A quantitative analysis of inter-island telephony traffic in the Pacific Basin Region (PBR)

As part of NASA's continuing assessment of future communication satellite requirements, a study was conducted to quantitatively scope current and future telecommunication traffic demand in the South Pacific Archipelagos. This demand was then converted to equivalent satellite transponder capacities. Only inter-island telephony traffic for the Pacific Basin Region was included. The results show that if all this traffic were carried by a satellite system, one-third of a satellite transponder would be needed to satisfy the base-year (1976-1977) requirement and about two-thirds of a satellite transponder would be needed to satisfy the forecasted 1985 requirement

Optical character recognition on heterogeneous SoC for HD automatic number plate recognition system

Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) systems are becoming vital for safety and security purposes. Typical ANPR systems are based on three stages: number plate localization (NPL), character segmentation (CS), and optical character recognition (OCR). Recently, high definition (HD) cameras have been used to improve their recognition rates. In this paper, four algorithms are proposed for the OCR stage of a real-time HD ANPR system. The proposed algorithms are based on feature extraction (vector crossing, zoning, combined zoning, and vector crossing) and template matching techniques. All proposed algorithms have been implemented using MATLAB as a proof of concept and the best one has been selected for hardware implementation using a heterogeneous system on chip (SoC) platform. The selected platform is the Xilinx Zynq-7000 All Programmable SoC, which consists of an ARM processor and programmable logic. Obtained hardware implementation results have shown that the proposed system can recognize one character in 0.63 ms, with an accuracy of 99.5% while utilizing around 6% of the programmable logic resources. In addition, the use of the heterogenous SoC consumes 36 W which is equivalent to saving around 80% of the energy consumed by the PC used in this work, whereas it is smaller in size by 95%

DSP embedded smart surveillance sensor with robust SWAD-based tracker

Smart video analytics algorithms can be embedded within surveillance sensors for fast in-camera processing. This paper presents a DSP embedded video analytics system for object and people tracking, using a PTZ camera. The tracking algorithm is based on adaptive template matching and it employs a novel Sum of Weighted Absolute Differences. The video analytics is implemented on the DSP board DM6437 EVM and it automatically controls the PTZ camera, to keep the target central to the field of view. The EVM is connected to the network and the tracking algorithm can be remotely activated, so that the PTZ enhanced with the DSP embedded video analytics becomes a smart surveillance sensor. The system runs in real-time and simulation results demonstrate that the described SWAD outperforms other template matching measures in terms of efficiency and accuracy

Archaean crustal development in the Lewisian complex of northwest Scotland

The Lewisian complex of northwest Scotland is typical of many Archaean terrains and has a well documented history starting similar to 2,700 Myr ago(1-6). Here we present new isotopic data that extend this history back to 3,300 Myr, and provide some insight into how the earliest continental crust may have formed. The Lewisian is dominated by tonalite, trondhjemite and granodiorite (TTG) rocks, which require a mafic lithospheric source, rather than being direct mantle melts(7-11). But the mafic and ultramafic rocks in the high-grade granulite-facies part of this terrain show little evidence of a significantly older crustal history(12,13) and precursor material to the TTG lithologies has not yet been identified. Here we show that older amphibolite material has survived at a lower metamorphic grade. Coexisting amphibolite minerals yield indistinguishable Pb-207-Pb-206 and Sm-147-Nd-143 ages of 3,310+/-27 Myr and 3,298+/-73 Myr, respectively. These data are consistent with an origin for much of the Lewisian terrain by the re-melting of preexisting lithosphere, with an isotopic signature similar to that of the amphibolites studied here

Challenges of Image-Based Crowd-Sourcing for Situation Awareness in Disaster Management

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