Validity and reliability of The Johns Hopkins Adapted Cognitive Exam for critically ill patients.

Science.gov (United States)

Lewin, John J; LeDroux, Shannon N; Shermock, Kenneth M; Thompson, Carol B; Goodwin, Haley E; Mirski, Erin A; Gill, Randeep S; Mirski, Marek A

2012-01-01

To validate The Johns Hopkins Adapted Cognitive Exam designed to assess and quantify cognition in critically ill patients. Prospective cohort study. Neurosciences, surgical, and medical intensive care units at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. One hundred six adult critically ill patients. One expert neurologic assessment and four measurements of the Adapted Cognitive Exam (all patients). Four measurements of the Folstein Mini-Mental State Examination in nonintubated patients only. Adapted Cognitive Exam and Mini-Mental State Examination were performed by 76 different raters. One hundred six patients were assessed, 46 intubated and 60 nonintubated, resulting in 424 Adapted Cognitive Exam and 240 Mini-Mental State Examination measurements. Criterion validity was assessed by comparing Adapted Cognitive Exam with a neurointensivist's assessment of cognitive status (ρ = 0.83, p validity was assessed by comparing Adapted Cognitive Exam with Mini-Mental State Examination in nonintubated patients (ρ = 0.81, p validity was assessed by surveying raters who used both the Adapted Cognitive Exam and Mini-Mental State Examination and indicated the Adapted Cognitive Exam was an accurate reflection of the patient's cognitive status, more sensitive a marker of cognition than the Mini-Mental State Examination, and easy to use. The Adapted Cognitive Exam demonstrated excellent interrater reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient = 0.997; 95% confidence interval 0.997-0.998) and interitem reliability of each of the five subscales of the Adapted Cognitive Exam and Mini-Mental State Examination (Cronbach's α: range for Adapted Cognitive Exam = 0.83-0.88; range for Mini-Mental State Examination = 0.72-0.81). The Adapted Cognitive Exam is the first valid and reliable examination for the assessment and quantification of cognition in critically ill patients. It provides a useful, objective tool that can be used by any member of the interdisciplinary critical care team to support

Beyond adaptive-critic creative learning for intelligent mobile robots

Science.gov (United States)

Liao, Xiaoqun; Cao, Ming; Hall, Ernest L.

2001-10-01

Intelligent industrial and mobile robots may be considered proven technology in structured environments. Teach programming and supervised learning methods permit solutions to a variety of applications. However, we believe that to extend the operation of these machines to more unstructured environments requires a new learning method. Both unsupervised learning and reinforcement learning are potential candidates for these new tasks. The adaptive critic method has been shown to provide useful approximations or even optimal control policies to non-linear systems. The purpose of this paper is to explore the use of new learning methods that goes beyond the adaptive critic method for unstructured environments. The adaptive critic is a form of reinforcement learning. A critic element provides only high level grading corrections to a cognition module that controls the action module. In the proposed system the critic's grades are modeled and forecasted, so that an anticipated set of sub-grades are available to the cognition model. The forecasting grades are interpolated and are available on the time scale needed by the action model. The success of the system is highly dependent on the accuracy of the forecasted grades and adaptability of the action module. Examples from the guidance of a mobile robot are provided to illustrate the method for simple line following and for the more complex navigation and control in an unstructured environment. The theory presented that is beyond the adaptive critic may be called creative theory. Creative theory is a form of learning that models the highest level of human learning - imagination. The application of the creative theory appears to not only be to mobile robots but also to many other forms of human endeavor such as educational learning and business forecasting. Reinforcement learning such as the adaptive critic may be applied to known problems to aid in the discovery of their solutions. The significance of creative theory is that it

Quantization-Based Adaptive Actor-Critic Tracking Control With Tracking Error Constraints.

Science.gov (United States)

Fan, Quan-Yong; Yang, Guang-Hong; Ye, Dan

2018-04-01

In this paper, the problem of adaptive actor-critic (AC) tracking control is investigated for a class of continuous-time nonlinear systems with unknown nonlinearities and quantized inputs. Different from the existing results based on reinforcement learning, the tracking error constraints are considered and new critic functions are constructed to improve the performance further. To ensure that the tracking errors keep within the predefined time-varying boundaries, a tracking error transformation technique is used to constitute an augmented error system. Specific critic functions, rather than the long-term cost function, are introduced to supervise the tracking performance and tune the weights of the AC neural networks (NNs). A novel adaptive controller with a special structure is designed to reduce the effect of the NN reconstruction errors, input quantization, and disturbances. Based on the Lyapunov stability theory, the boundedness of the closed-loop signals and the desired tracking performance can be guaranteed. Finally, simulations on two connected inverted pendulums are given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

A structure-based approach to evaluation product adaptability in adaptable design

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cheng, Qiang; Liu, Zhifeng; Cai, Ligang; Zhang, Guojun; Gu, Peihua

2011-01-01

Adaptable design, as a new design paradigm, involves creating designs and products that can be easily changed to satisfy different requirements. In this paper, two types of product adaptability are proposed as essential adaptability and behavioral adaptability, and through measuring which respectively a model for product adaptability evaluation is developed. The essential adaptability evaluation proceeds with analyzing the independencies of function requirements and function modules firstly based on axiomatic design, and measuring the adaptability of interfaces secondly with three indices. The behavioral adaptability reflected by the performance of adaptable requirements after adaptation is measured based on Kano model. At last, the effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated by an illustrative example of the motherboard of a personal computer. The results show that the method can evaluate and reveal the adaptability of a product in essence, and is of directive significance to improving design and innovative design

Adaptive Trajectory Design

Data.gov (United States)

National Aeronautics and Space Administration — Adaptive Trajectory Design (ATD) is an original concept for quick and efficient end-to-end trajectory designs using proven piece-wise dynamical methods. With ongoing...

Probabilistic DHP adaptive critic for nonlinear stochastic control systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Herzallah, Randa

2013-06-01

Following the recently developed algorithms for fully probabilistic control design for general dynamic stochastic systems (Herzallah & Káarnáy, 2011; Kárný, 1996), this paper presents the solution to the probabilistic dual heuristic programming (DHP) adaptive critic method (Herzallah & Káarnáy, 2011) and randomized control algorithm for stochastic nonlinear dynamical systems. The purpose of the randomized control input design is to make the joint probability density function of the closed loop system as close as possible to a predetermined ideal joint probability density function. This paper completes the previous work (Herzallah & Káarnáy, 2011; Kárný, 1996) by formulating and solving the fully probabilistic control design problem on the more general case of nonlinear stochastic discrete time systems. A simulated example is used to demonstrate the use of the algorithm and encouraging results have been obtained. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Optimal and robust control of a class of nonlinear systems using dynamically re-optimised single network adaptive critic design

Science.gov (United States)

Tiwari, Shivendra N.; Padhi, Radhakant

2018-01-01

Following the philosophy of adaptive optimal control, a neural network-based state feedback optimal control synthesis approach is presented in this paper. First, accounting for a nominal system model, a single network adaptive critic (SNAC) based multi-layered neural network (called as NN1) is synthesised offline. However, another linear-in-weight neural network (called as NN2) is trained online and augmented to NN1 in such a manner that their combined output represent the desired optimal costate for the actual plant. To do this, the nominal model needs to be updated online to adapt to the actual plant, which is done by synthesising yet another linear-in-weight neural network (called as NN3) online. Training of NN3 is done by utilising the error information between the nominal and actual states and carrying out the necessary Lyapunov stability analysis using a Sobolev norm based Lyapunov function. This helps in training NN2 successfully to capture the required optimal relationship. The overall architecture is named as 'Dynamically Re-optimised single network adaptive critic (DR-SNAC)'. Numerical results for two motivating illustrative problems are presented, including comparison studies with closed form solution for one problem, which clearly demonstrate the effectiveness and benefit of the proposed approach.

Fostering cooperative activism through critical design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Menendez Blanco, Maria; Bjørn, Pernille; De Angeli, Antonella

2017-01-01

Critical design is gaining momentum in interaction design, yet little CSCW research has focused on articulating the cooperative potentials of critical design artefacts. We address this gap by reflecting upon a design project aimed at overturning the prevailing narrative regarding dyslexia in Italy....... The adversarial propositions embedded in our critical design artefacts challenged the description of dyslexia as a learning disorder putting forward the view of a learning difference. These artefacts demonstrated their capacity to bridge heterogeneous social worlds (those of teachers, children, and parents......) into one cooperative entity and mobilise cooperative activism. The contribution to CSCW is two-fold. Firstly, we introduce the cooperative potentials of critical design artefacts; secondly, we propose critical design as a strategy for researchers engaging with cooperative activism....

Why Critical design is useless

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ebbesen, Toke Riis

Critical design is proliferating. According to Raby, this kind of design creates artefacts in order to “challenge narrow assumptions, preconceptions, and givens about the role products play in everyday life” (Raby, 2008, 94). Conceived basically as "useless", the value of critical design...

A Bayesian sequential design with adaptive randomization for 2-sided hypothesis test.

Science.gov (United States)

Yu, Qingzhao; Zhu, Lin; Zhu, Han

2017-11-01

Bayesian sequential and adaptive randomization designs are gaining popularity in clinical trials thanks to their potentials to reduce the number of required participants and save resources. We propose a Bayesian sequential design with adaptive randomization rates so as to more efficiently attribute newly recruited patients to different treatment arms. In this paper, we consider 2-arm clinical trials. Patients are allocated to the 2 arms with a randomization rate to achieve minimum variance for the test statistic. Algorithms are presented to calculate the optimal randomization rate, critical values, and power for the proposed design. Sensitivity analysis is implemented to check the influence on design by changing the prior distributions. Simulation studies are applied to compare the proposed method and traditional methods in terms of power and actual sample sizes. Simulations show that, when total sample size is fixed, the proposed design can obtain greater power and/or cost smaller actual sample size than the traditional Bayesian sequential design. Finally, we apply the proposed method to a real data set and compare the results with the Bayesian sequential design without adaptive randomization in terms of sample sizes. The proposed method can further reduce required sample size. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Robustness of critical points in a complex adaptive system: Effects of hedge behavior

Science.gov (United States)

Liang, Yuan; Huang, Ji-Ping

2013-08-01

In our recent papers, we have identified a class of phase transitions in the market-directed resource-allocation game, and found that there exists a critical point at which the phase transitions occur. The critical point is given by a certain resource ratio. Here, by performing computer simulations and theoretical analysis, we report that the critical point is robust against various kinds of human hedge behavior where the numbers of herds and contrarians can be varied widely. This means that the critical point can be independent of the total number of participants composed of normal agents, herds and contrarians, under some conditions. This finding means that the critical points we identified in this complex adaptive system (with adaptive agents) may also be an intensive quantity, similar to those revealed in traditional physical systems (with non-adaptive units).

Design Specifications for Adaptive Real-Time Systems

Science.gov (United States)

1991-12-01

TICfl \\ E CT E Design Specifications for JAN’\\ 1992 Adaptive Real - Time Systems fl Randall W. Lichota U, Alice H. Muntz - December 1991 \\ \\\\/ 0 / r...268-2056 Technical Report CMU/SEI-91-TR-20 ESD-91-TR-20 December 1991 Design Specifications for Adaptive Real - Time Systems Randall W. Lichota Hughes...Design Specifications for Adaptive Real - Time Systems Abstract: The design specification method described in this report treats a software

Urban drainage design and climate change adaptation decision making

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Qianqian Zhou

2012-10-15

adaptation actions (e.g. formulation of an appropriate service level). Furthermore, the risk-based economic approach enables an assessment and comparison of the expected benefits (due to saved flood damage) and corresponding costs of different adaptation measures. This gives more detailed insights into the pros and cons of different adaptation options, thus helping to optimize the efficiency and performance of urban drainage adaptation design. The thesis investigates impacts of uncertainties associated with not only the hydrological conditions (e.g. design intensities, climate change impacts), but also the present and future vulnerability conditions (e.g. impacts on assets). This enables a complete assessment of effects of various uncertainties in the climate change assessment process. Furthermore, in the study, two types of uncertainties are distinguished: 1) the overall uncertainty of an individual adaptation scenario, which may influence the choice of action; and 2) the marginal uncertainty between adaptation alternatives in order for a direct comparison of their efficiency once a decision of action is taken. Based on assessments of the two types of uncertainties, it is found that although climate change adaptation assessment is often associated with large uncertainties, it is still possible to identify robust adaptation options based on calculated marginal uncertainties. This is because that the uncertainties related to costing of floods and magnitude of climate impacts will be levelled out when comparing adaptation alternatives. In addition, a sensitivity analysis is also incorporated in the framework to assess the relative contribution of inherent uncertainties in the assessment. This allows an identification of critical/important uncertainties that matter for decision making and also provides a guide for further efforts to improve decision making in relation to climate change adaptation. Traditionally, assessment of climate change adaptation is based on conventional

Mission-Critical Systems Design Framework

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kyriakos Houliotis

2018-03-01

Full Text Available Safety-critical systems are well documented and standardized (e.g. IEC 61508, RTCA DO-178B within system design cycles. However in Defence and Security, systems that are critical to the success of a Mission are not defined within the literature nor are there any guidelines in defining criticality in their design or operational capabilities. When it comes to Vetronics (Vehicle Electronics, a mission-critical system, is a system with much complexity and mixed criticality levels that is a part of the overall platform (military vehicle offering integrated system capabilities. In this paper, a framework is presented, providing guidelines in designing efficiently and effectively mission-critical systems considering principles of Interoperable Open Architectures (IOA, mission-critical integrity levels and following new standardization activities such as NATO Generic Vehicle Architecture (NGVA. A Defensive Aid Suite (DAS system is used as a case study to illustrate how this framework can be exploited. The indention of this extension is to provide an approach to precisely estimate threats in order to de-risk missions in the very early stages.

Scalable Algorithms for Adaptive Statistical Designs

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Robert Oehmke

2000-01-01

Full Text Available We present a scalable, high-performance solution to multidimensional recurrences that arise in adaptive statistical designs. Adaptive designs are an important class of learning algorithms for a stochastic environment, and we focus on the problem of optimally assigning patients to treatments in clinical trials. While adaptive designs have significant ethical and cost advantages, they are rarely utilized because of the complexity of optimizing and analyzing them. Computational challenges include massive memory requirements, few calculations per memory access, and multiply-nested loops with dynamic indices. We analyze the effects of various parallelization options, and while standard approaches do not work well, with effort an efficient, highly scalable program can be developed. This allows us to solve problems thousands of times more complex than those solved previously, which helps make adaptive designs practical. Further, our work applies to many other problems involving neighbor recurrences, such as generalized string matching.

Engineering design guidelines for nuclear criticality safety

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Waltz, W.R.

1988-08-01

This document provides general engineering design guidelines specific to nuclear criticality safety for a facility where the potential for a criticality accident exists. The guide is applicable to the design of new SRP/SRL facilities and to major modifications Of existing facilities. The document is intended an: A guide for persons actively engaged in the design process. A resource document for persons charged with design review for adequacy relative to criticality safety. A resource document for facility operating personnel. The guide defines six basic criticality safety design objectives and provides information to assist in accomplishing each objective. The guide in intended to supplement the design requirements relating to criticality safety contained in applicable Department of Energy (DOE) documents. The scope of the guide is limited to engineering design guidelines associated with criticality safety and does not include other areas of the design process, such as: criticality safety analytical methods and modeling, nor requirements for control of the design process

Improving the Critic Learning for Event-Based Nonlinear $H_{\\infty }$ Control Design.

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Ding; He, Haibo; Liu, Derong

2017-10-01

In this paper, we aim at improving the critic learning criterion to cope with the event-based nonlinear H ∞ state feedback control design. First of all, the H ∞ control problem is regarded as a two-player zero-sum game and the adaptive critic mechanism is used to achieve the minimax optimization under event-based environment. Then, based on an improved updating rule, the event-based optimal control law and the time-based worst-case disturbance law are obtained approximately by training a single critic neural network. The initial stabilizing control is no longer required during the implementation process of the new algorithm. Next, the closed-loop system is formulated as an impulsive model and its stability issue is handled by incorporating the improved learning criterion. The infamous Zeno behavior of the present event-based design is also avoided through theoretical analysis on the lower bound of the minimal intersample time. Finally, the applications to an aircraft dynamics and a robot arm plant are carried out to verify the efficient performance of the present novel design method.

Adaptive design methods in clinical trials – a review

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Chang Mark

2008-05-01

Full Text Available Abstract In recent years, the use of adaptive design methods in clinical research and development based on accrued data has become very popular due to its flexibility and efficiency. Based on adaptations applied, adaptive designs can be classified into three categories: prospective, concurrent (ad hoc, and retrospective adaptive designs. An adaptive design allows modifications made to trial and/or statistical procedures of ongoing clinical trials. However, it is a concern that the actual patient population after the adaptations could deviate from the originally target patient population and consequently the overall type I error (to erroneously claim efficacy for an infective drug rate may not be controlled. In addition, major adaptations of trial and/or statistical procedures of on-going trials may result in a totally different trial that is unable to address the scientific/medical questions the trial intends to answer. In this article, several commonly considered adaptive designs in clinical trials are reviewed. Impacts of ad hoc adaptations (protocol amendments, challenges in by design (prospective adaptations, and obstacles of retrospective adaptations are described. Strategies for the use of adaptive design in clinical development of rare diseases are discussed. Some examples concerning the development of Velcade intended for multiple myeloma and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma are given. Practical issues that are commonly encountered when implementing adaptive design methods in clinical trials are also discussed.

Some challenges with statistical inference in adaptive designs.

Science.gov (United States)

Hung, H M James; Wang, Sue-Jane; Yang, Peiling

2014-01-01

Adaptive designs have generated a great deal of attention to clinical trial communities. The literature contains many statistical methods to deal with added statistical uncertainties concerning the adaptations. Increasingly encountered in regulatory applications are adaptive statistical information designs that allow modification of sample size or related statistical information and adaptive selection designs that allow selection of doses or patient populations during the course of a clinical trial. For adaptive statistical information designs, a few statistical testing methods are mathematically equivalent, as a number of articles have stipulated, but arguably there are large differences in their practical ramifications. We pinpoint some undesirable features of these methods in this work. For adaptive selection designs, the selection based on biomarker data for testing the correlated clinical endpoints may increase statistical uncertainty in terms of type I error probability, and most importantly the increased statistical uncertainty may be impossible to assess.

Dynamic optimization and adaptive controller design

Science.gov (United States)

Inamdar, S. R.

2010-10-01

In this work I present a new type of controller which is an adaptive tracking controller which employs dynamic optimization for optimizing current value of controller action for the temperature control of nonisothermal continuously stirred tank reactor (CSTR). We begin with a two-state model of nonisothermal CSTR which are mass and heat balance equations and then add cooling system dynamics to eliminate input multiplicity. The initial design value is obtained using local stability of steady states where approach temperature for cooling action is specified as a steady state and a design specification. Later we make a correction in the dynamics where material balance is manipulated to use feed concentration as a system parameter as an adaptive control measure in order to avoid actuator saturation for the main control loop. The analysis leading to design of dynamic optimization based parameter adaptive controller is presented. The important component of this mathematical framework is reference trajectory generation to form an adaptive control measure.

Adaptive Modeling, Engineering Analysis and Design of Advanced Aerospace Vehicles

Science.gov (United States)

Mukhopadhyay, Vivek; Hsu, Su-Yuen; Mason, Brian H.; Hicks, Mike D.; Jones, William T.; Sleight, David W.; Chun, Julio; Spangler, Jan L.; Kamhawi, Hilmi; Dahl, Jorgen L.

2006-01-01

This paper describes initial progress towards the development and enhancement of a set of software tools for rapid adaptive modeling, and conceptual design of advanced aerospace vehicle concepts. With demanding structural and aerodynamic performance requirements, these high fidelity geometry based modeling tools are essential for rapid and accurate engineering analysis at the early concept development stage. This adaptive modeling tool was used for generating vehicle parametric geometry, outer mold line and detailed internal structural layout of wing, fuselage, skin, spars, ribs, control surfaces, frames, bulkheads, floors, etc., that facilitated rapid finite element analysis, sizing study and weight optimization. The high quality outer mold line enabled rapid aerodynamic analysis in order to provide reliable design data at critical flight conditions. Example application for structural design of a conventional aircraft and a high altitude long endurance vehicle configuration are presented. This work was performed under the Conceptual Design Shop sub-project within the Efficient Aerodynamic Shape and Integration project, under the former Vehicle Systems Program. The project objective was to design and assess unconventional atmospheric vehicle concepts efficiently and confidently. The implementation may also dramatically facilitate physics-based systems analysis for the NASA Fundamental Aeronautics Mission. In addition to providing technology for design and development of unconventional aircraft, the techniques for generation of accurate geometry and internal sub-structure and the automated interface with the high fidelity analysis codes could also be applied towards the design of vehicles for the NASA Exploration and Space Science Mission projects.

Group sequential and confirmatory adaptive designs in clinical trials

CERN Document Server

Wassmer, Gernot

2016-01-01

This book provides an up-to-date review of the general principles of and techniques for confirmatory adaptive designs. Confirmatory adaptive designs are a generalization of group sequential designs. With these designs, interim analyses are performed in order to stop the trial prematurely under control of the Type I error rate. In adaptive designs, it is also permissible to perform a data-driven change of relevant aspects of the study design at interim stages. This includes, for example, a sample-size reassessment, a treatment-arm selection or a selection of a pre-specified sub-population. Essentially, this adaptive methodology was introduced in the 1990s. Since then, it has become popular and the object of intense discussion and still represents a rapidly growing field of statistical research. This book describes adaptive design methodology at an elementary level, while also considering designing and planning issues as well as methods for analyzing an adaptively planned trial. This includes estimation methods...

Criticality safety and facility design considerations

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Waltz, W.R.

1991-06-01

Operations with fissile material introduce the risk of a criticality accident that may be lethal to nearby personnel. In addition, concerns over criticality safety can result in substantial delays and shutdown of facility operations. For these reasons, it is clear that the prevention of a nuclear criticality accident should play a major role in the design of a nuclear facility. The emphasis of this report will be placed on engineering design considerations in the prevention of criticality. The discussion will not include other important aspects, such as the physics of calculating limits nor criticality alarm systems

Adaptive Inverse Optimal Control for Rehabilitation Robot Systems Using Actor-Critic Algorithm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Fancheng Meng

2014-01-01

Full Text Available The higher goal of rehabilitation robot is to aid a person to achieve a desired functional task (e.g., tracking trajectory based on assisted-as-needed principle. To this goal, a new adaptive inverse optimal hybrid control (AHC combining inverse optimal control and actor-critic learning is proposed. Specifically, an uncertain nonlinear rehabilitation robot model is firstly developed that includes human motor behavior dynamics. Then, based on this model, an open-loop error system is formed; thereafter, an inverse optimal control input is designed to minimize the cost functional and a NN-based actor-critic feedforward signal is responsible for the nonlinear dynamic part contaminated by uncertainties. Finally, the AHC controller is proven (through a Lyapunov-based stability analysis to yield a global uniformly ultimately bounded stability result, and the resulting cost functional is meaningful. Simulation and experiment on rehabilitation robot demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme.

The brine shrimp Artemia: adapted to critical life conditions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gonzalo M Gajardo

2012-06-01

Full Text Available The brine shrimp Artemia is a micro-crustacean, well adapted to the harsh conditions that severely hypersaline environments impose on survival and reproduction. Adaptation to these conditions has taken place at different functional levels or domains, from the individual (molecular-cellular-physiological to the population level. Such conditions are experienced by very few equivalent macro-planktonic organisms; thus, Artemia can be considered a model animal extremophile offering a unique suite of adaptations that are the focus of this review. The most obvious is a highly efficient osmoregulation system to withstand up to 10 times the salt concentration of ordinary seawater. Under extremely critical environmental conditions, for example when seasonal lakes dry out, Artemia takes refuge by producing a highly resistant encysted gastrula embryo (cyst capable of severe dehydration enabling an escape from population extinction. Cysts can be viewed as gene banks that store a genetic memory of historical population conditions. Their occurrence is due to the evolved ability of females to perceive forthcoming unstable environmental conditions expressed by their ability to switch reproductive mode, producing either cysts (oviparity when environmental conditions become deleterious or free-swimming nauplii (ovoviviparity that are able to maintain the population under suitable conditions.At the population level the trend is for conspecific populations to be fragmented into locally adapted populations, whereas species are restricted to salty lakes in particular regions (regional endemism. The Artemia model depicts adaptation as a complex response to critical life conditions, integrating and refining past and present experiences at all levels of organization. Although we consider an invertebrate restricted to a unique environment, the processes to be discussed are of general biological interest. Finally, we highlight the benefits of understanding the stress

Toward superconducting critical current by design

OpenAIRE

Sadovskyy, I. A.; Jia, Y.; Leroux, M.; Kwon, J.; Hu, H.; Fang, L.; Chaparro, C.; Zhu, S.; Welp, U.; Zuo, J. -M.; Zhang, Y.; Nakasaki, R.; Selvamanickam, V.; Crabtree, G. W.; Koshelev, A. E.

2015-01-01

We present the new paradigm of critical current by design. Analogous to materials by design, it aims at predicting the optimal defect landscape in a superconductor for targeted applications by elucidating the vortex dynamics responsible for the bulk critical current. To highlight this approach, we demonstrate the synergistic combination of critical current measurements on commercial high-temperature superconductors containing self-assembled and irradiation tailored correlated defects by using...

Designing adaptive intensive interventions using methods from engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Lagoa, Constantino M; Bekiroglu, Korkut; Lanza, Stephanie T; Murphy, Susan A

2014-10-01

Adaptive intensive interventions are introduced, and new methods from the field of control engineering for use in their design are illustrated. A detailed step-by-step explanation of how control engineering methods can be used with intensive longitudinal data to design an adaptive intensive intervention is provided. The methods are evaluated via simulation. Simulation results illustrate how the designed adaptive intensive intervention can result in improved outcomes with less treatment by providing treatment only when it is needed. Furthermore, the methods are robust to model misspecification as well as the influence of unobserved causes. These new methods can be used to design adaptive interventions that are effective yet reduce participant burden. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved.

Designing Adaptive Web Applications

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Dolog, Peter

2008-01-01

Learning system to study a discipline. In business to business interaction, different requirements and parameters of exchanged business requests might be served by different services from third parties. Such applications require certain intelligence and a slightly different approach to design. Adpative web......The unique characteristic of web applications is that they are supposed to be used by much bigger and diverse set of users and stakeholders. An example application area is e-Learning or business to business interaction. In eLearning environment, various users with different background use the e......-based applications aim to leave some of their features at the design stage in the form of variables which are dependent on several criteria. The resolution of the variables is called adaptation and can be seen from two perspectives: adaptation by humans to the changed requirements of stakeholders and dynamic system...

Paradigms for adaptive statistical information designs: practical experiences and strategies.

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Sue-Jane; Hung, H M James; O'Neill, Robert

2012-11-10

In the last decade or so, interest in adaptive design clinical trials has gradually been directed towards their use in regulatory submissions by pharmaceutical drug sponsors to evaluate investigational new drugs. Methodological advances of adaptive designs are abundant in the statistical literature since the 1970s. The adaptive design paradigm has been enthusiastically perceived to increase the efficiency and to be more cost-effective than the fixed design paradigm for drug development. Much interest in adaptive designs is in those studies with two-stages, where stage 1 is exploratory and stage 2 depends upon stage 1 results, but where the data of both stages will be combined to yield statistical evidence for use as that of a pivotal registration trial. It was not until the recent release of the US Food and Drug Administration Draft Guidance for Industry on Adaptive Design Clinical Trials for Drugs and Biologics (2010) that the boundaries of flexibility for adaptive designs were specifically considered for regulatory purposes, including what are exploratory goals, and what are the goals of adequate and well-controlled (A&WC) trials (2002). The guidance carefully described these distinctions in an attempt to minimize the confusion between the goals of preliminary learning phases of drug development, which are inherently substantially uncertain, and the definitive inference-based phases of drug development. In this paper, in addition to discussing some aspects of adaptive designs in a confirmatory study setting, we underscore the value of adaptive designs when used in exploratory trials to improve planning of subsequent A&WC trials. One type of adaptation that is receiving attention is the re-estimation of the sample size during the course of the trial. We refer to this type of adaptation as an adaptive statistical information design. Specifically, a case example is used to illustrate how challenging it is to plan a confirmatory adaptive statistical information

Practical considerations for adaptive trial design and implementation

CERN Document Server

Pinheiro, José; Kuznetsova, Olga

2014-01-01

This edited volume is a definitive text on adaptive clinical trial designs from creation and customization to utilization. As this book covers the full spectrum of topics involved in the adaptive designs arena, it will serve as a valuable reference for researchers working in industry, government and academia. The target audience is anyone involved in the planning and execution of clinical trials, in particular, statisticians, clinicians, pharmacometricians, clinical operation specialists, drug supply managers, and infrastructure providers.  In spite of the increased efficiency of adaptive trials in saving costs and time, ultimately getting drugs to patients sooner, their adoption in clinical development is still relatively low.  One of the chief reasons is the higher complexity of adaptive design trials as compared to traditional trials. Barriers to the use of clinical trials with adaptive features include the concerns about the integrity of study design and conduct, the risk of regulatory non-acceptance, t...

Can emergency medicine research benefit from adaptive design clinical trials?

Science.gov (United States)

Flight, Laura; Julious, Steven A; Goodacre, Steve

2017-04-01

Adaptive design clinical trials use preplanned interim analyses to determine whether studies should be stopped or modified before recruitment is complete. Emergency medicine trials are well suited to these designs as many have a short time to primary outcome relative to the length of recruitment. We hypothesised that the majority of published emergency medicine trials have the potential to use a simple adaptive trial design. We reviewed clinical trials published in three emergency medicine journals between January 2003 and December 2013. We determined the proportion that used an adaptive design as well as the proportion that could have used a simple adaptive design based on the time to primary outcome and length of recruitment. Only 19 of 188 trials included in the review were considered to have used an adaptive trial design. A total of 154/165 trials that were fixed in design had the potential to use an adaptive design. Currently, there seems to be limited uptake in the use of adaptive trial designs in emergency medicine despite their potential benefits to save time and resources. Failing to take advantage of adaptive designs could be costly to patients and research. It is recommended that where practical and logistical considerations allow, adaptive designs should be used for all emergency medicine clinical trials. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/.

Design of a motion JPEG (M/JPEG) adapter card

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, D. H.; Sudharsanan, Subramania I.

1994-05-01

In this paper we describe a design of a high performance JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) Micro Channel adapter card. The card, tested on a range of PS/2 platforms (models 50 to 95), can complete JPEG operations on a 640 by 240 pixel image within 1/60 of a second, thus enabling real-time capture and display of high quality digital video. The card accepts digital pixels for either a YUV 4:2:2 or an RGB 4:4:4 pixel bus and has been shown to handle up to 2.05 MBytes/second of compressed data. The compressed data is transmitted to a host memory area by Direct Memory Access operations. The card uses a single C-Cube's CL550 JPEG processor that complies with the baseline JPEG. We give broad descriptions of the hardware that controls the video interface, CL550, and the system interface. Some critical design points that enhance the overall performance of the M/JPEG systems are pointed out. The control of the adapter card is achieved by an interrupt driven software that runs under DOS. The software performs a variety of tasks that include change of color space (RGB or YUV), change of quantization and Huffman tables, odd and even field control and some diagnostic operations.

Reinforcement learning design-based adaptive tracking control with less learning parameters for nonlinear discrete-time MIMO systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Yan-Jun; Tang, Li; Tong, Shaocheng; Chen, C L Philip; Li, Dong-Juan

2015-01-01

Based on the neural network (NN) approximator, an online reinforcement learning algorithm is proposed for a class of affine multiple input and multiple output (MIMO) nonlinear discrete-time systems with unknown functions and disturbances. In the design procedure, two networks are provided where one is an action network to generate an optimal control signal and the other is a critic network to approximate the cost function. An optimal control signal and adaptation laws can be generated based on two NNs. In the previous approaches, the weights of critic and action networks are updated based on the gradient descent rule and the estimations of optimal weight vectors are directly adjusted in the design. Consequently, compared with the existing results, the main contributions of this paper are: 1) only two parameters are needed to be adjusted, and thus the number of the adaptation laws is smaller than the previous results and 2) the updating parameters do not depend on the number of the subsystems for MIMO systems and the tuning rules are replaced by adjusting the norms on optimal weight vectors in both action and critic networks. It is proven that the tracking errors, the adaptation laws, and the control inputs are uniformly bounded using Lyapunov analysis method. The simulation examples are employed to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

Course Design for Critical Thinking.

Science.gov (United States)

Furedy, John J.; Furedy, Christine

1979-01-01

A fourth year honors thesis research course in psychology at the University of Toronto uses the device of adversarial interaction to improve critical thinking. Course components, including thesis submission, research seminar, student relations, and supervision, are designed to simulate the constraints, criticism, and relationships of actual…

Adaptive Clinical Trials: Advantages and Disadvantages of Various Adaptive Design Elements.

Science.gov (United States)

Korn, Edward L; Freidlin, Boris

2017-06-01

There is a wide range of adaptive elements of clinical trial design (some old and some new), with differing advantages and disadvantages. Classical interim monitoring, which adapts the design based on early evidence of superiority or futility of a treatment arm, has long been known to be extremely useful. A more recent application of interim monitoring is in the use of phase II/III designs, which can be very effective (especially in the setting of multiple experimental treatments and a reliable intermediate end point) but do have the cost of having to commit earlier to the phase III question than if separate phase II and phase III trials were performed. Outcome-adaptive randomization is an older technique that has recently regained attention; it increases trial complexity and duration without offering substantial benefits to the patients in the trial. The use of adaptive trials with biomarkers is new and has great potential for efficiently identifying patients who will be helped most by specific treatments. Master protocols in which trial arms and treatment questions are added to an ongoing trial can be especially efficient in the biomarker setting, where patients are screened for entry into different subtrials based on evolving knowledge about targeted therapies. A discussion of three recent adaptive clinical trials (BATTLE-2, I-SPY 2, and FOCUS4) highlights the issues. Published by Oxford University Press 2017. This work is written by US Government employees and is in the public domain in the US.

Coastal Critical Habitat Designations

Data.gov (United States)

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce — The Endangered Species Act (ESA) requires the Federal government to designate critical habitat, areas of habitat essential to the species' conservation, for ESA...

Test Information Targeting Strategies for Adaptive Multistage Testing Designs.

Science.gov (United States)

Luecht, Richard M.; Burgin, William

Adaptive multistage testlet (MST) designs appear to be gaining popularity for many large-scale computer-based testing programs. These adaptive MST designs use a modularized configuration of preconstructed testlets and embedded score-routing schemes to prepackage different forms of an adaptive test. The conditional information targeting (CIT)…

Relational adaptivity - enacting human-centric systems design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Petersen, Kjell Yngve

2016-01-01

Human centered design approaches places the experiencing human at the center of concern, situated in relation to the dynamics of the environmental condition and the variables of the system of control and sensing. Taking the approach of enacted design methods to enforce the experience...... of the inhabitant as core in human-centered design solutions, the intelligence of the connected sensors is suggested to be developed as an actual learning and self-adjusting adaptive environment, where the adaptive system is part of a negotiation with users on the qualities of the environment. We will present...... a fully functional sketching environment for adaptive sensor-control systems, which enable integration of the complex situation of everyday activities and human well-being. The proposed sketching environment allows for the development of sensor systems related to lighting conditions and human occupancy...

Resilience design: toward a synthesis of cognition, learning, and collaboration for adaptive problem solving in conservation and natural resource stewardship

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Charles G. Curtin

2014-06-01

Full Text Available Through the resilience design approach, I propose to extend the resilience paradigm by re-examining the components of adaptive decision-making and governance processes. The approach can be divided into three core components: (1 equity design, i.e., the integration of collaborative approaches to conservation and adaptive governance that generates effective self-organization and emergence in conservation and natural resource stewardship; (2 process design, i.e., the generation of more effective knowledge through strategic development of information inputs; and (3 outcome design, i.e., the pragmatic synthesis of the previous two approaches, generating a framework for developing durable and dynamic conservation and stewardship. The design of processes that incorporate perception and learning is critical to generating durable solutions, especially in developing linkages between wicked social and ecological challenges. Starting from first principles based on human cognition, learning, and collaboration, coupled with nearly two decades of practical experience designing and implementing ecosystem-level conservation and restoration programs, I present how design-based approaches to conservation and stewardship can be achieved. This context is critical in helping practitioners and resources managers undertake more effective policy and practice.

Design strategies for irregularly adapting parallel applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Oliker, Leonid; Biswas, Rupak; Shan, Hongzhang; Sing, Jaswinder Pal

2000-01-01

Achieving scalable performance for dynamic irregular applications is eminently challenging. Traditional message-passing approaches have been making steady progress towards this goal; however, they suffer from complex implementation requirements. The use of a global address space greatly simplifies the programming task, but can degrade the performance of dynamically adapting computations. In this work, we examine two major classes of adaptive applications, under five competing programming methodologies and four leading parallel architectures. Results indicate that it is possible to achieve message-passing performance using shared-memory programming techniques by carefully following the same high level strategies. Adaptive applications have computational work loads and communication patterns which change unpredictably at runtime, requiring dynamic load balancing to achieve scalable performance on parallel machines. Efficient parallel implementations of such adaptive applications are therefore a challenging task. This work examines the implementation of two typical adaptive applications, Dynamic Remeshing and N-Body, across various programming paradigms and architectural platforms. We compare several critical factors of the parallel code development, including performance, programmability, scalability, algorithmic development, and portability

Teacher-Led Design of an Adaptive Learning Environment

Science.gov (United States)

Mavroudi, Anna; Hadzilacos, Thanasis; Kalles, Dimitris; Gregoriades, Andreas

2016-01-01

This paper discusses a requirements engineering process that exemplifies teacher-led design in the case of an envisioned system for adaptive learning. Such a design poses various challenges and still remains an open research issue in the field of adaptive learning. Starting from a scenario-based elicitation method, the whole process was highly…

Uncertainty quantification for criticality problems using non-intrusive and adaptive Polynomial Chaos techniques

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gilli, L.; Lathouwers, D.; Kloosterman, J.L.; Hagen, T.H.J.J. van der; Koning, A.J.; Rochman, D.

2013-01-01

Highlights: ► Non-intrusive spectral techniques are applied to perform UQ of criticality problems. ► A new adaptive algorithm based on the definition of sparse grid is derived. ► The method is applied to two reference criticality problems. - Abstract: In this paper we present the implementation and the application of non-intrusive spectral techniques for uncertainty analysis of criticality problems. Spectral techniques can be used to reconstruct stochastic quantities of interest by means of a Fourier-like expansion. Their application to uncertainty propagation problems can be performed in a non-intrusive fashion by evaluating a set of projection integrals that are used to reconstruct the spectral expansion. This can be done either by using standard Monte Carlo integration approaches or by adopting numerical quadrature rules. We present the derivation of a new adaptive quadrature algorithm, based on the definition of a sparse grid, which can be used to reduce the computational cost associated with non-intrusive spectral techniques. This new adaptive algorithm and the Monte Carlo integration alternative are then applied to two reference problems. First, a stochastic multigroup diffusion problem is introduced by considering the microscopic cross-sections of the system to be random quantities. Then a criticality benchmark is defined for which a set of resonance parameters in the resolved region are assumed to be stochastic

ADAPTING TO AND ADAPTED BY ADAPT-R - ARCHITECTURE, DESIGN AND ART PRACTICE TRAINING-RESEARCH

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Johan Verbeke

2014-12-01

Full Text Available Recently Schools of Architecture have started paying much more attention to their research endeavors. Especially research by design is high on the agenda as well as research projects where experience and knowledge from creative practice plays a key role as a research method. This paper introduces the ADAPT-r project. The project acronym stands for Architecture, Design, Arts Practice training Research. ADAPT-r is funded under the 7th Framework of Research of the European Commission. The project partners stimulate and explore the potential of creative practice research . This paper reports on its setting and first experiences and results and tries to contribute to an ongoing debate and framing of the development.

A Year of Progress: NASA's Space Launch System Approaches Critical Design Review

Science.gov (United States)

Askins, Bruce; Robinson, Kimberly

2015-01-01

NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) made significant progress on the manufacturing floor and on the test stand in 2014 and positioned itself for a successful Critical Design Review in mid-2015. SLS, the world's only exploration-class heavy lift rocket, has the capability to dramatically increase the mass and volume of human and robotic exploration. Additionally, it will decrease overall mission risk, increase safety, and simplify ground and mission operations - all significant considerations for crewed missions and unique high-value national payloads. Development now is focused on configuration with 70 metric tons (t) of payload to low Earth orbit (LEO), more than double the payload of the retired Space Shuttle program or current operational vehicles. This "Block 1" design will launch NASA's Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) on an uncrewed flight beyond the Moon and back and the first crewed flight around the Moon. The current design has a direct evolutionary path to a vehicle with a 130t lift capability that offers even more flexibility to reduce planetary trip times, simplify payload design cycles, and provide new capabilities such as planetary sample returns. Every major element of SLS has successfully completed its Critical Design Review and now has hardware in production or testing. In fact, the SLS MPCV-to-Stage-Adapter (MSA) flew successfully on the Exploration Flight Test (EFT) 1 launch of a Delta IV and Orion spacecraft in December 2014. The SLS Program is currently working toward vehicle Critical Design Review in mid-2015. This paper will discuss these and other technical and programmatic successes and challenges over the past year and provide a preview of work ahead before the first flight of this new capability.

Probabilistic dual heuristic programming-based adaptive critic

Science.gov (United States)

Herzallah, Randa

2010-02-01

Adaptive critic (AC) methods have common roots as generalisations of dynamic programming for neural reinforcement learning approaches. Since they approximate the dynamic programming solutions, they are potentially suitable for learning in noisy, non-linear and non-stationary environments. In this study, a novel probabilistic dual heuristic programming (DHP)-based AC controller is proposed. Distinct to current approaches, the proposed probabilistic (DHP) AC method takes uncertainties of forward model and inverse controller into consideration. Therefore, it is suitable for deterministic and stochastic control problems characterised by functional uncertainty. Theoretical development of the proposed method is validated by analytically evaluating the correct value of the cost function which satisfies the Bellman equation in a linear quadratic control problem. The target value of the probabilistic critic network is then calculated and shown to be equal to the analytically derived correct value. Full derivation of the Riccati solution for this non-standard stochastic linear quadratic control problem is also provided. Moreover, the performance of the proposed probabilistic controller is demonstrated on linear and non-linear control examples.

Frequency Adaptability and Waveform Design for OFDM Radar Space-Time Adaptive Processing

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Sen, Satyabrata [ORNL; Glover, Charles Wayne [ORNL

2012-01-01

We propose an adaptive waveform design technique for an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) radar signal employing a space-time adaptive processing (STAP) technique. We observe that there are inherent variabilities of the target and interference responses in the frequency domain. Therefore, the use of an OFDM signal can not only increase the frequency diversity of our system, but also improve the target detectability by adaptively modifying the OFDM coefficients in order to exploit the frequency-variabilities of the scenario. First, we formulate a realistic OFDM-STAP measurement model considering the sparse nature of the target and interference spectra in the spatio-temporal domain. Then, we show that the optimal STAP-filter weight-vector is equal to the generalized eigenvector corresponding to the minimum generalized eigenvalue of the interference and target covariance matrices. With numerical examples we demonstrate that the resultant OFDM-STAP filter-weights are adaptable to the frequency-variabilities of the target and interference responses, in addition to the spatio-temporal variabilities. Hence, by better utilizing the frequency variabilities, we propose an adaptive OFDM-waveform design technique, and consequently gain a significant amount of STAP-performance improvement.

Comparison of adaptive critic-based and classical wide-area controllers for power systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Ray, Swakshar; Venayagamoorthy, Ganesh Kumar; Chaudhuri, Balarko; Majumder, Rajat

2008-08-01

An adaptive critic design (ACD)-based damping controller is developed for a thyristor-controlled series capacitor (TCSC) installed in a power system with multiple poorly damped interarea modes. The performance of this ACD computational intelligence-based method is compared with two classical techniques, which are observer-based state-feedback (SF) control and linear matrix inequality LMI-H(infinity) robust control. Remote measurements are used as feedback signals to the wide-area damping controller for modulating the compensation of the TCSC. The classical methods use a linearized model of the system whereas the ACD method is purely measurement-based, leading to a nonlinear controller with fixed parameters. A comparative analysis of the controllers' performances is carried out under different disturbance scenarios. The ACD-based design has shown promising performance with very little knowledge of the system compared to classical model-based controllers. This paper also discusses the advantages and disadvantages of ACDs, SF, and LMI-H(infinity).

DEFACTO: A Design Environment for Adaptive Computing Technology

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Hall, Mary

2003-01-01

This report describes the activities of the DEFACTO project, a Design Environment for Adaptive Computing Technology funded under the DARPA Adaptive Computing Systems and Just-In-Time-Hardware programs...

Toward Superconducting Critical Current by Design.

Science.gov (United States)

Sadovskyy, Ivan A; Jia, Ying; Leroux, Maxime; Kwon, Jihwan; Hu, Hefei; Fang, Lei; Chaparro, Carlos; Zhu, Shaofei; Welp, Ulrich; Zuo, Jian-Min; Zhang, Yifei; Nakasaki, Ryusuke; Selvamanickam, Venkat; Crabtree, George W; Koshelev, Alexei E; Glatz, Andreas; Kwok, Wai-Kwong

2016-06-01

A new critical-current-by-design paradigm is presented. It aims at predicting the optimal defect landscape in superconductors for targeted applications by elucidating the vortex dynamics responsible for the bulk critical current. To this end, critical current measurements on commercial high-temperature superconductors are combined with large-scale time-dependent Ginzburg-Landau simulations of vortex dynamics. © 2016 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Technical guide to criticality alarm system design

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Greenfield, B.

2009-01-01

An instructional manual was created to guide criticality safety engineers through the technical aspects of designing a criticality alarm system (CAS) for Dept. of Energy (DOE) hazard class 1 and 2 facilities. The manual was structured such that it can be used by engineers designing completely new systems and by those who are working with existing facilities. Major design tasks are thoroughly analyzed to provide concise direction for how to complete the analysis. Regulatory and technical performance requirements were both addressed. (authors)

Transportation Network Data Requirements for Assessing Criticality for Resiliency and Adaptation Planning

Science.gov (United States)

2017-11-01

This report is one of two NCST Research Report documents produced as part of a project to advance the technical modeling tools for resiliency and adaptation planning, especially those used for criticality rankings. The official final technical report...

Implementing Adaptive Educational Methods with IMS Learning Design

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Specht, Marcus; Burgos, Daniel

2006-01-01

Please, cite this publication as: Specht, M. & Burgos, D. (2006). Implementing Adaptive Educational Methods with IMS Learning Design. Proceedings of Adaptive Hypermedia. June, Dublin, Ireland. Retrieved June 30th, 2006, from http://dspace.learningnetworks.org

Dramaturgies of Adaptive Lighting Design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Petersen, Kjell Yngve

2017-01-01

The changes from static to dynamic, and further to adaptive behaviours in architectural lighting design asks for a re-interpretation of the relation between the environment and the engaged experiencing human; i.e. the architecture and the inhabitant. To grasp the many factors involved, and to focus...

Adaptive clinical trial designs with pre-specified rules for modifying the sample size: understanding efficient types of adaptation.

Science.gov (United States)

Levin, Gregory P; Emerson, Sarah C; Emerson, Scott S

2013-04-15

Adaptive clinical trial design has been proposed as a promising new approach that may improve the drug discovery process. Proponents of adaptive sample size re-estimation promote its ability to avoid 'up-front' commitment of resources, better address the complicated decisions faced by data monitoring committees, and minimize accrual to studies having delayed ascertainment of outcomes. We investigate aspects of adaptation rules, such as timing of the adaptation analysis and magnitude of sample size adjustment, that lead to greater or lesser statistical efficiency. Owing in part to the recent Food and Drug Administration guidance that promotes the use of pre-specified sampling plans, we evaluate alternative approaches in the context of well-defined, pre-specified adaptation. We quantify the relative costs and benefits of fixed sample, group sequential, and pre-specified adaptive designs with respect to standard operating characteristics such as type I error, maximal sample size, power, and expected sample size under a range of alternatives. Our results build on others' prior research by demonstrating in realistic settings that simple and easily implemented pre-specified adaptive designs provide only very small efficiency gains over group sequential designs with the same number of analyses. In addition, we describe optimal rules for modifying the sample size, providing efficient adaptation boundaries on a variety of scales for the interim test statistic for adaptation analyses occurring at several different stages of the trial. We thus provide insight into what are good and bad choices of adaptive sampling plans when the added flexibility of adaptive designs is desired. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Analysis and Design of Adaptive OCDMA Passive Optical Networks

Science.gov (United States)

Hadi, Mohammad; Pakravan, Mohammad Reza

2017-07-01

OCDMA systems can support multiple classes of service by differentiating code parameters, power level and diversity order. In this paper, we analyze BER performance of a multi-class 1D/2D OCDMA system and propose a new approximation method that can be used to generate accurate estimation of system BER using a simple mathematical form. The proposed approximation provides insight into proper system level analysis, system level design and sensitivity of system performance to the factors such as code parameters, power level and diversity order. Considering code design, code cardinality and system performance constraints, two design problems are defined and their optimal solutions are provided. We then propose an adaptive OCDMA-PON that adaptively shares unused resources of inactive users among active ones to improve upstream system performance. Using the approximated BER expression and defined design problems, two adaptive code allocation algorithms for the adaptive OCDMA-PON are presented and their performances are evaluated by simulation. Simulation results show that the adaptive code allocation algorithms can increase average transmission rate or decrease average optical power consumption of ONUs for dynamic traffic patterns. According to the simulation results, for an adaptive OCDMA-PON with BER value of 1e-7 and user activity probability of 0.5, transmission rate (optical power consumption) can be increased (decreased) by a factor of 2.25 (0.27) compared to fixed code assignment.

Overview of adaptive phased management repository design development

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Russell, S.

2011-01-01

The Nuclear Waste Management Organization is implementing Adaptive Phased Management, Canada's plan for long-term management of used nuclear fuel. The organization is proceeding with the process for selecting a site in partnership with an informed and willing host community to safely and securely container and isolate used nuclear fuel in a deep geological repository in a suitable rock formation. Adaptive Phased Management is the culmination of more than 30 years of research, development and demonstration of repository concepts in Canada. Adaptive Phased Management uses a phased and adaptive step-wise approach to the multi-barrier system which is consistent with the long-term waste management approaches being developed in many other countries with nuclear power programs such as Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and France. The Nuclear Waste Management Organization is examining and developing conceptual designs for a deep geological repository and associated facilities for the placement of used nuclear fuel in long-lived containers. This paper will examine two of these generic conceptual designs which have recently been refined and updated. These conceptual designs will be used to support a pre-project review of repository design and safety by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. (author)

Adaption of the PARCS Code for Core Design Audit Analyses

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kim, Hyong Chol; Lee, Young Jin; Uhm, Jae Beop; Kim, Hyunjik [Nuclear Safety Evaluation, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of); Jeong, Hun Young; Ahn, Seunghoon; Woo, Swengwoong [Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

2013-05-15

The eigenvalue calculation also includes quasi-static core depletion analyses. PARCS has implemented variety of features and has been qualified as a regulatory audit code in conjunction with other NRC thermal-hydraulic codes such as TRACE or RELAP5. In this study, as an adaptation effort for audit applications, PARCS is applied for an audit analysis of a reload core design. The lattice physics code HELIOS is used for cross section generation. PARCS-HELIOS code system has been established as a core analysis tool. Calculation results have been compared on a wide spectrum of calculations such as power distribution, critical soluble boron concentration, and rod worth. A reasonable agreement between the audit calculation and the reference results has been found.

Adaptive Lighting Design – Staged Experiences of Light

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Petersen, Kjell Yngve; Søndergaard, Karin

in ways that meaningfully adapt. In the two installations, two different aspects are at play. In White Cube, the light colours are balanced. In White Box, the light follows the movements of the people in the space. In situations with several people occupying the same space, social relations become......Adaptive Lighting Design – Staged Experiences of Light The two installations, White Cube and White Box, enable experience-based studies as a form of perceptual activity, wherein lighting conditions are examined in a dialectical exchange between the system and the people participating. Adaptive...... lighting is based on a partial automation of the possibilities to adjust the colour tone and brightness levels of light in order to adapt to people’s needs and desires. Software can be seen to bear a communicative aesthetic, where the relation of user situations and the design intentions are controlled...

The Adaptive Ecosystem Climatology (AEC): Design and Development

Science.gov (United States)

deRada, S.; Penta, B.; McCarthy, S.; Gould, R. W., Jr.

2016-02-01

The concept of ecosystem-based management (EBM), recently introduced to rectify the shortcomings of single-species management policies, has been widely accepted as a basis for the conservation and management of natural resources. In line with NOAA's Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (IEA) Program, EBM is an integrated approach that considers the entire ecosystem and the interactions among species rather than focusing on individual components. This integrative approach relies on heterogeneous data, physical as well as biogeochemical data, among many others. Relative to physical data, however, marine biogeochemical records, also critical in IEA and EBM, are still lacking, both in terms of mature models and in terms of observational data availability. TheAdaptive Ecosystem Climatology (AEC) was conceived as a novel approach to address these limitations, mitigating the shortcomings of the individual components and combining their strengths to enhance decision-making activities. AEC is designed on the concept that a high-frequency climatology can be used as a baseline into which available observational data can be ingested to produce a higher accuracy product. In the absence of observations, the climatology acts as a best estimate. AEC was developed using a long-term simulation of a coupled biophysical numerical model configured for the Gulf of Mexico. Using the model results, we constructed a three-dimensional, dynamically balanced, gridded, static climatology for each calendar day. Using this `static' climatology as a background `first guess', observations from a particular date are ingested via optimal interpolation to `nudge' the climatology toward current conditions, thus providing representative fields for that date (adaptive climatology). With this adaptive approach, AEC can support a variety of EBM objectives, from fisheries, to resource management, to coastal resilience.

Designing sustainable soils in Earth's critical zone

Science.gov (United States)

Banwart, Steven Allan; de Souza, Danielle Maia; Menon, Manoj; Nikolaidis, Nikolaos; Panagos, Panos; Vala Ragnardsdottir, Kristin; Rousseva, Svelta; van Gaans, Pauline

2014-05-01

The demographic drivers of increasing human population and wealth are creating tremendous environmental pressures from growing intensity of land use, resulting in soil and land degradation worldwide. Environmental services are provided through multiple soil functions that include biomass production, water storage and transmission, nutrient transformations, contaminant attenuation, carbon and nitrogen storage, providing habitat and maintaining the genetic diversity of the land environment. One of the greatest challenges of the 21st century is to identify key risks to soil, and to design mitigation strategies to manage these risks and to enhance soil functions that can last into the future. The scientific study of Earth's Critical Zone (CZ), the thin surface layer that extends vertically from the top of the tree canopy to the bottom of aquifers, provides an essential integrating scientific framework to study, protect and enhance soil functions. The research hypothesis is that soil structure, the geometric architecture of solids, pores and biomass, is a critical indicator and essential factor of productive soil functions. The experimental design selects a network of Critical Zone Observatories (CZOs) as advanced field research sites along a gradient of land use intensity in order to quantify soil structure and soil processes that dictate the flows and transformations of material and energy as soil functions. The CZOs focus multidisciplinary expertise on soil processes, field observation and data interpretation, management science and ecological economics. Computational simulation of biophysical processes provides a quantitative method of integration for the range of theory and observations that are required to quantify the linkages between changes in soil structure and soil functions. Key results demonstrate that changes in soil structure can be quantified through the inputs of organic carbon and nitrogen from plant productivity and microbial activity, coupled with

A Bayesian Network Based Adaptability Design of Product Structures for Function Evolution

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Shaobo Li

2018-03-01

Full Text Available Structure adaptability design is critical for function evolution in product families, in which many structural and functional design factors are intertwined together with manufacturing cost, customer satisfaction, and final market sales. How to achieve a delicate balance among all of these factors to maximize the market performance of the product is too complicated to address based on traditional domain experts’ knowledge or some ad hoc heuristics. Here, we propose a quantitative product evolution design model that is based on Bayesian networks to model the dynamic relationship between customer needs and product structure design. In our model, all of the structural or functional features along with customer satisfaction, manufacturing cost, sale price, market sales, and indirect factors are modeled as random variables denoted as nodes in the Bayesian networks. The structure of the Bayesian model is then determined based on the historical data, which captures the dynamic sophisticated relationship of customer demands of a product, structural design, and market performance. Application of our approach to an electric toothbrush product family evolution design problem shows that our model allows for designers to interrogate with the model and obtain theoretical and decision support for dynamic product feature design process.

Design aspects of safety critical instrumentation of nuclear installations

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Swaminathan, P. [Electronics Group, Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam 603 102, Tamil Nadu (India)]. E-mail: swamy@igcar.ernet.in

2005-07-01

Safety critical instrumentation systems ensure safe shutdown/configuration of the nuclear installation when process status exceeds the safety threshold limits. Design requirements for safety critical instrumentation such as functional and electrical independence, fail-safe design, and architecture to ensure the specified unsafe failure rate and safe failure rate, human machine interface (HMI), etc., are explained with examples. Different fault tolerant architectures like 1/2, 2/2, 2/3 hot stand-by are compared for safety critical instrumentation. For embedded systems, software quality assurance is detailed both during design phase and O and M phase. Different software development models such as waterfall model and spiral model are explained with examples. The error distribution in embedded system is detailed. The usage of formal method is outlined to reduce the specification error. The guidelines for coding of application software are outlined. The interface problems of safety critical instrumentation with sensors, actuators, other computer systems, etc., are detailed with examples. Testability and maintainability shall be taken into account during design phase. Online diagnostics for safety critical instrumentation is detailed with examples. Salient details of design guides from Atomic Energy Regulatory Board, International Atomic Energy Agency and standards from IEEE, BIS are given towards the design of safety critical instrumentation systems. (author)

Design aspects of safety critical instrumentation of nuclear installations

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Swaminathan, P.

2005-01-01

Safety critical instrumentation systems ensure safe shutdown/configuration of the nuclear installation when process status exceeds the safety threshold limits. Design requirements for safety critical instrumentation such as functional and electrical independence, fail-safe design, and architecture to ensure the specified unsafe failure rate and safe failure rate, human machine interface (HMI), etc., are explained with examples. Different fault tolerant architectures like 1/2, 2/2, 2/3 hot stand-by are compared for safety critical instrumentation. For embedded systems, software quality assurance is detailed both during design phase and O and M phase. Different software development models such as waterfall model and spiral model are explained with examples. The error distribution in embedded system is detailed. The usage of formal method is outlined to reduce the specification error. The guidelines for coding of application software are outlined. The interface problems of safety critical instrumentation with sensors, actuators, other computer systems, etc., are detailed with examples. Testability and maintainability shall be taken into account during design phase. Online diagnostics for safety critical instrumentation is detailed with examples. Salient details of design guides from Atomic Energy Regulatory Board, International Atomic Energy Agency and standards from IEEE, BIS are given towards the design of safety critical instrumentation systems. (author)

Pushback: Critical data designers and pollution politics

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kim Fortun

2016-09-01

Full Text Available In this paper, we describe how critical data designers have created projects that ‘push back’ against the eclipse of environmental problems by dominant orders: the pioneering pollution database Scorecard, released by the US NGO Environmental Defense Fund in 1997; the US Environmental Protection Agency’s EnviroAtlas that brings together numerous data sets and provides tools for valuing ecosystem services; and the Houston Clean Air Network’s maps of real-time ozone levels in Houston. Drawing on ethnographic observations and interviews, we analyse how critical data designers turn scientific data and findings into claims and visualisations that are meaningful in contemporary political terms. The skills of critical data designers cross scales and domains; they must identify problems calling for public consideration, and then locate, access, link, and create visualisations of data relevant to the problem. We conclude by describing hazards ahead in work to leverage Big Data to understand and address environmental problems. Critical data designers need to understand what counts as a societal problem in a particular context, what doesn’t, what is seen as connected and not, what is seen as ethically charged, and what is exonerated and discounted. Such recognition is produced through interpretive, ‘close reading’ of the historical moment in which they operate.

Engineering Design of an Adaptive Leg Prosthesis Using Biological Principles

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Lenau, Torben Anker; Dentel, Andy; Invarsdottir, Thorunn

2010-01-01

The biomimetic design process is explored through a design case: An adaptive leg prosthesis. The aim is to investigate if the biomimetic design process can be carried out with a minimum of biological knowledge and without using advanced design methods. In the design case biomimetic design was suc...... was successfully carried out using library search resulting in 14 biological analogies for the design problem 'shape adaption'. It is proposed that search results are handled using special cards describing the biological phenomena and the functional principles....

New design procedure development of future reactor critical power estimation. (1) Practical design-by-analysis method for BWR critical power design correlation

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yamamoto, Yasushi; Mitsutake, Toru

2007-01-01

For present BWR fuels, the full mock-up thermal-hydraulic test, such as the critical power measurement test, pressure drop measurement test and so on, has been needed. However, the full mock-up test required the high costs and large-scale test facility. At present, there are only a few test facilities to perform the full mock-up thermal-hydraulic test in the world. Moreover, for future BWR, the bundle size tends to be larger, because of reducing the plant construction costs and minimizing the routine check period. For instance, AB1600, improved ABWR, was proposed from Toshiba, whose bundle size was 1.2 times larger than the conventional BWR fuel size. It is too expensive and far from realistic to perform the full mock-up thermal-hydraulic test for such a large size fuel bundle. The new design procedure is required to realize the large scale bundle design development, especially for the future reactor. Therefore, the new design procedure, Practical Design-by-Analysis (PDBA) method, has been developed. This new procedure consists of the partial mock-up test and numerical analysis. At present, the subchannel analysis method based on three-fluid two-phase flow model only is a realistic choice. Firstly, the partial mock-up test is performed, for instance, the 1/4 partial mock-up bundle. Then, the first-step critical power correlation coefficients are evaluated with the measured data. The input data, such as the spacer effect model coefficient, on the subchannel analysis are also estimated with the data. Next, the radial power effect on the critical power of the full-bundle size was estimated with the subchannel analysis. Finally, the critical power correlation is modified by the subchannel analysis results. In the present study, the critical power correlation of the conventional 8x8 BWR fuel was developed with the PDBA method by 4x4 partial mock-up tests and the subchannel analysis code. The accuracy of the estimated critical power was 3.8%. The several themes remain to

Mapping the Intangible: On Adaptivity and Relational Prototyping in Architectural Design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bolbroe, Cameline

2016-01-01

In recent years, new computing technologies in architecture have led to the possibility of designing architecture with non-static qualities, which affords the architectural designer with a whole new opportunity space to explore. At the same time, this opportunity space challenges both...... to meet the challenges of designing with adaptivity in architecture, I propose a particular method specifically tailored for adaptive architectural design. The method, relational prototyping, is founded on the idea of inhabitation as an act. Relational prototyping adapts techniques from performance...

Flexible receiver adapter formal design review

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Krieg, S.A.

1995-01-01

This memo summarizes the results of the Formal (90%) Design Review process and meetings held to evaluate the design of the Flexible Receiver Adapters, support platforms, and associated equipment. The equipment is part of the Flexible Receiver System used to remove, transport, and store long length contaminated equipment and components from both the double and single-shell underground storage tanks at the 200 area tank farms

Designing Adaptable Ships: Modularity and Flexibility in Future Ship Designs

Science.gov (United States)

2016-01-01

with motors, belts, shafts , seals, valves, hose spindles , and switches. If ship installation is not installed, the system will be status quo. Ship...Impact: the current centrifugal purifiers (Alfa-Laval) have experienced frequent failures with motor, belts, shafts , seals, valves, hose spindles ... Designing Adaptable Ships Modularity and Flexibility in Future Ship Designs John F. Schank, Scott Savitz, Ken Munson, Brian Perkinson, James

Algebraic and adaptive learning in neural control systems

Science.gov (United States)

Ferrari, Silvia

A systematic approach is developed for designing adaptive and reconfigurable nonlinear control systems that are applicable to plants modeled by ordinary differential equations. The nonlinear controller comprising a network of neural networks is taught using a two-phase learning procedure realized through novel techniques for initialization, on-line training, and adaptive critic design. A critical observation is that the gradients of the functions defined by the neural networks must equal corresponding linear gain matrices at chosen operating points. On-line training is based on a dual heuristic adaptive critic architecture that improves control for large, coupled motions by accounting for actual plant dynamics and nonlinear effects. An action network computes the optimal control law; a critic network predicts the derivative of the cost-to-go with respect to the state. Both networks are algebraically initialized based on prior knowledge of satisfactory pointwise linear controllers and continue to adapt on line during full-scale simulations of the plant. On-line training takes place sequentially over discrete periods of time and involves several numerical procedures. A backpropagating algorithm called Resilient Backpropagation is modified and successfully implemented to meet these objectives, without excessive computational expense. This adaptive controller is as conservative as the linear designs and as effective as a global nonlinear controller. The method is successfully implemented for the full-envelope control of a six-degree-of-freedom aircraft simulation. The results show that the on-line adaptation brings about improved performance with respect to the initialization phase during aircraft maneuvers that involve large-angle and coupled dynamics, and parameter variations.

Neural robust stabilization via event-triggering mechanism and adaptive learning technique.

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Ding; Liu, Derong

2018-06-01

The robust control synthesis of continuous-time nonlinear systems with uncertain term is investigated via event-triggering mechanism and adaptive critic learning technique. We mainly focus on combining the event-triggering mechanism with adaptive critic designs, so as to solve the nonlinear robust control problem. This can not only make better use of computation and communication resources, but also conduct controller design from the view of intelligent optimization. Through theoretical analysis, the nonlinear robust stabilization can be achieved by obtaining an event-triggered optimal control law of the nominal system with a newly defined cost function and a certain triggering condition. The adaptive critic technique is employed to facilitate the event-triggered control design, where a neural network is introduced as an approximator of the learning phase. The performance of the event-triggered robust control scheme is validated via simulation studies and comparisons. The present method extends the application domain of both event-triggered control and adaptive critic control to nonlinear systems possessing dynamical uncertainties. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The Potential of Adaptive Design in Animal Studies

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Arshad Majid

2015-10-01

Full Text Available Clinical trials are the backbone of medical research, and are often the last step in the development of new therapies for use in patients. Prior to human testing, however, preclinical studies using animal subjects are usually performed in order to provide initial data on the safety and effectiveness of prospective treatments. These studies can be costly and time consuming, and may also raise concerns about the ethical treatment of animals when potentially harmful procedures are involved. Adaptive design is a process by which the methods used in a study may be altered while it is being conducted in response to preliminary data or other new information. Adaptive design has been shown to be useful in reducing the time and costs associated with clinical trials, and may provide similar benefits in preclinical animal studies. The purpose of this review is to summarize various aspects of adaptive design and evaluate its potential for use in preclinical research.

The Potential of Adaptive Design in Animal Studies.

Science.gov (United States)

Majid, Arshad; Bae, Ok-Nam; Redgrave, Jessica; Teare, Dawn; Ali, Ali; Zemke, Daniel

2015-10-12

Clinical trials are the backbone of medical research, and are often the last step in the development of new therapies for use in patients. Prior to human testing, however, preclinical studies using animal subjects are usually performed in order to provide initial data on the safety and effectiveness of prospective treatments. These studies can be costly and time consuming, and may also raise concerns about the ethical treatment of animals when potentially harmful procedures are involved. Adaptive design is a process by which the methods used in a study may be altered while it is being conducted in response to preliminary data or other new information. Adaptive design has been shown to be useful in reducing the time and costs associated with clinical trials, and may provide similar benefits in preclinical animal studies. The purpose of this review is to summarize various aspects of adaptive design and evaluate its potential for use in preclinical research.

Hierarchical adaptive experimental design for Gaussian process emulators

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Busby, Daniel

2009-01-01

Large computer simulators have usually complex and nonlinear input output functions. This complicated input output relation can be analyzed by global sensitivity analysis; however, this usually requires massive Monte Carlo simulations. To effectively reduce the number of simulations, statistical techniques such as Gaussian process emulators can be adopted. The accuracy and reliability of these emulators strongly depend on the experimental design where suitable evaluation points are selected. In this paper a new sequential design strategy called hierarchical adaptive design is proposed to obtain an accurate emulator using the least possible number of simulations. The hierarchical design proposed in this paper is tested on various standard analytic functions and on a challenging reservoir forecasting application. Comparisons with standard one-stage designs such as maximin latin hypercube designs show that the hierarchical adaptive design produces a more accurate emulator with the same number of computer experiments. Moreover a stopping criterion is proposed that enables to perform the number of simulations necessary to obtain required approximation accuracy.

A holistic strategy for adaptive land management

Science.gov (United States)

Herrick, Jeffrey E.; Duniway, Michael C.; Pyke, David A.; Bestelmeyer, Brandon T.; Wills, Skye A.; Brown, Joel R.; Karl, Jason W.; Havstad, Kris M.

2012-01-01

Adaptive management is widely applied to natural resources management (Holling 1973; Walters and Holling 1990). Adaptive management can be generally defined as an iterative decision-making process that incorporates formulation of management objectives, actions designed to address these objectives, monitoring of results, and repeated adaptation of management until desired results are achieved (Brown and MacLeod 1996; Savory and Butterfield 1999). However, adaptive management is often criticized because very few projects ever complete more than one cycle, resulting in little adaptation and little knowledge gain (Lee 1999; Walters 2007). One significant criticism is that adaptive management is often used as a justification for undertaking actions with uncertain outcomes or as a surrogate for the development of specific, measurable indicators and monitoring programs (Lee 1999; Ruhl 2007).

Bayesian selective response-adaptive design using the historical control.

Science.gov (United States)

Kim, Mi-Ok; Harun, Nusrat; Liu, Chunyan; Khoury, Jane C; Broderick, Joseph P

2018-06-13

High quality historical control data, if incorporated, may reduce sample size, trial cost, and duration. A too optimistic use of the data, however, may result in bias under prior-data conflict. Motivated by well-publicized two-arm comparative trials in stroke, we propose a Bayesian design that both adaptively incorporates historical control data and selectively adapt the treatment allocation ratios within an ongoing trial responsively to the relative treatment effects. The proposed design differs from existing designs that borrow from historical controls. As opposed to reducing the number of subjects assigned to the control arm blindly, this design does so adaptively to the relative treatment effects only if evaluation of cumulated current trial data combined with the historical control suggests the superiority of the intervention arm. We used the effective historical sample size approach to quantify borrowed information on the control arm and modified the treatment allocation rules of the doubly adaptive biased coin design to incorporate the quantity. The modified allocation rules were then implemented under the Bayesian framework with commensurate priors addressing prior-data conflict. Trials were also more frequently concluded earlier in line with the underlying truth, reducing trial cost, and duration and yielded parameter estimates with smaller standard errors. © 2018 The Authors. Statistics in Medicine Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Online course design for teaching critical thinking.

Science.gov (United States)

Schaber, Patricia; Shanedling, Janet

2012-01-01

Teaching critical thinking (CT) skills, a goal in higher education, is seldom considered in the primary design of either classroom or online courses, and is even less frequently measured in student learning. In health professional education, CT along with clinical reasoning skills is essential for the development of clinical practitioners. This study, measuring CT skill development in an online theory course, supports using a cyclical course design to build higher level processes in student thinking. Eighty-six Masters of Occupational Therapy students in four sections of an occupation-based theory course were evaluated on elements in the Paul and Elder CT Model throughout the course and surveyed for their perceptions in their ability to think critically at course completion. Results of this study demonstrated that the online theory course design contributed to improving critical thinking skills and student's perceived CT skill development as applicable to their future professional practice. In a focus group, eight students identified four effective course design features that contributed to their CT skill development: highly structured learning, timely feedback from instructor, repetition of assignments, and active engagement with the material.

The life cycles of six multi-center adaptive clinical trials focused on neurological emergencies developed for the Advancing Regulatory Science initiative of the National Institutes of Health and US Food and Drug Administration: Case studies from the Adaptive Designs Accelerating Promising Treatments Into Trials Project.

Science.gov (United States)

Guetterman, Timothy C; Fetters, Michael D; Mawocha, Samkeliso; Legocki, Laurie J; Barsan, William G; Lewis, Roger J; Berry, Donald A; Meurer, William J

2017-01-01

Clinical trials are complicated, expensive, time-consuming, and frequently do not lead to discoveries that improve the health of patients with disease. Adaptive clinical trials have emerged as a methodology to provide more flexibility in design elements to better answer scientific questions regarding whether new treatments are efficacious. Limited observational data exist that describe the complex process of designing adaptive clinical trials. To address these issues, the Adaptive Designs Accelerating Promising Treatments Into Trials project developed six, tailored, flexible, adaptive, phase-III clinical trials for neurological emergencies, and investigators prospectively monitored and observed the processes. The objective of this work is to describe the adaptive design development process, the final design, and the current status of the adaptive trial designs that were developed. To observe and reflect upon the trial development process, we employed a rich, mixed methods evaluation that combined quantitative data from visual analog scale to assess attitudes about adaptive trials, along with in-depth qualitative data about the development process gathered from observations. The Adaptive Designs Accelerating Promising Treatments Into Trials team developed six adaptive clinical trial designs. Across the six designs, 53 attitude surveys were completed at baseline and after the trial planning process completed. Compared to baseline, the participants believed significantly more strongly that the adaptive designs would be accepted by National Institutes of Health review panels and non-researcher clinicians. In addition, after the trial planning process, the participants more strongly believed that the adaptive design would meet the scientific and medical goals of the studies. Introducing the adaptive design at early conceptualization proved critical to successful adoption and implementation of that trial. Involving key stakeholders from several scientific domains early

Critical teaching as mutual learning through collective social design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Chimirri, Niklas Alexander; Dupret, Katia

How to sustainably implement Higher Education’s aim to teach for critical and societally relevant thinking and acting into its teaching formats? As part of a two-week intense workshop process developed at Roskilde University’s HumTek Bachelor Study Program for first-year students, the authors have......, given that the students are to test and challenge their initial design ideas with other stakeholders. This process-oriented collective teaching-designing framework, we argue, sustainably anchors critical thinking and acting in a hands-on educational setting. Teaching is – like social design...... that teaching as well as design can only be rendered sustainable by critically reflecting on its epistemic possibilities and limitations across diverse stakeholder perspectives....

Adaptive Observer-Based Fault-Tolerant Control Design for Uncertain Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Huaming Qian

2015-01-01

Full Text Available This study focuses on the design of the robust fault-tolerant control (FTC system based on adaptive observer for uncertain linear time invariant (LTI systems. In order to improve robustness, rapidity, and accuracy of traditional fault estimation algorithm, an adaptive fault estimation algorithm (AFEA using an augmented observer is presented. By utilizing a new fault estimator model, an improved AFEA based on linear matrix inequality (LMI technique is proposed to increase the performance. Furthermore, an observer-based state feedback fault-tolerant control strategy is designed, which guarantees the stability and performance of the faulty system. Moreover, the adaptive observer and the fault-tolerant controller are designed separately, whose performance can be considered, respectively. Finally, simulation results of an aircraft application are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed design methods.

Evaluation of single and two-stage adaptive sampling designs for estimation of density and abundance of freshwater mussels in a large river

Science.gov (United States)

Smith, D.R.; Rogala, J.T.; Gray, B.R.; Zigler, S.J.; Newton, T.J.

2011-01-01

Reliable estimates of abundance are needed to assess consequences of proposed habitat restoration and enhancement projects on freshwater mussels in the Upper Mississippi River (UMR). Although there is general guidance on sampling techniques for population assessment of freshwater mussels, the actual performance of sampling designs can depend critically on the population density and spatial distribution at the project site. To evaluate various sampling designs, we simulated sampling of populations, which varied in density and degree of spatial clustering. Because of logistics and costs of large river sampling and spatial clustering of freshwater mussels, we focused on adaptive and non-adaptive versions of single and two-stage sampling. The candidate designs performed similarly in terms of precision (CV) and probability of species detection for fixed sample size. Both CV and species detection were determined largely by density, spatial distribution and sample size. However, designs did differ in the rate that occupied quadrats were encountered. Occupied units had a higher probability of selection using adaptive designs than conventional designs. We used two measures of cost: sample size (i.e. number of quadrats) and distance travelled between the quadrats. Adaptive and two-stage designs tended to reduce distance between sampling units, and thus performed better when distance travelled was considered. Based on the comparisons, we provide general recommendations on the sampling designs for the freshwater mussels in the UMR, and presumably other large rivers.

Guest-responsive structural adaptation of a rationally-designed ...

Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

adaptability of the TB core to undergo subtle structural changes in response to the guest that is included. The structural ... we report the design, synthesis and inclusion behaviour of a novel ..... Based on a rational design, we have shown from ...

Health adaptation policy for climate vulnerable groups: a 'critical computational linguistics' analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Seidel, Bastian M; Bell, Erica

2014-11-28

Many countries are developing or reviewing national adaptation policy for climate change but the extent to which these meet the health needs of vulnerable groups has not been assessed. This study examines the adequacy of such policies for nine known climate-vulnerable groups: people with mental health conditions, Aboriginal people, culturally and linguistically diverse groups, aged people, people with disabilities, rural communities, children, women, and socioeconomically disadvantaged people. The study analyses an exhaustive sample of national adaptation policy documents from Annex 1 ('developed') countries of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change: 20 documents from 12 countries. A 'critical computational linguistics' method was used involving novel software-driven quantitative mapping and traditional critical discourse analysis. The study finds that references to vulnerable groups are relatively little present or non-existent, as well as poorly connected to language about practical strategies and socio-economic contexts, both also little present. The conclusions offer strategies for developing policy that is better informed by a 'social determinants of health' definition of climate vulnerability, consistent with best practice in the literature and global policy prescriptions.

Continuous use of an adaptive lung ventilation controller in critically ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

1995-05-05

May 5, 1995 ... Adaptive lung ventilation (ALV) refers to closed-loop mechanical ventilation designed to work ... optimise the controller performance, the volume controller .... PawEE), vital capacity IYC), an index of airway resistance relative to ...

User Interaction with User-Adaptive Information Filters

NARCIS (Netherlands)

H. Cramer; V. Evers; M. van Someren; B. Wielinga; S. Besselink; L. Rutledge (Lloyd); N. Stash; L. Aroyo (Lora)

2007-01-01

htmlabstractUser-adaptive information filters can be a tool to achieve timely delivery of the right information to the right person, a feat critical in crisis management. This paper explores interaction issues that need to be taken into account when designing a user-adaptive information filter. Two

Adaptive fuzzy bilinear observer based synchronization design for generalized Lorenz system

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Baek, Jaeho; Lee, Heejin; Kim, Seungwoo; Park, Mignon

2009-01-01

This Letter proposes an adaptive fuzzy bilinear observer (FBO) based synchronization design for generalized Lorenz system (GLS). The GLS can be described to TS fuzzy bilinear generalized Lorenz model (FBGLM) with their states immeasurable and their parameters unknown. We design an adaptive FBO based on TS FBGLM for synchronization. Lyapunov theory is employed to guarantee the stability of error dynamic system via linear matrix equalities (LMIs) and to derive the adaptive laws to estimate unknown parameters. Numerical example is given to demonstrate the validity of our proposed adaptive FBO approach for synchronization.

User interaction with user-adaptive information filters

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Cramer, H.S.M.; Evers, V.; Someren, van M.W.; Wielinga, B.J.; Besselink, S.; Rutledge, L.W.; Stash, N.; Aroyo, L.M.; Aykin, N.M.

2007-01-01

User-adaptive information filters can be a tool to achieve timely delivery of the right information to the right person, a feat critical in crisis management. This paper explores interaction issues that need to be taken into account when designing a user-adaptive information filter. Two case studies

Adaptive bra designs for the individuals with special needs

Science.gov (United States)

Imran, A.; Drean, E.; Schacher, L.; Adolphe, D.

2017-10-01

Nowadays the numbers of disabled and elderly people is increasing, and the development of adaptive clothing for these people is in demand. The purpose of this study is to add features in bra design, to make it “Easy on, Easy off", to encourage the hemiplegic females to begin to dress themselves and to make dressing easier and more protective for them. This adaptive bra design will offer benefits to the wearer that include independence, conformity to culture, concealment of the disability, comfort, psychological contentment, safety, and durability. Our adaptive bra will promote harmony between functionality and aesthetics. Our e-bra enables continuous, real-time monitoring to identify any pathophysiological changes by monitoring blood pressure, body temperature, respiratory rate, oxygen consumption, some neural activity.

Modeling Adaptive Behavior for Systems Design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rasmussen, Jens

1994-01-01

Field studies in modern work systems and analysis of recent major accidents have pointed to a need for better models of the adaptive behavior of individuals and organizations operating in a dynamic and highly competitive environment. The paper presents a discussion of some key characteristics.......) The basic difference between the models of system functions used in engineering and design and those evolving from basic research within the various academic disciplines and finally 3.) The models and methods required for closed-loop, feedback system design....

Topology Design of Pressure Adaptive Honeycomb for a Morphing Fowler Flap

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Scheepstra, J.; Vos, R.; Barrett, R.

2011-01-01

A new method for designing a morphing Fowler flap based on pressure-adaptive honeycomb is detailed. Pressure adaptive honeycomb has been shown to be able to induce gross camber deformations in airfoil sections, such as a flap. However, due to the large amount of design variables the integration of

Hybrid Computerized Adaptive Testing: From Group Sequential Design to Fully Sequential Design

Science.gov (United States)

Wang, Shiyu; Lin, Haiyan; Chang, Hua-Hua; Douglas, Jeff

2016-01-01

Computerized adaptive testing (CAT) and multistage testing (MST) have become two of the most popular modes in large-scale computer-based sequential testing. Though most designs of CAT and MST exhibit strength and weakness in recent large-scale implementations, there is no simple answer to the question of which design is better because different…

Design of Adaptive Policy Pathways under Deep Uncertainties

Science.gov (United States)

Babovic, Vladan

2013-04-01

The design of large-scale engineering and infrastructural systems today is growing in complexity. Designers need to consider sociotechnical uncertainties, intricacies, and processes in the long- term strategic deployment and operations of these systems. In this context, water and spatial management is increasingly challenged not only by climate-associated changes such as sea level rise and increased spatio-temporal variability of precipitation, but also by pressures due to population growth and particularly accelerating rate of urbanisation. Furthermore, high investment costs and long term-nature of water-related infrastructure projects requires long-term planning perspective, sometimes extending over many decades. Adaptation to such changes is not only determined by what is known or anticipated at present, but also by what will be experienced and learned as the future unfolds, as well as by policy responses to social and water events. As a result, a pathway emerges. Instead of responding to 'surprises' and making decisions on ad hoc basis, exploring adaptation pathways into the future provide indispensable support in water management decision-making. In this contribution, a structured approach for designing a dynamic adaptive policy based on the concepts of adaptive policy making and adaptation pathways is introduced. Such an approach provides flexibility which allows change over time in response to how the future unfolds, what is learned about the system, and changes in societal preferences. The introduced flexibility provides means for dealing with complexities of adaptation under deep uncertainties. It enables engineering systems to change in the face of uncertainty to reduce impacts from downside scenarios while capitalizing on upside opportunities. This contribution presents comprehensive framework for development and deployment of adaptive policy pathway framework, and demonstrates its performance under deep uncertainties on a case study related to urban

Coupled sensor/platform control design for low-level chemical detection with position-adaptive micro-UAVs

Science.gov (United States)

Goodwin, Thomas; Carr, Ryan; Mitra, Atindra K.; Selmic, Rastko R.

2009-05-01

We discuss the development of Position-Adaptive Sensors [1] for purposes for detecting embedded chemical substances in challenging environments. This concept is a generalization of patented Position-Adaptive Radar Concepts developed at AFRL for challenging conditions such as urban environments. For purposes of investigating the detection of chemical substances using multiple MAV (Micro-UAV) platforms, we have designed and implemented an experimental testbed with sample structures such as wooden carts that contain controlled leakage points. Under this general concept, some of the members of a MAV swarm can serve as external position-adaptive "transmitters" by blowing air over the cart and some of the members of a MAV swarm can serve as external position-adaptive "receivers" that are equipped with chemical or biological (chem/bio) sensors that function as "electronic noses". The objective can be defined as improving the particle count of chem/bio concentrations that impinge on a MAV-based position-adaptive sensor that surrounds a chemical repository, such as a cart, via the development of intelligent position-adaptive control algorithms. The overall effect is to improve the detection and false-alarm statistics of the overall system. Within the major sections of this paper, we discuss a number of different aspects of developing our initial MAV-Based Sensor Testbed. This testbed includes blowers to simulate position-adaptive excitations and a MAV from Draganfly Innovations Inc. with stable design modifications to accommodate our chem/bio sensor boom design. We include details with respect to several critical phases of the development effort including development of the wireless sensor network and experimental apparatus, development of the stable sensor boom for the MAV, integration of chem/bio sensors and sensor node onto the MAV and boom, development of position-adaptive control algorithms and initial tests at IDCAST (Institute for the Development and

NEURAL NETWORKS CONTROL OF THE HYBRID POWER UNIT BASED ON THE METHOD OF ADAPTIVE CRITICS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. Serikov

2012-01-01

Full Text Available The formal statement of the optimization problem of hybrid vehicle power unit control is given. Its solving by neural networks method application on the basis of adaptive critic is considered.

Design Framework for an Adaptive MOOC Enhanced by Blended Learning

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gynther, Karsten

2016-01-01

The research project has developed a design framework for an adaptive MOOC that complements the MOOC format with blended learning. The design framework consists of a design model and a series of learning design principles which can be used to design in-service courses for teacher professional...

Surface Plasmon Wave Adapter Designed with Transformation Optics

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zhang, Jingjing; Xiao, Sanshui; Wubs, Martijn

2011-01-01

On the basis of transformation optics, we propose the design of a surface plasmon wave adapter which confines surface plasmon waves on non-uniform metal surfaces and enables adiabatic mode transformation of surface plasmon polaritons with very short tapers. This adapter can be simply achieved...... with homogeneous anisotropic naturally occurring materials or subwavelength grating-structured dielectric materials. Full wave simulations based on a finite-element method have been performed to validate our proposal....

Gifts to the Future: Design Reasoning, Design Research, and Critical Design Practitioners

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Janet McDonnell

Full Text Available Set in the context of a particular orthodoxy about the history of design research over the last 50 years, this opinion piece selectively surveys some of the significant findings from research into what expert design reasoning entails. Using the conceit of a pool of knowledge—which has come about from many different design research agendas, using multiple methods, and with differing foci of attention—it indicates some of what we know about design reasoning as a phenomenon by taking three “scoops” from the pool. These scoops, respectively characterize design reasoning as navigating the swamp; having negative capability; and being concerned with framing. This material is then used to contrast expert design reasoning with salient features of some popular characterizations of design thinking. The contribution concludes with some comments on designer formation, centered on the necessity of proficiency in reflection implied by any goal to nurture critical design practitioners.

Depression as a Mediator in the Relationship between Perceived Familial Criticism and College Adaptation

Science.gov (United States)

Puff, Jayme; Kolomeyer, Ellen; McSwiggan, Meagan; Pearte, Catherine; Lauer, Brea-Anne; Renk, Kimberly

2016-01-01

Objective: This study examined relationships among emerging adults' perceived familial criticism, their depressive symptoms, and their college adaptation. Participants: The current study examined the responses of 412 emerging adults (300 females and 112 males) who were college students at a large southeastern university. The majority of these…

Adaptive Robotic Systems Design in University of Applied Sciences

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Gunsing Jos

2016-01-01

Full Text Available In the industry for highly specialized machine building (small series with high variety and high complexity and in healthcare a demand for adaptive robotics is rapidly coming up. Technically skilled people are not always available in sufficient numbers. A lot of know how with respect to the required technologies is available but successful adaptive robotic system designs are still rare. In our research at the university of applied sciences we incorporate new available technologies in our education courses by way of research projects; in these projects students will investigate the application possibilities of new technologies together with companies and teachers. Thus we are able to transfer knowledge to the students including an innovation oriented attitude and skills. Last years we developed several industrial binpicking applications for logistics and machining-factories with different types of 3D vision. Also force feedback gripping has been developed including slip sensing. Especially for healthcare robotics we developed a so-called twisted wire actuator, which is very compact in combination with an underactuated gripper, manufactured in one piece in polyurethane. We work both on modeling and testing the functions of these designs but we work also on complete demonstrator systems. Since the amount of disciplines involved in complex product and machine design increases rapidly we pay a lot of attention with respect to systems engineering methods. Apart from the classical engineering disciplines like mechanical, electrical, software and mechatronics engineering, especially for adaptive robotics more and more disciplines like industrial product design, communication … multimedia design and of course physics and even art are to be involved depending on the specific application to be designed. Design tools like V-model, agile/scrum and design-approaches to obtain the best set of requirements are being implemented in the engineering studies from

Critical review of directional neutron survey meters

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Balmer, Matthew J.I.; Gamage, Kelum A.A.; Taylor, Graeme C.

2014-01-01

Having been overlooked for many years, research is now starting to take into account the directional distribution of the neutron work place field. The impact of not taking this into account has led to overly conservative estimates of dose in neutron workplace fields. This paper provides a critical review of this existing research into directional survey meters which could improve these estimates of dose. Instruments which could be adapted for use as directional neutron survey meters are also considered within this review. Using Monte-Carlo techniques, two of the most promising existing designs are evaluated; a boron-doped liquid scintillator and a multi-detector directional spectrometer. As an outcome of these simulations, possible adaptations to these instruments are suggested with a view to improving the portability of the instrument. -- Highlights: • We critically review the existing literature into directional survey meters. • Instruments which could be adapted for this purpose are also reviewed. • Investigate the potential of much lighter portable real-time instrument. • Improvements to existing instruments are suggested to improve their design. • Boron-Doped liquid scintillator design is the most promising, but needs further work

Adaptive Lighting Design – Staged Experiences of Light

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Søndergaard, Karin; Petersen, Kjell Yngve

2015-01-01

involved in the negotiations of how the lighting design unfolds. Each installation stages a specified place, where participants perform their own experiences of being and moving in dynamically changing lighting settings. Through investigative actions participants test the ways that the lighting...... compositions influence their ability to orient themselves within the geography of the space and how the balances in light colours and luminous intensities affect their experience of directionality, distances, and scales. In short, the experience of being present in the space as well as one’s experience......Adaptive Lighting Design – Staged Experiences of Light The two installations, White Cube and White Box, enable experience-based studies as a form of perceptual activity, wherein lighting conditions are examined in a dialectical exchange between the system and the people participating. Adaptive...

A web-based adaptive tutor to teach PCR primer design

NARCIS (Netherlands)

van Seters, Janneke R.; Wellink, Joan; Tramper, Johannes; Goedhart, Martin J.; Ossevoort, Miriam A.

2012-01-01

When students have varying prior knowledge, personalized instruction is desirable. One way to personalize instruction is by using adaptive e-learning to offer training of varying complexity. In this study, we developed a web-based adaptive tutor to teach PCR primer design: the PCR Tutor. We used

A Web-based Adaptive Tutor to Teach PCR Primer Design

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Seters, van J.R.; Wellink, J.; Tramper, J.; Goedhart, M.J.; Ossevoort, M.A.

2012-01-01

When students have varying prior knowledge, personalized instruction is desirable. One way to personalize instruction is by using adaptive e-learning to offer training of varying complexity. In this study, we developed a web-based adaptive tutor to teach PCR primer design: the PCR Tutor. We used

Adaptation and fixation in entrepreneurial approaches of a dental laboratory

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Cornelia M. Ferreira

2014-08-01

Research purpose: The study described how the dental laboratory adapted its entrepreneurial approaches over time in response to critical changes that occurred and how aspects in the managerial approach became fixated and proved to be essential to success. Motivation for the study: The study provided insight into how the dental laboratory transformed into a stable and prosperous laboratory by the integration of strategic, economic, cultural and social capital through a process of business decision making. Research design, approach and method: A cohort survey research design, based upon the compilation of longitudinal data over three selected time periods, was employed. The design of the measuring instruments and the interpretation of research results were derived from an adapted entrepreneurial-in-network theoretical framework. A triangulation data compilation approach was followed. Main findings: The results revealed that cultural capital in the dental laboratory became fixated on three value principles, whilst the other critical capitals prescribed exist in sufficient volumes and improve to adapt to changing circumstances in the dental market. Practical/managerial implications: Fixated cultural values acted as a ‘parent’-actor in order to guide the righteousness of behaviour, whereas adaptation required sufficient critical capitals and the proper integration thereof. Contribution/value-added: By adopting the entrepreneurship-in-network approach, the researchers incorporated the dynamic and interactive processes of entrepreneurship. Future studies may employ the same design and use multi-varied analyses to show how a business adapt or fixate its approaches in response to crises or changes in the business environment.

Robustness of Adaptive Survey Designs to Inaccuracy of Design Parameters

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Burger Joep

2017-09-01

Full Text Available Adaptive survey designs (ASDs optimize design features, given 1 the interactions between the design features and characteristics of sampling units and 2 a set of constraints, such as a budget and a minimum number of respondents. Estimation of the interactions is subject to both random and systematic error. In this article, we propose and evaluate four viewpoints to assess robustness of ASDs to inaccuracy of design parameter estimates: the effect of both imprecision and bias on both ASD structure and ASD performance. We additionally propose three distance measures to compare the structure of ASDs. The methodology is illustrated using a simple simulation study and a more complex but realistic case study on the Dutch Travel Survey. The proposed methodology can be applied to other ASD optimization problems. In our simulation study and case study, the ASD was fairly robust to imprecision, but not to realistic dynamics in the design parameters. To deal with the sensitivity of ASDs to changing design parameters, we recommend to learn and update the design parameters.

Design and construction of a fast critical facility

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kato, W.Y.; Dates, L.R.

1962-01-01

Design and construction of a fast critical facility. In a fast-power-reactor development programme, a critical facility is found to be a highly useful tool to ascertain calculational techniques, to verify neutron cross-section sets, and to obtain integral reactor-physics parameters necessary for the nuclear design of a power system. Since it is primarily a physics instrument, the design of a fast critical facility itself poses a number of different problems not found in the design of a power reactor. In addition to usual questions of site, containment, core design and instrumentation , there arise such problems as: how to obtain a large degree of flexibility consistent with safety, the determination of the size and type of facility to meet the experimental physics requirements, the determination of the number and location of control and safety rods minimizing perturbation effects and the specification of the reproducibility of control rods and other movable components to obtain the accuracy required in reactivity measurements. These are some of the problems which are discussed in this paper based on recent experience at the Argonne National Laboratory which has under construction a fast critical facility, ZPR-VI at its Lemont, Illinois site for fast-reactor-physics studies. The ZPR-VI is a movable half- or split-table-type machine similar to ZPR-III. It has a matrix about two and a half times the volume of the earlier machine and will be used to investigate the physics of large, highly dilute, metal and cermet, unmoderated and partially moderated systems having core volumes up to about 1500 l. A detailed description of the ZPR-VI with a discussion on the criteria used in the design of its various components from the point of view of reactor physics is presented. In addition, such topics as management and operating procedures, potential hazards during operation, experimental techniques to be used and construction costs are also included. (author) [fr

Design of an LVDS to USB3.0 adapter and application

Science.gov (United States)

Qiu, Xiaohan; Wang, Yu; Zhao, Xin; Chang, Zhen; Zhang, Quan; Tian, Yuze; Zhang, Yunyi; Lin, Fang; Liu, Wenqing

2016-10-01

USB 3.0 specification was published in 2008. With the development of technology, USB 3.0 is becoming popular. LVDS(Low Voltage Differential Signaling) to USB 3.0 Adapter connects the communication port of spectrometer device and the USB 3.0 port of a computer, and converts the output of an LVDS spectrometer device data to USB. In order to adapt to the changing and developing of technology, LVDS to USB3.0 Adapter was designed and developed based on LVDS to USB2.0 Adapter. The CYUSB3014, a new generation of USB bus interface chip produced by Cypress and conforming to USB3.0 communication protocol, utilizes GPIF-II (GPIF, general programmable interface) to connect the FPGA and increases effective communication speed to 2Gbps. Therefore, the adapter, based on USB3.0 technology, is able to connect more spectrometers to single computer and provides technical basis for the development of the higher speed industrial camera. This article describes the design and development process of the LVDS to USB3.0 adapter.

Design Information from the PSA for Digital Safety-Critical Systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kang, Hyun Gook; Jang, Seung Cheol

2005-01-01

Many safety-critical applications such as nuclear field application usually adopt a similar design strategy for digital safety-critical systems. Their differences from the normal design for the non-safety-critical applications could be summarized as: multiple-redundancy, highly reliable components, strengthened monitoring mechanism, verified software, and automated test procedure. These items are focusing on maintaining the capability to perform the given safety function when it is requested. For the past several decades, probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) techniques are used in the nuclear industry to assess the relative effects of contributing events on plant risk and system reliability. They provide a unifying means of assessing physical faults, recovery processes, contributing effects, human actions, and other events that have a high degree of uncertainty. The applications of PSA provide not only the analysis results of already installed system but also the useful information for the system under design. The information could be derived from the PSA experience of the various safety-critical systems. Thanks to the design flexibility, the digital system is one of the most suitable candidates for risk-informed design (RID). In this article, we will describe the feedbacks for system design and try to develop a procedure for RID. Even though the procedure is not sophisticated enough now, it could be the start point of the further investigation for developing more complete and practical methodology

Incompressible Navier-Stokes inverse design method based on adaptive unstructured meshes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rahmati, M.T.; Charlesworth, D.; Zangeneh, M.

2005-01-01

An inverse method for blade design based on Navier-Stokes equations on adaptive unstructured meshes has been developed. In the method, unlike the method based on inviscid equations, the effect of viscosity is directly taken into account. In the method, the pressure (or pressure loading) is prescribed. The design method then computes the blade shape that would accomplish the target prescribed pressure distribution. The method is implemented using a cell-centered finite volume method, which solves the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations on unstructured meshes. An adaptive unstructured mesh method based on grid subdivision and local adaptive mesh method is utilized for increasing the accuracy. (author)

Adaptive intervention design in mobile health: Intervention design and development in the Cell Phone Intervention for You trial.

Science.gov (United States)

Lin, Pao-Hwa; Intille, Stephen; Bennett, Gary; Bosworth, Hayden B; Corsino, Leonor; Voils, Corrine; Grambow, Steven; Lazenka, Tony; Batch, Bryan C; Tyson, Crystal; Svetkey, Laura P

2015-12-01

The obesity epidemic has spread to young adults, and obesity is a significant risk factor for cardiovascular disease. The prominence and increasing functionality of mobile phones may provide an opportunity to deliver longitudinal and scalable weight management interventions in young adults. The aim of this article is to describe the design and development of the intervention tested in the Cell Phone Intervention for You study and to highlight the importance of adaptive intervention design that made it possible. The Cell Phone Intervention for You study was a National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute-sponsored, controlled, 24-month randomized clinical trial comparing two active interventions to a usual-care control group. Participants were 365 overweight or obese (body mass index≥25 kg/m2) young adults. Both active interventions were designed based on social cognitive theory and incorporated techniques for behavioral self-management and motivational enhancement. Initial intervention development occurred during a 1-year formative phase utilizing focus groups and iterative, participatory design. During the intervention testing, adaptive intervention design, where an intervention is updated or extended throughout a trial while assuring the delivery of exactly the same intervention to each cohort, was employed. The adaptive intervention design strategy distributed technical work and allowed introduction of novel components in phases intended to help promote and sustain participant engagement. Adaptive intervention design was made possible by exploiting the mobile phone's remote data capabilities so that adoption of particular application components could be continuously monitored and components subsequently added or updated remotely. The cell phone intervention was delivered almost entirely via cell phone and was always-present, proactive, and interactive-providing passive and active reminders, frequent opportunities for knowledge dissemination, and multiple tools

Representing adaptive and adaptable Units of Learning. How to model personalized eLearning in IMS Learning Design

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Burgos, Daniel; Tattersall, Colin; Koper, Rob

2006-01-01

Burgos, D., Tattersall, C., & Koper, E. J. R. (2007). Representing adaptive and adaptable Units of Learning. How to model personalized eLearning in IMS Learning Design. In B. Fernández Manjon, J. M. Sanchez Perez, J. A. Gómez Pulido, M. A. Vega Rodriguez & J. Bravo (Eds.), Computers and Education:

Optimal Pid Controller Design Using Adaptive Vurpso Algorithm

Science.gov (United States)

Zirkohi, Majid Moradi

2015-04-01

The purpose of this paper is to improve theVelocity Update Relaxation Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm (VURPSO). The improved algorithm is called Adaptive VURPSO (AVURPSO) algorithm. Then, an optimal design of a Proportional-Integral-Derivative (PID) controller is obtained using the AVURPSO algorithm. An adaptive momentum factor is used to regulate a trade-off between the global and the local exploration abilities in the proposed algorithm. This operation helps the system to reach the optimal solution quickly and saves the computation time. Comparisons on the optimal PID controller design confirm the superiority of AVURPSO algorithm to the optimization algorithms mentioned in this paper namely the VURPSO algorithm, the Ant Colony algorithm, and the conventional approach. Comparisons on the speed of convergence confirm that the proposed algorithm has a faster convergence in a less computation time to yield a global optimum value. The proposed AVURPSO can be used in the diverse areas of optimization problems such as industrial planning, resource allocation, scheduling, decision making, pattern recognition and machine learning. The proposed AVURPSO algorithm is efficiently used to design an optimal PID controller.

Design and implementation of a wireless instrument adapter

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Laino, Kaori V.; Saathoff, Thore; Savarimuthu, Thiusius R.

2018-01-01

The evaluation of new methods for control and manipulation in minimally invasive robotic surgery requires a realistic setup. To decouple the evaluation of methods from overall clinical systems, we propose an instrument adapter for the S line EndoWrist\\c{opyright} instruments of the da Vinci...... surgical system. The adapter is small and lightweight and can be mounted to any robot to mimic motion. We describe its design and implementation, as well as a setup to calibrate instruments to study precise motion control. Our results indicate that each instrument requires individual calibration...

Design and Implementation of an Extensible Learner-Adaptive Environment

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kiyoshi Nakabayashi

2010-09-01

Full Text Available This paper describes the design and implementation of a flexible architecture that is capable of extending the functions of a learner-adaptive self-learning environment. A “courseware object”, which is a program module that is used to implement various educational functionalities, has been newly introduced to ensure both function extensibility as well as content reusability. A prototype system was designed and implemented to investigate the feasibility of the proposed architecture and to identify the core behavior and interaction schema of courseware objects. The results from this trial indicated that several learner-adaptive functionalities including the SCORM 2004 standard specifications will be able to be successfully implemented into the proposed architecture.

Adaptation of the Critical Care Family Need Inventory to the Turkish population and its psychometric properties

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sibel Büyükçoban

2015-08-01

Full Text Available In the complex environment of intensive care units, needs of patients’ relatives might be seen as the lowest priority. On the other hand, because of their patients’ critical and often uncertain conditions, stress levels of relatives are quite high. This study aims to adapt the Critical Care Family Need Inventory, which assesses the needs of patients’ relatives, for use with the Turkish-speaking population and to assess psychometric properties of the resulting inventory. The study was conducted in a state hospital with the participation of 191 critical care patient relatives. Content validity was assessed by expert opinions, and construct validity was examined by exploratory factor analysis (EFA. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was used to determine internal consistency. The translated inventory has a content validity ratio higher than the minimum acceptable level. Its construct validity was established by the EFA. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for the entire scale was 0.93 and higher than 0.80 for subscales, thus demonstrating the translated version’s reliability. The Turkish adaptation appropriately reflects all dimensions of needs in the original CCFNI, and its psychometric properties were acceptable. The revised tool could be useful for helping critical care healthcare workers provide services in a holistic approach and for policymakers to improve quality of service.

Design criteria and principles for criticality detection and alarm systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Delafield, H.J.; Clifton, J.J.

1984-10-01

The report gives design principles and criteria for criticality detection and alarm systems based on earlier work and revised in the light of more recent experience. In particular, account is taken of the developments which have taken place in the field of radiation detection and in the understanding of the different types of criticality excursion. General guidance is given on the principles to apply in deciding upon the need for a criticality system. The characteristics of a criticality incident are described in terms of the minimum incident of concern, and the radiation field. Criteria for the threshold of detection of a criticality incident are then derived and the methods of detection considered. The selection and siting of criticality detectors is discussed, and design principles are given for alarm systems. Finally, testing and post-alarm procedures are outlined, followed by a summary of the principal recommendations. The supporting Appendices include a discussion of reliability and a summary of radiation detector characteristics. (author)

Solution-verified reliability analysis and design of bistable MEMS using error estimation and adaptivity.

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Eldred, Michael Scott; Subia, Samuel Ramirez; Neckels, David; Hopkins, Matthew Morgan; Notz, Patrick K.; Adams, Brian M.; Carnes, Brian; Wittwer, Jonathan W.; Bichon, Barron J.; Copps, Kevin D.

2006-10-01

This report documents the results for an FY06 ASC Algorithms Level 2 milestone combining error estimation and adaptivity, uncertainty quantification, and probabilistic design capabilities applied to the analysis and design of bistable MEMS. Through the use of error estimation and adaptive mesh refinement, solution verification can be performed in an automated and parameter-adaptive manner. The resulting uncertainty analysis and probabilistic design studies are shown to be more accurate, efficient, reliable, and convenient.

A Web-Based Adaptive Tutor to Teach PCR Primer Design

Science.gov (United States)

van Seters, Janneke R.; Wellink, Joan; Tramper, Johannes; Goedhart, Martin J.; Ossevoort, Miriam A.

2012-01-01

When students have varying prior knowledge, personalized instruction is desirable. One way to personalize instruction is by using adaptive e-learning to offer training of varying complexity. In this study, we developed a web-based adaptive tutor to teach PCR primer design: the PCR Tutor. We used part of the Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (the…

Urban drainage design and climate change adaptation decision making

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zhou, Qianqian

response impacts in the context of hydrological extremes are considered while the added intangible values (e.g. recreational amenities due to a nice blue-green neighbourhood) of adaptation options are often ignored or underestimated. In order to facilitate the development and implementation of water...... the benefits of provision of positive environmental values and the preservation of water resources. It is found that neglecting intangible values in climate adaptation assessment can easily bias the decision making; the reframed approach hence provide an important tool for assessment of additional benefits...... and costs of such innovative solutions. The thesis points towards an integrated framework for urban drainage adaptation design considering climate change effects and adaptation benefits and costs. The case studies show how the proposed framework can be utilized to manage the anticipated climate change risks...

Critical Conversations: Feedback As A Stimulus To Creativity In Software Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Raymond McCall

2010-01-01

Full Text Available Three decades of creating software to support design rationale showed the author how rationale processes can promote generation of novel ideas. Rationale can promote creative design by promoting critical conversations among designers and other project participants. Critical conversations intertwine ideation and evaluation, using feedback about consequences of decisions to challenge designers to devise new ideas. Such conversations take two forms. The first is discussion involving feedback from speculation about consequences of design decisions for implementation and use. The second is discussion involving feedback from actual experiences of implementation and use of the software being designed. The former is purely a process of reflective discourse, the latter a process of situated cognition involving both action and reflective discourse. Thus, the former is pure argumentation, the latter situated argumentation. Exploiting the full potential of critical conversations for creative design requires rethinking rationale methods and integrating them into software supporting implementation and use.

Simple adaptive control system design for a quadrotor with an internal PFC

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Mizumoto, Ikuro; Nakamura, Takuto; Kumon, Makoto; Takagi, Taro [Dept. of Mechanical Systems Engineering, Kumamoto University 2-39-1 Kurokami, Kumamoto, 860-8555 (Japan)

2014-12-10

The paper deals with an adaptive control system design problem for a four rotor helicopter or quadrotor. A simple adaptive control design scheme with a parallel feedforward compensator (PFC) in the internal loop of the considered quadrotor will be proposed based on the backstepping strategy. As is well known, the backstepping control strategy is one of the advanced control strategy for nonlinear systems. However, the control algorithm will become complex if the system has higher order relative degrees. We will show that one can skip some design steps of the backstepping method by introducing a PFC in the inner loop of the considered quadrotor, so that the structure of the obtained controller will be simplified and a high gain based adaptive feedback control system will be designed. The effectiveness of the proposed method will be confirmed through numerical simulations.

Critical Race Design: An Emerging Methodological Approach to Anti-Racist Design and Implementation Research

Science.gov (United States)

Khalil, Deena; Kier, Meredith

2017-01-01

This article is about introducing Critical Race Design (CRD), a research methodology that centers race and equity at the nucleus of educational opportunities by design. First, the authors define design-based implementation research (DBIR; Penuel, Fishman, Cheng, & Sabelli, 2011) as an equity-oriented education research methodology where…

Effect of Margin Designs on the Marginal Adaptation of Zirconia Copings.

Science.gov (United States)

Habib, Syed Rashid; Al Ajmi, Mohammed Ginan; Al Dhafyan, Mohammed; Jomah, Abdulrehman; Abualsaud, Haytham; Almashali, Mazen

2017-09-01

The aim of this in vitro study was to investigate the effect of Shoulder versus Chamfer margin design on the marginal adaptation of zirconia (Zr) copings. 40 extracted molar teeth were mounted in resin and prepared for zirconia crowns with two margin preparation designs (20=Shoulder and 20=Chamfer). The copings were manufactured by Cercon® (DeguDent GmbH, Germany) using the CAD/CAM system for each tooth. They were tried on each tooth, cemented, thermocycled, re-embedded in resin and were subsequently cross sectioned centrally into two equal mesial and distal halves. They were examined under electron microscope at 200 X magnification and the measurements were recorded at 5 predetermined points in micrometers (µm). The o verall mean marginal gap for the two groups was found to be 206.98+42.78µm with Shoulder margin design (Marginal Gap=199.50+40.72µm) having better adaptation compared to Chamfer (Marginal Gap=214.46+44.85µm). The independent-samples t-test showed a statistically non-significant difference (p=.113) between the means of marginal gap for Shoulder and Chamfer margin designs and the measurements were recorded at 5 predetermined points for the two groups. The Chamfer margin design appeared to offer the same adaptation results as the Shoulder margin design.

Representing adaptive and adaptable Units of Learning. How to model personalized eLearning in IMS Learning Design

OpenAIRE

Burgos, Daniel; Tattersall, Colin; Koper, Rob

2006-01-01

Burgos, D., Tattersall, C., & Koper, E. J. R. (2007). Representing adaptive and adaptable Units of Learning. How to model personalized eLearning in IMS Learning Design. In B. Fernández Manjon, J. M. Sanchez Perez, J. A. Gómez Pulido, M. A. Vega Rodriguez & J. Bravo (Eds.), Computers and Education: E-learning - from theory to practice. Germany: Kluwer.

Program computes single-point failures in critical system designs

Science.gov (United States)

Brown, W. R.

1967-01-01

Computer program analyzes the designs of critical systems that will either prove the design is free of single-point failures or detect each member of the population of single-point failures inherent in a system design. This program should find application in the checkout of redundant circuits and digital systems.

Online adaptive optimal control for continuous-time nonlinear systems with completely unknown dynamics

Science.gov (United States)

Lv, Yongfeng; Na, Jing; Yang, Qinmin; Wu, Xing; Guo, Yu

2016-01-01

An online adaptive optimal control is proposed for continuous-time nonlinear systems with completely unknown dynamics, which is achieved by developing a novel identifier-critic-based approximate dynamic programming algorithm with a dual neural network (NN) approximation structure. First, an adaptive NN identifier is designed to obviate the requirement of complete knowledge of system dynamics, and a critic NN is employed to approximate the optimal value function. Then, the optimal control law is computed based on the information from the identifier NN and the critic NN, so that the actor NN is not needed. In particular, a novel adaptive law design method with the parameter estimation error is proposed to online update the weights of both identifier NN and critic NN simultaneously, which converge to small neighbourhoods around their ideal values. The closed-loop system stability and the convergence to small vicinity around the optimal solution are all proved by means of the Lyapunov theory. The proposed adaptation algorithm is also improved to achieve finite-time convergence of the NN weights. Finally, simulation results are provided to exemplify the efficacy of the proposed methods.

Global Squeeze: Assessing Climate-Critical Resource Constraints for Coastal Climate Adaptation

Science.gov (United States)

Chase, N. T.; Becker, A.; Schwegler, B.; Fischer, M.

2014-12-01

The projected impacts of climate change in the coastal zone will require local planning and local resources to adapt to increasing risks of social, environmental, and economic consequences from extreme events. This means that, for the first time in human history, aggregated local demands could outpace global supply of certain "climate-critical resources." For example, construction materials such as sand and gravel, steel, and cement may be needed to fortify many coastal locations at roughly the same point in time if decision makers begin to construct new storm barriers or elevate coastal lands. Where might adaptation bottlenecks occur? Can the world produce enough cement to armour the world's seaports as flood risks increase due to sea-level rise and more intense storms? Just how many coastal engineers would multiple such projects require? Understanding such global implications of adaptation requires global datasets—such as bathymetry, coastal topography, local sea-level rise and storm surge projections, and construction resource production capacity—that are currently unavailable at a resolution appropriate for a global-scale analysis. Our research group has identified numerous gaps in available data necessary to make such estimates on both the supply and demand sides of this equation. This presentation examines the emerging need and current availability of these types of datasets and argues for new coordinated efforts to develop and share such data.

Beyond Buzzword Bingo: a Critical Examination of Genre, Culture, and Communication

Science.gov (United States)

Hanasono, Lisa K.

2017-01-01

Courses: This single-class teaching activity was designed for courses on public speaking, rhetorical criticism, and critical thinking. In addition, instructors can adapt this activity for online or face-to-face courses on intercultural communication, organizational communication, listening, and political communication. Objectives: By completing…

Designing reading tasks to foster critical thinking Designing reading tasks to foster critical thinking

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Leda Maria Braga Tomitch

2008-04-01

Full Text Available What else is there besides multiple choice exercises, questions or true-false statements? What kind of readers do we EFL/ESL teachers, want to develop? Fortunately, there are alternative possibilities for designing reading activities which, besides being more interesting and fun for the students than the traditional tasks, can help develop more active and critical readers. A search in EFL/ESL reading textbooks has revealed that the most frequently encountered types of reading activities are comprehension questions, multiple-choice exercises, and true-false statements (Tomitch, in press a. These tasks have been used throughout the history of language teaching, and one must agree that they have their merits. However, there are reasons why they should not be used as the only source of activity in the classroom. What else is there besides multiple choice exercises, questions or true-false statements? What kind of readers do we EFL/ESL teachers, want to develop? Fortunately, there are alternative possibilities for designing reading activities which, besides being more interesting and fun for the students than the traditional tasks, can help develop more active and critical readers. A search in EFL/ESL reading textbooks has revealed that the most frequently encountered types of reading activities are comprehension questions, multiple-choice exercises, and true-false statements (Tomitch, in press a. These tasks have been used throughout the history of language teaching, and one must agree that they have their merits. However, there are reasons why they should not be used as the only source of activity in the classroom.

ITER - TVPS remote handling critical design issues

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1990-09-01

This report describes critical design issues concerning remote maintenance of the ITER Torus Vacuum Pumping System (TVPS). The key issues under investigation are the regeneration/isolation valve seal and seal mechanism replacement; impact of inert gas operation; impact of remote handling (RH) on the building configuration and RH equipment requirements. Seal exchange concepts are developed and their impact on the valve design identified. Concerns regarding the design and operation of RH equipment in an inert gas atmosphere are also explored. The report compares preliminary RH equipment options, pumping equipment maintenance frequency and their impact on the building design, and makes recommendations where a conflict exists between pumping equipment and the building layout. (51 figs., 11 refs.)

Biomimetic molecular design tools that learn, evolve, and adapt

Science.gov (United States)

2017-01-01

A dominant hallmark of living systems is their ability to adapt to changes in the environment by learning and evolving. Nature does this so superbly that intensive research efforts are now attempting to mimic biological processes. Initially this biomimicry involved developing synthetic methods to generate complex bioactive natural products. Recent work is attempting to understand how molecular machines operate so their principles can be copied, and learning how to employ biomimetic evolution and learning methods to solve complex problems in science, medicine and engineering. Automation, robotics, artificial intelligence, and evolutionary algorithms are now converging to generate what might broadly be called in silico-based adaptive evolution of materials. These methods are being applied to organic chemistry to systematize reactions, create synthesis robots to carry out unit operations, and to devise closed loop flow self-optimizing chemical synthesis systems. Most scientific innovations and technologies pass through the well-known “S curve”, with slow beginning, an almost exponential growth in capability, and a stable applications period. Adaptive, evolving, machine learning-based molecular design and optimization methods are approaching the period of very rapid growth and their impact is already being described as potentially disruptive. This paper describes new developments in biomimetic adaptive, evolving, learning computational molecular design methods and their potential impacts in chemistry, engineering, and medicine. PMID:28694872

Biomimetic molecular design tools that learn, evolve, and adapt

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

David A Winkler

2017-06-01

Full Text Available A dominant hallmark of living systems is their ability to adapt to changes in the environment by learning and evolving. Nature does this so superbly that intensive research efforts are now attempting to mimic biological processes. Initially this biomimicry involved developing synthetic methods to generate complex bioactive natural products. Recent work is attempting to understand how molecular machines operate so their principles can be copied, and learning how to employ biomimetic evolution and learning methods to solve complex problems in science, medicine and engineering. Automation, robotics, artificial intelligence, and evolutionary algorithms are now converging to generate what might broadly be called in silico-based adaptive evolution of materials. These methods are being applied to organic chemistry to systematize reactions, create synthesis robots to carry out unit operations, and to devise closed loop flow self-optimizing chemical synthesis systems. Most scientific innovations and technologies pass through the well-known “S curve”, with slow beginning, an almost exponential growth in capability, and a stable applications period. Adaptive, evolving, machine learning-based molecular design and optimization methods are approaching the period of very rapid growth and their impact is already being described as potentially disruptive. This paper describes new developments in biomimetic adaptive, evolving, learning computational molecular design methods and their potential impacts in chemistry, engineering, and medicine.

On the Adaptive Design Rules of Biochemical Networks in Evolution

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Bor-Sen Chen

2007-01-01

Full Text Available Biochemical networks are the backbones of physiological systems of organisms. Therefore, a biochemical network should be sufficiently robust (not sensitive to tolerate genetic mutations and environmental changes in the evolutionary process. In this study, based on the robustness and sensitivity criteria of biochemical networks, the adaptive design rules are developed for natural selection in the evolutionary process. This will provide insights into the robust adaptive mechanism of biochemical networks in the evolutionary process. We find that if a mutated biochemical network satisfies the robustness and sensitivity criteria of natural selection, there is a high probability for the biochemical network to prevail during natural selection in the evolutionary process. Since there are various mutated biochemical networks that can satisfy these criteria but have some differences in phenotype, the biochemical networks increase their diversities in the evolutionary process. The robustness of a biochemical network enables co-option so that new phenotypes can be generated in evolution. The proposed robust adaptive design rules of natural selection gain much insight into the evolutionary mechanism and provide a systematic robust biochemical circuit design method of biochemical networks for biotechnological and therapeutic purposes in the future.

Design Guide for Category I reactors critical facilities

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Brynda, W.J.; Powell, R.W.

1978-08-01

The purpose of this Design Guide is to provide additional guidance to aid the DOE facility contractor in meeting the requirement that the siting, design, construction, modification, operation, maintenance, and decommissioning of DOE-owned critical facilities be in accordance with generally uniform standards, guides, and codes which are comparable to those applied to similar reactors licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Robust Nearfield Wideband Beamforming Design Based on Adaptive-Weighted Convex Optimization

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Guo Ye-Cai

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Nearfield wideband beamformers for microphone arrays have wide applications in multichannel speech enhancement. The nearfield wideband beamformer design based on convex optimization is one of the typical representatives of robust approaches. However, in this approach, the coefficient of convex optimization is a constant, which has not used all the freedom provided by the weighting coefficient efficiently. Therefore, it is still necessary to further improve the performance. To solve this problem, we developed a robust nearfield wideband beamformer design approach based on adaptive-weighted convex optimization. The proposed approach defines an adaptive-weighted function by the adaptive array signal processing theory and adjusts its value flexibly, which has improved the beamforming performance. During each process of the adaptive updating of the weighting function, the convex optimization problem can be formulated as a SOCP (Second-Order Cone Program problem, which could be solved efficiently using the well-established interior-point methods. This method is suitable for the case where the sound source is in the nearfield range, can work well in the presence of microphone mismatches, and is applicable to arbitrary array geometries. Several design examples are presented to verify the effectiveness of the proposed approach and the correctness of the theoretical analysis.

Optimal Design of Large Dimensional Adaptive Subspace Detectors

KAUST Repository

Ben Atitallah, Ismail; Kammoun, Abla; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim; Alnaffouri, Tareq Y.

2016-01-01

This paper addresses the design of Adaptive Subspace Matched Filter (ASMF) detectors in the presence of a mismatch in the steering vector. These detectors are coined as adaptive in reference to the step of utilizing an estimate of the clutter covariance matrix using training data of signalfree observations. To estimate the clutter covariance matrix, we employ regularized covariance estimators that, by construction, force the eigenvalues of the covariance estimates to be greater than a positive scalar . While this feature is likely to increase the bias of the covariance estimate, it presents the advantage of improving its conditioning, thus making the regularization suitable for handling high dimensional regimes. In this paper, we consider the setting of the regularization parameter and the threshold for ASMF detectors in both Gaussian and Compound Gaussian clutters. In order to allow for a proper selection of these parameters, it is essential to analyze the false alarm and detection probabilities. For tractability, such a task is carried out under the asymptotic regime in which the number of observations and their dimensions grow simultaneously large, thereby allowing us to leverage existing results from random matrix theory. Simulation results are provided in order to illustrate the relevance of the proposed design strategy and to compare the performances of the proposed ASMF detectors versus Adaptive normalized Matched Filter (ANMF) detectors under mismatch scenarios.

Optimal Design of Large Dimensional Adaptive Subspace Detectors

KAUST Repository

Ben Atitallah, Ismail

2016-05-27

This paper addresses the design of Adaptive Subspace Matched Filter (ASMF) detectors in the presence of a mismatch in the steering vector. These detectors are coined as adaptive in reference to the step of utilizing an estimate of the clutter covariance matrix using training data of signalfree observations. To estimate the clutter covariance matrix, we employ regularized covariance estimators that, by construction, force the eigenvalues of the covariance estimates to be greater than a positive scalar . While this feature is likely to increase the bias of the covariance estimate, it presents the advantage of improving its conditioning, thus making the regularization suitable for handling high dimensional regimes. In this paper, we consider the setting of the regularization parameter and the threshold for ASMF detectors in both Gaussian and Compound Gaussian clutters. In order to allow for a proper selection of these parameters, it is essential to analyze the false alarm and detection probabilities. For tractability, such a task is carried out under the asymptotic regime in which the number of observations and their dimensions grow simultaneously large, thereby allowing us to leverage existing results from random matrix theory. Simulation results are provided in order to illustrate the relevance of the proposed design strategy and to compare the performances of the proposed ASMF detectors versus Adaptive normalized Matched Filter (ANMF) detectors under mismatch scenarios.

The synergy of creativity and critical thinking in engineering design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Spuzic, Sead; Narayanan, Ramadas; Adriansen, Hanne Kirstine

2016-01-01

framework. It has been widely recognised that engineering design encompasses two ways of thinkingdcreative and critical. A central argument that the synergy of creativity and criticality is significantly enhanced by connecting true interdisciplinary augmentation with the fine arts is discussed along...

Reminiscence and adaptation to critical life events in older adults with mild to moderate depressive symptoms

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Korte, J.; Bohlmeijer, Ernst Thomas; Westerhof, Gerben Johan; Pot, Anne Margriet

2011-01-01

Objectives: The role of reminiscence as a way of adapting to critical life events and chronic medical conditions was investigated in older adults with mild to moderate depressive symptoms. Reminiscence is the (non)volitional act or process of recollecting memories of one's self in the past. Method:

A critical systems perspective on the design of organizational space

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Mobach, Mark P.

2007-01-01

This paper is the first to introduce critical systems thinking into a new emerging research strand: the design of organizational space. The study revealed two things. First, critical systems thinking provides a thorough framework to understand the possibilities to connect organization and building;

Intelligent adaptive systems an interaction-centered design perspective

CERN Document Server

Hou, Ming; Burns, Catherine

2014-01-01

A synthesis of recent research and developments on intelligent adaptive systems from the HF (human factors) and HCI (human-computer interaction) domains, this book provides integrated design guidance and recommendations for researchers and system developers. It addresses a recognized lack of integration between the HF and HCI research communities, which has led to inconsistencies between the research approaches adopted, and a lack of exploitation of research from one field by the other. The book establishes design guidance through the review of conceptual frameworks, analytical methodologies,

Design Process of Flight Vehicle Structures for a Common Bulkhead and an MPCV Spacecraft Adapter

Science.gov (United States)

Aggarwal, Pravin; Hull, Patrick V.

2015-01-01

Design and manufacturing space flight vehicle structures is a skillset that has grown considerably at NASA during that last several years. Beginning with the Ares program and followed by the Space Launch System (SLS); in-house designs were produced for both the Upper Stage and the SLS Multipurpose crew vehicle (MPCV) spacecraft adapter. Specifically, critical design review (CDR) level analysis and flight production drawing were produced for the above mentioned hardware. In particular, the experience of this in-house design work led to increased manufacturing infrastructure for both Marshal Space Flight Center (MSFC) and Michoud Assembly Facility (MAF), improved skillsets in both analysis and design, and hands on experience in building and testing (MSA) full scale hardware. The hardware design and development processes from initiation to CDR and finally flight; resulted in many challenges and experiences that produced valuable lessons. This paper builds on these experiences of NASA in recent years on designing and fabricating flight hardware and examines the design/development processes used, as well as the challenges and lessons learned, i.e. from the initial design, loads estimation and mass constraints to structural optimization/affordability to release of production drawing to hardware manufacturing. While there are many documented design processes which a design engineer can follow, these unique experiences can offer insight into designing hardware in current program environments and present solutions to many of the challenges experienced by the engineering team.

Games on Games. Game Design as Critical Reflexive Practice

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Giovanni Caruso

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Can video game design be compared to more formalized practices of scientific research or speculation within game studies? And, by virtue of an intellectual leap that in itself calls for discussion, can video games be considered as an efficient vehicle for the presentation of certain kinds of knowledge, in the same way in which papers, conference presentations, and books are? What Ratto defines as critical making (2011, the practice of producing artifacts of different sorts in order to supplement and extend critical reflection, may apply to video games as well. Forms of research through design (Zimmerman, Forlizzi and Evenson, 2007, of carpentry (Bogost, 2012, and speculative design (Dunne and Raby, 2013 have been analyzed, discussed, and maybe most importantly, put into practice in different fields of cultural and scientific production. To address this gap and to map the current (and future state of self-reflexive games, we asked both researchers and designers to imagine an application of these concepts to video games. Paraphrasing Zimmerman, Forlizzi and Evenson, what does research through game design might mean? What epistemological insights can we derive from the act of designing, making and playing video games?

Request from nuclear fuel cycle and criticality safety design

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hamasaki, Manabu; Sakashita, Kiichiro; Natsume, Toshihiro

2005-01-01

The quality and reliability of criticality safety design of nuclear fuel cycle systems such as fuel fabrication facilities, fuel reprocessing facilities, storage systems of various forms of nuclear materials or transportation casks have been largely dependent on the quality of criticality safety analyses using qualified criticality calculation code systems and reliable nuclear data sets. In this report, we summarize the characteristics of the nuclear fuel cycle systems and the perspective of the requirements for the nuclear data, with brief comments on the recent issue about spent fuel disposal. (author)

Nonlinear adaptive control system design with asymptotically stable parameter estimation error

Science.gov (United States)

Mishkov, Rumen; Darmonski, Stanislav

2018-01-01

The paper presents a new general method for nonlinear adaptive system design with asymptotic stability of the parameter estimation error. The advantages of the approach include asymptotic unknown parameter estimation without persistent excitation and capability to directly control the estimates transient response time. The method proposed modifies the basic parameter estimation dynamics designed via a known nonlinear adaptive control approach. The modification is based on the generalised prediction error, a priori constraints with a hierarchical parameter projection algorithm, and the stable data accumulation concepts. The data accumulation principle is the main tool for achieving asymptotic unknown parameter estimation. It relies on the parametric identifiability system property introduced. Necessary and sufficient conditions for exponential stability of the data accumulation dynamics are derived. The approach is applied in a nonlinear adaptive speed tracking vector control of a three-phase induction motor.

MURI: Adaptive Waveform Design for Full Spectral Dominance

Science.gov (United States)

2011-03-11

perhaps in a similarly-named file in the same directory as the data file) and handled by a Java class with an API for a user to request data without the...1101- 1104 . [15] J. Wang, and A. Nehorai, “Adaptive polarimetry design for a target in compound-Gaussian clutter,” International Waveform Diversity and

Design of an Adaptive Human-Machine System Based on Dynamical Pattern Recognition of Cognitive Task-Load.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Jianhua; Yin, Zhong; Wang, Rubin

2017-01-01

This paper developed a cognitive task-load (CTL) classification algorithm and allocation strategy to sustain the optimal operator CTL levels over time in safety-critical human-machine integrated systems. An adaptive human-machine system is designed based on a non-linear dynamic CTL classifier, which maps a set of electroencephalogram (EEG) and electrocardiogram (ECG) related features to a few CTL classes. The least-squares support vector machine (LSSVM) is used as dynamic pattern classifier. A series of electrophysiological and performance data acquisition experiments were performed on seven volunteer participants under a simulated process control task environment. The participant-specific dynamic LSSVM model is constructed to classify the instantaneous CTL into five classes at each time instant. The initial feature set, comprising 56 EEG and ECG related features, is reduced to a set of 12 salient features (including 11 EEG-related features) by using the locality preserving projection (LPP) technique. An overall correct classification rate of about 80% is achieved for the 5-class CTL classification problem. Then the predicted CTL is used to adaptively allocate the number of process control tasks between operator and computer-based controller. Simulation results showed that the overall performance of the human-machine system can be improved by using the adaptive automation strategy proposed.

Design of uav robust autopilot based on adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mohand Achour Touat

2008-04-01

Full Text Available  This paper is devoted to the application of adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference systems to the robust control of the UAV longitudinal motion. The adaptive neore-fuzzy inference system model needs to be trained by input/output data. This data were obtained from the modeling of a ”crisp” robust control system. The synthesis of this system is based on the separation theorem, which defines the structure and parameters of LQG-optimal controller, and further - robust optimization of this controller, based on the genetic algorithm. Such design procedure can define the rule base and parameters of fuzzyfication and defuzzyfication algorithms of the adaptive neore-fuzzy inference system controller, which ensure the robust properties of the control system. Simulation of the closed loop control system of UAV longitudinal motion with adaptive neore-fuzzy inference system controller demonstrates high efficiency of proposed design procedure.

Developments in shielding and criticality assessment for cask design

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Watmough, M.H.; Cooper, A.J.; Croxford, R.W.

1993-01-01

This paper presents recent highlights from the shielding and criticality methods development programme that are of relevance to cask design. Specifically, the following points emerge: 1) the preparation of a licence application based upon UK methods and data used in a standardized fissile depletion and plutonium production model has been completed; 2) the assumptions used in the modelling of granules of broken fuel within the transport package following a postulated impact accident have been revised thereby allowing less pessimistic assessments to be performed; 3) enhancements are being made to the software used for shielding and criticality analysis enabling a more cost effective design service to be provided. These ongoing developments clearly show the activity to extend the scope of assessments while increasing the physical realism of the models. Through these developments BNFL continues to offer a comprehensive and cost effective shielding and criticality analysis service as part of its worldwide fuel transport business. (J.P.N.)

Adaptation of the ITER facility design to a Canadian site

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Smith, S.

2001-01-01

This paper presents the status of Canadian efforts to adapt the newly revised ITER facility design to suit the specific characteristics of the proposed Canadian site located in Clarington, west of Toronto, Ontario. ITER Canada formed a site-specific design team in 1999, comprising participants from three Canadian consulting companies to undertake this work. The technical aspects of this design activity includes: construction planning, geotechnical investigations, plant layout, heat sink design, electrical system interface, site-specific modifications and tie-ins, seismic design, and radwaste management. These areas are each addressed in this paper. (author)

Computer–Aided Design of the Critical Speed of Shafts | Akpobi ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

A computer aided design software for the analysis of the critical speed of shaft, is developed and presented in this work. The software was designed using the principles of object oriented programming, and implemented with the Microsoft Visual Basic Language. The package was tested on a number of benchmark design ...

Adaptation of G-TAG Software for Validating Touch-and-Go Comet Surface Sampling Design Methodology

Science.gov (United States)

Mandic, Milan; Acikmese, Behcet; Blackmore, Lars

2011-01-01

The G-TAG software tool was developed under the R&TD on Integrated Autonomous Guidance, Navigation, and Control for Comet Sample Return, and represents a novel, multi-body dynamics simulation software tool for studying TAG sampling. The G-TAG multi-body simulation tool provides a simulation environment in which a Touch-and-Go (TAG) sampling event can be extensively tested. TAG sampling requires the spacecraft to descend to the surface, contact the surface with a sampling collection device, and then to ascend to a safe altitude. The TAG event lasts only a few seconds but is mission-critical with potentially high risk. Consequently, there is a need for the TAG event to be well characterized and studied by simulation and analysis in order for the proposal teams to converge on a reliable spacecraft design. This adaptation of the G-TAG tool was developed to support the Comet Odyssey proposal effort, and is specifically focused to address comet sample return missions. In this application, the spacecraft descends to and samples from the surface of a comet. Performance of the spacecraft during TAG is assessed based on survivability and sample collection performance. For the adaptation of the G-TAG simulation tool to comet scenarios, models are developed that accurately describe the properties of the spacecraft, approach trajectories, and descent velocities, as well as the models of the external forces and torques acting on the spacecraft. The adapted models of the spacecraft, descent profiles, and external sampling forces/torques were more sophisticated and customized for comets than those available in the basic G-TAG simulation tool. Scenarios implemented include the study of variations in requirements, spacecraft design (size, locations, etc. of the spacecraft components), and the environment (surface properties, slope, disturbances, etc.). The simulations, along with their visual representations using G-View, contributed to the Comet Odyssey New Frontiers proposal

Critical Gates Identification for Fault-Tolerant Design in Math Circuits

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tian Ban

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Hardware redundancy at different levels of design is a common fault mitigation technique, which is well known for its efficiency to the detriment of area overhead. In order to reduce this drawback, several fault-tolerant techniques have been proposed in literature to find a good trade-off. In this paper, critical constituent gates in math circuits are detected and graded based on the impact of an error in the output of a circuit. These critical gates should be hardened first under the area constraint of design criteria. Indeed, output bits considered crucial to a system receive higher priorities to be protected, reducing the occurrence of critical errors. The 74283 fast adder is used as an example to illustrate the feasibility and efficiency of the proposed approach.

Object-oriented philosophy in designing adaptive finite-element package for 3D elliptic deferential equations

Science.gov (United States)

Zhengyong, R.; Jingtian, T.; Changsheng, L.; Xiao, X.

2007-12-01

Although adaptive finite-element (AFE) analysis is becoming more and more focused in scientific and engineering fields, its efficient implementations are remain to be a discussed problem as its more complex procedures. In this paper, we propose a clear C++ framework implementation to show the powerful properties of Object-oriented philosophy (OOP) in designing such complex adaptive procedure. In terms of the modal functions of OOP language, the whole adaptive system is divided into several separate parts such as the mesh generation or refinement, a-posterior error estimator, adaptive strategy and the final post processing. After proper designs are locally performed on these separate modals, a connected framework of adaptive procedure is formed finally. Based on the general elliptic deferential equation, little efforts should be added in the adaptive framework to do practical simulations. To show the preferable properties of OOP adaptive designing, two numerical examples are tested. The first one is the 3D direct current resistivity problem in which the powerful framework is efficiently shown as only little divisions are added. And then, in the second induced polarization£¨IP£©exploration case, new adaptive procedure is easily added which adequately shows the strong extendibility and re-usage of OOP language. Finally we believe based on the modal framework adaptive implementation by OOP methodology, more advanced adaptive analysis system will be available in future.

The future of the IMS Learning Design specification: a critical look

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Sloep, Peter

2009-01-01

P. B. Sloep (2009). The future of the IMS Learning Design specification: a critical look. Presentation at the IMS Learning Design seminar 'The future of IMS Learning Design'. December, 10, 2009, Wollongong, Australia: University of Wollongong.

Teaching as Designing: Preparing Pre-Service Teachers for Adaptive Teaching

Science.gov (United States)

Jordan, Michelle E.

2016-01-01

This conceptual article explores teaching as design work, arguing that a critical thing teachers do is design systems that enable their students to learn. Designing occurs when teachers generate new learning activities or modify curricular programs to create coherence for themselves and their students. Nonetheless, few teacher education programs…

Online training course on critical appraisal for nurses: adaptation and assessment.

Science.gov (United States)

Reviriego, Eva; Cidoncha, María Angeles; Asua, José; Gagnon, Marie Pierre; Mateos, Maider; Gárate, Lucía; de Lorenzo, Elena; González, Rosa María

2014-07-05

Research is an essential activity for improving quality and efficiency in healthcare. The objective of this study was to train nurses from the public Basque Health Service (Osakidetza) in critical appraisal, promoting continuous training and the use of research in clinical practice. This was a prospective pre-post test study. The InfoCritique course on critical appraisal was translated and adapted. A sample of 50 nurses and 3 tutors was recruited. Educational strategies and assessment instruments were established for the course. A course website was created that contained contact details of the teaching team and coordinator, as well as a course handbook and videos introducing the course. Assessment comprised the administration of questionnaires before and after the course, in order to explore the main intervention outcomes: knowledge acquired and self-learning readiness. Satisfaction was also measured at the end of the course. Of the 50 health professionals recruited, 3 did not complete the course for personal or work-related reasons. The mean score on the pre-course knowledge questionnaire was 70.5 out of 100, with a standard deviation of 11.96. In general, participants' performance on the knowledge questionnaire improved after the course, as reflected in the notable increase of the mean score, to 86.6, with a standard deviation of 10.00. Further, analyses confirmed statistically significant differences between pre- and post-course results (p tools for research, promote a research culture, and encourage critical thinking for evidence-based decision making.

An adaptive two-stage dose-response design method for establishing proof of concept.

Science.gov (United States)

Franchetti, Yoko; Anderson, Stewart J; Sampson, Allan R

2013-01-01

We propose an adaptive two-stage dose-response design where a prespecified adaptation rule is used to add and/or drop treatment arms between the stages. We extend the multiple comparison procedures-modeling (MCP-Mod) approach into a two-stage design. In each stage, we use the same set of candidate dose-response models and test for a dose-response relationship or proof of concept (PoC) via model-associated statistics. The stage-wise test results are then combined to establish "global" PoC using a conditional error function. Our simulation studies showed good and more robust power in our design method compared to conventional and fixed designs.

Optimizing trial design in pharmacogenetics research: comparing a fixed parallel group, group sequential, and adaptive selection design on sample size requirements.

Science.gov (United States)

Boessen, Ruud; van der Baan, Frederieke; Groenwold, Rolf; Egberts, Antoine; Klungel, Olaf; Grobbee, Diederick; Knol, Mirjam; Roes, Kit

2013-01-01

Two-stage clinical trial designs may be efficient in pharmacogenetics research when there is some but inconclusive evidence of effect modification by a genomic marker. Two-stage designs allow to stop early for efficacy or futility and can offer the additional opportunity to enrich the study population to a specific patient subgroup after an interim analysis. This study compared sample size requirements for fixed parallel group, group sequential, and adaptive selection designs with equal overall power and control of the family-wise type I error rate. The designs were evaluated across scenarios that defined the effect sizes in the marker positive and marker negative subgroups and the prevalence of marker positive patients in the overall study population. Effect sizes were chosen to reflect realistic planning scenarios, where at least some effect is present in the marker negative subgroup. In addition, scenarios were considered in which the assumed 'true' subgroup effects (i.e., the postulated effects) differed from those hypothesized at the planning stage. As expected, both two-stage designs generally required fewer patients than a fixed parallel group design, and the advantage increased as the difference between subgroups increased. The adaptive selection design added little further reduction in sample size, as compared with the group sequential design, when the postulated effect sizes were equal to those hypothesized at the planning stage. However, when the postulated effects deviated strongly in favor of enrichment, the comparative advantage of the adaptive selection design increased, which precisely reflects the adaptive nature of the design. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Protective design of critical infrastructure with high performance concretes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Riedel, W.; Nöldgen, M.; Stolz, A.; Roller, C.

2012-01-01

Conclusions: High performance concrete constructions will allow innovative design solutions for critical infrastructures. Validation of engineering methods can reside on large and model scale experiments conducted on conventional concrete structures. New consistent impact experiments show extreme protection potential for UHPC. Modern FEM with concrete models and explicit rebar can model HPC and UHPC penetration resistance. SDOF and TDOF approaches are valuable design tools on local and global level. Combination of at least 2 out of 3 design methods FEM – XDOF- EXP allow reliable prediction and efficient innovative designs

Scanning laser ophthalmoscope design with adaptive optics

OpenAIRE

Laut, SP; Jones, SM; Olivier, SS; Werner, JS

2005-01-01

A design for a high-resolution scanning instrument is presented for in vivo imaging of the human eye at the cellular scale. This system combines adaptive optics technology with a scanning laser ophthalmoscope (SLO) to image structures with high lateral (∼2 μm) resolution. In this system, the ocular wavefront aberrations that reduce the resolution of conventional SLOs are detected by a Hartmann-Shack wavefront sensor, and compensated with two deformable mirrors in a closed-loop for dynamic cor...

Supply chain design: Some critical questions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

J. D. Nel

2010-11-01

Full Text Available Effective supply chain management (SCM requires organisations to work together in order to satisfy the needs of their end customers. Since organisations have to determine which processes and relationships will best achieve this aim, the design of their supply chains is important. Supply chain design thus forms an integral part of SCM and embodies the supply chain's structure. Unfortunately, too many organisations allow the design of their supply chain to evolve into its current form instead of planning their supply chain design (SCD efforts. The literature is vague on what SCD efforts constitute. This article consists of a comprehensive literature study in which an effort was made to bring more clarity on exactly what purposeful SCD efforts consist of, and some key questions were formulated that organisations could use as a guide in their SCD practices. From these critical questions a conceptual framework has been developed that can be used to determine whether organisations' SCD practices are aligned with organisational objectives. The conceptual framework was tested at two South African organisations to determine if it indeed can be be used to analyse the SCD practices of organisations.

A Framework for Adaptive Learning Design in a Web-Conferencing Environment

Science.gov (United States)

Bower, Matt

2016-01-01

Many recent technologies provide the ability to dynamically adjust the interface depending on the emerging cognitive and collaborative needs of the learning episode. This means that educators can adaptively re-design the learning environment during the lesson, rather than purely relying on preemptive learning design thinking. Based on a…

Breckinridge Project, initial effort. Report XI, Volume V. Critical review of the design basis. [Critical review

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

None

1982-01-01

Report XI, Technical Audit, is a compendium of research material used during the Initial Effort in making engineering comparisons and decisions. Volumes 4 and 5 of Report XI present those studies which provide a Critical Review of the Design Basis. The Critical Review Report, prepared by Intercontinental Econergy Associates, Inc., summarizes findings from an extensive review of the data base for the H-Coal process design. Volume 4 presents this review and assessment, and includes supporting material; specifically, Design Data Tabulation (Appendix A), Process Flow Sheets (Appendix B), and References (Appendix C). Volume 5 is a continuation of the references of Appendix C. Studies of a proprietary nature are noted and referenced, but are not included in these volumes. They are included in the Limited Access versions of these reports and may be reviewed by properly cleared personnel in the offices of Ashland Synthetic Fuels, Inc.

Improving Energy Efficiency of an Autonomous Bicycle with Adaptive Controller Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

David Rodriguez-Rosa

2017-05-01

Full Text Available A method is proposed to achieve lateral stability of an autonomous bicycle with only the rotation of the front wheel. This can be achieved with a classic controller. However, if the energy consumption of the bicycle also has to be minimized, this solution is not valid. To solve this problem, an adaptive controller has been designed, which modifies its gains according to the bicycle’s forward velocity, adapting its response with minimum energy consumption and satisfying the design specifications. The study demonstrates the efficiency of the proposed control, achieving an energy saving of 73 . 8 % in trajectory tracking with respect to a conventional proportional-integral ( P I controller. These results show the importance of designing energy-efficient controllers, not only for autonomous vehicles but also for any automatic system where the energy consumption can be minimized.

Critical traffic loading for the design of prestressed concrete bridge

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hassan, M.I.U.

2009-01-01

A study has been carried out to determine critical traffic loadings for the design of bridge superstructures. The prestressed concrete girder bridge already constructed in Lahore is selected for the analysis as an example. Standard traffic loadings according to AASHTO (American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials) and Pakistan Highway Standards are used for this purpose. These include (1) HL-93 Truck, (2) Lane and (3) Tandem Loadings in addition to (4) Military tank loading, (5) Class-A, (6) Class-B and (7) Class-AA loading, (8) NLC (National Logistic Cell) and (9) Volvo truck loadings. Bridge superstructure including transom beam is analyzed Using ASD and LRFD (Load and Resistance Factor Design) provisions of AASHTO specifications. For the analysis, two longer and shorter spans are selected. This includes the analysis of bridge deck; interior and exterior girder; a typical transom beam and a pier. Dead and live loading determination is carried out using both computer aided and manual calculations. Evaluation of traffic loadings is done for all the bridge components to find out the critical loading. HL-93 loading comes out to be the most critical loading and where this loading is not critical in case of bridge decks; a factor of 1.15 is introduced to make it equivalent with HL-93 -Ioading. SAP-2000 (Structural Engineering Services of Pakistan) and MS-Excel is employed for analysis of bridge superstructure subjected to this loading. Internal forces are obtained for the structural elements of the bridge for all traffic loadings mentioned. It is concluded that HL-93 loading can be used for the design of prestressed concrete girder bridge. Bridge design authorities like NHA (National Highway Authority) and different cities development authorities are using different standard traffic loadings. A number of suggestions are made from the results of the research work related to traffic loadings and method of design. These recommendations may be

Valuation of design adaptability in aerospace systems

Science.gov (United States)

Fernandez Martin, Ismael

As more information is brought into early stages of the design, more pressure is put on engineers to produce a reliable, high quality, and financially sustainable product. Unfortunately, requirements established at the beginning of a new project by customers, and the environment that surrounds them, continue to change in some unpredictable ways. The risk of designing a system that may become obsolete during early stages of production is currently tackled by the use of robust design simulation, a method that allows to simultaneously explore a plethora of design alternatives and requirements with the intention of accounting for uncertain factors in the future. Whereas this design technique has proven to be quite an improvement in design methods, under certain conditions, it fails to account for the change of uncertainty over time and the intrinsic value embedded in the system when certain design features are activated. This thesis introduces the concepts of adaptability and real options to manage risk foreseen in the face of uncertainty at early design stages. The method described herein allows decision-makers to foresee the financial impact of their decisions at the design level, as well as the final exposure to risk. In this thesis, cash flow models, traditionally used to obtain the forecast of a project's value over the years, were replaced with surrogate models that are capable of showing fluctuations on value every few days. This allowed a better implementation of real options valuation, optimization, and strategy selection. Through the option analysis model, an optimization exercise allows the user to obtain the best implementation strategy in the face of uncertainty as well as the overall value of the design feature. Here implementation strategy refers to the decision to include a new design feature in the system, after the design has been finalized, but before the end of its production life. The ability to do this in a cost efficient manner after the system

Adaptive landing gear concept—feedback control validation

Science.gov (United States)

Mikulowski, Grzegorz M.; Holnicki-Szulc, Jan

2007-12-01

The objective of this paper is to present an integrated feedback control concept for adaptive landing gears (ALG) and its experimental validation. Aeroplanes are subjected to high dynamic loads as a result of the impact during each landing. Classical landing gears, which are in common use, are designed in accordance with official regulations in a way that ensures the optimal energy dissipation for the critical (maximum) sink speed. The regulations were formulated in order to ensure the functional capability of the landing gears during an emergency landing. However, the landing gears, whose characteristics are optimized for these critical conditions, do not perform well under normal impact conditions. For that situation it is reasonable to introduce a system that would adapt the characteristics of the landing gears according to the sink speed of landing. The considered system assumes adaptation of the damping force generated by the landing gear, which would perform optimally in an emergency situation and would adapt itself for regular landings as well. This research covers the formulation and design of the control algorithms for an adaptive landing gear based on MR fluid, implementation of the algorithms on an FPGA platform and experimental verification on a lab-scale landing gear device. The main challenge of the research was to develop a control methodology that could operate effectively within 50 ms, which is assumed to be the total duration of the phenomenon. The control algorithm proposed in this research was able to control the energy dissipation process on the experimental stand.

Design of 2-D Recursive Filters Using Self-adaptive Mutation Differential Evolution Algorithm

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Lianghong Wu

2011-08-01

Full Text Available This paper investigates a novel approach to the design of two-dimensional recursive digital filters using differential evolution (DE algorithm. The design task is reformulated as a constrained minimization problem and is solved by an Self-adaptive Mutation DE algorithm (SAMDE, which adopts an adaptive mutation operator that combines with the advantages of the DE/rand/1/bin strategy and the DE/best/2/bin strategy. As a result, its convergence performance is improved greatly. Numerical experiment results confirm the conclusion. The proposedSAMDE approach is effectively applied to test a numerical example and is compared with previous design methods. The computational experiments show that the SAMDE approach can obtain better results than previous design methods.

Adapting the Jukun Traditional Symbols for Textile Design and ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

The uniqueness of Africa is not because of its geographical location, but because of its diverse rich cultural heritage, symbolic operation and adages that surround the entire spectrum of human learning, reasoning, and communication. This research work on adaptation of the Jukun cultural symbols for textile design gives a ...

Fault-tolerant design of adaptive digital control systems for power plant components

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Parlos, A.G.; Menon, S.K.

1992-01-01

An adaptive controller has been designed for the water level of a Westinghouse type U-tube steam generator, and its operation has been demonstrated in the entire power range via computer simulations. The proposed design exhibits improved performance, at low operating powers, a,s compared to existing controller types. The continuous-time controller design is performed systematically via the Linear Quadratic Gaussian/Loop Transfer Recovery method, followed by gain adaptation allowing controller operation in the entire power range. Digital implementation of the controller is accomplished by a digital redesign which results in matching the digital and continuous-time system and controller states. It is only at this stage of the control system design process that issues such as microprocessor induced quantization effects are taken into account. The use of computer-aided-design software greatly expedites the design cycle, allowing the designer to maximize the controller stability robustness to uncertainties via numerous iterations. This inherent controller robustness can be exploited to tolerate incipient plant faults, such as deteriorating U-tube heat transfer properties, without significant loss of controller performance

Designing Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways using Many-Objective Robust Decision Making

Science.gov (United States)

Kwakkel, Jan; Haasnoot, Marjolijn

2017-04-01

Dealing with climate risks in water management requires confronting a wide variety of deeply uncertain factors, while navigating a many dimensional space of trade-offs amongst objectives. There is an emerging body of literature on supporting this type of decision problem, under the label of decision making under deep uncertainty. Two approaches within this literature are Many-Objective Robust Decision Making, and Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways. In recent work, these approaches have been compared. One of the main conclusions of this comparison was that they are highly complementary. Many-Objective Robust Decision Making is a model based decision support approach, while Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways is primarily a conceptual framework for the design of flexible strategies that can be adapted over time in response to how the future is actually unfolding. In this research we explore this complementarity in more detail. Specifically, we demonstrate how Many-Objective Robust Decision Making can be used to design adaptation pathways. We demonstrate this combined approach using a water management problem, in the Netherlands. The water level of Lake IJselmeer, the main fresh water resource of the Netherlands, is currently managed through discharge by gravity. Due to climate change, this won't be possible in the future, unless water levels are changed. Changing the water level has undesirable flood risk and spatial planning consequences. The challenge is to find promising adaptation pathways that balance objectives related to fresh water supply, flood risk, and spatial issues, while accounting for uncertain climatic and land use change. We conclude that the combination of Many-Objective Robust Decision Making and Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways is particularly suited for dealing with deeply uncertain climate risks.

Layer-based buffer aware rate adaptation design for SHVC video streaming

Science.gov (United States)

Gudumasu, Srinivas; Hamza, Ahmed; Asbun, Eduardo; He, Yong; Ye, Yan

2016-09-01

This paper proposes a layer based buffer aware rate adaptation design which is able to avoid abrupt video quality fluctuation, reduce re-buffering latency and improve bandwidth utilization when compared to a conventional simulcast based adaptive streaming system. The proposed adaptation design schedules DASH segment requests based on the estimated bandwidth, dependencies among video layers and layer buffer fullness. Scalable HEVC video coding is the latest state-of-art video coding technique that can alleviate various issues caused by simulcast based adaptive video streaming. With scalable coded video streams, the video is encoded once into a number of layers representing different qualities and/or resolutions: a base layer (BL) and one or more enhancement layers (EL), each incrementally enhancing the quality of the lower layers. Such layer based coding structure allows fine granularity rate adaptation for the video streaming applications. Two video streaming use cases are presented in this paper. The first use case is to stream HD SHVC video over a wireless network where available bandwidth varies, and the performance comparison between proposed layer-based streaming approach and conventional simulcast streaming approach is provided. The second use case is to stream 4K/UHD SHVC video over a hybrid access network that consists of a 5G millimeter wave high-speed wireless link and a conventional wired or WiFi network. The simulation results verify that the proposed layer based rate adaptation approach is able to utilize the bandwidth more efficiently. As a result, a more consistent viewing experience with higher quality video content and minimal video quality fluctuations can be presented to the user.

Adaptive Automation Design and Implementation

Science.gov (United States)

2015-09-17

with an automated system to a real-world adaptive au- tomation system implementation. There have been plenty of adaptive automation 17 Adaptive...of systems without increasing manpower requirements by allocating routine tasks to automated aids, improving safety through the use of au- tomated ...between intermediate levels of au- tomation , explicitly defining which human task a given level automates. Each model aids the creation and classification

Design of adaptive filter amplifier in UV communication based on DSP

Science.gov (United States)

Lv, Zhaoshun; Wu, Hanping; Li, Junyu

2016-10-01

According to the problem of the weak signal at receiving end in UV communication, we design a high gain, continuously adjustable adaptive filter amplifier. Based on proposing overall technical indicators and analyzing its working principle of the signal amplifier, we use chip LMH6629MF and two chips of AD797BN to achieve three-level cascade amplification. And apply hardware of DSP TMS320VC5509A to implement digital filtering. Design and verification by Multisim, Protel 99SE and CCS, the results show that: the amplifier can realize continuously adjustable amplification from 1000 to 10000 times without distortion. Magnification error is <=%4@1000 10000. And equivalent input noise voltage of amplification circuit is <=6 nV/ √Hz @30KHz 45KHz, and realizing function of adaptive filtering. The design provides theoretical reference and technical support for the UV weak signal processing.

Adapting participatory design to design information system with rural Ethiopian community

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Zewge, Amanuel; Dittrich, Yvonne; Bekele, Rahel

2015-01-01

Most of the Information and Communication Technology for Development initiatives introduced to communities in developing countries fails to deliver its promises due to the lack of intended beneficiary involvement. Participatory Design assumes to be effective as long as its nature of participations...... and methods are contextualized to a given settings. To this end, we discuss the implication of considering local (rural community) culture of participation practices, and propose a procedure to be followed in the early phases of information system development process. Finally we argue that, such adaption...... could advance the Participatory Action Research methodology....

Stakeholder Collaboration in Air Force Acquisition: Adaptive Design Using System Representations

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Dare, Robert

2003-01-01

This research, conducted under the auspices of the Lean Aerospace Initiative, sought to determine how Air Force development programs could achieve high levels of adaptability during the design phase...

A Critical Review of Instructional Design Process of Distance Learning System

Science.gov (United States)

Chaudry, Muhammad Ajmal; ur-Rahman, Fazal

2010-01-01

Instructional design refers to planning, development, delivery and evaluation of instructional system. It is an applied field of study aiming at the application of descriptive research outcomes in regular instructional settings. The present study was designed to critically review the process of instructional design at Allama Iqbal Open University…

[Introduction to critical reading of articles: study design and biases].

Science.gov (United States)

García Villar, C

2015-01-01

The critical evaluation of an article enables professionals to make good use of the new information and therefore has direct repercussions for the benefit of our patients. Before undertaking a detailed critical reading of the chosen article, we need to consider whether the study used the most appropriate design for the question it aimed to answer (i.e., whether the level of evidence is adequate). To do this, we need to know how to classify studies in function of their design (descriptive or analytical; prospective or retrospective; cross-sectional or longitudinal) as well as their correlation with the levels of evidence. In critical reading it is also important to know the main systematic errors or biases that can affect a study. Biases can appear in any phase of a study; they can affect the sample, the development of the study, or the measurement of the results. Copyright © 2014 SERAM. Published by Elsevier España, S.L.U. All rights reserved.

Design of Robust Adaptive Array Processors for Non-Stationary Ocean Environments

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

Wage, Kathleen E

2009-01-01

The overall goal of this project is to design adaptive array processing algorithms that have good transient performance, are robust to mismatch, work with low sample support, and incorporate waveguide...

Space Station Freedom - Approaching the critical design phase

Science.gov (United States)

Kohrs, Richard H.; Huckins, Earle, III

1992-01-01

The status and future developments of the Space Station Freedom are discussed. To date detailed design drawings are being produced to manufacture SSF hardware. A critical design review (CDR) for the man-tended capability configuration is planned to be performed in 1993 under the SSF program. The main objective of the CDR is to enable the program to make a full commitment to proceed to manufacture parts and assemblies. NASA recently signed a contract with the Russian space company, NPO Energia, to evaluate potential applications of various Russian space hardware for on-going NASA programs.

Adaptive designs based on the truncated product method

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Neuhäuser Markus

2005-09-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Adaptive designs are becoming increasingly important in clinical research. One approach subdivides the study into several (two or more stages and combines the p-values of the different stages using Fisher's combination test. Methods Alternatively to Fisher's test, the recently proposed truncated product method (TPM can be applied to combine the p-values. The TPM uses the product of only those p-values that do not exceed some fixed cut-off value. Here, these two competing analyses are compared. Results When an early termination due to insufficient effects is not appropriate, such as in dose-response analyses, the probability to stop the trial early with the rejection of the null hypothesis is increased when the TPM is applied. Therefore, the expected total sample size is decreased. This decrease in the sample size is not connected with a loss in power. The TPM turns out to be less advantageous, when an early termination of the study due to insufficient effects is possible. This is due to a decrease of the probability to stop the trial early. Conclusion It is recommended to apply the TPM rather than Fisher's combination test whenever an early termination due to insufficient effects is not suitable within the adaptive design.

Using engineering control principles to inform the design of adaptive interventions: a conceptual introduction.

Science.gov (United States)

Rivera, Daniel E; Pew, Michael D; Collins, Linda M

2007-05-01

The goal of this paper is to describe the role that control engineering principles can play in developing and improving the efficacy of adaptive, time-varying interventions. It is demonstrated that adaptive interventions constitute a form of feedback control system in the context of behavioral health. Consequently, drawing from ideas in control engineering has the potential to significantly inform the analysis, design, and implementation of adaptive interventions, leading to improved adherence, better management of limited resources, a reduction of negative effects, and overall more effective interventions. This article illustrates how to express an adaptive intervention in control engineering terms, and how to use this framework in a computer simulation to investigate the anticipated impact of intervention design choices on efficacy. The potential benefits of operationalizing decision rules based on control engineering principles are particularly significant for adaptive interventions that involve multiple components or address co-morbidities, situations that pose significant challenges to conventional clinical practice.

Spacecraft System Integration and Test: SSTI Lewis critical design audit

Science.gov (United States)

Brooks, R. P.; Cha, K. K.

1995-01-01

The Critical Design Audit package is the final detailed design package which provides a comprehensive description of the SSTI mission. This package includes the program overview, the system requirements, the science and applications activities, the ground segment development, the assembly, integration and test description, the payload and technology demonstrations, and the spacecraft bus subsystems. Publication and presentation of this document marks the final requirements and design freeze for SSTI.

A reference model for model-based design of critical infrastructure protection systems

Science.gov (United States)

Shin, Young Don; Park, Cheol Young; Lee, Jae-Chon

2015-05-01

Today's war field environment is getting versatile as the activities of unconventional wars such as terrorist attacks and cyber-attacks have noticeably increased lately. The damage caused by such unconventional wars has also turned out to be serious particularly if targets are critical infrastructures that are constructed in support of banking and finance, transportation, power, information and communication, government, and so on. The critical infrastructures are usually interconnected to each other and thus are very vulnerable to attack. As such, to ensure the security of critical infrastructures is very important and thus the concept of critical infrastructure protection (CIP) has come. The program to realize the CIP at national level becomes the form of statute in each country. On the other hand, it is also needed to protect each individual critical infrastructure. The objective of this paper is to study on an effort to do so, which can be called the CIP system (CIPS). There could be a variety of ways to design CIPS's. Instead of considering the design of each individual CIPS, a reference model-based approach is taken in this paper. The reference model represents the design of all the CIPS's that have many design elements in common. In addition, the development of the reference model is also carried out using a variety of model diagrams. The modeling language used therein is the systems modeling language (SysML), which was developed and is managed by Object Management Group (OMG) and a de facto standard. Using SysML, the structure and operational concept of the reference model are designed to fulfil the goal of CIPS's, resulting in the block definition and activity diagrams. As a case study, the operational scenario of the nuclear power plant while being attacked by terrorists is studied using the reference model. The effectiveness of the results is also analyzed using multiple analysis models. It is thus expected that the approach taken here has some merits

Designing a Profit-Maximizing Critical Peak Pricing Scheme Considering the Payback Phenomenon

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sung Chan Park

2015-10-01

Full Text Available Critical peak pricing (CPP is a demand response program that can be used to maximize profits for a load serving entity in a deregulated market environment. Like other such programs, however, CPP is not free from the payback phenomenon: a rise in consumption after a critical event. This payback has a negative effect on profits and thus must be appropriately considered when designing a CPP scheme. However, few studies have examined CPP scheme design considering payback. This study thus characterizes payback using three parameters (duration, amount, and pattern and examines payback effects on the optimal schedule of critical events and on the optimal peak rate for two specific payback patterns. This analysis is verified through numerical simulations. The results demonstrate the need to properly consider payback parameters when designing a profit-maximizing CPP scheme.

Adaptive OFDM Waveform Design for Spatio-Temporal-Sparsity Exploited STAP Radar

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Sen, Satyabrata [ORNL

2017-11-01

In this chapter, we describe a sparsity-based space-time adaptive processing (STAP) algorithm to detect a slowly moving target using an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) radar. The motivation of employing an OFDM signal is that it improves the target-detectability from the interfering signals by increasing the frequency diversity of the system. However, due to the addition of one extra dimension in terms of frequency, the adaptive degrees-of-freedom in an OFDM-STAP also increases. Therefore, to avoid the construction a fully adaptive OFDM-STAP, we develop a sparsity-based STAP algorithm. We observe that the interference spectrum is inherently sparse in the spatio-temporal domain, as the clutter responses occupy only a diagonal ridge on the spatio-temporal plane and the jammer signals interfere only from a few spatial directions. Hence, we exploit that sparsity to develop an efficient STAP technique that utilizes considerably lesser number of secondary data compared to the other existing STAP techniques, and produces nearly optimum STAP performance. In addition to designing the STAP filter, we optimally design the transmit OFDM signals by maximizing the output signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) in order to improve the STAP performance. The computation of output SINR depends on the estimated value of the interference covariance matrix, which we obtain by applying the sparse recovery algorithm. Therefore, we analytically assess the effects of the synthesized OFDM coefficients on the sparse recovery of the interference covariance matrix by computing the coherence measure of the sparse measurement matrix. Our numerical examples demonstrate the achieved STAP-performance due to sparsity-based technique and adaptive waveform design.

Just-in-time adaptive classifiers-part II: designing the classifier.

Science.gov (United States)

Alippi, Cesare; Roveri, Manuel

2008-12-01

Aging effects, environmental changes, thermal drifts, and soft and hard faults affect physical systems by changing their nature and behavior over time. To cope with a process evolution adaptive solutions must be envisaged to track its dynamics; in this direction, adaptive classifiers are generally designed by assuming the stationary hypothesis for the process generating the data with very few results addressing nonstationary environments. This paper proposes a methodology based on k-nearest neighbor (NN) classifiers for designing adaptive classification systems able to react to changing conditions just-in-time (JIT), i.e., exactly when it is needed. k-NN classifiers have been selected for their computational-free training phase, the possibility to easily estimate the model complexity k and keep under control the computational complexity of the classifier through suitable data reduction mechanisms. A JIT classifier requires a temporal detection of a (possible) process deviation (aspect tackled in a companion paper) followed by an adaptive management of the knowledge base (KB) of the classifier to cope with the process change. The novelty of the proposed approach resides in the general framework supporting the real-time update of the KB of the classification system in response to novel information coming from the process both in stationary conditions (accuracy improvement) and in nonstationary ones (process tracking) and in providing a suitable estimate of k. It is shown that the classification system grants consistency once the change targets the process generating the data in a new stationary state, as it is the case in many real applications.

Adaptive robust PID controller design based on a sliding mode for uncertain chaotic systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chang Weider; Yan Junjuh

2005-01-01

A robust adaptive PID controller design motivated from the sliding mode control is proposed for a class of uncertain chaotic systems in this paper. Three PID control gains, K p , K i , and K d , are adjustable parameters and will be updated online with an adequate adaptation mechanism to minimize a previously designed sliding condition. By introducing a supervisory controller, the stability of the closed-loop PID control system under with the plant uncertainty and external disturbance can be guaranteed. Finally, a well-known Duffing-Holmes chaotic system is used as an illustrative to show the effectiveness of the proposed robust adaptive PID controller

Heat adaptation of bioabsorbable craniofacial plates: a critical review of science and technology.

Science.gov (United States)

Pietrzak, William S

2009-11-01

Bioabsorbable fixation plates often require adaptation to the bone. This is typically accomplished by heating the plates to above the glass transition temperature and placing the softened plates against the bone or a prebent template until cool. Upon cooling, the plates regain stiffness and can be attached to bone to obtain anatomic fixation. This procedure is both efficient and effective and has been used throughout the craniofacial skeleton. There are many types of equipment available to heat the plates, each with advantages and disadvantages. Although a conceptually simple process, there are several nuances that have been reported in the literature, including transient effects on plate mechanical properties, memory effects, differences between wet and dry heating, and others. Upon the backdrop of the overwhelming clinical success of heat adaptation, this review critically evaluates the method and provides a comprehensive examination and explanation of the basic science and technology involved. This should help give surgeons a better understanding of the process that can help improve their use and further advance the technology.

Design optimization and analysis of selected thermal devices using self-adaptive Jaya algorithm

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rao, R.V.; More, K.C.

2017-01-01

Highlights: • Self-adaptive Jaya algorithm is proposed for optimal design of thermal devices. • Optimization of heat pipe, cooling tower, heat sink and thermo-acoustic prime mover is presented. • Results of the proposed algorithm are better than the other optimization techniques. • The proposed algorithm may be conveniently used for the optimization of other devices. - Abstract: The present study explores the use of an improved Jaya algorithm called self-adaptive Jaya algorithm for optimal design of selected thermal devices viz; heat pipe, cooling tower, honeycomb heat sink and thermo-acoustic prime mover. Four different optimization case studies of the selected thermal devices are presented. The researchers had attempted the same design problems in the past using niched pareto genetic algorithm (NPGA), response surface method (RSM), leap-frog optimization program with constraints (LFOPC) algorithm, teaching-learning based optimization (TLBO) algorithm, grenade explosion method (GEM) and multi-objective genetic algorithm (MOGA). The results achieved by using self-adaptive Jaya algorithm are compared with those achieved by using the NPGA, RSM, LFOPC, TLBO, GEM and MOGA algorithms. The self-adaptive Jaya algorithm is proved superior as compared to the other optimization methods in terms of the results, computational effort and function evalutions.

RARtool: A MATLAB Software Package for Designing Response-Adaptive Randomized Clinical Trials with Time-to-Event Outcomes.

Science.gov (United States)

Ryeznik, Yevgen; Sverdlov, Oleksandr; Wong, Weng Kee

2015-08-01

Response-adaptive randomization designs are becoming increasingly popular in clinical trial practice. In this paper, we present RARtool , a user interface software developed in MATLAB for designing response-adaptive randomized comparative clinical trials with censored time-to-event outcomes. The RARtool software can compute different types of optimal treatment allocation designs, and it can simulate response-adaptive randomization procedures targeting selected optimal allocations. Through simulations, an investigator can assess design characteristics under a variety of experimental scenarios and select the best procedure for practical implementation. We illustrate the utility of our RARtool software by redesigning a survival trial from the literature.

Adaptive designs for the one-sample log-rank test.

Science.gov (United States)

Schmidt, Rene; Faldum, Andreas; Kwiecien, Robert

2017-09-22

Traditional designs in phase IIa cancer trials are single-arm designs with a binary outcome, for example, tumor response. In some settings, however, a time-to-event endpoint might appear more appropriate, particularly in the presence of loss to follow-up. Then the one-sample log-rank test might be the method of choice. It allows to compare the survival curve of the patients under treatment to a prespecified reference survival curve. The reference curve usually represents the expected survival under standard of the care. In this work, convergence of the one-sample log-rank statistic to Brownian motion is proven using Rebolledo's martingale central limit theorem while accounting for staggered entry times of the patients. On this basis, a confirmatory adaptive one-sample log-rank test is proposed where provision is made for data dependent sample size reassessment. The focus is to apply the inverse normal method. This is done in two different directions. The first strategy exploits the independent increments property of the one-sample log-rank statistic. The second strategy is based on the patient-wise separation principle. It is shown by simulation that the proposed adaptive test might help to rescue an underpowered trial and at the same time lowers the average sample number (ASN) under the null hypothesis as compared to a single-stage fixed sample design. © 2017, The International Biometric Society.

Parametric optimization and design validation based on finite element analysis of hybrid socket adapter for transfemoral prosthetic knee.

Science.gov (United States)

Kumar, Neelesh

2014-10-01

Finite element analysis has been universally employed for the stress and strain analysis in lower extremity prosthetics. The socket adapter was the principal subject of interest due to its importance in deciding the knee motion range. This article focused on the static and dynamic stress analysis of the designed hybrid adapter developed by the authors. A standard mechanical design validation approach using von Mises was followed. Four materials were considered for the analysis, namely, carbon fiber, oil-filled nylon, Al-6061, and mild steel. The paper analyses the static and dynamic stress on designed hybrid adapter which incorporates features of conventional male and female socket adapters. The finite element analysis was carried out for possible different angles of knee flexion simulating static and dynamic gait situation. Research was carried out on available design of socket adapter. Mechanical design of hybrid adapter was conceptualized and a CAD model was generated using Inventor modelling software. Static and dynamic stress analysis was carried out on different materials for optimization. The finite element analysis was carried out on the software Autodesk Inventor Professional Ver. 2011. The peak value of von Mises stress occurred in the neck region of the adapter and in the lower face region at rod eye-adapter junction in static and dynamic analyses, respectively. Oil-filled nylon was found to be the best material among the four with respect to strength, weight, and cost. Research investigations on newer materials for development of improved prosthesis will immensely benefit the amputees. The study analyze the static and dynamic stress on the knee joint adapter to provide better material used for hybrid design of adapter. © The International Society for Prosthetics and Orthotics 2013.

Analysis and Design of a Context Adaptable SAD/MSE Architecture

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Arvind Sudarsanam

2009-01-01

Full Text Available Design of flexible multimedia accelerators that can cater to multiple algorithms is being aggressively pursued in the media processors community. Such an approach is justified in the era of sub-45 nm technology where an increasingly dominating leakage power component is forcing designers to make the best possible use of on-chip resources. In this paper we present an analysis of two commonly used window-based operations (sum of absolute differences and mean squared error across a variety of search patterns and block sizes (2×3, 5×5, etc.. We propose a context adaptable architecture that has (i configurable 2D systolic array and (ii 2D Configurable Register Array (CRA. CRA can cater to variable pixel access patterns while reusing fetched pixels across search windows. Benefits of proposed architecture when compared to 15 other published architectures are adaptability, high throughput, and low latency at a cost of increased footprint, when ported on a Xilinx FPGA.

Critical Design Factors for Sector Transport Maintenance in DEMO

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Utoh, H.; Someya, Y.; Tobita, K.; Asakura, N.; Hoshino, K.; Nakamura, M., E-mail: uto.hiroyasu@jaea.go.jp [Japan Atomic Energy Agency, Rokkasho (Japan)

2012-09-15

Full text: Maintenance is a critical issue for fusion DEMO reactor because the design conditions and requirements of DEMO maintenance scheme are different from that of ITER remote handling. The sector transport maintenance scheme has advantages to maintain blankets and divertors without the use of sophisticated remote handling devices including sensitive devices to radiation in the reactor. SlimCS designed in JAEA adopts the sector transport maintenance scheme in which every sector is pulled out horizontally through a port between TF coils. A critical design issue for the horizontal sector transport maintenance scheme is how to support an enormous turnover force of the toroidal field (TF) coils. We propose following two options; first option is the horizontal transport maintenance scheme in which every sector is pulled out through four horizontal ports connected with the corridor. Second option is the vertical sector transport maintenance scheme with small vertical maintenance ports (total: 6 ports). The new horizontal sector transport limited in the number of maintenance ports is a more realistic maintenance scheme, and the key engineering issue is the transferring mechanism of sector in the vacuum vessel. In the maintenance scenario, the key design factors are the cool down time in reactor and the cooling method in maintenance scheme for keeping components under operation temperature. By one-dimensional heat conduction analysis, the sector should be transported to hot cell within 40 hours in the case the cool down time is one month. In the horizontal sector transport maintenance, the maintenance time including removal of cooling piping, drain of cooling water and sector transport to hot cell is about 32 hours. Furthermore, the tritium release in the sector transport can be suppressed because the components temperature drops by forced-air cooling system. This paper mainly focuses on a sector transport maintenance scheme from the aspects of high plant availability

Network inference via adaptive optimal design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Stigter Johannes D

2012-09-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Current research in network reverse engineering for genetic or metabolic networks very often does not include a proper experimental and/or input design. In this paper we address this issue in more detail and suggest a method that includes an iterative design of experiments based, on the most recent data that become available. The presented approach allows a reliable reconstruction of the network and addresses an important issue, i.e., the analysis and the propagation of uncertainties as they exist in both the data and in our own knowledge. These two types of uncertainties have their immediate ramifications for the uncertainties in the parameter estimates and, hence, are taken into account from the very beginning of our experimental design. Findings The method is demonstrated for two small networks that include a genetic network for mRNA synthesis and degradation and an oscillatory network describing a molecular network underlying adenosine 3’-5’ cyclic monophosphate (cAMP as observed in populations of Dyctyostelium cells. In both cases a substantial reduction in parameter uncertainty was observed. Extension to larger scale networks is possible but needs a more rigorous parameter estimation algorithm that includes sparsity as a constraint in the optimization procedure. Conclusion We conclude that a careful experiment design very often (but not always pays off in terms of reliability in the inferred network topology. For large scale networks a better parameter estimation algorithm is required that includes sparsity as an additional constraint. These algorithms are available in the literature and can also be used in an adaptive optimal design setting as demonstrated in this paper.

A Conceptual Architecture for Adaptive Human-Computer Interface of a PT Operation Platform Based on Context-Awareness

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Qing Xue

2014-01-01

Full Text Available We present a conceptual architecture for adaptive human-computer interface of a PT operation platform based on context-awareness. This architecture will form the basis of design for such an interface. This paper describes components, key technologies, and working principles of the architecture. The critical contents covered context information modeling, processing, relationship establishing between contexts and interface design knowledge by use of adaptive knowledge reasoning, and visualization implementing of adaptive interface with the aid of interface tools technology.

Lessons Learned in Designing and Implementing a Computer-Adaptive Test for English

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jack Burston

2014-09-01

Full Text Available This paper describes the lessons learned in designing and implementing a computer-adaptive test (CAT for English. The early identification of students with weak L2 English proficiency is of critical importance in university settings that have compulsory English language course graduation requirements. The most efficient means of diagnosing the L2 English ability of incoming students is by means of a computer-based test since such evaluation can be administered quickly, automatically corrected, and the outcome known as soon as the test is completed. While the option of using a commercial CAT is available to institutions with the ability to pay substantial annual fees, or the means of passing these expenses on to their students, language instructors without these resources can only avail themselves of the advantages of CAT evaluation by creating their own tests.  As is demonstrated by the E-CAT project described in this paper, this is a viable alternative even for those lacking any computer programing expertise.  However, language teaching experience and testing expertise are critical to such an undertaking, which requires considerable effort and, above all, collaborative teamwork to succeed. A number of practical skills are also required. Firstly, the operation of a CAT authoring programme must be learned. Once this is done, test makers must master the art of creating a question database and assigning difficulty levels to test items. Lastly, if multimedia resources are to be exploited in a CAT, test creators need to be able to locate suitable copyright-free resources and re-edit them as needed.

Design and Preliminary Testing of the International Docking Adapter's Peripheral Docking Target

Science.gov (United States)

Foster, Christopher W.; Blaschak, Johnathan; Eldridge, Erin A.; Brazzel, Jack P.; Spehar, Peter T.

2015-01-01

The International Docking Adapter's Peripheral Docking Target (PDT) was designed to allow a docking spacecraft to judge its alignment relative to the docking system. The PDT was designed to be compatible with relative sensors using visible cameras, thermal imagers, or Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) technologies. The conceptual design team tested prototype designs and materials to determine the contrast requirements for the features. This paper will discuss the design of the PDT, the methodology and results of the tests, and the conclusions pertaining to PDT design that were drawn from testing.

Designing for Change: Interoperability in a scaling and adapting environment

Science.gov (United States)

Yarmey, L.

2015-12-01

The Earth Science cyberinfrastructure landscape is constantly changing. Technologies advance and technical implementations are refined or replaced. Data types, volumes, packaging, and use cases evolve. Scientific requirements emerge and mature. Standards shift while systems scale and adapt. In this complex and dynamic environment, interoperability remains a critical component of successful cyberinfrastructure. Through the resource- and priority-driven iterations on systems, interfaces, and content, questions fundamental to stable and useful Earth Science cyberinfrastructure arise. For instance, how are sociotechnical changes planned, tracked, and communicated? How should operational stability balance against 'new and shiny'? How can ongoing maintenance and mitigation of technical debt be managed in an often short-term resource environment? The Arctic Data Explorer is a metadata brokering application developed to enable discovery of international, interdisciplinary Arctic data across distributed repositories. Completely dependent on interoperable third party systems, the Arctic Data Explorer publicly launched in 2013 with an original 3000+ data records from four Arctic repositories. Since then the search has scaled to 25,000+ data records from thirteen repositories at the time of writing. In the final months of original project funding, priorities shift to lean operations with a strategic eye on the future. Here we present lessons learned from four years of Arctic Data Explorer design, development, communication, and maintenance work along with remaining questions and potential directions.

Hypercell : A bio-inspired information design framework for real-time adaptive spatial components

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Biloria, N.M.; Chang, J.R.

2012-01-01

Contemporary explorations within the evolutionary computational domain have been heavily instrumental in exploring biological processes of adaptation, growth and mutation. On the other hand a plethora of designers owing to the increasing sophistication in computer aided design software are equally

Critical plasma-materials issues for fusion reactor designs

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wilson, K.L.; Bauer, W.

1983-01-01

Plasma-materials interactions are a dominant driving force in the design of fusion power reactors. This paper presents a summary of plasma-materials interactions research. Emphasis is placed on critical aspects related to reactor design. Particular issues to be addressed are plasma edge characterization, hydrogen recycle, impurity introduction, and coating development. Typical wall fluxes in operating magnetically confined devices are summarized. Recent calculations of tritium inventory and first wall permeation, based on laboratory measurements of hydrogen recycling, are given for various reactor operating scenarios. Impurity introduction/wall erosion mechanisms considered include sputtering, chemical erosion, and evaporation (melting). Finally, the advanced material development for in-vessel components is discussed. (author)

Economic analysis of critical habitat designation for the desert tortoise (Mojave population)

Science.gov (United States)

Schamberger, Mel; MacGillvray, Timothy J.; Draper, Dirk D.

1993-01-01

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service emergency 1isted the Mojave population of the desert tortoise as endangered on August 4, 1989. The Mojave population formally was listed as threatened on April 2, 1990. The Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended, requires that the economic benefits and costs and other relevant effects of critical habitat designation be considered. The Secretary of the Interior may exclude from designation areas where the costs of designation are greater than the benefits, unless the exclusion would result in extinction of the species. Desert tortoises are threatened by an accumulation of human-and disease-related mortality accompanied by habitat destruction, degradation, and fragmentation. Many desert tortoises are illegally collected for pets, food, and commercial trade. Others are accidentally struck and killed by vehicles on roads and highways or are killed by gunshot or vehicles traveling off-highway. Raven predation on hatchling desert tortoises has increased as raven populations in the desert have risen. An upper respiratory tract disease is suspected to be a major cause of mortality in the western Mojave Desert. This presumably incurable affliction presumably is thought to be spread through the release of infected tortoises into the desert. The Service has proposed designating critical habitat in nine counties within four states. The 12 critical habitat units encompass 6.4 million acres of land, more than 80% federally owned. This region is economically and demographically diverse. Most of the land is sparsely settled and characterized as a hot desert ecosystem. Major industries in the region include entertainment and lodging (primarily in Las Vegas), property development to accommodate the rapid population growth, and services. Millions of rural acres in the region are leased by the federal government for livestock grazing and used for mining. Overall economic benefits to the affected states derived from cattle and sheep grazing in the

Using business critical design rules to frame new architecture introduction in multi-architecture portfolios

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Løkkegaard, Martin; Mortensen, Niels Henrik; Hvam, Lars

2018-01-01

component sharing, or sharing critical design principles. This alignment is not trivial, as extensive design knowledge is needed to overview a portfolio with many, often highly different products and manufacturing lines. In this paper, we suggest establishing a frame of reference for new......When introducing new architectures to an industrial portfolio, counting multiple existing product and manufacturing solutions, time-to-market and investments in manufacturing equipment can be significantly reduced if new concepts are aligned with the existing portfolio. This can be done through......-product introduction based on several ‘game rules’, or Business Critical Design Rules (BCDRs), which denote the most critical features of the product and manufacturing architectures, and should be considered an obligatory reference for design when introducing new architectures. BCDRs are derived from the portfolio...

Design and validation of dynamic hierarchies and adaptive layouts using spatial graph grammars

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Liao, K.; Kong, J.; Zhang, K.; de Vries, B.; Griffth, D.A.; Chun, Y.; Dean, D.J.

2017-01-01

With the thinking paradigm shifting on the evolution of complex adaptive systems, a pattern-based design approach is reviewed and reinterpreted. Although a variety of long-term and lasting explorations on patterns in geographical analysis, environmental planning, and design exist, in-depth

Adaptation of Agricultural and Food Systems to Climate Change: An Economic and Policy Perspective

OpenAIRE

John M. Antle; Susan M. Capalbo

2010-01-01

Adaptation of agricultural and food systems to climate change involves private and public investment decisions in the face of climate and policy uncertainties. The authors present a framework for analysis of adaptation as an investment, based on elements of the economics, finance, and ecological economics literatures. They use this framework to assess critically impact and adaptation studies, and discuss how research could be designed to support public and private investment decisions. They t...

Using Tests Designed to Measure Individual Sensorimotor Subsystem Perfomance to Predict Locomotor Adaptability

Science.gov (United States)

Peters, B. T.; Caldwell, E. E.; Batson, C. D.; Guined, J. R.; DeDios, Y. E.; Stepanyan, V.; Gadd, N. E.; Szecsy, D. L.; Mulavara, A. P.; Seidler, R. D.;

Integrated System Design: Promoting the Capacity of Sociotechnical Systems for Adaptation through Extensions of Cognitive Work Analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Naikar, Neelam; Elix, Ben

2016-01-01

This paper proposes an approach for integrated system design, which has the intent of facilitating high levels of effectiveness in sociotechnical systems by promoting their capacity for adaptation. Building on earlier ideas and empirical observations, this approach recognizes that to create adaptive systems it is necessary to integrate the design of all of the system elements, including the interfaces, teams, training, and automation, such that workers are supported in adapting their behavior as well as their structure, or organization, in a coherent manner. Current approaches for work analysis and design are limited in regard to this fundamental objective, especially in cases when workers are confronted with unforeseen events. A suitable starting point is offered by cognitive work analysis (CWA), but while this framework can support actors in adapting their behavior, it does not necessarily accommodate adaptations in their structure. Moreover, associated design approaches generally focus on individual system elements, and those that consider multiple elements appear limited in their ability to facilitate integration, especially in the manner intended here. The proposed approach puts forward the set of possibilities for work organization in a system as the central mechanism for binding the design of its various elements, so that actors can adapt their structure as well as their behavior-in a unified fashion-to handle both familiar and novel conditions. Accordingly, this paper demonstrates how the set of possibilities for work organization in a system may be demarcated independently of the situation, through extensions of CWA, and how it may be utilized in design. This lynchpin, conceptualized in the form of a diagram of work organization possibilities (WOP), is important for preserving a system's inherent capacity for adaptation. Future research should focus on validating these concepts and establishing the feasibility of implementing them in industrial contexts.

Observer-based design of set-point tracking adaptive controllers for nonlinear chaotic systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Khaki-Sedigh, A.; Yazdanpanah-Goharrizi, A.

2006-01-01

A gradient based approach for the design of set-point tracking adaptive controllers for nonlinear chaotic systems is presented. In this approach, Lyapunov exponents are used to select the controller gain. In the case of unknown or time varying chaotic plants, the Lyapunov exponents may vary during the plant operation. In this paper, an effective adaptive strategy is used for online identification of Lyapunov exponents and adaptive control of nonlinear chaotic plants. Also, a nonlinear observer for estimation of the states is proposed. Simulation results are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed methodology

Observer-based design of set-point tracking adaptive controllers for nonlinear chaotic systems

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Khaki-Sedigh, A. [Department of Electrical Engineering, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, Sayyed Khandan Bridge, Shariati Street, Tehran 16314 (Iran, Islamic Republic of)]. E-mail: sedigh@kntu.ac.ir; Yazdanpanah-Goharrizi, A. [Department of Electrical Engineering, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, Sayyed Khandan Bridge, Shariati Street, Tehran 16314 (Iran, Islamic Republic of)]. E-mail: yazdanpanah@ee.kntu.ac.ir

2006-09-15

A gradient based approach for the design of set-point tracking adaptive controllers for nonlinear chaotic systems is presented. In this approach, Lyapunov exponents are used to select the controller gain. In the case of unknown or time varying chaotic plants, the Lyapunov exponents may vary during the plant operation. In this paper, an effective adaptive strategy is used for online identification of Lyapunov exponents and adaptive control of nonlinear chaotic plants. Also, a nonlinear observer for estimation of the states is proposed. Simulation results are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed methodology.

Marginal adaptation of CAD-CAM onlays: Influence of preparation design and impression technique.

Science.gov (United States)

Lima, Fernanda Ferruzzi; Neto, Constantino Fernandes; Rubo, José H; Santos, Gildo Coelho; Moraes Coelho Santos, Maria Jacinta

2018-03-15

Factors that may affect the marginal adaptation of computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing (CAD-CAM) restorations include preparation design, impression technique, and CAD-CAM system. The influence of impression technique and preparation design on CAD-CAM partial coverage restorations has not been fully addressed. The purpose of this in vitro study was to investigate the influence of direct and indirect digital impression techniques and 2 preparation designs on the marginal adaptation of CAD-CAM onlays. Two mesio-occlusal buccal onlay preparations with reduction of the mesiobuccal cusp were made: conventional preparation (CP) with a 1.2-mm modified shoulder margin and modified preparation (MP) flat cuspal reduction without shoulder. Virtual models were generated from each preparation by using a digital scanner (BlueCam; Dentsply Sirona) from the plastic teeth (direct digital impression) or from the stone dies (indirect digital impression). Onlays were designed using a CAD-CAM system (CEREC 4.0; Dentsply Sirona), and nanoceramic resin blocks (Lava Ultimate Restorative; 3M ESPE) were milled using the CEREC MCX milling machine. Marginal discrepancy was evaluated using an optical stereomicroscope at ×25 magnification in 18 locations distributed along the margins of the preparation. The data were analyzed by using 3-way ANOVA followed by the Tukey HSD test (α=.05). CP presented a statistically significant reduced average marginal adaptation (59 ±50 μm) than did MP (69 ±58 μm) (Pmarginal discrepancy in the mesial and buccal locations of MP when compared with CP. Regarding impression techniques, the buccal location presented the smallest average marginal discrepancy in restorations fabricated with indirect impression when compared with direct impression (42 ±33 μm and 60 ±39 μm) (Pmargin presented improved marginal adaptation compared with modified preparation with flat cuspal reduction. Direct and indirect digital impression techniques produced

Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) in complex systems: cultural adaptation and safety impacts in healthcare.

Science.gov (United States)

Müller-Leonhardt, Alice; Mitchell, Shannon G; Vogt, Joachim; Schürmann, Tim

2014-07-01

In complex systems, such as hospitals or air traffic control operations, critical incidents (CIs) are unavoidable. These incidents can not only become critical for victims but also for professionals working at the "sharp end" who may have to deal with critical incident stress (CIS) reactions that may be severe and impede emotional, physical, cognitive and social functioning. These CIS reactions may occur not only under exceptional conditions but also during every-day work and become an important safety issue. In contrast to air traffic management (ATM) operations in Europe, which have readily adopted critical incident stress management (CISM), most hospitals have not yet implemented comprehensive peer support programs. This survey was conducted in 2010 at the only European general hospital setting which implemented CISM program since 2004. The aim of the article is to describe possible contribution of CISM in hospital settings framed from the perspective of organizational safety and individual health for healthcare professionals. Findings affirm that daily work related incidents also can become critical for healthcare professionals. Program efficiency appears to be influenced by the professional culture, as well as organizational structure and policies. Overall, findings demonstrate that the adaptation of the CISM program in general hospitals takes time but, once established, it may serve as a mechanism for changing professional culture, thereby permitting the framing of even small incidents or near misses as an opportunity to provide valuable feedback to the system. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Translation, adaptation, and validation of the behavioral pain scale and the critical-care pain observational tools in Taiwan

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hsiung NH

2016-09-01

Full Text Available Nai-Huan Hsiung,1 Yen Yang,1 Ming Shinn Lee,2 Koustuv Dalal,3 Graeme D Smith4 1Department of Nursing, College of Nursing, Tzu Chi University of Science and Technology, 2Department of Curriculum Design and Human Potentials Development, National Dong Hwa University, Hualien, Taiwan, Republic of China; 3Department of Public Health Science, School of Health Sciences, Örebro University, Örebro, Sweden; 4School of Nursing, Midwifery & Social Care, Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh, UK Abstract: This study describes the cultural adaptation and testing of the behavioral pain scale (BPS and the critical-care pain observation tools (CPOT for pain assessment in Taiwan. The cross-cultural adaptation followed the steps of translation, including forward translation, back-translation, evaluation of the translations by a committee of experts, adjustments, and then piloting of the prefinal versions of the BPS and the CPOT. A content validity index was used to assess content validities of the BPS and the CPOT, with 0.80 preset as the level that would be regarded as acceptable. The principal investigator then made adjustments when the content validity index was <0.80. The pilot test was performed with a sample of ten purposively selected patients by 2 medical staff from a medical care center in Taiwan. The BPS and the CPOT are adequate instruments for the assessment of pain levels in patients who cannot communicate due to sedation and ventilation treatments. Keywords: pain, scales, BPS, CPOT, Taiwan

An Optimized WSN Design for Latency-Critical Smart Grid Applications

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mounib Khanafer

2017-01-01

Full Text Available The growing popularity of the Internet of Things (IoT systems such as the smart grid, Body Area Networks (BANs, and the Intelligent Transportation System (ITS is driving Wireless Sensor Network (WSN systems to the limit in terms of abilities and performance. WSNs were initially designed for low power, low data rate, and latency-tolerant applications. However, this paradigm is changing because of the nature of the new applications. Therefore, instead of only focusing on power-efficient WSN design, researchers and industries are now developing Quality of Service (QoS protocols for WSNs. In addition to that, latency- and reliability-critical protocol designs are also becoming significantly important in WSNs. In this paper, we present an overview of some important smart grid latency-critical applications and highlight WSNs implementation challenges for these smart grid applications. Furthermore, we develop and evaluate two novel optimization models that solve for the optimum values of the end-to-end latency and power consumption in a clustered WSN given lower bounds on reliability and other network parameters.

Design, optimization and numerical modelling of a novel floating pendulum wave energy converter with tide adaptation

Science.gov (United States)

Yang, Jing; Zhang, Da-hai; Chen, Ying; Liang, Hui; Tan, Ming; Li, Wei; Ma, Xian-dong

2017-10-01

A novel floating pendulum wave energy converter (WEC) with the ability of tide adaptation is designed and presented in this paper. Aiming to a high efficiency, the buoy's hydrodynamic shape is optimized by enumeration and comparison. Furthermore, in order to keep the buoy's well-designed leading edge always facing the incoming wave straightly, a novel transmission mechanism is then adopted, which is called the tidal adaptation mechanism in this paper. Time domain numerical models of a floating pendulum WEC with or without tide adaptation mechanism are built to compare their performance on various water levels. When comparing these two WECs in terms of their average output based on the linear passive control strategy, the output power of WEC with the tide adaptation mechanism is much steadier with the change of the water level and always larger than that without the tide adaptation mechanism.

Model of designating the critical damages

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zwolińska Bożena

2017-06-01

Full Text Available Managing company in the lean way presumes no breakdowns nor reserves in the whole delivery chain. However, achieving such low indicators is impossible. That is why in some production plants it is extremely important to focus on preventive actions which can limit damages. This article depicts the method of designating the critical damages in accordance with lean maintenance method. The article consists of two parts which make for an integral body. Part one depicts the characteristic of a realistic object, it also contains productions capabilities analysis of certain areas within the production structure. Part two depicts the probabilistic model of shaping maximal time loss basing on emptying and filling interoperational buffers.

Use of adaptive diffusion theory based monitors in optimizing boiling water reactor core designs

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Congdon, S.P.; Martin, C.L.; Crowther, R.L.

1988-01-01

Three-dimensional coarse mesh models are routinely used to predict the performance of boiling water reactors. In the adaptive monitory model, the three-dimensional solutions are permanently adapted to incore probe data. The corrections resulting from the adaptive process lead to reliable predictions of future reactor states. The corrections can also be carried forward to future operating cycles. This can shorten the time required to introduce an validate new design and operating strategy improvements. (orig.) [de

Design and conduct of Caudwell Xtreme Everest: an observational cohort study of variation in human adaptation to progressive environmental hypoxia

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Levett, Denny Z. H.; Martin, Daniel S.; Wilson, Mark H.; Mitchell, Kay; Dhillon, Sundeep; Rigat, Fabio; Montgomery, Hugh E.; Mythen, Monty G.; Grocott, Michael P. W.; Ahuja, V.; Aref-Adib, G.; Burnham, R.; Chisholm, A.; Clarke, K.; Coates, D.; Coates, M.; Cook, D.; Cox, M.; Dhillon, S.; Dougall, C.; Doyle, P.; Duncan, P.; Edsell, M.; Edwards, L.; Evans, L.; Gardiner, P.; Grocott, M.; Gunning, P.; Hart, N.; Harrington, J.; Harvey, J.; Holloway, C.; Howard, D.; Hurlbut, D.; Imray, C.; Ince, C.; Jonas, M.; van der Kaaij, J.; Khosravi, M.; Kolfschoten, N.; Levett, D.; Luery, H.; Luks, A.; Martin, D.; McMorrow, R.; Meale, P.; Mitchell, K.; Montgomery, H.; Morgan, G.; Morgan, J.

2010-01-01

The physiological responses to hypoxaemia and cellular hypoxia are poorly understood, and inter-individual differences in performance at altitude and outcome in critical illness remain unexplained. We propose a model for exploring adaptation to hypoxia in the critically ill: the study of healthy

Designated Critical Habitat

Data.gov (United States)

Kansas Data Access and Support Center — Critical habitats include those areas documented as currently supporting self-sustaining populations of any threatened or endangered species of wildlife as well as...

Design of a Model Reference Adaptive Controller for an Unmanned Air Vehicle

Science.gov (United States)

Crespo, Luis G.; Matsutani, Megumi; Annaswamy, Anuradha M.

2010-01-01

This paper presents the "Adaptive Control Technology for Safe Flight (ACTS)" architecture, which consists of a non-adaptive controller that provides satisfactory performance under nominal flying conditions, and an adaptive controller that provides robustness under off nominal ones. The design and implementation procedures of both controllers are presented. The aim of these procedures, which encompass both theoretical and practical considerations, is to develop a controller suitable for flight. The ACTS architecture is applied to the Generic Transport Model developed by NASA-Langley Research Center. The GTM is a dynamically scaled test model of a transport aircraft for which a flight-test article and a high-fidelity simulation are available. The nominal controller at the core of the ACTS architecture has a multivariable LQR-PI structure while the adaptive one has a direct, model reference structure. The main control surfaces as well as the throttles are used as control inputs. The inclusion of the latter alleviates the pilot s workload by eliminating the need for cancelling the pitch coupling generated by changes in thrust. Furthermore, the independent usage of the throttles by the adaptive controller enables their use for attitude control. Advantages and potential drawbacks of adaptation are demonstrated by performing high fidelity simulations of a flight-validated controller and of its adaptive augmentation.

Adaptive e-learning methods and IMS Learning Design. An integrated approach

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Burgos, Daniel; Specht, Marcus

2006-01-01

Please, cite this publication as: Burgos, D., & Specht, M. (2006). Adaptive e-learning methods and IMS Learning Design. In Kinshuk, R. Koper, P. Kommers, P. Kirschner, D. G. Sampson & W. Didderen (Eds.), Proceedings of the 6th IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies (pp.

Just-in-Time Adaptive Interventions (JITAIs) in Mobile Health: Key Components and Design Principles for Ongoing Health Behavior Support.

Science.gov (United States)

Nahum-Shani, Inbal; Smith, Shawna N; Spring, Bonnie J; Collins, Linda M; Witkiewitz, Katie; Tewari, Ambuj; Murphy, Susan A

2018-05-18

The just-in-time adaptive intervention (JITAI) is an intervention design aiming to provide the right type/amount of support, at the right time, by adapting to an individual's changing internal and contextual state. The availability of increasingly powerful mobile and sensing technologies underpins the use of JITAIs to support health behavior, as in such a setting an individual's state can change rapidly, unexpectedly, and in his/her natural environment. Despite the increasing use and appeal of JITAIs, a major gap exists between the growing technological capabilities for delivering JITAIs and research on the development and evaluation of these interventions. Many JITAIs have been developed with minimal use of empirical evidence, theory, or accepted treatment guidelines. Here, we take an essential first step towards bridging this gap. Building on health behavior theories and the extant literature on JITAIs, we clarify the scientific motivation for JITAIs, define their fundamental components, and highlight design principles related to these components. Examples of JITAIs from various domains of health behavior research are used for illustration. As we enter a new era of technological capacity for delivering JITAIs, it is critical that researchers develop sophisticated and nuanced health behavior theories capable of guiding the construction of such interventions. Particular attention has to be given to better understanding the implications of providing timely and ecologically sound support for intervention adherence and retention.

Framing adaptation: three aspects for climate change risk management

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jones, Roger

2007-01-01

Full text: Substantial resources are being allocated to adaptation research and implementation. To use these resources wisely, framing the context within which adaptation decisions are made is critical. Three aspects are: Methods for assessing how much climate change to adapt to by when; Understanding the dynamic between different conceptual models for framing adaptation based on: a. Damages increasing proportionally with change, or b. Ricardian models that require adjustments to attain the 'new normal'; Adopting staged management strategies that depend on system status, which may range from business-as-usual to critical. General adaptation requirements and planning horizons need to have already been identified in scoping studies. Planning horizons include both operational and aspirational targets. Incremental adaptation can be informed by an aspirational goal far off into the future, but is undertaken through a shorter term operational approach. The need to anticipate long-term outcomes in advance is most relevant to measures that require large initial planning and investment, those with long lifetimes, or those where potential damages are irreversible and unacceptable. Five major sources of climate change uncertainty are relevant to assessing how much climate change to adapt to by when: ongoing climate variability and rate of change; past and future commitments to climate change; regional climate change projections; climate sensitivity; greenhouse gas emission scenarios and radiative forcing. These factors combine with different levels of importance depending on the relevant planning horizon. Short-term adaptation is most sensitive to the first and second factors, and long-term adaptation to the last three factors. These factors can be assessed within a probabilistic framework. Two conceptual models dominate assessments designed to inform adaptation. The IPCC Third and Fourth Assessment Reports clearly show that a great many risks increase proportionally with

Reliability design of a critical facility: An application of PRA methods

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Souza Vieira Neto, A.; Souza Borges, W. de

1987-01-01

Although a general agreement concerning the enforcement of reliability (probabilistic) design criteria for nuclear utilities is yet to be achieved. PRA methodology can still be used successfully as a project design and review tool, aimed at improving system's prospective performance or minimizing expected accident consequences. In this paper, the potential of such an application of PRA methods is examined in the special case of a critical design project currently being developed in Brazil. (orig.)

Opportunities and Challenges for Drug Development: Public-Private Partnerships, Adaptive Designs and Big Data.

Science.gov (United States)

Yildirim, Oktay; Gottwald, Matthias; Schüler, Peter; Michel, Martin C

2016-01-01

Drug development faces the double challenge of increasing costs and increasing pressure on pricing. To avoid that lack of perceived commercial perspective will leave existing medical needs unmet, pharmaceutical companies and many other stakeholders are discussing ways to improve the efficiency of drug Research and Development. Based on an international symposium organized by the Medical School of the University of Duisburg-Essen (Germany) and held in January 2016, we discuss the opportunities and challenges of three specific areas, i.e., public-private partnerships, adaptive designs and big data. Public-private partnerships come in many different forms with regard to scope, duration and type and number of participants. They range from project-specific collaborations to strategic alliances to large multi-party consortia. Each of them offers specific opportunities and faces distinct challenges. Among types of collaboration, investigator-initiated studies are becoming increasingly popular but have legal, ethical, and financial implications. Adaptive trial designs are also increasingly discussed. However, adaptive should not be used as euphemism for the repurposing of a failed trial; rather it requires carefully planning and specification before a trial starts. Adaptive licensing can be a counter-part of adaptive trial design. The use of Big Data is another opportunity to leverage existing information into knowledge useable for drug discovery and development. Respecting limitations of informed consent and privacy is a key challenge in the use of Big Data. Speakers and participants at the symposium were convinced that appropriate use of the above new options may indeed help to increase the efficiency of future drug development.

Opportunities and challenges for drug development: public-private partnerships, adaptive designs and big data

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Oktay Yildirim

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Drug development faces the double challenge of increasing costs and increasing pressure on pricing. To avoid that lack of perceived commercial perspective will leave existing medical needs unmet, pharmaceutical companies and many other stakeholders are discussing ways to improve the efficiency of drug Research & Development. Based on an international symposium organized by the Medical School of the University of Duisburg-Essen (Germany and held in January 2016, we discuss the opportunities and challenges of three specific areas, i.e. public-private partnerships, adaptive designs and big data. Public-private partnerships come in many different forms with regard to scope, duration and type and number of participants. They range from project-specific collaborations to strategic alliances to large multi-party consortia. Each of them offers specific opportunities and faces distinct challenges. Among types of collaboration, investigator-initiated studies are becoming increasingly popular but have legal, ethical and financial implications. Adaptive trial designs are also increasingly discussed. However, adaptive should not be used as euphemism for the repurposing of a failed trial; rather it requires carefully planning and specification before a trial starts. Adaptive licensing can be a counter-part of adaptive trial design. The use of Big Data is another opportunity to leverage existing information into knowledge useable for drug discovery and development. Respecting limitations of informed consent and privacy is a key challenge in the use of Big Data. Speakers and participants at the symposium were convinced that appropriate use of the above new options may indeed help to increase the efficiency of future drug development.

Opportunities and Challenges for Drug Development: Public–Private Partnerships, Adaptive Designs and Big Data

Science.gov (United States)

Yildirim, Oktay; Gottwald, Matthias; Schüler, Peter; Michel, Martin C.

2016-01-01

Drug development faces the double challenge of increasing costs and increasing pressure on pricing. To avoid that lack of perceived commercial perspective will leave existing medical needs unmet, pharmaceutical companies and many other stakeholders are discussing ways to improve the efficiency of drug Research and Development. Based on an international symposium organized by the Medical School of the University of Duisburg-Essen (Germany) and held in January 2016, we discuss the opportunities and challenges of three specific areas, i.e., public–private partnerships, adaptive designs and big data. Public–private partnerships come in many different forms with regard to scope, duration and type and number of participants. They range from project-specific collaborations to strategic alliances to large multi-party consortia. Each of them offers specific opportunities and faces distinct challenges. Among types of collaboration, investigator-initiated studies are becoming increasingly popular but have legal, ethical, and financial implications. Adaptive trial designs are also increasingly discussed. However, adaptive should not be used as euphemism for the repurposing of a failed trial; rather it requires carefully planning and specification before a trial starts. Adaptive licensing can be a counter-part of adaptive trial design. The use of Big Data is another opportunity to leverage existing information into knowledge useable for drug discovery and development. Respecting limitations of informed consent and privacy is a key challenge in the use of Big Data. Speakers and participants at the symposium were convinced that appropriate use of the above new options may indeed help to increase the efficiency of future drug development. PMID:27999543

Conceptual design of a digital control system for nuclear criticality experiments

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rojas, S.P.

1994-04-01

Nuclear criticality is a concern in many areas of nuclear engineering including waste management, nuclear weapons testing and design, basic nuclear research, and nuclear reactor design and analysis. As in many areas of science and engineering, experimental work conducted in this field has provided a wealth of data and insight essential to the formulation of theory and the advancement in knowledge of fissioning systems. In light of the many diverse applications of nuclear criticality, there is a continuing interest to learn and understand more about the fundamental physical processes through continued experimentation. This thesis addresses the problem of setting up and programming a microprocessor-based digital control system (PLC) for a proposed critical experiment using, among other devices, a stepper motor, a joystick control mechanism, and switches. This experiment represents a revised configuration to test cylindrical nuclear waste packages. A Monte Carlo numerical study for the proposed critical assembly has been performed in order to illustrate how results from numerical calculations are used in the process of assembling the control system and to corroborate previous experimental data. In summary, a control system utilizing some common devices necessary to perform a critical experiment (stepper motor, push-buttons, etc.) has been assembled. Control components were sized using the results of a probabilistic computer code (MCNP). Finally, a program was written that illustrates the coupling between the hardware and the devices being controlled in the new test fixture

Methodology For The System Integration Of Adaptive Resilience In Armor

Science.gov (United States)

2016-09-01

Center, but the lunar landing was aborted when an oxygen tank exploded two days later, crippling the command and service modules that were critical to...upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f4 /HMMWV_variants.gif. Ruhl, J. B. 2011. “General Design Principles For Resilience and Adaptive Capacity in Legal

Adapt! – Agile Project Management Supported by Axiomatic Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Weber Jakob

2017-01-01

Full Text Available This paper presents a novel approach for the use of Axiomatic Design Theory in combination with agile project management methods like Scrum for an effective, structured and combined product design and development process. Agile project management methods give a guideline how to manage a project, but there is only minor assistance regarding the actual product development process itself. Axiomatic Design can be used to support these methods in this point. In concrete terms, the results of the decomposition process of this theory can be used to formulate and structure the work packages for the agile project managing process. The Independence Axiom of Axiomatic Design Theory has a substantial contribution by ensuring the independence of the work packages which can be assigned to different project team members and can be processed independently by them. The combination of the different methods not only helps to ensure a good design solution but also helps to work more agile within a project team. The here proposed approach is one part of a holistic product design and development process for changeable production units – called Adapt! – and is described within a use case in the automotive sector.

Statistical controversies in clinical research: early-phase adaptive design for combination immunotherapies.

Science.gov (United States)

Wages, N A; Slingluff, C L; Petroni, G R

2017-04-01

In recent years, investigators have asserted that the 3 + 3 design lacks flexibility, making its use in modern early-phase trial settings, such as combinations and/or biological agents, inefficient. More innovative approaches are required to address contemporary research questions, such as those posed in trials involving immunotherapies. We describe the implementation of an adaptive design for identifying an optimal treatment regimen, defined by low toxicity and high immune response, in an early-phase trial of a melanoma helper peptide vaccine plus novel adjuvant combinations. Operating characteristics demonstrate the ability of the method to effectively recommend optimal regimens in a high percentage of trials with reasonable sample sizes. The proposed design is a practical, early-phase, adaptive method for use with combined immunotherapy regimens. This design can be applied more broadly to early-phase combination studies, as it was used in an ongoing study of two small molecule inhibitors in relapsed/refractory mantle cell lymphoma. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society for Medical Oncology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Economic assessment of climate adaptation options for urban drainage design in Odense, Denmark.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhou, Q; Halsnæs, K; Arnbjerg-Nielsen, K

2012-01-01

Climate change is likely to influence the water cycle by changing the precipitation patterns, in some cases leading to increased occurrences of precipitation extremes. Urban landscapes are vulnerable to such changes due to the concentrated population and socio-economic values in cities. Feasible adaptation requires better flood risk quantification and assessment of appropriate adaptation actions in term of costs and benefits. This paper presents an economic assessment of three prevailing climate adaptation options for urban drainage design in a Danish case study, Odense. A risk-based evaluation framework is used to give detailed insights of the physical and economic feasibilities of each option. Estimation of marginal benefits of adaptation options are carried out through a step-by-step cost-benefit analysis. The results are aimed at providing important information for decision making on how best to adapt to urban pluvial flooding due to climate impacts in cities.

Model of designating the critical damages

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Zwolińska Bożena

2017-06-01

Full Text Available The article consists of two parts which make for an integral body. This article depicts the method of designating the critical damages in accordance with lean maintenance method. Author considered exemplary production system (serial-parallel in which in time Δt appeared a damage on three different objects. Article depicts the mathematical model which enables determination of an indicator called “prioritized digit of the device”. In the developed model there were considered some parameters: production abilities of devices, existence of potential vicarious devices, position of damage in the production stream based on the capacity of operational buffers, time needed to remove the damages and influence of damages to the finalization of customers’ orders – CEF indicator.

Design and application of a new modular adapter for laser diffraction characterization of inhalation aerosols

NARCIS (Netherlands)

de Boer, Anne; Gjaltema, D; Hagedoorn, P; Schaller, M; Witt, W; Frijlink, H W

2002-01-01

An inhaler adapter has been designed for the characterization of the aerosol clouds from medical aerosol generators such as nebulizers, dry powder inhalers (dpis) and metered dose inhalers (mdis) with laser diffraction technology. The adapter has a pre-separator, for separation of large particles

Finite element analysis and genetic algorithm optimization design for the actuator placement on a large adaptive structure

Science.gov (United States)

Sheng, Lizeng

The dissertation focuses on one of the major research needs in the area of adaptive/intelligent/smart structures, the development and application of finite element analysis and genetic algorithms for optimal design of large-scale adaptive structures. We first review some basic concepts in finite element method and genetic algorithms, along with the research on smart structures. Then we propose a solution methodology for solving a critical problem in the design of a next generation of large-scale adaptive structures---optimal placements of a large number of actuators to control thermal deformations. After briefly reviewing the three most frequently used general approaches to derive a finite element formulation, the dissertation presents techniques associated with general shell finite element analysis using flat triangular laminated composite elements. The element used here has three nodes and eighteen degrees of freedom and is obtained by combining a triangular membrane element and a triangular plate bending element. The element includes the coupling effect between membrane deformation and bending deformation. The membrane element is derived from the linear strain triangular element using Cook's transformation. The discrete Kirchhoff triangular (DKT) element is used as the plate bending element. For completeness, a complete derivation of the DKT is presented. Geometrically nonlinear finite element formulation is derived for the analysis of adaptive structures under the combined thermal and electrical loads. Next, we solve the optimization problems of placing a large number of piezoelectric actuators to control thermal distortions in a large mirror in the presence of four different thermal loads. We then extend this to a multi-objective optimization problem of determining only one set of piezoelectric actuator locations that can be used to control the deformation in the same mirror under the action of any one of the four thermal loads. A series of genetic algorithms

New approach to managing nuclear criticality risk at Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Green, R.; Droke, R.; Paine, D.

1992-01-01

The negative aspects of having a nuclear criticality accident at a fuel fabrication facility have substantially increased in recent years. Although ensuring that the facility is designed and operating in a critically safe manner is a high management priority, practices of managing the risk of a criticality accident have not significantly changed. The method of evaluating risk based on quantitative analysis can enable management to adapt to the increased consequences of a nuclear criticality accident. Additional controls may be placed on high-risk areas within a facility to ensure safe operation of the plant. Areas where controls are in place that impede the productivity of the facility and have negligible impact on criticality safety may be removed or replaced. Management can also streamline the safety analysis efforts applied to facility upgrades by demonstrating that proposed design changes do not compromise criticality safety. Future expansion of quantitative analysis techniques will also allow risk-based management decisions on industrial, radiological, and environmental safety

Towards Individualized Online Learning: The Design and Development of an Adaptive Web Based Learning Environment

Science.gov (United States)

Inan, Fethi A.; Flores, Raymond; Ari, Fatih; Arslan-Ari, Ismahan

2011-01-01

The purpose of this study was to document the design and development of an adaptive system which individualizes instruction such as content, interfaces, instructional strategies, and resources dependent on two factors, namely student motivation and prior knowledge levels. Combining adaptive hypermedia methods with strategies proposed by…

Using Critical Incidents of Instructional Design and Multimedia Production Activities to Investigate Instructional Designers' Current Practices and Roles

Science.gov (United States)

Sugar, William A.; Luterbach, Kenneth J.

2016-01-01

Through consideration of critical incidents, this study analyzed 106 effective, ineffective and extraordinary instructional design and multimedia production (MP) activities discussed by 36 instructional design professionals. This evaluation provided insights into these professionals' best and not so best practices during the past 6 months.…

Model-based design of adaptive embedded systems

CERN Document Server

Hamberg, Roelof; Reckers, Frans; Verriet, Jacques

2013-01-01

Today’s embedded systems have to operate in a wide variety of dynamically changing environmental circumstances. Adaptivity, the ability of a system to autonomously adapt itself, is a means to optimise a system’s behaviour to accommodate changes in its environment. It involves making in-product trade-offs between system qualities at system level. The main challenge in the development of adaptive systems is keeping control of the intrinsic complexity of such systems while working with multi-disciplinary teams to create different parts of the system. Model-Based Development of Adaptive Embedded Systems focuses on the development of adaptive embedded systems both from an architectural and methodological point of view. It describes architectural solution patterns for adaptive systems and state-of-the-art model-based methods and techniques to support adaptive system development. In particular, the book describes the outcome of the Octopus project, a cooperation of a multi-disciplinary team of academic and indus...

Root locus analysis and design of the adaptation process in active noise control.

Science.gov (United States)

Tabatabaei Ardekani, Iman; Abdulla, Waleed H

2012-10-01

This paper applies root locus theory to develop a graphical tool for the analysis and design of adaptive active noise control systems. It is shown that the poles of the adaptation process performed in these systems move on typical trajectories in the z-plane as the adaptation step-size varies. Based on this finding, the dominant root of the adaptation process and its trajectory can be determined. The first contribution of this paper is formulating parameters of the adaptation process root locus. The next contribution is introducing a mechanism for modifying the trajectory of the dominant root in the root locus. This mechanism creates a single open loop zero in the original root locus. It is shown that appropriate localization of this zero can cause the dominant root of the locus to be pushed toward the origin, and thereby the adaptation process becomes faster. The validity of the theoretical findings is confirmed in an experimental setup which is implemented using real-time multi-threading and multi-core processing techniques.

A Novel Adaptive Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm with Foraging Behavior in Optimization Design

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Liu Yan

2018-01-01

Full Text Available The method of repeated trial and proofreading is generally used to the convention reducer design, but these methods is low efficiency and the size of the reducer is often large. Aiming the problems, this paper presents an adaptive particle swarm optimization algorithm with foraging behavior, in this method, the bacterial foraging process is introduced into the adaptive particle swarm optimization algorithm, which can provide the function of particle chemotaxis, swarming, reproduction, elimination and dispersal, to improve the ability of local search and avoid premature behavior. By test verification through typical function and the application of the optimization design in the structure of the reducer with discrete and continuous variables, the results are shown that the new algorithm has the advantages of good reliability, strong searching ability and high accuracy. It can be used in engineering design, and has a strong applicability.

Thermal adaptation of mesophilic and thermophilic FtsZ assembly by modulation of the critical concentration.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Luis Concha-Marambio

Full Text Available Cytokinesis is the last stage in the cell cycle. In prokaryotes, the protein FtsZ guides cell constriction by assembling into a contractile ring-shaped structure termed the Z-ring. Constriction of the Z-ring is driven by the GTPase activity of FtsZ that overcomes the energetic barrier between two protein conformations having different propensities to assemble into polymers. FtsZ is found in psychrophilic, mesophilic and thermophilic organisms thereby functioning at temperatures ranging from subzero to >100°C. To gain insight into the functional adaptations enabling assembly of FtsZ in distinct environmental conditions, we analyzed the energetics of FtsZ function from mesophilic Escherichia coli in comparison with FtsZ from thermophilic Methanocaldococcus jannaschii. Presumably, the assembly may be similarly modulated by temperature for both FtsZ orthologs. The temperature dependence of the first-order rates of nucleotide hydrolysis and of polymer disassembly, indicated an entropy-driven destabilization of the FtsZ-GTP intermediate. This destabilization was true for both mesophilic and thermophilic FtsZ, reflecting a conserved mechanism of disassembly. From the temperature dependence of the critical concentrations for polymerization, we detected a change of opposite sign in the heat capacity, that was partially explained by the specific changes in the solvent-accessible surface area between the free and polymerized states of FtsZ. At the physiological temperature, the assembly of both FtsZ orthologs was found to be driven by a small positive entropy. In contrast, the assembly occurred with a negative enthalpy for mesophilic FtsZ and with a positive enthalpy for thermophilic FtsZ. Notably, the assembly of both FtsZ orthologs is characterized by a critical concentration of similar value (1-2 μM at the environmental temperatures of their host organisms. These findings suggest a simple but robust mechanism of adaptation of FtsZ, previously shown

Explicit MPC design and performance-based tuning of an Adaptive Cruise Control Stop-&-Go

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Naus, G.J.L.; Ploeg, J.; Molengraft, M.J.G. van de; Steinbuch, M.

2008-01-01

This paper presents the synthesis, the implementation and the performance-based tuning of an Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) Stop-&-Go (S&G) design. A Model Predictive Control (MPC) framework is adopted to design the controller. Performance of the controller is evaluated, distinguishing between

Design of an adaptive pole assignment controller for steam generators and its experimental study

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Na, Man Gyun; No, Hee Cheon

1992-01-01

An adaptive observer is designed that both parameters and state variables of the steam generator are estimated simultaneously. A pole assignment controller is derived on the basis of the adaptive observer. The characteristics of the overall closed-loop control system can be expressed in terms of its poles, assigned poles. The troublesome tuning procedure of the P-I controller is reduced to the determination of the desired poles only. The proposed algorithm is compared with the conventional P-I controller through numerical simulation. Also, the adaptive pole assignment controller is studied experimentally by implementing it to the mock-up of the nuclear steam generator. The adaptive pole assignment controller shows better responses than the P-l controller does. (Author)

Design and Performance Analysis of an Adaptive Receiver for Multicarrier DS-CDMA

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wang Huahui

2007-01-01

Full Text Available An adaptive parallel interference cancelation (APIC scheme is proposed for the multicarrier direct sequence code division multiple access (MC-DS-CDMA system. Frequency diversity inherent in the MC system is exploited through maximal ratio combining, and an adaptive least mean square algorithm is used to estimate the multiple access interference. Theoretical analysis on the bit-error rate (BER of the APIC receiver is presented. Under a unified signal model, the conventional PIC (CPIC is shown to be a special case of the APIC. Hence the BER derivation for the APIC is also applicable to the CPIC. The performance and the accuracy of the theoretical results are examined via simulations under different design parameters, which show that the APIC outperforms the CPIC receiver provided that the adaptive parameters are properly selected.

Web-Based Intervention for Women With Type 1 Diabetes in Pregnancy and Early Motherhood: Critical Analysis of Adherence to Technological Elements and Study Design.

Science.gov (United States)

Berg, Marie; Linden, Karolina; Adolfsson, Annsofie; Sparud Lundin, Carina; Ranerup, Agneta

2018-05-02

randomization element in a randomized controlled trial design can become a barrier to achieving a critical mass of user interactions in Web-based interventions, especially when social support is included. For extended study periods, the technology used may need to be adapted in line with newly available technical options to avoid the risk of becoming outdated in the user realm, which in turn might jeopardize study validity in terms of randomized controlled trial designs. On the basis of lessons learned in this randomized controlled trial, we give recommendations to consider when designing and evaluating Web-based health interventions. ©Marie Berg, Karolina Linden, Annsofie Adolfsson, Carina Sparud Lundin, Agneta Ranerup. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 02.05.2018.

Stress adapted embroidered meshes with a graded pattern design for abdominal wall hernia repair

Science.gov (United States)

Hahn, J.; Bittrich, L.; Breier, A.; Spickenheuer, A.

2017-10-01

Abdominal wall hernias are one of the most relevant injuries of the digestive system with 25 million patients in 2013. Surgery is recommended primarily using allogenic non-absorbable wrap-knitted meshes. These meshes have in common that their stress-strain behaviour is not adapted to the anisotropic behaviour of native abdominal wall tissue. The ideal mesh should possess an adequate mechanical behaviour and a suitable porosity at the same time. An alternative fabrication method to wrap-knitting is the embroidery technology with a high flexibility in pattern design and adaption of mechanical properties. In this study, a pattern generator was created for pattern designs consisting of a base and a reinforcement pattern. The embroidered mesh structures demonstrated different structural and mechanical characteristics. Additionally, the investigation of the mechanical properties exhibited an anisotropic mechanical behaviour for the embroidered meshes. As a result, the investigated pattern generator and the embroidery technology allow the production of stress adapted mesh structures that are a promising approach for hernia reconstruction.

Cooperative control of multi-agent systems optimal and adaptive design approaches

CERN Document Server

Lewis, Frank L; Hengster-Movric, Kristian; Das, Abhijit

2014-01-01

Task complexity, communication constraints, flexibility and energy-saving concerns are all factors that may require a group of autonomous agents to work together in a cooperative manner. Applications involving such complications include mobile robots, wireless sensor networks, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), spacecraft, and so on. In such networked multi-agent scenarios, the restrictions imposed by the communication graph topology can pose severe problems in the design of cooperative feedback control systems.  Cooperative control of multi-agent systems is a challenging topic for both control theorists and practitioners and has been the subject of significant recent research. Cooperative Control of Multi-Agent Systems extends optimal control and adaptive control design methods to multi-agent systems on communication graphs.  It develops Riccati design techniques for general linear dynamics for cooperative state feedback design, cooperative observer design, and cooperative dynamic output feedback design.  B...

Nitric oxide and TNFα are critical regulators of reversible lymph node vascular remodeling and adaptive immune response.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Stephanie L Sellers

Full Text Available Lymph node (LN vascular growth, at the level of the main arteriole, was recently characterized for the first time during infection. Arteriole diameter was shown to increase for at least seven days and to occur via a CD4(+ T cell dependent mechanism, with vascular expansion playing a critical role in regulating induction of adaptive immune response. Here, using intravital microscopy of the inguinal LN during herpes simplex type II (HSV-2 infection, the data provides the first studies that demonstrate arteriole expansion during infection is a reversible vascular event that occurs via eutrophic outward remodeling. Furthermore, using genetic ablation models, and pharmacological blockade, we reveal arteriole remodeling and LN hypertrophy to be dependent upon both endothelial nitric oxide synthase (eNOS and TNFα expression. Additionally, we reveal transient changes in nitric oxide (NO levels to be a notable feature of response to viral infection and LN vascular remodeling and provide evidence that mast cells are the critical source of TNFα required to drive arteriole remodeling. Overall, this study is the first to fully characterize LN arteriole vascular changes throughout the course of infection. It effectively reveals a novel role for NO and TNFα in LN cellularity and changes in LN vascularity, which represent key advances in understanding LN vascular physiology and adaptive immune response.

A single network adaptive critic (SNAC) architecture for optimal control synthesis for a class of nonlinear systems.

Science.gov (United States)

Padhi, Radhakant; Unnikrishnan, Nishant; Wang, Xiaohua; Balakrishnan, S N

2006-12-01

Even though dynamic programming offers an optimal control solution in a state feedback form, the method is overwhelmed by computational and storage requirements. Approximate dynamic programming implemented with an Adaptive Critic (AC) neural network structure has evolved as a powerful alternative technique that obviates the need for excessive computations and storage requirements in solving optimal control problems. In this paper, an improvement to the AC architecture, called the "Single Network Adaptive Critic (SNAC)" is presented. This approach is applicable to a wide class of nonlinear systems where the optimal control (stationary) equation can be explicitly expressed in terms of the state and costate variables. The selection of this terminology is guided by the fact that it eliminates the use of one neural network (namely the action network) that is part of a typical dual network AC setup. As a consequence, the SNAC architecture offers three potential advantages: a simpler architecture, lesser computational load and elimination of the approximation error associated with the eliminated network. In order to demonstrate these benefits and the control synthesis technique using SNAC, two problems have been solved with the AC and SNAC approaches and their computational performances are compared. One of these problems is a real-life Micro-Electro-Mechanical-system (MEMS) problem, which demonstrates that the SNAC technique is applicable to complex engineering systems.

Critical Issues in Research Design in Action Research in an SME Development Context

Science.gov (United States)

McGrath, Helen; O'Toole, Thomas

2012-01-01

Purpose: The main aim of this paper is to develop guidelines on the critical issues to consider in research design in an action research (AR) environment for SME network capability development. Design/methodology/approach: The issues in research design for AR studies are developed from the authors' experience in running learning sets but, in…

Design adaptation to the local context - Example of the UK EPR

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dupuis, Joseph

2014-01-01

The Chief Executive Officer of SOFINEL, Joseph Dupuis, explained how the EPR design was adapted to the UK context and, in particular, the main modifications that were implemented to conform with UK specific regulations. He also presented the cultural and/or technical differences that had to be taken into account for managing the UK EPR project

Policy Gradient Adaptive Dynamic Programming for Data-Based Optimal Control.

Science.gov (United States)

Luo, Biao; Liu, Derong; Wu, Huai-Ning; Wang, Ding; Lewis, Frank L

2017-10-01

The model-free optimal control problem of general discrete-time nonlinear systems is considered in this paper, and a data-based policy gradient adaptive dynamic programming (PGADP) algorithm is developed to design an adaptive optimal controller method. By using offline and online data rather than the mathematical system model, the PGADP algorithm improves control policy with a gradient descent scheme. The convergence of the PGADP algorithm is proved by demonstrating that the constructed Q -function sequence converges to the optimal Q -function. Based on the PGADP algorithm, the adaptive control method is developed with an actor-critic structure and the method of weighted residuals. Its convergence properties are analyzed, where the approximate Q -function converges to its optimum. Computer simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the PGADP-based adaptive control method.

A literature review of applied adaptive design methodology within the field of oncology in randomised controlled trials and a proposed extension to the CONSORT guidelines.

Science.gov (United States)

Mistry, Pankaj; Dunn, Janet A; Marshall, Andrea

2017-07-18

The application of adaptive design methodology within a clinical trial setting is becoming increasingly popular. However the application of these methods within trials is not being reported as adaptive designs hence making it more difficult to capture the emerging use of these designs. Within this review, we aim to understand how adaptive design methodology is being reported, whether these methods are explicitly stated as an 'adaptive design' or if it has to be inferred and to identify whether these methods are applied prospectively or concurrently. Three databases; Embase, Ovid and PubMed were chosen to conduct the literature search. The inclusion criteria for the review were phase II, phase III and phase II/III randomised controlled trials within the field of Oncology that published trial results in 2015. A variety of search terms related to adaptive designs were used. A total of 734 results were identified, after screening 54 were eligible. Adaptive designs were more commonly applied in phase III confirmatory trials. The majority of the papers performed an interim analysis, which included some sort of stopping criteria. Additionally only two papers explicitly stated the term 'adaptive design' and therefore for most of the papers, it had to be inferred that adaptive methods was applied. Sixty-five applications of adaptive design methods were applied, from which the most common method was an adaptation using group sequential methods. This review indicated that the reporting of adaptive design methodology within clinical trials needs improving. The proposed extension to the current CONSORT 2010 guidelines could help capture adaptive design methods. Furthermore provide an essential aid to those involved with clinical trials.

Adaptation of the quality by design concept in early pharmaceutical development of an intranasal nanosized formulation.

Science.gov (United States)

Pallagi, Edina; Ambrus, Rita; Szabó-Révész, Piroska; Csóka, Ildikó

2015-08-01

Regulatory science based pharmaceutical development and product manufacturing is highly recommended by the authorities nowadays. The aim of this study was to adapt regulatory science even in the nano-pharmaceutical early development. Authors applied the quality by design (QbD) concept in the early development phase of nano-systems, where the illustration material was meloxicam. The meloxicam nanoparticles produced by co-grinding method for nasal administration were studied according to the QbD policy and the QbD based risk assessment (RA) was performed. The steps were implemented according to the relevant regulatory guidelines (quality target product profile (QTPP) determination, selection of critical quality attributes (CQAs) and critical process parameters (CPPs)) and a special software (Lean QbD Software(®)) was used for the RA, which represents a novelty in this field. The RA was able to predict and identify theoretically the factors (e.g. sample composition, production method parameters, etc.) which have the highest impact on the desired meloxicam-product quality. The results of the practical research justified the theoretical prediction. This method can improve pharmaceutical nano-developments by achieving shorter development time, lower cost, saving human resource efforts and more effective target-orientation. It makes possible focusing the resources on the selected parameters and area during the practical product development. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Designing Networks that are Capable of Self-Healing and Adapting

Science.gov (United States)

2017-04-01

from statistical mechanics, combinatorics, boolean networks, and numerical simulations, and inspired by design principles from biological networks, we... principles for self-healing networks, and applications, and construct an all-possible-paths model for network adaptation. 2015-11-16 UNIT CONVERSION...kg m –3 ) pound-force (lbf avoirdupois) 4.448 222 newton (N) Energy/Work/Power electron volt (eV) 1.602 177 × 10 –19 joule (J) erg 1 × 10 –7

Design of device driver program for PCI data acquisition adapters based on WDM of windows 2000

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yuan Weihua; Qiao Weimin; Jing Lan; Zhu Haijun

2003-01-01

The paper describes the design of device driver program for PCI data acquisition adapters based on WDM of Windows 2000. Give an actual example of PCI6208. Now, several data acquisition adapters based in this method are using in national big science engineer HIRFL-CSR. (authors)

An Adaptive Damping Network Designed for Strapdown Fiber Optic Gyrocompass System for Ships

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jin Sun

2017-03-01

Full Text Available The strapdown fiber optic gyrocompass (strapdown FOGC system for ships primarily works on external horizontal damping and undamping statuses. When there are large sea condition changes, the system will switch frequently between the external horizontal damping status and the undamping status. This means that the system is always in an adjustment status and influences the dynamic accuracy of the system. Aiming at the limitations of the conventional damping method, a new design idea is proposed, where the adaptive control method is used to design the horizontal damping network of the strapdown FOGC system. According to the size of acceleration, the parameters of the damping network are changed to make the system error caused by the ship’s maneuvering to a minimum. Furthermore, the jump in damping coefficient was transformed into gradual change to make a smooth system status switch. The adaptive damping network was applied for strapdown FOGC under the static and dynamic condition, and its performance was compared with the conventional damping, and undamping means. Experimental results showed that the adaptive damping network was effective in improving the dynamic performance of the strapdown FOGC.

Design and simplification of Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference Controllers for power plants

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Alturki, F.A.; Abdennour, A. [King Saud University, Riyadh (Saudi Arabia). Electrical Engineering Dept.

1999-10-01

This article presents the design of an Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference Controller (ANFIC) for a 160 MW power plant. The space of operating conditions of the plant is partitioned into five regions. For each of the regions, an optimal controller is designed to meet a set of design objectives. The resulting five linear controllers are used to train the ANFIC. To enhance the applicability of the control system, a new algorithm that reduces the fuzzy rules to the most essential ones is also presented. This algorithm offers substantial savings in computation time while maintaining the performance and robustness of the original controller. (author)

Optical design of the adaptive optics laser guide star system

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Bissinger, H. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)

1994-11-15

The design of an adaptive optics package for the 3 meter Lick telescope is presented. This instrument package includes a 69 actuator deformable mirror and a Hartmann type wavefront sensor operating in the visible wavelength; a quadrant detector for the tip-tile sensor and a tip-tilt mirror to stabilize atmospheric first order tip-tile errors. A high speed computer drives the deformable mirror to achieve near diffraction limited imagery. The different optical components and their individual design constraints are described. motorized stages and diagnostics tools are used to operate and maintain alignment throughout observation time from a remote control room. The expected performance are summarized and actual results of astronomical sources are presented.

Design of sewage treatment system by applying fuzzy adaptive PID controller

Science.gov (United States)

Jin, Liang-Ping; Li, Hong-Chan

2013-03-01

In the sewage treatment system, the dissolved oxygen concentration control, due to its nonlinear, time-varying, large time delay and uncertainty, is difficult to establish the exact mathematical model. While the conventional PID controller only works with good linear not far from its operating point, it is difficult to realize the system control when the operating point far off. In order to solve the above problems, the paper proposed a method which combine fuzzy control with PID methods and designed a fuzzy adaptive PID controller based on S7-300 PLC .It employs fuzzy inference method to achieve the online tuning for PID parameters. The control algorithm by simulation and practical application show that the system has stronger robustness and better adaptability.

Adaptive Rationality, Adaptive Behavior and Institutions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Volchik Vyacheslav, V.

2015-12-01

Full Text Available The economic literature focused on understanding decision-making and choice processes reveals a vast collection of approaches to human rationality. Theorists’ attention has moved from absolutely rational, utility-maximizing individuals to boundedly rational and adaptive ones. A number of economists have criticized the concepts of adaptive rationality and adaptive behavior. One of the recent trends in the economic literature is to consider humans irrational. This paper offers an approach which examines adaptive behavior in the context of existing institutions and constantly changing institutional environment. It is assumed that adaptive behavior is a process of evolutionary adjustment to fundamental uncertainty. We emphasize the importance of actors’ engagement in trial and error learning, since if they are involved in this process, they obtain experience and are able to adapt to existing and new institutions. The paper aims at identifying relevant institutions, adaptive mechanisms, informal working rules and practices that influence actors’ behavior in the field of Higher Education in Russia (Rostov Region education services market has been taken as an example. The paper emphasizes the application of qualitative interpretative methods (interviews and discourse analysis in examining actors’ behavior.

Systematic Planning of Adaptation Options for Pluvial Flood Resilience

Science.gov (United States)

Babovic, Filip; Mijic, Ana; Madani, Kaveh

2016-04-01

Different elements of infrastructure and the built environment vary in their ability to quickly adapt to changing circumstances. Furthermore, many of the slowest, and often largest infrastructure adaptations, offer the greatest improvements to system performance. In the context of de-carbonation of individual buildings Brand (1995) identified six potential layers of adaptation based on their renewal times ranging from daily to multi-decadal time scales. Similar layers exist in urban areas with regards to Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD) and pluvial flood risk. These layers range from appliances within buildings to changes in the larger urban form. Changes in low-level elements can be quickly implemented, but are limited in effectiveness, while larger interventions occur at a much slower pace but offer greater benefits as a part of systemic change. In the context of urban adaptation this multi-layered approach provides information on how to order urban adaptations. This information helps to identify potential pathways by prioritising relatively quick adaptations to be implemented in the short term while identifying options which require more long term planning with respect to both uncertainty and flexibility. This information is particularly critical in the evolution towards more resilient and water sensitive cities (Brown, 2009). Several potential adaptation options were identified ranging from small to large-scale adaptations. The time needed for the adaptation to be implemented was estimated and curves representing the added drainage capacity per year were established. The total drainage capacity added by each option was then established. This methodology was utilised on a case study in the Cranbrook Catchment in the North East of London. This information was able to provide insight on how to best renew or extend the life of critical ageing infrastructure.

ℋ- adaptive observer design and parameter identification for a class of nonlinear fractional-order systems

KAUST Repository

Ndoye, Ibrahima

2014-12-01

In this paper, an adaptive observer design with parameter identification for a nonlinear system with external perturbations and unknown parameters is proposed. The states of the nonlinear system are estimated by a nonlinear observer and the unknown parameters are also adapted to their values. Sufficient conditions for the stability of the adaptive observer error dynamics are derived in terms of linear matrix inequalities. Simulation results for chaotic Lorenz systems with unknown parameters in the presence of external perturbations are given to illustrate the effectiveness of our proposed approach. © 2014 IEEE.

On some properties of bone functional adaptation phenomenon useful in mechanical design.

Science.gov (United States)

Nowak, Michał

2010-01-01

The paper discusses some unique properties of trabecular bone functional adaptation phenomenon, useful in mechanical design. On the basis of the biological process observations and the principle of constant strain energy density on the surface of the structure, the generic structural optimisation system has been developed. Such approach allows fulfilling mechanical theorem for the stiffest design, comprising the optimisations of size, shape and topology, using the concepts known from biomechanical studies. Also the biomimetic solution of multiple load problems is presented.

Design of an effective energy receiving adapter for microwave wireless power transmission application

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Peng Xu

2016-10-01

Full Text Available In this paper, we demonstrate the viability of an energy receiving adapter in a 8×8 array form with high power reception efficiency with the resonator of artificial electromagnetic absorber being used as the element. Unlike the conventional reported rectifying antenna resonators, both the size of the element and the separations between the elements are electrically small in our design. The energy collecting process is explained with an equivalent circuit model, and a RF combining network is designed to combine the captured AC power from each element to one main terminal for AC-to-DC conversion. The energy receiving adapter yields a total reception efficiency of 67% (including the wave capture efficiency of 86% and the AC-to-DC conversion efficiency of 78%, which is quite promising for microwave wireless power transmission.

Review of design criteria for Criticality Accident Alarm System (CAAS) used in Fuel Reprocessing Facility

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chandrasekaran, S.; Basu, Pew; Sivasubramaniyan, K.; Venkatraman, B.

2016-01-01

Though fuel cycle facilities handling fissile materials are designed with careful criticality safety analysis, the criticality accident cannot be ruled out completely. Criticality Accident Alarm System (CAAS) is being installed as part of criticality safety management in fuel cycle facilities. CAAS system being used in India, is ECIL make, ionization chamber based gamma detector, which houses three identical detectors and works on 2/3 logic. As per ISO 7753 and ANSI/ANS-8.3, the CAAS must be designed to be capable of detecting any minimum accident occurs which could be of concern. Based on this, alarm limit used in CAAS is: 4 R/h (fast transient excursion) and 3 mR in 0.5 sec (slow excursion). In case of reprocessing facilities wherein process tanks located in heavy shielding, identification of CAAS installation locations require detailed radiation transport calculations. A study has been taken to estimate the gamma dose rate from thick concrete hot cells in order to determine the locations of CAAS to meet the present design criteria of alarm limit

Anti-windup adaptive PID control design for a class of uncertain chaotic systems with input saturation.

Science.gov (United States)

Tahoun, A H

2017-01-01

In this paper, the stabilization problem of actuators saturation in uncertain chaotic systems is investigated via an adaptive PID control method. The PID control parameters are auto-tuned adaptively via adaptive control laws. A multi-level augmented error is designed to account for the extra terms appearing due to the use of PID and saturation. The proposed control technique uses both the state-feedback and the output-feedback methodologies. Based on Lyapunov׳s stability theory, new anti-windup adaptive controllers are proposed. Demonstrative examples with MATLAB simulations are studied. The simulation results show the efficiency of the proposed adaptive PID controllers. Copyright © 2016 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

An Integrated Systems Approach to Designing Climate Change Adaptation Policy in Water Resources

Science.gov (United States)

Ryu, D.; Malano, H. M.; Davidson, B.; George, B.

2014-12-01

Climate change projections are characterised by large uncertainties with rainfall variability being the key challenge in designing adaptation policies. Climate change adaptation in water resources shows all the typical characteristics of 'wicked' problems typified by cognitive uncertainty as new scientific knowledge becomes available, problem instability, knowledge imperfection and strategic uncertainty due to institutional changes that inevitably occur over time. Planning that is characterised by uncertainties and instability requires an approach that can accommodate flexibility and adaptive capacity for decision-making. An ability to take corrective measures in the event that scenarios and responses envisaged initially derive into forms at some future stage. We present an integrated-multidisciplinary and comprehensive framework designed to interface and inform science and decision making in the formulation of water resource management strategies to deal with climate change in the Musi Catchment of Andhra Pradesh, India. At the core of this framework is a dialogue between stakeholders, decision makers and scientists to define a set of plausible responses to an ensemble of climate change scenarios derived from global climate modelling. The modelling framework used to evaluate the resulting combination of climate scenarios and adaptation responses includes the surface and groundwater assessment models (SWAT & MODFLOW) and the water allocation modelling (REALM) to determine the water security of each adaptation strategy. Three climate scenarios extracted from downscaled climate models were selected for evaluation together with four agreed responses—changing cropping patterns, increasing watershed development, changing the volume of groundwater extraction and improving irrigation efficiency. Water security in this context is represented by the combination of level of water availability and its associated security of supply for three economic activities (agriculture

Games on Games. Game Design as Critical Reflexive Practice

OpenAIRE

Giovanni Caruso; Riccardo Fassone; Gabriele Ferri; Stefano Gualeni; Mauro Salvador

2016-01-01

Can video game design be compared to more formalized practices of scientific research or speculation within game studies? And, by virtue of an intellectual leap that in itself calls for discussion, can video games be considered as an efficient vehicle for the presentation of certain kinds of knowledge, in the same way in which papers, conference presentations, and books are? What Ratto defines as critical making (2011), the practice of producing artifacts of different sorts in order to supple...

Bayesian dose selection design for a binary outcome using restricted response adaptive randomization.

Science.gov (United States)

Meinzer, Caitlyn; Martin, Renee; Suarez, Jose I

2017-09-08

In phase II trials, the most efficacious dose is usually not known. Moreover, given limited resources, it is difficult to robustly identify a dose while also testing for a signal of efficacy that would support a phase III trial. Recent designs have sought to be more efficient by exploring multiple doses through the use of adaptive strategies. However, the added flexibility may potentially increase the risk of making incorrect assumptions and reduce the total amount of information available across the dose range as a function of imbalanced sample size. To balance these challenges, a novel placebo-controlled design is presented in which a restricted Bayesian response adaptive randomization (RAR) is used to allocate a majority of subjects to the optimal dose of active drug, defined as the dose with the lowest probability of poor outcome. However, the allocation between subjects who receive active drug or placebo is held constant to retain the maximum possible power for a hypothesis test of overall efficacy comparing the optimal dose to placebo. The design properties and optimization of the design are presented in the context of a phase II trial for subarachnoid hemorrhage. For a fixed total sample size, a trade-off exists between the ability to select the optimal dose and the probability of rejecting the null hypothesis. This relationship is modified by the allocation ratio between active and control subjects, the choice of RAR algorithm, and the number of subjects allocated to an initial fixed allocation period. While a responsive RAR algorithm improves the ability to select the correct dose, there is an increased risk of assigning more subjects to a worse arm as a function of ephemeral trends in the data. A subarachnoid treatment trial is used to illustrate how this design can be customized for specific objectives and available data. Bayesian adaptive designs are a flexible approach to addressing multiple questions surrounding the optimal dose for treatment efficacy

78 FR 51327 - Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Designation of Critical Habitat for the Austin...

Science.gov (United States)

2013-08-20

...). Any additional tools or supporting information that we may develop for this critical habitat.... We think those benefits include educational and regulatory benefits afforded to all of our critical... Service 50 CFR Part 17 Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Designation of Critical Habitat for...

Adaptive management for soil ecosystem services

Science.gov (United States)

Birge, Hannah E.; Bevans, Rebecca A.; Allen, Craig R.; Angeler, David G.; Baer, Sara G.; Wall, Diana H.

2016-01-01

Ecosystem services provided by soil include regulation of the atmosphere and climate, primary (including agricultural) production, waste processing, decomposition, nutrient conservation, water purification, erosion control, medical resources, pest control, and disease mitigation. The simultaneous production of these multiple services arises from complex interactions among diverse aboveground and belowground communities across multiple scales. When a system is mismanaged, non-linear and persistent losses in ecosystem services can arise. Adaptive management is an approach to management designed to reduce uncertainty as management proceeds. By developing alternative hypotheses, testing these hypotheses and adjusting management in response to outcomes, managers can probe dynamic mechanistic relationships among aboveground and belowground soil system components. In doing so, soil ecosystem services can be preserved and critical ecological thresholds avoided. Here, we present an adaptive management framework designed to reduce uncertainty surrounding the soil system, even when soil ecosystem services production is not the explicit management objective, so that managers can reach their management goals without undermining soil multifunctionality or contributing to an irreversible loss of soil ecosystem services.

Adapting the Critical Thinking Assessment Test for Palestinian Universities

Science.gov (United States)

Basha, Sami; Drane, Denise; Light, Gregory

2016-01-01

Critical thinking is a key learning outcome for Palestinian students. However, there are no validated critical thinking tests in Arabic. Suitability of the US developed Critical Thinking Assessment Test (CAT) for use in Palestine was assessed. The test was piloted with university students in English (n = 30) and 4 questions were piloted in Arabic…

Robust Engineering Designs for Infrastructure Adaptation to a Changing Climate

Science.gov (United States)

Samaras, C.; Cook, L.

2015-12-01

Infrastructure systems are expected to be functional, durable and safe over long service lives - 50 to over 100 years. Observations and models of climate science show that greenhouse gas emissions resulting from human activities have changed climate, weather and extreme events. Projections of future changes (albeit with uncertainties caused by inadequacies of current climate/weather models) can be made based on scenarios for future emissions, but actual future emissions are themselves uncertain. Most current engineering standards and practices for infrastructure assume that the probabilities of future extreme climate and weather events will match those of the past. Climate science shows that this assumption is invalid, but is unable, at present, to define these probabilities over the service lives of existing and new infrastructure systems. Engineering designs, plans, and institutions and regulations will need to be adaptable for a range of future conditions (conditions of climate, weather and extreme events, as well as changing societal demands for infrastructure services). For their current and future projects, engineers should: Involve all stakeholders (owners, financers, insurance, regulators, affected public, climate/weather scientists, etc.) in key decisions; Use low regret, adaptive strategies, such as robust decision making and the observational method, comply with relevant standards and regulations, and exceed their requirements where appropriate; Publish design studies and performance/failure investigations to extend the body of knowledge for advancement of practice. The engineering community should conduct observational and modeling research with climate/weather/social scientists and the concerned communities and account rationally for climate change in revised engineering standards and codes. This presentation presents initial research on decisionmaking under uncertainty for climate resilient infrastructure design.

Criticality design evaluation of the White Sands reactor building storage vault

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Philbin, J.S.; Nelson, W.E.

1979-03-01

This report describes the conceptual design and criticality evaluation of a storage vault for components of the fast pulse reactor at White Sands Missile Range. Criticality calculations were performed with the KENO-IV Monte Carlo code for various storage configurations in order to investigate the coupling between the portable reactor and storage arrays of spare reactor rings or other fissile components of similar mass. Abnormal conditions corresponding to pseudo--random arrays of the fuel components, as well as a number of flooded configurations, were also evaluated to assess criticality potential for highly unlikely situations. In a normal, dry configuration, the neutron self-multiplication factor, k/sub eff/, of the fully loaded 3 x 8 planar array plus the reactor is less than 0.87. A completely flooded vault was found to produce self-multiplication factors in excess of 1.2

Customizing Countermeasure Prescriptions using Predictive Measures of Sensorimotor Adaptability

Science.gov (United States)

Bloomberg, J. J.; Peters, B. T.; Mulavara, A. P.; Miller, C. A.; Batson, C. D.; Wood, S. J.; Guined, J. R.; Cohen, H. S.; Buccello-Stout, R.; DeDios, Y. E.;

Critical review of directional neutron survey meters

Science.gov (United States)

Balmer, Matthew J. I.; Gamage, Kelum A. A.; Taylor, Graeme C.

2014-01-01

Having been overlooked for many years, research is now starting to take into account the directional distribution of the neutron work place field. The impact of not taking this into account has led to overly conservative estimates of dose in neutron workplace fields. This paper provides a critical review of this existing research into directional survey meters which could improve these estimates of dose. Instruments which could be adapted for use as directional neutron survey meters are also considered within this review. Using Monte-Carlo techniques, two of the most promising existing designs are evaluated; a boron-doped liquid scintillator and a multi-detector directional spectrometer. As an outcome of these simulations, possible adaptations to these instruments are suggested with a view to improving the portability of the instrument.

Critical Review of Directional Neutron Survey Meters

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Balmer, M.J.I.; Gamage, K.A.A.; Taylor, G.C.

2013-06-01

Having been overlooked for many years, research is now starting to take into account the directional distribution of the neutron work place field. The impact of not taking this into account has led to overly conservative estimates of dose in neutron workplace fields. This paper provides a critical review of this existing research into directional survey meters which could improve these estimates of dose. Instruments which could be adapted for use as directional neutron survey meters are also considered within this review. Using Monte-Carlo techniques, two of the most promising existing designs are evaluated; a boron-doped liquid scintillator and a multi-detector directional spectrometer. As an outcome of these simulations, possible adaptations to these instruments are suggested with a view to improving the portability of the instrument. (authors)

Decorative design of ceramic tiles adapted to inkjet printing employing digital image processing

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Defez, B.; Santiago-Praderas, V.; Lluna, E.; Peris-Fajarnes, G.; Dunai, E.

2013-01-01

The ceramic tile sector is a very competitive industry. The designer's proficiency to offer new models of the decorated surface, adapted to the production means, plays a very important role in the competitiveness. In the present work, we analyze the evolution of the design process in the ceramic sector, as much as the changes experimented in parallel by the printing equipment. Afterwards, we present a new concept of ceramic design, based on digital image processing. This technique allows the generation of homogeneous and non-repetitive designs for large surfaces, especially thought for inkjet printing. With the programmed algorithms we have compiled a prototype software for the assistance of the ceramic design. This tool allows creating continuous designs for large surfaces saving developing time. (Author)

Adaptive fuzzy observer based synchronization design and secure communications of chaotic systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hyun, Chang-Ho; Kim, Jae-Hun; Kim, Euntai; Park, Mignon

2006-01-01

This paper proposes a synchronization design scheme based on an alternative indirect adaptive fuzzy observer and its application to secure communication of chaotic systems. It is assumed that their states are unmeasurable and their parameters are unknown. Chaotic systems and the structure of the fuzzy observer are represented by the Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy model. Using Lyapunov stability theory, an adaptive law is derived to estimate the unknown parameters and the stability of the proposed system is guaranteed. Through this process, the asymptotic synchronization of chaotic systems is achieved. The proposed observer is applied to secure communications of chaotic systems and some numerical simulation results show the validity of theoretical derivations and the performance of the proposed observer

Design and validation of a critical pathway for hospital management of patients with severe traumatic brain injury.

Science.gov (United States)

Espinosa-Aguilar, Amilcar; Reyes-Morales, Hortensia; Huerta-Posada, Carlos E; de León, Itzcoatl Limón-Pérez; López-López, Fernando; Mejía-Hernández, Margarita; Mondragón-Martínez, María A; Calderón-Téllez, Ligia M; Amezcua-Cuevas, Rosa L; Rebollar-González, Jorge A

2008-05-01

Critical pathways for the management of patients with severe traumatic brain injury (STBI) may contribute to reducing the incidence of hospital complications, length of hospitalization stay, and cost of care. Such pathways have previously been developed for departments with significant resource availability. In Mexico, STBI is the most important cause of complications and length of stay in neurotrauma services at public hospitals. Although current treatment is designed basically in accordance with the Brain Trauma Foundation guidelines, shortfalls in the availability of local resources make it difficult to comply with these standards, and no critical pathway is available that accords with the resources of public hospitals. The purpose of the present study was to design and to validate a critical pathway for managing STBI patients that would be suitable for implementation in neurotrauma departments of middle-income level countries. The study comprised two phases: design (through literature review and design plan) and validation (content, construct, and appearance) of the critical pathway. The validated critical pathway for managing STBI patients entails four sequential subprocesses summarizing the hospital's care procedures, and includes three components: (1) nodes and criteria (in some cases, indicators are also included); (2) health team members in charge of the patient; (3) maximum estimated time for compliance with recommendations. This validated critical pathway is based on the current scientific evidence and accords with the availability of resources of middle-income countries.

Active materials for adaptive architectural envelopes based on plant adaptation principles

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marlen Lopez

2015-06-01

Full Text Available In this paper, the authors present research into adaptive architectural envelopes that adapt to environmental changes using active materials, as a result of application of biomimetic principles from plants to architecture. Buildings use large amounts of energy in order to maintain their internal comfort, because conventional buildings are designed to provide a static design solution. Most of the current solutions for facades are not designed for optimum adaptation to contextual issues and needs, while biological solutions to adaptation are often complex, multi-functional and highly responsive. We focus on plant adaptations to the environment, as, due to their immobility, they have developed special means of protection against weather changing conditions. Furthermore, recent developments in new technologies are allowing the possibility to transfer these plant adaptation strategies to technical implementation. These technologies include: multi-material 3D printing, advances in materials science and new capabilities in simulation software. Unlike traditional mechanical activation used for dynamic systems in kinetic facades, adaptive architectural envelopes require no complex electronics, sensors, or actuators. The paper proposes a research of the relationship that can be developed between active materials and environmental issues in order to propose innovative and low-tech design strategies to achieve living envelopes according to plant adaptation principles.  

A software engineering process for safety-critical software application

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kang, Byung Heon; Kim, Hang Bae; Chang, Hoon Seon; Jeon, Jong Sun

1995-01-01

Application of computer software to safety-critical systems in on the increase. To be successful, the software must be designed and constructed to meet the functional and performance requirements of the system. For safety reason, the software must be demonstrated not only to meet these requirements, but also to operate safely as a component within the system. For longer-term cost consideration, the software must be designed and structured to ease future maintenance and modifications. This paper presents a software engineering process for the production of safety-critical software for a nuclear power plant. The presentation is expository in nature of a viable high quality safety-critical software development. It is based on the ideas of a rational design process and on the experience of the adaptation of such process in the production of the safety-critical software for the shutdown system number two of Wolsung 2, 3 and 4 nuclear power generation plants. This process is significantly different from a conventional process in terms of rigorous software development phases and software design techniques, The process covers documentation, design, verification and testing using mathematically precise notations and highly reviewable tabular format to specify software requirements and software requirements and software requirements and code against software design using static analysis. The software engineering process described in this paper applies the principle of information-hiding decomposition in software design using a modular design technique so that when a change is required or an error is detected, the affected scope can be readily and confidently located. it also facilitates a sense of high degree of confidence in the 'correctness' of the software production, and provides a relatively simple and straightforward code implementation effort. 1 figs., 10 refs. (Author)

Design of capacitance measurement module for determining critical cold temperature of tea leaves

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yongzong Lu

2016-12-01

Full Text Available Critical cold temperature is one of the most crucial control factors for crop frost protection. Tea leaf's capacitance has a significant response to cold injury and appears as a peak response to a typical low temperature which is the critical temperature. However, the testing system is complex and inconvenient. In view of these, a tea leaf's critical temperature detector based on capacitance measurement module was designed and developed to measure accurately and conveniently the capacitance. Software was also designed to measure parameters, record data, query data as well as data deletion module. The detector utilized the MSP430F149 MCU as the control core and ILI9320TFT as the display module, and its software was compiled by IAR5.3. Capacitance measurement module was the crucial part in the overall design which was based on the principle of oscillator. Based on hardware debugging and stability analysis of capacitance measurement module, it was found that the output voltage of the capacitance measurement circuit is stable with 0.36% average deviation. The relationship between capacitance and 1/Uc2 was found to be linear distribution with the determination coefficient above 0.99. The result indicated that the output voltage of capacitance measurement module well corresponded to the change in value of the capacitance. The measurement error of the circuit was also within the required range of 0 to 100 pF which meets the requirement of tea leaf's capacitance. Keywords: Tea leaves, Critical cold temperature, Capacitance peak response, Frost protection, Detector

Potential of adaptive clinical trial designs in pharmacogenetic research, A simulation based on the IPASS trial

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Van Der Baan, Frederieke H.; Knol, Mirjam J.|info:eu-repo/dai/nl/304820350; Klungel, Olaf H.|info:eu-repo/dai/nl/181447649; Egberts, Toine C.G.|info:eu-repo/dai/nl/162850050; Grobbee, Diederick E.; Roes, Kit C.B.

2011-01-01

Background: An adaptive clinical trial design that allows population enrichment after interim analysis can be advantageous in pharmacogenetic research if previous evidence is not strong enough to exclude part of the patient population beforehand.With this design, underpowered studies or unnecessary

Design and implementation of adaptive inverse control algorithm for a micro-hand control system

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Wan-Cheng Wang

2014-01-01

Full Text Available The Letter proposes an online tuned adaptive inverse position control algorithm for a micro-hand. First, the configuration of the micro-hand is discussed. Next, a kinematic analysis of the micro-hand is investigated and then the relationship between the rotor position of micro-permanent magnet synchronous motor and the tip of the micro-finger is derived. After that, an online tuned adaptive inverse control algorithm, which includes an adaptive inverse model and an adaptive inverse control, is designed. The online tuned adaptive inverse control algorithm has better performance than the proportional–integral control algorithm does. In addition, to avoid damaging the object during the grasping process, an online force control algorithm is proposed here as well. An embedded micro-computer, cRIO-9024, is used to realise the whole position control algorithm and the force control algorithm by using software. As a result, the hardware circuit is very simple. Experimental results show that the proposed system can provide fast transient responses, good load disturbance responses, good tracking responses and satisfactory grasping responses.

Critical Jostling

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Pippin Barr

2016-11-01

Full Text Available Games can serve a critical function in many different ways, from serious games about real world subjects to self-reflexive commentaries on the nature of games themselves. In this essay we discuss critical possibilities stemming from the area of critical design, and more specifically Carl DiSalvo’s adversarial design and its concept of reconfiguring the remainder. To illustrate such an approach, we present the design and outcomes of two games, Jostle Bastard and Jostle Parent. We show how the games specifically engage with two previous games, Hotline Miami and Octodad: Dadliest Catch, reconfiguring elements of those games to create interactive critical experiences and extensions of the source material. Through the presentation of specific design concerns and decisions, we provide a grounded illustration of a particular critical function of videogames and hope to highlight this form as another valuable approach in the larger area of videogame criticism.

Evaluation of critical materials in five additional advance design photovoltaic cells

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Smith, S.A.; Watts, R.L.; Martin, P.; Gurwell, W.E.

1981-02-01

The objective of this study is to identify potential material supply constraints due to the large-scale deployment of five advanced photovoltaic (PV) cell designs, and to suggest strategies to reduce the impacts of these production capacity limitations and potential future material shortages. The Critical Materials Assessment Program (CMAP) screens the designs and their supply chains and identifies potential shortages which might preclude large-scale use of the technologies. The results of the screening of five advanced PV cell designs are presented: (1) indium phosphide/cadmium sulfide, (2) zinc phosphide, (3) cadmium telluride/cadmium sulfide, (4) copper indium selenium, and (5) cadmium selenide photoelectrochemical. Each of these five cells is screened individually assuming that they first come online in 1991, and that 25 Gwe of peak capacity is online by the year 2000. A second computer screening assumes that each cell first comes online in 1991 and that each cell has a 5 GWe of peak capacity by the year 2000, so that the total online capacity for the five cells is 25 GWe. Based on a review of the preliminary baseline screening results, suggestions were made for varying such parameters as the layer thickness, cell production processes, etc. The resulting PV cell characterizations were then screened again by the CMAP computer code. The CMAP methodology used to identify critical materials is described; and detailed characterizations of the advanced photovoltaic cell designs under investigation, descriptions of additional cell production processes, and the results are presented. (WHK)

Soundscape elaboration from anthrophonic adaptation of community noise

Science.gov (United States)

Teddy Badai Samodra, FX

2018-03-01

Under the situation of an urban environment, noise has been a critical issue in affecting the indoor environment. A reliable approach is required for evaluation of the community noise as one factor of anthrophonic in the urban environment. This research investigates the level of noise exposure from different community noise sources and elaborates the advantage of the noise disadvantages for soundscape innovation. Integrated building element design as a protector for noise control and speech intelligibility compliance using field experiment and MATLAB programming and modeling are also carried out. Meanwhile, for simulation analysis and building acoustic optimization, Sound Reduction-Speech Intelligibility and Reverberation Time are the main parameters for identifying tropical building model as case study object. The results show that the noise control should consider its integration with the other critical issue, thermal control, in an urban environment. The 1.1 second of reverberation time for speech activities and noise reduction more than 28.66 dBA for critical frequency (20 Hz), the speech intelligibility index could be reached more than fair assessment, 0.45. Furthermore, the environmental psychology adaptation result “Close The Opening” as the best method in high noise condition and personal adjustment as the easiest and the most adaptable way.

Initial conceptual design study of self-critical nuclear pumped laser systems

Science.gov (United States)

Rodgers, R. J.

1979-01-01

An analytical study of self-critical nuclear pumped laser system concepts was performed. Primary emphasis was placed on reactor concepts employing gaseous uranium hexafluoride (UF6) as the fissionable material. Relationships were developed between the key reactor design parameters including reactor power level, critical mass, neutron flux level, reactor size, operating pressure, and UF6 optical properties. The results were used to select a reference conceptual laser system configuration. In the reference configuration, the 3.2 m cubed lasing volume is surrounded by a graphite internal moderator and a region of heavy water. Results of neutronics calculations yield a critical mass of 4.9 U(235) in the form (235)UF6. The configuration appears capable of operating in a continuous steady-state mode. The average gas temperature in the core is 600 K and the UF6 partial pressure within the lasing volume is 0.34 atm.

Driving Meaningful Adaptation Action through an Adaptation Market Mechanism

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Butzengeiger-Geyer, Sonja; Koehler, Michel; Michaelowa, Axel

2011-07-01

Approaches and criteria for allocating adaptation funds vary significantly among current sources - UN-backed funds and bilateral cooperation - and to some extent lack transparency and consistency. Such funding risks being spent in a haphazard way that repeats many of the mistakes made in development assistance over the past decades. An Adaptation Market Mechanism (AMM) could contribute to efficient allocation of adaptation funds, promote adaptation activities by private and public actors through additional financial incentives, and raise additional and reliable adaptation money. This would help to avoid future public criticism of the effectiveness and efficiency of spending adaptation funding.The proposed AMM would specify mandatory adaptation targets, on international, regional or domestic level. Participants who achieve their targets either by generating adaptation units or by buying them in the market would incentivize private, commercial and institutional actors to develop adaptation projects that create verified adaptation units. A universally accepted and verifiable trading unit applicable to all types of adaptation activities would help to maximize the cost reduction potential for the AMM. We suggest applying net present value (NPV) for property saved; Disability Adjusted Life Years Saved (DALYS) for health benefits; and potentially a separate unit to consider the environmental benefits of an adaptation activity.(Author)

Design issues in adaptive web-site development

NARCIS (Netherlands)

De Bra, P.M.E.; Brusilovsky, P.; De Bra, P.M.E.

1999-01-01

For almost a decade people have been developing hypertext or hypermedia applications that adapt to some "features" of their users, like knowledge or preferences [Brusilovsky, 1996]. Recently some adaptive application environments have become available that use World Wide Web technology. Examples of

SUSTAINABLE ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN: REVIVING TRADITIONAL DESIGN AND ADAPTING MODERN SOLUTIONS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ibrahim Mostafa Eldemery

2010-03-01

Full Text Available Architecture is the art and science of designing which involves the manipulation of mass, space, volume, texture, light, shadow, materials, program and other elements in order to achieve an end which is aesthetic, functional and sustainable. Sustainability is a growing trend within the field of architecture, it is currently the most pressing, complex and challenging agenda facing architects. The industrialization and modernization of the world has led to increased initiatives regarding sustainability debate, where recently the word ‘sustainable’ entered into the consciousness of architects and became an essential concern in the discourse of architecture. What is more, we are nowadays witnessing the defense of former ways of life that affect not only the architecture, but also the habitat, work, and, in short, what can be called sustainability. Although sustainability at the human settlement scale has received great attention so far in most of the developing countries, it still remains the most glaring challenge in terms of its demand on resources and expertise. The aim today is to bring modern technologies and knowledge representing design solutions as guidelines like double skin façade, adapting traditional concepts, in tune with such practices to develop solutions that provide us with sustainable buildings that interact and are in harmony with natural climatic conditions. The paper will make an attempt at highlighting sustainability challenges we currently face including its implications for the built environment, in order to propose a sustainability evaluation framework, drawing out transferable lessons learned for future development.

Design and landing dynamic analysis of reusable landing leg for a near-space manned capsule

Science.gov (United States)

Yue, Shuai; Nie, Hong; Zhang, Ming; Wei, Xiaohui; Gan, Shengyong

2018-06-01

To improve the landing performance of a near-space manned capsule under various landing conditions, a novel landing system is designed that employs double chamber and single chamber dampers in the primary and auxiliary struts, respectively. A dynamic model of the landing system is established, and the damper parameters are determined by employing the design method. A single-leg drop test with different initial pitch angles is then conducted to compare and validate the simulation model. Based on the validated simulation model, seven critical landing conditions regarding nine crucial landing responses are found by combining the radial basis function (RBF) surrogate model and adaptive simulated annealing (ASA) optimization method. Subsequently, the adaptability of the landing system under critical landing conditions is analyzed. The results show that the simulation effectively results match the test results, which validates the accuracy of the dynamic model. In addition, all of the crucial responses under their corresponding critical landing conditions satisfy the design specifications, demonstrating the feasibility of the landing system.

Safe, Advanced, Adaptable Isolation System Eliminates the Need for Critical Lifts

Science.gov (United States)

Ginn, Starr

2011-01-01

The Starr Soft Support isolation system incorporates an automatically reconfigurable aircraft jack into NASA's existing 1-Hertz isolators. This enables an aircraft to float in mid-air without the need for a critical lift during ground vibration testing (GVT), significantly reducing testing risk, time, and costs. Currently incorporating the most advanced technology available, the 60,000-poundcapacity (27-metric-ton) isolation system is used for weight and measurement tests, control-surface free-play tests, and structural mode interaction tests without the need for any major reconfiguration, often saving days of time and significantly reducing labor costs. The Starr Soft Support isolation system consists of an aircraft-jacking device with three jacking points, each of which has an individual motor and accommodates up to 20,000 pounds (9 metric tons) for a total 60,000-pound (27-metric-ton) capacity. The system can be transported to the aircraft by forklift and placed at its jacking points using a pallet jack. The motors power the electric actuators, raising the aircraft above the ground until the landing gear can retract. Inflatable isolators then deploy, enabling the aircraft to float in mid-air, simulating a 1-Hertz free-free boundary condition. Inflatable isolators have been in use at NASA for years, enabling aircraft to literally float unsupported for highly accurate GVT. These isolators must be placed underneath the aircraft for this to occur. Traditionally, this is achieved by a critical lift a high-risk procedure in which a crane and flexible cord system are used to lift the aircraft. In contrast, the Starr Soft Support isolation system eliminates the need for critical lift by integrating the inflatable isolators into an aircraft jacking system. The system maintains vertical and horizontal isolating capabilities. The aircraft can be rolled onto the system, jacked up, and then the isolators can be inflated and positioned without any personnel needing to work

Uncertainty in adaptive capacity; Incertitudes dans la capacite d'adaptation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Neil Adger, W.; Vincent, K. [East Anglia Univ., Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, School of Environmental Sciences, Norwich (United Kingdom)

2005-03-01

The capacity to adapt is a critical element of the process of adaptation: it is the vector of resources that represent the asset base from which adaptation actions can be made. Adaptive capacity can in theory be identified and measured at various scales, from the individual to the nation. The assessment of uncertainty within such measures comes from the contested knowledge domain and theories surrounding the nature of the determinants of adaptive capacity and the human action of adaptation. While generic adaptive capacity at the national level, for example, is often postulated as being dependent on health, governance and political rights, and literacy, and economic well-being, the determinants of these variables at national levels are not widely understood. We outline the nature of this uncertainty for the major elements of adaptive capacity and illustrate these issues with the example of a social vulnerability index for countries in Africa. (authors)

Adaptive Leadership in Digital Transformation

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hansen, Anne Mette; Kræmmergaard, Pernille; Mathiassen, Lars

2012-01-01

Leaders’ ability to quickly adapt IT practices is especially critical in today’s increasingly turbulent environment with frequent changes in the competitive and technological landscape. However, developing such adaptive leadership is a difficult and complex process. Often, underlying assumptions...

Spanish-Language Adaptation of Morgeson and Humphrey's Work Design Questionnaire (WDQ).

Science.gov (United States)

Fernández Ríos, Manuel; Ramírez Vielma, Raúl G; Sánchez García, José Carlos; Bargsted Aravena, Mariana; Polo Vargas, Jean David; Ruiz Díaz, Miguel Ángel

2017-06-09

Since work organizations became the subject of scientific research, how to operationalize and measure dimensions of work design has been an issue, mainly due to concerns about internal consistency and factor structure. In response, Morgeson and Humphrey (2006) built the Work Design Questionnaire -WDQ-, an instrument that identifies and measures these dimensions in different work and organizational contexts. This paper presents the instruent's adaptation into Spanish using reliability and validity analysis and drawing on a sample of 1035 Spanish workers who hold various jobs in an array of occupational categories. The total instrument's internal consistency was Cronbach's alpha of .92 and the various scales' reliability ranged from .70 to .96, except for three dimensions. There was initially a difference in the comparative fit of the two versions' factor structures, but the model with 21 work characteristics (motivational -task and knowledge-, social, and work context) showed the highest goodness of fit of the various models tested, confirming previous results from the U.S. version as well as adaptations into other languages and contexts. CFA results indicated goodness of fit of factor configurations corresponding to each of the four major categories of work characteristics, with CFI and TLI around .90, as well as SRMR and RMSEA below .08. Thus it brings to the table a reliable, valid measure of work design with clear potential applications in research as well as professional practice, applications that could improve working conditions, boost productivity, and generate more personal and professional development opportunities for workers.

Space Mapping With Adaptive Response Correction for Microwave Design Optimization

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Koziel, S.; Bandler, J.W.; Madsen, Kaj

2009-01-01

at which the term was calculated, as in the surrogate model optimization process. In this paper, an adaptive response correction scheme is presented to work in conjunction with space-mapping optimization algorithms. This technique is designed to alleviate the difficulties of the standard output space......Output space mapping is a technique introduced to enhance the robustness of the space-mapping optimization process in case the space-mapped coarse model cannot provide sufficient matching with the fine model. The technique often works very well; however, in some cases it fails. Especially...

The DIAN-TU Next Generation Alzheimer’s prevention trial: adaptive design and disease progression model

Science.gov (United States)

Bateman, Randall J.; Benzinger, Tammie L.; Berry, Scott; Clifford, David B.; Duggan, Cynthia; Fagan, Anne M.; Fanning, Kathleen; Farlow, Martin R.; Hassenstab, Jason; McDade, Eric M.; Mills, Susan; Paumier, Katrina; Quintana, Melanie; Salloway, Stephen P.; Santacruz, Anna; Schneider, Lon S.; Wang, Guoqiao; Xiong, Chengjie

2016-01-01

INTRODUCTION The Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer Network Trials Unit (DIAN-TU) trial is an adaptive platform trial testing multiple drugs to slow or prevent the progression of Alzheimer’s disease in autosomal dominant Alzheimer’s disease (ADAD) families. With completion of enrollment of the first two drug arms, the DIAN-TU now plans to add new drugs to the platform, designated as the Next Generation Prevention Trial (NexGen). METHODS In collaboration with ADAD families, philanthropic organizations, academic leaders, the DIAN-TU Pharma Consortium, the NIH, and regulatory colleagues, the DIAN-TU developed innovative clinical study designs for the DIAN-TU NexGen trial. RESULTS Our expanded trials toolbox consists of a Disease Progression Model for ADAD, primary endpoint DIAN-TU cognitive performance composite, biomarker development, self-administered cognitive assessments, adaptive dose adjustments, and blinded data collection through the last participant completion. CONCLUSION These steps represent elements to improve efficacy of the adaptive platform trial and a continued effort to optimize prevention and treatment trials in ADAD. PMID:27583651

Model-Based Design of Adaptive Embedded Systems

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Basten, T.; Hamberg, R.; Reckers, F.; Verriet, J.

2013-01-01

Today’s embedded systems have to operate in a wide variety of dynamically changing environmental circumstances. Adaptivity, the ability of a system to autonomously adapt itself, is a means to optimise a system’s behaviour to accommodate changes in its environment. It involves making in-product

Complex Adaptive Systems of Systems (CASOS) engineering environment.

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Detry, Richard Joseph; Linebarger, John Michael; Finley, Patrick D.; Maffitt, S. Louise; Glass, Robert John, Jr.; Beyeler, Walter Eugene; Ames, Arlo Leroy

2012-02-01

Complex Adaptive Systems of Systems, or CASoS, are vastly complex physical-socio-technical systems which we must understand to design a secure future for the nation. The Phoenix initiative implements CASoS Engineering principles combining the bottom up Complex Systems and Complex Adaptive Systems view with the top down Systems Engineering and System-of-Systems view. CASoS Engineering theory and practice must be conducted together to develop a discipline that is grounded in reality, extends our understanding of how CASoS behave and allows us to better control the outcomes. The pull of applications (real world problems) is critical to this effort, as is the articulation of a CASoS Engineering Framework that grounds an engineering approach in the theory of complex adaptive systems of systems. Successful application of the CASoS Engineering Framework requires modeling, simulation and analysis (MS and A) capabilities and the cultivation of a CASoS Engineering Community of Practice through knowledge sharing and facilitation. The CASoS Engineering Environment, itself a complex adaptive system of systems, constitutes the two platforms that provide these capabilities.

Training Modalities to Increase Sensorimotor Adaptability

Science.gov (United States)

Bloomberg, J. J.; Mulavara, A. P.; Peters, B. T.; Brady, R.; Audas, C.; Cohen, H. S.

2009-01-01

During the acute phase of adaptation to novel gravitational environments, sensorimotor disturbances have the potential to disrupt the ability of astronauts to perform required mission tasks. The goal of our current series of studies is develop a sensorimotor adaptability (SA) training program designed to facilitate recovery of functional capabilities when astronauts transition to different gravitational environments. The project has conducted a series of studies investigating the efficacy of treadmill training combined with a variety of sensory challenges (incongruent visual input, support surface instability) designed to increase adaptability. SA training using a treadmill combined with exposure to altered visual input was effective in producing increased adaptability in a more complex over-ground ambulatory task on an obstacle course. This confirms that for a complex task like walking, treadmill training contains enough of the critical features of overground walking to be an effective training modality. SA training can be optimized by using a periodized training schedule. Test sessions that each contain short-duration exposures to multiple perturbation stimuli allows subjects to acquire a greater ability to rapidly reorganize appropriate response strategies when encountering a novel sensory environment. Using a treadmill mounted on top of a six degree-of-freedom motion base platform we investigated locomotor training responses produced by subjects introduced to a dynamic walking surface combined with alterations in visual flow. Subjects who received this training had improved locomotor performance and faster reaction times when exposed to the novel sensory stimuli compared to control subjects. Results also demonstrate that individual sensory biases (i.e. increased visual dependency) can predict adaptive responses to novel sensory environments suggesting that individual training prescription can be developed to enhance adaptability. These data indicate that SA

Neutronic Design of an Accelerator Driven Sub-Critical Research Reactor

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pesic, M.

2002-01-01

Conceptual design of an accelerator driven sub-critical research reactor (ADSRR), as a new project in the Vinca Institute of Nuclear Sciences, is suggested for support to the Ministry of science, technologies and development of Republic Serbia, Yugoslavia. This paper show initial results of neutronic analyses of the proposed ADSRR carried out by Monte Carlo based MCNP and SHIELD codes. According to the proposal, the ADSRR would be constructed, in a later phase, at high-energy channel H5B of the VINCY cyclotron of the TESLA Accelerator Installation, that is under completion in the Vinca Institute. The fuel elements of 80%-enriched uranium dioxide dispersed in aluminium matrix, available in the Vinca Institute, are proposed for the ADSRR core design. The HEU fuel elements are placed in aluminium tubes filled by the 'primary moderator' - light water. These 'fuel tubes' are placed in a square lattice within lead matrix in a stainless steel tank. The lead is used as a 'secondary moderator' in the core and as the axial and radial reflector. Such design of the ADSRR shows that this small low neutron flux system can be used as an experimental 'demonstration' ADS with some neutron characteristics similar to proposed well-known lead moderated and cooled power sub-critical ADS with intermediate or fast neutron spectrum. The proposed experimental ADSRR, beside usage as a valuable research machine in reactor and neutron physics, will contribute to following and developing new nuclear technologies in the country, useful for eventual nuclear power option and nuclear waste incineration in future. (author)

A Return to Innovative Engineering Design, Critical Thinking and Systems Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Camarda, Charles J.

2007-01-01

I believe we are facing a critical time where innovative engineering design is of paramount importance to the success of our aerospace industry. However, the very qualities and attributes necessary for enhancing, educating, and mentoring a creative spirit are in decline in important areas. The importance of creativity and innovation in this country was emphasized by a special edition of the Harvard Business Review OnPoint entitled: "The Creative Company" which compiled a series of past and present articles on the subject of creativity and innovation and stressed its importance to our national economy. There is also a recognition of a lack of engineering, critical thinking and problem-solving skills in our education systems and a trend toward trying to enhance those skills by developing K-12 educational programs such as Project Lead the Way, "Science for All Americans", Benchmarks 2061 , etc. In addition, with respect to spacecraft development, we have a growing need for young to mid-level engineers with appropriate experience and skills in spacecraft design, development, analysis, testing, and systems engineering. As the Director of Engineering at NASA's Johnson Space Center, I realized that sustaining engineering support of an operational human spacecraft such as the Space Shuttle is decidedly different than engineering design and development skills necessary for designing a new spacecraft such as the Crew Exploration Vehicle of the Constellation Program. We learned a very important lesson post Columbia in that the Space Shuttle is truly an experimental and not an operational vehicle and the strict adherence to developed rules and processes and chains of command of an inherently bureaucratic organizational structure will not protect us from a host of known unknowns let alone unknown unknowns. There are no strict rules, processes, or procedures for understanding anomalous results of an experiment, anomalies with an experimental spacecraft like Shuttle, or in the

Critical Points in Distance Learning System

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Airina Savickaitė

2013-08-01

Full Text Available Purpose – This article presents the results of distance learning system analysis, i.e. the critical elements of the distance learning system. The critical points of distance learning are a part of distance education online environment interactivity/community process model. The most important is the fact that the critical point is associated with distance learning participants. Design/methodology/approach – Comparative review of articles and analysis of distance learning module. Findings – A modern man is a lifelong learner and distance learning is a way to be a modern person. The focus on a learner and feedback is the most important thing of learning distance system. Also, attention should be paid to the lecture-appropriate knowledge and ability to convey information. Distance system adaptation is the way to improve the learner’s learning outcomes. Research limitations/implications – Different learning disciplines and learning methods may have different critical points. Practical implications – The information of analysis could be important for both lecturers and students, who studies distance education systems. There are familiar critical points which may deteriorate the quality of learning. Originality/value – The study sought to develop remote systems for applications in order to improve the quality of knowledge. Keywords: distance learning, process model, critical points. Research type: review of literature and general overview.

Design and criticality considerations for 9977 and 9978 shipping packages

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Reed, R.; Biswas, D.; Abramczyk, G.

2009-01-01

Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) has developed two new, Type B, state-of-the-art, general purpose, fissile material Shipping Packages, designated as 9977 and 9978, as replacements for the U.S. Dept. of Transportation (DOT) specification 6M container. The packages accommodate plutonium, uranium, and other special nuclear materials in bulk quantities and in many forms with capabilities exceeding those of the 6M. A nuclear criticality safety evaluation demonstrates the safe configurations of the new shipping container for plutonium and uranium metal/oxide loading under various conditions for the Safety Analysis Report for Packaging (SARP). The evaluation is in compliance with the performance requirements of 10CFR 71, specifically 10CFR71.55 and 71.59. The criticality safety index (CSI) is 1.0 for most of the contents (Max. Pu Loading -4.4 kg). (authors)

Conflict adaptation in schizophrenia: reviewing past and previewing future efforts.

Science.gov (United States)

Abrahamse, Elger; Ruitenberg, Marit; Duthoo, Wout; Sabbe, Bernard; Morrens, Manuel; van Dijck, Jean-Philippe

2016-05-01

Cognitive control impairments have been suggested to be a critical component in the overall cognitive deficits observed in patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. Here, we zoom in on a specific function of cognitive control, conflict adaptation. Abnormal neural activity patterns have been observed for patients diagnosed with schizophrenia in core conflict adaptation areas such as anterior cingulate cortex and prefrontal cortex. On the one hand, this strongly indicates that conflict adaptation is affected. On the other hand, however, outcomes at the behavioural level are needed to create a window into a precise interpretation of this abnormal neural activity. We present a narrative review of behavioural work within the context of conflict adaptation in schizophrenia, focusing on various major conflict adaptation markers: congruency sequence effects, proportion congruency effects, and post-error and post-conflict slowing. The review emphasises both methodological and theoretical aspects that are relevant to the understanding of conflict adaptation in schizophrenia. Based on the currently available set of behavioural studies on conflict adaptation, no clear-cut answer can be provided as to the precise conflict adaptation processes that are impaired (and to what extent) in schizophrenia populations. Future work is needed in state-of-the-art designs in order to reach better insight into the specifics of conflict adaptation impairments associated with schizophrenia.

Flight critical system design guidelines and validation methods

Science.gov (United States)

Holt, H. M.; Lupton, A. O.; Holden, D. G.

1984-01-01

Efforts being expended at NASA-Langley to define a validation methodology, techniques for comparing advanced systems concepts, and design guidelines for characterizing fault tolerant digital avionics are described with an emphasis on the capabilities of AIRLAB, an environmentally controlled laboratory. AIRLAB has VAX 11/750 and 11/780 computers with an aggregate of 22 Mb memory and over 650 Mb storage, interconnected at 256 kbaud. An additional computer is programmed to emulate digital devices. Ongoing work is easily accessed at user stations by either chronological or key word indexing. The CARE III program aids in analyzing the capabilities of test systems to recover from faults. An additional code, the semi-Markov unreliability program (SURE) generates upper and lower reliability bounds. The AIRLAB facility is mainly dedicated to research on designs of digital flight-critical systems which must have acceptable reliability before incorporation into aircraft control systems. The digital systems would be too costly to submit to a full battery of flight tests and must be initially examined with the AIRLAB simulation capabilities.

Therapist-Designed Adaptive Riding in Children With Cerebral Palsy : Results of a Feasibility Study

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Angsupaisal, Mattana; Visser, Baudina; Alkema, Anne; Meinsma-van der Tuin, Marja; Maathuis, Carel G. B.; Reinders-Messelink, Heleen; Hadders-Algra, Mijna

Background. It is debatable whether adaptive riding (AR) in children with cerebral palsy (CP) improves postural control and gross motor development. Objective. The study aim was to explore the feasibility of an extensive assessment protocol for a randomized controlled trial of therapist-designed

Good Practice in Designing and Implementing National Monitoring Systems for Adaptation to Climate Change

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Naswa, Prakriti; Trærup, Sara Lærke Meltofte; Bouroncle, Claudia

In this report, we identify, analyse and compare international good practices in the design and implementation of national monitoring and evaluating indicator systems for climate change adaptation. This first chapter provides an introduction to the context and key terminology in the domain...

Optimal Multitrial Prediction Combination and Subject-Specific Adaptation for Minimal Training Brain Switch Designs

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Spyrou, L.; Blokland, Y.M.; Farquhar, J.D.R.; Bruhn, J.

2016-01-01

Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) systems are traditionally designed by taking into account user-specific data to enable practical use. More recently, subject independent (SI) classification algorithms have been developed which bypass the subject specific adaptation and enable rapid use of the system.

Optimal multitrial prediction combination and subject-specific adaptation for minimal training brain switch designs

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Spyrou, L.; Blokland, Y.M.; Farquhar, J.D.R.; Bruhn, J.

2016-01-01

Brain-Computer Interface systems are traditionally designed by taking into account user-specific data to enable practical use. More recently, subject independent (SI) classification algorithms have been developed which bypass the subject specific adaptation and enable rapid use of the system. A

ALE-PSO: An Adaptive Swarm Algorithm to Solve Design Problems of Laminates

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Paolo Vannucci

2009-04-01

Full Text Available This paper presents an adaptive PSO algorithm whose numerical parameters can be updated following a scheduled protocol respecting some known criteria of convergence in order to enhance the chances to reach the global optimum of a hard combinatorial optimization problem, such those encountered in global optimization problems of composite laminates. Some examples concerning hard design problems are provided, showing the effectiveness of the approach.

DESIGN OF ROBUST COMMAND TO LINE-OF-SIGHT GUIDANCE LAW: A FUZZY ADAPTIVE APPROACH

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

ESMAIL SADEGHINASAB

2016-11-01

Full Text Available In this paper, the design of command to line-of-sight (CLOS missile guidance law is addressed. Taking a three dimensional guidance model, the tracking control problem is formulated. To solve the target tracking problem, the feedback linearization controller is first designed. Although such control scheme possesses the simplicity property, but it presents the acceptable performance only in the absence of perturbations. In order to ensure the robustness properties against model uncertainties, a fuzzy adaptive algorithm is proposed with two parts including a fuzzy (Mamdani system, whose rules are constructed based on missile guidance, and a so-called rule modifier to compensate the fuzzy rules, using the negative gradient method. Compared with some previous works, such control strategy provides a faster time response without large control efforts. The performance of feedback linearization controller is also compared with that of fuzzy adaptive strategy via various simulations.

Decomobil, Deliverable 3.6, Human Centred Design for Safety Critical Transport Systems

OpenAIRE

PAUZIE, Annie; MENDOZA, Lucile; SIMOES, Anabela; BELLET, Thierry; MOREAU, Fabien

2014-01-01

The scientific seminar on 'Human Centred Design for Safety Critical Transport Systems' organized in the framework of DECOMOBIL has been held the 8th of September 2014 in Lisbon, Portugal, hosted by ADI/ISG. The aims of the event were to present the scientific problematic related to the safety of the complex transport systems and the increasing importance of human-­centred design, with a specific focus on Resilience Engineering concept, a new approach to safety management in highly complex sys...

Responsibility for private sector adaptation to climate change

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tina Schneider

2014-06-01

Full Text Available The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007 indicates that vulnerable industries should adapt to the increasing likelihood of extreme weather events along with slowly shifting mean annual temperatures and precipitation patterns, to prevent major damages or periods of inoperability in the future. Most articles in the literature on business management frame organizational adaptation to climate change as a private action. This makes adaptation the sole responsibility of a company, for its sole benefit, and overlooks the fact that some companies provide critical goods and services such a food, water, electricity, and medical care, that are so vital to society that even a short-term setback in operations could put public security at risk. This raises the following questions: (1 Who is responsible for climate change adaptation by private-sector suppliers of critical infrastructure? (2 How can those who are identified to be responsible, actually be held to assume their responsibility for adapting to climate change? These questions will be addressed through a comprehensive review of the literature on business management, complemented by a review of specialized literature on public management. This review leads to several conclusions. Even though tasks that formerly belonged to the state have been taken over by private companies, the state still holds ultimate responsibility in the event of failure of private-sector owned utilities, insofar as they are "critical infrastructure." Therefore, it remains the state's responsibility to foster adaptation to climate change with appropriate action. In theory, effective ways of assuming this responsibility, while enabling critical infrastructure providers the flexibility adapt to climate change, would be to delegate adaptation to an agency, or to conduct negotiations with stakeholders. In view of this theory, Germany will be used as a case study to demonstrate how private-sector critical infrastructure

What do we mean by Human-Centered Design of Life-Critical Systems?

Science.gov (United States)

Boy, Guy A

2012-01-01

Human-centered design is not a new approach to design. Aerospace is a good example of a life-critical systems domain where participatory design was fully integrated, involving experimental test pilots and design engineers as well as many other actors of the aerospace engineering community. This paper provides six topics that are currently part of the requirements of the Ph.D. Program in Human-Centered Design of the Florida Institute of Technology (FIT.) This Human-Centered Design program offers principles, methods and tools that support human-centered sustainable products such as mission or process control environments, cockpits and hospital operating rooms. It supports education and training of design thinkers who are natural leaders, and understand complex relationships among technology, organizations and people. We all need to understand what we want to do with technology, how we should organize ourselves to a better life and finally find out whom we are and have become. Human-centered design is being developed for all these reasons and issues.

Monitoring the Performance of a Neuro-Adaptive Controller

Science.gov (United States)

Schumann, Johann; Gupta, Pramod

2004-01-01

Traditional control has proven to be ineffective to deal with catastrophic changes or slow degradation of complex, highly nonlinear systems like aircraft or spacecraft, robotics, or flexible manufacturing systems. Control systems which can adapt toward changes in the plant have been proposed as they offer many advantages (e.g., better performance, controllability of aircraft despite of a damaged wing). In the last few years, use of neural networks in adaptive controllers (neuro-adaptive control) has been studied actively. Neural networks of various architectures have been used successfully for online learning adaptive controllers. In such a typical control architecture, the neural network receives as an input the current deviation between desired and actual plant behavior and, by on-line training, tries to minimize this discrepancy (e.g.; by producing a control augmentation signal). Even though neuro-adaptive controllers offer many advantages, they have not been used in mission- or safety-critical applications, because performance and safety guarantees cannot b e provided at development time-a major prerequisite for safety certification (e.g., by the FAA or NASA). Verification and Validation (V&V) of an adaptive controller requires the development of new analysis techniques which can demonstrate that the control system behaves safely under all operating conditions. Because of the requirement to adapt toward unforeseen changes during operation, i.e., in real time, design-time V&V is not sufficient.

Design, realization and structural testing of a compliant adaptable wing

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Molinari, G; Arrieta, A F; Ermanni, P; Quack, M; Morari, M

2015-01-01

This paper presents the design, optimization, realization and testing of a novel wing morphing concept, based on distributed compliance structures, and actuated by piezoelectric elements. The adaptive wing features ribs with a selectively compliant inner structure, numerically optimized to achieve aerodynamically efficient shape changes while simultaneously withstanding aeroelastic loads. The static and dynamic aeroelastic behavior of the wing, and the effect of activating the actuators, is assessed by means of coupled 3D aerodynamic and structural simulations. To demonstrate the capabilities of the proposed morphing concept and optimization procedure, the wings of a model airplane are designed and manufactured according to the presented approach. The goal is to replace conventional ailerons, thus to achieve controllability in roll purely by morphing. The mechanical properties of the manufactured components are characterized experimentally, and used to create a refined and correlated finite element model. The overall stiffness, strength, and actuation capabilities are experimentally tested and successfully compared with the numerical prediction. To counteract the nonlinear hysteretic behavior of the piezoelectric actuators, a closed-loop controller is implemented, and its capability of accurately achieving the desired shape adaptation is evaluated experimentally. Using the correlated finite element model, the aeroelastic behavior of the manufactured wing is simulated, showing that the morphing concept can provide sufficient roll authority to allow controllability of the flight. The additional degrees of freedom offered by morphing can be also used to vary the plane lift coefficient, similarly to conventional flaps. The efficiency improvements offered by this technique are evaluated numerically, and compared to the performance of a rigid wing. (paper)

Adaptive control of 5 DOF upper-limb exoskeleton robot with improved safety.

Science.gov (United States)

Kang, Hao-Bo; Wang, Jian-Hui

2013-11-01

This paper studies an adaptive control strategy for a class of 5 DOF upper-limb exoskeleton robot with a special safety consideration. The safety requirement plays a critical role in the clinical treatment when assisting patients with shoulder, elbow and wrist joint movements. With the objective of assuring the tracking performance of the pre-specified operations, the proposed adaptive controller is firstly designed to be robust to the model uncertainties. To further improve the safety and fault-tolerance in the presence of unknown large parameter variances or even actuator faults, the adaptive controller is on-line updated according to the information provided by an adaptive observer without additional sensors. An output tracking performance is well achieved with a tunable error bound. The experimental example also verifies the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme. © 2013 ISA. Published by ISA. All rights reserved.

Universal Design for Learning: Critical Need Areas for People with Learning Disabilities

Science.gov (United States)

Strobel, Wendy; Arthanat, Sajay; Bauer, Stephen; Flagg, Jennifer

2007-01-01

The primary market research outlined in this paper was conducted by the Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center on Technology Transfer to identify critical technology needs for people with learning disabilities. Based on the research conducted, the underlying context of these technology needs is Universal Design for Learning (UDL). The paper…

Evaluation of an adaptive game that uses EEG measures validated during the design process as inputs to a biocybernetic loop

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kate eEwing

2016-05-01

Full Text Available Biocybernetic adaptation is a form of physiological computing whereby real-time data streaming from the brain and body is used by a negative control loop to adapt the user interface. This paper describes the development of an adaptive game system that is designed to maximize player engagement by utilizing changes in real-time EEG to adjust the level of game demand. The research consists of four main stages (1 the development of a conceptual framework upon which to model the interaction between person and system, (2 the validation of the psychophysiological inference underpinning the loop, (3 the construction of a working prototype, and (4 an evaluation of the adaptive game. Two studies are reported; the first demonstrates the sensitivity of EEG power in the (frontal theta and (parietal alpha bands to changing levels of game demand. These variables were then reformulated within the working biocybernetic control loop designed to maximize player engagement. The second study evaluated the performance of an adaptive game of Tetris with respect to system behavior and user experience. Important issues for the design and evaluation of closed-loop interfaces are discussed.

Evaluation of an Adaptive Game that Uses EEG Measures Validated during the Design Process as Inputs to a Biocybernetic Loop.

Science.gov (United States)

Ewing, Kate C; Fairclough, Stephen H; Gilleade, Kiel

2016-01-01

Biocybernetic adaptation is a form of physiological computing whereby real-time data streaming from the brain and body is used by a negative control loop to adapt the user interface. This article describes the development of an adaptive game system that is designed to maximize player engagement by utilizing changes in real-time electroencephalography (EEG) to adjust the level of game demand. The research consists of four main stages: (1) the development of a conceptual framework upon which to model the interaction between person and system; (2) the validation of the psychophysiological inference underpinning the loop; (3) the construction of a working prototype; and (4) an evaluation of the adaptive game. Two studies are reported. The first demonstrates the sensitivity of EEG power in the (frontal) theta and (parietal) alpha bands to changing levels of game demand. These variables were then reformulated within the working biocybernetic control loop designed to maximize player engagement. The second study evaluated the performance of an adaptive game of Tetris with respect to system behavior and user experience. Important issues for the design and evaluation of closed-loop interfaces are discussed.

Adaptive Backstepping Controller Design for the Anti-Synchronization of Identical WINDMI Chaotic Systems with Unknown Parameters and its SPICE Implementation

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

S. Vaidyanathan

2014-11-01

Full Text Available This paper derives new results for the adaptive backstepping controller design for the anti-synchronization of identical WINDMI systems (Wind-Magnetosphere-Ionosphere models with unknown parameters and also details the SPICE implementation of the proposed adaptive backstepping controller. In the anti-synchronization of chaotic systems, the sum of the outputs of master and slave systems is made to converge asymptotically to zero with time. The adaptive controller design for the anti-synchronization of identical WINDMI systems with unknown parameters has been established by applying Lyapunov stability theory. MATLAB simulations have been shown for the illustration of the adaptive anti-synchronizing backstepping controller for identical WINDMI chaotic systems. Finally, the proposed controller has been implemented using SPICE and circuit simulation results have been detailed.

Diversification and intensification of agricultural adaptation from global to local scales.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Minjie Chen

Full Text Available Smallholder farming systems are vulnerable to a number of challenges, including continued population growth, urbanization, income disparities, land degradation, decreasing farm size and productivity, all of which are compounded by uncertainty of climatic patterns. Understanding determinants of smallholder farming practices is critical for designing and implementing successful interventions, including climate change adaptation programs. We examine two dimensions wherein smallholder farmers may adapt agricultural practices; through intensification (i.e., adopt more practices or diversification (i.e. adopt different practices. We use data on 5314 randomly sampled households located in 38 sites in 15 countries across four regions (East and West Africa, South Asia, and Central America. We estimate empirical models designed to assess determinants of both intensification and diversification of adaptation activities at global scales. Aspects of adaptive capacity that are found to increase intensification of adaptation globally include variables associated with access to information and human capital, financial considerations, assets, household infrastructure and experience. In contrast, there are few global drivers of adaptive diversification, with a notable exception being access to weather information, which also increases adaptive intensification. Investigating reasons for adaptation indicate that conditions present in underdeveloped markets provide the primary impetus for adaptation, even in the context of climate change. We also compare determinants across spatial scales, which reveals a variety of local avenues through which policy interventions can relax economic constraints and boost agricultural adaptation for both intensification and diversification. For example, access to weather information does not affect intensification adaptation in Africa, but is significant at several sites in Bangladesh and India. Moreover, this information leads to

Diversification and intensification of agricultural adaptation from global to local scales

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Minjie; Wichmann, Bruno; Luckert, Marty; Winowiecki, Leigh; Förch, Wiebke

2018-01-01

Smallholder farming systems are vulnerable to a number of challenges, including continued population growth, urbanization, income disparities, land degradation, decreasing farm size and productivity, all of which are compounded by uncertainty of climatic patterns. Understanding determinants of smallholder farming practices is critical for designing and implementing successful interventions, including climate change adaptation programs. We examine two dimensions wherein smallholder farmers may adapt agricultural practices; through intensification (i.e., adopt more practices) or diversification (i.e. adopt different practices). We use data on 5314 randomly sampled households located in 38 sites in 15 countries across four regions (East and West Africa, South Asia, and Central America). We estimate empirical models designed to assess determinants of both intensification and diversification of adaptation activities at global scales. Aspects of adaptive capacity that are found to increase intensification of adaptation globally include variables associated with access to information and human capital, financial considerations, assets, household infrastructure and experience. In contrast, there are few global drivers of adaptive diversification, with a notable exception being access to weather information, which also increases adaptive intensification. Investigating reasons for adaptation indicate that conditions present in underdeveloped markets provide the primary impetus for adaptation, even in the context of climate change. We also compare determinants across spatial scales, which reveals a variety of local avenues through which policy interventions can relax economic constraints and boost agricultural adaptation for both intensification and diversification. For example, access to weather information does not affect intensification adaptation in Africa, but is significant at several sites in Bangladesh and India. Moreover, this information leads to diversification of

Inhabiting Adaptive Architecture

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Holger Schnädelbach

2017-12-01

Full Text Available Adaptive Architecture concerns buildings that are specifically designed to adapt to their inhabitants and to their environments. Work in this space has a very long history, with a number of adaptive buildings emerging during the modernist period, such as Rietveld’s Schröder house, Gaudi’s Casa Batlló and Chareau's Maison de Verre. Such early work included manual adaptivity, even if that was motor-assisted. Today, buildings have started to combine this with varying degrees of automation and designed-for adaptivity is commonplace in office buildings and eco homes, where lighting, air conditioning, access and energy generation respond to and influence the behaviour of people, and the internal and external climate.

Three Experiments Examining the Use of Electroencephalogram,Event-Related Potentials, and Heart-Rate Variability for Real-Time Human-Centered Adaptive Automation Design

Science.gov (United States)

Prinzel, Lawrence J., III; Parasuraman, Raja; Freeman, Frederick G.; Scerbo, Mark W.; Mikulka, Peter J.; Pope, Alan T.

2003-01-01

Adaptive automation represents an advanced form of human-centered automation design. The approach to automation provides for real-time and model-based assessments of human-automation interaction, determines whether the human has entered into a hazardous state of awareness and then modulates the task environment to keep the operator in-the-loop , while maintaining an optimal state of task engagement and mental alertness. Because adaptive automation has not matured, numerous challenges remain, including what the criteria are, for determining when adaptive aiding and adaptive function allocation should take place. Human factors experts in the area have suggested a number of measures including the use of psychophysiology. This NASA Technical Paper reports on three experiments that examined the psychophysiological measures of event-related potentials, electroencephalogram, and heart-rate variability for real-time adaptive automation. The results of the experiments confirm the efficacy of these measures for use in both a developmental and operational role for adaptive automation design. The implications of these results and future directions for psychophysiology and human-centered automation design are discussed.

3D design and electric simulation of a silicon drift detector using a spiral biasing adapter

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Li, Yu-yun; Xiong, Bo [School of Materials Science and Engineering, Xiangtan University, Xiangtan 411105 (China); Center for Semiconductor Particle and photon Imaging Detector, Development and Fabrication, Xiangtan University, Xiangtan 411105 (China); Li, Zheng, E-mail: zhengli58@gmail.com [School of Materials Science and Engineering, Xiangtan University, Xiangtan 411105 (China); Center for Semiconductor Particle and photon Imaging Detector, Development and Fabrication, Xiangtan University, Xiangtan 411105 (China)

2016-09-21

The detector system of combining a spiral biasing adapter (SBA) with a silicon drift detector (SBA-SDD) is largely different from the traditional silicon drift detector (SDD), including the spiral SDD. It has a spiral biasing adapter of the same design as a traditional spiral SDD and an SDD with concentric rings having the same radius. Compared with the traditional spiral SDD, the SBA-SDD separates the spiral's functions of biasing adapter and the p–n junction definition. In this paper, the SBA-SDD is simulated using a Sentaurus TCAD tool, which is a full 3D device simulation tool. The simulated electric characteristics include electric potential, electric field, electron concentration, and single event effect. Because of the special design of the SBA-SDD, the SBA can generate an optimum drift electric field in the SDD, comparable with the conventional spiral SDD, while the SDD can be designed with concentric rings to reduce surface area. Also the current and heat generated in the SBA are separated from the SDD. To study the single event response, we simulated the induced current caused by incident heavy ions (20 and 50 μm penetration length) with different linear energy transfer (LET). The SBA-SDD can be used just like a conventional SDD, such as X-ray detector for energy spectroscopy and imaging, etc. - Highlights: • The separation of the spiral biasing adapter and SDD is a new concept. • The distribution of the electric potential is symmetrical around the axis through the anode. • The region with higher electron concentrations defines the drift channel.

Design of Hemispherical Downward-Facing Vessel for Critical Heat Flux Experiment

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Hwang, J. S.; Suh, K. Y.

2009-01-01

The in-vessel retention (IVR) is one of major severe accident management strategies adopted by some operating nuclear power plants during a severe accident. The recent Shin-Gori Units 3 and 4 of the Advanced Power Reactor 1400 MWe (APR1400) have adopted the external reactor vessel cooling (ERVC) by reactor cavity flooding as major severe accident management strategy. The ERVC in the APR1400 design resorts to active flooding system using thermal insulator. The Corium Attack Stopper Apparatus Spherical Channel (CASA SC) tests are conducted to measure the critical power and critical heat flux (CHF) on a downward hemispherical vessel scaled down from the APR1400 lower head by 1/10 on a linear scale. CASA is designed through scaling and thermal analysis to simulate the APR1400 vessel and thermal insulator. The heated vessel of CASA SC represents the external surface of a hemisphere submerged vessel in water. The heated vessel plays an important role in the ERVC experiment depending on the configuration of oxide pool and metallic layer. Hand calculation and computational analysis are performed to produce high heat flux from the downward facing hemisphere in excess of 1 MW/m 2

Conceptual design for accelerator-driven sodium-cooled sub-critical transmutation reactors using scale laws

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lee, Kwang Gu; Chang, Soon Heung [Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Taejon (Korea, Republic of)

1998-12-31

The feasibility study on conceptual design methodology for accelerator-driven sodium-cooled sub-critical transmutation reactors has been conducted to optimize the design parameters from the scale laws and validates the reactor performance with the integrated code system. A 1000 MWth sodium-cooled sub-critical transmutation reactor has been scaled and verified through the methodology in this paper, which is referred to Advanced Liquid Metal Reactor (ALMR). A Pb-Bi target material and a partitioned fuel are the liquid phases, and they are cooled by the circulation of secondary Pb-Bi coolant and by primary sodium coolant, respectively. Overall key design parameters are generated from the scale laws and they are improved and validated by the integrated code system. Integrated Code System (ICS) consists of LAHET, HMCNP, ORIGEN2, and COMMIX codes and some files. Through ICS the target region, the core region, and thermal-hydraulic related regions are analyzed once-through Results of conceptual design are attached in this paper. 5 refs., 4 figs., 1 tab. (Author)

Ethical Considerations in Designing Adaptive Persuasive Games

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Pedersen, Christoffer Holmgård; Khaled, Rilla; Yannakakis, Georgios N.

In this poster, we describe an ongoing project concerning the development of an Adaptive Treatment Game (ATG) for treating Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The ATG uses biofeedback and computer game technology to enable multiple treatment techniques and goals. We examine how a multidisciplinary ap...... approach shaped the prototype and we discuss the ethical implications of creating a self-adaptive, semiautonomous treatment game....

78 FR 39237 - Endangered and Threatened Wildlife and Plants; Designation of Critical Habitat for the Jaguar

Science.gov (United States)

2013-07-01

... sever connectivity within these critical habitat units and subunits, and could constitute adverse... Habitat for the Jaguar AGENCY: Fish and Wildlife Service, Interior. ACTION: Revised proposed rule... reopening of the public comment period on the August 20, 2012, proposed designation of critical habitat for...

Adapting the Wii Fit Balance Board to Enable Active Video Game Play by Wheelchair Users: User-Centered Design and Usability Evaluation.

Science.gov (United States)

Thirumalai, Mohanraj; Kirkland, William B; Misko, Samuel R; Padalabalanarayanan, Sangeetha; Malone, Laurie A

2018-03-06

Active video game (AVG) playing, also known as "exergaming," is increasingly employed to promote physical activity across all age groups. The Wii Fit Balance Board is a popular gaming controller for AVGs and is used in a variety of settings. However, the commercial off-the-shelf (OTS) design poses several limitations. It is inaccessible to wheelchair users, does not support the use of stabilization assistive devices, and requires the ability to shift the center of balance (COB) in all directions to fully engage in game play. The aim of this study was to design an adapted version of the Wii Fit Balance Board to overcome the identified limitations and to evaluate the usability of the newly designed adapted Wii Fit Balance Board in persons with mobility impairments. In a previous study, 16 participants tried the OTS version of the Wii Fit Balance Board. On the basis of observed limitations, a team of engineers developed and adapted the design of the Wii Fit Balance Board, which was then subjected to multiple iterations of user feedback and design tweaks. On design completion, we recruited a new pool of participants with mobility impairments for a larger study. During their first visit, we assessed lower-extremity function using selected mobility tasks from the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health. During a subsequent session, participants played 2 sets of games on both the OTS and adapted versions of the Wii Fit Balance Board. Order of controller version played first was randomized. After participants played each version, we administered the System Usability Scale (SUS) to examine the participants' perceived usability. The adapted version of the Wii Fit Balance Board resulting from the user-centered design approach met the needs of a variety of users. The adapted controller (1) allowed manual wheelchair users to engage in game play, which was previously not possible; (2) included Americans with Disabilities Act-compliant handrails as part

A CRITICAL REVIEW OF INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN PROCESS OF DISTANCE LEARNING SYSTEM

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Muhammad Ajmal CHAUDRY

2010-07-01

Full Text Available Instructional design refers to planning, development, delivery and evaluation of instructional system. It is an applied field of study aiming at the application of descriptive research outcomes in regular instructional settings. The present study was designed to critically review the process of instructional design at Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU. It was survey study. Population of the study consisted of 120 academicians of different academic department of AIOU. Survey was conducted through questionnaire for academic staff. It was revealed that need assessment is not done before conceiving the outlines of a course. Also the course did not contain sufficient activities, picture and illustrations. It was also found that did not confirm the course objectives. The study recommended that proper of the course writers for distance learning may be arranged.

The needs of the relatives in the adult intensive care unit: Cultural adaptation and psychometric properties of the Chilean-Spanish version of the Critical Care Family Needs Inventory.

Science.gov (United States)

Rojas Silva, Noelia; Padilla Fortunatti, Cristobal; Molina Muñoz, Yerko; Amthauer Rojas, Macarena

2017-12-01

The admission of a patient to an intensive care unit is an extraordinary event for their family. Although the Critical Care Family Needs Inventory is the most commonly used questionnaire for understanding the needs of relatives of critically ill patients, no Spanish-language version is available. The aim of this study was to culturally adapt and validate theCritical Care Family Needs Inventory in a sample of Chilean relatives of intensive care patients. The back-translated version of the inventory was culturally adapted following input from 12 intensive care and family experts. Then, it was evaluated by 10 relatives of recently transferred ICU patients and pre-tested in 10 relatives of patients that were in the intensive care unit. Psychometric properties were assessed through exploratory factor analysis and Cronbach's α in a sample of 251 relatives of critically ill patients. The Chilean-Spanish version of the Critical Care Family Needs Inventoryhad minimal semantic modifications and no items were deleted. A two factor solution explained the 31% of the total instrument variance. Reliability of the scale was good (α=0.93), as were both factors (α=0.87; α=0.93). The Chilean-Spanish version of theCritical Care Family Needs Inventory was found valid and reliable for understanding the needs of relatives of patients in acute care settings. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Simulation and Rapid Prototyping of Adaptive Control Systems using the Adaptive Blockset for Simulink

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ravn, Ole

1998-01-01

The paper describes the design considerations and implementational aspects of the Adaptive Blockset for Simulink which has been developed in a prototype implementation. The concept behind the Adaptive Blockset for Simulink is to bridge the gap between simulation and prototype controller implement...... design, controller and state variable filter.The use of the Adaptive Blockset is demonstrated using a simple laboratory setup. Both the use of the blockset for simulation and for rapid prototyping of a real-time controller are shown.......The paper describes the design considerations and implementational aspects of the Adaptive Blockset for Simulink which has been developed in a prototype implementation. The concept behind the Adaptive Blockset for Simulink is to bridge the gap between simulation and prototype controller...... implementation. This is done using the code generation capabilities of Real Time Workshop in combination with C s-function blocks for adaptive control in Simulink. In the paper the design of each group of blocks normally found in adaptive controllers is outlined. The block types are, identification, controller...

Ensuring Success of Adaptive Control Research Through Project Lifecycle Risk Mitigation

Science.gov (United States)

Pavlock, Kate M.

2011-01-01

Lessons Learne: 1. Design-out unnecessary risk to prevent excessive mitigation management during flight. 2. Consider iterative checkouts to confirm or improve human factor characteristics. 3. Consider the total flight test profile to uncover unanticipated human-algorithm interactions. 4. Consider test card cadence as a metric to assess test readiness. 5. Full-scale flight test is critical to development, maturation, and acceptance of adaptive control laws for operational use.

ℋ- adaptive observer design and parameter identification for a class of nonlinear fractional-order systems

KAUST Repository

Ndoye, Ibrahima; Voos, Holger; Laleg-Kirati, Taous-Meriem; Darouach, Mohamed

2014-01-01

In this paper, an adaptive observer design with parameter identification for a nonlinear system with external perturbations and unknown parameters is proposed. The states of the nonlinear system are estimated by a nonlinear observer and the unknown

Humanoids Learning to Walk: A Natural CPG-Actor-Critic Architecture.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Cai; Lowe, Robert; Ziemke, Tom

2013-01-01

The identification of learning mechanisms for locomotion has been the subject of much research for some time but many challenges remain. Dynamic systems theory (DST) offers a novel approach to humanoid learning through environmental interaction. Reinforcement learning (RL) has offered a promising method to adaptively link the dynamic system to the environment it interacts with via a reward-based value system. In this paper, we propose a model that integrates the above perspectives and applies it to the case of a humanoid (NAO) robot learning to walk the ability of which emerges from its value-based interaction with the environment. In the model, a simplified central pattern generator (CPG) architecture inspired by neuroscientific research and DST is integrated with an actor-critic approach to RL (cpg-actor-critic). In the cpg-actor-critic architecture, least-square-temporal-difference based learning converges to the optimal solution quickly by using natural gradient learning and balancing exploration and exploitation. Futhermore, rather than using a traditional (designer-specified) reward it uses a dynamic value function as a stability indicator that adapts to the environment. The results obtained are analyzed using a novel DST-based embodied cognition approach. Learning to walk, from this perspective, is a process of integrating levels of sensorimotor activity and value.

Humanoids Learning to Walk: a Natural CPG-Actor-Critic Architecture

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

CAI eLI

2013-04-01

Full Text Available The identification of learning mechanisms for locomotion has been the subject of much researchfor some time but many challenges remain. Dynamic systems theory (DST offers a novel approach to humanoid learning through environmental interaction. Reinforcement learning (RL has offered a promising method to adaptively link the dynamic system to the environment it interacts with via a reward-based value system.In this paper, we propose a model that integrates the above perspectives and applies it to the case of a humanoid (NAO robot learning to walk the ability of which emerges from its value-based interaction with the environment. In the model,a simplified central pattern generator (CPG architecture inspired by neuroscientific research and DST is integrated with an actor-critic approach to RL (cpg-actor-critic. In the cpg-actor-critic architecture, least-square-temporal-difference (LSTD based learning converges to the optimal solution quickly by using natural gradient and balancing exploration and exploitation. Futhermore, rather than using a traditional (designer-specified reward it uses a dynamic value function as a stability indicator (SI that adapts to the environment.The results obtained are analyzed and explained by using a novel DST embodied cognition approach. Learning to walk, from this perspective, is a process of integrating sensorimotor levels and value.

75 FR 8968 - Draft Guidance for Industry on Adaptive Design Clinical Trials for Drugs and Biologics; Availability

Science.gov (United States)

2010-02-26

... DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES Food and Drug Administration [Docket No. FDA-2010-D-0090] Draft Guidance for Industry on Adaptive Design Clinical Trials for Drugs and Biologics; Availability... familiar and less familiar approaches. As more experience is obtained with the less familiar designs...

Detailed evaluation of ET-RR-2 neutronic design: approach to criticality

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ashoub, N.; Amin, E.

2000-01-01

The ET-RR-2 safety analysis evaluation effort included the assessment of the reactor core nuclear design parameters. The present work complements the previous effort of neutronic calculations using NCNSRC computer code packages. This paper is the first in comprehensive neutronic calculation assessment up to the equilibrium core. It deals with evaluation of neutronic calculation submitted during the early phase of the licensing process; namely the proposal to assemble the first critical core, calculation of power peaking factor and determination of detailed energy group flux distribution in the core particularly in the cobalt irradiation position. The neutronic design criteria are examined qualitatively and quantitatively in the present paper

Design and development of self-powered sensors on wireless sensor network for standalone plant critical data management during SBO and beyond design basis events

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Aparna, J.; Dulera, I.V.; Rama Rao, A.; Vijayan, P.K.

2015-01-01

Advanced reactors are designed with an aim of maximum safety, optimized fuel utilization and effective system design. Safety aspects in reactor designs are being viewed for all possible vulnerabilities, and as a result, robust self-regulating passive safety features have been favored in Gen IV and advanced reactor designs. In addition to passive systems, the accidents scenarios at Fukushima indicate the dire need of reliable and stand-alone self-powered sensors, for monitoring plant critical parameters for effective damage control actions. There is a strong need for plant critical data management and situation awareness during the unavailability of all conventional power sources in a nuclear power plant, during extended station blackout (SBO) conditions. These self-powered sensors would assist the operators in managing events like SBO and help in containing any Beyond Design Basis Events (BDBE) conditions, well away from the public domain

Applicability of object-oriented design methods and C++ to safety-critical systems

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Cuthill, B.B.

1994-01-01

This paper reports on a study identifying risks and benefits of using a software development methodology containing object-oriented design (OOD) techniques and using C++ as a programming language relative to selected features of safety-critical systems development. These features are modularity, functional diversity, removing ambiguous code, traceability, and real-time performance

Multistandard Receiver Design for Telemedicine Monitoring System

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Hongmei Wang

2018-01-01

Full Text Available In short-distance wireless communications for telemedicine monitoring, different medical data measurement equipment has different wireless transmission modes. A multistandard receiver is designed that can adapt to different medical data measuring equipment. Using a second-order bandpass sampling for the design of antialiasing filters, two aliasing signals can be separated. Simultaneously, constraint conditions for sampling frequency are not as critical. The design is useful for a multistandard receiver in a telemedicine monitoring system and has the advantages such as saving spectrum resources and facilitating spectrum planning.

A relative risk comparison of criticality control strategies based on fresh fuel and burnup credit design bases

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sanders, T.L.

1989-01-01

The fresh fuel design basis provides some margin of safety, i.e., criticality safety is almost independent of loading operations if fuel designs do not change significantly over the next 40 years. However, the design basis enrichment for future nuclear fuel will most likely vary with time. As a result, it cannot be guaranteed that the perceived passivity of the concept will be maintained over the life cycle of a future cask system. Several options are available to ensure that the reliability of a burnup credit system is comparable to or greater than that of a system based on a fresh fuel assumption. Criticality safety and control reliability could increase with burnup credit implementation. The safety of a burnup credit system could be comparable to that for a system based on the fresh fuel assumption. A burnup credit philosophy could be implemented without any cost-benefit tradeoff. A burnup credit design basis could result in a significant reduction in total system risk as well as economic benefits. These reductions occur primarily as a result of increased cask capacities and, thus, fewer shipments. Fewer shipments also result in fewer operations over the useful life of a cask, and opportunities for error decrease. The system concept can be designed such that only benefits occur. These benefits could include enhanced criticality safety and the overall reliability of cask operations, as well as system risk and economic benefits. Thus, burnup credit should be available as an alternative for the criticality design of spent fuel shipping casks

Uncertainty in adaptive capacity

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Neil Adger, W.; Vincent, K.

2005-01-01

The capacity to adapt is a critical element of the process of adaptation: it is the vector of resources that represent the asset base from which adaptation actions can be made. Adaptive capacity can in theory be identified and measured at various scales, from the individual to the nation. The assessment of uncertainty within such measures comes from the contested knowledge domain and theories surrounding the nature of the determinants of adaptive capacity and the human action of adaptation. While generic adaptive capacity at the national level, for example, is often postulated as being dependent on health, governance and political rights, and literacy, and economic well-being, the determinants of these variables at national levels are not widely understood. We outline the nature of this uncertainty for the major elements of adaptive capacity and illustrate these issues with the example of a social vulnerability index for countries in Africa. (authors)

Optimal Design of the Adaptive Normalized Matched Filter Detector using Regularized Tyler Estimators

KAUST Repository

Kammoun, Abla; Couillet, Romain; Pascal, Frederic; Alouini, Mohamed-Slim

2017-01-01

This article addresses improvements on the design of the adaptive normalized matched filter (ANMF) for radar detection. It is well-acknowledged that the estimation of the noise-clutter covariance matrix is a fundamental step in adaptive radar detection. In this paper, we consider regularized estimation methods which force by construction the eigenvalues of the covariance estimates to be greater than a positive regularization parameter ρ. This makes them more suitable for high dimensional problems with a limited number of secondary data samples than traditional sample covariance estimates. The motivation behind this work is to understand the effect and properly set the value of ρthat improves estimate conditioning while maintaining a low estimation bias. More specifically, we consider the design of the ANMF detector for two kinds of regularized estimators, namely the regularized sample covariance matrix (RSCM), the regularized Tyler estimator (RTE). The rationale behind this choice is that the RTE is efficient in mitigating the degradation caused by the presence of impulsive noises while inducing little loss when the noise is Gaussian. Based on asymptotic results brought by recent tools from random matrix theory, we propose a design for the regularization parameter that maximizes the asymptotic detection probability under constant asymptotic false alarm rates. Provided Simulations support the efficiency of the proposed method, illustrating its gain over conventional settings of the regularization parameter.

Optimal Design of the Adaptive Normalized Matched Filter Detector using Regularized Tyler Estimators

KAUST Repository

Kammoun, Abla

2017-10-25

This article addresses improvements on the design of the adaptive normalized matched filter (ANMF) for radar detection. It is well-acknowledged that the estimation of the noise-clutter covariance matrix is a fundamental step in adaptive radar detection. In this paper, we consider regularized estimation methods which force by construction the eigenvalues of the covariance estimates to be greater than a positive regularization parameter ρ. This makes them more suitable for high dimensional problems with a limited number of secondary data samples than traditional sample covariance estimates. The motivation behind this work is to understand the effect and properly set the value of ρthat improves estimate conditioning while maintaining a low estimation bias. More specifically, we consider the design of the ANMF detector for two kinds of regularized estimators, namely the regularized sample covariance matrix (RSCM), the regularized Tyler estimator (RTE). The rationale behind this choice is that the RTE is efficient in mitigating the degradation caused by the presence of impulsive noises while inducing little loss when the noise is Gaussian. Based on asymptotic results brought by recent tools from random matrix theory, we propose a design for the regularization parameter that maximizes the asymptotic detection probability under constant asymptotic false alarm rates. Provided Simulations support the efficiency of the proposed method, illustrating its gain over conventional settings of the regularization parameter.

Hyper-Morphology : Experimentations with bio-inspired design processes for adaptive spatial re-use

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Biloria, N.; Chang, J.R.

2013-01-01

Hyper-Morphology is an on-going research outlining a bottom-up evolutionary design process based on autonomous cellular building components. The research interfaces critical operational traits of the natural world (Evolutionary Development Biology, Embryology and Cellular Differentiation) with

Interactive design for self-study and developing students’ critical thinking skills in electromagnetic radiation topic

Science.gov (United States)

Ambarwati, D.; Suyatna, A.

2018-01-01

The purpose of this research are to create interactive electronic school books (ESB) for electromagnetic radiation topic that can be used for self-study and increasing students’ critical thinking skills. The research method was based on the design of research and development (R&D) model of ADDIE. The research procedure is used limited the design of the product has been validated. Data source at interactive requirement analysis phase of ESB is student and high school teacher of class XII in Lampung province. The validation of interactive ESB designs is performed by experts in science education. The data of ESB interactive needs were collected using questionnaires and analyzed using quantitative descriptive. The results of the questionnaire obtained by 97% of books that are often used in the form of printed books from schools have not been interactive and foster critical thinking of students, and 55% of students stating physics books are used not meet expectations. Expectations of students in physics learning, teachers must use interactive electronic books. The results of the validation experts pointed out, the design of ESB produced is interactive, can be used for self-study, and increasing students’ critical thinking skills, which contains instruction manuals, learning objectives, learning materials, sample questions and discussion, video illustrations, animations, summaries, as well as interactive quizzes incorporating feedback exam practice and preparation for college entrance.

Perceptions of nursing students after performing an individual activity designed to develop their critical thinking: The "critical card" tool.

Science.gov (United States)

Urcola-Pardo, Fernando; Blázquez-Ornat, Isabel; Anguas-Gracia, Ana; Gasch-Gallen, Ángel; Germán-Bes, Concepción

2018-03-01

Critical thinking in Health Sciences is among the transversal competences in the Nursing Degree. The critical card is a tool of individual learning, designed to develop critical thinking, and set in the process of environmental health learning. Every student must perform the activity to obtain the highest qualification in Community Health Nursing subject. The aim of this project was to evaluate this learning tool using the students' perceptions after its performance. The evaluation was based on the answers to a questionnaire obtained from the third course students of Nursing Degree at the University of Zaragoza. The questionnaire was made up of 14 Likert-type questions, grouped in four dimensions. The student participation rate was higher than 50%. The analysis of the questionnaire obtained 67,8% positive answers. The variability between dimensions ranged between 49% of positive answers for application in other subjects and 87% of positive answers for the improvements applicable to the instrument. The students coincided in indicating that the critical card is a useful learning tool and could be applicable in other subjects. However, the weight it is given in the global evaluation of the subject is considered to be too low, considering the time used to complete the activity. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Designing monitoring arrangements for collaborative learning about adaptation pathways

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hermans, L.M.; Haasnoot, M.; ter Maat, Judith; Kwakkel, J.H.

2017-01-01

Adaptation pathways approaches support long-term planning under uncertainty. The use of adaptation pathways implies a systematic monitoring effort to inform future adaptation decisions. Such monitoring should feed into a long-term collaborative learning process between multiple actors at various

Countermeasures to Enhance Sensorimotor Adaptability

Science.gov (United States)

Bloomberg, J. J.; Peters, B. T.; Mulavara, A. P.; Brady, R. A.; Batson, C. C.; Miller, C. A.; Cohen, H. S.

2011-01-01

During exploration-class missions, sensorimotor disturbances may lead to disruption in the ability to ambulate and perform functional tasks during the initial introduction to a novel gravitational environment following a landing on a planetary surface. The goal of our current project is to develop a sensorimotor adaptability (SA) training program to facilitate rapid adaptation to novel gravitational environments. We have developed a unique training system comprised of a treadmill placed on a motion-base facing a virtual visual scene that provides an unstable walking surface combined with incongruent visual flow designed to enhance sensorimotor adaptability. We have conducted a series of studies that have shown: Training using a combination of modified visual flow and support surface motion during treadmill walking enhances locomotor adaptability to a novel sensorimotor environment. Trained individuals become more proficient at performing multiple competing tasks while walking during adaptation to novel discordant sensorimotor conditions. Trained subjects can retain their increased level of adaptability over a six months period. SA training is effective in producing increased adaptability in a more complex over-ground ambulatory task on an obstacle course. This confirms that for a complex task like walking, treadmill training contains enough of the critical features of overground walking to be an effective training modality. The structure of individual training sessions can be optimized to promote fast/strategic motor learning. Training sessions that each contain short-duration exposures to multiple perturbation stimuli allows subjects to acquire a greater ability to rapidly reorganize appropriate response strategies when encountering a novel sensory environment. Individual sensory biases (i.e. increased visual dependency) can predict adaptive responses to novel sensory environments suggesting that customized training prescriptions can be developed to enhance

A self-adaptive k-means classifier for business incentive in a fashion design environment

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

O.R. Vincent

2018-01-01

Full Text Available An incentive mechanism to target market for fashion designers is proposed. Recent researches have been focused on the art, style or the design; while a few were based on traditional practice. In this study, economy is considered as a major liberation in the fashion world by analyzing six attributes, namely, style, color, fabric, brand, price and size that could bring about commercial success. Dataset of 1000 customers’ records were used and categorized as original, combined and new designs using self-adaptive k-means algorithm, which extract common attributes that would foster better business from the dataset. The results would be useful to designers in knowing the type of designs usually ordered by customers with the design code, and which combinations of the attributes have high patronage. In addition, customers would have easy access to the best and current designs invoke from a combination of highest patronized designs.

Resilience through adaptation.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Guus A Ten Broeke

Full Text Available Adaptation of agents through learning or evolution is an important component of the resilience of Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS. Without adaptation, the flexibility of such systems to cope with outside pressures would be much lower. To study the capabilities of CAS to adapt, social simulations with agent-based models (ABMs provide a helpful tool. However, the value of ABMs for studying adaptation depends on the availability of methodologies for sensitivity analysis that can quantify resilience and adaptation in ABMs. In this paper we propose a sensitivity analysis methodology that is based on comparing time-dependent probability density functions of output of ABMs with and without agent adaptation. The differences between the probability density functions are quantified by the so-called earth-mover's distance. We use this sensitivity analysis methodology to quantify the probability of occurrence of critical transitions and other long-term effects of agent adaptation. To test the potential of this new approach, it is used to analyse the resilience of an ABM of adaptive agents competing for a common-pool resource. Adaptation is shown to contribute positively to the resilience of this ABM. If adaptation proceeds sufficiently fast, it may delay or avert the collapse of this system.

Resilience through adaptation.

Science.gov (United States)

Ten Broeke, Guus A; van Voorn, George A K; Ligtenberg, Arend; Molenaar, Jaap

2017-01-01

Adaptation of agents through learning or evolution is an important component of the resilience of Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS). Without adaptation, the flexibility of such systems to cope with outside pressures would be much lower. To study the capabilities of CAS to adapt, social simulations with agent-based models (ABMs) provide a helpful tool. However, the value of ABMs for studying adaptation depends on the availability of methodologies for sensitivity analysis that can quantify resilience and adaptation in ABMs. In this paper we propose a sensitivity analysis methodology that is based on comparing time-dependent probability density functions of output of ABMs with and without agent adaptation. The differences between the probability density functions are quantified by the so-called earth-mover's distance. We use this sensitivity analysis methodology to quantify the probability of occurrence of critical transitions and other long-term effects of agent adaptation. To test the potential of this new approach, it is used to analyse the resilience of an ABM of adaptive agents competing for a common-pool resource. Adaptation is shown to contribute positively to the resilience of this ABM. If adaptation proceeds sufficiently fast, it may delay or avert the collapse of this system.

Design guidelines for adapting scientific research articles: An example from an introductory level, interdisciplinary program on soft matter

Science.gov (United States)

Langbeheim, Elon; Safran, Samuel A.; Yerushalmi, Edit

2013-01-01

We present design guidelines for using Adapted Primary Literature (APL) as part of current interdisciplinary topics to introductory physics students. APL is a text genre that allows students to comprehend a scientific article, while maintaining the core features of the communication among scientists, thus representing an authentic scientific discourse. We describe the adaptation of a research paper by Nobel Laureate Paul Flory on phase equilibrium in polymer-solvent mixtures that was presented to high school students in a project-based unit on soft matter. The adaptation followed two design strategies: a) Making explicit the interplay between the theory and experiment. b) Re-structuring the text to map the theory onto the students' prior knowledge. Specifically, we map the theory of polymer-solvent systems onto a model for binary mixtures of small molecules of equal size that was already studied in class.

Map-based mobile services design, interaction and usability

CERN Document Server

Meng, Liqiu; Winter, Stephan; Popovich, Vasily

2008-01-01

This book reports the newest research and technical achievements on the following theme blocks: Design of mobile map services and its constraints; Typology and usability of mobile map services; Visualization solutions on small displays for time-critical tasks; Mobile map users; Interaction and adaptation in mobile environments; and Applications of map-based mobile services.

Resilience thinking: integrating resilience, adaptability and transformability

Science.gov (United States)

Carl Folke; Stephen R. Carpenter; Brian Walker; Marten Scheffer; Terry Chapin; Johan. Rockstrom

2010-01-01

Resilience thinking addresses the dynamics and development of complex social-ecological systems (SES). Three aspects are central: resilience, adaptability and transformability. These aspects interrelate across multiple scales. Resilience in this context is the capacity of a SES to continually change and adapt yet remain within critical thresholds. Adaptability is part...

Some Challenges in the Design of Human-Automation Interaction for Safety-Critical Systems

Science.gov (United States)

Feary, Michael S.; Roth, Emilie

2014-01-01

Increasing amounts of automation are being introduced to safety-critical domains. While the introduction of automation has led to an overall increase in reliability and improved safety, it has also introduced a class of failure modes, and new challenges in risk assessment for the new systems, particularly in the assessment of rare events resulting from complex inter-related factors. Designing successful human-automation systems is challenging, and the challenges go beyond good interface development (e.g., Roth, Malin, & Schreckenghost 1997; Christoffersen & Woods, 2002). Human-automation design is particularly challenging when the underlying automation technology generates behavior that is difficult for the user to anticipate or understand. These challenges have been recognized in several safety-critical domains, and have resulted in increased efforts to develop training, procedures, regulations and guidance material (CAST, 2008, IAEA, 2001, FAA, 2013, ICAO, 2012). This paper points to the continuing need for new methods to describe and characterize the operational environment within which new automation concepts are being presented. We will describe challenges to the successful development and evaluation of human-automation systems in safety-critical domains, and describe some approaches that could be used to address these challenges. We will draw from experience with the aviation, spaceflight and nuclear power domains.

Adaptive Neural Networks Decentralized FTC Design for Nonstrict-Feedback Nonlinear Interconnected Large-Scale Systems Against Actuator Faults.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Yongming; Tong, Shaocheng

The problem of active fault-tolerant control (FTC) is investigated for the large-scale nonlinear systems in nonstrict-feedback form. The nonstrict-feedback nonlinear systems considered in this paper consist of unstructured uncertainties, unmeasured states, unknown interconnected terms, and actuator faults (e.g., bias fault and gain fault). A state observer is designed to solve the unmeasurable state problem. Neural networks (NNs) are used to identify the unknown lumped nonlinear functions so that the problems of unstructured uncertainties and unknown interconnected terms can be solved. By combining the adaptive backstepping design principle with the combination Nussbaum gain function property, a novel NN adaptive output-feedback FTC approach is developed. The proposed FTC controller can guarantee that all signals in all subsystems are bounded, and the tracking errors for each subsystem converge to a small neighborhood of zero. Finally, numerical results of practical examples are presented to further demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy.The problem of active fault-tolerant control (FTC) is investigated for the large-scale nonlinear systems in nonstrict-feedback form. The nonstrict-feedback nonlinear systems considered in this paper consist of unstructured uncertainties, unmeasured states, unknown interconnected terms, and actuator faults (e.g., bias fault and gain fault). A state observer is designed to solve the unmeasurable state problem. Neural networks (NNs) are used to identify the unknown lumped nonlinear functions so that the problems of unstructured uncertainties and unknown interconnected terms can be solved. By combining the adaptive backstepping design principle with the combination Nussbaum gain function property, a novel NN adaptive output-feedback FTC approach is developed. The proposed FTC controller can guarantee that all signals in all subsystems are bounded, and the tracking errors for each subsystem converge to a small

Developing Adaptive Proficiency in Special Forces Officers

National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

White, Susan S; Mueller-Hanson, Rose A; Dorsey, David W; Pulakos, Elaine D; Wisecarver, Michelle M; Deagle, Edwin A., III; Mendini, Kip G

2005-01-01

Adaptive proficiency is critical for operating in the dynamic Special Forces (SF) mission environment and a recent focus on this requirement has resulted in a greater emphasis on adaptability in current training for SF...

Basket criticality design of a dual purpose cask for VVER 1000 spent fuel assemblies

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Rezaeian, Mahdi [Nuclear Science and Technology Research Institute, Tehran (Iran, Islamic Republic of); Kamali, Jamshid [Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), Tehran (Iran, Islamic Republic of)

2016-12-15

Dual purpose cask technology is one of the most prominent options for interim storage of spent fuels following their removal from reactors. Criticality safety of the spent fuel assemblies are ensured by design of the basket within these casks. In this study, a set of criticality design calculations of a dual purpose cask for 12 VVER 1000 spent fuel assemblies of Bushehr nuclear power plant were carried out. The basket material of borated stainless steel with 0.5 to 2.5 wt% of boron and Boral (Al-B{sub 4}C) with 1.5 to 40 wt% of boron carbide, were investigated and the minimum required receptacle pitch of the basket was determined. Using the calculated receptacle pitch of the basket, the minimum required diameter of the cavity could be established.

Adaptive user interfaces

CERN Document Server

1990-01-01

This book describes techniques for designing and building adaptive user interfaces developed in the large AID project undertaken by the contributors.Key Features* Describes one of the few large-scale adaptive interface projects in the world* Outlines the principles of adaptivity in human-computer interaction

Robust fault detection of turbofan engines subject to adaptive controllers via a Total Measurable Fault Information Residual (ToMFIR) technique.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Wen; Chowdhury, Fahmida N; Djuric, Ana; Yeh, Chih-Ping

2014-09-01

This paper provides a new design of robust fault detection for turbofan engines with adaptive controllers. The critical issue is that the adaptive controllers can depress the faulty effects such that the actual system outputs remain the pre-specified values, making it difficult to detect faults/failures. To solve this problem, a Total Measurable Fault Information Residual (ToMFIR) technique with the aid of system transformation is adopted to detect faults in turbofan engines with adaptive controllers. This design is a ToMFIR-redundancy-based robust fault detection. The ToMFIR is first introduced and existing results are also summarized. The Detailed design process of the ToMFIRs is presented and a turbofan engine model is simulated to verify the effectiveness of the proposed ToMFIR-based fault-detection strategy. Copyright © 2013 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Design of an Adaptive-Neural Network Attitude Controller of a Satellite using Reaction Wheels

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Abbas Ajorkar

2015-04-01

Full Text Available In this paper, an adaptive attitude control algorithm is developed based on neural network for a satellite using four reaction wheels in a tetrahedron configuration. Then, an attitude control based on feedback linearization control has been designed and uncertainties in the moment of inertia matrix and disturbances torque have been considered. In order to eliminate the effect of these uncertainties, a multilayer neural network with back-propagation law is designed. In this structure, the parameters of the moment of inertia matrix and external disturbances are estimated and used in feedback linearization control law. Finally, the performance of the designed attitude controller is investigated by several simulations.

Adaption of commercial off the shelf modules for reconfigurable machine tool design

CSIR Research Space (South Africa)

Mpofu, K

2008-01-01

Full Text Available . University of Ljubljana (Slovenia) Machine Design Approach. Butala and Sluga [4] view the architecture of the machine tool as a system structure which is reflected in its configuration and which impacts the systems performance. The interfaces... process movements. This approach was also implemented in a computer aided planning system, they clarify the need of having the features to be implemented embedded in the collective drives that constitute it. This resulted in an adaption...

Technology transfer for adaptation

Science.gov (United States)

Biagini, Bonizella; Kuhl, Laura; Gallagher, Kelly Sims; Ortiz, Claudia

2014-09-01

Technology alone will not be able to solve adaptation challenges, but it is likely to play an important role. As a result of the role of technology in adaptation and the importance of international collaboration for climate change, technology transfer for adaptation is a critical but understudied issue. Through an analysis of Global Environment Facility-managed adaptation projects, we find there is significantly more technology transfer occurring in adaptation projects than might be expected given the pessimistic rhetoric surrounding technology transfer for adaptation. Most projects focused on demonstration and early deployment/niche formation for existing technologies rather than earlier stages of innovation, which is understandable considering the pilot nature of the projects. Key challenges for the transfer process, including technology selection and appropriateness under climate change, markets and access to technology, and diffusion strategies are discussed in more detail.

Design of control system for piezoelectric deformable mirror based on fuzzy self-adaptive PID control

Science.gov (United States)

Xiao, Nan; Gao, Wei; Song, Zongxi

2017-10-01

With the rapid development of adaptive optics technology, it is widely used in the fields of astronomical telescope imaging, laser beam shaping, optical communication and so on. As the key component of adaptive optics systems, the deformable mirror plays a role in wavefront correction. In order to achieve the high speed and high precision of deformable mirror system tracking control, it is necessary to find out the influence of each link on the system performance to model the system and design the controller. This paper presents a method about the piezoelectric deformable mirror driving control system.

Adaptation of AASHTO Pavement Design Guide for Local Conditions

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hajek, J.J. [Applied Research Associates Inc., Toronto, ON (Canada)

2001-07-01

The methodology used to adapt the 1993 AASHTO Guide for Design of Pavement Structures to Ontario conditions was described. The guide expresses the effect of traffic loads on pavement performance using the concept of axle Load Equivalency Factors (LEF). LEF is regarded as a pavement damage factor assigned to each specific load and axle configuration. The size of LEF is related to the damage that is expected to occur from a standard load of 80 kN carried by a single axle with dual tires. The factors are summarized to yield the number of Equivalent Single Axle Loads (ESALs) a pavement is expected to sustain during its life. A summary was also provided of the additional work done to prepare for the transition to the proposed mechanistically-based 2002 AASHTO Guide. The paper focused only on the design of flexible pavements in terms of load characterization using equivalent single axle loads along with axle load spectra, below grade and material characterization, plus initial and terminal serviceability and reliability. The AASHTO Guide uses two parameters to deal with design reliability: design reliability level and overall standard deviation. Data collected on Ontario highway pavements and materials was used for assessing the design inputs. Other data was also collected from research and development studies, laboratory experiments, and from a survey of experienced pavement design engineers. The end result was a new grouping of Ontario soils for pavement design, recommended values for the resilient modulus of below grade soils, recommendations for structural layer coefficients for Ontario pavement materials and recommendations for the initial pavement serviceability based on Ontario smoothness specifications. Results of calibration and verification processes indicate that for new flexible pavements, the AASHTO-Ontario model is in good agreement with the observed results. It was recommended that the calibration and verification of the AASHTO-Ontario model should be a

Comparing oncology clinical programs by use of innovative designs and expected net present value optimization: Which adaptive approach leads to the best result?

Science.gov (United States)

Parke, Tom; Marchenko, Olga; Anisimov, Vladimir; Ivanova, Anastasia; Jennison, Christopher; Perevozskaya, Inna; Song, Guochen

2017-01-01

Designing an oncology clinical program is more challenging than designing a single study. The standard approaches have been proven to be not very successful during the last decade; the failure rate of Phase 2 and Phase 3 trials in oncology remains high. Improving a development strategy by applying innovative statistical methods is one of the major objectives of a drug development process. The oncology sub-team on Adaptive Program under the Drug Information Association Adaptive Design Scientific Working Group (DIA ADSWG) evaluated hypothetical oncology programs with two competing treatments and published the work in the Therapeutic Innovation and Regulatory Science journal in January 2014. Five oncology development programs based on different Phase 2 designs, including adaptive designs and a standard two parallel arm Phase 3 design were simulated and compared in terms of the probability of clinical program success and expected net present value (eNPV). In this article, we consider eight Phase2/Phase3 development programs based on selected combinations of five Phase 2 study designs and three Phase 3 study designs. We again used the probability of program success and eNPV to compare simulated programs. For the development strategies, we considered that the eNPV showed robust improvement for each successive strategy, with the highest being for a three-arm response adaptive randomization design in Phase 2 and a group sequential design with 5 analyses in Phase 3.

Design and FPGA-implementation of an improved adaptive fuzzy logic controller for DC motor speed control

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

E.A. Ramadan

2014-09-01

Full Text Available This paper presents an improved adaptive fuzzy logic speed controller for a DC motor, based on field programmable gate array (FPGA hardware implementation. The developed controller includes an adaptive fuzzy logic control (AFLC algorithm, which is designed and verified with a nonlinear model of DC motor. Then, it has been synthesised, functionally verified and implemented using Xilinx Integrated Software Environment (ISE and Spartan-3E FPGA. The performance of this controller has been successfully validated with good tracking results under different operating conditions.

Adaptability in the workplace: development of a taxonomy of adaptive performance.

Science.gov (United States)

Pulakos, E D; Arad, S; Donovan, M A; Plamondon, K E

2000-08-01

The purpose of this research was to develop a taxonomy of adaptive job performance and examine the implications of this taxonomy for understanding, predicting, and training adaptive behavior in work settings. Two studies were conducted to address this issue. In Study 1, over 1,000 critical incidents from 21 different jobs were content analyzed to identify an 8-dimension taxonomy of adaptive performance. Study 2 reports the development and administration of an instrument, the Job Adaptability Inventory, that was used to empirically examine the proposed taxonomy in 24 different jobs. Exploratory factor analyses using data from 1,619 respondents supported the proposed 8-dimension taxonomy from Study 1. Subsequent confirmatory factor analyses on the remainder of the sample (n = 1,715) indicated a good fit for the 8-factor model. Results and implications are discussed.

An aspect-oriented approach for designing safety-critical systems

Science.gov (United States)

Petrov, Z.; Zaykov, P. G.; Cardoso, J. P.; Coutinho, J. G. F.; Diniz, P. C.; Luk, W.

The development of avionics systems is typically a tedious and cumbersome process. In addition to the required functions, developers must consider various and often conflicting non-functional requirements such as safety, performance, and energy efficiency. Certainly, an integrated approach with a seamless design flow that is capable of requirements modelling and supporting refinement down to an actual implementation in a traceable way, may lead to a significant acceleration of development cycles. This paper presents an aspect-oriented approach supported by a tool chain that deals with functional and non-functional requirements in an integrated manner. It also discusses how the approach can be applied to development of safety-critical systems and provides experimental results.

An adaptive drug delivery design using neural networks for effective treatment of infectious diseases: a simulation study.

Science.gov (United States)

Padhi, Radhakant; Bhardhwaj, Jayender R

2009-06-01

An adaptive drug delivery design is presented in this paper using neural networks for effective treatment of infectious diseases. The generic mathematical model used describes the coupled evolution of concentration of pathogens, plasma cells, antibodies and a numerical value that indicates the relative characteristic of a damaged organ due to the disease under the influence of external drugs. From a system theoretic point of view, the external drugs can be interpreted as control inputs, which can be designed based on control theoretic concepts. In this study, assuming a set of nominal parameters in the mathematical model, first a nonlinear controller (drug administration) is designed based on the principle of dynamic inversion. This nominal drug administration plan was found to be effective in curing "nominal model patients" (patients whose immunological dynamics conform to the mathematical model used for the control design exactly. However, it was found to be ineffective in curing "realistic model patients" (patients whose immunological dynamics may have off-nominal parameter values and possibly unwanted inputs) in general. Hence, to make the drug delivery dosage design more effective for realistic model patients, a model-following adaptive control design is carried out next by taking the help of neural networks, that are trained online. Simulation studies indicate that the adaptive controller proposed in this paper holds promise in killing the invading pathogens and healing the damaged organ even in the presence of parameter uncertainties and continued pathogen attack. Note that the computational requirements for computing the control are very minimal and all associated computations (including the training of neural networks) can be carried out online. However it assumes that the required diagnosis process can be carried out at a sufficient faster rate so that all the states are available for control computation.

The Art of Displacement: Designing Experiential Systems and Transverse Epistemologies as Conceptual Criticism

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Rolf Hughes

2014-07-01

Full Text Available With architects and designers increasingly facing problems that are neither predictable nor simple but highly complex, a particular synthesis of design intelligence and creativity is required. If the art of being a professional is becoming ‘the art of managing complexity’, what are the ‘boundaries’ of professional practice? ‘Trans-disciplinarity’, for example, requires liminal or neither/nor thinking (thus ‘boundary concepts’ remain a core concern. A concern with boundaries and ‘edges’ implies in turn a concern with ‘relationality’ (i.e. how we establish relations, positions, borders between different disciplinary priorities and methods and thence a problem that affects how we think of disciplinarity, interdisciplinarity, networks of various kinds, and trans-disciplinarity – that of ‘substance’, ‘content’ or ‘matter’.This paper subjects design research, theory and practice to transverse epistemologies, attempting a ‘flow of transformations’ via such themes as authorship, remediation, smuggling, disruptive innovation, performative knowledge, and gesture versus identity. It brings together an ars combinatoria of conceptual criticism, trans-disciplinary practice as ‘disruptive innovation’, Michael Speaks’s notion of ‘design intelligence’ and Margaret Boden’s three types of creativity – combinatorial, exploratory, and transformational – seeking thereby to suggest new structures that might yield ‘transdisciplines’. Departing from two separate points – Bruno Latour’s call for ‘earthly accounts of buildings and design processes’ and Jack Burnham’s identification of a paradigm shift from an ‘object-oriented’ to a ‘systems-oriented’ culture – the paper describes the formation of a new interdisciplinary practice, experience design (the design of meaningful experience across time, as a form of ‘epistemological Conceptualism’. This prioritises critical thinking and

AWARE: Adaptive Software Monitoring and Dynamic Reconfiguration for Critical Infrastructure Protection

Science.gov (United States)

2015-04-29

in which we applied these adaptation patterns to an adaptive news web server intended to tolerate extremely heavy, unexpected loads. To address...collection of existing models used as benchmarks for OO-based refactoring and an existing web -based repository called REMODD to provide users with model...invariant properties. Specifically, we developed Avida- MDE (based on the Avida digital evolution platform) to support the automatic generation of software

Signal Adaptive System for Space/Spatial-Frequency Analysis

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Veselin N. Ivanović

2009-01-01

Full Text Available This paper outlines the development of a multiple-clock-cycle implementation (MCI of a signal adaptive two-dimensional (2D system for space/spatial-frequency (S/SF signal analysis. The design is based on a method for improved S/SF representation of the analyzed 2D signals, also proposed here. The proposed MCI design optimizes critical design performances related to hardware complexity, making it a suitable system for real time implementation on an integrated chip. Additionally, the design allows the implemented system to take a variable number of clock cycles (CLKs (the only necessary ones regarding desirable—2D Wigner distribution-presentation of autoterms in different frequency-frequency points during the execution. This ability represents a major advantage of the proposed design which helps to optimize the time required for execution and produce an improved, cross-terms-free S/SF signal representation. The design has been verified by a field-programmable gate array (FPGA circuit design, capable of performing S/SF analysis of 2D signals in real time.

Research and design calculation of multipurpose critical assembly using moderated light water and low enriched fuel from 1.6 to 5.0% U-235

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nguyen Kien Cuong; Vo Doan Hai Dang; Luong Ba Vien; Le Vinh Vinh; Huynh Ton Nghiem; Nguyen Minh Tuan; Nguyen Manh Hung; Pham Quang Huy; Tran Quoc Duong; Tran Tri Vien

2015-01-01

Basing on the idea in ??using fuel of nuclear power plants such as PWR (AP-1000) and VVER-1000 with light water as moderation, design calculation of critical assembly was performed to confirm the possibility of using these fuels. Designed critical assembly has simple structure consisting of low enriched fuel from 1.6% to 5% U-235; water has functions as cooling, biological protection and control. Critical assembly is operated at nominal power 100 W with fuel pitch about 2.0 cm. Applications of the critical assembly are quite abundant in basic research, education and training with low investment cost compare with research reactor and easy in operation. So critical assembly can be used for university or training centre for nuclear engineering training. Main objectives of the project are: design calculation in neutronics, thermal hydraulics and safety analysis for critical configuration benchmarks using low enriched fuel; design in mechanical and auxiliary systems for critical assembly; determine technical specifications and estimate construction, installation cost of critical assembly. The process of design, fabrication, installation and construction of critical assembly will be considered with different implementation phases and localization capabilities in installation of critical assembly is highly feasibility. Cost estimation of construction and installation of critical assembly was implemented and showed that investment cost for critical assembly is much lower than research reactor and most of components, systems of critical assembly can be localized with current technique quality of the country. (author)

Impediments to User Gains: Experiences from a Critical Participatory Design Project

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Bossen, Claus; Dindler, Christian; Iversen, Ole Sejer

2012-01-01

interviews with participants in a project aimed at developing technology that fosters engaging museum experiences, and rethinking cultural heritage communication. Despite the use of established PD techniques by experienced PD practitioners, a significant number of frustrations relating to the PD process were...... prominent in the research study. Based on these findings, we provide an analysis of impediments for users gains in PD projects: Differences between aims were unresolved, absence of a shared set-up for collaboration and different conceptions of technology.......Actual studies of user gains from involvement in design processes are few, although a concern for users’ gains is a core characteristic of participatory design (PD). We explore the question of user gains through a retrospective evaluation of a critical PD project. We conducted ten qualitative...

Design and analysis on super-critical water cooled power reactors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ishiwatari, Yuki

2005-01-01

The Super-Critical Water Cooled Power Reactors (SCPR) is cooled by 25 MPa supercritical water of 280degC at reactor inlet and greater than 500degC at reactor outlet and directly connected with turbine/generators with high energy conversion efficiency. This corresponds to the deletion of recirculation system and steam-water separation system of BWR type reactors or of pressurizer and steam generator of PWR type reactors. In addition to the design study of the university of Tokyo, technology development of the SCPR for practical use has started under the collaboration of industry and academia since 2000. Mockup single tube and bundle tests for heat transfer/fluid flow characteristics of the design have been conducted with 3D heat transfer analysis. Materials compatible with coolant conditions for fuel cans and reactor internals are also assessed. Overall evaluation of the reactor concept is under way. (T. Tanaka)

Design of an Adaptive Power Regulation Mechanism and a Nozzle for a Hydroelectric Power Plant Turbine Test Rig

Science.gov (United States)

Mert, Burak; Aytac, Zeynep; Tascioglu, Yigit; Celebioglu, Kutay; Aradag, Selin; ETU Hydro Research Center Team

2014-11-01

This study deals with the design of a power regulation mechanism for a Hydroelectric Power Plant (HEPP) model turbine test system which is designed to test Francis type hydroturbines up to 2 MW power with varying head and flow(discharge) values. Unlike the tailor made regulation mechanisms of full-sized, functional HEPPs; the design for the test system must be easily adapted to various turbines that are to be tested. In order to achieve this adaptability, a dynamic simulation model is constructed in MATLAB/Simulink SimMechanics. This model acquires geometric data and hydraulic loading data of the regulation system from Autodesk Inventor CAD models and Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis respectively. The dynamic model is explained and case studies of two different HEPPs are performed for validation. CFD aided design of the turbine guide vanes, which is used as input for the dynamic model, is also presented. This research is financially supported by Turkish Ministry of Development.

Introduction to adaptive arrays

CERN Document Server

Monzingo, Bob; Haupt, Randy

2011-01-01

This second edition is an extensive modernization of the bestselling introduction to the subject of adaptive array sensor systems. With the number of applications of adaptive array sensor systems growing each year, this look at the principles and fundamental techniques that are critical to these systems is more important than ever before. Introduction to Adaptive Arrays, 2nd Edition is organized as a tutorial, taking the reader by the hand and leading them through the maze of jargon that often surrounds this highly technical subject. It is easy to read and easy to follow as fundamental concept

The Iodine Satellite (iSat) Project Development Towards Critical Design Review

Science.gov (United States)

Dankanich, John W.; Calvert, Derek; Kamhawi, Hani; Hickman, Tyler; Szabo, James; Byrne, Lawrence

2015-01-01

Despite the prevalence of small satellites in recent years, the systems flown to date have very limited propulsion capability. SmallSats are typically secondary payloads and have significant constraints for volume, mass, and power in addition to limitations on the use of hazardous propellants or stored energy. These constraints limit the options for SmallSat maneuverability. NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate approved the iodine Satellite flight project for a rapid demonstration of iodine Hall thruster technology in a 12U (cubesat units) configuration under the Small Spacecraft Technology Program. The mission is a partnership between NASA MSFC, NASA GRC, and Busek Co, Inc., with the Air Force supporting the propulsion technology maturation. The team is working towards the critical design review in the final design and fabrication phase of the project. The current design shows positive technical performance margins in all areas. The iSat project is planned for launch readiness in the spring of 2017.

Hybrid Adaptive Flight Control with Model Inversion Adaptation

Science.gov (United States)

Nguyen, Nhan

2011-01-01

This study investigates a hybrid adaptive flight control method as a design possibility for a flight control system that can enable an effective adaptation strategy to deal with off-nominal flight conditions. The hybrid adaptive control blends both direct and indirect adaptive control in a model inversion flight control architecture. The blending of both direct and indirect adaptive control provides a much more flexible and effective adaptive flight control architecture than that with either direct or indirect adaptive control alone. The indirect adaptive control is used to update the model inversion controller by an on-line parameter estimation of uncertain plant dynamics based on two methods. The first parameter estimation method is an indirect adaptive law based on the Lyapunov theory, and the second method is a recursive least-squares indirect adaptive law. The model inversion controller is therefore made to adapt to changes in the plant dynamics due to uncertainty. As a result, the modeling error is reduced that directly leads to a decrease in the tracking error. In conjunction with the indirect adaptive control that updates the model inversion controller, a direct adaptive control is implemented as an augmented command to further reduce any residual tracking error that is not entirely eliminated by the indirect adaptive control.

Adaptive pressure-controlled cellular structures for shape morphing I: design and analysis

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Luo, Quantian; Tong, Liyong

2013-01-01

This work investigates adaptive bio-inspired pressure cellular structures for shape morphing. Optimum designs for cellular structures with void and pressure cells are proposed and then structural analyses are conducted. In the present design, a unit cell is comprised of straight and curved walls. When compressed air is pumped into a pressure cell, the curved walls deform in bending due to the pressure difference in two adjacent cells that leads to overall structural deformation in extension. One-dimensional actuation strain up to 35% can be theoretically achieved. In part I, we present basic design concepts and cellular mechanics. Unlike conventional structural analysis for cellular structures, a statically indeterminate unit cell is considered and novel analytical formulations are derived for the present pressurized cellular structures in linear and nonlinear analyses. In part II, we will present experimental testing and finite element analysis to demonstrate the feasibility of the present pressurized cellular actuators for morphing wings and to validate the present cellular mechanics formulations. (paper)

A new adaptive videogame for training attention and executive functions: design principles and initial validation.

Science.gov (United States)

Montani, Veronica; De Filippo De Grazia, Michele; Zorzi, Marco

2014-01-01

A growing body of evidence suggests that action videogames could enhance a variety of cognitive skills and more specifically attention skills. The aim of this study was to develop a novel adaptive videogame to support the rehabilitation of the most common consequences of traumatic brain injury (TBI), that is the impairment of attention and executive functions. TBI patients can be affected by psychomotor slowness and by difficulties in dealing with distraction, maintain a cognitive set for a long time, processing different simultaneously presented stimuli, and planning purposeful behavior. Accordingly, we designed a videogame that was specifically conceived to activate those functions. Playing involves visuospatial planning and selective attention, active maintenance of the cognitive set representing the goal, and error monitoring. Moreover, different game trials require to alternate between two tasks (i.e., task switching) or to perform the two tasks simultaneously (i.e., divided attention/dual-tasking). The videogame is controlled by a multidimensional adaptive algorithm that calibrates task difficulty on-line based on a model of user performance that is updated on a trial-by-trial basis. We report simulations of user performance designed to test the adaptive game as well as a validation study with healthy participants engaged in a training protocol. The results confirmed the involvement of the cognitive abilities that the game is supposed to enhance and suggested that training improved attentional control during play.

A new adaptive videogame for training attention and executive functions: design principles and initial validation

Science.gov (United States)