Non-Destructive Inspection of Concrete Structures Using an Acceleration Pickup
The present paper proposes a method for detecting cracks or honeycombs in concrete structures using an acceleration pickup. The sensor on the concrete surface observes the stationary waves which are generated inside the structures depending on the depth of the crack (if there is a crack) or the bottom of the structure (if there are no cracks or honeycombs). The method measures the depths of the reflection planes (such as cracks or honeycombs) accurately by modeling the sensor output as an output of a linear dynamic system with unknown parameters and by applying a maximum likelihood method. The method is shown to be quite effectively applied to measure the depths of cracks and honeycombs
Intelligent BioRobot Platform for Integrated Clinical Test
Recently, automation in clinical test is raised as a fusion of bio and robotic technology. Particularly, automation in clinical test becomes a new application area of the robotic technology. In this paper, we present a robot platform for clinical test suitable for small or medium size of hospitals. The platform is designed to minimize the consumption of reagents, and easily integrate various testing equipments since it is functionally modularized. The platform is aimed for accommodating almost 70 kinds of clinical tests, which are the most frequently conducted in the hospitals. The platform consists of several major function blocks such as manipulation, transportation and detection, incubation, reservation, and each of them is designed as a module of the system. Basic ideas of the design are described and each functional block is explained in details
A Study on Greenhouse Automatic Control System Based on Wireless Sensor Network
The system proposed in this paper collects temperature of leaves and humidity on leaves of crop. As well as greenhouse environmental information such as temperature, humidity, etc. Crop diseases, especially, have deep relationship not only with indoor environmental factors but also with humidity lasting time on leaves and temperature of leaves. Accordingly, monitoring crop itself is as important as monitoring indoor environments. Using these collected greenhouse environmental data, indoor environments can be more effectively controlled, and monitoring crop itself can contribute to improve productivity and to prevent crops from damages by blight and harmful insects. In addition, it will be possible for farmers to do control plant growth through closely studying relationship between indoor environmental information and monitored information on crop itself. Collected data can be stored to database either in server installed in greenhouse or to remote server. It is made possible to collect information and control effectively and automatically greenhouse in the site or from a remote place through web browser. System components are: temperature sensor, humidity sensor, leaf temperature sensor, leaf humidity sensor, Zigbee based wireless sensor node, relay nodes for automatic control, and data server to store greenhouse information. The system is implemented using low power wireless components, and easy to install.