Different Kinds Of Environments Research Articles

Living with robots: Interactive environmental knowledge acquisition

Robots, in order to properly interact with people and effectively perform the requested tasks, should have a deep and specific knowledge of the environment they live in. Current capabilities of robotic platforms in understanding the surrounding environment and the assigned tasks are limited, despite the recent progress in robotic perception. Moreover, novel improvements in human–robot interaction support the view that robots should be regarded as intelligent agents that can request the help of the user to improve their knowledge and performance.In this paper, we present a novel approach to semantic mapping. Instead of requiring our robots to autonomously learn every possible aspect of the environment, we propose a shift in perspective, allowing non-expert users to shape robot knowledge through human–robot interaction. Thus, we present a fully operational prototype system that is able to incrementally and on-line build a rich and specific representation of the environment. Such a novel representation combines the metric information needed for navigation tasks with the symbolic information that conveys meaning to the elements of the environment and the objects therein. Thanks to such a representation, we are able to exploit multiple AI techniques to solve spatial referring expressions and support task execution. The proposed approach has been experimentally validated on different kinds of environments, by several users, and on multiple robotic platforms.

Design Fixation: A Comparison between Native and Foreign Domains

Design fixation negatively impacts design outcomes and is generally referred as the designer's inability to consider multiple strategies to formulate and solve a design need. The present paper will assess some of the design skills of Indian engineering students viz. fluency, flexibility and originality. To evaluate these skills, a more general task of designing a disposable spill-proof coffee cup is given to the sample. The sample consisted of students from native domain (Mechanical and Civil engineering departments) and foreign domain (other than the mentioned departments). The results were discussed with reference to the level of fixation of students of native and foreign domains, while providing two different kinds of environments, one with a specified sample example and other with a design pattern.

Determination of strain, site occupancy, photoluminescent, and thermoluminescent-trapping parameters of Sm3+-doped NaSrB5O9 microstructures

Monoclinic NaSrB5O9:Sm3+ phosphors were synthesized by a conventional solid-state reaction method in air. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) studies revealed that the Sm3+ ions preferably occupy Sr2+ cation sites in the NaSrB5O9 host lattice. The doping-dependent crystallite size and lattice strain on the X-ray peak broadening of the NaSrB5O9:Sm3+ phosphor was determined by the Scherrer and Williamson–Hall (W–H) methods. Trigonally and tetrahedrally coordinated boron atoms in the phosphors were confirmed by confocal Raman analysis. Under near-UV excitation (402nm), the NaSrB5O9:Sm3+ phosphors emitted reddish-orange light at 604 nm that corresponds to the 4G5/2→6H7/2 transition. The concentration quenching mechanism between the two Sm3+ ions within the host was proved to be the dipole-dipole interaction, and the critical distance was found to be 22.29Å. The fitted luminescence decay curves in terms of a second-order exponential model suggest that the Sm3+ ions possess two different kinds of environments in the host lattice, which was supported by XPS analysis. The defects acting as trapping centers were investigated by thermoluminescence glow curves. The γ-irradiated NaSrB5O9:Sm3+ phosphors show two major dosimetric glow peaks centered at about 188.83 and 378.66°C, indicating two different kinds of trapping centers in the phosphors.

Aims and Scope of JIDPS: Coping with the Challenges in Transdisciplinary Design

In my last editorial for Vol 18 No 4 of the journal (Zeng, 2014), the Aims and Scope of Journal of Integrated Design and Process Science (JIDPS) were summarized into a framework of three levels covering the research findings related to transdisciplinary notions of design and process: 1) understanding of design and process crossing boundaries of natural, human, and built environments, 2) principles, methods, and tools, and 3) applications of design and process science to engineering and social problems. In the last issue, three papers respectively addressing these issues were included. A transdisciplinary design is a design that requires knowledge, expertise, experiences, and tools from different disciplines. There are many challenges in conducting a transdisciplinary design project. First, it is usually difficult for experts from different domains to communicate smoothly due to the different terminology and models that different domains use to describe the world. Second, due to the lack of an all-inclusive brain, the acquisition of relevant knowledge distributed in different domains can be a lengthy process. Third, the solution direction cannot be well defined before enough knowledge has been obtained while the necessary domain knowledge cannot be effectively and efficiently obtained before a solution direction has been well defined. This issue will look into the concept of transdisciplinary design and associated methodologies and applications. The first paper, titled “Environment-Based Design (EBD): a methodology for transdisciplinary design” by Zeng introduces a methodology to deal with transdisciplinary design problems. In the EBD methodology (Zeng, 2011), design is an activity that aims to change an existing environment to a desired one by creating a new artefact into the existing environment. As a result, design starts from the environment, serves the environment, and changes the environment. The transdisciplinary nature of a design can thus be taken into account through different kinds of environment and environment interactions across different disciplines. The EBD methodology includes three interdependent activities: environment analysis, conflict identification, and solution generation. Throughout the entire design process, any newly generated design solution will be viewed as an environment component for the succeeding design activities. The design process continues until no more undesired conflict exists in the environment. A transdisciplinary design problem can be decomposed through the partitioning of the environment implied in the problem description. Underlying the EBD methodology is a question strategy based on semantic analysis enabled by the Recursive Object Model (ROM). The questions generated throughout the design process will guide designers to collect information from different domains and to integrate the information into the present design context. In addition, this paper also proposes four criteria

Generating synthetic Landsat images based on all available Landsat data: Predicting Landsat surface reflectance at any given time

A new algorithm for generating synthetic Landsat images is developed based on all available Landsat data. This algorithm is capable of predicting Landsat surface reflectance for any desired date. It first excludes cloud, cloud shadow, and snow observations, and then uses the remaining clear observations to estimate time series models for each Landsat pixel. Three time series models (a simple model, advanced model, and full model) are used for estimating surface reflectance for each pixel, and the selection of a time series model is dependent on the number of clear observations available: the more clear observations, the more complex the model will be that is used. For each time series model there are three components (seasonality, trend, and breaks), that are used for modeling intra-annual and inter-annual differences and abrupt surface change. Abrupt surface changes are detected by differencing predicted and observed Landsat observations, and if the difference is larger than twice the Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) for six consecutive observations, it will be detected as a “break” in the time series model. The RMSE values are temporally adjusted to provide better threshold range. For each “synthetic” image, a Quality Assessment (QA) Band is provided that contains information on how the time series model was estimated and used for generating the synthetic data. We have applied this approach to six Landsat scenes within the United States. We visually compared the synthetic images with real Landsat images for different kinds of environments and they are similar for all image pairs. We also quantitatively assessed the accuracy of the synthetic data by calculating the RMSE value for all clear Landsat observations. The RMSE values for the three visible bands are the lowest (approximately 0.01), and the Short-wave Infrared (SWIR) bands are slightly higher in magnitude (between 0.01 and 0.02). The Near Infrared (NIR) band has the highest RMSE values (between 0.02 and 0.03). The goal of this paper is to provide Landsat images that are free of cloud, cloud shadow, snow, and Scan Line Corrector (SLC)-off gaps that can be used to derive land cover and bio-physical products.

Parameter Design of Disturbance Observer for a Robust Control of Two-Wheeled Wheelchair System

The wheelchair system presented in this research has only two wheels. This mechanical choice increases the maneuverability of the wheelchair itself, making the system more agile and able to overcome small obstacles (e.g. step, bump, rough terrain, etc.) in different kinds of environments. In addition, the user is able to train her/his body, since it is necessary to lean the body forward and backward to drive the wheelchair along the corresponding direction. Besides these advantages, there is a big drawback: the system is naturally unstable. For this reason, a motion controller is necessary to keep the wheelchair balanced. Furthermore, it is not possible to have a direct control along the pitch direction and a stable configuration is reached only through the actuation of the wheels. In order to estimate the torque acting on the pitch direction, the synthesized pitch angle disturbance observer (SPADO) is introduced. The results collected by SPADO combined with a Lyapunov controller makes the stabilization possible. During the design phase, particular attention should be paid to the inertia parameters variation, otherwise the performance of the entire system decreases. A detailed stability analysis is carried on to identify, from a theoretical point of view, the best parameter tuning. Then, the results from the experiments on the real platform are presented to verify the theoretical results.

Deterministic propagation model for RFID using site-specific and FDTD

The conduction of experiments to evaluate a tag orientation and its readability in a laboratory offers great potential for reducing time and costs for users. This article presents a novel methodology for developing simulation models for RFID (radio-frequency identification) environments. The main challenges in adopting this model are: (1) to find out how the properties of each one of the materials, on which the tag is applied, influence the read range and to determine the necessary power for tag reading and (2) to find out the power of the backscattered signal received by the tag when energised by the RF wave transmitted by the reader. The validation tests, performed in four different kinds of environments, with tags applied to six different kinds of materials, six different distances and with a reader configured with three different powers, showed achievements on the average of 95.3% accuracy in the best scenario and 87.0% in the worst scenario. The methodology can be easily duplicated to generate simulation models to other different RFID environments.

Prototyped LEACH Routing Algorithm for the Enhancement of Energy Efficiency in Wireless Sensor Network

topic of discussion and research is wireless sensor network and it just because it is an always application based. The research on wireless sensor networks has recently received much attention by offering an advantage of monitoring different kinds of environments by sensing their physical phenomenon. There are some important parameters are like prolonged network lifetime, scalability, and load balancing for many sensor network applications. Clustering in sensor nodes is an effective technique for achieving efficiency in these parameters. In this work, a prototype energy efficient LEACH algorithm has been written on the basis of energy impact factor for wireless sensor network applications. Low Energy Adaptive Clustering Hierarchy is one of popular cluster-based structures, which has been widely used in wireless sensor networks. To maintain balanced energy consumption LEACH uses TDMA. The prototyped protocol adds feature to LEACH to reduce the consumption of the network resource in each round.

Morphology and dynamics of inflated subaqueous basaltic lava flows

AbstractDuring eruptions onto low slopes, basaltic Pahoehoe lava can form thin lobes that progressively coalesce and inflate to many times their original thickness, due to a steady injection of magma beneath brittle and viscoelastic layers of cooled lava that develop sufficient strength to retain the flow. Inflated lava flows forming tumuli and pressure ridges have been reported in different kinds of environments, such as at contemporary subaerial Hawaiian‐type volcanoes in Hawaii, La Réunion and Iceland, in continental environments (states of Oregon, Idaho, Washington), and in the deep sea at Juan de Fuca Ridge, the Galapagos spreading center, and at the East Pacific Rise (this study). These lava have all undergone inflation processes, yet they display highly contrasting morphologies that correlate with their depositional environment, the most striking difference being the presence of water. Lava that have inflated in subaerial environments display inflation structures with morphologies that significantly differ from subaqueous lava emplaced in the deep sea, lakes, and rivers. Their height is 2–3 times smaller and their length being 10–15 times shorter. Based on heat diffusion equation, we demonstrate that more efficient cooling of a lava flow in water leads to the rapid development of thicker (by 25%) cooled layer at the flow surface, which has greater yield strength to counteract its internal hydrostatic pressure than in subaerial environments, thus limiting lava breakouts to form new lobes, hence promoting inflation. Buoyancy also increases the ability of a lava to inflate by 60%. Together, these differences can account for the observed variations in the thickness and extent of subaerial and subaqueous inflated lava flows.

Ribbon model based path tracking method for autonomous ground vehicles

To resolve the path tracking problem of autonomous ground vehicles, an analysis of existing path tracking methods was carried out and an important conclusion was got. The vehicle-road model is crucial for path following. Based on the conclusion, a new vehicle-road model named “ribbon model” was constructed with consideration of road width and vehicle geometry structure. A new vehicle-road evaluation algorithm was proposed based on this model, and a new path tracking controller including a steering controller and a speed controller was designed. The difficulties of preview distance selection and parameters tuning with speed in the pure following controller are avoided in this controller. To verify the performance of the novel method, simulation and real vehicle experiments were carried out. Experimental results show that the path tracking controller can keep the vehicle in the road running as fast as possible, so it can adjust the control strategy, such as safety, amenity, and rapidity criteria autonomously according to the road situation. This is important for the controller to adapt to different kinds of environments, and can improve the performance of autonomous ground vehicles significantly.

Speed and Texture: An Empirical Study on Optical-Flow Accuracy in ADAS Scenarios

Increasing mobility in everyday life has led to the concern for the safety of automotives and human life. Computer vision has become a valuable tool for developing driver assistance applications that target such a concern. Many such vision-based assisting systems rely on motion estimation, where optical flow has shown its potential. A variational formulation of optical flow that achieves a dense flow field involves a data term and regularization terms. Depending on the image sequence, the regularization has to appropriately be weighted for better accuracy of the flow field. Because a vehicle can be driven in different kinds of environments, roads, and speeds, optical-flow estimation has to be accurately computed in all such scenarios. In this paper, we first present the polar representation of optical flow, which is quite suitable for driving scenarios due to the possibility that it offers to independently update regularization factors in different directional components. Then, we study the influence of vehicle speed and scene texture on optical-flow accuracy. Furthermore, we analyze the relationships of these specific characteristics on a driving scenario (vehicle speed and road texture) with the regularization weights in optical flow for better accuracy. As required by the work in this paper, we have generated several synthetic sequences along with ground-truth flow fields.

System for monitoring microclimate conditions in greenhouse

Monitoring microclimate parameters in different kind of environments has significant contribution to many areas of human activity and production processes. One of them is vegetable production in greenhouses where measurement of its microclimate parameters may influence the decision on taking appropriate action and protect crops. It is also important to preserve optimal condition in greenhouses to facilitate the process of transpiration, plant mineral nutrition and prevent of a variety physiological damage caused by a deficit of some specific nutrients. Systems for monitoring have wide application in the last years thanks to development of modern computer technology. In this paper model of the monitoring system based on smart transducer concept was introduced. Within the system components are based on MSP430 ultra low power micro controllers. They are using wireless communication to exchange data within the system that was structured according to smart transducer concept. User applications from the network could access to system interface using HTTP protocol where web server could be running on the computer or it could be an embedded web server running on micro controller based device.

Modeling and Evaluation of Wireless Sensor Network Protocols by Stochastic Timed Automata

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are widely used in different kinds of environments. They may encounter lots of stochastic uncertainties and disturbances like message loss and node dynamics. Thus, it is critical to ensure the correctness of low level protocols in WSNs and evaluate their performance under different circumstances. In this paper, we propose a new method to analyze and evaluate WSN protocols based on stochastic timed automata and statistical model checking.For modeling, the work flow of a WSN protocol can be modeled with classical timed automata. Then, to model the uncertainties such as message loss and node dynamics, which are common in realistic circumstances, the timed automata can be extended by stochastic transitions, resulting in the stochastic timed automata. For analysis, the correctness of the protocol can be answered by classical model checking on the timed automata, while the performance of the protocol under realistic environments can be evaluated by statistical model checking on the stochastic model. To illustrate the feasibility and scalability of the modeling and verification method presented in this paper, Timing-sync Protocol for Sensor Networks (TPSN) will be studied completely throughout the paper.

A informação no contexto da política neoliberal

The article outlines the "neoliberal* politics in its complexity, historical context, and how the Information, no matter its way of support, outgoing from many different kinds of environments has been distorted irrthe whole international scenery.

Mollusks: how are they arranged in the rocky intertidal zone?

Mollusks occupy different kinds of environments, including the intertidal zone. The present study investigated the spatial distribution of mollusks on beach rocks of the intertidal zone of Pacheco Beach in the state of Ceará, Brazil. Sampling occurred from August 2006 to September 2007. Across two transects, six samples of 0.25 m² were collected monthly in gaps of 30 m (0 m, 30 m, 60 m, 90 m, 120 m and 150 m). The mollusks were counted in field, and samples of sediment and algae were taken for further analysis. A total of 74,515 individuals were found and classified into 67 species, 52 genera and 39 families. Gastropods were predominant, corresponding to 73.1% of the species, followed by bivalves (22.4%) and chitons (4.5%). Caecum ryssotitum de Folin, 1867 was the most abundant taxon, representing 68.8% of total specimen findings. In general, species were mostly found in Middle Littoral zone (samples 60 m and 90 m), suggesting that the greater number of microenvironments available in this area may contribute to establishment and survival.

Open Guided Inquiry Laboratory in Physics Teacher Education

This study has investigated the use of an open guided inquiry laboratory course in which a group of pre-service teachers planned and implemented practical work for school purposes. A total of 32 pre-service teachers (physics, mathematics, and chemistry majors) participated in the study. Each participant wrote a reflective essay after completing the course, and three pre-service teachers were interviewed four times during the course. The results show that the use of an open guided inquiry environment provides support for pre-service teachers to discover the limits of their understanding of subject matter knowledge, allowing them to construct knowledge in a different kind of environment from any they had possessed previously, and helping them to understand the possibilities of practical work in teaching. In the course of developing their competence in these aspects, pre-service teachers also gain an understanding of various aspects of teachers’ knowledge.

Creating dialogue by storytelling

PurposeThe objective of this paper is to develop practice and theory from Augusto Boal's dialogue technique (Image Theatre) for organisational use. The paper aims to examine how the members in an organisation create dialogue together by using a dramaturgical storytelling framework where the dialogue emerges from storytelling facilitated by symbolic representations of still images.Design/methodology/approachThe study follows the lines of participatory action and art‐based research. The data are collected from 13 dramaturgical work story storytelling sessions in four different organisations. The research design belongs to the tradition of research‐based theatre, which implies artful inquiry, scripting and performance in research.FindingsThe paper presents a model for organisational dialogue. The model illustrates the dramaturgical storytelling of work story which influences problem shifting in a positive way.Research limitations/implicationsThe limitations of this study are related to the scope of the research. The Scandinavian cultural context facilitates an open, bottom up process. More case studies in different kinds of environments should be conducted. In the future it might be advantageous to conduct more longitudinal studies on how organisations can nurture continuous dialogue.Practical implicationsWork story as a dialogue practice facilitated members from the same occupational groups to share experiences with each other and construct common interests by investigating unstructured and uncertain social situations at work.Originality/valueThe paper combines research fields that explore art‐based initiatives within organisations, workplace learning and innovation research.

Hominin responses to environmental changes during the Middle Pleistocene in central and southern Italy

Abstract. The palaeobotanical record of early Palaeolithic sites from Western Europe indicates that hominins settled in different kinds of environments. During the "mid-Pleistocene transition (MPT)", from about 1 to 0.6 Ma, the transition from 41- to 100-ka dominant climatic oscillations, occurring within a long-term cooling trend, was associated with an aridity crisis which strongly modified the ecosystems. Starting from the MPT the more favourable climate of central and southern Italy provided propitious environmental conditions for long-term human occupations even during the glacial times. In fact, the human strategy of territory occupation was certainly driven by the availabilities of resources. Prehistoric sites such as Notarchirico (ca. 680–600 ka), La Pineta (ca. 600–620 ka), Guado San Nicola (ca. 380–350 ka) or Ceprano (ca. 345–355 ka) testify to a preferential occupation of the central and southern Apennines valleys during interglacial phases, while later interglacial occupations were oriented towards the coastal plains, as attested by the numerous settlements of the Roma Basin (ca. 300 ka). Faunal remains indicate that human subsistence behaviours benefited from a diversity of exploitable ecosystems, from semi-open to closed environments. In central and southern Italy, several palynological records have already illustrated the regional- and local-scale vegetation dynamic trends. During the Middle Pleistocene climate cycles, mixed mesophytic forests developed during the interglacial periods and withdrew in response to increasing aridity during the glacial episodes. New pollen data from the Boiano Basin (Molise, Italy) attest to the evolution of vegetation and climate between MIS 13 and 9 (ca. 500 to 300 ka). In this basin the persistence of high edaphic humidity, even during the glacial phases, could have favoured the establishment of a refuge area for the arboreal flora and provided subsistence resources for the animal and hominin communities during the Middle Pleistocene. This could have constrained human groups to migrate into such a propitious area. Regarding the local climate evolution during the glacial episodes, the supposed displacement from these sites could be linked to the environmental dynamics solely due to the aridity increase, rather than directly to the global climate changes.

Mycorrhizal hyphae as ecological niche for highly specialized hypersymbionts – or just soil free-riders?

Mycorrhizal fungi interconnect two different kinds of environments, namely the plant roots with the surrounding soil. This widespread coexistence of plants and fungi has important consequences for plant mineral nutrition, water acquisition, carbon allocation, tolerance to abiotic and biotic stresses and interplant competition. Yet some current research indicates a number of important roles to be played by hyphae-associated microbes, in addition to the hyphae themselves, in foraging for and acquisition of soil resources and in transformation of organic carbon in the soil-plant systems. We critically review the available scientific evidence for the theory that the surface of mycorrhizal hyphae in soil is colonized by highly specialized microbial communities, and that these fulfill important functions in the ecology of mycorrhizal fungal hyphae such as accessing recalcitrant forms of mineral nutrients, and production of signaling and other compounds in the vicinity of the hyphae. The validity of another hypothesis will then be addressed, namely that the specific associative microbes are rewarded with exclusive access to fungal carbon, which would qualify them as hypersymbionts (i.e., symbionts of symbiotic mycorrhizal fungi). Thereafter, we ask whether recruitment of functionally different microbial assemblages by the hyphae is required under different soil conditions (questioning what evidence is available for such an effect), and we identify knowledge gaps requiring further attention.

Intense phototautomer emission of 2-(3′-pyridyl)benzimidazole encapsulated in Nafion membrane

When encapsulated in the water nanochannels of a Nafion membrane, 2-(3′-pyridyl)benzimidazole is found to exhibit fluorescence from a monocationic species, T*, in which the pyridyl nitrogen is protonated. This kind of fluorescence has not been observed earlier for this molecule, except to a very small extent in strongly acidic aqueous solutions. Thus, Nafion is found to promote the formation of an uncommon excited state in this molecule. Two bands are observed in the T* fluorescence in Nafion. These are ascribed to fluorophores in two different kinds of environments: bulk water-like and interfacial. The band ascribed to the fluorophores residing near the interface is found to become the predominant one in partially dehydrated membranes, thereby fortifying our contention of the importance of electrostatic interactions at low hydration levels. The assignment of the fluorescence in native membranes to the phototautomer gains support from the experiments with cation-exchanged Nafion membranes, in which the fluorescence is blue shifted and is ascribed to the monocationic C* form, in which the benzimidazole nitrogen is protonated.