneity of the sub problems increases as the number of processors increases. In this work, we introduce two techniques to address load imbalance in the parallelization of sampling-based motion planning algorithms: an adaptive work stealing approach and bulk-synchronous redistribution. We show that applying these techniques to representatives of the two major classes of parallel sampling-based motion planning algorithms, probabilistic roadmaps and rapidly-exploring random trees, results in a more scalable and load-balanced computation on more than 3,000 cores. © 2014 IEEE.

Using Load Balancing to Scalably Parallelize Sampling-Based Motion Planning Algorithms

KAUST Repository

Fidel, Adam

2014-05-01

Motion planning, which is the problem of computing feasible paths in an environment for a movable object, has applications in many domains ranging from robotics, to intelligent CAD, to protein folding. The best methods for solving this PSPACE-hard problem are so-called sampling-based planners. Recent work introduced uniform spatial subdivision techniques for parallelizing sampling-based motion planning algorithms that scaled well. However, such methods are prone to load imbalance, as planning time depends on region characteristics and, for most problems, the heterogeneity of the sub problems increases as the number of processors increases. In this work, we introduce two techniques to address load imbalance in the parallelization of sampling-based motion planning algorithms: an adaptive work stealing approach and bulk-synchronous redistribution. We show that applying these techniques to representatives of the two major classes of parallel sampling-based motion planning algorithms, probabilistic roadmaps and rapidly-exploring random trees, results in a more scalable and load-balanced computation on more than 3,000 cores. © 2014 IEEE.

PROMO – Real-time Prospective Motion Correction in MRI using Image-based Tracking

Science.gov (United States)

White, Nathan; Roddey, Cooper; Shankaranarayanan, Ajit; Han, Eric; Rettmann, Dan; Santos, Juan; Kuperman, Josh; Dale, Anders

2010-01-01

Artifacts caused by patient motion during scanning remain a serious problem in most MRI applications. The prospective motion correction technique attempts to address this problem at its source by keeping the measurement coordinate system fixed with respect to the patient throughout the entire scan process. In this study, a new image-based approach for prospective motion correction is described, which utilizes three orthogonal 2D spiral navigator acquisitions (SP-Navs) along with a flexible image-based tracking method based on the Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) algorithm for online motion measurement. The SP-Nav/EKF framework offers the advantages of image-domain tracking within patient-specific regions-of-interest and reduced sensitivity to off-resonance-induced corruption of rigid-body motion estimates. The performance of the method was tested using offline computer simulations and online in vivo head motion experiments. In vivo validation results covering a broad range of staged head motions indicate a steady-state error of the SP-Nav/EKF motion estimates of less than 10 % of the motion magnitude, even for large compound motions that included rotations over 15 degrees. A preliminary in vivo application in 3D inversion recovery spoiled gradient echo (IR-SPGR) and 3D fast spin echo (FSE) sequences demonstrates the effectiveness of the SP-Nav/EKF framework for correcting 3D rigid-body head motion artifacts prospectively in high-resolution 3D MRI scans. PMID:20027635

User-Independent Motion State Recognition Using Smartphone Sensors.

Science.gov (United States)

Gu, Fuqiang; Kealy, Allison; Khoshelham, Kourosh; Shang, Jianga

2015-12-04

The recognition of locomotion activities (e.g., walking, running, still) is important for a wide range of applications like indoor positioning, navigation, location-based services, and health monitoring. Recently, there has been a growing interest in activity recognition using accelerometer data. However, when utilizing only acceleration-based features, it is difficult to differentiate varying vertical motion states from horizontal motion states especially when conducting user-independent classification. In this paper, we also make use of the newly emerging barometer built in modern smartphones, and propose a novel feature called pressure derivative from the barometer readings for user motion state recognition, which is proven to be effective for distinguishing vertical motion states and does not depend on specific users' data. Seven types of motion states are defined and six commonly-used classifiers are compared. In addition, we utilize the motion state history and the characteristics of people's motion to improve the classification accuracies of those classifiers. Experimental results show that by using the historical information and human's motion characteristics, we can achieve user-independent motion state classification with an accuracy of up to 90.7%. In addition, we analyze the influence of the window size and smartphone pose on the accuracy.

User-Independent Motion State Recognition Using Smartphone Sensors

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fuqiang Gu

2015-12-01

Full Text Available The recognition of locomotion activities (e.g., walking, running, still is important for a wide range of applications like indoor positioning, navigation, location-based services, and health monitoring. Recently, there has been a growing interest in activity recognition using accelerometer data. However, when utilizing only acceleration-based features, it is difficult to differentiate varying vertical motion states from horizontal motion states especially when conducting user-independent classification. In this paper, we also make use of the newly emerging barometer built in modern smartphones, and propose a novel feature called pressure derivative from the barometer readings for user motion state recognition, which is proven to be effective for distinguishing vertical motion states and does not depend on specific users’ data. Seven types of motion states are defined and six commonly-used classifiers are compared. In addition, we utilize the motion state history and the characteristics of people’s motion to improve the classification accuracies of those classifiers. Experimental results show that by using the historical information and human’s motion characteristics, we can achieve user-independent motion state classification with an accuracy of up to 90.7%. In addition, we analyze the influence of the window size and smartphone pose on the accuracy.

Does historical wildfire activity alter metal fluxes to northern lakes?

Science.gov (United States)

Pelletier, N.; Chetelat, J.; Vermaire, J. C.; Palmer, M.; Black, J.; Pellisey, J.; Tracz, B.; van der Wielen, S.

2017-12-01

Current drought conditions in northwestern Canada are conducive to more frequent and severe wildfires that may mobilize mercury and other metals accumulated in soil and biomass. There is evidence that wildfires can remobilize and transport mercury within and outside catchments by atmospheric volatilization, particulate emissions and catchment soil erosion. However, the effect of fires on mercury fluxes to nearby lake sediments remains unclear. In this study, we use a combination of 10 dated lake sediment cores and four nearby ombrotrophic peatland cores to investigate the effects of wildfires on mercury fluxes to lake sediments. Lakes varying in catchment size and distance from recent fire events were sampled. Mercury concentrations in the environmental archives were measured, and macroscopic charcoal particles (>100 um) were counted at high resolution in the sediments to observe the co-variation of the local fire history and mercury fluxes. Mercury flux recorded in ombrotrophic peat cores provided an estimate of the historical atmospheric mercury flux from local and regional atmospheric deposition. The mercury flux recorded in lake sediments corresponds to the sum of direct atmospheric deposition and catchment transport. In combination, these archives will allow for the partitioning of mercury loading attributable to catchment transport from direct atmospheric deposition. After correcting the fluxes for particle focusing and terragenic elements input, flux from different lakes will be compared based on their catchment size and their temporal and spatial proximity known fire events. Altogether, our preliminary results using these paleolimnological methods will provide new insights on mercury transport processes that are predicted to become more important under a changing climate.

Vision-based human motion analysis: An overview

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Poppe, Ronald Walter

2007-01-01

Markerless vision-based human motion analysis has the potential to provide an inexpensive, non-obtrusive solution for the estimation of body poses. The significant research effort in this domain has been motivated by the fact that many application areas, including surveillance, Human-Computer

A scheme for PET data normalization in event-based motion correction

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhou, Victor W; Kyme, Andre Z; Fulton, Roger; Meikle, Steven R

2009-01-01

Line of response (LOR) rebinning is an event-based motion-correction technique for positron emission tomography (PET) imaging that has been shown to compensate effectively for rigid motion. It involves the spatial transformation of LORs to compensate for motion during the scan, as measured by a motion tracking system. Each motion-corrected event is then recorded in the sinogram bin corresponding to the transformed LOR. It has been shown previously that the corrected event must be normalized using a normalization factor derived from the original LOR, that is, based on the pair of detectors involved in the original coincidence event. In general, due to data compression strategies (mashing), sinogram bins record events detected on multiple LORs. The number of LORs associated with a sinogram bin determines the relative contribution of each LOR. This paper provides a thorough treatment of event-based normalization during motion correction of PET data using LOR rebinning. We demonstrate theoretically and experimentally that normalization of the corrected event during LOR rebinning should account for the number of LORs contributing to the sinogram bin into which the motion-corrected event is binned. Failure to account for this factor may cause artifactual slice-to-slice count variations in the transverse slices and visible horizontal stripe artifacts in the coronal and sagittal slices of the reconstructed images. The theory and implementation of normalization in conjunction with the LOR rebinning technique is described in detail, and experimental verification of the proposed normalization method in phantom studies is presented.

Active control of divertor heat and particle fluxes in EAST towards advanced steady state operations

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Wang, L., E-mail: lwang@ipp.ac.cn [Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hefei 230031 (China); Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024 (China); Guo, H.Y. [Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hefei 230031 (China); General Atomics, P. O. Box 85608, San Diego, CA 92186 (United States); Li, J.; Wan, B.N.; Gong, X.Z.; Zhang, X.D.; Hu, J.S. [Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hefei 230031 (China); Liang, Y. [Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hefei 230031 (China); Association EURATOM-FZJ, D-52425 Jülich (Germany); Xu, G.S. [Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hefei 230031 (China); Zou, X.L. [CEA, IRFM, F-13108 Saint-Paul-lez-Durance (France); Loarte, A. [ITER Organization, Route de Vinon sur Verdon, 13115 St Paul Lez Durance (France); Maingi, R.; Menard, J.E. [Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Princeton, NJ 08543 (United States); Luo, G.N.; Gao, X.; Hu, L.Q.; Gan, K.F.; Liu, S.C.; Wang, H.Q.; Chen, R. [Institute of Plasma Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hefei 230031 (China); and others

2015-08-15

Significant progress has been made in EAST towards advanced steady state operations by active control of divertor heat and particle fluxes. Many innovative techniques have been developed to mitigate transient ELM and stationary heat fluxes on the divertor target plates. It has been found that lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) can lead to edge plasma ergodization, striation of the stationary heat flux and lower ELM transient heat and particle fluxes. With multi-pulse supersonic molecular beam injection (SMBI) to quantitatively regulate the divertor particle flux, the divertor power footprint pattern can be actively modified. H-modes have been extended over 30 s in EAST with the divertor peak heat flux and the target temperature being controlled well below 2 MW/m{sup 2} and 250 °C, respectively, by integrating these new methods, coupled with advanced lithium wall conditioning and internal divertor pumping, along with an edge coherent mode to provide continuous particle and power exhaust.

Motion Sensor Reactivity in Physically Active Young Adults

Science.gov (United States)

Behrens, Timothy K.; Dinger, Mary K.

2007-01-01

The purpose of this study was to examine whether young adults changed their physical activity (PA) behavior when wearing motion sensors. PA patterns of 119 young adults (M age = 20.82 years, SD = 1.50, M body mass index = 23.93 kg/m[superscript 2] , SD = 4.05) were assessed during 2 consecutive weeks. In Week 1, participants wore an accelerometer.…

Measure of thermal neutron flux in the IPEN/MB-01 reactor using 197 Au wire activation detectors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Marques, Andre Luis Ferreira

1995-01-01

This dissertation has aimed at developing a neutron flux measurement technique by means of detectors activation analysis. The main task of this work was the implementation of this thermal neutron flux measurement technique, using gold wires as activation detectors in the IPEN/MB-01 reactor core. The neutron thermal flux spatial distribution was obtained by gold wire activation technique, with wire diameters of 0.125 mm and 0.250 mm in seven selected reactor experimental channels. The values of thermal flux were about 10 9 neutrons/cm 2 .s. This experiment has been the first one conducted with gold wires in the IPEN/MB-01 reactor, being this technique implemented for use by experiments in flux mapping of the core

Measurement of absolute neutron flux in LWSCR based on the nuclear track method

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sadeghzadeh, J.; Nassiri Mofakham, N.; Khajehmiri, Z.

2012-01-01

Highlights: ► Up to now the spectral parameters of thermal neutrons are measured with activation foils that are not always reliable in low flux systems. ► We applied a solid state nuclear track detector to measure the absolute neutron flux in the light water sub-critical reactor (LWSCR). ► Experiments concerning fission track detecting were performed and were investigated using the Monte Carlo code MCNP. ► The neutron fluxes obtained in experiment are in fairly good agreement with the results obtained by MCNP. - Abstract: In the present paper, a solid state nuclear track detector is applied to measure the absolute neutron flux in the light water sub-critical reactor (LWSCR) in Nuclear Science and Technology Research Institute (NSTRI). Up to now, the spectral parameters of thermal neutrons have been measured with activation foils that are not always reliable in low flux systems. The method investigated here is the irradiation method. Experiments concerning fission track detecting were performed. The experiment including neutron flux calculation method has also been investigated using the Monte Carlo code MCNP. The analysis shows that the values of neutron flux obtained by experiment are in fairly good agreement with the results obtained by MCNP. Thus, this method may be able to predict the absolute value of neutron flux at LWSCR and other similar reactors.

Superluminal motion of extragalactic objects

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Matveenko, L.I. (AN SSSR, Moscow. Inst. Kosmicheskikh Issledovanij)

1983-07-01

Extragalactic objects with active nuclei are reviewed. Experimental data are obtained with the method of superfar radiointerferometry. The main peculiarities of the complex structure of Seyfert galaxies, quasars and lacertae objects are considered: the distribution of radiobrightness, spectra, alteration of the density of radiation flux and the distance between the components of sources. The superluminal velocities of component divergence observed are explained by different reasons: fast motion of components considerable difference of the Hubble component or non-cosmologic nature of the red shift of objects, effect of echoreflection of radiation, gravitation lens, systematic alteration of the optical thickness of the object, synchronouys radiation of electrons in the dipole magnetic field, as well as different kinematic illusions connected with the final time of signal propagation.

Superluminal motion of extragalactic objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Matveenko, L.I.

1983-01-01

Extragalactic objects with active nuclei are reviewed. Experimental data are obtained with the method of superfar radiointerferometry. The main peculiarities of the complex strUcture of Seyfert galaxies quasars and lacertae ob ects are considered: the distribution of radiobrightness, spectra, alteration of the density of radiation flux and the distance between the components of sources. The superluminal velocities of component divergence observed are explained by different reasons: fast motion of components considerable difference of the Hubble component or non-cosmologic nature of the red shift of objects, effect of echoreflection of radiation, gravitation lens, systematic alteration of the optical thickness of the object, synchronoUs radiation of electrons in the dipole magnetic field, as well as different kinematic illusions connected with the final time of signal propagation

Determination of average activating thermal neutron flux in bulk samples

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Doczi, R.; Csikai, J.; Doczi, R.; Csikai, J.; Hassan, F. M.; Ali, M.A.

2004-01-01

A previous method used for the determination of the average neutron flux within bulky samples has been applied for the measurements of hydrogen contents of different samples. An analytical function is given for the description of the correlation between the activity of Dy foils and the hydrogen concentrations. Results obtained by the activation and the thermal neutron reflection methods are compared

From elementary flux modes to elementary flux vectors: Metabolic pathway analysis with arbitrary linear flux constraints

Science.gov (United States)

Klamt, Steffen; Gerstl, Matthias P.; Jungreuthmayer, Christian; Mahadevan, Radhakrishnan; Müller, Stefan

2017-01-01

Elementary flux modes (EFMs) emerged as a formal concept to describe metabolic pathways and have become an established tool for constraint-based modeling and metabolic network analysis. EFMs are characteristic (support-minimal) vectors of the flux cone that contains all feasible steady-state flux vectors of a given metabolic network. EFMs account for (homogeneous) linear constraints arising from reaction irreversibilities and the assumption of steady state; however, other (inhomogeneous) linear constraints, such as minimal and maximal reaction rates frequently used by other constraint-based techniques (such as flux balance analysis [FBA]), cannot be directly integrated. These additional constraints further restrict the space of feasible flux vectors and turn the flux cone into a general flux polyhedron in which the concept of EFMs is not directly applicable anymore. For this reason, there has been a conceptual gap between EFM-based (pathway) analysis methods and linear optimization (FBA) techniques, as they operate on different geometric objects. One approach to overcome these limitations was proposed ten years ago and is based on the concept of elementary flux vectors (EFVs). Only recently has the community started to recognize the potential of EFVs for metabolic network analysis. In fact, EFVs exactly represent the conceptual development required to generalize the idea of EFMs from flux cones to flux polyhedra. This work aims to present a concise theoretical and practical introduction to EFVs that is accessible to a broad audience. We highlight the close relationship between EFMs and EFVs and demonstrate that almost all applications of EFMs (in flux cones) are possible for EFVs (in flux polyhedra) as well. In fact, certain properties can only be studied with EFVs. Thus, we conclude that EFVs provide a powerful and unifying framework for constraint-based modeling of metabolic networks. PMID:28406903

Examination of faults active motion on buried pipelines | Parish ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

... lateral spreading, landslides and slope failures. Since the pipelines are widely spread, and in some areas necessarily cross through the areas with faults, therefore, improvement study of pipelines in areas with faults is very important. This article explores faults active motion on buried pipelines. Keywords: water utilities ...

Hand Motion-Based Remote Control Interface with Vibrotactile Feedback for Home Robots

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Juan Wu

2013-06-01

Full Text Available This paper presents the design and implementation of a hand-held interface system for the locomotion control of home robots. A handheld controller is proposed to implement hand motion recognition and hand motion-based robot control. The handheld controller can provide a ‘connect-and-play’ service for the users to control the home robot with visual and vibrotactile feedback. Six natural hand gestures are defined for navigating the home robots. A three-axis accelerometer is used to detect the hand motions of the user. The recorded acceleration data are analysed and classified to corresponding control commands according to their characteristic curves. A vibration motor is used to provide vibrotactile feedback to the user when an improper operation is performed. The performances of the proposed hand motion-based interface and the traditional keyboard and mouse interface have been compared in robot navigation experiments. The experimental results of home robot navigation show that the success rate of the handheld controller is 13.33% higher than the PC based controller. The precision of the handheld controller is 15.4% more than that of the PC and the execution time is 24.7% less than the PC based controller. This means that the proposed hand motion-based interface is more efficient and flexible.

Simulation of spatiotemporal CT data sets using a 4D MRI-based lung motion model.

Science.gov (United States)

Marx, Mirko; Ehrhardt, Jan; Werner, René; Schlemmer, Heinz-Peter; Handels, Heinz

2014-05-01

Four-dimensional CT imaging is widely used to account for motion-related effects during radiotherapy planning of lung cancer patients. However, 4D CT often contains motion artifacts, cannot be used to measure motion variability, and leads to higher dose exposure. In this article, we propose using 4D MRI to acquire motion information for the radiotherapy planning process. From the 4D MRI images, we derive a time-continuous model of the average patient-specific respiratory motion, which is then applied to simulate 4D CT data based on a static 3D CT. The idea of the motion model is to represent the average lung motion over a respiratory cycle by cyclic B-spline curves. The model generation consists of motion field estimation in the 4D MRI data by nonlinear registration, assigning respiratory phases to the motion fields, and applying a B-spline approximation on a voxel-by-voxel basis to describe the average voxel motion over a breathing cycle. To simulate a patient-specific 4D CT based on a static CT of the patient, a multi-modal registration strategy is introduced to transfer the motion model from MRI to the static CT coordinates. Differences between model-based estimated and measured motion vectors are on average 1.39 mm for amplitude-based binning of the 4D MRI data of three patients. In addition, the MRI-to-CT registration strategy is shown to be suitable for the model transformation. The application of our 4D MRI-based motion model for simulating 4D CT images provides advantages over standard 4D CT (less motion artifacts, radiation-free). This makes it interesting for radiotherapy planning.

Applications of Phase-Based Motion Processing

Science.gov (United States)

Branch, Nicholas A.; Stewart, Eric C.

2018-01-01

Image pyramids provide useful information in determining structural response at low cost using commercially available cameras. The current effort applies previous work on the complex steerable pyramid to analyze and identify imperceptible linear motions in video. Instead of implicitly computing motion spectra through phase analysis of the complex steerable pyramid and magnifying the associated motions, instead present a visual technique and the necessary software to display the phase changes of high frequency signals within video. The present technique quickly identifies regions of largest motion within a video with a single phase visualization and without the artifacts of motion magnification, but requires use of the computationally intensive Fourier transform. While Riesz pyramids present an alternative to the computationally intensive complex steerable pyramid for motion magnification, the Riesz formulation contains significant noise, and motion magnification still presents large amounts of data that cannot be quickly assessed by the human eye. Thus, user-friendly software is presented for quickly identifying structural response through optical flow and phase visualization in both Python and MATLAB.

Gamma-ray-spectroscopy following high-flux 14-MeV neutron activation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Williams, R.E.

1981-01-01

The Rotating Target Neutron Source (RTNS-I), a high-intensity source of 14-MeV neutrons at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), has been used for applications in activation analysis, inertial-confinement-fusion diagnostic development, and fission decay-heat studies. The fast-neutron flux from the RTNS-I is at least 50 times the maximum fluxes available from typical neutron generators, making these applications possible. Facilities and procedures necessary for gamma-ray spectroscopy of samples irradiated at the RTNS-I were developed

Gamma-ray-spectroscopy following high-flux 14-MeV neutron activation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Williams, R.E.

1981-10-12

The Rotating Target Neutron Source (RTNS-I), a high-intensity source of 14-MeV neutrons at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), has been used for applications in activation analysis, inertial-confinement-fusion diagnostic development, and fission decay-heat studies. The fast-neutron flux from the RTNS-I is at least 50 times the maximum fluxes available from typical neutron generators, making these applications possible. Facilities and procedures necessary for gamma-ray spectroscopy of samples irradiated at the RTNS-I were developed.

Mobile technology and telemedicine for shoulder range of motion: validation of a motion-based machine-learning software development kit.

Science.gov (United States)

Ramkumar, Prem N; Haeberle, Heather S; Navarro, Sergio M; Sultan, Assem A; Mont, Michael A; Ricchetti, Eric T; Schickendantz, Mark S; Iannotti, Joseph P

2018-03-07

Mobile technology offers the prospect of delivering high-value care with increased patient access and reduced costs. Advances in mobile health (mHealth) and telemedicine have been inhibited by the lack of interconnectivity between devices and software and inability to process consumer sensor data. The objective of this study was to preliminarily validate a motion-based machine learning software development kit (SDK) for the shoulder compared with a goniometer for 4 arcs of motion: (1) abduction, (2) forward flexion, (3) internal rotation, and (4) external rotation. A mobile application for the SDK was developed and "taught" 4 arcs of shoulder motion. Ten subjects without shoulder pain or prior shoulder surgery performed the arcs of motion for 5 repetitions. Each motion was measured by the SDK and compared with a physician-measured manual goniometer measurement. Angular differences between SDK and goniometer measurements were compared with univariate and power analyses. The comparison between the SDK and goniometer measurement detected a mean difference of less than 5° for all arcs of motion (P > .05), with a 94% chance of detecting a large effect size from a priori power analysis. Mean differences for the arcs of motion were: abduction, -3.7° ± 3.2°; forward flexion, -4.9° ± 2.5°; internal rotation, -2.4° ± 3.7°; and external rotation -2.6° ± 3.4°. The SDK has the potential to remotely substitute for a shoulder range of motion examination within 5° of goniometer measurements. An open-source motion-based SDK that can learn complex movements, including clinical shoulder range of motion, from consumer sensors offers promise for the future of mHealth, particularly in telemonitoring before and after orthopedic surgery. Copyright © 2018 Journal of Shoulder and Elbow Surgery Board of Trustees. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

A Comparison of the Performance Improvement by Collocated and Noncollocated Active Damping in Motion Systems

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Babakhani, B.; de Vries, Theodorus J.A.; van Amerongen, J.

2012-01-01

In this paper, both collocated and noncollocated active vibration control (AVC) of a the vibrations in a motion system are considered. Pole-zero plots of both the AVC loop and the motion-control (MC) loop are used to analyze the effect of the applied active damping on the system dynamics. Using

Parkinson-related changes of activation in visuomotor brain regions during perceived forward self-motion.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anouk van der Hoorn

Full Text Available Radial expanding optic flow is a visual consequence of forward locomotion. Presented on screen, it generates illusionary forward self-motion, pointing at a close vision-gait interrelation. As particularly parkinsonian gait is vulnerable to external stimuli, effects of optic flow on motor-related cerebral circuitry were explored with functional magnetic resonance imaging in healthy controls (HC and patients with Parkinson's disease (PD. Fifteen HC and 22 PD patients, of which 7 experienced freezing of gait (FOG, watched wide-field flow, interruptions by narrowing or deceleration and equivalent control conditions with static dots. Statistical parametric mapping revealed that wide-field flow interruption evoked activation of the (pre-supplementary motor area (SMA in HC, which was decreased in PD. During wide-field flow, dorsal occipito-parietal activations were reduced in PD relative to HC, with stronger functional connectivity between right visual motion area V5, pre-SMA and cerebellum (in PD without FOG. Non-specific 'changes' in stimulus patterns activated dorsolateral fronto-parietal regions and the fusiform gyrus. This attention-associated network was stronger activated in HC than in PD. PD patients thus appeared compromised in recruiting medial frontal regions facilitating internally generated virtual locomotion when visual motion support falls away. Reduced dorsal visual and parietal activations during wide-field optic flow in PD were explained by impaired feedforward visual and visuomotor processing within a magnocellular (visual motion functional chain. Compensation of impaired feedforward processing by distant fronto-cerebellar circuitry in PD is consistent with motor responses to visual motion stimuli being either too strong or too weak. The 'change'-related activations pointed at covert (stimulus-driven attention.

Base response arising from free-field motions

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Whitley, J.R.; Morgan, J.R.; Hall, W.J.; Newmark, N.M.

1977-01-01

A procedure is illustrated in this paper for deriving (estimating) from a free-field record the horizontal base motions of a building, including horizontal rotation and translation. More specifically the goal was to compare results of response calculations based on derived accelerations with the results of calculations based on recorded accelerations. The motions are determined by assuming that an actual recorded ground wave transits a rigid base of a given dimension. Calculations given in the paper were made employing the earthquake acceleration time histories of the Hollywood storage building and the adjacent P.E. lot for the Kern County (1952) and San Fernando (1971) earthquakes. For the Kern County earthquake the derived base corner accelerations, including the effect of rotation show generally fair agreement with the spectra computed from the Hollywood storage corner record. For the San Fernando earthquake the agreement between the spectra computed from derived base corner accelerations and that computed from the actual basement corner record is not as good as that for the Kern County earthquake. These limited studies admittedly are hardly a sufficient basis on which to form a judgment, but these differences noted probably can be attributed in part to foundation distortion, building feedback, distance between measurement points, and soil structure interaction; it was not possible to take any of these factors into account in these particular calculations

Ego-motion based on EM for bionic navigation

Science.gov (United States)

Yue, Xiaofeng; Wang, L. J.; Liu, J. G.

2015-12-01

Researches have proved that flying insects such as bees can achieve efficient and robust flight control, and biologists have explored some biomimetic principles regarding how they control flight. Based on those basic studies and principles acquired from the flying insects, this paper proposes a different solution of recovering ego-motion for low level navigation. Firstly, a new type of entropy flow is provided to calculate the motion parameters. Secondly, EKF, which has been used for navigation for some years to correct accumulated error, and estimation-Maximization, which is always used to estimate parameters, are put together to determine the ego-motion estimation of aerial vehicles. Numerical simulation on MATLAB has proved that this navigation system provides more accurate position and smaller mean absolute error than pure optical flow navigation. This paper has done pioneering work in bionic mechanism to space navigation.

Complex Human Activity Recognition Using Smartphone and Wrist-Worn Motion Sensors

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Shoaib, M.; Bosch, S.; Durmaz, O.; Scholten, Johan; Havinga, Paul J.M.

2016-01-01

The position of on-body motion sensors plays an important role in human activity recognition. Most often, mobile phone sensors at the trouser pocket or an equivalent position are used for this purpose. However, this position is not suitable for recognizing activities that involve hand gestures, such

Orbit-attitude coupled motion around small bodies: Sun-synchronous orbits with Sun-tracking attitude motion

Science.gov (United States)

Kikuchi, Shota; Howell, Kathleen C.; Tsuda, Yuichi; Kawaguchi, Jun'ichiro

2017-11-01

The motion of a spacecraft in proximity to a small body is significantly perturbed due to its irregular gravity field and solar radiation pressure. In such a strongly perturbed environment, the coupling effect of the orbital and attitude motions exerts a large influence that cannot be neglected. However, natural orbit-attitude coupled dynamics around small bodies that are stationary in both orbital and attitude motions have yet to be observed. The present study therefore investigates natural coupled motion that involves both a Sun-synchronous orbit and Sun-tracking attitude motion. This orbit-attitude coupled motion enables a spacecraft to maintain its orbital geometry and attitude state with respect to the Sun without requiring active control. Therefore, the proposed method can reduce the use of an orbit and attitude control system. This paper first presents analytical conditions to achieve Sun-synchronous orbits and Sun-tracking attitude motion. These analytical solutions are then numerically propagated based on non-linear coupled orbit-attitude equations of motion. Consequently, the possibility of implementing Sun-synchronous orbits with Sun-tracking attitude motion is demonstrated.

Reliable selection of earthquake ground motions for performance-based design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Katsanos, Evangelos; Sextos, A.G.

2016-01-01

A decision support process is presented to accommodate selecting and scaling of earthquake motions as required for the time domain analysis of structures. Prequalified code-compatible suites of seismic motions are provided through a multi-criterion approach to satisfy prescribed reduced variability...... of the method, by being subjected to numerous suites of motions that were highly ranked according to both the proposed approach (δsv-sc) and the conventional index (δconv), already used by most existing code-based earthquake records selection and scaling procedures. The findings reveal the superiority...

Modelling, Simulation and Testing of a Reconfigurable Cable-Based Parallel Manipulator as Motion Aiding System

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gianni Castelli

2010-01-01

Full Text Available This paper presents results on the modelling, simulation and experimental tests of a cable-based parallel manipulator to be used as an aiding or guiding system for people with motion disabilities. There is a high level of motivation for people with a motion disability or the elderly to perform basic daily-living activities independently. Therefore, it is of great interest to design and implement safe and reliable motion assisting and guiding devices that are able to help end-users. In general, a robot for a medical application should be able to interact with a patient in safety conditions, i.e. it must not damage people or surroundings; it must be designed to guarantee high accuracy and low acceleration during the operation. Furthermore, it should not be too bulky and it should exert limited wrenches after close interaction with people. It can be advisable to have a portable system which can be easily brought into and assembled in a hospital or a domestic environment. Cable-based robotic structures can fulfil those requirements because of their main characteristics that make them light and intrinsically safe. In this paper, a reconfigurable four-cable-based parallel manipulator has been proposed as a motion assisting and guiding device to help people to accomplish a number of tasks, such as an aiding or guiding system to move the upper and lower limbs or the whole body. Modelling and simulation are presented in the ADAMS environment. Moreover, experimental tests are reported as based on an available laboratory prototype.

Neutron flux variations near the Earth’s crust. A possible tectonic activity detection

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B. M. Kuzhevskij

2003-01-01

Full Text Available The present work contains some results of observations of neutron flux variations near the Earth’s surface. The Earth’s crust is determined to be a significant source of thermal and slow neutrons, originated from the interaction between the nuclei of the elements of the Earth’s crust and the atmosphere and α-particles, produced by decay of radioactive gases (Radon, Thoron and Actinon. In turn, variations of radioactive gases exhalation is connected with geodynamical processes in the Earth’s crust, including tectonic activity. This determined relation between the processes in the Earth’s crust and neutrons’ flux allow to use variations of thermal and slow neutrons’ flux in order to observe increasing tectonic activity and to develop methods for short-term prediction of natural hazards.

Analysis of nematode motion using an improved light-scatter based system.

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Chuck S Nutting

2015-02-01

Full Text Available The detailed assessment of nematode activity and viability still remains a relatively undeveloped area of biological and medical research. Computer-based approaches to assessing the motility of larger nematode stages have been developed, yet these lack the capability to detect and analyze the more subtle and important characteristics of the motion of nematodes. There is currently a need to improved methods of assessing the viability and health of parasitic worms.We describe here a system that converts the motion of nematodes through a light-scattering system into an electrical waveform, and allows for reproducible, and wholly non-subjective, assessment of alterations in motion, as well as estimation of the number of nematode worms of different forms and sizes. Here we have used Brugia sp. microfilariae (L1, infective larvae (L3 and adults, together with the free-living nematode Caenorhabditis elegans.The motion of worms in a small (200 ul volume can be detected, with the presence of immotile worms not interfering with the readings at practical levels (up to at least 500 L1 /200 ul. Alterations in the frequency of parasite movement following the application of the anti-parasitic drugs, (chloroquine and imatinib; the anti-filarial effect of the latter agent is the first demonstrated here for the first time. This system can also be used to estimate the number of parasites, and shortens the time required to estimate parasites numbers, and eliminates the need for microscopes and trained technicians to provide an estimate of microfilarial sample sizes up to 1000 parasites/ml. Alterations in the form of motion of the worms can also be depicted.This new instrument, named a "WiggleTron", offers exciting opportunities to further study nematode biology and to aid drug discovery, as well as contributing to a rapid estimate of parasite numbers in various biological samples.

Solar activity associated with an unusual series of microwave flux decreases

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sawyer, C.

1976-01-01

East-limb passage of an activity complex in the spring of 1974 was accompanied by a remarkable series of microwave flux decreases. Within an interval of four days, two post-burst decreases and five 'absorption' events occurred, along with two oscillations. Hα patrol films and a spectrogram show a surge and flare sprays with an unusually large velocity of approach at the time of the first post-burst decrease. Two other 'absorption' events were loosely associated with prominence activations, but no outstanding Hα activity was seen at the time of the oscillations. These observations, along with published data, show that the flux decreases followed only flares that lay westward of the major microwave source; ejections from this location would likely have overlain the source while the region was near the east limb. Absorption by flare-ejected material is a plausible, though not exclusive, explanation of these events. (author)

Unfolded ANO-1 fluxes using the LEPRICON methodology

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wagschal, J.J.; Maerker, R.E.; Broadhead, B.L.; Williams, M.L.

1985-01-01

Calculated fluxes at a one-quarter depth midplane location in the pressure vessel of the ANO-1 reactor were adjusted using the LEPRICON methodology. The adjustment was based on the LEPRICON benchmark database in combination with the ANO-1 cavity activation measurements. The LEPRICON database has been expanded and now also includes the PSF field, of which the analysis has been recently completed. The measured, calculated and adjusted ANO-1 activations are presented together with their corresponding uncertainties. However, the main purpose of this work is to obtain more credible flux values in the pressure vessel. The pressure-vessel flux adjustments and the reduction in the pressure vessel flux uncertainties are elaborated on in the concluding section

Self-organized critical behavior in pinned flux lattices

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pla, O.; Nori, F.

1991-01-01

We study the response of pinned fluxed lattices, under small perturbations in the driving force, below and close to the pinning-depinning transition. For driving Lorentz forces below F c (the depinning force at which the whole flux lattice slides), the system has instabilities against small force increases, with a power-law distribution characteristic of self-organized criticality. Specifically, D(d)∼d -1,3 , where d is the displacement of a flux line after a very small force increase. We also study the initial stages of the motion of the lattice once the driving force overcomes the pinning forces

Strong ground motion prediction applying dynamic rupture simulations for Beppu-Haneyama Active Fault Zone, southwestern Japan

Science.gov (United States)

Yoshimi, M.; Matsushima, S.; Ando, R.; Miyake, H.; Imanishi, K.; Hayashida, T.; Takenaka, H.; Suzuki, H.; Matsuyama, H.

2017-12-01

We conducted strong ground motion prediction for the active Beppu-Haneyama Fault zone (BHFZ), Kyushu island, southwestern Japan. Since the BHFZ runs through Oita and Beppy cities, strong ground motion as well as fault displacement may affect much to the cities.We constructed a 3-dimensional velocity structure of a sedimentary basin, Beppu bay basin, where the fault zone runs through and Oita and Beppu cities are located. Minimum shear wave velocity of the 3d model is 500 m/s. Additional 1-d structure is modeled for sites with softer sediment: holocene plain area. We observed, collected, and compiled data obtained from microtremor surveys, ground motion observations, boreholes etc. phase velocity and H/V ratio. Finer structure of the Oita Plain is modeled, as 250m-mesh model, with empirical relation among N-value, lithology, depth and Vs, using borehole data, then validated with the phase velocity data obtained by the dense microtremor array observation (Yoshimi et al., 2016).Synthetic ground motion has been calculated with a hybrid technique composed of a stochastic Green's function method (for HF wave), a 3D finite difference (LF wave) and 1D amplification calculation. Fault geometry has been determined based on reflection surveys and active fault map. The rake angles are calculated with a dynamic rupture simulation considering three fault segments under a stress filed estimated from source mechanism of earthquakes around the faults (Ando et al., JpGU-AGU2017). Fault parameters such as the average stress drop, a size of asperity etc. are determined based on an empirical relation proposed by Irikura and Miyake (2001). As a result, strong ground motion stronger than 100 cm/s is predicted in the hanging wall side of the Oita plain.This work is supported by the Comprehensive Research on the Beppu-Haneyama Fault Zone funded by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT), Japan.

Evidence of small-scale magnetic concentrations dragged by vortex motion of solar photospheric plasma

Science.gov (United States)

Balmaceda, L.; Vargas Domínguez, S.; Palacios, J.; Cabello, I.; Domingo, V.

2010-04-01

Vortex-type motions have been measured by tracking bright points in high-resolution observations of the solar photosphere. These small-scale motions are thought to be determinant in the evolution of magnetic footpoints and their interaction with plasma and therefore likely to play a role in heating the upper solar atmosphere by twisting magnetic flux tubes. We report the observation of magnetic concentrations being dragged towards the center of a convective vortex motion in the solar photosphere from high-resolution ground-based and space-borne data. We describe this event by analyzing a series of images at different solar atmospheric layers. By computing horizontal proper motions, we detect a vortex whose center appears to be the draining point for the magnetic concentrations detected in magnetograms and well-correlated with the locations of bright points seen in G-band and CN images.

Automatic Motion Generation for Robotic Milling Optimizing Stiffness with Sample-Based Planning

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Julian Ricardo Diaz Posada

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Optimal and intuitive robotic machining is still a challenge. One of the main reasons for this is the lack of robot stiffness, which is also dependent on the robot positioning in the Cartesian space. To make up for this deficiency and with the aim of increasing robot machining accuracy, this contribution describes a solution approach for optimizing the stiffness over a desired milling path using the free degree of freedom of the machining process. The optimal motion is computed based on the semantic and mathematical interpretation of the manufacturing process modeled on its components: product, process and resource; and by configuring automatically a sample-based motion problem and the transition-based rapid-random tree algorithm for computing an optimal motion. The approach is simulated on a CAM software for a machining path revealing its functionality and outlining future potentials for the optimal motion generation for robotic machining processes.

FPGA-based architecture for motion recovering in real-time

Science.gov (United States)

Arias-Estrada, Miguel; Maya-Rueda, Selene E.; Torres-Huitzil, Cesar

2002-03-01

A key problem in the computer vision field is the measurement of object motion in a scene. The main goal is to compute an approximation of the 3D motion from the analysis of an image sequence. Once computed, this information can be used as a basis to reach higher level goals in different applications. Motion estimation algorithms pose a significant computational load for the sequential processors limiting its use in practical applications. In this work we propose a hardware architecture for motion estimation in real time based on FPGA technology. The technique used for motion estimation is Optical Flow due to its accuracy, and the density of velocity estimation, however other techniques are being explored. The architecture is composed of parallel modules working in a pipeline scheme to reach high throughput rates near gigaflops. The modules are organized in a regular structure to provide a high degree of flexibility to cover different applications. Some results will be presented and the real-time performance will be discussed and analyzed. The architecture is prototyped in an FPGA board with a Virtex device interfaced to a digital imager.

Filament Activation in Response to Magnetic Flux Emergence and Cancellation in Filament Channels

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Ting; Zhang, Jun; Ji, Haisheng

2015-06-01

We conducted a comparative analysis of two filaments that showed a quite different activation in response to the flux emergence within the filament channels. The observations from the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and Global Oscillation Network Group (GONG) were made to analyze the two filaments on 2013 August 17 - 20 (SOL2013-08-17) and September 29 (SOL2013-09-29). The first event showed that the main body of the filament was separated into two parts when an active region (AR) emerged with a maximum magnetic flux of about 6.4×1021 Mx underlying the filament. The close neighborhood and common direction of the bright threads in the filament and the open AR fan loops suggest a similar magnetic connectivity of these two flux systems. The equilibrium of the filament was not destroyed three days after the start of the emergence of the AR. To our knowledge, similar observations have never been reported before. In the second event, the emerging flux occurred nearby a barb of the filament with a maximum magnetic flux of 4.2×1020 Mx, about one order of magnitude lower than that of the first event. Two patches of parasitic polarity in the vicinity of the barb merged, then cancelled with nearby network fields. About 20 hours after the onset of the emergence, the filament erupted. Our findings imply that the location of emerging flux within the filament channel is probably crucial to filament evolution. If the flux emergence appears nearby the barbs, it is highly likely that the emerging flux and the filament magnetic fields will cancel, which may lead to the eruption of the filament. The comparison of the two events shows that the emergence of a small AR may still not be enough to disrupt the stability of a filament system, and the actual eruption only occurs after the flux cancellation sets in.

Critical currents and thermally activated flux motion in high-temperature superconductors

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Palstra, T.T.M.; Batlogg, B.; Dover, R.B. van; Schneemeyer, L.F.; Waszczak, J.V.

1989-01-01

We have measured the resistance below Tc of single crystals of the high-temperature superconductors Ba2YCu3O7 and Bi2.2Sr2Ca0.8Cu2O8+δ in magnetic fields up to 12 T. The resistive transition of both compounds is dominated by intrinsic dissipation which is thermally activated, resulting in an

Vocal fold motion outcome based on excellent prognosis with laryngeal electromyography.

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, Libby J; Rosen, Clark A; Munin, Michael C

2016-10-01

As laryngeal electromyography (LEMG) becomes more refined, accurate predictions of vocal fold motion recovery are possible. Focus has been on outcomes for patients with poor prognosis for vocal fold motion recovery. Limited information is available regarding the expected rate of purposeful vocal fold motion recovery when there is good to normal motor recruitment, no signs of denervation, and no signs of synkinetic activity with LEMG, termed excellent prognosis. The objective of this study is to determine the rate of vocal fold motion recovery with excellent prognosis findings on LEMG after acute recurrent laryngeal nerve injury. Retrospective review. Patients undergoing a standardized LEMG protocol, consisting of qualitative (evaluation of motor recruitment, motor unit configuration, detection of fibrillations, presence of synkinesis) and quantitative (turns analysis) measurements were evaluated for purposeful vocal-fold motion recovery, calculated after at least 6 months since onset of injury. Twenty-three patients who underwent LEMG for acute vocal fold paralysis met the inclusion criteria of excellent prognosis. Eighteen patients (78.3%) recovered vocal fold motion, as determined by flexible laryngoscopy. Nearly 80% of patients determined to have excellent prognosis for vocal fold motion recovery experienced return of vocal fold motion. This information will help clinicians not only counsel their patients on expectations but will also help guide treatment. 4. Laryngoscope, 126:2310-2314, 2016. © 2016 The American Laryngological, Rhinological and Otological Society, Inc.

Residual Motion and Duty Time in Respiratory Gating Radiotherapy Using Individualized or Population-Based Windows

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Fuji, Hiroshi; Asada, Yoshihiro; Numano, Masumi; Yamashita, Haruo; Nishimura, Tetsuo; Hashimoto, Takayuki; Harada, Hideyuki; Asakura, Hirofumi; Murayama, Shigeyuki

2009-01-01

Purpose: The efficiency and precision of respiratory gated radiation therapy for tumors is affected by variations in respiration-induced tumor motion. We evaluated the use of individualized and population-based parameters for such treatment. Methods and Materials: External respiratory signal records and images of respiration-induced tumor motion were obtained from 42 patients undergoing respiratory gated radiation therapy for liver tumors. Gating window widths were calculated for each patient, with 2, 4, and 10 mm of residual motion, and the mean was defined as the population-based window width. Residual motions based on population-based and predefined window widths were compared. Duty times based on whole treatment sessions, at various window levels, were calculated. The window level giving the longest duty time was defined as the individualized most efficient level (MEL). MELs were also calculated based on the first 10 breathing cycles. The duty times for population-based MELs (defined as mean MELs) and individualized MELs were compared. Results: Tracks of respiration-induced tumor motion ranged from 3 to 50 mm. Half of the patients had larger actual residual motions than the assigned residual motions. Duty times were greater when based on individualized, rather than population-based, window widths. The MELs established during whole treatment sessions for 2 mm and 4 mm of residual motion gave significantly increased duty times, whereas those calculated using the first 10 breathing cycles showed only marginal increases. Conclusions: Using individualized window widths and levels provided more precise and efficient respiratory gated radiation therapy. However, methods for predicting individualized window levels before treatment remain to be explored.

State Generation Method for Humanoid Motion Planning Based on Genetic Algorithm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Xuyang Wang

2012-05-01

Full Text Available A new approach to generate the original motion data for humanoid motion planning is presented in this paper. And a state generator is developed based on the genetic algorithm, which enables users to generate various motion states without using any reference motion data. By specifying various types of constraints such as configuration constraints and contact constraints, the state generator can generate stable states that satisfy the constraint conditions for humanoid robots. To deal with the multiple constraints and inverse kinematics, the state generation is finally simplified as a problem of optimizing and searching. In our method, we introduce a convenient mathematic representation for the constraints involved in the state generator, and solve the optimization problem with the genetic algorithm to acquire a desired state. To demonstrate the effectiveness and advantage of the method, a number of motion states are generated according to the requirements of the motion.

State Generation Method for Humanoid Motion Planning Based on Genetic Algorithm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Xuyang Wang

2008-11-01

Full Text Available A new approach to generate the original motion data for humanoid motion planning is presented in this paper. And a state generator is developed based on the genetic algorithm, which enables users to generate various motion states without using any reference motion data. By specifying various types of constraints such as configuration constraints and contact constraints, the state generator can generate stable states that satisfy the constraint conditions for humanoid robots.To deal with the multiple constraints and inverse kinematics, the state generation is finally simplified as a problem of optimizing and searching. In our method, we introduce a convenient mathematic representation for the constraints involved in the state generator, and solve the optimization problem with the genetic algorithm to acquire a desired state. To demonstrate the effectiveness and advantage of the method, a number of motion states are generated according to the requirements of the motion.

Alpha motion based on a motion detector, but not on the Müller-Lyer illusion

Science.gov (United States)

Suzuki, Masahiro

2014-07-01

This study examined the mechanism of alpha motion, the apparent motion of the Müller-Lyer figure's shaft that occurs when the arrowheads and arrow tails are alternately presented. The following facts were found: (a) reduced exposure duration decreased the amount of alpha motion, and this phenomenon was not explainable by the amount of the Müller-Lyer illusion; (b) the motion aftereffect occurred after adaptation to alpha motion; (c) occurrence of alpha motion became difficult when the temporal frequency increased, and this characteristic of alpha motion was similar to the characteristic of a motion detector that motion detection became difficult when the temporal frequency increased from the optimal frequency. These findings indicated that alpha motion occurs on the basis of a motion detector but not on the Müller-Lyer illusion, and that the mechanism of alpha motion is the same as that of general motion perception.

A review of land-based greenhouse gas flux estimates in Indonesia

Science.gov (United States)

Austin, Kemen G.; Harris, Nancy L.; Wijaya, Arief; Murdiyarso, Daniel; Harvey, Tom; Stolle, Fred; Kasibhatla, Prasad S.

2018-05-01

This study examines underlying reasons for differences among land-based greenhouse gas flux estimates in Indonesia, where six national inventories reported average emissions of between 0.4 and 1.1 Gt CO2e yr‑1 over the 2000–2012 period. The large range among estimates is only somewhat smaller than Indonesia’s GHG mitigation commitment. To determine the reasons for these differences, we compared input data and estimation methods, including the definitions and assumptions used for setting accounting boundaries, including emitting activities, incorporating fluxes from various carbon pools, and handling legacy fluxes. We also tested the sensitivity of methodological differences by generating our own reference emissions estimate and iteratively modifying individual components of the inventory. We found that the largest changes stem from the inclusion of legacy GHG emissions due to peat drainage (which increased emissions by at least +94% compared to the reference), methane emissions due to peat fires (+35%), and GHG emissions from belowground biomass and necromass carbon pools (+61%), modifications to assumptions of the mass of fuel burnt in peat fire events (+88%), and accounting for regrowth following a deforestation event (‑31%). These differences cumulatively explain more than half of the observed difference among inventory estimates. Understanding the various approaches to emissions estimation, and how these influence the magnitude of component GHG fluxes, is an important first step towards reconciling GHG inventories. The Indonesian government’s success in achieving its mitigation goal will depend on its ability to measure progress and evaluate the effectiveness of abatement actions, for which reliable harmonized greenhouse gas inventories are an essential foundation.

A unified internal model theory to resolve the paradox of active versus passive self-motion sensation.

Science.gov (United States)

Laurens, Jean; Angelaki, Dora E

2017-10-18

Brainstem and cerebellar neurons implement an internal model to accurately estimate self-motion during externally generated ('passive') movements. However, these neurons show reduced responses during self-generated ('active') movements, indicating that predicted sensory consequences of motor commands cancel sensory signals. Remarkably, the computational processes underlying sensory prediction during active motion and their relationship to internal model computations during passive movements remain unknown. We construct a Kalman filter that incorporates motor commands into a previously established model of optimal passive self-motion estimation. The simulated sensory error and feedback signals match experimentally measured neuronal responses during active and passive head and trunk rotations and translations. We conclude that a single sensory internal model can combine motor commands with vestibular and proprioceptive signals optimally. Thus, although neurons carrying sensory prediction error or feedback signals show attenuated modulation, the sensory cues and internal model are both engaged and critically important for accurate self-motion estimation during active head movements.

LCoMotion - Learning, Cognition and Motion; a multicomponent cluster randomized school-based intervention aimed at increasing learning and cognition - rationale, design and methods

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bugge, Anna; Tarp, Jakob; Ostergaard, Lars

2014-01-01

BACKGROUND: The aim of the study; LCoMotion - Learning, Cognition and Motion was to develop, document, and evaluate a multi-component physical activity (PA) intervention in public schools in Denmark. The primary outcome was cognitive function. Secondary outcomes were academic skills, body composi...

Phase-locked flux-flow Josephson oscillator

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ustinov, A. V.; Mygind, Jesper; Oboznov, V. A.

1992-01-01

We report on the observation of large rf induced steps due to phase-locking of unidirectional flux-flow motion in long quasi-one-dimensional Josephson junctions. The external microwave irradiation in the frequency range 62–77 GHz was applied from the edge of the junction at which the fluxons enter....... The dependence of the amplitude of the phase-locked step on external magnetic field and microwave power has been measured. The observed zero-crossing steps have potential application in Josephson voltage standards. A simple model for the flux-flow as determined by the microwave driven boundary gate at the edge...

3D fluoroscopic image estimation using patient-specific 4DCBCT-based motion models

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dhou, S; Hurwitz, M; Cai, W; Rottmann, J; Williams, C; Wagar, M; Berbeco, R; Lewis, J H; Mishra, P; Li, R; Ionascu, D

2015-01-01

3D fluoroscopic images represent volumetric patient anatomy during treatment with high spatial and temporal resolution. 3D fluoroscopic images estimated using motion models built using 4DCT images, taken days or weeks prior to treatment, do not reliably represent patient anatomy during treatment. In this study we developed and performed initial evaluation of techniques to develop patient-specific motion models from 4D cone-beam CT (4DCBCT) images, taken immediately before treatment, and used these models to estimate 3D fluoroscopic images based on 2D kV projections captured during treatment. We evaluate the accuracy of 3D fluoroscopic images by comparison to ground truth digital and physical phantom images. The performance of 4DCBCT-based and 4DCT-based motion models are compared in simulated clinical situations representing tumor baseline shift or initial patient positioning errors. The results of this study demonstrate the ability for 4DCBCT imaging to generate motion models that can account for changes that cannot be accounted for with 4DCT-based motion models. When simulating tumor baseline shift and patient positioning errors of up to 5 mm, the average tumor localization error and the 95th percentile error in six datasets were 1.20 and 2.2 mm, respectively, for 4DCBCT-based motion models. 4DCT-based motion models applied to the same six datasets resulted in average tumor localization error and the 95th percentile error of 4.18 and 5.4 mm, respectively. Analysis of voxel-wise intensity differences was also conducted for all experiments. In summary, this study demonstrates the feasibility of 4DCBCT-based 3D fluoroscopic image generation in digital and physical phantoms and shows the potential advantage of 4DCBCT-based 3D fluoroscopic image estimation when there are changes in anatomy between the time of 4DCT imaging and the time of treatment delivery. (paper)

Extract the Relational Information of Static Features and Motion Features for Human Activities Recognition in Videos

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Li Yao

2016-01-01

Full Text Available Both static features and motion features have shown promising performance in human activities recognition task. However, the information included in these features is insufficient for complex human activities. In this paper, we propose extracting relational information of static features and motion features for human activities recognition. The videos are represented by a classical Bag-of-Word (BoW model which is useful in many works. To get a compact and discriminative codebook with small dimension, we employ the divisive algorithm based on KL-divergence to reconstruct the codebook. After that, to further capture strong relational information, we construct a bipartite graph to model the relationship between words of different feature set. Then we use a k-way partition to create a new codebook in which similar words are getting together. With this new codebook, videos can be represented by a new BoW vector with strong relational information. Moreover, we propose a method to compute new clusters from the divisive algorithm’s projective function. We test our work on the several datasets and obtain very promising results.

Mode extraction on wind turbine blades via phase-based video motion estimation

Science.gov (United States)

Sarrafi, Aral; Poozesh, Peyman; Niezrecki, Christopher; Mao, Zhu

2017-04-01

In recent years, image processing techniques are being applied more often for structural dynamics identification, characterization, and structural health monitoring. Although as a non-contact and full-field measurement method, image processing still has a long way to go to outperform other conventional sensing instruments (i.e. accelerometers, strain gauges, laser vibrometers, etc.,). However, the technologies associated with image processing are developing rapidly and gaining more attention in a variety of engineering applications including structural dynamics identification and modal analysis. Among numerous motion estimation and image-processing methods, phase-based video motion estimation is considered as one of the most efficient methods regarding computation consumption and noise robustness. In this paper, phase-based video motion estimation is adopted for structural dynamics characterization on a 2.3-meter long Skystream wind turbine blade, and the modal parameters (natural frequencies, operating deflection shapes) are extracted. Phase-based video processing adopted in this paper provides reliable full-field 2-D motion information, which is beneficial for manufacturing certification and model updating at the design stage. The phase-based video motion estimation approach is demonstrated through processing data on a full-scale commercial structure (i.e. a wind turbine blade) with complex geometry and properties, and the results obtained have a good correlation with the modal parameters extracted from accelerometer measurements, especially for the first four bending modes, which have significant importance in blade characterization.

Neural Mechanisms of Cortical Motion Computation Based on a Neuromorphic Sensory System

Science.gov (United States)

Abdul-Kreem, Luma Issa; Neumann, Heiko

2015-01-01

The visual cortex analyzes motion information along hierarchically arranged visual areas that interact through bidirectional interconnections. This work suggests a bio-inspired visual model focusing on the interactions of the cortical areas in which a new mechanism of feedforward and feedback processing are introduced. The model uses a neuromorphic vision sensor (silicon retina) that simulates the spike-generation functionality of the biological retina. Our model takes into account two main model visual areas, namely V1 and MT, with different feature selectivities. The initial motion is estimated in model area V1 using spatiotemporal filters to locally detect the direction of motion. Here, we adapt the filtering scheme originally suggested by Adelson and Bergen to make it consistent with the spike representation of the DVS. The responses of area V1 are weighted and pooled by area MT cells which are selective to different velocities, i.e. direction and speed. Such feature selectivity is here derived from compositions of activities in the spatio-temporal domain and integrating over larger space-time regions (receptive fields). In order to account for the bidirectional coupling of cortical areas we match properties of the feature selectivity in both areas for feedback processing. For such linkage we integrate the responses over different speeds along a particular preferred direction. Normalization of activities is carried out over the spatial as well as the feature domains to balance the activities of individual neurons in model areas V1 and MT. Our model was tested using different stimuli that moved in different directions. The results reveal that the error margin between the estimated motion and synthetic ground truth is decreased in area MT comparing with the initial estimation of area V1. In addition, the modulated V1 cell activations shows an enhancement of the initial motion estimation that is steered by feedback signals from MT cells. PMID:26554589

Neural Mechanisms of Cortical Motion Computation Based on a Neuromorphic Sensory System.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Luma Issa Abdul-Kreem

Full Text Available The visual cortex analyzes motion information along hierarchically arranged visual areas that interact through bidirectional interconnections. This work suggests a bio-inspired visual model focusing on the interactions of the cortical areas in which a new mechanism of feedforward and feedback processing are introduced. The model uses a neuromorphic vision sensor (silicon retina that simulates the spike-generation functionality of the biological retina. Our model takes into account two main model visual areas, namely V1 and MT, with different feature selectivities. The initial motion is estimated in model area V1 using spatiotemporal filters to locally detect the direction of motion. Here, we adapt the filtering scheme originally suggested by Adelson and Bergen to make it consistent with the spike representation of the DVS. The responses of area V1 are weighted and pooled by area MT cells which are selective to different velocities, i.e. direction and speed. Such feature selectivity is here derived from compositions of activities in the spatio-temporal domain and integrating over larger space-time regions (receptive fields. In order to account for the bidirectional coupling of cortical areas we match properties of the feature selectivity in both areas for feedback processing. For such linkage we integrate the responses over different speeds along a particular preferred direction. Normalization of activities is carried out over the spatial as well as the feature domains to balance the activities of individual neurons in model areas V1 and MT. Our model was tested using different stimuli that moved in different directions. The results reveal that the error margin between the estimated motion and synthetic ground truth is decreased in area MT comparing with the initial estimation of area V1. In addition, the modulated V1 cell activations shows an enhancement of the initial motion estimation that is steered by feedback signals from MT cells.

Photoneutron Flux Measurement via Neutron Activation Analysis in a Radiotherapy Bunker with an 18 MV Linear Accelerator

Science.gov (United States)

Çeçen, Yiğit; Gülümser, Tuğçe; Yazgan, Çağrı; Dapo, Haris; Üstün, Mahmut; Boztosun, Ismail

2017-09-01

In cancer treatment, high energy X-rays are used which are produced by linear accelerators (LINACs). If the energy of these beams is over 8 MeV, photonuclear reactions occur between the bremsstrahlung photons and the metallic parts of the LINAC. As a result of these interactions, neutrons are also produced as secondary radiation products (γ,n) which are called photoneutrons. The study aims to map the photoneutron flux distribution within the LINAC bunker via neutron activation analysis (NAA) using indium-cadmium foils. Irradiations made at different gantry angles (0°, 90°, 180° and 270°) with a total of 91 positions in the Philips SLI-25 linear accelerator treatment room and location-based distribution of thermal neutron flux was obtained. Gamma spectrum analysis was carried out with high purity germanium (HPGe) detector. Results of the analysis showed that the maximum neutron flux in the room occurred at just above of the LINAC head (1.2x105 neutrons/cm2.s) which is compatible with an americium-beryllium (Am-Be) neutron source. There was a 90% decrease of flux at the walls and at the start of the maze with respect to the maximum neutron flux. And, just in front of the LINAC door, inside the room, neutron flux was measured less than 1% of the maximum.

Photoneutron Flux Measurement via Neutron Activation Analysis in a Radiotherapy Bunker with an 18 MV Linear Accelerator

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Çeçen Yiğit

2017-01-01

Full Text Available In cancer treatment, high energy X-rays are used which are produced by linear accelerators (LINACs. If the energy of these beams is over 8 MeV, photonuclear reactions occur between the bremsstrahlung photons and the metallic parts of the LINAC. As a result of these interactions, neutrons are also produced as secondary radiation products (γ,n which are called photoneutrons. The study aims to map the photoneutron flux distribution within the LINAC bunker via neutron activation analysis (NAA using indium-cadmium foils. Irradiations made at different gantry angles (0°, 90°, 180° and 270° with a total of 91 positions in the Philips SLI-25 linear accelerator treatment room and location-based distribution of thermal neutron flux was obtained. Gamma spectrum analysis was carried out with high purity germanium (HPGe detector. Results of the analysis showed that the maximum neutron flux in the room occurred at just above of the LINAC head (1.2x105 neutrons/cm2.s which is compatible with an americium-beryllium (Am-Be neutron source. There was a 90% decrease of flux at the walls and at the start of the maze with respect to the maximum neutron flux. And, just in front of the LINAC door, inside the room, neutron flux was measured less than 1% of the maximum.

Weakening of flux-pinning strength for high-Tc superconductors in an alternating magnetic field

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chen, Q.Y.

1992-01-01

This paper reports on the flux-pinning forces in high temperature superconductors which were found to be weakened in an ac field as the applied field strength or the frequency increases. In the weakly pinned regime, flux dynamics could be described with the concept of magnetic diffusion. Flux-motion-induced finite resistivity could lead to significant skin-effect which was reflected in the ac screening effectiveness. The frequency dependence of the relative local field within a superconducting hollow cylinder were used to deduce the flux-motion resistivity ρ. For superconducting YB 2 Cu 3 O 7 - x compounds at 77K it was found that ρ ∼(mu, Omega)-cm. The corresponding magnetic diffusion coefficient was ∼ 224 cm 2 /s. At 750 Hz the skin depth is around 1.54 mm as compared with the 2-mm sample wall thickness

Improved frame-based estimation of head motion in PET brain imaging

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Mukherjee, J. M.; Lindsay, C.; King, M. A.; Licho, R.; Mukherjee, A.; Olivier, P.; Shao, L.

2016-01-01

not susceptible to motion introduced between CT and PET acquisitions. Conclusions: The authors have shown that they can estimate motion for frames with time intervals as short as 5 s using nonattenuation corrected reconstructed FDG PET brain images. Intraframe motion in 60-s frames causes degradation of accuracy to about 2 mm based on the motion type.

Improved frame-based estimation of head motion in PET brain imaging

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Mukherjee, J. M., E-mail: joyeeta.mitra@umassmed.edu; Lindsay, C.; King, M. A.; Licho, R. [Department of Radiology, University of Massachusetts Medical School, Worcester, Massachusetts 01655 (United States); Mukherjee, A. [Aware, Inc., Bedford, Massachusetts 01730 (United States); Olivier, P. [Philips Medical Systems, Cleveland, Ohio 44143 (United States); Shao, L. [ViewRay, Oakwood Village, Ohio 44146 (United States)

2016-05-15

not susceptible to motion introduced between CT and PET acquisitions. Conclusions: The authors have shown that they can estimate motion for frames with time intervals as short as 5 s using nonattenuation corrected reconstructed FDG PET brain images. Intraframe motion in 60-s frames causes degradation of accuracy to about 2 mm based on the motion type.

Vertical motions in an intense magnetic flux tube. Pt. 5

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Webb, A.R.; Roberts, B.

1980-01-01

It is of interest to examine the effect of radiative relaxation on the propagation of waves in an intense magnetic flux tube embedded in a stratified atmosphere. The radiative energy loss (assuming Newton's law of cooling) leads to a decrease in the vertical phase-velocity of the waves, and to a damping of the amplitude for those waves with frequencies greater than the adiabatic value (ωsub(upsilon)) of the tube cut-off frequency. The cut-off frequency is generalized to include the effects of radiative relaxation, and allows the waves to be classified as mainly progressive or mainly damped. The phase-shift between velocity oscillations at two different levels and the phase-difference between temperature and velocity perturbations are compared with the available observations. Radiative dissipation of waves propagating along an intense flux tube may be the cause of the high temperature (and excess brightness) observed in the network. (orig.)

Non-kinematic Flux-transport Dynamos Including the Effects of Diffusivity Quenching

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Ichimura, Chiaki; Yokoyama, Takaaki [Department of Earth and Planetary Science, The University of Tokyo, Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033 (Japan)

2017-04-10

Turbulent magnetic diffusivity is quenched when strong magnetic fields suppress turbulent motion in a phenomenon known as diffusivity quenching. Diffusivity quenching can provide a mechanism for amplifying magnetic field and influencing global velocity fields through Lorentz force feedback. To investigate this effect, we conducted mean field flux-transport dynamo simulations that included the effects of diffusivity quenching in a non-kinematic regime. We found that toroidal magnetic field strength is amplified by up to approximately 1.5 times in the convection zone as a result of diffusivity quenching. This amplification is much weaker than that in kinematic cases as a result of Lorentz force feedback on the system’s differential rotation. While amplified toroidal fields lead to the suppression of equatorward meridional flow locally near the base of the convection zone, large-scale equatorward transport of magnetic flux via meridional flow, which is the essential process of the flux-transport dynamo, is sustainable in our calculations.

Gaussian particle filter based pose and motion estimation

Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

无

2007-01-01

Determination of relative three-dimensional (3D) position, orientation, and relative motion between two reference frames is an important problem in robotic guidance, manipulation, and assembly as well as in other fields such as photogrammetry.A solution to pose and motion estimation problem that uses two-dimensional (2D) intensity images from a single camera is desirable for real-time applications. The difficulty in performing this measurement is that the process of projecting 3D object features to 2D images is a nonlinear transformation. In this paper, the 3D transformation is modeled as a nonlinear stochastic system with the state estimation providing six degrees-of-freedom motion and position values, using line features in image plane as measuring inputs and dual quaternion to represent both rotation and translation in a unified notation. A filtering method called the Gaussian particle filter (GPF) based on the particle filtering concept is presented for 3D pose and motion estimation of a moving target from monocular image sequences. The method has been implemented with simulated data, and simulation results are provided along with comparisons to the extended Kalman filter (EKF) and the unscented Kalman filter (UKF) to show the relative advantages of the GPF. Simulation results showed that GPF is a superior alternative to EKF and UKF.

Visuotactile motion congruence enhances gamma-band activity in visual and somatosensory cortices.

Science.gov (United States)

Krebber, Martin; Harwood, James; Spitzer, Bernhard; Keil, Julian; Senkowski, Daniel

2015-08-15

When touching and viewing a moving surface our visual and somatosensory systems receive congruent spatiotemporal input. Behavioral studies have shown that motion congruence facilitates interplay between visual and tactile stimuli, but the neural mechanisms underlying this interplay are not well understood. Neural oscillations play a role in motion processing and multisensory integration. They may also be crucial for visuotactile motion processing. In this electroencephalography study, we applied linear beamforming to examine the impact of visuotactile motion congruence on beta and gamma band activity (GBA) in visual and somatosensory cortices. Visual and tactile inputs comprised of gratings that moved either in the same or different directions. Participants performed a target detection task that was unrelated to motion congruence. While there were no effects in the beta band (13-21Hz), the power of GBA (50-80Hz) in visual and somatosensory cortices was larger for congruent compared with incongruent motion stimuli. This suggests enhanced bottom-up multisensory processing when visual and tactile gratings moved in the same direction. Supporting its behavioral relevance, GBA was correlated with shorter reaction times in the target detection task. We conclude that motion congruence plays an important role for the integrative processing of visuotactile stimuli in sensory cortices, as reflected by oscillatory responses in the gamma band. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The fate of task-irrelevant visual motion: perceptual load versus feature-based attention.

Science.gov (United States)

Taya, Shuichiro; Adams, Wendy J; Graf, Erich W; Lavie, Nilli

2009-11-18

We tested contrasting predictions derived from perceptual load theory and from recent feature-based selection accounts. Observers viewed moving, colored stimuli and performed low or high load tasks associated with one stimulus feature, either color or motion. The resultant motion aftereffect (MAE) was used to evaluate attentional allocation. We found that task-irrelevant visual features received less attention than co-localized task-relevant features of the same objects. Moreover, when color and motion features were co-localized yet perceived to belong to two distinct surfaces, feature-based selection was further increased at the expense of object-based co-selection. Load theory predicts that the MAE for task-irrelevant motion would be reduced with a higher load color task. However, this was not seen for co-localized features; perceptual load only modulated the MAE for task-irrelevant motion when this was spatially separated from the attended color location. Our results suggest that perceptual load effects are mediated by spatial selection and do not generalize to the feature domain. Feature-based selection operates to suppress processing of task-irrelevant, co-localized features, irrespective of perceptual load.

Smart Sensor-Based Motion Detection System for Hand Movement Training in Open Surgery.

Science.gov (United States)

Sun, Xinyao; Byrns, Simon; Cheng, Irene; Zheng, Bin; Basu, Anup

2017-02-01

We introduce a smart sensor-based motion detection technique for objective measurement and assessment of surgical dexterity among users at different experience levels. The goal is to allow trainees to evaluate their performance based on a reference model shared through communication technology, e.g., the Internet, without the physical presence of an evaluating surgeon. While in the current implementation we used a Leap Motion Controller to obtain motion data for analysis, our technique can be applied to motion data captured by other smart sensors, e.g., OptiTrack. To differentiate motions captured from different participants, measurement and assessment in our approach are achieved using two strategies: (1) low level descriptive statistical analysis, and (2) Hidden Markov Model (HMM) classification. Based on our surgical knot tying task experiment, we can conclude that finger motions generated from users with different surgical dexterity, e.g., expert and novice performers, display differences in path length, number of movements and task completion time. In order to validate the discriminatory ability of HMM for classifying different movement patterns, a non-surgical task was included in our analysis. Experimental results demonstrate that our approach had 100 % accuracy in discriminating between expert and novice performances. Our proposed motion analysis technique applied to open surgical procedures is a promising step towards the development of objective computer-assisted assessment and training systems.

Photothermally activated motion and ignition using aluminum nanoparticles

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Abboud, Jacques E.; Chong Xinyuan; Zhang Mingjun; Zhang Zhili; Jiang Naibo; Roy, Sukesh; Gord, James R.

2013-01-01

The aluminum nanoparticles (Al NPs) are demonstrated to serve as active photothermal media, to enhance and control local photothermal energy deposition via the photothermal effect activated by localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) and amplified by Al NPs oxidation. The activation source is a 2-AA-battery-powered xenon flash lamp. The extent of the photothermally activated movement of Al NPs can be ∼6 mm. Ignition delay can be ∼0.1 ms. Both scanning electron microscopy and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy measurements of motion-only and after-ignition products confirm significant Al oxidation occurs through sintering and bursting after the flash exposure. Simulations suggest local heat generation is enhanced by LSPR. The positive-feedback effects from the local heat generation amplified by Al oxidation produce a large increase in local temperature and pressure, which enhances movement and accelerates ignition.

Towards a Near Real-Time Satellite-Based Flux Monitoring System for the MENA Region

Science.gov (United States)

Ershadi, A.; Houborg, R.; McCabe, M. F.; Anderson, M. C.; Hain, C.

2013-12-01

Satellite remote sensing has the potential to offer spatially and temporally distributed information on land surface characteristics, which may be used as inputs and constraints for estimating land surface fluxes of carbon, water and energy. Enhanced satellite-based monitoring systems for aiding local water resource assessments and agricultural management activities are particularly needed for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. The MENA region is an area characterized by limited fresh water resources, an often inefficient use of these, and relatively poor in-situ monitoring as a result of sparse meteorological observations. To address these issues, an integrated modeling approach for near real-time monitoring of land surface states and fluxes at fine spatio-temporal scales over the MENA region is presented. This approach is based on synergistic application of multiple sensors and wavebands in the visible to shortwave infrared and thermal infrared (TIR) domain. The multi-scale flux mapping and monitoring system uses the Atmosphere-Land Exchange Inverse (ALEXI) model and associated flux disaggregation scheme (DisALEXI), and the Spatial and Temporal Adaptive Reflectance Fusion Model (STARFM) in conjunction with model reanalysis data and multi-sensor remotely sensed data from polar orbiting (e.g. Landsat and MODerate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS)) and geostationary (MSG; Meteosat Second Generation) satellite platforms to facilitate time-continuous (i.e. daily) estimates of field-scale water, energy and carbon fluxes. Within this modeling system, TIR satellite data provide information about the sub-surface moisture status and plant stress, obviating the need for precipitation input and a detailed soil surface characterization (i.e. for prognostic modeling of soil transport processes). The STARFM fusion methodology blends aspects of high frequency (spatially coarse) and spatially fine resolution sensors and is applied directly to flux output

Comparison of the Danish Physical Activity Questionnaire with a validated position and motion instrument

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Matthiessen, Jeppe; Biltoft-Jensen, Anja Pia; Rasmussen, Lone Banke

2008-01-01

Objective To compare the Danish Physical Activity Questionnaire (DPAQ) estimating physical activity energy expenditure (PAEE) and physical activity level (PAL) and the pattern of physical activity (including health-related physical activity) with measurements from a validated position and motion ...

A handy motion driven hybrid energy harvester: dual Halbach array based electromagnetic and triboelectric generators

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Salauddin, M; Park, J Y

2016-01-01

In this work, we have proposed and experimentally validated of hybrid electromagnetic and triboelectric energy harvester using dual Halbach magnets array excited by human handy motion. Hybrid electromagnetic (EM) and triboelectric (TE) generator that can deliver an output performance much higher than that of the individual energy-harvesting unit due to the combination operation of EM and TE mechanisms under the same mechanical movements. A Halbach array concentrates the magnetic flux lines on one side of the array while suppressing the flux lines on the other side. Dual Halbach array allows the concentrated magnetic flux lines to interact with the same coil in a way where maximum flux linkage occurs. When an external mechanical vibration is applied to the hybrid structure in the axial direction of the harvester, the suspended mass (two sided dual-Halbach-array frame) starts to oscillate within the magnetic springs and TEG part. Therefore, the TEG part, the Al film and microstructure PDMS film are collected into full contact with each other, generating triboelectric charges due to the various triboelectricities between them. A prototype of the hybrid harvester has been fabricated and tested. The EMG is capable of delivering maximum 11.5mW peak power at 32.5Ω matching load resistance and the TEG delivering 88μW peak power at 10MΩ load resistance. (paper)

Studies of vertical fluxes of horizontal momentum in the lower atmosphere using the MU-radar

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

F. S. Kuo

2008-11-01

Full Text Available We study the momentum flux of the atmospheric motions in the height ranges between 6 and 22 km observed using the MU radar at Shigaraki in Japan during a 3 day period in January 1988. The data were divided by double Fourier transformation into data set of waves with downward- phase- velocity and data set of waves with upward-phase-velocity for independent momentum flux calculation. The result showed that both the 72 h averaged upward flux and downward flux of zonal momentum were negative at nearly each height, meaning that the upward flux was dominated by westward propagating waves while the downward flux was dominated by eastward propagating waves. The magnitude of the downward flux was approximately a factor of 1.5 larger than the upward flux for waves in the 2~7 h and 7~24 h period bands, and about equal to the upward flux in the 10–30 min and 30 min–2 h period bands. It is also observed that the vertical flux of zonal momentum tended to be small in each frequency band at the altitudes below the jet maximum (10~12 km, and the flux increased toward more negative values to reach a negative maximum at some altitude well above the jet maximum. Daily averaged flux showed tremendous variation: The 1st 24 h (quiet day was relatively quiet, and the fluxes of the 2nd and 3rd 24 h (active days increased sharply. Moreover, the upward fluxes of zonal momentum below 17 km in the quiet day for each period band (10~30 min, 30 min~2 h, 2~7 h, and 7~24 h were dominantly positive, while the corresponding downward fluxes were dominantly negative, meaning that the zonal momentum below 17 km in each period band under study were dominantly eastward (propagating along the mean wind. In the active days, both the upward fluxes and downward fluxes in each frequency band were dominantly negative throughout the whole altitude range 6.1–18.95 km.

Variable disparity-motion estimation based fast three-view video coding

Science.gov (United States)

Bae, Kyung-Hoon; Kim, Seung-Cheol; Hwang, Yong Seok; Kim, Eun-Soo

2009-02-01

In this paper, variable disparity-motion estimation (VDME) based 3-view video coding is proposed. In the encoding, key-frame coding (KFC) based motion estimation and variable disparity estimation (VDE) for effectively fast three-view video encoding are processed. These proposed algorithms enhance the performance of 3-D video encoding/decoding system in terms of accuracy of disparity estimation and computational overhead. From some experiments, stereo sequences of 'Pot Plant' and 'IVO', it is shown that the proposed algorithm's PSNRs is 37.66 and 40.55 dB, and the processing time is 0.139 and 0.124 sec/frame, respectively.

Experimental Study on Hot Metal Desulfurization Using Sintered Red Mud-Based Flux

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Fengshan; Zhang, Yanling; Guo, Zhancheng

2017-09-01

This research presents the results of laboratory and pilot-scale tests conducted on the use of sintered red mud (RM)-based flux in the hot metal desulfurization (HMD) process. Al2O3/Na2O in RM can decrease the melting point of lime-based slag and can work as a flux in the HMD process. Good slag fluidity was observed throughout the process, and high desulfurization rates ( 80%) with a low final S content (pilot-scale test results indicated that a desulfurization rate as high as 91% and a S content <0.0099% could be acquired when RM:lime = 1:1, verifying the feasibility of using sintered RM-based flux in HMD. The data obtained provide important information for promoting the large-scale application of sintered RM in steelmaking.

Software for project-based learning of robot motion planning

Science.gov (United States)

Moll, Mark; Bordeaux, Janice; Kavraki, Lydia E.

2013-12-01

Motion planning is a core problem in robotics concerned with finding feasible paths for a given robot. Motion planning algorithms perform a search in the high-dimensional continuous space of robot configurations and exemplify many of the core algorithmic concepts of search algorithms and associated data structures. Motion planning algorithms can be explained in a simplified two-dimensional setting, but this masks many of the subtleties and complexities of the underlying problem. We have developed software for project-based learning of motion planning that enables deep learning. The projects that we have developed allow advanced undergraduate students and graduate students to reflect on the performance of existing textbook algorithms and their own variations on such algorithms. Formative assessment has been conducted at three institutions. The core of the software used for this teaching module is also used within the Robot Operating System, a widely adopted platform by the robotics research community. This allows for transfer of knowledge and skills to robotics research projects involving a large variety robot hardware platforms.

New flux based dose–response relationships for ozone for European forest tree species

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Büker, P.; Feng, Z.; Uddling, J.; Briolat, A.; Alonso, R.; Braun, S.; Elvira, S.; Gerosa, G.; Karlsson, P.E.; Le Thiec, D.

2015-01-01

To derive O 3 dose–response relationships (DRR) for five European forest trees species and broadleaf deciduous and needleleaf tree plant functional types (PFTs), phytotoxic O 3 doses (PODy) were related to biomass reductions. PODy was calculated using a stomatal flux model with a range of cut-off thresholds (y) indicative of varying detoxification capacities. Linear regression analysis showed that DRR for PFT and individual tree species differed in their robustness. A simplified parameterisation of the flux model was tested and showed that for most non-Mediterranean tree species, this simplified model led to similarly robust DRR as compared to a species- and climate region-specific parameterisation. Experimentally induced soil water stress was not found to substantially reduce PODy, mainly due to the short duration of soil water stress periods. This study validates the stomatal O 3 flux concept and represents a step forward in predicting O 3 damage to forests in a spatially and temporally varying climate. - Highlights: • We present new ozone flux based dose–response relationships for European trees. • The model-based study accounted for the soil water effect on stomatal flux. • Different statistically derived ozone flux thresholds were applied. • Climate region specific parameterisation often outperformed simplified parameterisation. • Findings could help redefining critical levels for ozone effects on trees. - New stomatal flux based ozone dose–response relationships for tree species are derived for the regional risk assessment of ozone effects on European forest ecosystems.

Patient cloth with motion recognition sensors based on flexible piezoelectric materials.

Science.gov (United States)

Youngsu Cha; Kihyuk Nam; Doik Kim

2017-07-01

In this paper, we introduce a patient cloth for position monitoring using motion recognition sensors based on flexible piezoelectric materials. The motion recognition sensors are embedded in three parts, which are the knee, hip and back, in the patient cloth. We use polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) as the flexible piezoelectric material for the sensors. By using the piezoelectric effect of the PVDF, we detect electrical signals when the cloth is bent or extended. We analyze the sensing values for our human motions by processing the sensor outputs in a custom-made program. Specifically, we focus on the transitions between standing and sitting, and sitting knee extension and supine position, which are important motions for patient monitoring.

A DOUBLE-RING ALGORITHM FOR MODELING SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS: UNIFYING KINEMATIC DYNAMO MODELS AND SURFACE FLUX-TRANSPORT SIMULATIONS

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Munoz-Jaramillo, Andres; Martens, Petrus C. H.; Nandy, Dibyendu; Yeates, Anthony R.

2010-01-01

The emergence of tilted bipolar active regions (ARs) and the dispersal of their flux, mediated via processes such as diffusion, differential rotation, and meridional circulation, is believed to be responsible for the reversal of the Sun's polar field. This process (commonly known as the Babcock-Leighton mechanism) is usually modeled as a near-surface, spatially distributed α-effect in kinematic mean-field dynamo models. However, this formulation leads to a relationship between polar field strength and meridional flow speed which is opposite to that suggested by physical insight and predicted by surface flux-transport simulations. With this in mind, we present an improved double-ring algorithm for modeling the Babcock-Leighton mechanism based on AR eruption, within the framework of an axisymmetric dynamo model. Using surface flux-transport simulations, we first show that an axisymmetric formulation-which is usually invoked in kinematic dynamo models-can reasonably approximate the surface flux dynamics. Finally, we demonstrate that our treatment of the Babcock-Leighton mechanism through double-ring eruption leads to an inverse relationship between polar field strength and meridional flow speed as expected, reconciling the discrepancy between surface flux-transport simulations and kinematic dynamo models.

Spinal cord motion. Influence of respiration and cardiac cycle

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Winklhofer, S. [RWTH Aachen University Hospital (Germany). Dept. of Neuroradiology; University Hospital Zurich (Switzerland). Inst. of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology; Schoth, F. [RWTH Aachen University Hospital (Germany). Dept. of Diagnostic Radiology; Stolzmann, P. [University Hospital Zurich (Switzerland). Inst. of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology; Krings, T. [Toronto Western Hospital, ON (Canada). Div. of Neuroradiology; Mull, M.; Wiesmann, M. [RWTH Aachen University Hospital (Germany). Dept. of Neuroradiology; Stracke, C.P. [RWTH Aachen University Hospital (Germany). Dept. of Neuroradiology; Alfried-Krupp-Hospital, Essen (Germany). Dept. of Neuroradiology

2014-11-15

To assess physiological spinal cord motion during the cardiac cycle compared with the influence of respiration based on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) measurements. Anterior-posterior spinal cord motion within the spinal canal was assessed in 16 healthy volunteers (median age, 25 years) by cardiac-triggered and cardiac-gated gradient echo pulse sequence MRI. Image acquisition was performed during breath-holding, normal breathing, and forced breathing. Normal spinal cord motion values were computed using descriptive statistics. Breathing-dependent differences were assessed using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test and compared with the cardiac-based cord motion. A normal value table was set up for the spinal cord motion of each vertebral cervico-thoracic-lumbar segment. Significant differences in cord motion were found between cardiac-based motion while breath-holding and the two breathing modalities (P < 0.01 each). Spinal cord motion was found to be highest during forced breathing, with a maximum in the lower cervical spinal segments (C5; mean, 2.1 mm ± 1.17). Image acquisition during breath-holding revealed the lowest motion. MRI permits the demonstration and evaluation of cardiac and respiration-dependent spinal cord motion within the spinal canal from the cervical to lumbar segments. Breathing conditions have a considerably greater impact than cardiac activity on spinal cord motion.

Spinal cord motion. Influence of respiration and cardiac cycle

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Winklhofer, S.; University Hospital Zurich; Schoth, F.; Stolzmann, P.; Krings, T.; Mull, M.; Wiesmann, M.; Stracke, C.P.; Alfried-Krupp-Hospital, Essen

2014-01-01

To assess physiological spinal cord motion during the cardiac cycle compared with the influence of respiration based on magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) measurements. Anterior-posterior spinal cord motion within the spinal canal was assessed in 16 healthy volunteers (median age, 25 years) by cardiac-triggered and cardiac-gated gradient echo pulse sequence MRI. Image acquisition was performed during breath-holding, normal breathing, and forced breathing. Normal spinal cord motion values were computed using descriptive statistics. Breathing-dependent differences were assessed using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test and compared with the cardiac-based cord motion. A normal value table was set up for the spinal cord motion of each vertebral cervico-thoracic-lumbar segment. Significant differences in cord motion were found between cardiac-based motion while breath-holding and the two breathing modalities (P < 0.01 each). Spinal cord motion was found to be highest during forced breathing, with a maximum in the lower cervical spinal segments (C5; mean, 2.1 mm ± 1.17). Image acquisition during breath-holding revealed the lowest motion. MRI permits the demonstration and evaluation of cardiac and respiration-dependent spinal cord motion within the spinal canal from the cervical to lumbar segments. Breathing conditions have a considerably greater impact than cardiac activity on spinal cord motion.

Validation of Energy Expenditure Prediction Models Using Real-Time Shoe-Based Motion Detectors.

Science.gov (United States)

Lin, Shih-Yun; Lai, Ying-Chih; Hsia, Chi-Chun; Su, Pei-Fang; Chang, Chih-Han

2017-09-01

This study aimed to verify and compare the accuracy of energy expenditure (EE) prediction models using shoe-based motion detectors with embedded accelerometers. Three physical activity (PA) datasets (unclassified, recognition, and intensity segmentation) were used to develop three prediction models. A multiple classification flow and these models were used to estimate EE. The "unclassified" dataset was defined as the data without PA recognition, the "recognition" as the data classified with PA recognition, and the "intensity segmentation" as the data with intensity segmentation. The three datasets contained accelerometer signals (quantified as signal magnitude area (SMA)) and net heart rate (HR net ). The accuracy of these models was assessed according to the deviation between physically measured EE and model-estimated EE. The variance between physically measured EE and model-estimated EE expressed by simple linear regressions was increased by 63% and 13% using SMA and HR net , respectively. The accuracy of the EE predicted from accelerometer signals is influenced by the different activities that exhibit different count-EE relationships within the same prediction model. The recognition model provides a better estimation and lower variability of EE compared with the unclassified and intensity segmentation models. The proposed shoe-based motion detectors can improve the accuracy of EE estimation and has great potential to be used to manage everyday exercise in real time.

Design and Evaluation of Accelerometer based Motional Feedback

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Schneider, Henrik; Pranjic, Emilio; Agerkvist, Finn T.

2015-01-01

and enable radical design changes in the loudspeaker which can lead to efficiency improvements. In combination this has motivated a revisit of the accelerometer based motional feedback technique. Experimental results on a 8 inch subwoofer show that the total harmonic distortion can be significantly reduced...

Gamma-stability and vortex motion in type II superconductors

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kurzke, Matthias; Spirn, Daniel

2009-07-15

We consider a time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equation for superconductors with a strictly complex relaxation parameter, and derive motion laws for the vortices in the case of a finite number of vortices in a bounded magnetic field. The motion laws correspond to the flux-flow Hall effect. As our main tool, we develop a quantitative {gamma}-stability result relating the Ginzburg-Landau energy to the renormalized energy. (orig.)

Gamma-stability and vortex motion in type II superconductors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kurzke, Matthias; Spirn, Daniel

2009-01-01

We consider a time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau equation for superconductors with a strictly complex relaxation parameter, and derive motion laws for the vortices in the case of a finite number of vortices in a bounded magnetic field. The motion laws correspond to the flux-flow Hall effect. As our main tool, we develop a quantitative Γ-stability result relating the Ginzburg-Landau energy to the renormalized energy. (orig.)

Auditory Motion Elicits a Visual Motion Aftereffect.

Science.gov (United States)

Berger, Christopher C; Ehrsson, H Henrik

2016-01-01

The visual motion aftereffect is a visual illusion in which exposure to continuous motion in one direction leads to a subsequent illusion of visual motion in the opposite direction. Previous findings have been mixed with regard to whether this visual illusion can be induced cross-modally by auditory stimuli. Based on research on multisensory perception demonstrating the profound influence auditory perception can have on the interpretation and perceived motion of visual stimuli, we hypothesized that exposure to auditory stimuli with strong directional motion cues should induce a visual motion aftereffect. Here, we demonstrate that horizontally moving auditory stimuli induced a significant visual motion aftereffect-an effect that was driven primarily by a change in visual motion perception following exposure to leftward moving auditory stimuli. This finding is consistent with the notion that visual and auditory motion perception rely on at least partially overlapping neural substrates.

Auditory Motion Elicits a Visual Motion Aftereffect

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Christopher C. Berger

2016-12-01

Full Text Available The visual motion aftereffect is a visual illusion in which exposure to continuous motion in one direction leads to a subsequent illusion of visual motion in the opposite direction. Previous findings have been mixed with regard to whether this visual illusion can be induced cross-modally by auditory stimuli. Based on research on multisensory perception demonstrating the profound influence auditory perception can have on the interpretation and perceived motion of visual stimuli, we hypothesized that exposure to auditory stimuli with strong directional motion cues should induce a visual motion aftereffect. Here, we demonstrate that horizontally moving auditory stimuli induced a significant visual motion aftereffect—an effect that was driven primarily by a change in visual motion perception following exposure to leftward moving auditory stimuli. This finding is consistent with the notion that visual and auditory motion perception rely on at least partially overlapping neural substrates.

Relationships between Microbial Activities and Subduction-related Outgassing and Volatile Flux at Aleutian Arc Volcanoes

Science.gov (United States)

Miller, H.; Lopez, T. M.; Fischer, T. P.; Schrenk, M. O.

2016-12-01

Subduction-related processes, including the movement and alteration of carbon compounds, are an important component of global geochemical cycles. Actively degassing volcanoes of the Aleutian Island arc offer interesting opportunities to not only characterize the composition and abundance of volatiles, but also to identify the origin of the discharging gases (e.g. mantle, organic matter, or carbonates). Taking this approach a step further, microbial activities in and around volcanic fumarole areas may impact the composition and flux of reduced volcanic gases, either through their modification or their assimilation into fixed biomass. Microbiological studies of these systems can be used to develop predictive models to complement those based upon geochemical data while providing greater understanding of the causal relationships between microbial populations and their environment, and ultimately refine estimates of volcanic outgassing. Coupled fumarole soil and gas samples were collected from several Aleutian Island volcanoes in 2015 (Gareloi, Kanaga, Kiska, Little Sitkin) and 2016 (Okmok, Resheschnoi). DNA was extracted from the soil and used to describe microbial community composition, while gas samples were analyzed through chromatography and mass spectrometry. Preliminary data suggests a relationship between the abundance of specific groups of prokaryotes known to metabolize reduced gases, such as sulfur-oxidizers and methanotrophs, and the abundances of the degassing volatiles, including sulfur dioxide and methane. Ongoing studies aimed at investigating the relationship between the genomic composition of the fumarolic microbial community and the physical and chemical properties of the soil (i.e. mineralogy, bulk geochemistry, nutrient concentration, gas flux, and environmental measurements) are underway. These data will be used to evaluate the potential for microbial communities to remove volcanic carbon and store it as biomass, or to modify the volatile carbon

SLIPPING MAGNETIC RECONNECTION OF FLUX-ROPE STRUCTURES AS A PRECURSOR TO AN ERUPTIVE X-CLASS SOLAR FLARE

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Li, Ting; Hou, Yijun; Zhang, Jun [Key Laboratory of Solar Activity, National Astronomical Observatories, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100012 (China); Yang, Kai, E-mail: liting@nao.cas.cn [School of Astronomy and Space Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023 (China)

2016-10-20

We present the quasi-periodic slipping motion of flux-rope structures prior to the onset of an eruptive X-class flare on 2015 March 11, obtained by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph and the Solar Dynamics Observatory . The slipping motion occurred at the north part of the flux rope and seemed to successively peel off the flux rope. The speed of the slippage was 30−40 km s{sup −1}, with an average period of 130 ± 30 s. The Si iv λ 1402.77 line showed a redshift of 10−30 km s{sup −1} and a line width of 50−120 km s{sup −1} at the west legs of slipping structures, indicative of reconnection downflow. The slipping motion lasted about 40 minutes, and the flux rope started to rise up slowly at the late stage of the slippage. Then an X2.1 flare was initiated, and the flux rope was impulsively accelerated. One of the flare ribbons swept across a negative-polarity sunspot, and the penumbral segments of the sunspot decayed rapidly after the flare. We studied the magnetic topology at the flaring region, and the results showed the existence of a twisted flux rope, together with quasi-separatrix layer (QSL) structures binding the flux rope. Our observations imply that quasi-periodic slipping magnetic reconnection occurs along the flux-rope-related QSLs in the preflare stage, which drives the later eruption of the flux rope and the associated flare.

Observation-based modelling of permafrost carbon fluxes with accounting for deep carbon deposits and thermokarst activity

Science.gov (United States)

Schneider von Deimling, T.; Grosse, G.; Strauss, J.; Schirrmeister, L.; Morgenstern, A.; Schaphoff, S.; Meinshausen, M.; Boike, J.

2015-06-01

High-latitude soils store vast amounts of perennially frozen and therefore inert organic matter. With rising global temperatures and consequent permafrost degradation, a part of this carbon stock will become available for microbial decay and eventual release to the atmosphere. We have developed a simplified, two-dimensional multi-pool model to estimate the strength and timing of future carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) fluxes from newly thawed permafrost carbon (i.e. carbon thawed when temperatures rise above pre-industrial levels). We have especially simulated carbon release from deep deposits in Yedoma regions by describing abrupt thaw under newly formed thermokarst lakes. The computational efficiency of our model allowed us to run large, multi-centennial ensembles under various scenarios of future warming to express uncertainty inherent to simulations of the permafrost carbon feedback. Under moderate warming of the representative concentration pathway (RCP) 2.6 scenario, cumulated CO2 fluxes from newly thawed permafrost carbon amount to 20 to 58 petagrams of carbon (Pg-C) (68% range) by the year 2100 and reach 40 to 98 Pg-C in 2300. The much larger permafrost degradation under strong warming (RCP8.5) results in cumulated CO2 release of 42 to 141 Pg-C and 157 to 313 Pg-C (68% ranges) in the years 2100 and 2300, respectively. Our estimates only consider fluxes from newly thawed permafrost, not from soils already part of the seasonally thawed active layer under pre-industrial climate. Our simulated CH4 fluxes contribute a few percent to total permafrost carbon release yet they can cause up to 40% of total permafrost-affected radiative forcing in the 21st century (upper 68% range). We infer largest CH4 emission rates of about 50 Tg-CH4 per year around the middle of the 21st century when simulated thermokarst lake extent is at its maximum and when abrupt thaw under thermokarst lakes is taken into account. CH4 release from newly thawed carbon in wetland

Observation-based modelling of permafrost carbon fluxes with accounting for deep carbon deposits and thermokarst activity

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

T. Schneider von Deimling

2015-06-01

Full Text Available High-latitude soils store vast amounts of perennially frozen and therefore inert organic matter. With rising global temperatures and consequent permafrost degradation, a part of this carbon stock will become available for microbial decay and eventual release to the atmosphere. We have developed a simplified, two-dimensional multi-pool model to estimate the strength and timing of future carbon dioxide (CO2 and methane (CH4 fluxes from newly thawed permafrost carbon (i.e. carbon thawed when temperatures rise above pre-industrial levels. We have especially simulated carbon release from deep deposits in Yedoma regions by describing abrupt thaw under newly formed thermokarst lakes. The computational efficiency of our model allowed us to run large, multi-centennial ensembles under various scenarios of future warming to express uncertainty inherent to simulations of the permafrost carbon feedback. Under moderate warming of the representative concentration pathway (RCP 2.6 scenario, cumulated CO2 fluxes from newly thawed permafrost carbon amount to 20 to 58 petagrams of carbon (Pg-C (68% range by the year 2100 and reach 40 to 98 Pg-C in 2300. The much larger permafrost degradation under strong warming (RCP8.5 results in cumulated CO2 release of 42 to 141 Pg-C and 157 to 313 Pg-C (68% ranges in the years 2100 and 2300, respectively. Our estimates only consider fluxes from newly thawed permafrost, not from soils already part of the seasonally thawed active layer under pre-industrial climate. Our simulated CH4 fluxes contribute a few percent to total permafrost carbon release yet they can cause up to 40% of total permafrost-affected radiative forcing in the 21st century (upper 68% range. We infer largest CH4 emission rates of about 50 Tg-CH4 per year around the middle of the 21st century when simulated thermokarst lake extent is at its maximum and when abrupt thaw under thermokarst lakes is taken into account. CH4 release from newly thawed carbon in

Melt layer erosion of pure and lanthanum doped tungsten under VDE-like high heat flux loads

Science.gov (United States)

Yuan, Y.; Greuner, H.; Böswirth, B.; Luo, G.-N.; Fu, B. Q.; Xu, H. Y.; Liu, W.

2013-07-01

Heat loads expected for VDEs in ITER were applied in the neutral beam facility GLADIS at IPP Garching. Several ˜3 mm thick rolled pure W and W-1 wt% La2O3 plates were exposed to pulsed hydrogen beams with a central heat flux of 23 MW/m2 for 1.5-1.8 s. The melting thresholds are determined, and melt layer motion as well as material structure evolutions are shown. The melting thresholds of the two W grades are very close in this experimental setup. Lots of big bubbles with diameters from several μm to several 10 μm in the re-solidified layer of W were observed and they spread deeper with increasing heat flux. However, for W-1 wt% La2O3, no big bubbles were found in the corrugated melt layer. The underlying mechanisms referred to the melt layer motion and bubble issues are tentatively discussed based on comparison of the erosion characteristics between the two W grades.

Investigating the role of sliding friction in rolling motion: a teaching sequence based on experiments and simulations

Science.gov (United States)

De Ambrosis, Anna; Malgieri, Massimiliano; Mascheretti, Paolo; Onorato, Pasquale

2015-05-01

We designed a teaching-learning sequence on rolling motion, rooted in previous research about student conceptions, and proposing an educational reconstruction strongly centred on the role of friction in different cases of rolling. A series of experiments based on video analysis is used to highlight selected key concepts and to motivate students in their exploration of the topic; and interactive simulations, which can be modified on the fly by students to model different physical situations, are used to stimulate autonomous investigation in enquiry activities. The activity sequence was designed for students on introductory physics courses and was tested with a group of student teachers. Comparisons between pre- and post-tests, and between our results and those reported in the literature, indicate that students’ understanding of rolling motion improved markedly and some typical difficulties were overcome.

Event-based motion correction for PET transmission measurements with a rotating point source

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhou, Victor W; Kyme, Andre Z; Meikle, Steven R; Fulton, Roger

2011-01-01

Accurate attenuation correction is important for quantitative positron emission tomography (PET) studies. When performing transmission measurements using an external rotating radioactive source, object motion during the transmission scan can distort the attenuation correction factors computed as the ratio of the blank to transmission counts, and cause errors and artefacts in reconstructed PET images. In this paper we report a compensation method for rigid body motion during PET transmission measurements, in which list mode transmission data are motion corrected event-by-event, based on known motion, to ensure that all events which traverse the same path through the object are recorded on a common line of response (LOR). As a result, the motion-corrected transmission LOR may record a combination of events originally detected on different LORs. To ensure that the corresponding blank LOR records events from the same combination of contributing LORs, the list mode blank data are spatially transformed event-by-event based on the same motion information. The number of counts recorded on the resulting blank LOR is then equivalent to the number of counts that would have been recorded on the corresponding motion-corrected transmission LOR in the absence of any attenuating object. The proposed method has been verified in phantom studies with both stepwise movements and continuous motion. We found that attenuation maps derived from motion-corrected transmission and blank data agree well with those of the stationary phantom and are significantly better than uncorrected attenuation data.

Attitude Motion of Cylindrical Space Debris during Its Removal by Ion Beam

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Vladimir S. Aslanov

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The paper is devoted to the problem of space debris mitigation. Contactless method of the space debris deorbiting is considered. It is assumed that ion thrusters on the active spacecraft create the ion flow, which blows the debris and slows it down. The objectives of this work are the development of mathematical models and the research of space debris motion under the action of the ion flow. It is supposed that the space debris is a rigid body of a cylindrical shape. Calculation of ion beam force and torque was performed for a self-similar model of plasma plume expansion using the hypothesis of ion fully diffused reflection from a surface. A mathematical model describing plane motions of the cylindrical space debris under the influence of gravity gradient torque and the ion flux was constructed. It was shown that motion of the space debris around its center of mass has a significant effect on its removal time. Phase portraits, describing the motion of the space debris relative to its center of mass, were constructed. Comparison of the descent times in different motion modes was carried out. The results can be used to create new effective systems of large space debris removal.

A FULL STUDY ON THE SUN–EARTH CONNECTION OF AN EARTH-DIRECTED CME MAGNETIC FLUX ROPE

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Vemareddy, Panditi [Indian Institute of Astrophysics, II Block, Koramangala, Bangalore-560 034 (India); Mishra, Wageesh, E-mail: vemareddy@iiap.res.in, E-mail: wageesh@ustc.edu.cn [Department of Geophysics and Planetary Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei-230026 (China)

2015-11-20

We present an investigation of an eruption event of a coronal mass ejection (CME) magnetic flux rope (MFR) from the source active region (AR) NOAA 11719 on 2013 April 11 utilizing observations from the Solar Dynamic Observatory, the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, and the WIND spacecraft. The source AR consists of a pre-existing sigmoidal structure stacked over a filament channel which is regarded as an MFR system. EUV observations of low corona suggest further development of this MFR system by added axial flux through tether-cutting reconnection of loops at the middle of the sigmoid under the influence of continuous slow flux motions for two days. Our study implies that the MFR system in the AR is initiated to upward motion by kink instability and further driven by torus instability. The CME morphology, captured in simultaneous three-point coronagraph observations, is fitted with a Graduated Cylindrical Shell (GCS) model and discerns an MFR topology with its orientation aligning with a magnetic neutral line in the source AR. This MFR expands self-similarly and is found to have source AR twist signatures in the associated near-Earth magnetic cloud (MC). We further derived the kinematics of this CME propagation by employing a plethora of stereoscopic as well as single-spacecraft reconstruction techniques. While stereoscopic methods perform relatively poorly compared to other methods, fitting methods worked best in estimating the arrival time of the CME compared to in situ measurements. Supplied with the values of constrained solar wind velocity, drag parameter, and three-dimensional kinematics from the GCS fit, we construct CME kinematics from the drag-based model consistent with in situ MC arrival.

A FULL STUDY ON THE SUN–EARTH CONNECTION OF AN EARTH-DIRECTED CME MAGNETIC FLUX ROPE

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Vemareddy, Panditi; Mishra, Wageesh

2015-01-01

We present an investigation of an eruption event of a coronal mass ejection (CME) magnetic flux rope (MFR) from the source active region (AR) NOAA 11719 on 2013 April 11 utilizing observations from the Solar Dynamic Observatory, the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, and the WIND spacecraft. The source AR consists of a pre-existing sigmoidal structure stacked over a filament channel which is regarded as an MFR system. EUV observations of low corona suggest further development of this MFR system by added axial flux through tether-cutting reconnection of loops at the middle of the sigmoid under the influence of continuous slow flux motions for two days. Our study implies that the MFR system in the AR is initiated to upward motion by kink instability and further driven by torus instability. The CME morphology, captured in simultaneous three-point coronagraph observations, is fitted with a Graduated Cylindrical Shell (GCS) model and discerns an MFR topology with its orientation aligning with a magnetic neutral line in the source AR. This MFR expands self-similarly and is found to have source AR twist signatures in the associated near-Earth magnetic cloud (MC). We further derived the kinematics of this CME propagation by employing a plethora of stereoscopic as well as single-spacecraft reconstruction techniques. While stereoscopic methods perform relatively poorly compared to other methods, fitting methods worked best in estimating the arrival time of the CME compared to in situ measurements. Supplied with the values of constrained solar wind velocity, drag parameter, and three-dimensional kinematics from the GCS fit, we construct CME kinematics from the drag-based model consistent with in situ MC arrival

Coupling Flux Towers and Networks with Proximal and Remote Sensing Data: New Tools to Collect and Share Time-Synchronized Hourly Fluxes

Science.gov (United States)

Burba, George; Avenson, Tom; Burkart, Andreas; Gamon, John; Guan, Kaiyu; Julitta, Tommaso; Pastorello, Gilberto; Sakowska, Karolina

2017-04-01

optical and flux data in space Current flux towers can be augmented with ground optical sensors and use standard routines to deliver continuous products (e.g. SIF, PRI, NDVI, etc.) based on automated field spectrometers (e.g., FloX and RoX, etc.) and other optical systems Schedule can be developed to point ground optical sensor into the footprint, or to run leaf chamber measurements in the footprint, at the same time with the satellite or UAV above the footprint Full snapshot of the satellite pixel can then be constructed including leaf-level, ground optical sensor, and flux measurements from the same footprint area closely coupled with the satellite measurements to help interpret satellite data, validate models, and improve upscaling Several dozens of new towers already operational globally can be readily adapted for the proposed concept. In addition, over 500 active traditional towers can be updated to synchronize their data with satellite measurements. This presentation will show how FluxSuite system is used by major networks, and describe the concept of how this approach can be utilized to couple satellite and tower data.

Design and Validation of Exoskeleton Actuated by Soft Modules toward Neurorehabilitation—Vision-Based Control for Precise Reaching Motion of Upper Limb

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Victoria W. Oguntosin

2017-07-01

Full Text Available We demonstrated the design, production, and functional properties of the Exoskeleton Actuated by the Soft Modules (EAsoftM. Integrating the 3D printed exoskeleton with passive joints to compensate gravity and with active joints to rotate the shoulder and elbow joints resulted in ultra-light system that could assist planar reaching motion by using the vision-based control law. The EAsoftM can support the reaching motion with compliance realized by the soft materials and pneumatic actuation. In addition, the vision-based control law has been proposed for the precise control over the target reaching motion within the millimeter scale. Aiming at rehabilitation exercise for individuals, typically soft actuators have been developed for relatively small motions, such as grasping motion, and one of the challenges has been to extend their use for a wider range reaching motion. The proposed EAsoftM presented one possible solution for this challenge by transmitting the torque effectively along the anatomically aligned with a human body exoskeleton. The proposed integrated systems will be an ideal solution for neurorehabilitation where affordable, wearable, and portable systems are required to be customized for individuals with specific motor impairments.

Design and Validation of Exoskeleton Actuated by Soft Modules toward Neurorehabilitation-Vision-Based Control for Precise Reaching Motion of Upper Limb.

Science.gov (United States)

Oguntosin, Victoria W; Mori, Yoshiki; Kim, Hyejong; Nasuto, Slawomir J; Kawamura, Sadao; Hayashi, Yoshikatsu

2017-01-01

We demonstrated the design, production, and functional properties of the Exoskeleton Actuated by the Soft Modules (EAsoftM). Integrating the 3D printed exoskeleton with passive joints to compensate gravity and with active joints to rotate the shoulder and elbow joints resulted in ultra-light system that could assist planar reaching motion by using the vision-based control law. The EAsoftM can support the reaching motion with compliance realized by the soft materials and pneumatic actuation. In addition, the vision-based control law has been proposed for the precise control over the target reaching motion within the millimeter scale. Aiming at rehabilitation exercise for individuals, typically soft actuators have been developed for relatively small motions, such as grasping motion, and one of the challenges has been to extend their use for a wider range reaching motion. The proposed EAsoftM presented one possible solution for this challenge by transmitting the torque effectively along the anatomically aligned with a human body exoskeleton. The proposed integrated systems will be an ideal solution for neurorehabilitation where affordable, wearable, and portable systems are required to be customized for individuals with specific motor impairments.

Design and Validation of Exoskeleton Actuated by Soft Modules toward Neurorehabilitation—Vision-Based Control for Precise Reaching Motion of Upper Limb

Science.gov (United States)

Oguntosin, Victoria W.; Mori, Yoshiki; Kim, Hyejong; Nasuto, Slawomir J.; Kawamura, Sadao; Hayashi, Yoshikatsu

2017-01-01

We demonstrated the design, production, and functional properties of the Exoskeleton Actuated by the Soft Modules (EAsoftM). Integrating the 3D printed exoskeleton with passive joints to compensate gravity and with active joints to rotate the shoulder and elbow joints resulted in ultra-light system that could assist planar reaching motion by using the vision-based control law. The EAsoftM can support the reaching motion with compliance realized by the soft materials and pneumatic actuation. In addition, the vision-based control law has been proposed for the precise control over the target reaching motion within the millimeter scale. Aiming at rehabilitation exercise for individuals, typically soft actuators have been developed for relatively small motions, such as grasping motion, and one of the challenges has been to extend their use for a wider range reaching motion. The proposed EAsoftM presented one possible solution for this challenge by transmitting the torque effectively along the anatomically aligned with a human body exoskeleton. The proposed integrated systems will be an ideal solution for neurorehabilitation where affordable, wearable, and portable systems are required to be customized for individuals with specific motor impairments. PMID:28736514

Quasi-biennial modulation of solar neutrino flux: connections with solar activity

Science.gov (United States)

Vecchio, A.; Laurenza, M.; D'alessi, L.; Carbone, V.; Storini, M.

2011-12-01

A quasi-biennial periodicity has been recently found (Vecchio et al., 2010) in the solar neutrino flux, as detected at the Homestake experiment, as well as in the flux of solar energetic protons, by means of the Empirical Modes Decomposition technique. Moreover, both fluxes have been found to be significantly correlated at the quasi-biennial timescale, thus supporting the hypothesis of a connection between solar neutrinos and solar activity. The origin of this connection is investigated, by modeling how the standard Mikheyev-Smirnov-Wolfenstein (MSW) effect (the process for which the well-known neutrino flavor oscillations are modified in passing through the material) could be influenced by matter fluctuations. As proposed by Burgess et al., 2004, by introducing a background magnetic field in the helioseismic model, density fluctuations can be excited in the radiative zone by the resonance between helioseismic g-modes and Alfvén waves. In particular, with reasonable values of the background magnetic field (10-100 kG), the distance between resonant layers could be of the same order of neutrino oscillation length. We study the effect over this distance of a background magnetic field which is variable with a ~2 yr period, in agreement with typical variations of solar activity. Our findings suggest that the quasi-biennial modulation of the neutrino flux is theoretically possible as a consequence of the magnetic field variations in the solar interior. A. Vecchio, M. Laurenza, V. Carbone, M. Storini, The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 709, L1-L5 (2010). C. Burgess, N. S. Dzhalilov, T. I. Rashba, V., B.Semikoz, J. W. F. Valle, Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 348, 609-624 (2004).

Sun's pole-equator flux differences

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Belvedere, G [Istituto di Astronomia dell' Universita di Catania, Italy; Paterno, L [Osservatorio Astrofisico di Catania, Italy

1977-04-01

The possibility that large flux differences between the poles and the equator at the bottom of the solar convective zone are compatible with the small differences observed at the surface is studied. The consequences of increasing the depth of the convective zone due to overshooting are explored. A Boussinesq model is used for the convective zone and it is assumed that the interaction of the global convection with rotation is modelled through a convective flux coefficient whose perturbed part is proportional to the local Taylor number. The numerical integration of the equations of motion and energy shows that coexistence between large pole-equator flux differences at the bottom and small ones at the surface is possible if the solar convective zone extends to a depth of 0.4 R(Sun). The angular velocity distribution inside the convective zone is in agreement with the ..cap alpha omega..-dynamo theories of the solar cycle.

On the theory of critical currents and flux flow in superconductors by the mechanism of plastic deformation of the flux-line lattice

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Welch, D.O.

1999-01-01

In this paper the author will discuss how the nature of the stress state in the flux-line lattice (FLL) of superconductors arises from the distribution, density, geometry, and strength of pinning centers. Under certain conditions this stress causes the onset of plastic deformation in the FLL for values of the current density below that required for flux-flow by general depinning. He will describe an analytic framework, based on a theory of plasticity of the FLL, which describes the flux-flow characteristics, including the possibility of thermally-activated flow and flux creep

Neutron activation analysis: Modelling studies to improve the neutron flux of Americium-Beryllium source

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Didi, Abdessamad; Dadouch, Ahmed; Tajmouati, Jaouad; Bekkouri, Hassane [Advanced Technology and Integration System, Dept. of Physics, Faculty of Science Dhar Mehraz, University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah, Fez (Morocco); Jai, Otman [Laboratory of Radiation and Nuclear Systems, Dept. of Physics, Faculty of Sciences, Tetouan (Morocco)

2017-06-15

Americium–beryllium (Am-Be; n, γ) is a neutron emitting source used in various research fields such as chemistry, physics, geology, archaeology, medicine, and environmental monitoring, as well as in the forensic sciences. It is a mobile source of neutron activity (20 Ci), yielding a small thermal neutron flux that is water moderated. The aim of this study is to develop a model to increase the neutron thermal flux of a source such as Am-Be. This study achieved multiple advantageous results: primarily, it will help us perform neutron activation analysis. Next, it will give us the opportunity to produce radio-elements with short half-lives. Am-Be single and multisource (5 sources) experiments were performed within an irradiation facility with a paraffin moderator. The resulting models mainly increase the thermal neutron flux compared to the traditional method with water moderator.

Measurement of thermal, epithermal and fast neutron flux in the IEA-R1 reactor by the foil activation method

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Koskinas, M.F.

1979-01-01

Experimental and theoretical details of the foil activation method applied to neutrons flux measurements at the IEA-R1 reactor are presented. The thermal - and epithermal - neutron flux were determined form activation measurements of gold, cobalt and manganese foils; and for the fast neutron flux determination, aluminum, iron and nickel foils were used. The measurements of the activity induced in the metal foils were performed using a Ge-Li gamma spectrometry system. In each energy range of the reactor neutron spectrum, the agreement among the experimental flux values obtained using the three kind of materials, indicates the consistency of the theoretical approach and of the nuclear parameters selected. (Author) [pt

Mitigation of motion artifacts in CBCT of lung tumors based on tracked tumor motion during CBCT acquisition

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lewis, John H; Li Ruijiang; Jia Xun; Watkins, W Tyler; Song, William Y; Jiang, Steve B; Lou, Yifei

2011-01-01

An algorithm capable of mitigating respiratory motion blurring artifacts in cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) lung tumor images based on the motion of the tumor during the CBCT scan is developed. The tumor motion trajectory and probability density function (PDF) are reconstructed from the acquired CBCT projection images using a recently developed algorithm Lewis et al (2010 Phys. Med. Biol. 55 2505-22). Assuming that the effects of motion blurring can be represented by convolution of the static lung (or tumor) anatomy with the motion PDF, a cost function is defined, consisting of a data fidelity term and a total variation regularization term. Deconvolution is performed through iterative minimization of this cost function. The algorithm was tested on digital respiratory phantom, physical respiratory phantom and patient data. A clear qualitative improvement is evident in the deblurred images as compared to the motion-blurred images for all cases. Line profiles show that the tumor boundaries are more accurately and clearly represented in the deblurred images. The normalized root-mean-squared error between the images used as ground truth and the motion-blurred images are 0.29, 0.12 and 0.30 in the digital phantom, physical phantom and patient data, respectively. Deblurring reduces the corresponding values to 0.13, 0.07 and 0.19. Application of a -700 HU threshold to the digital phantom results in tumor dimension measurements along the superior-inferior axis of 2.8, 1.8 and 1.9 cm in the motion-blurred, ground truth and deblurred images, respectively. Corresponding values for the physical phantom are 3.4, 2.7 and 2.7 cm. A threshold of -500 HU applied to the patient case gives measurements of 3.1, 1.6 and 1.7 cm along the SI axis in the CBCT, 4DCT and deblurred images, respectively. This technique could provide more accurate information about a lung tumor's size and shape on the day of treatment.

Magnetohydrodynamic interpretation of the motion of prominences

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sakurai, Takashi

1976-01-01

We study three types of prominence eruptions, which we will call the arch type, the loop type, and the gigantic arch type, respectively, from their shapes. If we regard the prominence as a magnetic flux tube, the onset of its ascending motion can be interpreted as the motion due to the screw-mode instability, which is the most unstable mode of instabilities of a magnetofluid column (pinch). The growth rate of this mode is evaluated and is shown to be consistent with the time scale of the initial stage of the eruption. In order to study the nonlinear stage of the instability, we propose a method of numerical calculation based on a variational technique known as Ritz's method. The result shows that the characteristic motion of the arch-, loop-, and gigantic arch-type eruptions may be reproduced by perturbing a model sequence with decreasing pitch angles of the unperturbed helical magnetic field lines. This conclusion seems to be supported by the pitch angles of observed threads in each type of prominence and also by the fact that the observed time profiles of the rising velocity of the prominences of each type agree well with those predicted from model calculations. (auth.)

COSANI-2, Gamma Doses from SABINE Calculation, Activity from ANISN Flux Calculation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dupont, C.

1975-01-01

1 - Nature of physical problem solved: Retrieval of SABINE and/or ANISN results. Calculates in case of SABINE results the individual contributions of capture gamma rays in each region to the total gamma dose and to the total gamma heating may calculate in case of ANISN new activity rates starting from ANISN flux saved on tape and activity cross sections taken on an ANISN binary library tape. The program can draw on a BENSON plotter any of the following quantities: - group flux; - activity rates; - dose rates; - neutron spectra for SABINE; - neutron or gamma direct or adjoint spectra for ANISN; - gamma heating and dose rate for SABINE including individual contributions from each region. Several ANISN and/or SABINE cases can be drawn on the same graph for comparison purposes. 2 - Restrictions on the complexity of the problem: Maximum number of: - tapes containing ANISN and/or SABINE results: 5; - curves per graph: 3; - regions: 40; - points per curve: 500; - energy groups: 200

Solar proton fluxes since 1956

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Reedy, R.C.

1977-01-01

The fluxes of protons emitted during solar flares since 1956 were evaluated. The depth-versus-activity profiles of 56 Co in several lunar rocks are consistent with the solar-proton fluxes detected by experiments on several satellites. Only about 20% of the solar-proton-induced activities of 22 Na and 55 Fe in lunar rocks from early Apollo missions were produced by protons emitted from the sun during solar cycle 20 (1965--1975). The depth-versus-activity data for these radionuclides in several lunar rocks were used to determine the fluxes of protons during solar cycle 19 (1954--1964). The average proton fluxes for cycle 19 are about five times those for both the last million years and for cycle 20. These solar-proton flux variations correlate with changes in sunspot activity

DEFINITION AND ANALYSIS OF MOTION ACTIVITY AFTER-STROKE PATIENT FROM THE VIDEO STREAM

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

M. Yu. Katayev

2014-01-01

Full Text Available This article describes an approach to the assessment of motion activity of man in after-stroke period, allowing the doctor to get new information to give a more informed recommendations on rehabilitation treatment than in traditional approaches. Consider description of the hardware-software complex for determination and analysis of motion activity after-stroke patient for the video stream. The article provides a description of the complex, its algorithmic filling and the results of the work on the example of processing of the actual data. The algorithms and technology to significantly accelerate the gait analysis and improve the quality of diagnostics post-stroke patients.

Vesicle Motion during Sustained Exocytosis in Chromaffin Cells: Numerical Model Based on Amperometric Measurements.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Daungruthai Jarukanont

Full Text Available Chromaffin cells release catecholamines by exocytosis, a process that includes vesicle docking, priming and fusion. Although all these steps have been intensively studied, some aspects of their mechanisms, particularly those regarding vesicle transport to the active sites situated at the membrane, are still unclear. In this work, we show that it is possible to extract information on vesicle motion in Chromaffin cells from the combination of Langevin simulations and amperometric measurements. We developed a numerical model based on Langevin simulations of vesicle motion towards the cell membrane and on the statistical analysis of vesicle arrival times. We also performed amperometric experiments in bovine-adrenal Chromaffin cells under Ba2+ stimulation to capture neurotransmitter releases during sustained exocytosis. In the sustained phase, each amperometric peak can be related to a single release from a new vesicle arriving at the active site. The amperometric signal can then be mapped into a spike-series of release events. We normalized the spike-series resulting from the current peaks using a time-rescaling transformation, thus making signals coming from different cells comparable. We discuss why the obtained spike-series may contain information about the motion of all vesicles leading to release of catecholamines. We show that the release statistics in our experiments considerably deviate from Poisson processes. Moreover, the interspike-time probability is reasonably well described by two-parameter gamma distributions. In order to interpret this result we computed the vesicles' arrival statistics from our Langevin simulations. As expected, assuming purely diffusive vesicle motion we obtain Poisson statistics. However, if we assume that all vesicles are guided toward the membrane by an attractive harmonic potential, simulations also lead to gamma distributions of the interspike-time probability, in remarkably good agreement with experiment. We

Vesicle Motion during Sustained Exocytosis in Chromaffin Cells: Numerical Model Based on Amperometric Measurements.

Science.gov (United States)

Jarukanont, Daungruthai; Bonifas Arredondo, Imelda; Femat, Ricardo; Garcia, Martin E

2015-01-01

Chromaffin cells release catecholamines by exocytosis, a process that includes vesicle docking, priming and fusion. Although all these steps have been intensively studied, some aspects of their mechanisms, particularly those regarding vesicle transport to the active sites situated at the membrane, are still unclear. In this work, we show that it is possible to extract information on vesicle motion in Chromaffin cells from the combination of Langevin simulations and amperometric measurements. We developed a numerical model based on Langevin simulations of vesicle motion towards the cell membrane and on the statistical analysis of vesicle arrival times. We also performed amperometric experiments in bovine-adrenal Chromaffin cells under Ba2+ stimulation to capture neurotransmitter releases during sustained exocytosis. In the sustained phase, each amperometric peak can be related to a single release from a new vesicle arriving at the active site. The amperometric signal can then be mapped into a spike-series of release events. We normalized the spike-series resulting from the current peaks using a time-rescaling transformation, thus making signals coming from different cells comparable. We discuss why the obtained spike-series may contain information about the motion of all vesicles leading to release of catecholamines. We show that the release statistics in our experiments considerably deviate from Poisson processes. Moreover, the interspike-time probability is reasonably well described by two-parameter gamma distributions. In order to interpret this result we computed the vesicles' arrival statistics from our Langevin simulations. As expected, assuming purely diffusive vesicle motion we obtain Poisson statistics. However, if we assume that all vesicles are guided toward the membrane by an attractive harmonic potential, simulations also lead to gamma distributions of the interspike-time probability, in remarkably good agreement with experiment. We also show that

Temporal regularization of ultrasound-based liver motion estimation for image-guided radiation therapy

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

O’Shea, Tuathan P., E-mail: tuathan.oshea@icr.ac.uk; Bamber, Jeffrey C.; Harris, Emma J. [Joint Department of Physics, The Institute of Cancer Research and The Royal Marsden NHS foundation Trust, Sutton, London SM2 5PT (United Kingdom)

2016-01-15

Purpose: Ultrasound-based motion estimation is an expanding subfield of image-guided radiation therapy. Although ultrasound can detect tissue motion that is a fraction of a millimeter, its accuracy is variable. For controlling linear accelerator tracking and gating, ultrasound motion estimates must remain highly accurate throughout the imaging sequence. This study presents a temporal regularization method for correlation-based template matching which aims to improve the accuracy of motion estimates. Methods: Liver ultrasound sequences (15–23 Hz imaging rate, 2.5–5.5 min length) from ten healthy volunteers under free breathing were used. Anatomical features (blood vessels) in each sequence were manually annotated for comparison with normalized cross-correlation based template matching. Five sequences from a Siemens Acuson™ scanner were used for algorithm development (training set). Results from incremental tracking (IT) were compared with a temporal regularization method, which included a highly specific similarity metric and state observer, known as the α–β filter/similarity threshold (ABST). A further five sequences from an Elekta Clarity™ system were used for validation, without alteration of the tracking algorithm (validation set). Results: Overall, the ABST method produced marked improvements in vessel tracking accuracy. For the training set, the mean and 95th percentile (95%) errors (defined as the difference from manual annotations) were 1.6 and 1.4 mm, respectively (compared to 6.2 and 9.1 mm, respectively, for IT). For each sequence, the use of the state observer leads to improvement in the 95% error. For the validation set, the mean and 95% errors for the ABST method were 0.8 and 1.5 mm, respectively. Conclusions: Ultrasound-based motion estimation has potential to monitor liver translation over long time periods with high accuracy. Nonrigid motion (strain) and the quality of the ultrasound data are likely to have an impact on tracking

Reference geometry-based detection of (4D-)CT motion artifacts: a feasibility study

Science.gov (United States)

Werner, René; Gauer, Tobias

2015-03-01

Respiration-correlated computed tomography (4D or 3D+t CT) can be considered as standard of care in radiation therapy treatment planning for lung and liver lesions. The decision about an application of motion management devices and the estimation of patient-specific motion effects on the dose distribution relies on precise motion assessment in the planning 4D CT data { which is impeded in case of CT motion artifacts. The development of image-based/post-processing approaches to reduce motion artifacts would benefit from precise detection and localization of the artifacts. Simple slice-by-slice comparison of intensity values and threshold-based analysis of related metrics suffer from- depending on the threshold- high false-positive or -negative rates. In this work, we propose exploiting prior knowledge about `ideal' (= artifact free) reference geometries to stabilize metric-based artifact detection by transferring (multi-)atlas-based concepts to this specific task. Two variants are introduced and evaluated: (S1) analysis and comparison of warped atlas data obtained by repeated non-linear atlas-to-patient registration with different levels of regularization; (S2) direct analysis of vector field properties (divergence, curl magnitude) of the atlas-to-patient transformation. Feasibility of approaches (S1) and (S2) is evaluated by motion-phantom data and intra-subject experiments (four patients) as well as - adopting a multi-atlas strategy- inter-subject investigations (twelve patients involved). It is demonstrated that especially sorting/double structure artifacts can be precisely detected and localized by (S1). In contrast, (S2) suffers from high false positive rates.

Two-dimensional nature of the active Brownian motion of catalytic microswimmers at solid and liquid interfaces

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dietrich, Kilian; Renggli, Damian; Zanini, Michele; Buttinoni, Ivo; Isa, Lucio; Volpe, Giovanni

2017-01-01

Colloidal particles equipped with platinum patches can establish chemical gradients in H 2 O 2 -enriched solutions and undergo self-propulsion due to local diffusiophoretic migration. In bulk (3D), this class of active particles swim in the direction of the surface heterogeneities introduced by the patches and consequently reorient with the characteristic rotational diffusion time of the colloids. In this article, we present experimental and numerical evidence that planar 2D confinements defy this simple picture. Instead, the motion of active particles both on solid substrates and at flat liquid–liquid interfaces is captured by a 2D active Brownian motion model, in which rotational and translational motion are constrained in the xy -plane. This leads to an active motion that does not follow the direction of the surface heterogeneities and to timescales of reorientation that do not match the free rotational diffusion times. Furthermore, 2D-confinement at fluid–fluid interfaces gives rise to a unique distribution of swimming velocities: the patchy colloids uptake two main orientations leading to two particle populations with velocities that differ up to one order of magnitude. Our results shed new light on the behavior of active colloids in 2D, which is of interest for modeling and applications where confinements are present. (paper)

An intercomparison and validation of satellite-based surface radiative energy flux estimates over the Arctic

Science.gov (United States)

Riihelä, Aku; Key, Jeffrey R.; Meirink, Jan Fokke; Kuipers Munneke, Peter; Palo, Timo; Karlsson, Karl-Göran

2017-05-01

Accurate determination of radiative energy fluxes over the Arctic is of crucial importance for understanding atmosphere-surface interactions, melt and refreezing cycles of the snow and ice cover, and the role of the Arctic in the global energy budget. Satellite-based estimates can provide comprehensive spatiotemporal coverage, but the accuracy and comparability of the existing data sets must be ascertained to facilitate their use. Here we compare radiative flux estimates from Clouds and the Earth's Radiant Energy System (CERES) Synoptic 1-degree (SYN1deg)/Energy Balanced and Filled, Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX) surface energy budget, and our own experimental FluxNet / Satellite Application Facility on Climate Monitoring cLoud, Albedo and RAdiation (CLARA) data against in situ observations over Arctic sea ice and the Greenland Ice Sheet during summer of 2007. In general, CERES SYN1deg flux estimates agree best with in situ measurements, although with two particular limitations: (1) over sea ice the upwelling shortwave flux in CERES SYN1deg appears to be underestimated because of an underestimated surface albedo and (2) the CERES SYN1deg upwelling longwave flux over sea ice saturates during midsummer. The Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer-based GEWEX and FluxNet-CLARA flux estimates generally show a larger range in retrieval errors relative to CERES, with contrasting tendencies relative to each other. The largest source of retrieval error in the FluxNet-CLARA downwelling shortwave flux is shown to be an overestimated cloud optical thickness. The results illustrate that satellite-based flux estimates over the Arctic are not yet homogeneous and that further efforts are necessary to investigate the differences in the surface and cloud properties which lead to disagreements in flux retrievals.

Crustal block motion model and interplate coupling along Ecuador-Colombia trench based on GNSS observation network

Science.gov (United States)

Ito, T.; Mora-Páez, H.; Peláez-Gaviria, J. R.; Kimura, H.; Sagiya, T.

2017-12-01

IntroductionEcuador-Colombia trench is located at the boundary between South-America plate, Nazca Plate and Caribrian plate. This region is very complexes such as subducting Caribrian plate and Nazca plate, and collision between Panama and northern part of the Andes mountains. The previous large earthquakes occurred along the subducting boundary of Nazca plate, such as 1906 (M8.8) and 1979 (M8.2). And also, earthquakes occurred inland, too. So, it is important to evaluate earthquake potentials for preparing huge damage due to large earthquake in near future. GNSS observation In the last decade, the GNSS observation was established in Columbia. The GNSS observation is called by GEORED, which is operated by servicing Geologico Colomiano. The purpose of GEORED is research of crustal deformation. The number of GNSS site of GEORED is consist of 60 continuous GNSS observation site at 2017 (Mora et al., 2017). The sampling interval of almost GNSS site is 30 seconds. These GNSS data were processed by PPP processing using GIPSY-OASYS II software. GEORED can obtain the detailed crustal deformation map in whole Colombia. In addition, we use 100 GNSS data at Ecuador-Peru region (Nocquet et al. 2014). Method We developed a crustal block movements model based on crustal deformation derived from GNSS observation. Our model considers to the block motion with pole location and angular velocity and the interplate coupling between each block boundaries, including subduction between the South-American plate and the Nazca plate. And also, our approach of estimation of crustal block motion and coefficient of interplate coupling are based on MCMC method. The estimated each parameter is obtained probably density function (PDF). Result We tested 11 crustal block models based on geological data, such as active fault trace at surface. The optimal number of crustal blocks is 11 for based on geological and geodetic data using AIC. We use optimal block motion model. And also, we estimate

Enhancing the smoothness of joint motion induced by functional electrical stimulation using co-activation strategies

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ruppel Mirjana

2017-09-01

Full Text Available The motor precision of today’s neuroprosthetic devices that use artificial generation of limb motion using Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES is generally low. We investigate the adoption of natural co-activation strategies as present in antagonistic muscle pairs aiming to improve motor precision produced by FES. In a test in which artificial knee-joint movements were generated, we could improve the smoothness of FES-induced motion by 513% when applying co-activation during the phases in which torque production is switched between muscles – compared to no co-activation. We further demonstrated how the co-activation level influences the joint stiffness in a pendulum test.

Decoding facial expressions based on face-selective and motion-sensitive areas.

Science.gov (United States)

Liang, Yin; Liu, Baolin; Xu, Junhai; Zhang, Gaoyan; Li, Xianglin; Wang, Peiyuan; Wang, Bin

2017-06-01

Humans can easily recognize others' facial expressions. Among the brain substrates that enable this ability, considerable attention has been paid to face-selective areas; in contrast, whether motion-sensitive areas, which clearly exhibit sensitivity to facial movements, are involved in facial expression recognition remained unclear. The present functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study used multi-voxel pattern analysis (MVPA) to explore facial expression decoding in both face-selective and motion-sensitive areas. In a block design experiment, participants viewed facial expressions of six basic emotions (anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness, and surprise) in images, videos, and eyes-obscured videos. Due to the use of multiple stimulus types, the impacts of facial motion and eye-related information on facial expression decoding were also examined. It was found that motion-sensitive areas showed significant responses to emotional expressions and that dynamic expressions could be successfully decoded in both face-selective and motion-sensitive areas. Compared with static stimuli, dynamic expressions elicited consistently higher neural responses and decoding performance in all regions. A significant decrease in both activation and decoding accuracy due to the absence of eye-related information was also observed. Overall, the findings showed that emotional expressions are represented in motion-sensitive areas in addition to conventional face-selective areas, suggesting that motion-sensitive regions may also effectively contribute to facial expression recognition. The results also suggested that facial motion and eye-related information played important roles by carrying considerable expression information that could facilitate facial expression recognition. Hum Brain Mapp 38:3113-3125, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Magnetic Resonance-based Motion Correction for Quantitative PET in Simultaneous PET-MR Imaging.

Science.gov (United States)

Rakvongthai, Yothin; El Fakhri, Georges

2017-07-01

Motion degrades image quality and quantitation of PET images, and is an obstacle to quantitative PET imaging. Simultaneous PET-MR offers a tool that can be used for correcting the motion in PET images by using anatomic information from MR imaging acquired concurrently. Motion correction can be performed by transforming a set of reconstructed PET images into the same frame or by incorporating the transformation into the system model and reconstructing the motion-corrected image. Several phantom and patient studies have validated that MR-based motion correction strategies have great promise for quantitative PET imaging in simultaneous PET-MR. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Magnetowetting and sliding motion of a sessile ferrofluid droplet in the presence of a permanent magnet.

Science.gov (United States)

Nguyen, Nam-Trung; Zhu, Guiping; Chua, Yong-Chin; Phan, Vinh-Nguyen; Tan, Say-Hwa

2010-08-03

Motion of a droplet on a planar surface has applications in droplet-based lab on a chip technology. This paper reports the experimental results of the shape, contact angles, and motion of ferrofluid droplets driven by a permanent magnet on a planar homogeneous surface. The water-based ferrofluid in use is a colloidal suspension of single-domain magnetic nanoparticles. The effect of the magnetic field on the apparent contact angle of the ferrofluid droplet was first investigated. The results show that an increasing magnetic flux decreases the apparent contact angle of a sessile ferrofluid droplet. Next, the dynamic contact angle was investigated by observing the shape and the motion of a sessile ferrofluid droplet. The advancing and receding contact angles of the moving ferrofluid were measured at different moving speeds and magnetic field strengths. The measured contact angles were used to estimate the magnitude of the forces involved in the sliding motion. Scaling analysis was carried out to derive the critical velocity, beyond which the droplet is not able to catch up with the moving magnet.

Motion based parsing for video from observational psychology

Science.gov (United States)

Kokaram, Anil; Doyle, Erika; Lennon, Daire; Joyeux, Laurent; Fuller, Ray

2006-01-01

In Psychology it is common to conduct studies involving the observation of humans undertaking some task. The sessions are typically recorded on video and used for subjective visual analysis. The subjective analysis is tedious and time consuming, not only because much useless video material is recorded but also because subjective measures of human behaviour are not necessarily repeatable. This paper presents tools using content based video analysis that allow automated parsing of video from one such study involving Dyslexia. The tools rely on implicit measures of human motion that can be generalised to other applications in the domain of human observation. Results comparing quantitative assessment of human motion with subjective assessment are also presented, illustrating that the system is a useful scientific tool.

Flux balance modeling to predict bacterial survival during pulsed-activity events

Science.gov (United States)

Jose, Nicholas A.; Lau, Rebecca; Swenson, Tami L.; Klitgord, Niels; Garcia-Pichel, Ferran; Bowen, Benjamin P.; Baran, Richard; Northen, Trent R.

2018-04-01

Desert biological soil crusts (BSCs) are cyanobacteria-dominated surface soil microbial communities common to plant interspaces in arid environments. The capability to significantly dampen their metabolism allows them to exist for extended periods in a desiccated dormant state that is highly robust to environmental stresses. However, within minutes of wetting, metabolic functions reboot, maximizing activity during infrequent permissive periods. Microcoleus vaginatus, a primary producer within the crust ecosystem and an early colonizer, initiates crust formation by binding particles in the upper layer of soil via exopolysaccharides, making microbial dominated biological soil crusts highly dependent on the viability of this organism. Previous studies have suggested that biopolymers play a central role in the survival of this organism by powering resuscitation, rapidly forming compatible solutes, and fueling metabolic activity in dark, hydrated conditions. To elucidate the mechanism of this phenomenon and provide a basis for future modeling of BSCs, we developed a manually curated, genome-scale metabolic model of Microcoleus vaginatus (iNJ1153). To validate this model, gas chromatography-mass spectroscopy (GC-MS) and liquid chromatography-mass spectroscopy (LC-MS) were used to characterize the rate of biopolymer accumulation and depletion in in hydrated Microcoleus vaginatus under light and dark conditions. Constraint-based flux balance analysis showed agreement between model predictions and experimental reaction fluxes. A significant amount of consumed carbon and light energy is invested into storage molecules glycogen and polyphosphate, while β-polyhydroxybutyrate may function as a secondary resource. Pseudo-steady-state modeling suggests that glycogen, the primary carbon source with the fastest depletion rate, will be exhausted if M. vaginatus experiences dark wetting events 4 times longer than light wetting events.

The Toggle Local Planner for sampling-based motion planning

KAUST Repository

Denny, Jory; Amato, Nancy M.

2012-01-01

Sampling-based solutions to the motion planning problem, such as the probabilistic roadmap method (PRM), have become commonplace in robotics applications. These solutions are the norm as the dimensionality of the planning space grows, i.e., d > 5

Effect of body orientation on proprioception during active and passive motions

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Niessen, M.H.M.; Veeger, H.E.J.; Janssen, T.W.J.

2009-01-01

Objective: To investigate whether passive and active reproduction of joint position, as well as detection of passive motion (as measures of a subject's proprioception) of the shoulder differ while sitting compared with lying supine. Design: Shoulder proprioception of 28 healthy subjects (age, 22.2 ±

Analysis of motion of the three wheeled mobile platform

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jaskot Anna

2018-01-01

Full Text Available The work is dedicated to the designing motion of the three wheeled mobile platform under the unsteady conditions. In this paper the results of the analysis based on the dynamics model of the three wheeled mobile robot, with two rear wheels and one front wheel has been included The prototype has been developed by the author's construction assumptions that is useful to realize the motion of the platform in a various configurations of wheel drives, including control of the active forces and the direction of their settings while driving. Friction forces, in longitudinal and in the transverse directions, are considered in the proposed model. Relation between friction and active forces are also included. The motion parameters of the mobile platform has been determined by adopting classical approach of mechanics. The formulated initial problem of platform motion has been solved numerically using the Runge-Kutta method of the fourth order. Results of motion analysis with motion parameters values are determined and sample results are presented.

Visual complexity, player experience, performance and physical exertion in motion-based games for older adults

OpenAIRE

Smeddinck, Jan D.; Gerling, Kathrin M.; Tiemkeo, Saranat

2013-01-01

Motion-based video games can have a variety of benefits for the players and are increasingly applied in physical therapy, rehabilitation and prevention for older adults. However, little is known about how this audience experiences playing such games, how the player experience affects the way older adults interact with motion-based games, and how this can relate to therapy goals. In our work, we decompose the player experience of older adults engaging with motion-based games, focusing on the e...

SU-E-J-01: 3D Fluoroscopic Image Estimation From Patient-Specific 4DCBCT-Based Motion Models

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dhou, S; Hurwitz, M; Lewis, J; Mishra, P

2014-01-01

Purpose: 3D motion modeling derived from 4DCT images, taken days or weeks before treatment, cannot reliably represent patient anatomy on the day of treatment. We develop a method to generate motion models based on 4DCBCT acquired at the time of treatment, and apply the model to estimate 3D time-varying images (referred to as 3D fluoroscopic images). Methods: Motion models are derived through deformable registration between each 4DCBCT phase, and principal component analysis (PCA) on the resulting displacement vector fields. 3D fluoroscopic images are estimated based on cone-beam projections simulating kV treatment imaging. PCA coefficients are optimized iteratively through comparison of these cone-beam projections and projections estimated based on the motion model. Digital phantoms reproducing ten patient motion trajectories, and a physical phantom with regular and irregular motion derived from measured patient trajectories, are used to evaluate the method in terms of tumor localization, and the global voxel intensity difference compared to ground truth. Results: Experiments included: 1) assuming no anatomic or positioning changes between 4DCT and treatment time; and 2) simulating positioning and tumor baseline shifts at the time of treatment compared to 4DCT acquisition. 4DCBCT were reconstructed from the anatomy as seen at treatment time. In case 1) the tumor localization error and the intensity differences in ten patient were smaller using 4DCT-based motion model, possible due to superior image quality. In case 2) the tumor localization error and intensity differences were 2.85 and 0.15 respectively, using 4DCT-based motion models, and 1.17 and 0.10 using 4DCBCT-based models. 4DCBCT performed better due to its ability to reproduce daily anatomical changes. Conclusion: The study showed an advantage of 4DCBCT-based motion models in the context of 3D fluoroscopic images estimation. Positioning and tumor baseline shift uncertainties were mitigated by the 4DCBCT-based

Sequential Ground Motion Effects on the Behavior of a Base-Isolated RCC Building

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zhi Zheng

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The sequential ground motion effects on the dynamic responses of reinforced concrete containment (RCC buildings with typical isolators are studied in this paper. Although the base isolation technique is developed to guarantee the security and integrity of RCC buildings under single earthquakes, seismic behavior of base-isolated RCC buildings under sequential ground motions is deficient. Hence, an ensemble of as-recorded sequential ground motions is employed to study the effect of including aftershocks on the seismic evaluation of base-isolated RCC buildings. The results indicate that base isolation can significantly attenuate the earthquake shaking of the RCC building under not only single earthquakes but also seismic sequences. It is also found that the adverse aftershock effect on the RCC can be reduced due to the base isolation applied to the RCC. More importantly, the study indicates that disregarding aftershocks can induce significant underestimation of the isolator displacement for base-isolated RCC buildings.

Motion-compensated optical coherence tomography using envelope-based surface detection and Kalman-based prediction

Science.gov (United States)

Irsch, Kristina; Lee, Soohyun; Bose, Sanjukta N.; Kang, Jin U.

2018-02-01

We present an optical coherence tomography (OCT) imaging system that effectively compensates unwanted axial motion with micron-scale accuracy. The OCT system is based on a swept-source (SS) engine (1060-nm center wavelength, 100-nm full-width sweeping bandwidth, and 100-kHz repetition rate), with axial and lateral resolutions of about 4.5 and 8.5 microns respectively. The SS-OCT system incorporates a distance sensing method utilizing an envelope-based surface detection algorithm. The algorithm locates the target surface from the B-scans, taking into account not just the first or highest peak but the entire signature of sequential A-scans. Subsequently, a Kalman filter is applied as predictor to make up for system latencies, before sending the calculated position information to control a linear motor, adjusting and maintaining a fixed system-target distance. To test system performance, the motioncorrection algorithm was compared to earlier, more basic peak-based surface detection methods and to performing no motion compensation. Results demonstrate increased robustness and reproducibility, particularly noticeable in multilayered tissues, while utilizing the novel technique. Implementing such motion compensation into clinical OCT systems may thus improve the reliability of objective and quantitative information that can be extracted from OCT measurements.

Wearable motion sensors to continuously measure real-world physical activities.

Science.gov (United States)

Dobkin, Bruce H

2013-12-01

Rehabilitation for sensorimotor impairments aims to improve daily activities, walking, exercise, and motor skills. Monitoring of practice and measuring outcomes, however, is usually restricted to laboratory-based procedures and self-reports. Mobile health devices may reverse these confounders of daily care and research trials. Wearable, wireless motion sensor data, analyzed by activity pattern-recognition algorithms, can describe the type, quantity, and quality of mobility-related activities in the community. Data transmission from the sensors to a cell phone and the Internet enable continuous monitoring. Remote access to laboratory quality data about walking speed, duration and distance, gait asymmetry and smoothness of movements, as well as cycling, exercise, and skills practice, opens new opportunities to engage patients in progressive, personalized therapies with feedback about the performance. Clinical trial designs will be able to include remote verification of the integrity of complex physical interventions and compliance with practice, as well as capture repeated, ecologically sound, ratio scale outcome measures. Given the progressively falling cost of miniaturized wearable gyroscopes, accelerometers, and other physiologic sensors, as well as inexpensive data transmission, sensing systems may become as ubiquitous as cell phones for healthcare. Neurorehabilitation can develop these mobile health platforms for daily care and clinical trials to improve exercise and fitness, skills learning, and physical functioning.

Feasibility of Using Low-Cost Motion Capture for Automated Screening of Shoulder Motion Limitation after Breast Cancer Surgery.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Valeriya Gritsenko

Full Text Available To determine if a low-cost, automated motion analysis system using Microsoft Kinect could accurately measure shoulder motion and detect motion impairments in women following breast cancer surgery.Descriptive study of motion measured via 2 methods.Academic cancer center oncology clinic.20 women (mean age = 60 yrs were assessed for active and passive shoulder motions during a routine post-operative clinic visit (mean = 18 days after surgery following mastectomy (n = 4 or lumpectomy (n = 16 for breast cancer.Participants performed 3 repetitions of active and passive shoulder motions on the side of the breast surgery. Arm motion was recorded using motion capture by Kinect for Windows sensor and on video. Goniometric values were determined from video recordings, while motion capture data were transformed to joint angles using 2 methods (body angle and projection angle.Correlation of motion capture with goniometry and detection of motion limitation.Active shoulder motion measured with low-cost motion capture agreed well with goniometry (r = 0.70-0.80, while passive shoulder motion measurements did not correlate well. Using motion capture, it was possible to reliably identify participants whose range of shoulder motion was reduced by 40% or more.Low-cost, automated motion analysis may be acceptable to screen for moderate to severe motion impairments in active shoulder motion. Automatic detection of motion limitation may allow quick screening to be performed in an oncologist's office and trigger timely referrals for rehabilitation.

Feasibility of Using Low-Cost Motion Capture for Automated Screening of Shoulder Motion Limitation after Breast Cancer Surgery.

Science.gov (United States)

Gritsenko, Valeriya; Dailey, Eric; Kyle, Nicholas; Taylor, Matt; Whittacre, Sean; Swisher, Anne K

2015-01-01

To determine if a low-cost, automated motion analysis system using Microsoft Kinect could accurately measure shoulder motion and detect motion impairments in women following breast cancer surgery. Descriptive study of motion measured via 2 methods. Academic cancer center oncology clinic. 20 women (mean age = 60 yrs) were assessed for active and passive shoulder motions during a routine post-operative clinic visit (mean = 18 days after surgery) following mastectomy (n = 4) or lumpectomy (n = 16) for breast cancer. Participants performed 3 repetitions of active and passive shoulder motions on the side of the breast surgery. Arm motion was recorded using motion capture by Kinect for Windows sensor and on video. Goniometric values were determined from video recordings, while motion capture data were transformed to joint angles using 2 methods (body angle and projection angle). Correlation of motion capture with goniometry and detection of motion limitation. Active shoulder motion measured with low-cost motion capture agreed well with goniometry (r = 0.70-0.80), while passive shoulder motion measurements did not correlate well. Using motion capture, it was possible to reliably identify participants whose range of shoulder motion was reduced by 40% or more. Low-cost, automated motion analysis may be acceptable to screen for moderate to severe motion impairments in active shoulder motion. Automatic detection of motion limitation may allow quick screening to be performed in an oncologist's office and trigger timely referrals for rehabilitation.

Definition of Motion and Biophysical Indicators for Home-Based Rehabilitation through Serious Games

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Matteo Morando

2018-05-01

Full Text Available In this paper, we describe Remote Monitoring Validation Engineering System (ReMoVES, a newly-developed platform for motion rehabilitation through serious games and biophysical sensors. The main features of the system are highlighted as follows: motion tracking capabilities through Microsoft Kinect V2 and Leap Motion are disclosed and compared with other solutions; the emotional state of the patient is evaluated with heart rate measurements and electrodermal activity monitored by Microsoft Band 2 during the execution of the functional exercises planned by the therapist. The ReMoVES platform is conceived for home-based rehabilitation after the hospitalisation period, and the system will deploy machine learning techniques to provide an automated evaluation of the patient performance during the training. The algorithms should deliver effective reports to the therapist about the training performance while the patient exercises on their own. The game features that will be described in this manuscript represent the input for the training set, while the feedback provided by the therapist is the output. To face this supervised learning problem, we are describing the most significant features to be used as key indicators of the patient’s performance along with the evaluation of their accuracy in discriminating between good or bad patient actions.

Generalization of the quasi-geostrophic Eliassen-Palm flux to include eddy forcing of condensation heating

Science.gov (United States)

Stone, P. H.; Salustri, G.

1984-01-01

A modified Eulerian form of the Eliassen-Palm flux which includes the effect of eddy forcing on condensation heating is defined. With the two-dimensional vector flux in the meridional plane which is a function of the zonal mean eddy fluxes replaced by the modified flux, both the Eliassen-Palm theorem and a modified but more general form of the nonacceleration theorem for quasi-geostrophic motion still hold. Calculations of the divergence of the modified flux and of the eddy forcing of the moisture field are presented.

The instantaneous linear motion information measurement method based on inertial sensors for ships

Science.gov (United States)

Yang, Xu; Huang, Jing; Gao, Chen; Quan, Wei; Li, Ming; Zhang, Yanshun

2018-05-01

Ship instantaneous line motion information is the important foundation for ship control, which needs to be measured accurately. For this purpose, an instantaneous line motion measurement method based on inertial sensors is put forward for ships. By introducing a half-fixed coordinate system to realize the separation between instantaneous line motion and ship master movement, the instantaneous line motion acceleration of ships can be obtained with higher accuracy. Then, the digital high-pass filter is applied to suppress the velocity error caused by the low frequency signal such as schuler period. Finally, the instantaneous linear motion displacement of ships can be measured accurately. Simulation experimental results show that the method is reliable and effective, and can realize the precise measurement of velocity and displacement of instantaneous line motion for ships.

Neutron flux density data acquisition system based on LabVIEW

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zhao Yanhui; Zhao Xiuliang; Li Zonglun; Liang Fengyan; Liu Liyan

2011-01-01

In the LabVIEW software, combined with PCI-6251 data acquisition card, VI of neutron flux density data acquisition is realized by DAQmx data acquisition functions. VI is composed of front panel and block diagram. The data collected can be displayed in the forms of the data curve and the data control, and saved in the form of files. Test results show that the frequency of output signal in NI ELVIS can be accurately measured by the system, realizing neutron flux density data acquisition based on LabVIEW. (authors)

Real-time DSP implementation for MRF-based video motion detection.

Science.gov (United States)

Dumontier, C; Luthon, F; Charras, J P

1999-01-01

This paper describes the real time implementation of a simple and robust motion detection algorithm based on Markov random field (MRF) modeling, MRF-based algorithms often require a significant amount of computations. The intrinsic parallel property of MRF modeling has led most of implementations toward parallel machines and neural networks, but none of these approaches offers an efficient solution for real-world (i.e., industrial) applications. Here, an alternative implementation for the problem at hand is presented yielding a complete, efficient and autonomous real-time system for motion detection. This system is based on a hybrid architecture, associating pipeline modules with one asynchronous module to perform the whole process, from video acquisition to moving object masks visualization. A board prototype is presented and a processing rate of 15 images/s is achieved, showing the validity of the approach.

Mass motions in impulsive flarelike brightenings as observed by OSO 8

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Bruner, E.C. Jr.; Lites, B.W.

1979-01-01

CIV lambda1548 line profiles obtained with the University of Colorado spectrometer aboard OSO 8 reveal transient, redshifted brightenings in the chromosphere-corona transition region above active regions and sunspots. In these events the intensity rises by factors of up to 5 in less than the profile sampling interval of 27 s. These events indicate that the emitting material is moving downward at velocities of up to 30 km s -1 . The increase in line intensity and the amount of motion are consistent with the interpretation of these events as pressure waves propagating down magnetic flux loops

Identification of novel KCNQ4 openers by a high-throughput fluorescence-based thallium flux assay.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Qunyi; Rottländer, Mario; Xu, Mingkai; Christoffersen, Claus Tornby; Frederiksen, Kristen; Wang, Ming-Wei; Jensen, Henrik Sindal

2011-11-01

To develop a real-time thallium flux assay for high-throughput screening (HTS) of human KCNQ4 (Kv7.4) potassium channel openers, we used CHO-K1 cells stably expressing human KCNQ4 channel protein and a thallium-sensitive dye based on the permeability of thallium through potassium channels. The electrophysiological and pharmacological properties of the cell line expressing the KCNQ4 protein were found to be in agreement with that reported elsewhere. The EC(50) values of the positive control compound (retigabine) determined by the thallium and (86)rubidium flux assays were comparable to and consistent with those documented in the literature. Signal-to-background (S/B) ratio and Z factor of the thallium influx assay system were assessed to be 8.82 and 0.63, respectively. In a large-scale screening of 98,960 synthetic and natural compounds using the thallium influx assay, 76 compounds displayed consistent KCNQ4 activation, and of these 6 compounds demonstrated EC(50) values of less than 20 μmol/L and 2 demonstrated EC(50) values of less than 1 μmol/L. Taken together, the fluorescence-based thallium flux assay is a highly efficient, automatable, and robust tool to screen potential KCNQ4 openers. This approach may also be expanded to identify and evaluate potential modulators of other potassium channels. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Reduced flux motion via flux creep annealing in high- Jc single-crystal Y1Ba2Cu3O7

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Thompson, J.R.; Sun, Y.R.; Malozemoff, A.P.; Christen, D.K.; Kerchner, H.R.; Ossandon, J.G.; Marwick, A.D.; Holtzberg, F.

1991-01-01

We investigated the stabilization of magnetic flux in a high-temperature superconductor (a proton-irradiated Y 1 Ba 2 Cu 3 O 7 crystal), by operating with subcritical current density J. Using the thermal history to obtain an induced current density J≤J c , we observed a drastically reduced relaxation rate dM/dt (M=magnetization), after ''flux creep annealing.'' The results show that the field gradient ∼J∼M determined the relaxation rate, independent of the sample's H-T history, in agreement with recent theory

Management of respiratory motion in radiation oncology

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Vedam, Subrahmanya Sastry

2003-01-01

Respiration affects the instantaneous position of almost all thoracic and abdominal structures (lung, breast, liver, pancreas, etc.), posing significant problems in the radiotherapy of tumors located at these sites. The diaphragm, for example, has been shown to move approximately 1.5 cm in the superior-inferior direction during normal breathing. During radiotherapy, margin expansion around the tumor, based on an estimate of the expected range of tumor motion, is commonly employed to ensure adequate dose coverage. Such a margin estimate may or may not encompass the 'current' extent of motion exhibited by the tumor, resulting in either a higher dose to the surrounding normal tissue or a cold spot in the tumor volume, leading to poor prognosis. Accounting for respiratory motion by active management during radiotherapy can, however, potentiate a reduction in the amount of high dose to normal tissue. Active management of respiratory motion forms the primary theme of this dissertation. Among the various techniques available to manage respiratory motion, our research focused on respiratory gated and respiration synchronized radiotherapy, with an external marker to monitor respiratory motion. Multiple session recordings of diaphragm and external marker motion revealed a consistent linear relationship, validating the use of external marker motion as a 'surrogate' for diaphragm motion. The predictability of diaphragm motion based on such external marker motion both within and between treatment sessions was also determined to be of the order of 0.1 cm. Gating during exhalation was found to be more reproducible than gating during inhalation. Although, a reduction in the 'gate' width achieved a modest reduction in the margins added around the tumor further reduction was limited by setup error. A motion phantom study of the potential gains from respiratory gating indicated margin reduction of 0.2-1.1 cm while employing gating. In addition, gating also improved the quality of

EVOLUTION OF SPINNING AND BRAIDING HELICITY FLUXES IN SOLAR ACTIVE REGION NOAA 10930

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Ravindra, B. [Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Koramangala, Bangalore 560 034 (India); Yoshimura, Keiji [Department of Physics, Montana State University Bozeman, MT 59717 (United States); Dasso, Sergio, E-mail: ravindra@iiap.res.in, E-mail: yosimura@solar.physics.montana.edu, E-mail: dasso@df.uba.ar [Instituto de Astronomia y Fisica del Espacio (CONICET-UBA), 1428 Buenos Aires (Argentina)

2011-12-10

The line-of-sight magnetograms from Solar Optical Telescope Narrowband Filter Imager observations of NOAA Active Region 10930 have been used to study the evolution of spinning and braiding helicities over a period of five days starting from 2006 December 9. The north (N) polarity sunspot was the follower and the south (S) polarity sunspot was the leader. The N-polarity sunspot in the active region was rotating in the counterclockwise direction. The rate of rotation was small during the first two days of observations and it increased up to 8 Degree-Sign hr{sup -1} on the third day of the observations. On the fourth and fifth days it remained at 4 Degree-Sign hr{sup -1} with small undulations in its magnitude. The sunspot rotated about 260 Degree-Sign in the last three days. The S-polarity sunspot did not complete more than 20 Degree-Sign in five days. However, it changed its direction of rotation five times over a period of five days and injected both the positive and negative type of spin helicity fluxes into the corona. Through the five days, both the positive and negative sunspot regions injected equal amounts of spin helicity. The total injected helicity is predominantly negative in sign. However, the sign of the spin and braiding helicity fluxes computed over all the regions were reversed from negative to positive five times during the five-day period of observations. The reversal in spinning helicity flux was found before the onset of the X3.4-class flare, too. Though, the rotating sunspot has been observed in this active region, the braiding helicity has contributed more to the total accumulated helicity than the spinning helicity. The accumulated helicity is in excess of -7 Multiplication-Sign 10{sup 43} Mx{sup 2} over a period of five days. Before the X3.4-class flare that occurred on 2006 December 13, the rotation speed and spin helicity flux increased in the S-polarity sunspot. Before the flare, the total injected helicity was larger than -6

Assessment of potential strong ground motions in the city of Rome

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

L. Malagnini

1994-06-01

Full Text Available A methodology is used which combines stochastic generation of random series with a finite-difference technique to estimate the expected horizontal ground motion for the city of Rome as induced by a large earthquake in the Central Apennines. In this approach, source properties and long-path propagation are modelled through observed spectra of ground motion in the region, while the effects of the near-surface geology in the city are simulated by means of a finite-difference technique applied to 2-D models including elastic and anelastic properties of geologic materials and topographic variations. The parameters commonly used for earthquake engineering purposes are estimated from the simulated time histories of horizontal ground motion. We focus our attention on peak ground acceleration and velocity, and on the integral of the squared acceleration and velocity (that are proportional to the Arias intensity and seismic energy flux, respectively. Response spectra are analyzed as well. Parameter variations along 2-D profiles visualize the effects of the small-scale geological heterogeneities and topography irregularities on ground motion in the case of a strong earthquake. Interestingly, the largest amplification of peak ground acceleration and Arias intensity does not necessarily occur at the same sites where peak ground velocity and flux of seismic energy reach their highest values, depending on the frequency band of amplification. A magnitude 7 earthquake at a distance of 100 km results in peak ground accelerations ranging from 30 to 70 gals while peak ground velocities are estimated to vary from 5 to 7 cm/s; moreover, simulated time histories of horizontal ground motion yield amplitudes of 5% damped pseudovelocity response spectra as large as 15-20 cm/s for frequencies from 1to 3 Hz. In this frequency band, the mean value is 7 cm/s for firm sites and ranges from 10 to 13 cm/s for soil sites. All these results are in good agreement with predictions

WiFi-Based Real-Time Calibration-Free Passive Human Motion Detection

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Liangyi Gong

2015-12-01

Full Text Available With the rapid development of WLAN technology, wireless device-free passive human detection becomes a newly-developing technique and holds more potential to worldwide and ubiquitous smart applications. Recently, indoor fine-grained device-free passive human motion detection based on the PHY layer information is rapidly developed. Previous wireless device-free passive human detection systems either rely on deploying specialized systems with dense transmitter-receiver links or elaborate off-line training process, which blocks rapid deployment and weakens system robustness. In the paper, we explore to research a novel fine-grained real-time calibration-free device-free passive human motion via physical layer information, which is independent of indoor scenarios and needs no prior-calibration and normal profile. We investigate sensitivities of amplitude and phase to human motion, and discover that phase feature is more sensitive to human motion, especially to slow human motion. Aiming at lightweight and robust device-free passive human motion detection, we develop two novel and practical schemes: short-term averaged variance ratio (SVR and long-term averaged variance ratio (LVR. We realize system design with commercial WiFi devices and evaluate it in typical multipath-rich indoor scenarios. As demonstrated in the experiments, our approach can achieve a high detection rate and low false positive rate.

WiFi-Based Real-Time Calibration-Free Passive Human Motion Detection.

Science.gov (United States)

Gong, Liangyi; Yang, Wu; Man, Dapeng; Dong, Guozhong; Yu, Miao; Lv, Jiguang

2015-12-21

With the rapid development of WLAN technology, wireless device-free passive human detection becomes a newly-developing technique and holds more potential to worldwide and ubiquitous smart applications. Recently, indoor fine-grained device-free passive human motion detection based on the PHY layer information is rapidly developed. Previous wireless device-free passive human detection systems either rely on deploying specialized systems with dense transmitter-receiver links or elaborate off-line training process, which blocks rapid deployment and weakens system robustness. In the paper, we explore to research a novel fine-grained real-time calibration-free device-free passive human motion via physical layer information, which is independent of indoor scenarios and needs no prior-calibration and normal profile. We investigate sensitivities of amplitude and phase to human motion, and discover that phase feature is more sensitive to human motion, especially to slow human motion. Aiming at lightweight and robust device-free passive human motion detection, we develop two novel and practical schemes: short-term averaged variance ratio (SVR) and long-term averaged variance ratio (LVR). We realize system design with commercial WiFi devices and evaluate it in typical multipath-rich indoor scenarios. As demonstrated in the experiments, our approach can achieve a high detection rate and low false positive rate.

Compressive Video Recovery Using Block Match Multi-Frame Motion Estimation Based on Single Pixel Cameras

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sheng Bi

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Compressive sensing (CS theory has opened up new paths for the development of signal processing applications. Based on this theory, a novel single pixel camera architecture has been introduced to overcome the current limitations and challenges of traditional focal plane arrays. However, video quality based on this method is limited by existing acquisition and recovery methods, and the method also suffers from being time-consuming. In this paper, a multi-frame motion estimation algorithm is proposed in CS video to enhance the video quality. The proposed algorithm uses multiple frames to implement motion estimation. Experimental results show that using multi-frame motion estimation can improve the quality of recovered videos. To further reduce the motion estimation time, a block match algorithm is used to process motion estimation. Experiments demonstrate that using the block match algorithm can reduce motion estimation time by 30%.

Event-Based Computation of Motion Flow on a Neuromorphic Analog Neural Platform.

Science.gov (United States)

Giulioni, Massimiliano; Lagorce, Xavier; Galluppi, Francesco; Benosman, Ryad B

2016-01-01

Estimating the speed and direction of moving objects is a crucial component of agents behaving in a dynamic world. Biological organisms perform this task by means of the neural connections originating from their retinal ganglion cells. In artificial systems the optic flow is usually extracted by comparing activity of two or more frames captured with a vision sensor. Designing artificial motion flow detectors which are as fast, robust, and efficient as the ones found in biological systems is however a challenging task. Inspired by the architecture proposed by Barlow and Levick in 1965 to explain the spiking activity of the direction-selective ganglion cells in the rabbit's retina, we introduce an architecture for robust optical flow extraction with an analog neuromorphic multi-chip system. The task is performed by a feed-forward network of analog integrate-and-fire neurons whose inputs are provided by contrast-sensitive photoreceptors. Computation is supported by the precise time of spike emission, and the extraction of the optical flow is based on time lag in the activation of nearby retinal neurons. Mimicking ganglion cells our neuromorphic detectors encode the amplitude and the direction of the apparent visual motion in their output spiking pattern. Hereby we describe the architectural aspects, discuss its latency, scalability, and robustness properties and demonstrate that a network of mismatched delicate analog elements can reliably extract the optical flow from a simple visual scene. This work shows how precise time of spike emission used as a computational basis, biological inspiration, and neuromorphic systems can be used together for solving specific tasks.

Thermally Activated Motion of Sodium Cations in Insulating Parent Low-Silica X Zeolite

Science.gov (United States)

Igarashi, Mutsuo; Jeglič, Peter; Mežnaršič, Tadej; Nakano, Takehito; Nozue, Yasuo; Watanabe, Naohiro; Arčon, Denis

2017-07-01

We report a 23Na spin-lattice relaxation rate, T1 - 1, in low-silica X zeolite. T1 - 1 follows multiple BPP-type behavior as a result of thermal motion of sodium cations in insulating material. The estimated lowest activation energy of 15 meV is much lower than 100 meV observed previously for sodium motion in heavily Na-loaded samples and is most likely attributed to short-distance jumps of sodium cations between sites within the same supercage.

Angle-independent measure of motion for image-based gating in 3D coronary angiography

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lehmann, Glen C.; Holdsworth, David W.; Drangova, Maria

2006-01-01

The role of three-dimensional (3D) image guidance for interventional procedures and minimally invasive surgeries is increasing for the treatment of vascular disease. Currently, most interventional procedures are guided by two-dimensional x-ray angiography, but computed rotational angiography has the potential to provide 3D geometric information about the coronary arteries. The creation of 3D angiographic images of the coronary arteries requires synchronization of data acquisition with respect to the cardiac cycle, in order to minimize motion artifacts. This can be achieved by inferring the extent of motion from a patient's electrocardiogram (ECG) signal. However, a direct measurement of motion (from the 2D angiograms) has the potential to improve the 3D angiographic images by ensuring that only projections acquired during periods of minimal motion are included in the reconstruction. This paper presents an image-based metric for measuring the extent of motion in 2D x-ray angiographic images. Adaptive histogram equalization was applied to projection images to increase the sharpness of coronary arteries and the superior-inferior component of the weighted centroid (SIC) was measured. The SIC constitutes an image-based metric that can be used to track vessel motion, independent of apparent motion induced by the rotational acquisition. To evaluate the technique, six consecutive patients scheduled for routine coronary angiography procedures were studied. We compared the end of the SIC rest period (ρ) to R-waves (R) detected in the patient's ECG and found a mean difference of 14±80 ms. Two simultaneous angular positions were acquired and ρ was detected for each position. There was no statistically significant difference (P=0.79) between ρ in the two simultaneously acquired angular positions. Thus we have shown the SIC to be independent of view angle, which is critical for rotational angiography. A preliminary image-based gating strategy that employed the SIC was

Development of Novel High Temperature Superconducting Detectors Based on Flux Activation and Ultrafast Dynamics

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Frankel, Anatoly

1998-01-01

It is proposed to study quasiparticle (QP) relaxation dynamics and flux mechanism of HTS using pump/probe femtosecond spectroscopy and nonequilibrium photoresponse in the presence of a magnetic field (and/or bias current...

Characteristics of heat flux and particle flux to the divertor in H-mode of JT-60U

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Itami, K.; Hosogane, N.; Asakura, N.; Kubo, H.; Tsuji, S.; Shimada, M.

1995-01-01

Heat flux and particle flux behavior in H-mode is studied in a comparative manner. It was confirmed that the multiple peak structure of heat flux during ELM activity has a role in reducing the average value of a peak heat flux at the divertor. In order to characterize heat and particle flux during ELM activity, the ELM part and the steady state part of heat flux and particle flux were determined and statistically analyzed. A large in-out asymmetry of peak ELM heat flux density was found. The asymmetry is almost unaffected by the ion grad-B drift direction. In-out asymmetry of both ELM and steady-state parts of the particle flux were found to be similar. ((orig.))

Linear magnetic motor/generator. [to generate electric energy using magnetic flux for spacecraft power supply

Science.gov (United States)

Studer, P. A. (Inventor)

1982-01-01

A linear magnetic motor/generator is disclosed which uses magnetic flux to provide mechanical motion or electrical energy. The linear magnetic motor/generator includes an axially movable actuator mechanism. A permament magnet mechanism defines a first magnetic flux path which passes through a first end portion of the actuator mechanism. Another permament magnet mechanism defines a second magnetic flux path which passes through a second end portion of the actuator mechanism. A drive coil defines a third magnetic flux path passing through a third central portion of the actuator mechanism. A drive coil selectively adds magnetic flux to and subtracts magnetic flux from magnetic flux flowing in the first and second magnetic flux path.

A process-based 222radon flux map for Europe and its comparison to long-term observations

Science.gov (United States)

Karstens, U.; Schwingshackl, C.; Schmithüsen, D.; Levin, I.

2015-11-01

Detailed 222radon (222Rn) flux maps are an essential pre-requisite for the use of radon in atmospheric transport studies. Here we present a high-resolution 222Rn flux map for Europe, based on a parameterization of 222Rn production and transport in the soil. The 222Rn exhalation rate is parameterized based on soil properties, uranium content, and modelled soil moisture from two different land-surface reanalysis data sets. Spatial variations in exhalation rates are primarily determined by the uranium content of the soil, but also influenced by soil texture and local water-table depth. Temporal variations are related to soil moisture variations as the molecular diffusion in the unsaturated soil zone depends on available air-filled pore space. The implemented diffusion parameterization was tested against campaign-based 222Rn soil profile measurements. Monthly 222Rn exhalation rates from European soils were calculated with a nominal spatial resolution of 0.083° × 0.083° and compared to long-term direct measurements of 222Rn exhalation rates in different areas of Europe. The two realizations of the 222Rn flux map, based on the different soil moisture data sets, both realistically reproduce the observed seasonality in the fluxes but yield considerable differences for absolute flux values. The mean 222Rn flux from soils in Europe is estimated to be 10 mBq m-2 s-1 (ERA-Interim/Land soil moisture) or 15 mBq m-2 s-1 (GLDAS (Global Land Data Assimilation System) Noah soil moisture) for the period 2006-2010. The corresponding seasonal variations with low fluxes in winter and high fluxes in summer range in the two realizations from ca. 7 to ca. 14 mBq m-2 s-1 and from ca. 11 to ca. 20 mBq m-2 s-1, respectively. These systematic differences highlight the importance of realistic soil moisture data for a reliable estimation of 222Rn exhalation rates. Comparison with observations suggests that the flux estimates based on the GLDAS Noah soil moisture model on average better

A process-based 222radon flux map for Europe and its comparison to long-term observations

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Karstens, U.; Schwingshackl, C.; Schmithuesen, D.; Levin, I.

2015-01-01

Detailed 222 radon ( 222 Rn) flux maps are an essential pre-requisite for the use of radon in atmospheric transport studies. Here we present a high-resolution 222 Rn flux map for Europe, based on a parameterization of 222 Rn production and transport in the soil. The 222 Rn exhalation rate is parameterized based on soil properties, uranium content, and modelled soil moisture from two different land-surface reanalysis data sets. Spatial variations in exhalation rates are primarily determined by the uranium content of the soil, but also influenced by soil texture and local water-table depth. Temporal variations are related to soil moisture variations as the molecular diffusion in the unsaturated soil zone depends on available air-filled pore space. The implemented diffusion parameterization was tested against campaign-based 222 Rn soil profile measurements. Monthly 222 Rn exhalation rates from European soils were calculated with a nominal spatial resolution of 0.083 x 0.083 and compared to long-term direct measurements of 222 Rn exhalation rates in different areas of Europe. The two realizations of the 222 Rn flux map, based on the different soil moisture data sets, both realistically reproduce the observed seasonality in the fluxes but yield considerable differences for absolute flux values. The mean 222 Rn flux from soils in Europe is estimated to be 10 mBq m -2 s -1 (ERA-Interim/Land soil moisture) or 15 mBq m -2 s -1 (GLDAS (Global Land Data Assimilation System) Noah soil moisture) for the period 2006-2010. The corresponding seasonal variations with low fluxes in winter and high fluxes in summer range in the two realizations from ca. 7 to ca. 14 mBq m -2 s -1 and from ca. 11 to ca. 20 mBq m -2 s -1 , respectively. These systematic differences highlight the importance of realistic soil moisture data for a reliable estimation of 222 Rn exhalation rates. Comparison with observations suggests that the flux estimates based on the GLDAS Noah soil moisture model on

The Implementation of Problem-Solving Based Laboratory Activities to Teach the Concept of Simple Harmonic Motion in Senior High School

Science.gov (United States)

Iradat, R. D.; Alatas, F.

2017-09-01

Simple harmonic motion is considered as a relatively complex concept to be understood by students. This study attempts to implement laboratory activities that focus on solving contextual problems related to the concept. A group of senior high school students participated in this pre-experimental method from a group’s pretest-posttest research design. Laboratory activities have had a positive impact on improving students’ scientific skills, such as, formulating goals, conducting experiments, applying laboratory tools, and collecting data. Therefore this study has added to the theoretical and practical knowledge that needs to be considered to teach better complicated concepts in physics learning.

Calculation of heat fluxes induced by radio frequency heating on the actively cooled protections of ion cyclotron resonant heating (ICRH) and lower hybrid (LH) antennas in Tore Supra

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Ritz, G., E-mail: Guillaume.ritz@gmail.com [CEA, Institut de la Recherche sur la Fusion Magnétique (IRFM), 13108 Saint Paul-lez-Durance (France); Corre, Y., E-mail: Yann.corre@cea.fr [CEA, Institut de la Recherche sur la Fusion Magnétique (IRFM), 13108 Saint Paul-lez-Durance (France); Rault, M.; Missirlian, M. [CEA, Institut de la Recherche sur la Fusion Magnétique (IRFM), 13108 Saint Paul-lez-Durance (France); Portafaix, C. [ITER Organization, Route de Vinon-sur-Verdon, 13115 Saint Paul-lez-Durance (France); Martinez, A.; Ekedahl, A.; Colas, L.; Guilhem, D.; Salami, M.; Loarer, T. [CEA, Institut de la Recherche sur la Fusion Magnétique (IRFM), 13108 Saint Paul-lez-Durance (France)

2013-10-15

Highlights: ► The heat flux generated by radiofrequency (RF) heating was calculated using Tore Supra's heating antennas. ► The highest heat flux value, generated by ions accelerated in RF-rectified sheath potentials, was 5 MW/m{sup 2}. ► The heat flux on the limiters of antennas was in the same order of magnitude as that on the toroidal pumping limiter. -- Abstract: Lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) and ion cyclotron resonance heating (ICRH) are recognized as important auxiliary heating and current drive methods for present and next step fusion devices. However, these radio frequency (RF) systems generate a heat flux up to several MW/m{sup 2} on the RF antennas during plasma operation. This paper focuses on the determination of the heat flux deposited on the lateral protections of the RF antennas in Tore Supra. The heat flux was calculated by finite element method (FEM) using a model of the lateral protection. The FEM calculation was based on surface temperature measurements using infrared cameras monitoring the RF antennas. The heat flux related to the acceleration of electrons in front of the LHCD grills (LHCD active) and to the acceleration of ions in RF-rectified sheath potentials (ICRH active) were calculated. Complementary results on the heat flux related to fast ions (ICRH active with a relatively low magnetic field) are also reported in this paper.

A human motion model based on maps for navigation systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kaiser Susanna

2011-01-01

Full Text Available Abstract Foot-mounted indoor positioning systems work remarkably well when using additionally the knowledge of floor-plans in the localization algorithm. Walls and other structures naturally restrict the motion of pedestrians. No pedestrian can walk through walls or jump from one floor to another when considering a building with different floor-levels. By incorporating known floor-plans in sequential Bayesian estimation processes such as particle filters (PFs, long-term error stability can be achieved as long as the map is sufficiently accurate and the environment sufficiently constraints pedestrians' motion. In this article, a new motion model based on maps and floor-plans is introduced that is capable of weighting the possible headings of the pedestrian as a function of the local environment. The motion model is derived from a diffusion algorithm that makes use of the principle of a source effusing gas and is used in the weighting step of a PF implementation. The diffusion algorithm is capable of including floor-plans as well as maps with areas of different degrees of accessibility. The motion model more effectively represents the probability density function of possible headings that are restricted by maps and floor-plans than a simple binary weighting of particles (i.e., eliminating those that crossed walls and keeping the rest. We will show that the motion model will help for obtaining better performance in critical navigation scenarios where two or more modes may be competing for some of the time (multi-modal scenarios.

Activation of retinal glial (Müller cells by extracellular ATP induces pronounced increases in extracellular H+ flux.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Boriana K Tchernookova

Full Text Available Small alterations in extracellular acidity are potentially important modulators of neuronal signaling within the vertebrate retina. Here we report a novel extracellular acidification mechanism mediated by glial cells in the retina. Using self-referencing H+-selective microelectrodes to measure extracellular H+ fluxes, we show that activation of retinal Müller (glial cells of the tiger salamander by micromolar concentrations of extracellular ATP induces a pronounced extracellular H+ flux independent of bicarbonate transport. ADP, UTP and the non-hydrolyzable analog ATPγs at micromolar concentrations were also potent stimulators of extracellular H+ fluxes, but adenosine was not. The extracellular H+ fluxes induced by ATP were mimicked by the P2Y1 agonist MRS 2365 and were significantly reduced by the P2 receptor blockers suramin and PPADS, suggesting activation of P2Y receptors. Bath-applied ATP induced an intracellular rise in calcium in Müller cells; both the calcium rise and the extracellular H+ fluxes were significantly attenuated when calcium re-loading into the endoplasmic reticulum was inhibited by thapsigargin and when the PLC-IP3 signaling pathway was disrupted with 2-APB and U73122. The anion transport inhibitor DIDS also markedly reduced the ATP-induced increase in H+ flux while SITS had no effect. ATP-induced H+ fluxes were also observed from Müller cells isolated from human, rat, monkey, skate and lamprey retinae, suggesting a highly evolutionarily conserved mechanism of potential general importance. Extracellular ATP also induced significant increases in extracellular H+ flux at the level of both the outer and inner plexiform layers in retinal slices of tiger salamander which was significantly reduced by suramin and PPADS. We suggest that the novel H+ flux mediated by ATP-activation of Müller cells and of other glia as well may be a key mechanism modulating neuronal signaling in the vertebrate retina and throughout the brain.

Attenuation relation for strong motion in Eastern Java based on appropriate database and method

Science.gov (United States)

Mahendra, Rian; Rohadi, Supriyanto; Rudyanto, Ariska

2017-07-01

The selection and determination of attenuation relation has become important for seismic hazard assessment in active seismic region. This research initially constructs the appropriate strong motion database, including site condition and type of the earthquake. The data set consisted of large number earthquakes of 5 ≤ Mw ≤ 9 and distance less than 500 km that occurred around Java from 2009 until 2016. The location and depth of earthquake are being relocated using double difference method to improve the quality of database. Strong motion data from twelve BMKG's accelerographs which are located in east Java is used. The site condition is known by using dominant period and Vs30. The type of earthquake is classified into crustal earthquake, interface, and intraslab based on slab geometry analysis. A total of 10 Ground Motion Prediction Equations (GMPEs) are tested using Likelihood (Scherbaum et al., 2004) and Euclidean Distance Ranking method (Kale and Akkar, 2012) with the associated database. The evaluation of these methods lead to a set of GMPEs that can be applied for seismic hazard in East Java where the strong motion data is collected. The result of these methods found that there is still high deviation of GMPEs, so the writer modified some GMPEs using inversion method. Validation was performed by analysing the attenuation curve of the selected GMPE and observation data in period 2015 up to 2016. The results show that the selected GMPE is suitable for estimated PGA value in East Java.

Slow motion in films and video clips: Music influences perceived duration and emotion, autonomic physiological activation and pupillary responses.

Science.gov (United States)

Wöllner, Clemens; Hammerschmidt, David; Albrecht, Henning

2018-01-01

Slow motion scenes are ubiquitous in screen-based audiovisual media and are typically accompanied by emotional music. The strong effects of slow motion on observers are hypothetically related to heightened emotional states in which time seems to pass more slowly. These states are simulated in films and video clips, and seem to resemble such experiences in daily life. The current study investigated time perception and emotional response to media clips containing decelerated human motion, with or without music using psychometric and psychophysiological testing methods. Participants were presented with slow-motion scenes taken from commercial films, ballet and sports footage, as well as the same scenes converted to real-time. Results reveal that slow-motion scenes, compared to adapted real-time scenes, led to systematic underestimations of duration, lower perceived arousal but higher valence, lower respiration rates and smaller pupillary diameters. The presence of music compared to visual-only presentations strongly affected results in terms of higher accuracy in duration estimates, higher perceived arousal and valence, higher physiological activation and larger pupillary diameters, indicating higher arousal. Video genre affected responses in addition. These findings suggest that perceiving slow motion is not related to states of high arousal, but rather affects cognitive dimensions of perceived time and valence. Music influences these experiences profoundly, thus strengthening the impact of stretched time in audiovisual media.

Numerical analysis of viscous effect on ship rolling motions based on CFD

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

LUO Tian

2017-03-01

Full Text Available During the ship design procedure, the analysis of ship rolling motions is of great significance because the rolling motions have extraordinary effects on the sea-keeping, maneuverability and stability of a ship. It is difficult to simulate rolling motions due to the effect of viscosity, which causes many nonlinear components in computation. As such, the potential theory used for other ship motions cannot be used for rolling motions. This paper simulates the rolling motions of the DTMB 5512 ship model and the ship transverse section of the S60 ship model with a naoe-FOAM-SJTU solver using the Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes(RANSmethod based on the OpenFOAM. The results of rolling motions are compared with the experimental data, which confirms the reliability of the meshes and results. For the ship transverse section of the S60 ship model, the damping coefficient is divided into three parts with the Euler and RANS methods:friction, vorticity and wave parts. For the DTMB 5512 ship model, the damping coefficient is also respectively analyzed, including the friction, vorticity, wave and bilge keel parts. The results in this paper show that the vorticity part accounts for the greatest proportion, while the friction part accounts for the least, and the bilge keels reduces the damping moment to a certain extent which shows the effect of rolling parameters on rolling motions and moments.

Melt layer erosion of pure and lanthanum doped tungsten under VDE-like high heat flux loads

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yuan, Y.; Greuner, H.; Böswirth, B.; Luo, G.-N.; Fu, B.Q.; Xu, H.Y.; Liu, W.

2013-01-01

Heat loads expected for VDEs in ITER were applied in the neutral beam facility GLADIS at IPP Garching. Several ∼3 mm thick rolled pure W and W–1 wt% La 2 O 3 plates were exposed to pulsed hydrogen beams with a central heat flux of 23 MW/m 2 for 1.5–1.8 s. The melting thresholds are determined, and melt layer motion as well as material structure evolutions are shown. The melting thresholds of the two W grades are very close in this experimental setup. Lots of big bubbles with diameters from several μm to several 10 μm in the re-solidified layer of W were observed and they spread deeper with increasing heat flux. However, for W–1 wt% La 2 O 3 , no big bubbles were found in the corrugated melt layer. The underlying mechanisms referred to the melt layer motion and bubble issues are tentatively discussed based on comparison of the erosion characteristics between the two W grades

High-resolution digital movies of emerging flux and horizontal flows in active regions on the sun

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Topka, K.; Ferguson, S.; Frank, Z.; Tarbell, T.; Title, A.

1988-01-01

High-resolution observations of active regions in many wavelength bands obtained at the Vacuum Tower Telescope of NSO/Sunspot (Sacramento Peak) are presented. The SOUP tunable filter, HRSO 1024 x 1024 CCD camera, and a sunspot tracker for image stabilization were used. Subarrays of 512 x 512 pixels were processed digitally and recorded on videodisk in movie format. The movies with 0.5 to 1 arcsecond resolution of the following simultaneous observations were shown: green continuum, longitudinal magnetogram, Doppler velocity, Fe I 5576 A line center, H alpha wings, and H alpha line center. The best set of movies show a 90 x 90 arcsecond field-of-view of an active region at S29, W11. When viewed at speeds of a few thousand times real-time, the photospheric movies clearly show the active region fields being distorted by a remarkable combination of systematic flows and small eruptions of new flux. Flux emergence is most easily discovered in line center movies: an elongated dark feature appears first, followed soon after by bright points at one or both ends. A brief, strong upflow is seen when the dark feature first appears; downflow in the bright points persists much longer. The magnetic flux appears to increase gradually over this extended period. Some of the flux emergence events were studied in detail, with measurements of horizontal and vertical velocities and magnetic flux versus time within one footpoint of the loop

High-resolution digital movies of emerging flux and horizontal flows in active regions on the sun

Science.gov (United States)

Topka, K.; Ferguson, S.; Frank, Z.; Tarbell, T.; Title, A.

1988-01-01

High-resolution observations of active regions in many wavelength bands obtained at the Vacuum Tower Telescope of NSO/Sunspot (Sacramento Peak) are presented. The SOUP tunable filter, HRSO 1024 x 1024 CCD camera, and a sunspot tracker for image stabilization were used. Subarrays of 512 x 512 pixels were processed digitally and recorded on videodisk in movie format. The movies with 0.5 to 1 arcsecond resolution of the following simultaneous observations were shown: green continuum, longitudinal magnetogram, Doppler velocity, Fe I 5576 A line center, H alpha wings, and H alpha line center. The best set of movies show a 90 x 90 arcsecond field-of-view of an active region at S29, W11. When viewed at speeds of a few thousand times real-time, the photospheric movies clearly show the active region fields being distorted by a remarkable combination of systematic flows and small eruptions of new flux. Flux emergence is most easily discovered in line center movies: an elongated dark feature appears first, followed soon after by bright points at one or both ends. A brief, strong upflow is seen when the dark feature first appears; downflow in the bright points persists much longer. The magnetic flux appears to increase gradually over this extended period. Some of the flux emergence events were studied in detail, with measurements of horizontal and vertical velocities and magnetic flux versus time within one footpoint of the loop.

High-resolution digital movies of emerging flux and horizontal flows in active regions on the sun

Science.gov (United States)

Topka, K.; Ferguson, S.; Frank, Z.; Tarbell, T.; Title, A.

1988-11-01

High-resolution observations of active regions in many wavelength bands obtained at the Vacuum Tower Telescope of NSO/Sunspot (Sacramento Peak) are presented. The SOUP tunable filter, HRSO 1024 x 1024 CCD camera, and a sunspot tracker for image stabilization were used. Subarrays of 512 x 512 pixels were processed digitally and recorded on videodisk in movie format. The movies with 0.5 to 1 arcsecond resolution of the following simultaneous observations were shown: green continuum, longitudinal magnetogram, Doppler velocity, Fe I 5576 A line center, H alpha wings, and H alpha line center. The best set of movies show a 90 x 90 arcsecond field-of-view of an active region at S29, W11. When viewed at speeds of a few thousand times real-time, the photospheric movies clearly show the active region fields being distorted by a remarkable combination of systematic flows and small eruptions of new flux. Flux emergence is most easily discovered in line center movies: an elongated dark feature appears first, followed soon after by bright points at one or both ends. A brief, strong upflow is seen when the dark feature first appears; downflow in the bright points persists much longer. The magnetic flux appears to increase gradually over this extended period. Some of the flux emergence events were studied in detail, with measurements of horizontal and vertical velocities and magnetic flux versus time within one footpoint of the loop.

Robust motion control of oscillatory-base manipulators h∞-control and sliding-mode-control-based approaches

CERN Document Server

Toda, Masayoshi

2016-01-01

This book provides readers with alternative robust approaches to control design for an important class of systems characteristically associated with ocean-going vessels and structures. These systems, which include crane vessels, on-board cranes, radar gimbals, and a conductivity temperature and depth winch, are modelled as manipulators with oscillating bases. One design approach is based on the H-infinity control framework exploiting an effective combination of PD control, an extended matrix polytope and a robust stability analysis method with a state-dependent coefficient form. The other is based on sliding-mode control using some novel nonlinear sliding surfaces. The model demonstrates how successful motion control can be achieved by suppressing base oscillations and in the presence of uncertainties. This is important not only for ocean engineering systems in which the problems addressed here originate but more generally as a benchmark platform for robust motion control with disturbance rejection. Researche...

Comparison of nonflare solar soft x ray flux with 10.7-cm radio flux

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Donnelly, R.F.

1982-01-01

The similarities and differences of the nonflare solar 1- to 8-A X ray flux and the daily 10.7-cm Ottawa solar radio flux are examined. The radio flux is shown to be much less sensitive than the soft X ray flux on the average to the coronal emission of active regions located near or beyond the solar chromospheric limb relative to regions near the center of the solar disk. This is caused by the solar soft X ray emission's being optically thin while much of the 10.7-cm active region emission is from optical depths of tauapprox.1. The radio flux includes a large quiet sun flux which is emitted mostly from the tenuous chromosphere-corona transition region (Tapprox.10 4 --10 6 0 K) and partly from the cooler portions of the quiet corona Tapprox.1.5 x 10 6 0 K. Conversely, the solar soft X ray flux has a very small quiet sun component

A respiratory monitoring device based on clavicular motion

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pitts, D G; Aspinall, R; Patel, M K; Lang, P-O; Sinclair, A J

2013-01-01

Respiratory rate is one of the key vital signs yet unlike temperature, heart rate or blood pressure, there is no simple and low cost measurement device for medical use. Here we discuss the development of a respiratory sensor based upon clavicular motion and the findings of a pilot study comparing respiratory rate readings derived from clavicular and thoracic motion with an expiratory breath flow reference sensor. Simultaneously sampled data from resting volunteers (n = 8) was analysed to determine the location of individual breaths in the data set and from these, breath periods and frequency were calculated. Clavicular sensor waveforms were found to be more consistent and of greater amplitude than those from the thoracic device, demonstrating good alignment with the reference waveform. On comparing breath by breath periods a close agreement was observed with the reference, with mean clavicular respiratory rate R 2 values of 0.89 (lateral) and 0.98 (longitudinal-axis). This pilot study demonstrates the viability of clavicular respiratory sensing. The sensor is unobtrusive, unaffected by bioelectrical or electrode problems and easier to determine and more consistent than thoracic motion sensing. With relatively basic signal conditioning and processing requirements, it could provide an ideal platform for a low-cost respiratory monitor. (note)

Dynamic vision based on motion-contrast: changes with age in adults.

Science.gov (United States)

Wist, E R; Schrauf, M; Ehrenstein, W H

2000-10-01

Data are presented for a computerized test of dynamic vision in a sample of 1006 healthy subjects aged between 20 and 85 years. The test employed a form-from-motion stimulus: i.e., within a random-dot display, Landolt rings of the same average luminance as their surroundings become visible only when the dots within the ring are moved briefly, while those of the surround remain stationary. Thus, detection of gap location is based upon motion contrast (form-from-motion) rather than luminance contrast. With the size and exposure duration of the centrally presented ring held constant, motion contrast was manipulated by varying the percentage (between 20 and 100%) of moving dots within the ring. Subjects reported gap location (left, right, top, bottom). A gradual decline of dynamic vision with age was found for all motion-contrast levels. Beyond 70 years of age, chance-level performance occurred in almost half of the subjects. The data provide the basis for applications including diagnostic screening for glaucoma, visual disturbances in brain-damaged patients, as well as assessment of the dynamic vision of drivers of motor vehicles and athletes.

Research Note:Effects of human activities on the Yangtze River suspended sediment flux into the estuary in the last century

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)