Automatic Measurement System Research Articles

Automatic Measurement System for Nitrite and Nitrate in Water Bodies

Nitrate and nitrite are reaction products that result, for example, from the application of nitrogenous fertilizers to agricultural land. That part of the nitrogen not absorbed by the plants can pass into the groundwater in the form of nitrate or nitrite. This can also lead to contamination of drinking water via the groundwater, with all its negative side effects. In the present article an automatic system is presented, which performs independently the measurement of nitrate and nitrite at a water body. For the measurement of these parameters commercially available test strips are used, which are evaluated automatically. The determination of the nitrite/nitrate value is based on the Griess reaction which leads to a color change of the test pads depending on the concentration of the analyte. The sample is applied to the test pads with an automated dispenser system and the color change is measured with an RGB sensor. The nitrate/nitrite concentration present can be determined from the R/G ratio and a nomogram. The measuring accuracy of the system meets the requirements of the European Drinking Water Directive for the determination of the nitrate and nitrite value. The limit of detection (LOD) was determined for the self-designed sensor with LOD = 2.003 mg/l for nitrate over a measurement range of 0–50 mg/l nitrate and a LOD of 0.611 mg/l nitrite over a measurement range of 0–10 mg/l nitrite and 0.013 mg/l for a measurement range of 0–1 mg/l nitrite.

Fluid Level Measurement System in Oil Storage. Python, Lab-Based Scale

Refineries, fuel depots, airports and storage terminals commonly use fluid level measurement in storage tanks. Different fluid level measurement techniques and devices differ in the inaccuracy of measurement results, costs, and company needs. In addition, these measurements seek reliability of measurement data, immediate response times, control in operations, oil movement, custody transfer and inventory control. The objective is to develop a computer system for measuring fluid levels in oil storage tanks, using ultrasonic and temperature sensors, creating a web application for an automated measurement system (SAM) for managing volumes of Petroleum. The study methodology is i) Analysis of measurement reports. ii) Selection of physical components of the computer system. iii) SAM algorithm design and web application, and iv) Validate the system. The SAM application developed in open source proposes functional modules for administration, control, security, management and monitoring of storage tanks, the status of physical components and generation of dynamic reports in real-time. The results show the control characteristics of storage tanks such as maximum and minimum volume, temperature, time, precise data records in less time than certain current computer structures.

Research on Vision Measurement System of Mechanical Workpiece Based on Machine Vision

With the rapid development of modern industrial industry, the workpiece measurement system of many industrial products gradually exceeds the operating load, and the operating efficiency is not high, the cycle is too long, and the accuracy rate is low. In order to solve the problem of automatic and intelligent measurement of mechanical workpieces in industrial production, an automatic mechanical workpiece measurement system based on machine vision is designed in this paper. The digital division of the workpiece is carried out automatically, and fast visual measurement is performed to judge whether the workpiece is qualified or not, which greatly improves the accuracy of workpiece detection. On this basis, this paper optimizes the machine vision measurement system of the workpiece based on the picture and label recognition system to make its operation efficiency higher and operation accuracy better.

Development and Automation of a Bacterial Biosensor to the Targeting of the Pollutants Toxic Effects by Portable Raman Spectrometer.

Water quality monitoring requires a rapid and sensitive method that can detect multiple hazardous pollutants at trace levels. This study aims to develop a new generation of biosensors using a low-cost fiber-optic Raman device. An automatic measurement system was thus conceived, built and successfully tested with toxic substances of three different types: antibiotics, heavy metals and herbicides. Raman spectroscopy provides a multiparametric view of metabolic responses of biological organisms to these toxic agents through their spectral fingerprints. Spectral analysis identified the most susceptible macromolecules in an E. coli model strain, providing a way to determine specific toxic effects in microorganisms. The automation of Raman analysis reduces the number of spectra required per sample and the measurement time: for four samples, time was cut from 3 h to 35 min by using a multi-well sample holder without intervention from an operator. The correct classifications were, respectively, 99%, 82% and 93% for the different concentrations of norfloxacin, while the results were 85%, 93% and 81% for copper and 92%, 90% and 96% for 3,5-dichlorophenol at the three tested concentrations. The work initiated here advances the technology needed to use Raman spectroscopy coupled with bioassays so that together, they can advance field toxicological testing.

A LABVIEW AND INTERNET OF THINGS BASED AUTOMATION MEASUREMENT SYSTEM FOR MONITORING AND ANALYZING STRUCTURE

The civil infrastructure systems play a critical role in the world; however, their average age is becoming higher and higher. Most of these structures need inspection, maintenance or replacement in order to ensure safety requirement of structures as well as users. Structural health monitoring systems has drawn attention from many organizations to manage crucial structures. Applied programming and Internet of Things (IoT) has received a great attention in the last decades due to its potential and capacity to be integrated into any complex system. This paper presents the use LabVIEW, IoT platform and hardwares to build an automated measurement system. The proposed solutions are demonstrated in this paper will help building robust and reliable measurement systems for crucial applications. The measurement system is used to evaluate the health of structures through the changes of natural frequencies.

Magnus-Forces Analysis of Pitched-Baseball Trajectories Using YOLOv3-Tiny Deep Learning Algorithm

This study analyzed the characteristics of pitched baseballs from TV broadcast videos to understand the effects of the Magnus force on a pitched-baseball trajectory using aerodynamic theory. Furthermore, an automatic measurement and analysis system for pitched-baseball trajectories, ball speeds, and spin rates was established, capturing the trajectory of the baseball thrown by the pitcher before the catcher catches it and analyzing its related dynamic parameters. The system consists of two parts: (1) capturing and detecting the pitched baseball in all frames of the video using the YOLOv3-tiny deep learning algorithm and automatically recording the coordinates of each detected baseball position; (2) automatically calculating the average speed and spin rate of the pitched baseball using aerodynamic theory. As the baseball thrown by the pitcher is fast, and live-action TV videos like sports and concerts are typically at least 24 fps or more, this study used YOLOv3-tiny algorithm to speed up the calculation. Finally, the system automatically presented pitching data on the screen, and the pitching information in the baseball game was easily obtained and recorded for further discussion. The system was tested using 30 videos of pitched baseballs and could effectively capture the baseball trajectories, throw points, catch points, and vertical displacements. Compared with the values from the TV broadcast, the average errors on the calculated ball speed and spin rate were 1.88% and 7.51%, respectively. Using the ratio of the spin rate and ball speed as a parameter to analyze the pitching state of the pitcher’s four-seam fastball in the Nippon Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball matches, it was observed that when this ratio increased, the Magnus displacement of the ball increased, thereby decreasing its late break. Therefore, the developed system provides scientific pitching data to improve the performance of baseball pitchers.

A precision grinding technology for zirconium alloy tubes based on ultrasonic wall thickness automatic measurement system

To ensure the safety and long-term performance of nuclear fuel cladding zirconium tubes, the wall thickness uniformity of each cross-section is strictly needed. Therefore, this paper developed an automatic ultrasonic wall thickness measurement system for detecting and precision grinding the nuclear zirconium tubes. The overall scheme, key mechanical structures, and design of the control system are determined considering the project background and measuring requirements. Then, a series of performance testing was performed from aspects of measuring accuracy, measuring efficiency, stability, and practicability. The results revealed that it could accurately obtain the wall thickness distribution with high accuracy and efficiency, and subsequently the precision grinding process by automatically generated deviation correcting procedures to achieve the requirement of the wall thickness uniformity and surface quality. The proposed new combination method of ultrasonic auto-measuring and precision grinding proposed in this work would have great significance for the development and application of nuclear reaction zirconium alloy containers.

Automatic velocity measurement system applied to elevator overspeed governors

All around the world, modern elevators transport safely and comfortably millions of passengers and freight each day. Since modern elevators emerged at the beginning of the 19th century, several advances have risen in this transportation system. Among them, safety conditions were significantly improved. Therefore, modern elevators must be equipped with safety protection systems to assure safety conditions and avoid accidents. An overspeed governor is one of the components of such a safety system. It acts as a stopping mechanism when the elevator car reaches an excessive velocity, known as tripping speed. When the tripping speed is reached, the overspeed governor is mechanically locked and halts the rope, thus stopping the elevator car. This paper describes the development of a new measuring system able to measure the trigger velocity of an overspeed governor with the help of a graphical interface available on a mobile electronic device (smartphone or tablet). Practical application: A new overspeed governor velocity measuring system uses a mobile electronic device for non-contact velocity measurement. This new process may replace the inaccurate measuring system currently employed by maintenance technicians, thus increasing its reliability. The main objective consists of rigorously testing the operation of overspeed governors. The developed system guarantees the automatic execution of the test under several anomalous operating situations, thus allowing the user to have real-time access to the test data obtained through a graphical interface available on a mobile electronic device.

An advanced multi-camera system for automatic, high-precision and efficient tube profile measurement

In this paper, an advanced multi-camera system based on stereo vision is developed for automatic, highly accurate and efficient tube three-dimensional profile measurement of tubes, which can be applied to tube pre-assembly or in-process tube profile inspection. Multiple cameras are designed to acquire the tube images from different angles to help avoid image understanding disaster in case of tube overlap of complex tubes. A high precision calibration method based on photography is adopted to provide basic accuracy guarantee of the developed system. Then importantly, a new approach to tube model reconstruction is proposed, including a creative and adaptive tube seed growing method for accurate tube axis reconstruction, and a direct tube end reconstruction method. Furthermore, an automatic method of tube features calculation to help improve the efficiency of tube measurement. Finally, several experiments are performed to verify the reliability, efficiency and high-precision of the developed system. According to the experimental results, the tube measurement process can be finished in about 1.5 s/m. The average deviation of the radial deviation and axial deviation is within 0.062 mm respect to its reference value with the maximum standard deviation of 0.025 mm. For the bending angle and rotate angle, the average deviations from the reference values are within 0.025° and 0.031° with the maximum standard deviation of 0.011° and 0.012°, respectively.

Tinnitus: systematic approach to primary care assessment and management.

<h3>Abstract</h3> <h3>Background</h3> Sodium intakes of different populations around the world became of interest after a positive correlation was drawn between dietary sodium intake and prevalence of hypertension. Sri Lanka has adopted a salt reduction strategy to combat high blood pressure in the population with escalation of non-communicable diseases. <h3>Objective</h3> To measure intake of salt, potassium and sodium/potassium ratio of adults in urban and rural settings. <h3>Design</h3> A community based study of 328 adults between 30-59 years, including equal numbers from urban and rural sectors. Weight, height and waist circumference were measured. Blood pressure was measured by a standardized automated measurement system and the mean of two readings was used for analysis. 24-hour urine was collected and measured for creatinine, sodium, potassium levels. <h3>Results</h3> Mean daily salt consumption was 8.3g (95%CI:7.9,8.8), which is 1.6 times higher than WHO recommendation. Mean daily potassium intake was 1,265g (95%CI:1191.0,1339.3), which is 2.8 times lower and sodium/potassium ratio was 4.3 (95%CI:4.2,4.5), which is 7 times higher than WHO recommendation. Daily salt consumption was significantly higher in males (9.0g;95%CI:8.3,9.8) than females (7.7g;95%CI:7.2,8.2); rural (8.9g;95%CI:8.2-9.6,) than urban (7.7g;95%CI:7.2,8.3) with increasing body mass index (8.2g;95%CI:6.1,10.2 to 10.0g;95%CI:8.5,11.6). Systolic blood pressure was significantly positively correlated with high BMI and waist circumference. <h3>Conclusions</h3> High salt consumption, low potassium intake and high sodium/potassium ratio was found in this population. This information can be used to set targets to reduce salt intake in the population. Need to create awareness to enhance the consumption of potassium rich food while reducing salt intake to minimize future NCD burden.

Affordable and customizable high-resolution scanning system for measurement of acoustic fields

Spatial scans of acoustic fields are often required to characterize acoustic system behavior. Automated positioning systems allow for higher spatial resolution, more efficient use of time, and increased repeatability and precision during data collection than is possible manually. Unfortunately, commercial systems can be expensive, difficult to customize after purchase, and can be very cumbersome to manipulate. The present work describes an affordable and customizable scanning system that can be operated through MATLAB using an Arduino microcontroller and constructed with OpenBuilds hardware. We will outline the integration of an oscilloscope and function generator with the motion control system to enable a completely automated measurement system. Further, we will discuss potential pitfalls one may encounter when creating a similar system and highlight best practices that allow you to avoid those problems at the system design stage. This work will discuss similar systems created to characterize underwater acoustic metamaterials (doi:10.1121/10.0009161), quantify performance of an additively manufactured acoustic diffuser (doi:10.1121/1.5147148), define pressure field responses due to inclusion of an acoustic metasurface used for acoustic holography (doi:10.26153/tsw/13999), and analyze acoustic properties of cylindrical sediment samples containing infauna (doi:10.1121/2.0000744). [Work sponsored by ARLUT, ONR, Sandia, and Samsung.]

Octopus-inspired sucker to absorb soft tissues: stiffness gradient and acetabular protuberance improve the adsorption effect

Rigid suckers commonly used in surgical procedures often cause absorption damage, while their soft counterparts are difficult to handle due to their weak anchoring. Alternatively, the octopus sucker is both soft and has strong suction power. Further observation revealed that its structure is self-sealing and that the tissues are layered in hardness. Inspired by said structure and the characteristics of associated materials, a bionic soft sucker with stiffness gradient and acetabular roof structure was proposed, made of silicone with varying hardness including structures such as acetabular roof and circle muscles. The automatic tensile force measurement system was used to experimentally analyze the adsorption performance of the suckers to the soft curved contact surface. Both dry and wet conditions were tested, along with practical tests on organisms. The bionic sucker adsorption force was increased by 25.1% and 34.6% on the cylindrical surface, and 45.2% and 7.3% on the spherical surface for dry and wet conditions, respectively. During the experiment, the bionic suckers did not cause notable suction damage to the contact surfaces. Thus, this type of bionic sucker shows good application prospects in the field of surgery.

Design and Implementation of Efficient Algorithm for Quality Assurance of Smart Energy Meters During Mass Production

To ensure the quality of the process of energy meter manufacturing, the parameters which are electrically connected are manually calculated after every single step. The process of measuring manually become outdated, erroneous, and it also take more time rather than the automatic, effort and human resources. In addition, it can be easily manipulated and can go ahead to lower products being moved, either because of deliberation or because of evil intents. With incorrect readings of the electrical parameters, the reliability of product to work has been reduced. To improve the reliability of the calculation of electrical parameters and make the process quicker, automated measurement system with application software was developed. When the energy meter is attached to the test bench, the software measures all the parameters and transmits to a data base system i.e. Meter No., Password, kWh, kVarh, Maximum Demand (MD) Interval, Cumulative MD of Tariff 1 &amp; Tariff 2 and MD Counts etc. These parameters will be checked at every step to manufacturing and while moving from one lab to another lab and finally will be compared with previous parameters record to check any abnormal behavior of the product.

Towards a Fleet of Robots for Orientation, Imaging, and Morphometric Analyses of Planktonic Foraminifera

Morphometric shell measurements help to quantify the evolutionary patterns of planktonic foraminifera (marine, calcite-secreting, and floating protists). The study of shell variations of these organisms requires observations at high stratigraphic resolution, which entails morphometric measurements from thousands of specimens. The collection of such data is time-consuming because specimens need to be oriented prior to imaging. In our studies about menardiform, globorotalids through time automatic devices were developed to orientate and image specimens under incident light. A first prototype—Automated Measurement system for shell mORphology (AMOR)—was realized in 2009 and was proven to be advantageous for gathering morphometric data. AMOR consists of a motorized universal tilting stage enabling an automatic orientation of specimens in a multicellular slide under a motorized binocular microscope. After the collection of images from the oriented specimens, shell parameters can be extracted and analyzed using separate digital imaging and morphometric software. AMOR was strongly tuned to Globorotalia menardii, a species with a quasi-symmetrical biconvex geometry in a keel view and often with a non-circular periphery in an equatorial view. Improvements of the software driving AMOR now allow the orientation of spiro- and umbilico-convex profiles and with circular forms in an equatorial view such as in phylogenetically related species like Globorotalia miocenica and Globorotalia multicamerata. Program AMOR v. 3.28 was given more flexibility using a scripting language for automatic control of the Windows graphical user interface. This approach was used to allow combinations of fix orienting functions in AMOR, which released us from reprogramming of the sophisticated LabView code. Scripting of core functions enables developing “portfolios” of adapted recipes for processing the morphologies that are beyond the menardiform morphogroup. To further expand on this concept, a follow-up robot—System AMOR 2—was completed in March 2020. It integrates the modified hardware, a newer digital camera, the updated software (AMOR v. 4.2), and improved functions. The present contribution describes the development from old AMOR to its newer twin, with the perspective of building a fleet of robots for the imaging of the oriented foraminifera in parallel.

Hand Measurement System Based on Haptic and Vision Devices towards Post-Stroke Patients.

Diagnostics of a hand requires measurements of kinematics and joint limits. The standard tools for this purpose are manual devices such as goniometers which allow measuring only one joint simultaneously, making the diagnostics time-consuming. The paper presents a system for automatic measurement and computer presentation of essential parameters of a hand. Constructed software uses an integrated vision system, a haptic device for measurement, and has a web-based user interface. The system provides a simplified way to obtain hand parameters, such as hand size, wrist, and finger range of motions, using the homogeneous-matrix-based notation. The haptic device allows for active measurement of the wrist’s range of motion and additional force measurement. A study was conducted to determine the accuracy and repeatability of measurements compared to the gold standard. The system functionality was confirmed on five healthy participants, with results showing comparable results to manual measurements regarding fingers’ lengths. The study showed that the finger’s basic kinematic structure could be measured by a vision system with a mean difference to caliper measurement of 4.5 mm and repeatability with the Standard Deviations up to 0.7 mm. Joint angle limits measurement achieved poorer results with a mean difference to goniometer of 23.6º. Force measurements taken by the haptic device showed the repeatability with a Standard Deviation of 0.7 N. The presented system allows for a unified measurement and a collection of important parameters of a human hand with therapist interface visualization and control with potential use for post-stroke patients’ precise rehabilitation.

An automatic measurement system of distal femur morphological parameters using 3D slicer software.

In the field of joint surgery, the computer-aided design of knee prostheses suitable for the Chinese population requires a large quantity of anatomical knee data. In this study, we propose a new method that uses 3D Slicer software to automatically measure the morphological parameters of the distal femur. First, 141 femur samples were segmented from CT data to establish the femoral shape library. Next, balanced iterative reducing and clustering using hierarchies (BIRCH) combined with iterative closest point (ICP) and generalised procrustes analysis (GPA) were used to achieve fast registration of the femur samples. The statistical model was automatically calculated from the registered femur samples, and an orthopaedic surgeon marked the points on the statistical model. Finally, we developed an automatic measurement system using 3D Slicer software, and a deformable model matching method was applied to establish the point correspondence between the statistical model and the other samples. By matching points on the statistical model to corresponding points in other samples, we measured all other samples. We marked six points and measured eight parameters. We evaluated the performance of automatic matching by comparing the points marked manually with those matched automatically and verified the accuracy of the system by comparing the manual and automatic measurement results. The results indicated that the average error of the automatic matching points was 1.03mm, and the average length error and average angle error measured automatically by the system were 0.37mm and 0.63°, respectively. These errors were smaller than the intra-rater and inter-rater errors measured manually by two different surgeons, which showed that the accuracy of our automatic method was high. Taken together, this study established an accurate and automatic measurement system for the distal femur based on the secondary development of 3D Slicer software to assist orthopaedic surgeons in completing the measurements of big data and further promote the improved design of Chinese-specific knee prostheses.

Optical coherence tomography for laser welding applications

In order to realize the automatic quality measurement of laser welding parts, an automatic on-line quality measurement system is established. The optical coherence tomography algorithm used in the system is studied. Firstly, the test equipment of laser welding quality inspection system is built based on optical coherence tomography algorithm. Then, the typical control algorithm is analyzed by taking the scanning galvanometer control as an example, that is, high-precision scanning and high-precision image acquisition in X and Y directions are realized. Then, the image is processed by dual-tree complex wavelet transform. Finally, the test sample is tested with the test equipment and the test results are analyzed. Experimental results show that this method can detect the quality of laser welding seam, and the detection accuracy is 5 µm. It provides industrial solutions for the online inspection of the laser welding to enable consistent and high quality welds.

Development of an automatic measurement system for medical pills based on a PDMS capacitive sensor

Regular medication intake is extremely important to get the desired therapeutic effect. However, this is quite difficult for patients, especially for the elderly and patients with Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases. In this paper, we present a sensor system for the patients to monitor the number of pills in a pharmacy bottle so that missing or repeated medicine-intake can be avoided. Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) with a special pattern is used to make pillars as springs between metal plates to form a capacitive sensor. Stress analysis and computer simulation are conducted to prove the feasibility of the new design. A circuit for small capacitance measurement is also designed to convert the capacitance to the voltage signal. Moreover, a sandwich of five capacitive sensing layers is fabricated into a weighing system to detect the weight of a medicine bottle with pills. In the detection system, the output voltage corresponds to the weight of pills with an average sensitivity is 20.06 mV/g. We conducted experiments examining the unused pills in the pharmacy bottles. Our results indicate the number of the pills from 0 to 100 can be measured accurately. Therefore, our detection system by using the flexible PDMS capacitive sensor can detect and record the number of pills, facilitating the monitoring of medicine intake for the elderly and patients suffering from dementia.

Efficient and accurate phase-measurement method for core-loss characterization.

Accurate core-loss characterization is essential to push the power density of power converters to their limits. However, existing core-loss measurement methods still have some limitations, such as a slow test speed and a complex probe calibration procedure. In particular, accurate phase-difference measurement is time-consuming because a fast Fourier transform analysis with a kHz-range frequency interval is typically applied to reduce the influence of noise. An automated measurement system for magnetic core-loss characterization is described in this paper. An accurate phase-detection block with programmable attenuators is developed to measure the phase difference between voltage and current waveforms. The proposed system considerably improves the test speed while providing comparable accuracy to the existing method.

Fully automated measurement system for temperature-dependent X-ray total scattering at beamline BL04B2 at SPring-8.

Data-driven approaches in materials science demand the collection of large amounts of data on the target materials at synchrotron beamlines. To accurately gather suitable experimental data, it is essential to establish fully automated measurement systems to reduce the workload of the beamline staff. Moreover, the recent COVID-19 pandemic has further emphasized the necessity of automated and/or remote measurements at synchrotron beamlines. Here, the installation of a new sample changer combined with a high-temperature furnace and a fully automated alignment system on beamline BL04B2 at SPring-8 is reported. The system allows X-ray total scattering measurements of up to 21 samples at different temperatures (from room temperature to 1200°C) to be conducted without any human assistance.