Communication and Powering Scheme for Wireless and Battery-Less Measurement

The paper presents solution for wireless and battery-less measurement in the enclosed areas. The principle is based on passive RFID, nevertheless this paper is focused on high power-demanding applications such as MEMS accelerometers, gas sensors, piezoresistive strain gauges, etc. Standard FRID communication scheme (sensing the input current change on the primary side) cannot be used in this case, because the communication channel is overloaded by the high power load. Paper presents possible solution which is based on the dual frequency scheme – one frequency for powering and other for the communication. This is ensuring capability for measurement up to several centimeters on the frequency bands 125 kHz and 375 kHz. It can be suitable for continual measurement in isolated systems such as the rotating objects, concrete walls, enclosed plastic barrels, high temperature chambers etc

3D Energy Harvester Evaluation

This paper discusses the characterization and evaluation of an MEMS based electrostatic generator, a part of the power supply unit of the self-powered microsystem[1,2,3]. The designed generator is based on electrostatic converter and uses the principle of conversion of non-electric energy into electrical energy by periodical modification of gap between electrodes of a capacitor [4]. The structure is designed and modeled as three-dimensional silicon based MEMS. Innovative approach involving the achievement of very low resonant frequency of the structure (about 100Hz) by usage of modified long cantilever spring design, minimum area of the chip, 3D work mode, the ability to be tuned to reach desired parameters, proves promising directions of possible further development

Zen Communication - A Cross Cultural Approach to Mindfulness, Appropriate Response, and Flow in Dyadic Interactions

This study examined the question of how the qualities that arise from the practice of traditionally East Asian disciplines such as Zen and related martial arts might be effectively applied to dyadic interactions. Long-form interviews of about 40 minutes each were conducted with academics who have studied these topics and with expert practitioners who have extensive direct experience. Most subjects had significant cross-cultural experience, having studied and/or practiced in both the U.S. and in Japan. Detailed analysis of transcripts of these recorded interviews indicated that, in particular, the seated Zen meditation practice known as zazen generates personally transformational qualities that immediately and significantly enhance dyadic interactions. A discourse on cross-cultural issues and implications, explanation of key Zen concepts and principles, and examination of the effects of more extensive Zen practice are included

The Vindication of Good Over Evil: “Futile” Self-Defense

The burgeoning self-defense literature, like that in most areas of moral and legal philosophy, typically begins with and seeks to rationalize our intuitions. I submit that the intuitive judgment of virtually all respondents, at least initially, is that IV is permitted to exercise her right of self-defense, however futile, and scratch WA. This intuition, I believe, is incredibly powerful and robust; I certainly have it myself. Yet quite a few philosophers and legal theorists contend IV is not permitted to employ futile self-defense against WA. Presumably, they believe IV must passively accept her fate without injuring WA. Why hold this counterintuitive judgment? Two possible answers are available. First, contrary to my generalization about what most respondents are likely to believe initially, these philosophers may not share my intuition that IV is permitted to injure WA when resistance is futile. Second, these philosophers might share this intuition initially, but ultimately reject it on theoretical grounds. I find it hard to believe the first answer explains why many philosophers contend that IV’s act is impermissible. Virtually all respondents, as I have said, begin with the initial intuition that IV is permitted to scratch WA, although it is hard to know how to respond to those philosophers who disagree. In what follows, I focus on the second answer, which I regard as more common and plausible. Philosophers who eventually reject their intuition and come around to holding that IV is not permitted to injure WA do so because they are unable to bring their initial judgment into reflective equilibrium with other particular judgments and general principles they hold about self-defense. Of course, nothing is methodologically suspect about a procedure by which initial intuitions are rejected because they fail to withstand the test of reflective equilibrium. Unless some such initial intuitions were eventually rejected on this ground, we could simply rely on them without the need to subject them to reflective equilibrium in the first place. Nonetheless, I will try to defend the initial intuition that IV is permitted to employ futile self-defense against WA. I will endeavor to show that our intuition about this case does not really contradict some of the other particular judgments and general principles about self-defense we should hold. This effort, however, is necessarily incomplete. I make no systematic effort to show that this intuition is compatible with the judgments we are likely to make about every case in which self-defense is permissibly exercised

Design and Fabrication of 3D Electrostatic Energy Harvester

This paper discusses the design of an electrostatic generator, power supply component of the self-powered microsystem, which is able to provide enough energy to power smart sensor chains or if necessary also other electronic monitoring devices. One of the requirements for this analyzer is the mobility, so designing the power supply expects use of an alternative way of getting electricity to power the device, rather than rely on periodic supply of external energy in the form of charging batteries, etc. In this case the most suitable method to use is so-called energy harvesting – a way how to gather energy. This uses the principle of non-electric conversion of energy into electrical energy in the form of converters. The present study describes the topology design of such structures of electrostatic generator. Structure is designed and modeled as a three-dimensional silicon based MEMS. Innovative approach involving the achievement of very low resonant frequency of the structure, while the minimum area of the chip, the ability to work in all 3 axes of coordinate system and ability to be tuned to reach desired parameters proves promising directions of possible further development of this issue. The work includes simulation of electro-mechanical and electrical properties of the structure, description of its behavior in different operating modes and phases of activity. Simulation results were compared with measured values of the produced prototype chip. These results can suggest possible modifications to the proposed structure for further optimization and application environment adaptation

Chemical structure of non-apatitic environment of the nanocrystals trabecular bone

Non-stoichiometric apatite crystals are the mineral fraction of bones. The apatite surface plays a crucial role in biological bone behavior. The bioapatite crystals have a multilayer hydrate shell, which contains impurity ions such as magnesium, sodium, potassium. Nowadays the qualitative and quantitative characteristic of non-apatitic environment of the nanocrystals is not clear yet. Water is the major component of non-apatitic environment in bones. That is why, we studied the surface of nanocrystals from trabecular bone in healthy rats under the water deficiency

Compositional Multi-objective Parameter Tuning

Multi-objective decision-making is critical for everyday tasks and engineering problems. Finding the perfect trade-off to maximize all the solution's criteria requires a considerable amount of experience or the availability of a significant number of resources. This makes these decisions difficult to achieve for expensive problems such as engineering. Most of the time, to solve such expensive problems, we are limited by time, resources, and available expertise. Therefore, it is desirable to simplify or approximate the problem when possible before solving it. The state-of-the-art approach for simplification is model-based or surrogate-based optimization. These approaches use approximation models of the real problem, which are cheaper to evaluate. These models, in essence, are simplified hypotheses of cause-effect relationships, and they replace high estimates with cheap approximations. In this thesis, we investigate surrogate models as wrappers for the real problem and apply \gls{moea} to find Pareto optimal decisions. The core idea of surrogate models is the combination and stacking of several models that each describe an independent objective. When combined, these independent models describe the multi-objective space and optimize this space as a single surrogate hypothesis - the surrogate compositional model. The combination of multiple models gives the potential to approximate more complicated problems and stacking of valid surrogate hypotheses speeds-up convergence. Consequently, a better result is obtained at lower costs. We combine several possible surrogate variants and use those that pass validation. After recombination of valid single objective surrogates to a multi-objective surrogate hypothesis, several instances of \gls{moea}s provide several Pareto front approximations. The modular structure of implementation allows us to avoid a static sampling plan and use self-adaptable models in a customizable portfolio. In numerous case studies, our methodology finds comparable solutions to standard NSGA2 using considerably fewer evaluations. We recommend the present approach for parameter tuning of expensive black-box functions.:1 Introduction 1.1 Motivation 1.2 Objectives 1.3 Research questions 1.4 Results overview 2 Background 2.1 Parameter tuning 2.2 Multi-objective optimization 2.2.1 Metrics for multi-objective solution 2.2.2 Solving methods 2.3 Surrogate optimization 2.3.1 Domain-specific problem 2.3.2 Initial sampling set 2.4 Discussion 3 Related Work 3.1 Comparison criteria 3.2 Platforms and frameworks 3.3 Model-based multi-objective algorithms 3.4 Scope of work 4 Compositional Surrogate 4.1 Combinations of surrogate models 4.1.1 Compositional Surrogate Model [RQ1] 4.1.2 Surrogate model portfolio [RQ2] 4.2 Sampling plan [RQ3] 4.2.1 Surrogate Validation 4.3 Discussion 5 Implementation 5.1 Compositional surrogate 5.2 Optimization orchestrator 6 Evaluation 6.1 Experimental setup 6.1.1 Optimization problems 6.1.2 Optimization search 6.1.3 Surrogate portfolio 6.1.4 Benchmark baseline 6.2 Benchmark 1: Portfolio with compositional surrogates. Dynamic sampling plan 6.3 Benchmark 2: Inner parameters 6.3.1 TutorM parameters 6.3.2 Sampling plan size 6.4 Benchmark 3: Scalability of surrogate models 6.5 Discussion of results 7 Conclusion 8 Future Work A Appendix A.1 Benchmark results on ZDT DTLZ, WFG problem