ALBERT

Description: We estimate the contamination risks from the atmospheric dispersion of radionuclides released by severe nuclear power plant accidents using the ECHAM/Modular Earth Submodel System (MESSy) atmospheric chemistry (EMAC) atmospheric chemistry-general circulation model at high resolution (50 km). We present an overview of global risks and also a case study of nuclear power plants that are currently under construction, planned and proposed in the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East, a region prone to earthquakes. We implemented continuous emissions from each location, making the simplifying assumption that all potential accidents release the same amount of radioactivity. We simulated atmospheric transport and decay, focusing on 137Cs and 131I as proxies for particulate and gaseous radionuclides, respectively. We present risk maps for potential surface layer concentrations, deposition and doses to humans from the inhalation exposure of 131I. The estimated risks exhibit seasonal variability, with the highest surface level concentrations of gaseous radionuclides in the Northern Hemisphere during winter.

Description: Our aim is to explore general practitioners’ (GPs’) knowledge about EMF, and to assess whether different knowledge structures are related to the GPs’ concern about EMF. Random samples were drawn from lists of GPs in Germany in 2008. Knowledge about EMF was assessed by seven items. A latent class analysis was conducted to identify latent structures in GPs’ knowledge. Further, the GPs’ concern about EMF health risk was measured using a score comprising six items. The association between GPs’ concern about EMF and their knowledge was analysed using multiple linear regression. In total 435 (response rate 23.3%) GPs participated in the study. Four groups were identified by the latent class analysis: 43.1% of the GPs gave mainly correct answers; 23.7% of the GPs answered low frequency EMF questions correctly; 19.2% answered only the questions relating EMF with health risks, and 14.0% answered mostly “don’t know”. There was no association between GPs’ latent knowledge classes or between the number of correct answers given by the GPs and their EMF concern, whereas the number of incorrect answers was associated with EMF concern. Greater EMF concern in subjects with more incorrect answers suggests paying particular attention to misconceptions regarding EMF in risk communication.

Description: This study aims to explore the efficiency of using online education as an intervention measure to prevent occupational hazards in a clinical nursing setting. The subjects were 320 female nursing staff from two hospitals in Taiwan. The questionnaire results indicated that the subjects primarily experienced human factor occupational hazards, as well as psychological and social hazards. Specifically, 73.1% and 69.8% of the subjects suffered from poor sleep quality and low back pain, respectively. After web-based learning, the experimental group had higher post-test scores than the control group in terms of knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP). However, there was only a significant difference (p 〈 0.05) in their knowledge about the prevention of occupational hazards. It is suggested that an online discussion may enhance nursing staff’s participation in web-based learning, and further facilitate their comments on negative factors. The findings can highly promote nursing staff’s attitudes and practices toward preventing occupational hazards through web-based learning.

Description: Ambient particulate matters and temperature were reported to have additive effects over the respiratory disease hospital admissions and deaths. The purpose of this study is to discuss the interactive pulmonary toxicities of cold stress and fine particulate matter (PM2.5) exposure by estimating inflammation and oxidative stress responses. 48 Wistar male rats, matched by weight and age, were randomly assigned to six groups, which were treated with cold stress alone (0 °C, 10 °C, and 20 °C (Normal control)) and cold stresses plus PM2.5 exposures respectively. Cold stress alone groups were intratracheal instillation of 0.25 mL normal saline, while cold stress plus PM2.5 exposure groups were intratracheal instillation of 8 mg/0.25 mL PM2.5. These procedures were carried out for three times with an interval of 48 hours for each treatment. All rats were sacrificed after 48 hours of the third treatment. The bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) was collected for analyzing inflammatory cells and cytokines, and lung homogenate MDA was determined for oxidative stress estimation. Results showed higher level of total cell and neutrophil in the BALF of PM2.5 exposed groups (p 〈 0.05). Negative relationships between cold stress intensity and the level of tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-a), C-reactive protein (CRP) interleukin-6 (IL-6) and interleukin-8 (IL-8) in BALF were indicated in PM2.5 exposure groups. Exposure to cold stress alone caused significant increase of inflammatory cytokines and methane dicarboxylic aldehyde (MDA) and decline of superoxide dismutase (SOD) and glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) activity only in 0 °C exposure group (p 〈 0.05). The two-way ANOVA found significant interactive effects between PM2.5 exposure and cold stress in the level of neutrophil, IL-6 and IL-8 and SOD activity (p 〈 0.05). These data demonstrated that inflammation and oxidative stress involved in the additive effect of PM2.5 exposure and cold stress on pulmonary toxicity, providing explanation for epidemiological studies on the health effect of ambient PM2.5 and cold stress.

Description: This paper presents a detailed description of an approach designed to investigate the application of the Health Impact Assessment (HIA) framework to assess the potential health impacts of climate change. A HIA framework has been combined with key climate change terminology and concepts. The fundamental premise of this framework is an understanding of the interactions between people, the environment and climate. The diversity and complexity of these interactions can hinder much needed action on the critical health issue of climate change. The objectives of the framework are to improve the methodology for understanding and assessing the risks associated with potential health impacts of climate change, and to provide decision-makers with information that can facilitate the development of effective adaptation plans. While the process presented here provides guidance with respect to this task it is not intended to be prescriptive. As such, aspects of the process can be amended to suit the scope and available resources of each project. A series of working tables has been developed to assist in the collation of evidence throughout the process. The framework has been tested in a number of locations including Western Australia, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Nauru.

Description: This investigation analyzes the effect of vortex wakes on the Lagrangian displacement of particles induced by the passage of an obstacle in a two-dimensional incompressible and inviscid fluid. In addition to the trajectories of individual particles, we also study their drift and the corresponding total drift areas in the Föppl and Kirchhoff potential flow models. Our findings, which are obtained numerically and in some regimes are also supported by asymptotic analysis, are compared to the wakeless potential flow which serves as a reference. We show that in the presence of the Föppl vortex wake, some of the particles follow more complicated trajectories featuring a second loop. The appearance of an additional stagnation point in the Föppl flow is identified as a source of this effect. It is also demonstrated that, while the total drift area increases with the size of the wake for large vortex strengths, it is actually decreased for small circulation values. On the other hand, the Kirchhoff flow model is shown to have an unbounded total drift area. By providing a systematic account of the wake effects on the drift, the results of this study will allow for more accurate modeling of hydrodynamic stirring.

Description: The slow motion of a circular cylinder in a plane Poiseuille flow in a microchannel is analyzed for a wide range of cylinder radii and positions across the channel. The cylinder translates parallel to the channel walls and rotates about its axis. The Stokes approximation is used and the problem is solved analytically using the Papkovich-Fadle eigenfunction expansion and the least-squares method. The stream function and the pressure distribution of the flow field are obtained as results. The force and moment exerted on the cylinder, and the pressure change far from the cylinder, are calculated and shown as functions of the size and location of the cylinder. The results confirm some reciprocal relations exactly. In particular, the translational and rotational velocities of the drifting cylinder in the existing Poiseuille flow are determined. The induced pressure change, when the cylinder drifts in the Poiseuille flow, is also calculated. Some typical streamline patterns, depending on the size and location of the cylinder, are shown and discussed. When the cylinder translates and/or rotates in the channel blocked at infinity, a series of Moffatt eddies appears far from the cylinder in the channel, as expected.

Description: Interactions between capillary and elastic effects are relevant to a variety of applications from micro- and nano-scale manufacturing to biological systems. In this work, we investigate capillary flows in flexible, millimeter-scale cylindrical elastic tubes. We demonstrate that surface tension can cause sufficiently flexible tubes to collapse and coalesce spontaneously through non-axisymmetric buckling, and develop criteria for the initial deformation and complete collapse of a circular tube. Experimental results for capillary rise and evaporation of a liquid in a flexible tube are presented, and several regimes are seen for the equilibrium state of a flexible tube deforming under capillary pressure. Deformations of the tube walls are measured in different regimes and compared with a shell theory model. Analysis and experimental results show that despite the complex and non-axisymmetric deformed shapes of cylindrical structures, the elastocapillary length used in previous literature for flat plates and sheets can be used to predict the behavior of flexible tubes.

Description: We present laboratory experimental results demonstrating that librational forcing of an ellipsoidal container of water can produce intense motions through the mechanism of a libration driven elliptical instability (LDEI). These libration studies are conducted using an ellipsoidal acrylic container filled with water. A particle image velocimetry method is used to measure the 2D velocity field in the equatorial plane over hundreds libration cycles for a fixed Ekman number, E = 2 × 10 −5 . In doing so, we recover the libration induced base flow and a time averaged zonal flow. Further, we show that LDEI in non-axisymmetric container geometries is capable of driving both intermittent and saturated turbulent motions in the bulk fluid. Additionally, we measure the growth rate and amplitude of the LDEI induced excited flow in a fully ellipsoidal container at more extreme parameters than previously studied [Noir et al. , “Experimental study of libration-driven flows in nonaxisymmetric containers,” Phys. Earth Planet. Inter. 204-205 , 1 (2012); Cébron et al. , Phys. Fluids 24 , 061703, “Libration driven elliptical instability,” (2012)]. Excitation of bulk filling turbulence by librational forcing provides a mechanism for transferring rotational energy into turbulent fluid motion and thus can play an important role in the thermal evolution, interior dynamics, and magneto-hydrodynamics of librating bodies, as appear to be common in solar system settings [e.g., Comstock and Bills, “A solar system survey of forced librations in longitude,” J. Geophys. Res. Planets 108 , 1 (2003)].

Description: We numerically study the displacement flow of two iso-viscous Newtonian fluids in an inclined two-dimensional channel, formed by two parallel plates. The results are complementary to our previous studies on displacement flows in pipes and channels. The heavier displacing fluid moves the lighter displaced fluid in the downward direction. Three dimensionless groups largely describe these flows: the densimetric Froude number ( Fr ), the Reynolds number ( Re ), and the duct inclination (β). As a first order approximation, we are able to classify different flow regimes phenomenologically in a two-dimensional ( Fr ; Re cosβ/ Fr )-plane and provide leading order expressions for the transitions between different regimes. The stabilizing and/or de-stabilizing effects of the imposed mean flow on buoyant exchange flows (zero imposed velocity) are described for a broad range of dimensionless parameters.

Description: Compressible granular materials are involved in many applications, some of them being related to energetic porous media. Gas permeation effects are important during their compaction stage, as well as their eventual chemical decomposition. Also, many situations involve porous media separated from pure fluids through two-phase interfaces. It is thus important to develop theoretical and numerical formulations to deal with granular materials in the presence of both two-phase interfaces and gas permeation effects. Similar topic was addressed for fluid mixtures and interfaces with the Discrete Equations Method (DEM) [R. Abgrall and R. Saurel, “Discrete equations for physical and numerical compressible multiphase mixtures,” J. Comput. Phys. 186 (2), 361-396 (2003)] but it seemed impossible to extend this approach to granular media as intergranular stress [K. K. Kuo, V. Yang, and B. B. Moore, “Intragranular stress, particle-wall friction and speed of sound in granular propellant beds,” J. Ballist. 4 (1), 697-730 (1980)] and associated configuration energy [J. B. Bdzil, R. Menikoff, S. F. Son, A. K. Kapila, and D. S. Stewart, “Two-phase modeling of deflagration-to-detonation transition in granular materials: A critical examination of modeling issues,” Phys. Fluids 11 , 378 (1999)] were present with significant effects. An approach to deal with fluid-porous media interfaces was derived in Saurel et al. [“Modelling dynamic and irreversible powder compaction,” J. Fluid Mech. 664 , 348-396 (2010)] but its validity was restricted to weak velocity disequilibrium only. Thanks to a deeper analysis, the DEM is successfully extended to granular media modelling in the present paper. It results in an enhanced version of the Baer and Nunziato [“A two-phase mixture theory for the deflagration-to-detonation transition (DDT) in reactive granular materials,” Int. J. Multiphase Flow 12 (6), 861-889 (1986)] model as symmetry of the formulation is now preserved. Several computational examples are shown to validate and illustrate method’s capabilities.

Description: We perform a theoretical and numerical study of the Coulomb-driven electroconvection flow of a dielectric liquid between two coaxial cylinders. The specific case, where the inner to outer diameter ratio is 0.5, is analyzed. A strong unipolar injection of ions either from the inner or outer cylinder is considered to introduce free charge carriers into the system. A finite volume method is used to solve all governing equations including Navier-Stokes equations and a simplified set of Maxwell’s equations. The flow is characterized by a subcritical bifurcation in the finite amplitude regime. A linear stability criterion and a nonlinear one that correspond to the onset and stop of the flow motion, respectively, are linked with a hysteresis loop. In addition, we also explore the behavior of the system for higher values of the stability parameter. For inner injection, we observe a transition between the patterns made of 7 and 8 cells, before an oscillatory regime is attained. Such a transition leads to a second finite amplitude stability criterion. A simple modal analysis reveals that the competition of different modes is at the origin of this behavior. The charge density, as well as velocity field distributions is provided to help understand the bifurcation behavior.

Description: In this study we evaluate the capabilities of three satellite sensors for assessing water composition and bottom depth in Lake Garda, Italy. A consistent physics-based processing chain was applied to Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), Landsat-8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) and RapidEye. Images gathered on 10 June 2014 were corrected for the atmospheric effects with the 6SV code. The computed remote sensing reflectance (Rrs) from MODIS and OLI were converted into water quality parameters by adopting a spectral inversion procedure based on a bio-optical model calibrated with optical properties of the lake. The same spectral inversion procedure was applied to RapidEye and to OLI data to map bottom depth. In situ measurements of Rrs and of concentrations of water quality parameters collected in five locations were used to evaluate the models. The bottom depth maps from OLI and RapidEye showed similar gradients up to 7 m (r = 0.72). The results indicate that: (1) the spatial and radiometric resolutions of OLI enabled mapping water constituents and bottom properties; (2) MODIS was appropriate for assessing water quality in the pelagic areas at a coarser spatial resolution; and (3) RapidEye had the capability to retrieve bottom depth at high spatial resolution. Future work should evaluate the performance of the three sensors in different bio-optical conditions.

Description: The sensorimotor system (SMS) plays an important role in sports and in every day movement. Several tools for assessment and training have been designed. Many of them are directed to specific populations, and have major shortcomings due to the training effect or safety. The aim of the present study was to design and assess a dynamic sensorimotor test and training device that can be adjusted for all levels of performance. The novel pneumatic-driven mechatronic device can guide the trainee, allow independent movements or disrupt the individual with unpredicted perturbations while standing on a platform. The test-reliability was evaluated using intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). Subjects were required to balance their center of pressure (COP) in a target circle (TITC). The time in TITC and the COP error (COPe) were recorded for analysis. The results of 22 males and 14 females (23.7 ± 2.6 years) showed good to excellent test–retest reliability. The newly designed Active Balance System (ABS) was then compared with the Biodex Balance System SD® (BBS). The results of 15 females, 14 males (23.4 ± 1.6 years) showed modest correlation in static and acceptable correlation in dynamic conditions, suggesting that ABS could be a reliable and comparable tool for dynamic balance assessments.

Description: Climate change will increase the frequency and magnitude of extreme weather events and create risks that will impact health care facilities. Health care facilities will need to assess climate change risks and adopt adaptive management strategies to be resilient, but guidance tools are lacking. In this study, a toolkit was developed for health care facility officials to assess the resiliency of their facility to climate change impacts. A mixed methods approach was used to develop climate change resiliency indicators to inform the development of the toolkit. The toolkit consists of a checklist for officials who work in areas of emergency management, facilities management and health care services and supply chain management, a facilitator’s guide for administering the checklist, and a resource guidebook to inform adaptation. Six health care facilities representing three provinces in Canada piloted the checklist. Senior level officials with expertise in the aforementioned areas were invited to review the checklist, provide feedback during qualitative interviews and review the final toolkit at a stakeholder workshop. The toolkit helps health care facility officials identify gaps in climate change preparedness, direct allocation of adaptation resources and inform strategic planning to increase resiliency to climate change.

Description: The World Health Organization defines social determinants of health as “complex, integrated, and overlapping social structures and economic systems” that are responsible for most health inequities. Similar to the individual-level risk factors such as behavioral and biological risk factors that influence disease, we consider social determinants of health such as the distribution of income, wealth, influence and power as risk factors for risk of disease. We operationally define health inequity in a disease within a population due to a risk factor that is unfair and avoidable as the difference between the disease outcome with and without the risk factor in the population. We derive expressions for difference in health inequity between two populations due to a risk factor that is unfair and avoidable for a given disease. The difference in heath inequity between two population groups due to a risk factor increases with increasing difference in relative risks and the difference in prevalence of the risk factor in the two populations. The difference in health inequity could be larger than the difference in health outcomes between the two populations in some situations. Compared to health disparities which are typically measured and monitored using absolute or relative disparities of health outcomes, the methods presented in this manuscript provide a different, yet complementary, picture because they parse out the contributions of unfair and avoidable risk factors.

Description: Enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) extract heat from underground hot dry rock (HDR) by first fracturing the HDR and then circulating a geofluid (typically water) into it and bringing the heated geofluid to a power plant to generate electricity. This study focuses on analysis, examination, and comparison of leading geothermal power plant configurations with a geofluid temperature from 200 to 800 °C, and also analyzes the embodied energy of EGS surface power plants. The power generation analysis is focused on flash type cycles for using subcritical geofluid (〈374 °C) and expansion type cycles for using supercritical geofluid (>374 °C). Key findings of this study include: (i) double-flash plants have 24.3%–29.0% higher geofluid effectiveness than single-flash ones, and 3%–10% lower specific embodied energy; (ii) the expansion type plants have geofluid effectiveness > 750 kJ/kg, significantly higher than flash type plants (geofluid effectiveness 〈 300 kJ/kg) and the specific embodied energy is lower; (iii) to increase the turbine outlet vapor fraction from 0.75 to 0.90, we include superheating by geofluid but that reduces the geofluid effectiveness by 28.3%; (iv) for geofluid temperatures above 650 °C, double-expansion plants have a 2% higher geofluid effectiveness and 5%–8% lower specific embodied energy than single-expansion ones.

Description: A new method of depositing tin dioxide nanofibers in order to develop chemical sensors is presented. It involves an electrospinning process with in-plane electrostatic focusing over micromechanized substrates. It is a fast and reproducible method. After an annealing process, which can be performed by the substrate heaters, it is observed that the fibers are intertwined forming porous networks that are randomly distributed on the substrate. The fiber diameters oscillate from 100 nm to 200 nm and fiber lengths reach several tens of microns. Each fiber has a polycrystalline structure with multiple nano-grains. The sensors have been tested for the detection of acetone and hydrogen peroxide (precursors of the explosive triacetone triperoxide, TATP) in air in the ppm range. High and fast responses to these gases have been obtained.

Description: The effects of aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) exposure and sodium selenite supplementation on cell apoptosis of jejunum in broilers were studied. A total of 240 one-day-old male AA broilers were randomly assigned four dietary treatments containing 0 mg/kg of AFB1 (control), 0.3 mg/kg AFB1 (AFB1), 0.4 mg/kg supplement Se (+ Se) and 0.3 mg/kg AFB1 + 0.4 mg/kg supplement Se (AFB1 + Se), respectively. Compared with the control broilers, the number of apoptotic cells, the expression of Bax and Caspase-3 mRNA were significantly increased, while the expression of Bcl-2 mRNA and the Bcl-2/Bax ratio were significantly decreased in AFB1 broilers. The number of apoptotic cells and the expression of Caspase-3 mRNA in AFB1 + Se broilers were significantly higher than those in the control broilers, but significantly lower than those in AFB1 broilers. There were no significant changes in the expression of Bax mRNA between AFB1 + Se and control broilers; the expression of Bcl-2 mRNA and the Bcl-2/Bax ratio in AFB1 + Se broilers were significantly lower than those in the control broilers, but significantly higher than those in AFB1 broilers. In conclusion, 0.3 mg/kg AFB1 in the diet can increase cell apoptosis, decrease Bcl-2 mRNA expression, and increase of Bax and Caspase-3 mRNA expression in broiler’s jejunum. However, supplementation of dietary sodium selenite at the concentration of 0.4 mg/kg Se may ameliorate AFB1-induced apoptosis by increasing Bcl-2 mRNA expression, and decreasing Bax and Caspase-3 mRNA expression.

Description: MEMS Inertial Measurement Units are available at low cost and can replace expensive units in mobile mapping platforms which need direct georeferencing. This is done through the integration with GNSS measurements in order to achieve a continuous positioning solution and to obtain orientation angles. This paper presents the results of the assessment of the accuracy of a system that integrates GNSS and a MEMS IMU in a terrestrial platform. We describe the methodology used and the tests realized where the accuracy of the positions and orientation parameters were assessed using an independent photogrammetric technique employing cameras that integrate the mobile mapping system developed by the authors. Results for the accuracy of attitude angles and coordinates show that accuracies better than a decimeter in positions, and under a degree in angles, can be achieved even considering that the terrestrial platform is operating in less than favorable environments.

Description: This paper proposes an automated system for monitoring mobility patterns using a network of very low resolution visual sensors (30 30 pixels). The use of very low resolution sensors reduces privacy concern, cost, computation requirement and power consumption. The core of our proposed system is a robust people tracker that uses low resolution videos provided by the visual sensor network. The distributed processing architecture of our tracking system allows all image processing tasks to be done on the digital signal controller in each visual sensor. In this paper, we experimentally show that reliable tracking of people is possible using very low resolution imagery. We also compare the performance of our tracker against a state-of-the-art tracking method and show that our method outperforms. Moreover, the mobility statistics of tracks such as total distance traveled and average speed derived from trajectories are compared with those derived from ground truth given by Ultra-Wide Band sensors. The results of this comparison show that the trajectories from our system are accurate enough to obtain useful mobility statistics.

Description: Magnetic sensing technology offers an attractive alternative for in vivo tracking with much better performance than RF and ultrasound technologies. In this paper, an efficient in vivo magnetic tracking system is presented. The proposed system is intended to localize an endoscopic capsule which delivers biomarkers around specific locations of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract. For efficiently localizing a magnetic marker inside the capsule, a mathematical model has been developed for the magnetic field around a cylindrical magnet and used with a localization algorithm that provides minimum error and fast computation. The proposed tracking system has much reduced complexity compared to the ones reported in the literature to date. Laboratory tests and in vivo animal trials have demonstrated the suitability of the proposed system for tracking a magnetic marker with expected accuracy.

Description: This paper presents a sensor fusion system of cameras and a 2D laser sensorfor large-scale 3D reconstruction. The proposed system is designed to capture data on afast-moving ground vehicle. The system consists of six cameras and one 2D laser sensor,and they are synchronized by a hardware trigger. Reconstruction of 3D structures is doneby estimating frame-by-frame motion and accumulating vertical laser scans, as in previousworks. However, our approach does not assume near 2D motion, but estimates free motion(including absolute scale) in 3D space using both laser data and image features. In orderto avoid the degeneration associated with typical three-point algorithms, we present a newalgorithm that selects 3D points from two frames captured by multiple cameras. The problemof error accumulation is solved by loop closing, not by GPS. The experimental resultsshow that the estimated path is successfully overlaid on the satellite images, such that thereconstruction result is very accurate.

Description: The proliferation of mobile smart devices has led to a rapid increase of location-based services, many of which are amassing large datasets of user trajectory information. Unfortunately, current trajectory information is not yet sufficiently rich to support classification of user transportation modes. In this paper, we propose a method that employs both the Global Positioning System and accelerometer data from smart devices to classify user outdoor transportation modes. The classified modes include walking, bicycling, and motorized transport, in addition to the motionless (stationary) state, for which we provide new depth analysis. In our classification, stationary mode has two sub-modes: stay (remaining in the same place for a prolonged time period; e.g., in a parked vehicle) and wait (remaining at a location for a short period; e.g., waiting at a red traffic light). These two sub-modes present different semantics for data mining applications. We use support vector machines with parameters that are optimized for pattern recognition. In addition, we employ ant colony optimization to reduce the dimension of features and analyze their relative importance. The resulting classification system achieves an accuracy rate of 96.31% when applied to a dataset obtained from 18 mobile users.

Description: For many years, ultrasound has provided clinicians with an affordable and effective imaging tool for applications ranging from cardiology to obstetrics. Development of microbubble contrast agents over the past several decades has enabled ultrasound to distinguish between blood flow and surrounding tissue. Current clinical practices using microbubble contrast agents rely heavily on user training to evaluate degree of localized perfusion. Advances in separating the signals produced from contrast agents versus surrounding tissue backscatter provide unique opportunities for specialized sensors designed to image microbubbles with higher signal to noise and resolution than previously possible. In this review article, we describe the background principles and recent developments of ultrasound transducer technology for receiving signals produced by contrast agents while rejecting signals arising from soft tissue. This approach relies on transmitting at a low-frequency and receiving microbubble harmonic signals at frequencies many times higher than the transmitted frequency. Design and fabrication of dual-frequency transducers and the extension of recent developments in transducer technology for dual-frequency harmonic imaging are discussed.

Description: In this paper, a new low complexity and lossless image compression system for capsule endoscopy (CE) is presented. The compressor consists of a low-cost YEF color space converter and variable-length predictive with a combination of Golomb-Rice and unary encoding. All these components have been heavily optimized for low-power and low-cost and lossless in nature. As a result, the entire compression system does not incur any loss of image information. Unlike transform based algorithms, the compressor can be interfaced with commercial image sensors which send pixel data in raster-scan fashion that eliminates the need of having large buffer memory. The compression algorithm is capable to work with white light imaging (WLI) and narrow band imaging (NBI) with average compression ratio of 78% and 84% respectively. Finally, a complete capsule endoscopy system is developed on a single, low-power, 65-nm field programmable gate arrays (FPGA) chip. The prototype is developed using circular PCBs having a diameter of 16 mm. Several in-vivo and ex-vivo trials using pig's intestine have been conducted using the prototype to validate the performance of the proposed lossless compression algorithm. The results show that, compared with all other existing works, the proposed algorithm offers a solution to wireless capsule endoscopy with lossless and yet acceptable level of compression.

Description: A reflection fiber inclinometer is proposed and experimentally demonstrated based on two linearly polarized (LP) modes coupling. The configuration consists of a section of polarization-maintaining fiber (PMF) containing a fiber Bragg grating (FBG) splicing with single mode fiber (SMF). Bending the PMF in the upstream of FBG can induce an additional birefringence of PMF, which results in the intensity changes of two LP modes owing to orthogonal polarization coupling. The experimental results represent that the device shows different bending responses at the angle range from 0° to 40°and from 64° to 88°, respectively. Moreover, the temperature change just shifts the wavelengths of LP modes reflected and does not influence their intensities, which effectively avoid the temperature cross-sensitivity and make it a good candidate for measuring inclinometer and temperature simultaneously.

Description: This paper proposes a polygeneration system based on a multi-input chemical looping combustion system, which generates methanol and electricity, through the use of natural gas and coal. In this system, the chemical looping hydrogen (CLH) production system and the coal-based methanol production system are integrated. A high quality fuel, natural gas, is used to improve the conversion ratio of coal. The Gibbs energy of the two kinds of fuels is fully used. Benefitting from the chemical looping process, 27% CO2 can be captured without energy penalty. With the same outputs of methanol and electricity, the energy savings ratio of the new system is about 12%. Based on the exergy analyses, it is disclosed that the integration of synthetic utilization of natural gas and coal plays a significant role in reducing the exergy destruction of the new system. The promising results obtained in this paper may lead to a clean coal technology that will utilize natural gas and coal more efficiently and economically.

Description: Many city governments choose to supply more developable land and transportation infrastructure with the hope of attracting people and businesses to their cities. However, like those in Taiwan, major cities worldwide suffer from traffic congestion. This study applies the system thinking logic of the causal loops diagram (CLD) model in the System Dynamics (SD) approach to analyze the issue of traffic congestion and other issues related to roads and land development in Taiwan’s cities. Comparing the characteristics of development trends with yearbook data for 2002 to 2013 for all of Taiwan’s cities, this study explores the developing phenomenon of unlimited city sprawl and identifies the cause and effect relationships in the characteristics of development trends in traffic congestion, high-density population aggregation in cities, land development, and green land disappearance resulting from city sprawl. This study provides conclusions for Taiwan’s cities’ sustainability and development (S&D). When developing S&D policies, during decision making processes concerning city planning and land use management, governments should think with a holistic view of carrying capacity with the assistance of system thinking to clarify the prejudices in favor of the unlimited developing phenomena resulting from city sprawl.

Description: This study assessed the feasibility of community-based comprehensive intervention on Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) on a large population in China. An intervention study was conducted on 7200 T2DM patients within one year and consisted of six lectures on health issues, and four times face-to-face lifestyle counseling delivered by general health practitioners, at local primary health centers (PHCs). A “knowledge, attitude and practice” (KAP) survey and fasting plasma glucose (FPG) measurement were conducted at baseline and after the intervention, respectively. A total of 6586 T2DM patients completed the intervention. After one year intervention, patients’ KAP level improved significantly (p 〈 0.001) and the average FPG has decreased from 8.53 mmol/L (standard deviation: 2.84) to 7.11 mmol/L (standard deviation: 1.34) (p 〈 0.001). Patients in rural areas and with lower education level showed higher FPG and poorer KAP level both before and after the intervention. In conclusion, community-based comprehensive intervention for T2DM is feasible on a large population. Improving and repeating the comprehensive strategy is greatly recommended in order to sustain the impact, especially in rural areas and for patients with lower education levels.

Description: The amount of liquid water in snow characterizes the wetness of a snowpack. Its temporal evolution plays an important role for wet-snow avalanche prediction, as well as the onset of meltwater release and water availability estimations within a river basin. However, it is still a challenge and a not yet satisfyingly solved issue to measure the liquid water content (LWC) in snow with conventional in situ and remote sensing techniques. We propose a new approach based on the attenuation of microwave radiation in the L-band emitted by the satellites of the Global Positioning System (GPS). For this purpose, we performed a continuous low-cost GPS measurement experiment at the Weissfluhjoch test site in Switzerland, during the snow melt period in 2013. As a measure of signal strength, we analyzed the carrier-to-noise power density ratio (C/N0) and developed a procedure to normalize these data. The bulk volumetric LWC was determined based on assumptions for attenuation, reflection and refraction of radiation in wet snow. The onset of melt, as well as daily melt-freeze cycles were clearly detected. The temporal evolution of the LWC was closely related to the meteorological and snow-hydrological data. Due to its non-destructive setup, its cost-efficiency and global availability, this approach has the potential to be implemented in distributed sensor networks for avalanche prediction or basin-wide melt onset measurements.

Description: On-site analysis is an efficient approach to facilitate analysis at the location of the system under investigation as it can result in more accurate, more precise and quickly available analytical data. In our work, a novel self-made thermal desorption based interface was fabricated to couple solid-phase microextraction with ion mobility spectrometry for on-site water analysis. The portable interface can be connected with the front-end of an ion mobility spectrometer directly without other modifications. The analytical performance was evaluated via the extraction of chemical warfare agents and simulants in water samples. Several parameters including ionic strength and extraction time have been investigated in detail. The application of the developed method afforded satisfactory recoveries ranging from 72.9% to 114.4% when applied to the analysis of real water samples.

Description: We consider the problem of localising an unknown number of land mines usingconcentration information provided by a wireless sensor network. A number of vapoursensors/detectors, deployed in the region of interest, are able to detect the concentrationof the explosive vapours, emanating from buried land mines. The collected data iscommunicated to a fusion centre. Using a model for the transport of the explosive chemicalsin the air, we determine the unknown number of sources using a Principal ComponentAnalysis (PCA)-based technique. We also formulate the inverse problem of determiningthe positions and emission rates of the land mines using concentration measurementsprovided by the wireless sensor network. We present a solution for this problem basedon a probabilistic Bayesian technique using a Markov chain Monte Carlo sampling scheme,and we compare it to the least squares optimisation approach. Experiments conducted onsimulated data show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

Description: A smart-card-based user authentication scheme for wireless sensor networks (in short, a SUA-WSN scheme) is designed to restrict access to the sensor data only to users who are in possession of both a smart card and the corresponding password. While a significant number of SUA-WSN schemes have been suggested in recent years, their intended security properties lack formal definitions and proofs in a widely-accepted model. One consequence is that SUA-WSN schemes insecure against various attacks have proliferated. In this paper, we devise a security model for the analysis of SUA-WSN schemes by extending the widely-accepted model of Bellare, Pointcheval and Rogaway (2000). Our model provides formal definitions of authenticated key exchange and user anonymity while capturing side-channel attacks, as well as other common attacks. We also propose a new SUA-WSN scheme based on elliptic curve cryptography (ECC), and prove its security properties in our extended model. To the best of our knowledge, our proposed scheme is the first SUA-WSN scheme that provably achieves both authenticated key exchange and user anonymity. Our scheme is also computationally competitive with other ECC-based (non-provably secure) schemes.

Description: Optical mouse chips—equipped with adequate lenses—can serve as small, light, precise, fast, and cheap motion sensors monitoring optic flow induced by self motion of an agent in a contrasted environment. We present a device that extracts self motion parameters exclusively from flow in eight mouse sensors. Four pairs of sensors with opposite azimuth are mounted on a sensor head, each individual sensor looking down with \(-\)45\(^{\circ}\) elevation. The head is mounted on a carriage and is moved at constant height above a textured planar ground. The calibration procedure and tests on the precision of self motion estimates are reported.

Description: Future wireless sensor networks are expected to provide various sensing services and energy efficiency is one of the most important criterions. The node scheduling strategy aims to increase network lifetime by selecting a set of sensor nodes to provide the required sensing services in a periodic manner. In this paper, we are concerned with the service-oriented node scheduling problem to provide multiple sensing services while maximizing the network lifetime. We firstly introduce how to model the data correlation for different services by using Markov Random Field (MRF) model. Secondly, we formulate the service-oriented node scheduling issue into three different problems, namely, the multi-service data denoising problem which aims at minimizing the noise level of sensed data, the representative node selection problem concerning with selecting a number of active nodes while determining the services they provide, and the multi-service node scheduling problem which aims at maximizing the network lifetime. Thirdly, we propose a Multi-service Data Denoising (MDD) algorithm, a novel multi-service Representative node Selection and service Determination (RSD) algorithm, and a novel MRF-based Multi-service Node Scheduling (MMNS) scheme to solve the above three problems respectively. Finally, extensive experiments demonstrate that the proposed scheme efficiently extends the network lifetime.

Description: Phytoplankton patchiness, namely the heterogeneous distribution of microalgae over multiple spatial scales, dramatically impacts marine ecology. A spectacular example of such heterogeneity occurs in thin phytoplankton layers (TPLs), where large numbers of photosynthetic microorganisms are found within a small depth interval. Some species of motile phytoplankton can form TPLs by gyrotactic trapping due to the interplay of their particular swimming style (directed motion biased against gravity) and the transport by a flow with shear along the direction of gravity. Here we consider gyrotactic swimmers in numerical simulations of the Kolmogorov shear flow, both in laminar and turbulent regimes. In the laminar case, we show that the swimmer motion is integrable and the formation of TPLs can be fully characterized by means of dynamical systems tools. We then study the effects of rotational Brownian motion or turbulent fluctuations (appearing when the Reynolds number is large enough) on TPLs. In both cases, we show that TPLs become transient, and we characterize their persistence.

Description: In order to meet the needs of wind speed prediction in wind farms, we consider the influence of random atmospheric disturbances on wind variations. Considering a simplified fluid convection mode, a Lorenz system can be employed as an atmospheric disturbance model. Here Lorenz disturbance is defined as the European norm of the solutions of the Lorenz equation. Grey generating and accumulated generating models are employed to explore the relationship between wind speed and its related disturbance series. We conclude that a linear or quadric polynomial generating model are optimal through the verification of short-term wind speed prediction in the Sotavento wind farm. The new proposed model not only greatly improves the precision of short-term wind speed prediction, but also has great significance for the maintenance and stability of wind power system operation.

Description: The model of gas bubble growth in high-viscous gas-saturated magmatic melt, subjected to rapid decompression, is presented in the current study. It is shown that consideration of unsteady character of the process is extremely important in a wide range of supersaturation. The analytical solution is found for the profile of dissolved gas concentration and the rate of bubble growth. The model of kinetics of overall degassing is developed. This model is based on distinguishing the so-called “forbidden” zone in the melt volume with suppressed formation of the new nucleation sites. The simple analytical dependences of the number of nucleating bubbles and typical nucleation time on the value of initial decompression were derived together with time dependence of volumetric concentration of the gas phase. Our results match the available experimental data.

Description: We investigate the effect of viscosity contrast on the stability of gravitationally unstable, diffusive layers in porous media. Our analysis helps evaluate experimental observations of various diffusive (boundary) layer models that are commonly used to study the sequestration of CO 2 in brine aquifers. We evaluate the effect of viscosity contrast for two basic models that are characterized with respect to whether or not the interface between CO 2 and brine is allowed to move. We find that diffusive layers are in general more unstable when viscosity decreases with depth within the layer compared to when viscosity increases with depth. This behavior is in contrast to the one associated with the classical displacement problem of gravitationally unstable diffusive layers that are subject to mean flow. For the classical problem, a greater instability is associated with the displacement of a more viscous, lighter fluid along the direction of gravity by a less viscous, heavier fluid. We show that the contrasting behavior highlighted in this study is a special case of the classical displacement problem that depends on the relative strength of the displacement and buoyancy velocities. We demonstrate the existence of a critical viscosity ratio that determines whether the flow is buoyancy dominated or displacement dominated. We explain the new behaviors in terms of the interaction of vorticity components related to gravitational and viscous effects.

Description: Maintaining a healthy ecosystem is essential for maximizing sustainable ecological services of the best quality to human beings. Ecological and conservation research has provided a strong scientific background on identifying ecological health indicators and correspondingly making effective conservation plans. At the same time, ecologists have asserted a strong need for spatially explicit and temporally effective ecosystem health assessments based on remote sensing data. Currently, remote sensing of ecosystem health is only based on one ecosystem attribute: vigor, organization, or resilience. However, an effective ecosystem health assessment should be a comprehensive and dynamic measurement of the three attributes. This paper reviews opportunities of remote sensing, including optical, radar, and LiDAR, for directly estimating indicators of the three ecosystem attributes, discusses the main challenges to develop a remote sensing-based spatially-explicit comprehensive ecosystem health system, and provides some future perspectives. The main challenges to develop a remote sensing-based spatially-explicit comprehensive ecosystem health system are: (1) scale issue; (2) transportability issue; (3) data availability; and (4) uncertainties in health indicators estimated from remote sensing data. However, the Radarsat-2 constellation, upcoming new optical sensors on Worldview-3 and Sentinel-2 satellites, and improved technologies for the acquisition and processing of hyperspectral, multi-angle optical, radar, and LiDAR data and multi-sensoral data fusion may partly address the current challenges.

Description: This paper reviews the most dependable heat flux sensors, which can be used with InfraRed (IR) thermography to measure convective heat transfer coefficient distributions, and some of their applications performed by the authors’ research group at the University of Naples Federico II. After recalling the basic principles that make IR thermography work, the various heat flux sensors to be used with it are presented and discussed, describing their capability to investigate complex thermo-fluid-dynamic flows. Several applications to streams, which range from natural convection to hypersonic flows, are also described.

Description: Mean-shift tracking has gained more interests, nowadays, aided by its feasibility of real-time and reliable tracker implementation. In order to reduce background clutter interference to mean-shift object tracking, this paper proposes a novel indicator function generation method. The proposed method takes advantage of two ‘a priori’ knowledge elements, which are inherent to a kernel support for initializing a target model. Based on the assured background labels, a gradient-based label propagation is performed, resulting in a number of objects differentiated from the background. Then the proposed region growing scheme picks up one largest target object near the center of the kernel support. The grown object region constitutes the proposed indicator function and this allows an exact target model construction for robust mean-shift tracking. Simulation results demonstrate the proposed exact target model could significantly enhance the robustness as well as the accuracy of mean-shift object tracking.

Description: In this paper, an adaptive activity and environment recognition algorithm running on a mobile phone is presented. The algorithm makes inferences based on sensor and radio receiver data provided by the phone. A wide set of features that can be extracted from these data sources were investigated, and a Bayesian maximum a posteriori classifier was used for classifying between several user activities and environments. The accuracy of the method was evaluated on a dataset collected in a real-life trial. In addition, comparison to other state-of-the-art classifiers, namely support vector machines and decision trees, was performed. To make the system adaptive for individual user characteristics, an adaptation algorithm for context model parameters was designed. Moreover, a confidence measure for the classification correctness was designed. The proposed adaptation algorithm and confidence measure were evaluated on a second dataset obtained from another real-life trial, where the users were requested to provide binary feedback on the classification correctness. The results show that the proposed adaptation algorithm is effective at improving the classification accuracy.

Description: A novel wireless and passive surface acoustic wave (SAW) based temperature-compensated vibration sensor utilizing a flexible Y-cut quartz cantilever beam with a relatively substantial proof mass and two one-port resonators is developed. One resonator acts as the sensing device adjacent to the clamped end for maximum strain sensitivity, and the other one is used as the reference located on clamped end for temperature compensation for vibration sensor through the differential approach. Vibration directed to the proof mass flex the cantilever, inducing relative changes in the acoustic propagation characteristics of the SAW travelling along the sensing device, and generated output signal varies in frequency as a function of vibration.  A theoretical mode using the Rayleigh method was established to determine the optimal dimensions of the cantilever beam. Coupling of Modes (COM) model was used to extract the optimal design parameters of the SAW devices prior to fabrication. The performance of the developed SAW sensor attached to an antenna towards applied vibration was evaluated wirelessly by using the precise vibration table, programmable incubator chamber, and reader unit.  High vibration sensitivity of ~10.4 kHz/g, good temperature stability, and excellent linearity were observed in the wireless measurements.

Description: H-type finned tube heat exchanger elements maintain a high capacity for heat transfer, possess superior self-cleaning properties and retain the ability to effect flue gas waste heat recovery in boiler renovations. In this paper, the heat transfer and pressure drop characteristics of H-type finned tube banks are studied via an experimental open high-temperature wind tunnel system. The effects of fin width, fin height, fin pitch and air velocity on fin efficiency, convective heat transfer coefficient, integrated heat transfer capacity and pressure drop are examined. The results indicate that as air velocity, fin height and fin width increase, fin efficiency decreases. Convective heat transfer coefficient is proportional to fin pitch, but inversely proportional to fin height and fin width. Integrated heat transfer capacity is related to fin efficiency, convective heat transfer coefficient and finned ratio. Pressure drop increases with the increase of fin height and fin width. Finally, predictive correlations of fin efficiency, Nusselt number and Euler Number are developed based on the experimental data.

Description: This paper is devoted to the analysis and design of high performance permanent-magnet synchronous wind generators (PSWGs). A systematic and sequential methodology for the design of PMSGs is proposed with a high performance wind generator as a design model. Aiming at high induced voltage, low harmonic distortion as well as high generator efficiency, optimal generator parameters such as pole-arc to pole-pitch ratio and stator-slot-shoes dimension, etc. are determined with the proposed technique using Maxwell 2-D, Matlab software and the Taguchi method. The proposed double three-phase and six-phase winding configurations, which consist of six windings in the stator, can provide evenly distributed current for versatile applications regarding the voltage and current demands for practical consideration. Specifically, windings are connected in series to increase the output voltage at low wind speed, and in parallel during high wind speed to generate electricity even when either one winding fails, thereby enhancing the reliability as well. A PMSG is designed and implemented based on the proposed method. When the simulation is performed with a 6 Ω load, the output power for the double three-phase winding and six-phase winding are correspondingly 10.64 and 11.13 kW. In addition, 24 Ω load experiments show that the efficiencies of double three-phase winding and six-phase winding are 96.56% and 98.54%, respectively, verifying the proposed high performance operation.

Description: To meet Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) cellulosic biofuel mandates, the United States will require an annual domestic supply of about 242 million Mg of biomass by 2022. To improve the feedstock logistics of lignocellulosic biofuels in order to access available biomass resources from areas with varying yields, commodity systems have been proposed and designed to deliver quality-controlled biomass feedstocks at preprocessing “depots”. Preprocessing depots densify and stabilize the biomass prior to long-distance transport and delivery to centralized biorefineries. The logistics of biomass commodity supply chains could introduce spatially variable environmental impacts into the biofuel life cycle due to needing to harvest, move, and preprocess biomass from multiple distances that have variable spatial density. This study examines the uncertainty in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of corn stover logistics within a bio-ethanol supply chain in the state of Kansas, where sustainable biomass supply varies spatially. Two scenarios were evaluated each having a different number of depots of varying capacity and location within Kansas relative to a central commodity-receiving biorefinery to test GHG emissions uncertainty. The first scenario sited four preprocessing depots evenly across the state of Kansas but within the vicinity of counties having high biomass supply density. The second scenario located five depots based on the shortest depot-to-biorefinery rail distance and biomass availability. The logistics supply chain consists of corn stover harvest, collection and storage, feedstock transport from field to biomass preprocessing depot, preprocessing depot operations, and commodity transport from the biomass preprocessing depot to the biorefinery. Monte Carlo simulation was used to estimate the spatial uncertainty in the feedstock logistics gate-to-gate sequence. Within the logistics supply chain GHG emissions are most sensitive to the transport of the densified biomass, which introduces the highest variability (0.2–13 g CO2e/MJ) to life cycle GHG emissions. Moreover, depending upon the biomass availability and its spatial density and surrounding transportation infrastructure (road and rail), logistics can increase the variability in life cycle environmental impacts for lignocellulosic biofuels. Within Kansas, life cycle GHG emissions could range from 24 g CO2e/MJ to 41 g CO2e/MJ depending upon the location, size and number of preprocessing depots constructed. However, this range can be minimized through optimizing the siting of preprocessing depots where ample rail infrastructure exists to supply biomass commodity to a regional biorefinery supply system.

Description: Recharging implantable electronics from the outside of the human body is very important for applications such as implantable biosensors and other implantable electronics. In this paper, a recharging method for implantable biosensors based on a wearable incoherent light source has been proposed and simulated. Firstly, we develop a model of the incoherent light source and a multi-layer model of skin tissue. Secondly, the recharging processes of the proposed method have been simulated and tested experimentally, whereby some important conclusions have been reached. Our results indicate that the proposed method will offer a convenient, safe and low-cost recharging method for implantable biosensors, which should promote the application of implantable electronics.

Description: A simple and inexpensive method based on solvent extraction followed by low temperature clean-up was applied for determination of seven pyrethroids residues in bovine raw milk using gas chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (GC-MS/MS) and gas chromatography with electron-capture detector (GC-ECD). Sample extraction procedure was established through the evaluation of seven different extraction protocols, evaluated in terms of analyte recovery and cleanup efficiency. Sample preparation optimization was based on Doehlert design using fifteen runs with three different variables. Response surface methodologies and polynomial analysis were used to define the best extraction conditions. Method validation was carried out based on SANCO guide parameters and assessed by multivariate analysis. Method performance was considered satisfactory since mean recoveries were between 87% and 101% for three distinct concentrations. Accuracy and precision were lower than ±20%, and led to no significant differences (p 〈 0.05) between results obtained by GC-ECD and GC-MS/MS techniques. The method has been applied to routine analysis for determination of pyrethroid residues in bovine raw milk in the Brazilian National Residue Control Plan since 2013, in which a total of 50 samples were analyzed.

Description: The development of a round liquid jet under the influence of a confined coaxial flow of an immiscible liquid of comparable density (central to annular flow density ratio of 8:10) was investigated in the vicinity of the nozzle exit. Two flow regimes were considered; one where the annular flow is faster than the central jet, so the central liquid jet is accelerated and one where the annular flow is slower, so the central liquid jet is decelerated. The central jet was visualised by high speed photography. Three modes of jet development were identified and classified in terms of the Reynolds number, Re, of the central jet which was in the range of 525 〈 Re 〈 2725, a modified definition of the Weber number, We, which allows the distinction between accelerating and deceleration flows and was in the range of −22 〈 We 〈 67 and the annular to central Momentum Ratio, MR, of the two streams which was in the range of 3.6 〈 MR 〈 91. By processing the time resolved jet images using Proper Orthogonal Decomposition (POD), it was possible to reduce the description of jet morphology to a small number of spatial modes, which isolated the most significant morphologies of the jet development. In this way, the temporal and spatial characteristics of the instabilities on the interface were clearly identified which highlights the advantages of POD over direct observation of the images. Relationships between the flow parameters and the interfacial waves were established. The wavelength of the interfacial instability was found to depend on the velocity of the fastest moving stream, which is contrary to findings for fluids with large density differences.

Description: Interaction of a vortex ring impinging on multiple permeable screens orthogonal to the ring axis was studied to experimentally investigate the persistence and decay of vortical structures inside the screen array using digital particle image velocimetry in a refractive index matched environment. The permeable screens had porosities (open area ratios) of 83.8%, 69.0%, and 55.7% and were held by a transparent frame that allowed the screen spacing to be changed. Vortex rings were generated using a piston-cylinder mechanism at nominal jet Reynolds numbers of 1000, 2000, and 3000 with piston stroke length-to-diameter ratios of 2 and 3. The interaction of vortex rings with the porous medium showed a strong dependence of the overall flow evolution on the screen porosity, with a central flow being preserved and vortex ring-like structures (with smaller diameter than the primary vortex ring) being generated near the centerline. Due to the large rod size used in the screens, immediate reformation of the transmitted vortex ring with size comparable to the primary ring (as has been observed with thin screens) was not observed in most cases. Since the screens have lower complexity and high open area ratios, centerline vortex ring-like flow structures formed with comparable size to the screen pore size and penetrated through the screens. In the case of low porosity screens (55.7%) with large screen spacing, re-emergence of large scale (large separation), weak vortical structures/pairs (analogous to a transmitted vortex ring) was observed downstream of the first screen. Additional smaller scale vortical structures were generated by the interaction of the vortex ring with subsequent screens. The size distribution of the generated vortical structures were shown to be strongly affected by porosity, with smaller vortical structures playing a stronger role as porosity decreased. Finally, porosity significantly affected the decay of total energy, but the effect of screen spacing decreased as porosity decreased.

Description: In this paper, we study mobile element (ME)-based data-gathering schemes in wireless sensor networks. Due to the physical speed limits of mobile elements, the existing data-gathering schemes that usemobile elements can suffer from high data-gathering latency. In order to address this problem, this paper proposes a new hierarchical and cooperative data-gathering (HiCoDG) scheme that enables multiple mobile elements to cooperate with each other to collect and relay data. In HiCoDG, two types of mobile elements are used: the mobile collector (MC) and the mobile relay (MR). MCs collect data from sensors and forward them to the MR, which will deliver them to the sink. In this work, we also formulated an integer linear programming (ILP) optimization problem to find the optimal trajectories for MCs and the MR, such that the traveling distance of MEs is minimized. Two variants of HiCoDG, intermediate station (IS)-based and cooperative movement scheduling (CMS)-based, are proposed to facilitate cooperative data forwarding from MCs to theMR. An analytical model for estimating the average data-gathering latency in HiCoDG was also designed. Simulations were performed to compare the performance of the IS and CMS variants, as well as a multiple traveling salesman problem (mTSP)-based approach. The simulation results show that HiCoDG outperformsmTSP in terms of latency. The results also show that CMS can achieve the lowest latency with low energy consumption.

Description: Patients with limited English proficiency have known limitations accessing health care, but differences in hospital outcomes once access is obtained are unknown. We investigate inpatient mortality rates and obstetric trauma for self-reported speakers of English, Spanish, and languages of Asia and the Pacific Islands (API) and compare quality of care by language with patterns by race/ethnicity. Data were from the United States Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project, 2009 State Inpatient Databases for California. There were 3,757,218 records. Speaking a non-English principal language and having a non-White race/ethnicity did not place patients at higher risk for inpatient mortality; the exception was significantly higher stroke mortality for Japanese-speaking patients. Patients who spoke API languages or had API race/ethnicity had higher risk for obstetric trauma than English-speaking White patients. Spanish-speaking Hispanic patients had more obstetric trauma than English-speaking Hispanic patients. The influence of language on obstetric trauma and the potential effects of interpretation services on inpatient care are discussed. The broader context of policy implications for collection and reporting of language data is also presented. Results from other countries with and without English as a primary language are needed for the broadest interpretation and generalization of outcomes.

Description: Large private sector investments in low- and middle-income countries are often critically evaluated with regards to their environmental, social, human rights, and health impacts. A health impact assessment, including a baseline health survey, was commissioned by the Addax Bioenergy Sierra Leone project in 2010. As part of the monitoring, a follow-up survey was conducted three years later. A set of health indicators was assessed at six impacted and two control sites. Most of these indices improved, particularly at the impacted sites. The prevalences of stunting, wasting, and Plasmodium falciparum in children under five years of age decreased significantly at impacted sites (all p 〈 0.05) and non-significantly at control sites. Anemia in children and in women of reproductive age (15–49 years) decreased significantly at impacted and control sites (p 〈 0.05 and p 〈 0.001, respectively). Health facility-based deliveries increased significantly at the impacted sites (p 〈 0.05). The prevalences of helminth infections in children aged 10–15 years remained approximately at the same levels, although focal increases at the impacted sites were noted. Access to improved sanitation decreased significantly (p 〈 0.05) at control and non-significantly at impacted sites. Water quality remained poor without significant changes. The epidemiologic monitoring of a bioenergy project provides a useful contribution for evidence-based decision-making.

Description: Elderly persons’ perceived accessibility to railway traveling depends on their functional limitations/diseases, their functional abilities and their travel behaviors in interaction with the barriers encountered during whole trips. A survey was conducted on a random sample of 1000 city residents (65–85 years old; 57% response rate). The travels were perceived least accessible by respondents with severely reduced functional ability and by those with more than one functional limitation/disease (e.g., restricted mobility and chronic pain). Those who traveled “often”, perceived the accessibility to be better than those who traveled less frequently. For travelers with high functional ability, the main barriers to more frequent traveling were travel costs and low punctuality. For those with low functional ability, one’s own health was reported to be the main barrier. Our results clarify the links among existing functional limitations/functional abilities, the barriers encountered, the travel behavior, and the overall accessibility to traveling. By operationalizing the whole-trip concept as a chain of events, we deliver practical knowledge on vulnerable groups for decision-making to improve the transport environment for all.

Description: Vortex cavitation forming in the leading-edge vortices of a delta wing was examined to determine how the individual cavitation bubbles incepted, grew, interacted with the underlying vortical flow and produced acoustic tones. The non-cavitating vortical flow over the delta wing was chosen to be similar to those previously reported in the literature. It was found that vortex breakdown was unaffected by the presence of incipient and developed vortex cavitation bubbles in the vortex core. While some cavitation bubbles incepted, grew, and collapsed relatively quickly, others reached an equilibrium position wherein the bubble tip was stationary in the laboratory frame at a particular location along the vortex axis. For a given attack angle, the equilibrium location moved upstream with a reduction in free stream cavitation number. It is shown that the existence of these stationary vortex bubbles is possible when there is a balance between the axial growth of the bubble along the vortex axis and the opposite motion of the axial jetting flow in the vortex core, and only a single equilibrium position is possible along the axially evolving vortex for a given free stream cavitation number. These transient and stationary vortex bubbles emit significant cavitation noise upon inception, growth, and collapse. The spectral content of the noise produced was expected to be related to the interaction of the bubble with the surrounding vortical flow in a manner similar to that reported in previous studies, where sustained tones were similar to the underlying vortex frequency. However, in the present study, the dominant frequency and higher harmonics of the tones occur at a higher frequency than that of the underlying vortex. Hence, it is likely that the highly elongated stationary bubbles have higher-order volume oscillations compared to the two-dimensional radial mode of the vortex cores of vortex cavitation bubbles with much smaller diameter-to-length ratios.

Description: Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is leading to a new paradigm of Internet of Everything (IoE). WSNs have a wide range of applications but are usually deployed in a particular application. However, the future of WSNs lies in the aggregation and allocation of resources, serving diverse applications. WSN virtualization by the middleware is an emerging concept that enables aggregation of multiple independent heterogeneous devices, networks, radios and software platforms; and enhancing application development. WSN virtualization, middleware can further be categorized into sensor virtualization and network virtualization. Middleware for WSN virtualization poses several challenges like efficient decoupling of networks, devices and software. In this paper efforts have been put forward to bring an overview of the previous and current middleware designs for WSN virtualization, the design goals, software architectures, abstracted services, testbeds and programming techniques. Furthermore, the paper also presents the proposed model, challenges and future opportunities for further research in the middleware designs for WSN virtualization.

Description: Laminar flow over a periodic array of cylindrical surface roughness elements is simulated with an immersed boundary spectral method both to validate the method for subsequent studies and to examine how persistent streamwise vortices are introduced by a low Reynolds number roughness element. Direct comparisons are made with prior studies at a roughness-based Reynolds number Re k (= U ( k ) k / ν ) of 205 and a diameter to spanwise spacing ratio d / λ of 1/3. Downstream velocity contours match present and past experiments very well. The shear layer developed over the top of the roughness element produces the downstream velocity deficit. Upstream of the roughness element, the vortex topology is found to be consistent with juncture flow experiments, creating three cores along the recirculation line. Streamtraces stemming from these upstream cores, however, have unexpectedly little effect on the downstream flowfield as lateral divergence of the boundary layer quickly dissipates their vorticity. Long physical relaxation time of the recirculating wake behind the roughness remains a prominent issue for simulating this type of flowfield.

Description: A new fluorescent probe P derived from naphthalimide bearing a pyridine group has been synthesized and characterized. The proposed probe P shows high selectivity and sensitivity to Cu2+ in aqueous media. Under optimized conditions, the linear response of P (2 μM) toward Cu2+ was 0.05–0.9 μM in ethanol-water solution (3:2, v:v, 50 mM HEPES, pH 7.4), and the detection limit was 0.03 μM.

Description: Chlorpyrifos (CPF) is a commonly used organophosphate insecticide (OP). In adults, exposure to OPs has been inconsistently associated with reduced lung function. OP exposure and lung function has not been assessed in adolescents. The objective of this study was to assess CPF exposure and lung function among Egyptian adolescents. We conducted a 10-month study of male adolescent pesticide applicators (n = 38) and non-applicators of similar age (n = 24). Urinary 3,5,6-trichloro-2-pyridinol (TPCy), a CPF-specific metabolite, was analyzed in specimens collected throughout the study. Spirometry was performed twice after pesticide application: day 146, when TCPy levels were elevated and day 269, when TCPy levels were near baseline. Applicators had higher levels of TCPy (mean cumulative TCPy day 146 = 33,217.6; standard deviation (SD) = 49,179.3) than non-applicators (mean cumulative TCPy day 146 = 3290.8; SD = 3994.9). Compared with non-applicators, applicators had higher odds of reporting wheeze, odds ratio = 3.41 (95% CI: 0.70; 17.41). Cumulative urinary TCPy was inversely associated with spirometric measurements at day 146, but not at day 269. Although generally non-significant, results were consistent with an inverse association between exposure to CPF and lung function.

Description: Diatoms are a highly diversified group of algae that are widely distributed in aquatic ecosystems, and various species have different nutrient and temperature requirements for optimal growth. Here, we describe unusual psychrophilic diatoms of Cymbella in a travertine deposition environment in southwestern China in winter season. Travertine surfaces are colonized by these psychrophilic diatoms, which form biofilms of extracellular polysaccharide substances (EPS) with active metabolic activities in extremely cold conditions. The travertine in Huanglong, is a typical single crystalline calcite with anisotropic lattice distortions of unit cell parameters along axes of a and c, and this structure is suggestive of some level of metabolic mediation on mineralization. Near-edge X-ray absorption fine structure spectroscopy (NEXAFS) results further confirmed the occurrence of biogenic distortion of the crystal lattice of travertine calcite. Overall, our results imply that the metabolic influence of psychrophilic diatoms may be particularly important for promoting formation and dissolution of travertine in extremely cold environments of Huanglong. The EPS of psychrophilic diatoms will protect travertine from HCO3− etching and provide template for forming travertine when water re-flowing, in warm season.

Description: The aim of this study is to investigate the relationships between road traffic noise exposure, annoyance caused by different noise sources and validated health indicators in a cohort of 1375 adults from the region of Basel, Switzerland. Road traffic noise exposure for each study participant was determined using modelling, and annoyance from various noise sources was inquired by means of a four-point Likert scale. Regression parameters from multivariable regression models for the von Zerssen score of somatic symptoms (point symptom score increase per annoyance category) showed strongest associations with annoyance from industry noise (2.36, 95% CI: 1.54, 3.17), neighbour noise (1.62, 95% CI: 1.17, 2.06) and road traffic noise (1.53, 95% CI: 1.09, 1.96). Increase in modelled noise exposure by 10 dB(A) resulted in a von Zerssen symptom score increase of 0.47 (95% CI: −0.01, 0.95) units. Subsequent structural equation modelling revealed that the association between physical noise exposure and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) is strongly mediated by annoyance and sleep disturbance. This study elucidates the complex interplay of different factors for the association between physical noise exposure and HRQOL.

Description: Background: Lead is a pervasive pollutant, associated at low levels to many adverse health effects. Objective: To investigate lead levels, exposure pathways and intervention possibilities in school children from Alpuyeca, in Morelos, Mexico. Methods: Blood lead concentrations (BPb) were measured in 226 children in 2011. Exposure pathways were assessed through a questionnaire, lead measurements in different environmental matrices and spatial aggregation analysis of lead concentrations. Results: BPb ranged from 1.5 to 36.5 µg/dL, with a mean (SD) of 7.23 (4.9) µg/dL. Sixty-four and 18% of the children had BPb > 5 µg/dL and > 10 µg/dL, respectively. The use of lead glazed ceramics was reported in almost half of the households; it was the main BPb determinant and it was associated with an increased risk of having BPb > 5 g/dL by 2.7 times (p = 0.001). Environmental samples were within US EPA’s lead recommended limits, and blood lead levels were randomly distributed in the community. Conclusions: Lead remains a public health problem in Alpuyeca, Mexico. Unlike other local pollutants, lead exposure prevention can be achieved inexpensively and in a short term. Interventions should make mothers aware of lead’s health effects and empower them to safeguard their children’s health by avoiding the culturally ingrained use of lead glazed pottery.Background: Lead is a pervasive pollutant, associated at low levels to many adverse health effects. Objective: To investigate lead levels, exposure pathways and intervention possibilities in school children from Alpuyeca, in Morelos, Mexico. Methods: Blood lead concentrations (BPb) were measured in 226 children in 2011. Exposure pathways were assessed through a questionnaire, lead measurements in different environmental matrices and spatial aggregation analysis of lead concentrations. Results: BPb ranged from 1.5 to 36.5 µg/dL, with a mean (SD) of 7.23 (4.9) µg/dL. Sixty-four and 18% of the children had BPb > 5 µg/dL and > 10 µg/dL, respectively. The use of lead glazed ceramics was reported in almost half of the households; it was the main BPb determinant and it was associated with an increased risk of having BPb > 5 g/dL by 2.7 times (p = 0.001). Environmental samples were within US EPA’s lead recommended limits, and blood lead levels were randomly distributed in the community. Conclusions: Lead remains a public health problem in Alpuyeca, Mexico. Unlike other local pollutants, lead exposure prevention can be achieved inexpensively and in a short term. Interventions should make mothers aware of lead’s health effects and empower them to safeguard their children’s health by avoiding the culturally ingrained use of lead glazed pottery.

Description: This paper presents a performance analysis of two open-source, laser scanner-based Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) techniques (i.e., Gmapping and Hector SLAM) using a Microsoft Kinect to replace the laser sensor. Furthermore, the paper proposes a new system integration approach whereby a Linux virtual machine is used to run the open source SLAM algorithms. The experiments were conducted in two different environments; a small room with no features and a typical office corridor with desks and chairs. Using the data logged from real-time experiments, each SLAM technique was simulated and tested with different parameter settings. The results show that the system is able to achieve real time SLAM operation. The system implementation offers a simple and reliable way to compare the performance of Windows-based SLAM algorithm with the algorithms typically implemented in a Robot Operating System (ROS). The results also indicate that certain modifications to the default laser scanner-based parameters are able to improve the map accuracy. However, the limited field of view and range of Kinect’s depth sensor often causes the map to be inaccurate, especially in featureless areas, therefore the Kinect sensor is not a direct replacement for a laser scanner, but rather offers a feasible alternative for 2D SLAM tasks.

Description: Winemaking is a dynamic process, where microbiological and chemical effects may strongly differentiate products from the same vineyard and even between wine vats. This high variability means an increase in work in terms of control and process management. The winemaking process therefore requires a site-specific approach in order to optimize cellar practices and quality management, suggesting a new concept of winemaking, identified as Precision Enology. The Institute of Biometeorology of the Italian National Research Council has developed a wireless monitoring system, consisting of a series of nodes integrated in barrel bungs with sensors for the measurement of wine physical and chemical parameters in the barrel. This paper describes an open-source evolution of the preliminary prototype, using Arduino-based technology. Results have shown good performance in terms of data transmission and accuracy, minimal size and power consumption. The system has been designed to create a low-cost product, which allows a remote and real-time control of wine evolution in each barrel, minimizing costs and time for sampling and laboratory analysis. The possibility of integrating any kind of sensors makes the system a flexible tool that can satisfy various monitoring needs.

Description: Crotamine is one of the main constituents of the venom of the South American rattlesnake Crotalus durissus terrificus. Here we sought to investigate the inflammatory and toxicological effects induced by the intrahippocampal administration of crotamine isolated from Crotalus whole venom. Adult rats received an intrahippocampal infusion of crotamine or vehicle and were euthanized 24 h or 21 days after infusion. Plasma and brain tissue were collected for biochemical analysis. Complete blood count, creatinine, urea, glutamic oxaloacetic transaminase (GOT), glutamic pyruvic transaminase (GPT), creatine-kinase (CK), creatine kinase-muscle B (CK-MB) and oxidative parameters (assessed by DNA damage and micronucleus frequency in leukocytes, lipid peroxidation and protein carbonyls in plasma and brain) were quantified. Unpaired and paired t-tests were used for comparisons between saline and crotamine groups, and within groups (24 h vs. 21 days), respectively. After 24 h crotamine infusion promoted an increase of urea, GOT, GPT, CK, and platelets values (p ≤ 0.01), while red blood cells, hematocrit and leukocytes values decreased (p ≤ 0.01). Additionally, 21 days after infusion crotamine group showed increased creatinine, leukocytes, TBARS (plasma and brain), carbonyl (plasma and brain) and micronucleus compared to the saline-group (p ≤ 0.01). Our findings show that crotamine infusion alter hematological parameters and cardiac markers, as well as oxidative parameters, not only in the brain, but also in the blood, indicating a systemic pro-inflammatory and toxicological activity. A further scientific attempt in terms of preserving the beneficial activity over toxicity is required.

Description: Global climate change is affecting health and mortality, particularly in vulnerable populations. High ambient temperatures decrease blood pressure (BP) in young and middle aged adults and may lead to orthostatic hypotension, increasing the risk of falls in older adults. The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of a test protocol to investigate BP response and aerobic capacity of older adults in a hot indoor environment. BP response and aerobic capacity were assessed in 26 community-dwelling older women (median age 75.5 years) at a room temperature of either 20 °C or 30 °C. The protocol was well tolerated by all participants. In the 30 °C condition systolic and diastolic BP (median difference 10 and 8 mmHg, respectively) and distance walked in 6 min (median difference 29.3 m) were lower than in the 20 °C condition (all p 〈 0.01). Systolic BP decreased after standing up from a lying position in the 30 °C (17.4 mmHg) and 20 °C (14.2 mmHg) condition (both p 〈 0.001). In conclusion, the protocol is feasible in this cohort and should be repeated in older adults with poor physical performance and impaired cardio-vascular response mechanisms. Furthermore, aerobic capacity was reduced after exposure to hot environmental temperatures, which should be considered when recommending exercise to older people during the summer months.

Description: Avoiding or minimizing potential environmental impact is the driving idea behind protecting a population’s health via Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) and Strategic Environmental Assessments (SEAs). However, both are often carried out without any systematic approach. This paper describes the findings of a review of HIA, EIA and SEA experiences carried out by the authors, who act as institutional competent subjects at the national and regional levels in Italy. The analysis of how health is tackled in EIA and SEA procedures could support the definition of a protocol for the integration of HIA with EIA and SEA. Although EIA and SEA approaches include the aim of protecting health, significant technical and methodological gaps are present when assessing health systematically, and their basic principles regarding assessment are unsatisfactory for promoting and addressing healthcare concepts stated by the WHO. HIA is still poorly integrated into the decision-making process, screening and monitoring phases are only occasionally implemented, and operational details are not well-defined. The collaborative approach of institutions involved in environment and health is a core element in a systematic advancement toward supporting effective decisions and effective protection of the environment and health. At the Italian national level, the definition of guidelines and tools for HIA, also in relation with EIA and SEA, is of great interest.

Description: There is expedient evidence showing that differences in adolescent alcohol consumption and other risk-behaviour depend on both family structure and family member drunkenness exposure. Data were obtained among adolescents (N = 12,115, mean age 14.9 ± 0.89) in Austria, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Romania, Slovenia and Spain within the European Union’s 7th Framework Programme funded project, ‘Saving and Empowering Young Lives in Europe (SEYLE)’. The current study reveals how adolescents’ alcohol consumption patterns are related to their family structure and having seen their family member drunk. The results revealed statistically significant differences in adolescent alcohol consumption depending on whether the adolescent lives in a family with both birth parents, in a single-parent family or in a family with one birth parent and one step-parent. The study also revealed that the abstaining from alcohol percentage among adolescents was greater in families with both birth parents compared to other family types. The study also showed that the more often adolescents see their family member drunk the more they drink themselves. There is no difference in adolescent drinking patterns whether they see their family member drunk once a month or once a week. This study gives an insight on which subgroups of adolescents are at heightened risk of alcohol abuse and that decrease of family member drunkenness may have positive effects on the drinking habits of their children.

Description: An LC resonant pressure sensor with improved performance is presented in this paper. The sensor is designed with a buried structure, which protects the electrical components from contact with harsh environments and reduces the resonant-frequency drift of the sensor in high-temperature environments. The pressure-sensitive membrane of the sensor is optimized according to small-deflection-plate theory, which allows the sensor to operate in high-pressure environments. The sensor is fabricated using low-temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) technology, and a fugitive film is used to create a completed sealed embedded cavity without an evacuation channel. The experimental results show that the frequency drift of the sensor versus the temperature is approximately 0.75 kHz/°C, and the responsivity of the sensor can be up to 31 kHz/bar within the pressure range from atmospheric pressure to 60 bar.

Description: The explosive triacetone triperoxide (TATP), which can be prepared from commercially readily available reagents following an easy synthetic procedure, is one of the most common components of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Molecularly-imprinted polymer (MIP) electrochemical sensors have proved useful for the determination of different compounds in different matrices with the required sensitivity and selectivity. In this work, a highly sensitive and selective molecularly imprinted polymer with electrochemical capabilities for the determination of TATP has been developed. The molecular imprinting has been performed via electropolymerisation onto a glassy carbon electrode surface by cyclic voltammetry from a solution of pyrrole functional monomer, TATP template and LiClO4. Differential Pulse Voltammetry of TATP, with LiClO4 as supporting electrolyte, was performed in a potential range of −2.0 V to +1.0 V (vs. Ag/AgCl). Three-factor two-level factorial design was used to optimise the monomer concentration at 0.1 mol∙L−1, template concentration at 100 mmol∙L−1 and the number of cyclic voltammetry scan cycles to 10. The molecularly imprinted polymer-modified glassy carbon electrode demonstrated good performance at low concentrations for a linear range of 82–44,300 µg∙L−1 and a correlation coefficient of r2 = 0.996. The limits of detection (LoD) and quantification (LoQ) achieved were 26.9 μg∙L−1 and 81.6 μg∙L−1, respectively. The sensor demonstrated very good repeatability with precision values (n = 6, expressed as %RSD) of 1.098% and 0.55% for 1108 and 2216 µg∙L−1, respectively. It also proved selective for TATP in the presence of other explosive substances such as PETN, RDX, HMX, and TNT.

Description: Delay tracking of spread-spectrum signals is widely used for ranging in radio frequency based navigation. Its use in non-coherent optical ranging, however, has not been extensively studied since optical channels are less subject to narrowband interference situations where these techniques become more useful. In this work, an early-late delay-locked loop adapted to indoor optical ranging is presented and analyzed. The specific constraints of free-space infrared channels in this context substantially differ from those typically considered in radio frequency applications. The tracking stage is part of an infrared differential range measuring system with application to mobile target indoor localization. Spread-spectrum signals are used in this context to provide accurate ranging while reducing the effect of multipath interferences. The performance of the stage regarding noise and dynamic errors is analyzed and validated, providing expressions that allow an adequate selection of the design parameters depending on the expected input signal characteristics. The behavior of the stage in a general multipath scenario is also addressed to estimate the multipath error bounds. The results, evaluated under realistic conditions corresponding to an 870 nm link with 25 MHz chip-rate, built with low-cost up-to-date devices, show that an overall error below 6% of a chip time can be achieved.

Description: Many intelligent transportation system applications require accurate, reliable, and continuous vehicle positioning. How to achieve such positioning performance in extended GPS-denied environments such as tunnels is the main challenge for land vehicles. This paper proposes a hybrid multi-sensor fusion strategy for vehicle positioning in tunnels. First, the preliminary positioning algorithm is developed. The Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology is introduced to achieve preliminary positioning in the tunnel. The received signal strength (RSS) is used as an indicator to calculate the distances between the RFID tags and reader, and then a Least Mean Square (LMS) federated filter is designed to provide the preliminary position information for subsequent global fusion. Further, to improve the positioning performance in the tunnel, an interactive multiple model (IMM)-based global fusion algorithm is developed to fuse the data from preliminary positioning results and low-cost in-vehicle sensors, such as electronic compasses and wheel speed sensors. In the actual implementation of IMM, the strong tracking extended Kalman filter (STEKF) algorithm is designed to replace the conventional extended Kalman filter (EKF) to achieve model individual filtering. Finally, the proposed strategy is evaluated through experiments. The results validate the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed strategy.

Description: A high accuracy localization technique using Long Term Evolution (LTE) based on a new and accurate multiple carrier noise model has been developed. In the noise consideration, the LTE multiple carriers phase noise has been incorporated so that a new and accurate noise model is achieved. An experiment was performed to characterize the phase noise of carriers at 2 GHz. The developed noise model was incorporated into LTE localization analysis in a high traffic area in Hong Kong to evaluate the accuracy of localization. The evaluation and analysis reveals that the new localization method achieves an improvement of about 10% accuracy comparing to existing widely adopted schemes.

Description: In biomimetics, living systems are imitated to develop receptors for ions, molecules and bioparticles. The most pertinent idea is self-organization in analogy to evolution in nature, which created the key-lock principle. Today, modern science has been developing host-guest chemistry, a strategy of supramolecular chemistry for designing interactions of analytes with synthetic receptors. This can be realized, e.g., by self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) or molecular imprinting. The strategies are used for solid phase extraction (SPE), but preferably in developing recognition layers of chemical sensors.

Description: In three-phase inverters used in uninterruptible power supplies (UPSs), three-limb inductors and three-limb transformers are commonly used in consideration of cost and size. However, magnetic coupling exists between the three phases of the inverter, which can result in complex models. When instantaneous feedback control strategies are introduced to achieve high quality output waveforms, the transient analysis of the closed-loop inverters becomes difficult. In this paper, the phenomenon of magnetic coupling in three-phase inverters due to three-limb inductors and three-limb transformers is analyzed. A decoupled dynamic model is derived based on the instantaneous symmetrical components transformation, which comprises three decoupled equivalent circuits of instantaneous symmetrical components. Analyses based on this model indicate that magnetic coupling may have a significant impact on the performance of three-phase inverters under unbalanced load conditions and transient responses. For three-phase inverters in UPSs with Proportional-Integral-Differential (PID) closed-loop control strategies, the interactive influence between instantaneous closed-loop regulation and magnetic coupling is researched. Finally, a method of reliability analysis and PID controller design for inverters with magnetic coupling is derived. Simulation and experiment results validate the model and conclusions.

Description: The aim of this paper is to present a thermodynamic cycle for the production of electrical power in the 2–5 kW range, suitable for all types of thermally propelled vehicles. The sensible heat recovered from the exhaust gases feeds the energy recovery system, which is able to produce sufficient power to sustain the air conditioning system or other auxiliaries. The working fluids R134a and R245fa have been used in the ORC system, and the systems are simulated by CAMEL-ProTM software. The cycles are generated starting from the same heat source: the exhaust gas of a typical 2.0 L Diesel engine (or from a small size turbine engine). The design of the condenser has been performed to obtain a very compact component, evaluating the heat exchanger tube and fins type design. Through empirical formulas, the area of heat exchange, the heat required to exchange and the pressure drop in the element have been calculated. A commercial software package is used to build the model of the condenser, then a thermal and mechanical analysis and a CFD analysis are realized to estimate the heat exchange. Finally the evaluations, the possible future studies and possible improvements of the system are shown.

Description: In urban Maroua, Cameroon, improved drinking water sources are available to a large majority of the population, yet this water is frequently distributed through informal distribution systems and stored in home containers (canaries), leaving it vulnerable to contamination. We assessed where contamination occurs within the distribution system, determined potential sources of environmental contamination, and investigated potential pathogens. Gastrointestinal health status (785 individuals) was collected via health surveys. Drinking water samples were collected from drinking water sources and canaries. Escherichia coli and total coliform levels were evaluated and molecular detection was performed to measure human-associated faecal marker, HF183; tetracycline-resistance gene, tetQ; Campylobacter spp.; and Staphylococcus aureus. Statistical analyses were performed to evaluate the relationship between microbial contamination and gastrointestinal illness. Canari samples had higher levels of contamination than source samples. HF183 and tetQ were detected in home and source samples. An inverse relationship was found between tetQ and E. coli. Presence of tetQ with lower E. coli levels increased the odds of reported diarrhoeal illness than E. coli levels alone. Further work is warranted to better assess the relationship between antimicrobial-resistant bacteria and other pathogens in micro-ecosystems within canaries and this relationship’s impact on drinking water quality.

Description: The authors wish to add the following amendment and correction on their paper published in IJERPH [1]: Page 6139, Line 3 in Paragraph 3: “…Israel, [17,18],…” should read “…Israel and Palestine [17,18]…”. [...]

Description: Longitudinal data enables detecting the effect of aging/time, and as a repeated measures design is statistically more efficient compared to cross-sectional data if the correlations between repeated measurements are not large. In particular, when genotyping cost is more expensive than phenotyping cost, the collection of longitudinal data can be an efficient strategy for genetic association analysis. However, in spite of these advantages, genome-wide association studies (GWAS) with longitudinal data have rarely been analyzed taking this into account. In this report, we calculate the required sample size to achieve 80% power at the genome-wide significance level for both longitudinal and cross-sectional data, and compare their statistical efficiency. Furthermore, we analyzed the GWAS of eight phenotypes with three observations on each individual in the Korean Association Resource (KARE). A linear mixed model allowing for the correlations between observations for each individual was applied to analyze the longitudinal data, and linear regression was used to analyze the first observation on each individual as cross-sectional data. We found 12 novel genome-wide significant disease susceptibility loci that were then confirmed in the Health Examination cohort, as well as some significant interactions between age/sex and SNPs.

Description: To mitigate climate change, city authorities are developing policies in areas such as transportation, housing and energy use, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In addition to their effects on greenhouse gas emissions, these policies are likely to have consequences for the wellbeing of their populations for example through changes in opportunities to take physical exercise. In order to explore the potential consequences for wellbeing, we first explore what ‘wellbeing’ is and how it can be operationalised for urban planners. In this paper, we illustrate how wellbeing can be divided into objective and subjective aspects which can be measured quantitatively; our review of measures informs the development of a theoretical model linking wellbeing to policies which cities use to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Finally, we discuss the extent to which the links proposed in the conceptual model are supported by the literature and how cities can assess wellbeing implications of policies.

Description: Aluminum absorption leads to deposits in several tissues. In this study, we have investigated, to our knowledge for the first time, aluminum deposition in the salivary glands in addition to the resultant cellular changes in the parotid and submandibular salivary glands in a model of chronic intoxication with aluminum citrate in rats. Aluminum deposits were observed in the parotid and submandibular glands. Immunohistochemical evaluation of cytokeratin-18 revealed a decreased expression in the parotid gland with no changes in the submandibular gland. A decreased expression of α-smooth muscle actin was observed in the myoepithelial cells of both glands. The expression of metallothionein I and II (MT-I/II), a group of metal-binding proteins, which are useful indicators for detecting physiological responses to metal exposure, was higher in both glands. In conclusion, we have shown that at a certain time and quantity of dosage, aluminum citrate promotes aluminum deposition in the parotid and submandibular glands, leads to an increased expression of MT-I/II in both the glands, damages the cytoskeleton of the myoepithelial cells in both glands, and damages the cytoskeleton of the acinar/ductal cells of the parotid glands, with the submandibular glands showing resistance to the toxicity of the latter.

Description: Compensatory health beliefs (CHBs) are beliefs that an unhealthy behavior can be compensated with a healthy behavior. In line with the CHBs model, the aim of this study was twofold. First, the study investigated the relationship between autonomous motivation and CHBs that physical inactivity can be compensated by taking the stairs instead of the elevator. Second, the study focused on the associations between CHBs and readiness to use the stairs more often and stair and elevator use. Thus, a cross-sectional online questionnaire was designed that was filled out by 135 participants. Path analysis showed that individuals with stronger autonomous motivation to use the stairs strongly agreed that sedentary behavior could be compensated by taking the stairs instead of the elevator. Moreover, CHBs were positively related to readiness to change behavior, but not to self-reported stair and elevator use. Even though future research is necessary to replicate these findings, autonomous motivation seems to have a positive impact on CHBs which, in turn, might boost an intended behavior change. Thus, promoting possible compensation of physical inactivity might foster the readiness to change the unhealthy behavior.

Description: Climate change puts pressure on existing health vulnerabilities through higher frequency of extreme weather events, changes in disease vector distribution or exacerbated air pollution. Climate change adaptation policies may hold potential to reduce societal inequities. We assessed the role of public health and social justice in European climate change adaptation using a three-fold approach: a document analysis, a critical discourse analysis of a subgroup of strategies, and a ranking of strategies against our social justice framework. The ranking approach favored planning that includes various adaptation types, social issues and infrastructure changes. Themes on values identified in the five subgroup documents showed that risks are perceived as contradictory, technology is viewed as savior, responsibilities need to be negotiated, and social justice is advocated by only a few countries. Of 21 strategy documents assessed overall, those from Austria, England and Sweden received the highest scores in the ranking. Our qualitative assessment showed that in European adaptation planning, progress could still be made through community involvement into adaptation decisions, consistent consideration of social and demographic determinants, and a stronger link between infrastructural adaptation and the health sector. Overall, a social justice framework can serve as an evaluation guideline for adaptation policy documents.

Description: Cervical cancer remains a significant cause of morbidity and mortality for women in developing countries, despite the fact that inexpensive, simple and effective screening methods are available. Visual inspection of the cervix with acetic acid (VIA) can be used as part of a “reen and treat” program to identify precancerous lesions for cryotherapy treatment. This case report details how the VIA screening test was incorporated into the care of a patient presenting to a maternal health clinic in Thomonde, Haiti which was staffed by doctors and medical students from Emory University School of Medicine in collaboration with Haiti Medishare. As demonstrated here, the VIA test requires minimal materials, can be efficiently incorporated into a physical exams, provides immediate results, and is easily demonstrated to and performed by local healthcare providers. The straightforward and sensitive VIA technique is an ideal cervical cancer screening method for resource poor areas.

Description: Many driver assistance systems require knowledge of the vehicle environment. As these systems are increasing in complexity and performance, this knowledge of the environment needs to be more complete and reliable, so sensor fusion combining long, medium and short range sensors is now being used. This paper analyzes the feasibility of using ultrasonic sensors for low cost vehicle-positioning and tracking in the lane adjacent to the host vehicle in order to identify free areas around the vehicle and provide information to an automatic avoidance collision system that can perform autonomous braking and lane change manoeuvres. A laser scanner is used for the early detection of obstacles in the direction of travel while two ultrasonic sensors monitor the blind spot of the host vehicle. The results of tests on a test track demonstrate the ability of these sensors to accurately determine the kinematic variables of the obstacles encountered, despite a clear limitation in range.

Description: Detailed information on tree cover structure is critical for research and monitoring programs targeting African woodlands, including agroforestry parklands. High spatial resolution satellite imagery represents a potentially effective alternative to field-based surveys, but requires the development of accurate methods to automate information extraction. This study presents a method for tree crown mapping based on Geographic Object Based Image Analysis (GEOBIA) that use spectral and geometric information to detect and delineate individual tree crowns and crown clusters. The method was implemented on a WorldView-2 image acquired over the parklands of Saponé, Burkina Faso, and rigorously evaluated against field reference data. The overall detection rate was 85.4% for individual tree crowns and crown clusters, with lower accuracies in areas with high tree density and dense understory vegetation. The overall delineation error (expressed as the difference between area of delineated object and crown area measured in the field) was 45.6% for individual tree crowns and 61.5% for crown clusters. Delineation accuracies were higher for medium (35–100 m2) and large (≥100 m2) trees compared to small (〈35 m2) trees. The results indicate potential of GEOBIA and WorldView-2 imagery for tree crown mapping in parkland landscapes and similar woodland areas.

Description: Total suspended solid (TSS) is an important water quality parameter. This study was conducted to test the feasibility of the band combination of hyperspectral sensing for inland turbid water monitoring in Taiwan. The field spectral reflectance in the Wu river basin of Taiwan was measured with a spectroradiometer; the water samples were collected from the different sites of the Wu river basin and some water quality parameters were analyzed on the sites (in situ) as well as brought to the laboratory for further analysis. To obtain the data set for this study, 160 in situ sample observations were carried out during campaigns from August to December, 2005. The water quality results were correlated with the reflectivity to determine the spectral characteristics and their relationship with turbidity and TSS. Furthermore, multiple-regression (MR) and artificial neural network (ANN) were used to model the transformation function between TSS concentration and turbidity levels of stream water, and the radiance measured by the spectroradiometer. The value of the turbidity and TSS correlation coefficient was 0.766, which implies that turbidity is significantly related to TSS in the Wu river basin. The results indicated that TSS and turbidity are positively correlated in a significant way across the entire spectrum, when TSS concentration and turbidity levels were under 800 mg·L−1 and 600 NTU, respectively. Optimal wavelengths for the measurements of TSS and turbidity are found in the 700 and 900 nm range, respectively. Based on the results, better accuracy was obtained only when the ranges of turbidity and TSS concentration were less than 800 mg·L−1 and less than 600 NTU, respectively and used rather than using whole dataset (R2 = 0.93 versus 0.88 for turbidity and R2 = 0.83 versus 0.58 for TSS). On the other hand, the ANN approach can improve the TSS retrieval using MR. The accuracy of TSS estimation applying ANN (R2 = 0.66) was better than with the MR approach (R2 = 0.58), as expected due to the nonlinear nature of the transformation model.

Description: Security and privacy issues in medical wireless body area networks (WBANs) constitute a major unsolved concern because of the challenges posed by the scarcity of resources in WBAN devices and the usability restrictions imposed by the healthcare domain. In this paper, we describe a WBAN architecture based on the well-known publish-subscribe paradigm. We present two protocols for publishing data and sending commands to a sensor that guarantee confidentiality and fine-grained access control. Both protocols are based on a recently proposed ciphertext policy attribute-based encryption (CP-ABE) scheme that is lightweight enough to be embedded into wearable sensors. We show how sensors can implement lattice-based access control (LBAC) policies using this scheme, which are highly appropriate for the eHealth domain. We report experimental results with a prototype implementation demonstrating the suitability of our proposed solution.

Description: Solutal Marangoni instability (SMI) is investigated both in 2D and 3D using a combined Cahn-Hilliard and Navier-Stokes model in a finite system. Fe-Sn is chosen as a representative alloy system since the phase diagram reveals a region with a miscibility gap, where two liquid phases, namely, the Fe-rich phase L 1 and the Sn-rich phase L 2 , are in chemical equilibrium. In 3D, considering a perturbed liquid cylinder ( L 2 phase) with a length of λ and a radius of R 0 embedded in the middle of a simulation box of λ × H × H (length × width × height) surrounded by the phase L 1 , we find that the perturbation induced Marangoni flow is either clockwise or anti-clockwise depending on the mean curvature difference between the convex and concave regions which is affected by the ratio of λ/ R 0 . The critical ratio of λ/ R 0 for SMI is shown to be invariant for different Marangoni numbers as well as independent of the geometrical properties of the L 1 phase. In 2D, a perturbed liquid pipe with a length of λ and a radius of R 0 embedded in the middle of a simulation box of λ × H (length × height) is taken into account. Due to different curvature constitution, the critical ratio of λ/ R 0 for SMI depends on the height of the L 1 phase.

Description: For several years, a promising Plasma Synthetic Jet actuator for high-speed flow control has been under development at ONERA. So far, its confined geometry and small space-time scales at play have prevented its full experimental characterization. Complementary accurate numerical simulations are then considered in this study in order to provide a complete aerothermodynamic description of the actuator. Two major obstacles have to be overcome with this approach: the modeling of the energy deposited by the electric arc and the accurate computation of the transient response of the cavity generating the pulsed jet. To solve the first problem, an Euler solver coupled with an electric circuit model was used to evaluate the energy deposition in the cavity. Such a coupling is performed by considering the electric field between the two electrodes. The second issue was then addressed by injecting these source terms in large Eddy simulations of the entire actuator. Aerodynamic results were finally compared with Schlieren visualizations. Using the proposed methodology, the temporal evolution of the jet front is remarkably well predicted.

Description: and projection. Although China is the world's most populous country with approximately a fifth of the world's population, none of the empirical tables from mainland China were used in calibrating the existing models. In this paper, we applied recent three model life table systems with different inputs to China mortality data to investigate whether or not these systems truly reflect Chinese mortality epidemiological patterns and whether or not system biases exist. The resulting residuals show that, in most cases, the male infant mortality rate (1q0), adult mortality rate (45q15) and old age mortality rate (20q60) have a strong bias towards being overestimated and the life expectancy at birth (e0) bias is underestimated. We also give the detailed results for each case. Furthermore, we found that the average relative errors (AREs) for females are more than those for males for e0, 45q15 and 20q60, but for 1q0, males have larger AREs in the Wilmoth and Murray systems. We also found that the urban population has more errors than the rural population in almost all cases. Finally, by comparing the AREs with 10 other countries, we found the errors for China are more than those for other countries in most cases. It is concluded that these existing model life table systems cannot accurately reflect Chinese mortality epidemiological situations and trajectories. Therefore, model life tables should be used with caution when applied to China on the basis of 5q0.

Description: Objective: To assess the impact of different smoking behaviors of caregivers on environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure in children aged 5–6 years in Changsha, China. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional, random digit-dial telephone survey of caregivers (n = 543) between August and October 2013. Caregivers’ smoking behaviors were collected by a questionnaire. Exposure assessment was based upon determination of urinary cotinine levels in children employing gas chromatography–triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (GC-MS/MS). Results: In children not living with a smoker, children living with one smoker, and children living with more than one smoker at home, median urinary cotinine concentrations (ng/mL) were 0.72, 2.97, and 4.46, respectively. For children living with one smoker, median urinary cotinine levels of children exposed to ETS were associated with caregiver smoking behaviors, i.e., if a caregiver consumed more cigarettes (>20 compared with ≤10; 7.73 versus 2.29 ng/mL, respectively). Conclusions: The magnitude of ETS exposure in children is correlated with the smoking behaviors of the caregiver. Counseling for smoking cessation and educational interventions are needed urgently for smoking caregivers to increase their awareness about ETS exposure and to encourage smoking cessation at home or to take precautions to protect children’s health.

Description: Lentinus edodes, a functional food, was evaluated as a potential antidote for adsorption/removal of cadmium ion from simulated gastrointestinal fluids. An adsorption/removal capacity of 65.12 mg/g was achieved by L. edodes in solutions with a pH ranging from 2.5 to 6.0, while little if any adsorption was observed in solutions with a pH under 2.5. In solutions with pH 6.0, 84% of the cadmium adsorption by L. edodes occurred in the first minute. Scanning electronic microscopic examination showed that the cell wall polysaccharides of L. edodes provided a rough sponge-like surface for effective cadmium adsorption. FTIR indicated that the carboxyl, hydroxyl and –NH groups of the cell wall polysaccharides and proteins were the primary functional groups that chemically bind with cadmium ions. The energy dispersive spectrometry further revealed that cation exchange might be attributed to cadmium biosorption. These results suggested that L. edodes was effective for cadmium detoxication, especially in low concentration.

Description: This study set out to explore the relationship between female media use behavior and agreement with agenda-specific publicly promoted health messages. A random digit dial telephone cross-sectional survey was conducted using a nationally representative sample of female residents aged 25 and over. Respondents’ agreement with health messages was measured by a six-item Health Information Scale (HIS). Data were analyzed using chi-square tests and multiple logistic regression. This survey achieved a response rate of 86% (n = 1074). In this study the longest duration of daily television news watching (OR = 2.32), high self-efficacy (OR = 1.56), and greater attention to medical and health news (OR = 5.41) were all correlates of greater agreement with the selected health messages. Surprisingly, Internet use was not significant in the final model. Many women that public health interventions need to be targeting are not receptive to health information that can be accessed through Internet searches. However, they may be more readily targeted by television campaigns. Agenda-specific public health campaigns aiming to empower women to serve as nodes of information transmission and achieve efficient trickle down through the family unit might do better to invest more heavily in television promotion.

Description: Wireless Sensor Networks deliver valuable information for long periods, then it is desirable to have optimum performance, reduced delays, low overhead, and reliable delivery of information. In this work, proposed metrics that influence energy consumption are used for a performance comparison among our proposed routing protocol, called Multi-Parent Hierarchical (MPH), the well-known protocols for sensor networks, Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV), Dynamic Source Routing (DSR), and Zigbee Tree Routing (ZTR), all of them working with the IEEE 802.15.4 MAC layer. Results show how some communication metrics affect performance, throughput, reliability and energy consumption. It can be concluded that MPH is an efficient protocol since it reaches the best performance against the other three protocols under evaluation, such as 19.3% reduction of packet retransmissions, 26.9% decrease of overhead, and 41.2% improvement on the capacity of the protocol for recovering the topology from failures with respect to AODV protocol. We implemented and tested MPH in a real network of 99 nodes during ten days and analyzed parameters as number of hops, connectivity and delay, in order to validate our Sensors 2014, 14 22812 simulator and obtain reliable results. Moreover, an energy model of CC2530 chip is proposed and used for simulations of the four aforementioned protocols, showing that MPH has 15.9% reduction of energy consumption with respect to AODV, 13.7% versus DSR, and 5% against ZTR.

Description: An automated traffic measuring system for use on multiple drive lanes is proposed in this paper. This system, which uses ultrasonic sensors and a lateral scanning method, is suitable for use on real traffic roads. The proposed system can be easily established and maintained in various roadway environments. In addition, the system can be adjusted to measure traffic volumes according to the size and number of drive lanes. This paper describes the results of an experiment that the lateral scanning method can be easily applied to real traffic roads and provide a low error rate and real-time responses. This system can play an important role in accurately measuring traffic volumes as part of an intelligent transportation system.

Description: Public fitness centers and exercise facilities have been implicated as possible sources for transmitting community-acquired bacterial infections. However, the overall diversity of the bacterial community residing on the surfaces in these indoor environments is still unknown. In this study, we investigated the overall bacterial ecology of selected fitness centers in a metropolitan area (Memphis, TN, USA) utilizing culture-independent pyrosequencing of the 16S rRNA genes. Samples were collected from the skin-contact surfaces (e.g., exercise instruments, floor mats, handrails, etc.) within fitness centers. Taxonomical composition revealed the abundance of Firmicutes phyla, followed by Proteobacter and Actinobacteria, with a total of 17 bacterial families and 25 bacterial genera. Most of these bacterial genera are of human and environmental origin (including, air, dust, soil, and water). Additionally, we found the presence of some pathogenic or potential pathogenic bacterial genera including Salmonella, Staphylococcus, Klebsiella, and Micrococcus. Staphylococcus was found to be the most prevalent genus. Presence of viable forms of these pathogens elevates risk of exposure of any susceptible individuals. Several factors (including personal hygiene, surface cleaning and disinfection schedules of the facilities) may be the reasons for the rich bacterial diversity found in this study. The current finding underscores the need to increase public awareness on the importance of personal hygiene and sanitation for public gym users.

Description: High accuracy attitude and position determination is very important for underwater gliders. The cross-coupling among three attitude angles (heading angle, pitch angle and roll angle) becomes more serious when pitch or roll motion occurs. This cross-coupling makes attitude angles inaccurate or even erroneous. Therefore, the high accuracy attitude and position determination becomes a difficult problem for a practical underwater glider. To solve this problem, this paper proposes backing decoupling and adaptive extended Kalman filter (EKF) based on the quaternion expanded to the state variable (BD-AEKF). The backtracking decoupling can eliminate effectively the cross-coupling among the three attitudes when pitch or roll motion occurs. After decoupling, the adaptive extended Kalman filter (AEKF) based on quaternion expanded to the state variable further smoothes the filtering output to improve the accuracy and stability of attitude and position determination. In order to evaluate the performance of the proposed BD-AEKF method, the pitch and roll motion are simulated and the proposed method performance is analyzed and compared with the traditional method. Simulation results demonstrate the proposed BD-AEKF performs better. Furthermore, for further verification, a new underwater navigation system is designed, and the three-axis non-magnetic turn table experiments and the vehicle experiments are done. The results show that the proposed BD-AEKF is effective in eliminating cross-coupling and reducing the errors compared with the conventional method.