Jumpei Yamashita, Hiroki Terashima, Makoto Yoneya
et al.
Our daily activities require vigilance. Therefore, it is useful to externally monitor and predict our vigilance level using a straightforward method. It is known that the vigilance level is linked to pupillary fluctuations via Locus Coeruleus and Norepinephrine (LC-NE) system. However, previous methods of estimating long-term vigilance require monitoring pupillary fluctuations at rest over a long period. We developed a method of predicting the short-term vigilance level by monitoring pupillary fluctuation for a shorter period consisting of several seconds. The LC activity also fluctuates at a timescale of seconds. Therefore, we hypothesized that the short-term vigilance level could be estimated using pupillary fluctuations in a short period and quantified their amplitude as the Micro-Pupillary Unrest Index (M-PUI). We found an intra-individual trial-by-trial positive correlation between Reaction Time (RT) reflecting the short-term vigilance level and M-PUI in the period immediately before the target onset in a Psychomotor Vigilance Task (PVT). This relationship was most evident when the fluctuation was smoothed by a Hanning window of approximately 50 to 100 ms (including cases of down-sampled data at 100 and 50 Hz), and M-PUI was calculated in the period up to one or two seconds before the target onset. These results suggest that M-PUI can monitor and predict fluctuating levels of vigilance. M-PUI is also useful for examining pupillary fluctuations in a short period for elucidating the psychophysiological mechanisms of short-term vigilance.
Halgurd N. Awl, Rashad H. Mahmud, Bakhtiar A. Karim
et al.
In this paper, a new design of high gain and wide bandwidth microstrip patch antenna array containing double meander dipole structure is proposed. Two in-phase resonant frequencies in the Ku-band (12–18 GHz) could be achieved in the double meander dipole array structure, which lead to enhance impedance bandwidth without costing extra design section. Besides, further enhanced gain of 2 dBi of the array over the entire operating frequency range has been achieved by introducing a double-layer substrate technique. The proposed antenna has been fabricated using the E33 model LPKF prototyping PCB machine. The measurement results have been performed, and they are in very good agreement with the simulation results. The measured –10 dB impedance bandwidth indicates that the array provides a very wide bandwidth which is around 30% at the center frequency of 15.5 GHz. A stable gain with a peak value of 10 dBi is achieved over the operating frequency range. The E- and H-plane radiation patterns are simulated, and a very low sidelobe level is predicted. The proposed antenna is simple and has relatively low-profile, and it could be a good candidate for millimeter wave communications.
The purpose of this paper was to predict the path loss characterization of the ground-to-air (G2A) communication channel between the ground sensor (GS) and unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) using machine learning (ML) models in smart farming (SF) scenarios. Two ML algorithms such as support vector regression (SVR) and artificial neural network (ANN) were studied to analyze the measured data in different scenarios with Napier and Ruzi grass farms as the measurement locations. The proposed empirical GS-to-UAV two-ray (GUT-R) model and the ML models were compared to characterize path loss prediction models. The performances of the path loss prediction models were evaluated using the statistical error indicators in different measurement locations and UAV trajectories. To obtain the statistical error indicators, the accuracy path loss results of UAV trajectory at 2 m altitudes showed the SVR model (MAE = 1.252 dB, RMSE = 3.067 dB, and R2 = 0.972) and the ANN model (MAE = 1.150 dB, RMSE = 2.502 dB, and R2 = 0.981) for the Napier scenario. In the Ruzi scenario, the SVR model (MAE = 1.202 dB, RMSE = 2.962 dB, and R2 = 0.965) and the ANN model (MAE = 1.146 dB, RMSE = 2.507 dB, and R2 = 0.983) were presented. For UAV trajectory at 5 m altitudes, the SVR model (MAE = 2.125 dB, RMSE = 4.782 dB, and R2 = 0.933) and the ANN model (MAE = 2.025 dB, RMSE = 4.439 dB, and R2 = 0.950) were resulted in the Napier scenario. In the Ruzi scenario, the SVR model (MAE = 2.112 dB, RMSE = 4.682 dB, and R2 = 0.935) and the ANN model (MAE = 2.016 dB, RMSE = 4.407 dB, and R2 = 0.954) were displayed. The proposed ML models using SVR and ANN can optimally predict the path loss characterization in SF scenarios, where the accuracy was 95% for the SVR and 97% for the ANN.
In this paper, a single-arm Archimedean spiral (SAAS) antenna with broadband circular polarization is investigated. Unlike traditional single-arm Archimedean spiral antenna, the antenna arm consists of a hybrid meandered strip line and a smooth arc strip line. Especially at low frequencies, the meandered strip line significantly improves the circular polarization performance by extending the antenna surface current path. The effects of the meandered strip line on the radiation pattern and axial ratio (AR) are studied in detail. To obtain unidirectional radiation, a metallic cavity is added below the SAAS antenna. The measurement results show that the voltage standing wave ratio (VSWR) is less than 2 from 0.88 GHz to 8.82 GHz, which indicates a wide impedance bandwidth of 1 : 10 is realized. A wide AR bandwidth of 1 : 5 is available, that the measured AR is less than 3 dB from 1.6 GHz to 8 GHz.
Edirorial rédigé par Sylvie Durrieu (Irstea-Montpellier, France), Anne Jolly (Office National des Forêts-Nancy, France), Osvaldo Valeria (Université du Québec en Abitibi Témiscamingue, Rouyn-Noranda, Canada).
Instruments and machines, Applied optics. Photonics
Aiming at the direction-of-arrival (DOA) estimation of two-dimensional (2D) coherently distributed (CD) sources which are coherent with each other, we explore the propagator method based on spatial smoothing of a uniform rectangular array (URA). The rotational invariance relationships with respect to the nominal azimuth and nominal elevation are obtained under the small angular spreads assumption. A propagator operator is constructed through spatial smoothing of sample covariance matrices firstly. Then, combination of propagator and identical matrix is divided according to rotational operators, and the nominal angles can be obtained through eigendecomposition lastly. Realizing angle matching automatically, the proposed method can estimate multiple DOAs of 2D coherent CD sources without spectral peak searching and prior knowledge of deterministic angular signal distribution function. Simulations are conducted to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.
To lower the peak sidelobe level (PSLL) of sparse concentric ring arrays, a method with multiple design constraints that embed a function model into modified real genetic algorithm (MGA) and select the grid ring radii as optimization individual to synthesize sparse concentric ring arrays is proposed. The multiple constraints include the array aperture, the minimum element spacing, and the number of elements. The proposed method dynamically calculates the ratio of element on each ring, and it has a faster convergence rate than other algorithms. The MGA uses real number to code the optimization variable, and it reduces the complexity of coding and improves the search efficiency. Finally, the results demonstrate the accuracy and effectiveness of the algorithm.
This study designed and fabricated a frequency-selective structure-based security paper for the electromagnetic detection system of a security gate, which aims to prevent leakage of confidential documents. When a functional paper embedded with a frequency-selective pattern that selectively reflects a specific frequency is being leaked out of a security zone, the electromagnetic detection system receives and detects the intensity of the electromagnetic wave reflected from the security paper passing through an antenna gate, which transmits/receives RF signals. A stable detection performance of the security paper can be ensured by improving the incidence angle stability for incident waves and reducing the reflection loss. This study designed a frequency-selective structure with stable frequency reflection properties at the X-band by utilizing a Jerusalem cross structure. The proposed design was realized using the screen printing technique, which could implement a circuit, to print silver ink on a plain paper. To verify the applicability of the frequency-selective structure-based security paper, an RF detection system with a multiple antenna array was constructed and the intensity of the received signals was measured. The measurement was performed for various scenarios, and the result showed that the proposed security paper was well detected.
Millimeter-wave (Mm-w) is the trend of communication development in the future; users who carry mobile communication equipment could be blocked by others in a crowded population environment. Based on Shooting and Bouncing Ray (SBR) method and setting up different orientation receivers (RX), population density, and people fabric property at 28 GHz and 38 GHz, simulating experimental scene similar to station square by Wireless Insite software, we use least square method to do linear-regression analysis for path loss and build path loss model. The result shows that the path loss index has a certain change in the different frequency, orientation receivers, population density, and people fabric. The path loss index of RouteC1 and RouteA2 has an obvious change in the central transmitter (TX). Each route shadow fading obeys Gaussian distribution whose mean is 0. This paper’s result has a theoretical guiding for designing the communication system in a crowded population environment.
In this paper, a compact frequency reconfigurable circular patch antenna with an arc-shaped slot loaded in the ground layer is proposed for multiband wireless communication applications. By controlling the ON/OFF states of the five PIN diodes mounted on the arc-shaped slot, the effective length of the arc-shaped slot and the effective length of antennas current are changed, and accordingly six-frequency band reconfiguration can be achieved. The simulated and measured results show that the antenna can operate from 1.82 GHz to 2.46 GHz, which is located in DCS1800 (1.71–1.88 GHz), UMTS (2.11–2.20 GHz), WiBro (2.3–2.4 GHz), and Bluetooth (2.4–2.48 GHz) frequency bands and so forth. Compared to the common rectangular slot circular patch antenna, the proposed arc-shaped slot circular patch antenna not only has a better rotational symmetry with the circular patch and substrate but also has more compact size. For the given operating frequency at 1.82 GHz, over 55% area reduction is achieved in this design with respect to the common design with rectangular slot. Since the promising frequency reconfiguration, this antenna may have potential applications in modern multiband and multifunctional mobile communication systems.
A coplanar waveguide fed dual-band circularly polarized rectangular slot antenna is presented. The proposed antenna consists of a rectangular metal frame acting as a ground and an S-shaped monopole as a radiator. The spatial distribution of the surface current density is employed to demonstrate that the circular polarization is generated by the S-shaped monopole which controls the path of the surface currents. An antenna prototype, having overall dimension 37 × 37 × 1 mm3, has been fabricated on FR4 substrate with dielectric constant 4.4. The proposed antenna achieves 10 dB return loss bandwidths and 3 dB axial ratio (AR) in the frequency bands 2.39–2.81 GHz and 5.42–5.92 GHz, respectively. Both these characteristics are suitable for WLAN and WiMAX applications.
A new kind of circular polarization leaky-wave antenna with N-shaped slots cut in the upper side of substrate integrated waveguide (SIW) is investigated and presented. The radiation pattern and polarization axial ratio of the leaky-wave antenna are studied. The results show that the width of N-shaped slots has significant effect on the circular polarization property of the antenna. By properly choosing structural parameters, the SIW based leaky-wave antenna can realize circular polarization with excellent axial ratio in 8 GHz satellite band.
Nous proposons une méthode pour estimer le volume d’arbres individuels d’une zone dominée par des pins maritimes, à partir de données LiDAR aéroporté. Le nuage de point à été segmenté à partir de l’algorithme PTrees. Pour chaque arbre segmenté, la hauteur du plus haut point, le volume de l’enveloppe du nuage et de l’enveloppe de la couronne ont été utilisés dans des modèles non linéaires pour prédire le volume total d’arbres mesurés sur le terrain. A l’arbre, les modèles testés permettent d’estimer le volume avec une erreur quadratique moyenne (RMSE) de l’ordre de 35%. Ce niveau d’erreur a plusieurs origines. Tout d’abord les volumes terrain ont été estimés à partir de tarifs de cubage qui décrivent un arbre moyen. Ainsi une variabilité autour de cet arbre moyen peut être induite par des variations de fertilité ou de sylviculture qui agissent localement sur la croissance des arbres. Le passage à la placette permet de diminuer la RMSE d’un facteur 2, autour de 15%. Ce changement d’échelle permet en effet de compenser les erreurs liées à la segmentation et qui se traduisent par des fausses détections d’arbres soit omissions qui génèrent des fusions de couronnes. Par ailleurs, nos résultats suggèrent que des paramètres de hauts niveaux, tel que la hauteur de la base du houppier, ou le volume de la couronne peuvent introduire du bruit dans les modèles. Nous recommandons donc de sélectionner les variables LiDAR afin de limiter la propagation d’erreur, tout en ajoutant des variables permettant de décrire l’environnement de l’arbre afin de mieux prendre en compte ses conditions de croissance.
Instruments and machines, Applied optics. Photonics
The design and simulation of a 10 × 8 multibeam dual-band orthogonal linearly polarized antenna array operating at Ku-band are presented for transmit-receive applications. By using patches with different coupling methods as elements, both perpendicular polarization in 12.25–12.75 GHz band and horizontal polarization in 14.0–14.5 GHz band are realized in a shared antenna aperture. A microstrip Rotman lens is employed as the beamforming network with 7 input ports, which can generate a corresponding number of beams to cover −30°–30° with 5 dB beamwidth along one dimension. This type of multibeam orthogonal linearly polarized planar antenna is a good candidate for satellite communication (SatCom).
Three-dimensional (3D) imaging technology based on antenna array is one of the most important 3D synthetic aperture radar (SAR) high resolution imaging modes. In this paper, a novel 3D imaging method is proposed for airborne down-looking sparse array SAR based on the imaging geometry and the characteristic of echo signal. The key point of the proposed algorithm is the introduction of a special squint model in cross track processing to obtain accurate focusing. In this special squint model, point targets with different cross track positions have different squint angles at the same range resolution cell, which is different from the conventional squint SAR. However, after theory analysis and formulation deduction, the imaging procedure can be processed with the uniform reference function, and the phase compensation factors and algorithm realization procedure are demonstrated in detail. As the method requires only Fourier transform and multiplications and thus avoids interpolations, it is computationally efficient. Simulations with point scatterers are used to validate the method.
This paper focuses on the fading characteristics of wireless channel on High-Speed Railway (HSR) in hilly terrain scenario. Due to the rapid speed, the fading characteristics of HSR channel are highly correlated with time or Transmit-Receive distance and have their own special property. To investigate the fading characteristics, the measurement is conducted on the Guangzhou-Shenzhen passenger-dedicated line in China with the speed of 295 km/h in the data-collection area at 2.4 GHz. From the measured data, the amplitude of each path is estimated by using the Subspace-Alternating Generalized Expectation-Maximization (SAGE) algorithm along with other parameters of channel impulse responses. Then the fading parameters, including path loss, shadow fading, and K-factor, are analysed. With the numerical results in the measurement and analysis, the fading characteristics have been revealed and modelled. It is supposed that this work has a promotion for HSR communication system design and improvement.
The radar cross section (RCS) of a wind turbine is a figure of merit for assessing its effect on the performance of electronic systems. In this paper, the fundamental equations for estimating the wind turbine clutter signal in radar and communication systems are presented. Methods of RCS prediction are summarized, citing their advantages and disadvantages. Bistatic and monostatic RCS patterns for two wind turbine configurations, a horizontal axis three-blade design and a vertical axis helical design, are shown. The unique electromagnetic scattering features, the effect of materials, and methods of mitigating wind turbine clutter are also discussed.