Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
prDeep: Robust Phase Retrieval with a Flexible Deep Network

Phase retrieval algorithms have become an important component in many modern computational imaging systems. For instance, in the context of ptychography and speckle correlation imaging, they enable imaging past the diffraction limit and through scattering media, respectively. Unfortunately, traditional phase retrieval algorithms struggle in the presence of noise. Progress has been made recently on more robust algorithms using signal priors, but at the expense of limiting the range of supported measurement models (e.g., to Gaussian or coded diffraction patterns). In this work we leverage the regularization-by-denoising framework and a convolutional neural network denoiser to create prDeep, a new phase retrieval algorithm that is both robust and broadly applicable. We test and validate prDeep in simulation to demonstrate that it is robust to noise and can handle a variety of system models. A MatConvNet implementation of prDeep is available at this https URL.
Nonnegative Linear Elimination for Chemical Reaction Networks

We consider linear elimination of variables in steady state equations of a chemical reaction network. Particular subsets of variables corresponding to sets of so-called reactant-noninteracting species, are introduced. The steady state equations for the variables in such a set, taken together with potential linear conservation laws in the variables, define a linear system of equations. We give conditions that guarantee that the solution to this system is nonnegative, provided it is unique. The results are framed in terms of spanning forests of a particular multidigraph derived from the reaction network and thereby conditions for uniqueness and nonnegativity of a solution are derived by means of the multidigraph. Though our motivation comes from applications in systems biology, the results have general applicability in applied sciences.
Mechanism Analysis of the Required Rotor Current and Voltage for DFIG-Based WTs to Ride-Through Severe Symmetrical Grid Faults

Doubly-fed induction generator (DFIG)-based wind turbines is prone to suffering from overcurrent during severe grid faults, due to the high electromotive force. To overcome this problem, various fault ride-through (FRT) control strategies are proposed, but they do not theoretically elaborate how to coordinate the rotor current and voltage to ride-through severe grid faults under the limited capacity of the rotor side converter. To fill this gap, a time-domain analysis is presented in this letter. It reveals the fundamental requirements of the rotor current and rotor voltage for DFIG-based WTs to ride-through severe symmetrical faults. Moreover, the analysis results are conductive to understand the existing FRT control strategies and stimulate new FRT method. Finally, the analysis results are validated by simulation and experiment.
The role of seed dispersal, pollination and historical effects on genetic patterns of an insular plant that has lost its only seed disperser

Aim The genetic structure of many plant species is heavily dependent on their pollinators and seed dispersers, and can thus be altered if either of the associated mutualistic interactions is disrupted. In this study we assess the genetic diversity and structure and infer the seed/pollen gene‐flow patterns among insular populations of Daphne rodriguezii, a shrub pollinated and dispersed by animals that has lost its only disperser (the lizard Podarcis lilfordi) in most of its populations.
Improved Modulation Strategy Using Dual Phase Shift Modulation for Active Commutated Current-Fed Dual Active Bridge

This paper proposes dual phase shift modulation (DPSM) for active commutated current-fed dual active bridge for low-voltage (LV) high-power application to improve the performance of the converter at light loads. The proposed DPSM uses an additional control variable to actively control the peak current in the converter that helps to improve the performance as compared to simpler single variable but unregulated peak current control, phase shift modulation (PSM). The control variables are chosen such that the excess current is just enough to achieve zero current switching (ZCS) turn-off of the LV devices. In the reverse direction, the converter is a full-bridge converter with <italic>LC</italic> filter. The implementation of the conventional PSM to the full bridge, popularly known as phase-shift full bridge is simple but restricted by the zero voltage switching (ZVS) range. The proposed DPSM is implemented in the reverse direction to maintain the ZVS turn-on of the high-voltage (HV) devices even at very light loads by utilizing the LV devices instead of using them only for synchronous rectification. At higher loads where achieving ZVS is relatively easy, the modulation shifts to conventional PSM to reduce the circulating current and the associated duty cycle loss. The improvement in the performance is validated experimentally with a 1-kW prototype developed for a 30<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\%$</tex-math></inline-formula> variation in the LV voltage (42–56 V) for both directions of operation. The control of the peak current improved the efficiency by 12<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\%$</tex-math></inline-formula> from the conventional PSM at 10<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\%$</tex-math></inline-formula> load at the highest current (42 V) in the forward operation. In the reverse direction, the ZVS turn-on for the HV devices is achieved even at 6<inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\%$</tex-math></inline-formula> load by the proposed modulation at the highest voltage (56 V). Thus, the proposed DPSM is a software-only solution that does not require any additional active or passive components, offering an improved performance while maintaining a low component count and simplicity of the power electronics circuit.
Ostraciiform Underwater Robot With Segmented Caudal Fin

Ostraciiform body/caudal fish locomotion requires high-frequency oscillation of the caudal fin, yielding negligible body oscillations. It is the most ideal form of biomimetic locomotion for underwater robots where body-stabilization is required for photography or manipulation applications. This letter presents a two-segment caudal fin design with substantial improvements over existing single-segment fins. The proposed fin helped reducing drag, increasing resonant frequency, and achieving a wide controllable range of thrust forces. The design, modeling, fabrication, and validation of an Ostraciiform robot with the proposed caudal fin are presented in detail. Over 1200 test trials on six fin designs were compared, showing nearly three-times higher resonant frequency and 12% thrust force increase over single-segment homogeneous fin. It is also demonstrated that the peak frequency could be selected via mechanical fin designs, enabling customized caudal fin design according to applications.
Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation Altered Voluntary Cooperative Norms Compliance Under Equal Decision-Making Power

Social norms play an essential role in human interactions and the development of the evolution of human history. Extensive studies corroborate that compliance with social norms typically requires a punishment threat as almost always specific individuals have self-interests that tempt them to violate the norm. Neural imaging studies demonstrate that lateral orbitofrontal cortex (LOFC) and right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (rDLPFC) are activated when individuals decide to increase social norm compliance when punishment is possible. Moreover, rDLPFC is affirmed to be involved in social norm compliance with or without external punishment threats in a series of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) research. However, these neuroscience studies are based on the ultimatum game (UG) in which the decision-making power between the proposer and the responder is unequal, and no studies support the causal relationship between rDLPFC and voluntary cooperative norms compliance among the equal decision-making power of subjects. Whether modulating the excitability of rDLPFC, which plays a role in norm compliance, alters the extent of compliance with voluntary cooperative norms under equal decision-making power and how norms from different types with asymmetric endowment influence compliance remain unknown. The present study aimed to provide evidence of a direct link between the neural and behavioral results through the application of tDCS over rDLPFC on compliance with voluntary cooperative norms under equal decision-making power. Results verified that activating rDLPFC altered voluntary cooperative norms compliance of all our participants and significant effect over different initial endowments was observed. The role of norm.own and norm.other in compliance was changed in the anodal treatment. Findings validate that enhancing the excitability of the rDLPFC using tDCS leads to high compliance in voluntary cooperation and this effect is specific to equal decision-making power rather than unequal decision-making power.
Cross-shaped PnC for anchor loss reduction of thin-film ALN-on-silicon high frequency MEMS resonator

This paper presents an approach to reduce the anchor loss of thin-film-piezoelectric-on-silicon (TPoS) high frequency MEMS resonator. The PnC prevents acoustic wave to propagate through the support tethers, and reflects it back to the resonator body, which serves to increase the store energy, and then enhances the quality factor (Q). This design discussed the effect of the tether width, tether length, and impact of the design geometry on bandgap and the quality factor. The desired design of PnCs provides wide bandgap and high quality factor by introducing cross-shaped of 2D phononic crystal externally on anchors. The design provides a bandgap up to 230MHz and increases the quality factor from 21,180 to 221,536. The technique provides a high quality factor than the previous work.
The improvement of the Pulsed-Electroacoustic (PEA) system measurement from the acoustic wave transportation perspective

Space charge formation inside the dielectric materials is one of the most important factors which are required to be investigated to avoid the aging or failure operation of the materials. The Pulsed-Electroacoustic (PEA) method is the most common method that has been used to investigate space charge in the dielectrics. It has been recognised that several factors could affect the accuracy of the space charge distribution measurement for the PEA equipment, especially when multi-layered sample is concerned. In this paper, the influence of the thickness of the bottom electrode and the reflected signals in multilayers sample will be mainly focused. The PEA equipment will be modelled through COMSOL software. Based on the developed models, the recommendation of the bottom electrode thickness will be given in this paper, and the validation of the multilayers sample model will be presented by comparing the simulated results with the calculated results.
Towards the formal verification of security properties of a Network-on-Chip router

Vulnerabilities and design flaws in Network-on-Chip (NoC) routers can be exploited in order to spy, modify and constraint the sensitive communication inside the Multi-Processors Systems-on-Chip (MPSoCs). Although previous works address the NoC threat, finding secure and efficient solutions to verify the security is still a challenge. In this work, we propose for the first time a method to formally verify the correctness and the security properties of a NoC router in order to provide the proper communication functionality and to avoid NoC attacks. We present a generalized verification flow that proves a wide set of implementation-independent security-related properties to hold. We employ unbounded model checking techniques to account for the highly-sequential behaviour of the NoC systems. The evaluation results demonstrate the feasibility of our approach by presenting verification results of six different NoC routing architectures demonstrating the vulnerabilities of each design.
High Range and Doppler Resolution by Application of Compressed Sensing Using Low Baseband Bandwidth OFDM Radar

Multicarrier waveforms such as orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) found their way into radar applications in the last few years. However, currently, typically only a fraction of the large baseband bandwidth required to obtain high resolution is available in practice due to hardware limitations. In this paper, we propose a frequency-agile sparse OFDM radar processing that allows the transmission of consecutive bandwidth-reduced OFDM pulses on different carriers, and thereby covering a much larger measurement bandwidth in a measurement frame. Through joint processing of multiple narrowband pulses and compressed sensing methods, high resolution and unambiguity in the joint range-velocity profile are obtained comparable to an equivalent wideband OFDM. It shows that a baseband bandwidth of 20% of the full channel bandwidth is sufficient to reliably obtain the same result as for an equivalent wideband OFDM signal. The proposed processing scheme is validated using simulations and radar measurements at 77 GHz.
Mode composite waveguide directional coupler

In this work, a mode composite waveguide (MCW) directional coupler is proposed and demonstrated. Due to the dual mode nature of the MCW, the mode conversion between the inner and outer waveguide is involved during power coupling. The coupler operation principle is mathematically formulated in achieving the required power summation and cancellation, and a detailed design methodology is also presented. An MCW backward directional coupler at 10 GHz is fabricated to validate the proposed concept. The desired coupling level of −20 dB and the maximum isolation of −50 dB are obtained in the coupler measurement.
Memory-aware multiobjective design space exploration of heteregeneous MPSoC

This paper discusses multiobjective exploration of heterogeneous MPSoC design space using a method based on NSGA-II evolutionary algorithm. Key feature of the proposed method is separation of computation and communication which enables exploration of mapping computation to processors and communication to memory elements. In this paper two approaches to mapping and scheduling are presented and compared: (1) single-phased, where tasks and communication channels are mapped to processor and memories simultaneously, and (2) two-phased, where mapping of tasks to processors is done in first phase, followed by mapping of communication channel to memories in the second phase.
Optimization of on-package decoupling capacitors considering system variables

A key aspect of power integrity in modern electronic systems is the choice and optimization of decoupling capacitors. Traditionally, this issue has been addressed at PCB level, but the integration of discrete SMD capacitors inside BGA package substrates is becoming more and more common in complex high-speed digital devices. In the context of semiconductors industry, the on-package decoupling applied to digital microcontrollers needs to be defined, often without any clear information on system configuration. This paper shows how the package behavior can change depending on the interaction with PCB parameters, and proposes a methodology to optimize on-package decoupling taking into account the system variability.
Opinion Dynamics-Based Vehicle Velocity Estimation and Diagnosis

An opinion dynamics approach is proposed to enhance the reliability of the vehicle velocity estimators, which are required for autonomous driving as well as advanced vehicle active safety systems, such as traction and stability control. The corners’ estimates of a velocity observer, which is formed by combining the kinematic and model-based estimation schemes, are used as opinions with different levels of confidence in the developed algorithm. This is to find more reliable estimates robust to disturbances and time delay via solving a convex optimization problem. To bypass the effect of failure in velocity estimation, a fault rejection policy is used concurrently with the opinion dynamics. Road tests confirm the validity and robustness of the algorithm on slippery and dry roads independent of the powertrain configuration in different driving scenarios, especially for combined-slip and low-excitation maneuvers, which are demanding for the current vehicle state estimators.
Real-time digital implementation of a principal component analysis algorithm for neurons spike detection

This paper presents the result of a multidisciplinary experiment where electrical activity from a cultured rat hippocampi neuronal population is detected in real time by a FPGA implemented digital circuit. State-of-the-art EOMOSFET Multi Electrode Array (MEA) biosensors exploits a capacitive coupling between the biological environment and the sensing electronics to minimize invasiveness and cell damage, at the price of a lower SNR. For this reason, they are typically improved by noise rejection algorithms. Real time neural spikes detection opens unthinkable scenarios, allowing to stimulate single neurons in response to their behavior, possibly improving medical conditions like epilepsy. In this scenario, a spike sorting algorithm has been hardware implemented, allowing real time neural spike detection with a latency of 165ns.
Mission Profile Based System-Level Reliability Analysis of DC/DC Converters for a Backup Power Application

Reliability analysis is an important tool for assisting the design phase of a power electronic converter to fulfill its life-cycle specifications. Existing converter-level reliability analysis methods have two major limitations: 1) being based on constant failure rate models; and 2) lack of consideration of long-term operation conditions (i.e., mission profile). Although various studies have been presented on power electronic component-level lifetime prediction based on wear-out failure mechanisms and mission profile, it is still a challenge to apply the same method to the reliability analysis of converters with multiple components. Component lifetime prediction based on associated models provides only a $B_{X}$ lifetime information (i.e., the time when X% items fail), but the time-dependent reliability curve is still not available. In this paper, a converter-level reliability analysis approach is proposed based on time-dependent failure rate models and long-term mission profiles. Two different methods to obtain the component-level time-to-failure are illustrated by a case study of dc/dc converters for a 5 kW fuel cell-based backup power system. The reliability analysis of the converters with and without redundancy is also performed to assist the decision making in the design phase of the fuel cell power conditioning stage.
Minimizing switching time of energy harvesting management circuit

Energy management circuit is a mediator circuit between energy harvesting device and a load circuit. It operates without stable DC supply voltage which varies from 0 V to voltage level required by load circuit. Energy management circuit monitors the amount of energy collected from energy harvester and turns on and off the load circuit. With very low instantaneous power available from energy harvester, the energy management circuit must have as-low-as-possible power consumption. The problem is that with decrease of power consumption, the switching time increases proportionally. This paper proposes an energy management circuit with minimized switching time independent of power consumption. The proposed circuit is evaluated through simulations and laboratory measurements on a developed prototype. Evaluation has confirmed that the switching time of the proposed design is independent of power consumption and it depends only on the propagation delay time and transition time of MOS transistors used.
Overweight or Obese Individuals at Eighteen Years of Age Develop Pancreatic Adenocarcinoma at a Significantly Earlier Age

Background Adolescent obesity is a national epidemic that recently has been shown to increase risk for pancreatic adenocarcinoma (PC) and is associated with an earlier age of PC onset. We hypothesized that PC patients who are overweight or obese at age 18 would have an earlier age of PC onset. Methods Retrospective review of 531 patients in our PC registry was completed. Self-reported weight at age 18 and maximum lifetime weight were used to calculate body mass index (BMI) at age 18 (BMI-18) and maximum lifetime BMI. Results Complete BMI and baseline covariate data was available in 319 PC patients. Mean age (in years) of PC diagnosis for patients whose BMI-18 was overweight (64.0) or obese (59.9) was significantly different when compared to patients with a normal BMI-18 (66.7). No significant difference was observed in the mean age of PC diagnosis in those patients who maintained a normal BMI-18 when compared to those patients who subsequently became overweight or obese (67.0 versus 66.6; p = 0.65). Conclusions An elevated BMI at age 18 is associated with an earlier age of PC onset and should be factored into determining the optimal age of beginning screening for patients at high risk for PC.
Effects on the antenna's radiation pattern due to metamaterial-based sub-wavelength insulation

A metamaterial-based insulator is proposed for highly compact MIMO-systems. In previous work, the proposed insulator has been demonstrated to reduce efficiently the coupling at PEC boundaries between two very close antennas on a common ground plane. The present study concentrates on the effects of this insulator on the antenna radiation pattern. The chosen operating frequency is 2.4 GHz considering that it is a usual frequency for many indoor wireless applications. The theoretical results are supported by numerical simulations.
N94-34049 Hybrid Knowledge Systems *

In this paper, we describe an architecture, due to the author, called hybrid knowledge systems (HKS, for short) that can be used to inter-operate between (1) a specification of the control laws describing a physical system (in particular, this could include specifications such as those of Brockett and/or Nerode and Kohn, but is not limited to those), (2) a collection of databases, knowledge bases and/or other data structures reflecting information about the world in which the physical system being controlled resides, (3) observations (e.g. sensor information) from the external world, and (4) actions that must be taken in response to external observations.
Mixed-Severity Fire Fosters Heterogeneous Spatial Patterns of Conifer Regeneration in a Dry Conifer Forest

We examined spatial patterns of post-fire regenerating conifers in a Colorado, USA, dry conifer forest 11–12 years following the reintroduction of mixed-severity fire. We mapped and measured all post-fire regenerating conifers, as well as all other post-fire regenerating trees and all residual (i.e., surviving) trees, in three 4-ha plots following the 2002 Hayman Fire. Residual tree density ranged from 167 to 197 trees ha−1 (TPH), and these trees were clustered at distances up to 30 m. Post-fire regenerating conifers, which ranged in density from 241 to 1036 TPH, were also clustered at distances up to at least 30 m. Moreover, residual tree locations drove post-fire regenerating conifer locations, with the two showing a pattern of repulsion. Topography and post-fire sprouting tree species locations further drove post-fire conifer regeneration locations. These results provide a foundation for anticipating how the reintroduction of mixed-severity fire may affect long-term forest structure, and also yield insights into how historical mixed-severity fire may have regulated the spatially heterogeneous conditions commonly described for pre-settlement dry conifer forests of Colorado and elsewhere.