Design and performance analysis of a purely textile spiral antenna for on-body NFC applications

Novel combinations of materials and construction techniques are key for the development of new textile antenna configurations for on-body applications. Stretchable, flexible and conformable features of textile antennas are one of the hot research topics nowadays. This work gives a step forward with new designs of purely textile spiral antennas with flexible and robust features for Near Field Communications (NFC) on-body applications. Their performance is successfully validated with a real NFC chipset, and some design and construction considerations are offered for novel textile materials

A combination of transmission line models as design instruments for electromagnetically coupled microstrip patch antennas in the 2.45 GHz ISM band

This communication presents an analytical framework that combines transmission line models for the design of electromagnetically coupled microstrip patch antennas for the 2.45 GHz industrial, scientific, and medical band. It provides initial values for all dimensions of the antenna, with measured resonance frequency errors below 6%. The initial design is optimized in two subsequent phases to center the resonance frequency and to increase the impedance bandwidth (BW), obtaining measured resonance frequency errors below 0.6% and BW enhancements of more than 1.2 times the original ones, respectively. The model has been validated with antenna prototypes based on rigid and textile materials, exhibiting excellent free-space measured BW of 4% and 5.12%, maximal measured gains of 4.28 and 7.33 dBi, and radiation efficiencies of 63.4% and 71.8%, respectively. Moreover, very stable on-body performance is obtained, with minimal frequency detuning when deploying the textile antenna on the human body. The measured maximum on-body gain for the textile antenna equals 5.5 dBi, with a simulated specific absorption rate of 0.323 W/kg at 2.45 GHz

American College of Rheumatology Provisional Criteria for Clinically Relevant Improvement in Children and Adolescents With Childhood-Onset Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

10.1002/acr.23834ARTHRITIS CARE & RESEARCH715579-59

Reliable lab-scale construction process for electromagnetically coupled textile microstrip patch antennas for the 2.45 & x00A0;GHz ISM Band

A precise layer alignment is crucial to ensure performance repeatability of multilayer microstrip antennas. We introduce a novel lab-scale construction process for multilayer microstrip textile patch antennas that consists in combining an alignment method, based on laser-cut wood frames to perform accurate layer alignment, with a fast intralayer attachment method, based on thermally activated adhesive sheets. This lab-scale construction process is validated with an electromagnetically coupled microstrip rectangular patch textile antenna operating in the 2.45 & x00A0;GHz ISM band. It has been reproduced eight times to validate the proposed construction process. The differences between desired simulated versus measured average values of the resonant frequencies, impedance bandwidths, gains, and total efficiencies equal 6.25 & x00A0;MHz, 21.5 & x00A0;MHz, 0.6 & x00A0;dBi, and 4.45 & x0025;, respectively. Moreover, the standard deviations of measured resonant frequencies, impedance bandwidths, gains, and total efficiencies equal 24.54 & x00A0;MHz, 14.02 & x00A0;MHz, 0.15 & x00A0;dBi, and 3.57 & x0025;, respectively. These results confirm that the novel lab-scale construction process provides good performance repeatability of multilayer microstrip textile patch antennas

2 x 2 textile rectenna array with electromagnetically coupled microstrip patch antennas in the 2.4 GHz WiFi band

The development of e-textiles is fostering research in wireless energy transmission. This paper presents a purely textile 2.4 GHz WiFi band 2 x 2 rectenna array for RF energy harvesting. It utilizes the electromagnetically coupled microstrip patch antenna topology and a simple and precise construction method that provides a good performance repeatability to create multilayer microstrip textile patch antennas. The rectifier is implemented with Schottky diodes and it takes the voltage doubling configuration. An average DC power of 1,1 mW was measured for 14 mu W/cm(2) of RF input power density, while the end-to-end average power conversion efficiency (PCE) measured was 31%. The characterization of the end-to-end PCE was evaluated considering the physical size of the prototype to make the comparison with other designs easier. Measurements in a real WiFi scenario were also performed, demonstrating its feasibility for feeding e-textiles

Experimental Frequency Tuning Methodology of a Cantilever Piezoelectric Harvester Validated in a Multimodal Transportation

Piezoelectric energy harvesting is a promising technology that increases the autonomy of low power IoT devices in scenarios that are subjected to mechanical vibrations. This work shows the potential of this technology to power IoT devices with the energy that is harvested from vibrations occurred during air and road transportation. Adjusting the natural resonance frequency of the piezoelectric generator (PEG) to the mechanical acceleration frequency that has the highest power spectral density is key to increase the harvested energy. Therefore, in this work a commercial PEG is tuned to the best spectrogram frequency of a real vibration signal following a two-phase tuning process. The harvested power generated by the PEG has been validated in real scenarios, providing 2.4 μ Wh during flight (take-off, cruise flight, and landing), 11.3 μ Wh during truck transportation in urban areas, and 4.8 μ Wh during intercity transportation. The PEG has been embedded in an ultra-low power IoT device to validate how much this harvested energy can increase the autonomy in a real scenario that is subjected to similar vibrations. An NFC temperature data logger is developed for perishable products that are transported by air and road transports. The energy harvested by the PEG tuned with the methodology proposed in this work has increased the autonomy of the data logger 16.7% during a real use case of 30 h, which validates the potential of the piezoelectric energy harvesting technology to increase the autonomy of future low power IoT devices used in scenarios with aperiodic vibrations

Agronomic Evaluation and Physiological Quality in Triticale, under Two Production Systems in the Laguna Region

Objective: To evaluate ten triticale genotypes to assess the quality of the seeds under two production systems, with cut and without cut, in the municipalities of Matamoros (L1) and Francisco I. Madero (L2), Coahuila, Mexico. Design/Methodology/Approach: The agronomic variables evaluated were: Grain yield (GY), number of seeds per spike (NSS), spike length (SL), number of spikelets per spike (SS) and plant height (PH). Variables in the laboratory were: normal seedlings (NS), abnormal seedlings (AS), seeds without germinating (SWG), dry seedling weight (DW), plumule length (PL) and radicle length (RL). Statistical analysis was performed with the PROC ANOVA procedure, of the SAS software. Results: A higher grain yield was found for Matamoros (L1) compared to Francisco I. Madero (L2); however, for the variable number of seeds per spike it was higher in the latter (L2). For the physiological quality of seeds in L2, the highest values were in the variables normal seedlings and radicle length. In the comparison of production systems, the best response was for the system without cut in both locations; therefore, good quality triticale seed can be produced with acceptable grain yield. Study Limitations/Implications: It is necessary to describe the performance of triticale in the spring-summer agricultural cycle in the central region of the country.Findings/ Conclusions: The productive performance of triticale genotypes was variable depending on the production system, and there was also a different effect on the physiological quality of the harvested seed

Agronomic Evaluation and Physiological Quality in Triticale, under Two Production Systems in the Laguna Region

Objective: to evaluate ten triticale genotypes to evaluate the quality of the seeds, under two production systems with one cut and without cut in the municipalities of Matamoros (L1) and Francisco I. Madero (L2), Coahuila. Design/Methodology/Approach: the agronomic variables evaluated were:,Grain yield (RG), grains per ear (GPE), ear length (LE), spikelets per spike (EE) and plant height (AP). Variables at the laboratory level were: germination percentage (PG), anormal seedlings (PA), seeds without germinate (SSG), dry weight (PS), plumule length (LP) and radicle length (LR). Statistical analysis was performed with the PROC ANOVA procedure, of the SAS software. Results: for L1, a higher grain yield, compared with L2, however, for the variable number of grains per ear it was higher in L2. In the physiological quality of seeds for L2, the highest values they were in the variables germination percentage and radicle length. In the comparison of production systems, the best answer was for the system  without  cut in both locations, therefore, good triticale seed can be produced quality with acceptable grain yield. Study limitations/implications: It is required to describe the behavior of triticale in the spring-summer agricultural cycle in the central region of the country. Findings/Conclusions: The productive behavior of triticale genotypes was variable depending on the production system, likewise different effect on the physiological quality of the harvested seed.Objective: To evaluate ten triticale genotypes to assess the quality of the seeds under two production systems, with cut and without cut, in the municipalities of Matamoros (L1) and Francisco I. Madero (L2), Coahuila,Mexico.Design/Methodology/Approach: The agronomic variables evaluated were: Grain yield (GY), number of seeds per spike (NSS), spike length (SL), number of spikelets per spike (SS) and plant height (PH). Variables in the laboratory were: normal seedlings (NS), abnormal seedlings (AS), seeds without germinating (SWG), dry seedling weight (DW), plumule length (PL) and radicle length (RL). Statistical analysis was performed with the PROC ANOVA procedure, of the SAS software.Results: A higher grain yield was found for Matamoros (L1) compared to Francisco I. Madero (L2); however,for the variable number of seeds per spike it was higher in the latter (L2). For the physiological quality of seeds in L2, the highest values were in the variables normal seedlings and radicle length. In the comparison of production systems, the best response was for the system without cut in both locations; therefore, good quality triticale seed can be produced with acceptable grain yield.Study Limitations/Implications: It is necessary to describe the performance of triticale in the springsummer agricultural cycle in the central region of the country.Findings/Conclusions: The productive performance of triticale genotypes was variable depending on the production system, and there was also a different effect on the physiological quality of the harvested see

American college of rheumatology provisional criteria for clinically relevant improvement in children and adolescents with childhood-onset systemic Lupus erythematosus

To develop a Childhood Lupus Improvement Index (CHILI) as a tool to measure response to therapy in childhood-onset systemic lupus erythematosus (cSLE), with a focus on clinically relevant improvement (CRIcSLE). Methods Pediatric nephrology and rheumatology subspecialists (n = 213) experienced in cSLE management were invited to define CRIcSLE and rate a total of 433 unique patient profiles for the presence/absence of CRIcSLE. Patient profiles included the following cSLE core response variables (CRVs): global assessment of patient well-being (patient-global), physician assessment of cSLE activity (MD-global), disease activity index score (here, we used the Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Disease Activity Index), urine protein-to-creatinine ratio, and Child Health Questionnaire physical summary score. Percentage and absolute changes in these cSLE-CRVs (baseline versus follow-up) were considered in order to develop candidate algorithms and validate their performance (sensitivity, specificity, area under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUC]; range 0-1). Results During an international consensus conference, unanimous agreement on a definition of CRIcSLE was achieved; cSLE experts (n = 13) concurred (100%) that the preferred CHILI algorithm considers absolute changes in the cSLE-CRVs. After transformation to a range of 0-100, a CHILI score of >= 54 had outstanding accuracy for identifying CRIcSLE (AUC 0.93, sensitivity 81.1%, and specificity 84.2%). CHILI scores also reflect minor, moderate, and major improvement for values exceeding 15, 68, and 92, respectively (all AUC >= 0.92, sensitivity >= 93.1%, and specificity >= 73.4%). Conclusion The CHILI is a new, seemingly highly accurate index for measuring CRI in cSLE over time. This index is useful to categorize the degree of response to therapy in children and adolescents with cSLE.715579590CNPQ - Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e TecnológicoFAPESP – Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa Do Estado De São Paulo303422/2015-7; 7/2016-9; 304255/2015-7215/03756-