Säännösteltyjen järvien ekologisen tilan arviointi

Vaikka säännösteltyjä järviä on tutkittu kahden viimeisen vuosikymmenen aikana, ovat aikaisemmissa hankkeissa kerätyt biologiset aineistot hajanaisia ja etenkin lievästi säännöstellyissä järvissä riittämättömiä vesipolitiikan puitedirektiivin edellyttämien vertailuolojen määrittelyyn ja ekologisen tilan luokittelu- ja seurantajärjestelmän kehittämiseen. Tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli tuottaa tietoa säännösteltyjen järvien ekologista luokittelua ja ympäristötavoitteiden määrittämistä varten ottaen huomioon samaan aikaan EU-tasolla ja kansallisesti tapahtuva valmistelutyö vesipuitedirektiivin toimeenpanemiseksi. Osahankkeissa hyödynnettiin olemassa olevia biologisia aineistoja säännöstellyiltä järviltä ja niiden vertailuvesistöistä. Uutta aineistoa kerättiin rantavyöhykkeen kalastosta, rantavyöhykkeen pohjaeläimistöstä ja vesikasvillisuudesta. Työssä kehitettiin luokittelumuuttujia vesienhoitoasetuksen mukaista tilan arviointia varten. Varsinaista luokittelumuuttujien valintaa varten laadittiin vaihtoehtoisia tilan arviointimalleja, joiden perusteella järvien tilaluokka määriteltiin. Vedenkorkeuden säännöstelyn vaikutus näkyi sekä vesikasvillisuudessa, pohjaeläimistössä että rantavyöhykkeen kalastossa. Järvien tilaluokka oli laatutekijästä ja elinympäristöstä riippuen huonompi kuin hyvä, kun vedenkorkeuden talvialenema oli yli 2–3 m. Sekä vesikasvillisuudessa, pohjaeläimistössä että kalastossa oli tunnistettavissa useita säännöstelylle herkkiä lajeja. Vesikasveista säännöstelystä näyttävät kärsivät eniten pohjalehtiset, pohjaeläimistä kaksivuotiset hyönteistoukat ja kaloista mutu ja kivisimppu. Rantavyöhykkeen kalaston, pohjaeläimistön ja vesikasvillisuuden luokitukset poikkesivat useassa säännöstelyjärvessä selvästi toisistaan. Järven yleistilaan vaikuttaa tällöin suuresti, määräytyykö tila kaikkien biologisten laatutekijöiden keskimääräisenä tilana (esim. mediaani) vai heikoimmassa tilassa olevan laatutekijän (ns. heikoimman lenkin menetelmä) mukaan

Development of MorphHand: Exploring the design of soft robotics for upper limb prosthetics

Tämä diplomityö kuvailee pehmeän robottikäsiproteesin konseptin, joka on nimetty MorphHand:ksi. Sitä kehitetään, jotta nähtäisiin voisiko morfologisen laskennan ja pehmeän robotiikan ideoita hyödyntää nykyaikaisia yläraajaproteeseja vaivaavien ongelmien ratkaisussa. Diplomityön tavoitteena oli kokeilla voisiko tämän konseptin toteuttaa 3D-tulostamalla käden kumista. Tämä tehtiin valmistamalla useita pehmeitä prototyyppisormia, joissa oli joustavat, samasta rakenteesta tehdyt nivelet. Prototyyppien vastetta testattiin taivutuskokeissa, jotta nähtiin, miten erilaisten morfologisten parametrien muuttaminen vaikuttaisi siihen. Testatut morfologiset parametrit vaikuttivat prototyyppien vasteeseen oletetuilla tavoilla ja tulokset osoittivat, että kuvailtu konsepti voi olla toteutettavissa. Käytettyjä valmistustapoja tulisi kuitenkin kehittää, jotta sormista saataisiin kestävämpiä ja niiden vasteesta parempi.This thesis describes the concept of a soft robotic hand prosthesis, namely MorphHand. It is developed to see, if the ideas of morphological computation and soft robotics could bring answers to some of the current problems in upper limb prosthetics. The goal of the thesis was to explore the possibility of realizing the concept by 3D-printing the hand from rubber. This was done by manufacturing several soft one-piece finger prototypes, with compliant flexure joints. Their response was evaluated in bending tests, to see how changing different morphological parameters would affect their response. The evaluated morphological parameters had the predicted effects on the prototype fingers' response, and the results showed that the proposed concept may be realizable. However, the used production methods should be reconsidered to make the fingers more durable and their response better

Pneumatic Multi-Pocket Elastomer Actuators for Metacarpophalangeal Joint Flexion and Abduction-Adduction

During recent years, interest has been rising towards developing fluidic fiber-reinforced elastomer actuators for wearable soft robotics used in hand rehabilitation and power-assist. However, they do not enable finger abduction-adduction, which plays an important role in activities of daily living, when grasping larger objects. Furthermore, the developed gloves often do not have separate control of joints, which is important for doing various common rehabilitation motions. The main obstacle for the development of a fully-assisting glove is moving a joint with multiple degrees of freedom. If the functions are built into the same structure, they are naturally coupled and affect each other, which makes them more difficult to design and complex to control than a simple flexion-extension actuator. In this study, we explored the key design elements and fabrication of pneumatic multi-pocket elastomer actuators for a soft rehabilitation glove. The goal was to gain more control over the metacarpophalangeal joint’s response by increasing the degree of actuation. Three main functional designs were tested for achieving both flexion and abduction-adduction. Five prototypes, with four different actuator geometries and four different reinforcement types, were designed and fabricated. They were evaluated by recording their free motion with motion capture and measuring their torque output using a dummy finger. Results showed the strengths and weaknesses of each design in separating the control of the two functions. We discuss the different improvements that are needed in order to make each design plausible for developing an actuator that meets the requirements for full assist of the hand’s motions. In conclusion, we show that it is possible to produce multi-pocket actuators for assisting MCP joint motion in both flexion and abduction-adduction, although coupling between the separate functions is still problematic and should be considered further

Film Mood and Its Quantitative Determinants in Different Types of Scenes

Films elicit emotions in viewers by infusing the story they tell with an affective character or tone - in a word, a mood. Considerable effort has been made recently to develop computational methods to estimate affective content in film. However, these efforts have focused almost exclusively on style-based features while neglecting to consider different scene types separately. In this study, we investigated the quantitative determinants of film mood across scenes classified by their setting and use of sounds. We examined whether viewers could assess film mood directly in terms of hedonic tone, energetic arousal, and tense arousal; whether their mood ratings differed by scene type; and how various narrative and stylistic film attributes as well as low- and high-level computational features related to the ratings. We found that the viewers were adept at assessing film mood, that sound-based scene classification brought out differences in the mood ratings, and that the low- and high-level features related to different mood dimensions. The study showed that computational film mood estimation can benefit from scene type classification and the use of both low- and high-level features. We have made our clip assessment and annotation data as well as the extracted computational features publicly available.Peer reviewe

New Layouts of Fiber Reinforcements to Enable Full Finger Motion Assist with Pneumatic Multi-Chamber Elastomer Actuators

Fiber-reinforced fluid-driven elastomer actuators have enabled the production of simple, low-cost and safe hand rehabilitation devices. However, so far, the actuators support only finger flexion-extension, and little has been reported on abduction-adduction, which is essential for manipulation tasks and grasping larger objects. The technical design difficulty of realizing abduction-adduction lies in the suppression of interference effects between the metacarpophalangeal (MCP) joint’s two orthogonal motion axes, caused by the necessary multi-chamber actuator structure and its reinforcements, under strong spatial constraints. This problem has not been solved yet, regardless of research efforts on designing various actuator structures. In this study, our goal was to enable flexion of all three finger joints and abduction-adduction of the MCP joint, while minimizing the interference and realizing required ranges of motion. For this, we propose two new types of fiber reinforcements (separate single loops and two-directional hitching) and their combination to direct a multi-chamber structure’s expansion and strengthen its force output into the wanted directions. The reinforcements’ effects on actuator response were evaluated by attaching prototypes to a dummy finger and measuring its range of motion and related joint torques and forces. Results showed that the single loops provided length extension, while the hitching constrained it from the bottom at the centerline and strengthened flexion. When combined, they could be used to adjust the amount of length extension and flexion along the actuator, without detrimentally affecting the flexion or abduction-adduction functions. In conclusion, the two new reinforcement types have the potential of being a major design factor for fitting the actuators’ response for different users’ finger kinematics

Seasonal epilimnetic temperature patterns and trends in a suite of lakes from Wisconsin (USA), Germany, and Finland

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