SensorShoe: Mobile Gait Analysis for Parkinson's Disease Patients

We present the design and initial evaluation of a mobile gait analysis system, SensorShoe. The target user group is represented by Parkinson's Disease patients, which need continuous assistance with the physical therapy in their home environment. SensorShoe analyses the gait by using a low-power sensor node equipped with movement sensors. In addition, SensorShoe gives real-time feedback and therapy assistance to the patient, and provides the caregivers an effective remote monitoring and control tool

Snapshots of the EYES project

The EYES project (IST-2001-34734) is a three years European research project on self-organizing and collaborative energy-efficient sensor networks. It addresses the convergence of distributed information processing, wireless communications, and mobile computing. The goal of the project is to develop the architecture and the technology which enables the creation of a new generation of sensors that can effectively network together so as to provide a flexible platform for the support of a large variety of mobile sensor network applications. This paper provides a broad overview of the EYES project and highlights some approaches and results of the architecture

Parameter reduction for the Yld2004-18p yield criterion

The Yld2004-18p yield criterion uses 18 parameters to define anisotropy for a full 3D stress state. It is demonstrated in this paper that dependencies between the parameters exist and for a given set of experimental data the parameters are not uniquely defined. Analysis of the yield function shows that two specific combinations of parameters do not contribute to the value of the yield function. Therefore, the number of parameters can be reduced to 16, without any loss of flexibility. Similarly, the number of parameters for the plane stress version of this yield criterion reduces from 14 to 1

Large induced optical activity in the conduction band of polyaniline doped with (1S)-(+)-10-camphorsulfonic acid

A large induced CD is found in the conduction band of polyaniline doped with optically active camphorsulfonic acid. In films obtained by spin-coating from a m-cresol soln., the chiral dopant induces chirality within the main chain of polyaniline. No other combinations of achiral conducting polymers and chiral dopants have been found that show induced optical activity in their conduction band

Peak load reduction of multiple water heaters: Respecting consumer comfort and money savings

Demand Response programs can allow residential electricity consumers to cut their energy bills. However, in case of contingencies in the energy system when the guaranteed peak load reduction is needed, comfort of consumers can be significantly deteriorated and they can choose to opt out. This paper investigates the possibility of peak load reduction and yet highly respecting consumers' comfort by coordinating a group of electric tank water heaters. The proposed peak shaving mechanism accounts for interests of both utility companies and their customers. It employs two optimization models tailored to the needs of both sides to optimally schedule individual water heaters. The suggested Simulation results show the potential of the proposed mechanism to provide the guaranteed peak load reduction thus contributing to the stability of the electrical grid, while transparent balancing between comfort-money and comfort-energy incorporated in the control scheme is of interest and use to green consumers

Proteus II: design and evaluation of an integrated power-efficient underwater sensor node

We describe the design and evaluation of an integrated low-cost underwater sensor node designed for reconfigurability, allowing continuous operation on a relatively small rechargeable battery for one month. The node uses a host CPU for the network protocols and processing sensor data and a separate CPU performs signal processing for the ultrasonic acoustic software-defined Modulator/Demodulator (MODEM). A Frequency Shift Keying- (FSK-) based modulation scheme with configurable symbol rates, Hamming error correction, and Time-of-Arrival (ToA) estimation for underwater positioning is implemented. The onboard sensors, an accelerometer and a temperature sensor, can be used to measure basic environmental parameters; additional internal and external sensors are supported through industry-standard interfaces (I2C, SPI, and RS232) and an Analog to Digital Converter (ADC) for analog peripherals. A 433 MHz radio can be used when the node is deployed at the surface. Tests were performed to validate the low-power operation. Moreover the acoustic communication range and performance and ToA capabilities were evaluated. Results show that the node achieves the one-month lifetime, is able to perform communication in highly reflective environments, and performs ToA estimation with an accuracy of about 1-2 meters

On Mobility Management in Multi-Sink Sensor Networks for Geocasting of Queries

In order to efficiently deal with location dependent messages in multi-sink wireless sensor networks (WSNs), it is key that the network informs sinks what geographical area is covered by which sink. The sinks are then able to efficiently route messages which are only valid in particular regions of the deployment. In our previous work (see the 5th and 6th cited documents), we proposed a combined coverage area reporting and geographical routing protocol for location dependent messages, for example, queries that are injected by sinks. In this paper, we study the case where we have static sinks and mobile sensor nodes in the network. To provide up-to-date coverage areas to sinks, we focus on handling node mobility in the network. We discuss what is a better method for updating the routing structure (i.e., routing trees and coverage areas) to handle mobility efficiently: periodic global updates initiated from sinks or local updates triggered by mobile sensors. Simulation results show that local updating perform very well in terms of query delivery ratio. Local updating has a better scalability to increasing network size. It is also more energy efficient than ourpreviously proposed approach, where global updating in networks have medium mobility rate and speed

Load shifting of domestic water heaters under double price tariffs: Bringing together money savings and comfort

Demand Side Management (DSM) programs can offer residential electricity consumers opportunities to cut their energy bills. However, if such programs significantly downgrade comfort of consumers, they can choose to opt them out. This impedes the DSM implementation in practice and declines the efficiency of DSM in overall. Finding ways how consumers can reduce their money expenses with least impact to their comfort is thus desirable. This paper focuses on tank electric water heaters (WHs) under double-price tariffs as a case of energy storage devices under simplified variable pricing. We investigate whether or not the WH load shifting can bring money savings while maintaining the user comfort based on the introduced expenses-comfort balancing approach. The proposed approach is based on daynight energy rates and the energy-comfort model suggested earlier. The refined energy model constitutes the first contribution of this paper. As the second contribution, we reformulate the energy-comfort balancing problem into the problem of ’expenses comfort balancing’. By simulating diverse hot water usage we show that the proposed mechanism can enable monetary savings without significant drop of comfort. Specifically, the customers can reach up to 20 percent of daily money savings compared to the regular operation of the heater during weekdays. The reported research can be of interest to utilities that focus on improving consumer uptake of DSM

Parameter reduction for the Yld2004-18p yield criterion

The Yld2004-18p yield criterion uses 18 parameters to define anisotropy for a full 3D stress state. It is demonstrated in this paper that dependencies between the parameters exist and for a given set of experimental data the parameters are not uniquely defined. Analysis of the yield function shows that two specific combinations of parameters do not contribute to the value of the yield function. Therefore, the number of parameters can be reduced to 16, without any loss of flexibility. Similarly, the number of parameters for the plane stress version of this yield criterion reduces from 14 to 12.1111Ysciescopu

Teacher perspectives on the introduction of linguistics in the languages classroom: Evidence from a co-creation project on French, German and Spanish

Linguistics is conspicuously absent from language teaching in UK schools. A-level cultural topics cover a range of themes such as cyber-society, cultural heritage, and multiculturalism, but the approach taken to these topics is not informed by linguistics. In previous work (Sheehan et al. 2021), we have argued that this is an unfortunate omission not only because linguistics is appealing to many language students and perceived by them to be useful, but also because the existing cultural topics could be significantly enriched by the inclusion of the critical/analytical study of language itself (Corr et al. 2019). In this paper, we provide concrete examples of how linguistics can be integrated into the existing A-level curriculum for Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) in England and Wales. Reporting on a project in which teachers trialled linguistics materials co-created by us (a group of academics) and experienced languages teachers, we present evidence that linguistics materials are perceived to be both highly novel but nonetheless compatible with the existing A-level curriculum. Data from questionnaires and semi-structured interviews with participating teachers also shows that: (i) these new materials can be taught with little or no prior experience of linguistics; and (ii) adding linguistics materials to the curriculum leads to significant impacts on teacher and pupil attitudes towards language(s). Despite some challenges, which we also discuss, the results highlight again the great potential of linguistics as a component of language teaching and the contribution that it can make to the enrichment of the discipline