Battery-operated System Research Articles

A Portable Battery-Operated Sensor System for Simple and Rapid Assessment of Virgin Olive Oil Quality Grade

Virgin olive oil quality is assessed by chemical as well as sensory analysis. Two of the most important parameters that define the quality of virgin olive oils are the free acidity and the peroxide index. These chemical parameters are usually determined by manual titration procedures that must be carried out in a laboratory by trained personnel. In this paper, a portable sensor system to support the quality grade assessment of virgin olive oil is presented. The system is battery operated and characterized by small dimensions, light weight and quick measurement response (about 30 s). The working principle is based on the measurement of the electrical conductance of an emulsion between a chemical reagent and the olive oil sample. Two different chemical reagents have been investigated: (1) a hydro-alcoholic solution (HAS), made of 60% ethanol and 40% distilled water; (2) 100% distilled water (DW). Tests have been carried out on a set of 40 olive oil samples. The results have shown how, for most of the fresh virgin olive oil samples (31 samples out of 40), the free acidity can be estimated with good accuracy from the electrical conductance of the emulsion using HAS as the reagent. In the case of the full set of samples, the emulsion electrical conductance, using HAS as the reagent, is a function of both the sample free acidity as well as the compounds produced by oil oxidation, and a compensation method based on the measured electrical conductance, using DW as the reagent, has been introduced to improve the accuracy in the estimated free acidity. Tests have also been carried out on the full set of samples, using a k-nearest neighbors algorithm, to demonstrate the feasibility of olive oil classification according to the quality grade. The results have shown how measurements carried out using only the HAS reagent provide better classification accuracy than measurements carried out using both the HAS and DW reagents. The proposed system can be a low-cost alternative to standard laboratory analyses to evaluate the quality grade of virgin olive oil.

DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF MGIRI MODIFIED NMC CHARKHA

—Charkha is a small spinning device produces yarns from fibers, which can be used to make clothes. The demand for cotton fabrics in the modern world has increased the production of cotton fabrics, making them more readily available. To increase production, charkhas are operated on electricity or on a battery-operated system. There is no reliable electricity available in most of India's rural areas. Due to low population density, there is much expense associated with installing and maintaining transmission lines. As a result, some areas will lack access to reliable electricity. For the elimination of manual labour operation of charkha by using electricity is the simplest option. However, there are some issues, like the yarn produced by using electrically operated charkha does not meet the definition of khadi that is the reason the option of using electrically operated charkha is not taken significantly. A detailed study was carried out on the design and analysis of the MGIRI modified NMC charkha. The basic necessity of this study is to enhance income and reduce drudgery. Efforts have been made to modify the existing design in order to increase productivity and ease of use. In the design, the mode and means of motion transmission have been redesigned. Reduction in rotating elements (gears and pulleys), the addition of bearings, and reduction in the weight of the machine have been undertaken.

Evaluating sensitivity and specificity of the Biomeme Franklin™ three9 real-time PCR device and SARS-CoV-2 go-strips assay using clinical samples.

We evaluated the sensitivity and specificity of the Biomeme Franklin™ three9 Real-Time PCR Thermocycler and Biomeme SARS-CoV-2 Go-Strips in the detection of SARS-CoV-2. The Biomeme Franklin™ three9 platform is a portable, battery-operated system that could be used in remote settings. We assessed performance of the Biomeme SARS-CoV-2 detection system at a wide range of viral concentrations, examined cross-reactivity of the SARS-CoV-2 Go-Strips against several near-neighbor respiratory pathogens, and evaluated agreement against the BioFire® Respiratory Panel 2.1 in four clinical sample types. Our data indicate the Biomeme Go-Strips can reliably detect SARS-CoV-2 at a concentration of 4.2 × 103 copies/mL. No cross reactivity of the Go-Strips targets was detected against any of the tested near-neighbor respiratory pathogens. Cohen's kappa statistics ranged from 0.68 to 0.92 between results from the Biomeme SARS-CoV-2 Go-Strips and the BioFire® Respiratory Panel 2.1 in all the different sample types. Compared to the BioFire® Respiratory Panel 2.1, the Biomeme SARS-CoV-2 Go-Strips demonstrated statistically significantly lower sensitivity in 3 out of 5 sample types. Overall, our study demonstrates the Biomeme Franklin™ three9 used with the SARS-CoV-2 Go-Strips is an effective system for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 that could potentially be used in a remote or austere environment.

Optimal Measuring and Energy Planning of Smart Grid Considering the Battery Lifetime by Using FFA

The ceaselessly developing request for power in this world privileges a productive and dependable framework of energy sources. Disseminated energy assets such as wind-based energy and solar-based energy can remain shared inside a smart grid to source energy to the utilizers in a feasible way. In arranging to safeguard the extra dependable and conservative energy source, the battery-operated capacity system is coordinated inside the smart grid. In this objective, the operational cost of smart grid is decreased by financial planning in view of the ideal estimate of the battery-operated system and the period of battery procedure. Hence, the actual period battery procedure cost is modelled in view of the perceptiveness of release individually in the time interim. In addition, the anticipated economic planning with battery-operated measuring is improved by using the Fire-Fly algorithm (FFA). The adequacy of FFA is associated through other metaheuristic strategies in relations of execution estimation files, which remain price of power also misfortune of power supply possibility. The proposed method results show that this method diminishes the price of the grid and also achieves the optimum estimate of the battery-operating to the smart grid.

A spiking neural network (SNN) for detecting high frequency oscillations (HFOs) in the intraoperative ECoG

To achieve seizure freedom, epilepsy surgery requires the complete resection of the epileptogenic brain tissue. In intraoperative electrocorticography (ECoG) recordings, high frequency oscillations (HFOs) generated by epileptogenic tissue can be used to tailor the resection margin. However, automatic detection of HFOs in real-time remains an open challenge. Here we present a spiking neural network (SNN) for automatic HFO detection that is optimally suited for neuromorphic hardware implementation. We trained the SNN to detect HFO signals measured from intraoperative ECoG on-line, using an independently labeled dataset (58 min, 16 recordings). We targeted the detection of HFOs in the fast ripple frequency range (250-500 Hz) and compared the network results with the labeled HFO data. We endowed the SNN with a novel artifact rejection mechanism to suppress sharp transients and demonstrate its effectiveness on the ECoG dataset. The HFO rates (median 6.6 HFO/min in pre-resection recordings) detected by this SNN are comparable to those published in the dataset (Spearman’s rho = 0.81). The postsurgical seizure outcome was “predicted” with 100% (CI [63 100%]) accuracy for all 8 patients. These results provide a further step towards the construction of a real-time portable battery-operated HFO detection system that can be used during epilepsy surgery to guide the resection of the epileptogenic zone.

BioDry: An Inexpensive, Low-Power Method to Preserve Aquatic Microbial Biomass at Room Temperature.

This report describes BioDry (patent pending), a method for reliably preserving the biomolecules associated with aquatic microbial biomass samples, without the need of hazardous materials (e.g. liquid nitrogen, preservatives, etc.), freezing, or bulky storage/sampling equipment. Gel electrophoresis analysis of nucleic acid extracts from samples treated in the lab with the BioDry method indicated that molecular integrity was protected in samples stored at room temperature for up to 30 days. Analysis of 16S/18S rRNA genes for presence/absence and relative abundance of microorganisms using both 454-pyrosequencing and TRFLP profiling revealed statistically indistinguishable communities from control samples that were frozen in liquid nitrogen immediately after collection. Seawater and river water biomass samples collected with a portable BioDry “field unit", constructed from off-the-shelf materials and a battery-operated pumping system, also displayed high levels of community rRNA preservation, despite a slight decrease in nucleic acid recovery over the course of storage for 30 days. Functional mRNA and protein pools from the field samples were also effectively conserved with BioDry, as assessed by respective RT-PCR amplification and western blot of ribulose-1-5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase. Collectively, these results demonstrate that BioDry can adequately preserve a suite of biomolecules from aquatic biomass at ambient temperatures for up to a month, giving it great potential for high resolution sampling in remote locations or on autonomous platforms where space and power are limited.

Infrared Image Processing for a Physiological Information Telemetry System

Traditional measurements of physiological information are generally by contact mode. Although contact measurements have the advantage of high accuracy, some people feel uncomfortable, and the battery-operated portable or handheld measurement system cannot be implemented for long-term operation. In this work, we adopt a high performance infrared thermal imaging camera to scan and capture human body images. The grayscale image processing and conversion procedures are provided to detect human body temperatures and heart rates (HR). The remote monitoring measurement function for physiological information is suitable for in-home care, in-home care services, large hospitals or health care institutions. The system uses an infrared thermal imaging camera to search regions of the human body. The algorithm is applied to the elliptical model to search the human body for positions on the head and neck, which are captured because of the higher temperature regions on the neck. We use the fast Fourier transform method to transfer the temperature's data from the time domain into the frequency domain. Information from the human body temperature and HR are calculated using the correlation between heart rate and vessel temperature. This physiological information determines physical health symptoms and achieves the concept for a physiological information telemetry system.

Design and development of an automated, portable and handheld tablet personal computer-based data acquisition system for monitoring electromyography signals during rehabilitation

This article describes the design of a robust, inexpensive, easy-to-use, small, and portable online electromyography acquisition system for monitoring electromyography signals during rehabilitation. This single-channel (one-muscle) system was connected via the universal serial bus port to a programmable Windows operating system handheld tablet personal computer for storage and analysis of the data by the end user. The raw electromyography signals were amplified in order to convert them to an observable scale. The inherent noise of 50 Hz (Malaysia) from power lines electromagnetic interference was then eliminated using a single-hybrid IC notch filter. These signals were sampled by a signal processing module and converted into 24-bit digital data. An algorithm was developed and programmed to transmit the digital data to the computer, where it was reassembled and displayed in the computer using software. Finally, the following device was furnished with the graphical user interface to display the online muscle strength streaming signal in a handheld tablet personal computer. This battery-operated system was tested on the biceps brachii muscles of 20 healthy subjects, and the results were compared to those obtained with a commercial single-channel (one-muscle) electromyography acquisition system. The results obtained using the developed device when compared to those obtained from a commercially available physiological signal monitoring system for activities involving muscle contractions were found to be comparable (the comparison of various statistical parameters) between male and female subjects. In addition, the key advantage of this developed system over the conventional desktop personal computer-based acquisition systems is its portability due to the use of a tablet personal computer in which the results are accessible graphically as well as stored in text (comma-separated value) form.

Separating Nonstationary Powerline Interference from ECG Using Empirical Mode Decomposition

Powerline interference (PLI) is a significant source of noise in Electrocardiogram (ECG). It often exhibits variations in frequency and amplitude along with relatively lower level than that of ECG signal in battery-operated ECG system, whose separation remains a challenging task. The use of masking signal-aided empirical mode decomposition is presented to deal with this problem in this study. Simulation results show that our method can effectively decompose the time-varying PLI into a single intrinsic mode function (IMF) at various interference levels.

Accuracy analysis of the State-of-Charge and remaining run-time determination for lithium-ion batteries

This paper describes the various error sources in a real-time State-of-Charge (SoC) evaluation system and their effects on the overall accuracy in the calculation of the remaining run-time of a battery-operated system. The SoC algorithm for Li-ion batteries studied in this paper combines direct measurement of the Electro-Motive Force (EMF) and book-keeping systems. The major error source appears to be the value of the EMF, which changes with temperature, with previous (dis)charging conditions and due to aging over time. It is shown that with a new method for modelling the SoC–EMF relationship and by predicting the battery’s State-of-Charge-left, an error of less than 1 min or 1% in the remaining run-time can be obtained.

Stereotactic vacuum biopsy of calcifications with a handheld portable biopsy system: a validation study

To prospectively evaluate a compact portable 10-gauge handheld battery-operated biopsy system for stereotactic biopsy of microcalcifications. The ethics committee of the hospital approved this prospective multicentric study, and informed consent was obtained. Biopsy under stereotactic guidance was performed in 215 patients for 219 lesions consisting of microcalcifications without mass. The feasibility and the tolerance of the procedure were evaluated. The mean weight of the specimen was calculated. In patients with surgical diagnoses, the underestimation rate in biopsy diagnoses of atypical ductal hyperplasia and ductal carcinoma in situ were evaluated. The sampled specimens were separated according to the presence of calcifications on magnified specimen radiographs and to the probe the rotation number in order to evaluate the contribution of each rotation and the contribution of the specimen with and without calcifications on the radiographs. The macrobiopsy was feasible in 98.5% of the patients and was well tolerated in 82% of patients. It identified 4.6% invasive carcinomas, 18.5% ductal carcinomas in situ, 14.8% atypical ductal hyperplasias, 22.2% benign proliferative mastopathies and 39.8% benign non-proliferative mastopathies. The underestimation rate was 26.6% when an atypical ductal hyperplasia was diagnosed at biopsy, and 7.7% when a ductal carcinoma in situ was diagnosed. In the 77 patients with surgical correlation, the accurate diagnosis was obtained in specimens sampled during the first, second, and third in 69%, 9%, and 4% of the biopsies, respectively, and the analysis of specimens without microcalcification had an added value in 8% of patients. The compact portable battery-operated biopsy system can be used successfully for stereotactic biopsy of microcalcifications and constitutes a valid alternative to current systems.

A New Portable Instrument for Continuous Measurement of Formaldehyde in Ambient Air

Abstract A new instrument for the in situ measurement of formaldehyde with online concentration output was built on the base of the Hantzsch chemistry fluorimetric detection of formaldehyde in liquid phase. The instrument was specially designed for applications in a fast-changing environment, for example, in airborne research. Individual instrument components were optimized to reduce size, weight, and power consumption and to improve response time. The small size, battery-operated system was shown to reach good performance, stable sensitivity, and detection limits of <100 ppt for temperatures between 0° and 35°C during aircraft flight missions in field campaigns in the Italian Po Valley. The instrument proved its performance with formaldehyde mixing ratios ranging from 0.5 to 25 ppb.

A Square-Wave Current Inverter for Aircraft-Mounted Electromagnetic Surveying Systems

An inverter topology that has been developed for geophysical surveying applications makes it possible to achieve very fast current reversal in magnetic field coils. The inverter also makes it possible to generate waveforms that contain a variable high-frequency spectrum superimposed on a high-amplitude low-frequency fundamental. A feature, which is attractive from an implementation point of view, is that a low-voltage source such as a battery can be combined with high-voltage transistors to meet high dynamic requirements. Two variations of the topology are discussed, namely, a clamped and unclamped version. The proposed inverter was successfully implemented in two aircraft-mounted geophysical surveying systems achieving substantial performance improvement over the older systems. A 40-kW system was constructed for a fixed-wing aircraft and a smaller, battery-operated system was implemented on a helicopter.

A low-voltage, low quiescent current, low drop-out regulator

The demand for low-voltage, low drop-out (LDO) regulators is increasing because of the growing demand for portable electronics, i.e., cellular phones, pagers, laptops, etc. LDO's are used coherently with dc-dc converters as well as standalone parts. In power supply systems, they are typically cascaded onto switching regulators to suppress noise and provide a low noise output. The need for low voltage is innate to portable low power devices and corroborated by lower breakdown voltages resulting from reductions in feature size. Low quiescent current in a battery-operated system is an intrinsic performance parameter because it partially determines battery life. This paper discusses some techniques that enable the practical realizations of low quiescent current LDO's at low voltages and in existing technologies. The proposed circuit exploits the frequency response dependence on load-current to minimize quiescent current flow. Moreover, the output current capabilities of MOS power transistors are enhanced and drop-out voltages are decreased for a given device size. Other applications, like dc-dc converters, can also reap the benefits of these enhanced MOS devices. An LDO prototype incorporating the aforementioned techniques was fabricated. The circuit was operable down to input voltages of 1 V with a zero-load quiescent current flow of 23 /spl mu/A. Moreover, the regulator provided 18 and 50 mA of output current at input voltages of 1 and 1.2 V, respectively.

An automated system, based on microchips, for monitoring individual activity in wild small mammals

A new battery-operated system based on microchips has been developed for detecting free-moving, wild small mammals. An electronic identification unit connected to a portable data-logger can simultaneously accommodate up to eight detector antennae, which are positioned in the habitat of the species under study. The system can operate even in extreme weather conditions and has the capacity to distinguish and record individual mammals entering burrows or visiting artificial feeding stations. Detection events are stored in a data-logger and subsequently can be edited and analysed by many common software packages. A pilot study tested the system by monitoring the visits of three species of small mammals to artificial feeding stations. Further possible applications are discussed. J. Exp. Zool. 280:97–99, 1998. © 1998 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

An automated system, based on microchips, for monitoring individual activity in wild small mammals

A new battery-operated system based on microchips has been developed for detecting free-moving, wild small mammals. An electronic identification unit connected to a portable data-logger can simultaneously accommodate up to eight detector antennae, which are positioned in the habitat of the species under study. The system can operate even in extreme weather conditions and has the capacity to distinguish and record individual mammals entering burrows or visiting artificial feeding stations. Detection events are stored in a data-logger and subsequently can be edited and analysed by many common software packages. A pilot study tested the system by monitoring the visits of three species of small mammals to artificial feeding stations. Further possible applications are discussed.

Time‐ and Level‐Controlled Filling System for Class A Evaporation Pans

Recently developed integrated circuit technology and new reliable pressure transducers have made it possible to develop a battery-operated system to automatically fill class A evaporation pans from stored water. The system records and stores the average of 12 pan level records during a 1 min time period at the end of each every 15 min period for later transmission to a central data storage facility. The measurement sensitivity of the system is 0.02 cm of evaporation over a range of 3.5 cm. A field calibration of the system showed that there was a very good (\iR²=0.999) linear relationship between standard hook gage and pressure transducer water level measurements. This system is being used in remote locations because the circuitry draws very little quiescent current. A small solar panel keeps the system’s 12 V battery fully charged.

An atmospheric electrical voltmeter follower

Horizontal passive antennas used to sense the potential of the atmosphere above the earth’s surface demand high performance from attached electrometer voltmeter circuits. The floating follower circuit described here allows precision dc measurements of potential difference in the range ±10 V, while maintaining input currents of order 10−15 A. Voltage offsets over most of the dynamic range are less than 50 μV, allowing precise guarding of the input electrode to further minimize input leakage currents. The battery-operated system is well suited to atmospheric electrical measurements using horizontal antennas operating within 10 cm of the earth’s surface, and provides an inexpensive means of precision high impedance voltage measurements.

Data acquisition and signal processing using a laptop personal computer

This article describes a battery-operated system, consisting of a laptop personal computer, peripheral electronics, and associated software programs, that allows for flexible data acquisition and conditional signal processing. The design of a data acquisition system around a laptop computer contains many challenges not encountered in conventional PC-based systems. The focus of this article is on those aspects of the peripheral electronics that are implemented specifically to minimize power consumption in a battery-operated environment, take advantage of the particular features of our laptop, and provide the greatest possible signal processing flexibility and capability. The use of this system in an experiment to detect bearing defects by acquiring and processing the signal from an accelerometer is described. The application employs a vibration envelope detection scheme along with the full flexibility designed into the peripheral electronics to provide a quite sophisticated tool for monitoring the health of a bearing.

Microcontroller-Based Data Acquisition System for Impact Measurement

ABSTRACT Adata acquisition system for measuring impact accelerations along three orthogonal axes has been designed, built, and tested. This unit is a portable, stand-alone, battery-operated system. It calculates and records the resultant acceleration vector, its time of occurrence and its duration. Impact thresholds for data recording can be programmed for different agricultural products. The adjustable threshold assures that only the desired damaging impact level data is collected. The hardware design and performance of this unit are described.