A high dynamic Micro Strips Ionization Chamber featuring Embedded Multi DSP Processing

An X-ray detector will be presented that is the combination of a segmented ionization chamber featuring one-dimensional spatial resolution integrated with an intelligent ADC front-end, multi DSP processing and embedded PC platform. This detector is optimized to fan beam geometry with an active area of 192 mm (horizontal) and a vertical acceptance of 6 mm. Spatial resolution is obtained by subdividing the anode into readout strips, having pitch of 150 micrometers, which are connected to 20 custom made integrating VLSI chips (each capable of 64-channel read-out and multiplexing) and read out by 14 bits 10 MHz ADCs and fast adaptive PGAs into DSP boards. A bandwidth reaching 3.2Gbit/s of raw data, generated from the real time sampling of the 1280 micro strips, is cascaded processed with FPGA and DSP to allow data compression resulting in several days of uninterrupted acquisition capability. Fast acquisition rates reaching 10 kHz are allowed due to the MicroCAT structure utilized not only as a shielding grid in ionization chamber mode but also to provide active electron amplification in the gas.Comment: 5 pages, 7 figures, distilled by AFPL Ghostscript 7.0

Imaging with high Dynamic using an Ionization Chamber

In this work a combination of an ionization chamber with one-dimensional spatial resolution and a MicroCAT structure will be presented. The combination between gas gain operations and integrating front-end electronics yields a dynamic range as high as eight to nine orders of magnitude. Therefore this device is well suitable for medical imaging or applications such as small angle x-ray scattering, where the requirements on the dynamic of the detector are exceptional high. Basically the described detector is an ionization chamber adapted to fan beam geometry with an active area of 192 cm and a pitch of the anode strips of 150 micrometer. In the vertical direction beams as high as 10 mm can be accepted. Every read-out strip is connected to an analogue integrating electronics channel realized in a custom made VLSI chip. A MicroCAT structure utilized as a shielding grid enables frame rates as high as 10kHz. The high dynamic range observed stems from the fact that the MicroCAT enables active electron amplification in the gas. Thus a single photon resolution can be obtained for low photon fluxes even with the integrating electronics. The specialty of this device is that for each photon flux the gas amplification can be adjusted in such a fashion that the maximum DQE value is achieved.Comment: 7 pages, 12 figures, distilled by OpenOffice.org 3.

Use of object recognition ai in community and heritage mapping for the drafting of sustainable development strategies suitable for individual communities, with case studies in China, Albania and Italy.

In order to plan effective strategies for the sustainable development of individual communities, as prescribed by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 11, it is necessary for designers and policy makers to gain a deep awareness of the bond that connects people to their territory. AI-driven technologies, and specifically Object Recognition algorithms, are powerful tools that can be used to this end, as they make it possible to analyse huge amounts of pictures shared on social media by residents and visitors of a specific area. A model of the emotional, subjective point of view of the members of the community is thus generated, giving new insights that can support traditional techniques such as surveys and interviews. For the purposes of this research, three case studies have been considered: the neighbourhood around Siping Road in Shanghai, China; the village of Moscopole in southeastern Albania; the rural area of Oltrepò Pavese in northern Italy. The results demonstrate that a conscious use of AI-driven technologies does not necessarily imply homogenisation and flattening of individual differences: on the contrary, in all three cases diversities tend to emerge, making it possible to recognise and enhance the individuality of each community and the genius loci of each place

Fast Fourier transform-volume integral : a smart approach for the electromagnetic design of complex systems in large fusion devices

A volume integral (VI) equation method based on the fast Fourier transform (FFT) is proposed for the electromagnetic simulation of complex systems in large magnetic confinement fusion (MCF) devices. Such FFT-VI allows for dramatically reducing the time and the human effort required to adapt the CAD input files to models suited for electromagnetic simulations. Moreover, with FFT-VI the mesh generation is performed automatically and is very efficient and robust. The adoption of the FFT allows for significantly reducing the computation time and the memory requirements, therefore making simulations with several millions of unknowns feasible. Numerical results show that, in terms of numerical performances, the FFT-VI method applied to challenging electromagnetic problems in representative MCF devices is markedly superior with respect to the state of the art VI techniques. A sample implementation of FFT-VI is made publicly available

Barley starch

This thesis examined barley amylopectin structure and looked for correlations between the structure and physical properties of starch. The structure of amylopectin and gelatinisation and retrogradation of starch were studied in 10 different barley cultivars/breeding lines with differing genetic background. Amylopectin is built up of thousands of chains of glucose monomers, organised into clusters. The detailed fine structure of amylopectin was studied by isolating clusters of amylopectin and their building blocks, which are the tightly branched units building up the clusters. Barley cultivars/breeding lines possessing the amo1 mutation had fewer long chains of DP≥38 in amylopectin and more large building blocks. The structure of building blocks was rather conserved between the different barley cultivars/breeding lines studied and was categorized into different size groups. These different building blocks were shown to be randomly distributed in the amylopectin molecule. The C-chains in amylopectin can be of any length and are a category of chains different from the B-chains. The backbone in amylopectin consists of a special type of B-chains which, when cleaved by α-amylase, become chains of a similar type to C-chains. Gelatinisation and retrogradation (recrystallisation of gelatinised starch) of barley starch was studied by differential scanning calorimetry. The amo1 mutation resulted in a broader gelatinisation temperature range and a higher enthalpy of retrogradation. Other structural features were also found to influence the physical properties of starch. Small clusters and denser structure of the building blocks resulted in higher gelatinisation temperature. Fast retrogradation was observed in barley which had amylopectin with shorter chains and many large building blocks consisting of many chains. Amylopectin structure was also studied in developing barley kernels. Three barley cultivars/breeding lines were grown in a phytotron and kernels were harvested at 9, 12 and 24 days after flowering. The results showed that amylopectin synthesized at later stages of development had a more tightly branched structure. Expression of the enzymes involved in starch biosynthesis is also known to change during endosperm development

Dependence on plasma shape and plasma fueling for small edge-localized mode regimes in TCV and ASDEX Upgrade

\u3cp\u3eWithin the EUROfusion MST1 work package, a series of experiments has been conducted on AUG and TCV devices to disentangle the role of plasma fueling and plasma shape for the onset of small ELM regimes. On both devices, small ELM regimes with high confinement are achieved if and only if two conditions are fulfilled at the same time. Firstly, the plasma density at the separatrix must be large enough (n\u3csub\u3ee,sep\u3c/sub\u3e/n\u3csub\u3eG\u3c/sub\u3e ∼ 0.3), leading to a pressure profile flattening at the separatrix, which stabilizes type-I ELMs. Secondly, the magnetic configuration has to be close to a double null (DN), leading to a reduction of the magnetic shear in the extreme vicinity of the separatrix. As a consequence, its stabilizing effect on ballooning modes is weakened.\u3c/p\u3