Extended QDSEGA for Controlling Real Robot : Acquisition of Locomotion Patterns for Snake : like Robot

Reinforcement learning is very effective for robot learning. It is because it does not need prior knowledge and has higher capability of reactive and adaptive behaviors. In our previous works, we proposed new reinforce learning algorithm: &quot;Q-learning with dynamic structuring of exploration space based on genetic algorithm (QDSEGA)&quot;. It is designed for complicated systems with large action-state space like a robot with many redundant degrees of freedom. However the application of QDSEGA is restricted to static systems. A snake-like robot has many redundant degrees of freedom and the dynamics of the system are very important to complete the locomotion task. So application of usual reinforcement learning is very difficult. In this paper, we extend layered structure of QDSEGA so that it becomes possible to apply it to real robots that have complexities and dynamics. We apply it to acquisition of locomotion pattern of the snake-like robot and demonstrate the effectiveness and the validity of QDSEGA with the extended layered structure by simulation and experiment. </p

Picosecond electrical spectroscopy using monolithic GaAs circuits

This article describes an experimental apparatus for free-space mm-wave transmission measurements (spectroscopy). GaAs nonlinear transmission lines and sampling circuits are used as picosecond pulse generators and detectors, with planar monolithic bowtie antennas with associated substrate lenses used as the radiating and receiving elements. The received pulse is 270 mV amplitude and 2.4 ps rise time. Through Fourier transformation of the received pulse, 30–250 GHz measurements are demonstrated with <=0.3 dB (rms) accuracy

ニホンゴ キョウシ ヨウセイ カテイ ガクセイ ノ パーソナリティ トクセイ ト ソノ ケイセイ ヨウイン : ジコ ヒョウカ ショクギョウ イシキ ガ オヨボス エイキョウ ノ ケントウ ヨリ

本研究の目的は、日本語教師養成課程の学生が捉える自身のパーソナリティを明らかにし、その形成要因を社会的・心理的側面から検討し、学生の資質向上の支援を目指す養成教育に関する示唆を得ることにある。日本語教師の資質については「人間性」が重視されているものの、パーソナリティに関する実証的研究は日本語教育においてあまり行なわれていない。パーソナリティは職業との適合関係によって説明され、これまで職業心理学の分野でさまざまな集団のパーソナリティ傾向が明らかになっている。以上の目的を果たすため、質問紙調査を実施した。被調査者は、一般の日本語教師養成講座受講生と日本語教育を専攻する大学生・院生の223名である。質問項目は、先行研究を参考にパーソナリティに関してはSD法による17の形容詞対、形成要因に関しては外国語能力、海外在住経験、教授経験、理想の教師像、被教育体験、日本語教師の基本的資質・能力、日本語教師に対する適性感・志望度で構成された.回答を統計的に分析した結果、学生は自身を、意欲的で責任感も強く、公平でまじめで親切ではあるが、特に明るくはないと捉えていること、外国語学習経験、 異文化体験、子どもの頃のリーダーシップ的役割や勉強・学校に対する肯定感、日本語教師の基本的資質・能力に関する自己評価の高さ、日本語教師に対する志向の強さは、パーソナリティ形成に影響を及ぼしていることを明らかにした。本考察より、養成教育において行なわれる第二言語習得理論学習や異文化トレーニングは、学生の資質向上の機会として寄与する可能性が示された。以上のことから養成教育では 「社会・文化」「教育」「言語」に関わる領域が等価に位置づけられ、学生自身が自己と向き合い、能動性・自律性を見出していける内容の展開が必要であると考える。養成教育に関わる教師は、学生が自身に足りない部分があることに気付き、さまざまな要因との相互作用の中で自己意識を変化させていけるような場を与えていかなければならないであろう。This study aims to investigate how the students of a Japanese language teacher training course rate their own personality and to examine the social and psychological factors that may have influenced them, in order to consider how educators should support these students in developing their competence as Japanese language teachers. In Japanese language teaching, “humanity” has often been regarded as important. However, there are very few empirical studies on the personalities. It has been shown that a person\u27s personality is related to a person\u27s career. The following questionnaire was employed to collect data. The first part of this quest adopted the SD methodology consisting of 17 adjective pairs to measure the personalities of the students. Furthermore, items concerning their English/ foreign language proficiency, their experience living abroad, their ideal teacher, their childhood and school life, and their basic attitude were prepared along with items evaluating their ability in terms of teaching Japanese and their aptitude and aspirations to become a teacher. The participants were 223 students attending a teacher training course. The results of the statistical analyses on the collated data indicated that these students recognize that they are well motivated and responsible, fair, earnest, kind, but not too particularly cheerful. Moreover, it was revealed that several factors had influenced the formation of their personalities, for instance, learning a foreign language, any intercultural experiences, any leadership experiences, affirmation of their desire to study and attend school, high evaluations of their basic attitude and abilities, and a strong desire to become a Japanese language teacher. The results suggested that if these training programs are to have more opportunities to offer SLA theory and intercultural training, it might be possible to help these students improve their competence. In conclusion, I should note that thee educators must support students to increase their personal self-awareness

Inattainability of Carnot efficiency in the Brownian heat engine

We discuss the reversibility of Brownian heat engine. We perform asymptotic analysis of Kramers equation on B\"uttiker-Landauer system and show quantitatively that Carnot efficiency is inattainable even in a fully overdamping limit. The inattainability is attributed to the inevitable irreversible heat flow over the temperature boundary.Comment: 5 pages, to appear in Phys. Rev.

The OmniTread OT-4 serpentine robot—design and performance

Serpentine robots are slender, multi-segmented vehicles designed to provide greater mobility than conventional mobile robots. Serpentine robots are ideally suited for urban search and rescue, military intelligence gathering, and inspection tasks in hazardous or inaccessible environments. One such serpentine robot, developed at the University of Michigan, is the “OmniTread OT-4.” The OT-4 comprises seven segments, which are linked to each other by six joints. The OT-4 can climb over obstacles that are much higher than the robot itself, propel itself inside pipes of different diameters, and traverse difficult terrain, such as rocks or the rubble of a collapsed structure. The foremost and unique design characteristic of the OT-4 is the use of pneumatic bellows to actuate the joints. The pneumatic bellows allow the simultaneous control of position and stiffness for each joint. Controllable stiffness is important in serpentine robots, which require stiff joints to cross gaps and compliant joints to conform to rough terrain for effective propulsion. Another unique feature of the OmniTread design is the coverage of all four sides of each segment with drive tracks. This design makes the robot indifferent to rollovers, which are bound to happen when the slender bodies of serpentine robots travel over rugged terrain. This paper describes the OmniTread concept and some of its technical features in some detail. In the Experiment Results Section, photographs of successful obstacle traverses illustrate the abilities of the OT-4. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/56171/1/20196_ftp.pd

Energetics of Forced Thermal Ratchet

Molecular motors are known to have the high efficiency of energy transformation in the presence of thermal fluctuation. Motivated by the surprising fact, recent studies of thermal ratchet models are showing how and when work should be extracted from non-equilibrium fluctuations. One of the important finding was brought by Magnasco where he studied the temperature dependence on the fluctuation-induced current in a ratchet (multistable) system and showed that the current can generically be maximized in a finite temperature. The interesting finding has been interpreted that thermal fluctuation is not harmful for the fluctuation-induced work and even facilitates its efficiency. We show, however, this interpretation turns out to be incorrect as soon as we go into the realm of the energetics [Sekimoto,J.Phys.Soc.Jpn.66,1234-1237(1997)]: the efficiency of energy transformation is not maximized at finite temperature, even in the same system that Magnasco considered. The maximum efficiency is realized in the absence of thermal fluctuation. The result presents an open problem whether thermal fluctuation could facilitate the efficiency of energetic transformation from force-fluctuation into work.Comment: 3pages, 4sets of figure

Brownian motors: Joint effect of non-Gaussian noise and time asymmetric forcing

Previous works have shown that time asymmetric forcing on the one hand, as well as non-Gaussian noises on the other, can separately enhance the efficiency and current of a Brownian motor. Here, we study the result of subjecting a Brownian motor to both effects simultaneously. Our results have been compared with those obtained for the Gaussian white noise regime in the adiabatic limit. We find that, although the inclusion of the time asymmetry parameter increases the efficiency value up to a certain extent, for the present case this increase is much less appreciable than in the white noise case. We also present a comparative study of the transport coherence in the context of colored noise. Though the efficiency in some cases becomes higher for the non-Gaussian case, the P\'eclet number is always higher in the Gaussian colored noise case than in the white noise as well as non-Gaussian colored noise cases.Comment: 18 page

Carbon-Dot-Sensitized, Nitrogen-Doped TiO2in Mesoporous Silica for Water Decontamination through Nonhydrophobic Enrichment-Degradation Mode

Mesoporous silica synthesized from the co-condensation of tetraethoxysilane and silylated carbon dot containing amide group has been adopted as the carrier for the in-situ growth of TiO2 through an impregnation-hydrothermal crystallization process. Benefitted from the initial complexing between the titania precursor and carbon dot, highly dispersed anatase TiO2 nanoparticles can be formed inside the mesoporous channel. The hybrid material possesses ordered hexagonal mesostructure with a p6mm symmetry, high specific surface area (446.27 m2g-1), large pore volume (0.57 cm3g-1), uniform pore size (5.11 nm) and a wide absorption band between 300-550 nm. TiO2 nanocrystals are anchored to carbon dot through bonds of Ti-O-N and Ti-O-C as revealed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Moreover, the nitrogen doping of TiO2 is also verified by the formation of Ti-N bond. This composite shows excellent adsorption capability to organic 2, 4-dichlorophenol and acid orange 7 with electron-deficient aromatic ring through the electron donor-acceptor interaction between carbon dot and organics instead of hydrophobic effect as analyzed by the contact angle analysis, which can be photocatalytically recycled through visible light irradiation after the adsorption. The narrowed bandgap by nitrogen doping and the photosensitization effect of carbon dot are revealed to be co-responsible for the visible-light activity of TiO2. The adsorption capacity does not suffer obvious loss after being recycled 3 times