Utility based cross-layer collaboration for speech enhancement in wireless acoustic sensor networks

A wireless acoustic sensor network is considered that is used to estimate a desired speech signal that has been corrupted by noise. The application layer of the WASN derives an optimal filter in a linear MMSE sense. A utility function is then used in conjunction with the MMSE estimate in order to evaluate the most significant signal components from each node in the system. The utility values are used as a cross-layer link between the application layer and the network layer so the nodes transmit the signal components that are deemed most relevant to the estimate while adhering to the power constraints of the system. The simulation results show that a high signal-to-error and signal-to-noise ratio is still achievable while transmitting a subset of signal components

Physical and optical aerosol properties at the Dutch North Sea coast based on AERONET observations

International audienceSun photometer measurements at the AERONET station at the North Sea coast in The Hague (The Netherlands) provide a climatology of optical and physical aerosol properties for the area. Results are presented from the period January 2002 to July 2003. For the analysis and interpretation these data are coupled to chemical aerosol data from a nearby station of the Dutch National Air Quality Network. This network provides PM10 and black carbon concentrations. Meteorological conditions and air mass trajectories are also used. Due to the location close to the coast, the results are strongly dependent on wind direction, i.e. air mass trajectory. In general the aerosol optical properties are governed by industrial aerosol emitted form various industrial, agricultural and urban areas surrounding the site in almost all directions over land. For maritime air masses industrial aerosols are transported from over the North Sea, whereas very clean air is transported from the NW in clean polar air masses from the North Atlantic. In the winter the effect of the production of sea salt aerosol at high wind speeds is visible in the optical and physical aerosol data. In these cases fine and coarse mode radii are similar to those reported in the literature for marine aerosol. Relations are derived between the Ångström coefficients with both the fine/coarse mode fraction and the ratio of black carbon and PM10

Physical and optical aerosol properties at the Dutch North Sea coast

International audienceSun photometer measurements at the AERONET station at the North Sea coast in The Hague (The Netherlands) provide a climatology of optical and physical aerosol properties for the area. Results are presented from the period January 2002 to July 2003. For the analysis and interpretation these data are coupled to chemical aerosol data from a nearby station of the Dutch National Air Quality Network. This network provides PM10 and black carbon concentrations. Meteorological conditions and air mass trajectories are also used. Due to the location close to the coast, the results are strongly dependent on wind direction, i.e.~air mass trajectory. In general the aerosol optical properties are governed by industrial aerosol emitted form various industrial, agricultural and urban areas surrounding the site in almost all directions over land. For maritime air masses industrial aerosols are transported from over the North Sea, whereas very clean air is transported from the NW in clean polar air masses from the North Atlantic. In the winter the effect of the production of sea salt aerosol at high wind speeds is visible in the optical and physical aerosol data. In these cases fine and coarse mode radii are similar to those reported in the literature for marine aerosol. Relations are derived between the Ångström coefficients with both the fine/coarse mode fraction and the ratio of black carbon and PM10

Detection of Noble Gas Scintillation Light with Large Area Avalanche Photodiodes (LAAPDs)

Large Area Avalanche Photodiodes (LAAPDs) were used for a series of systematic measurements of the scintillation light in Ar, Kr, and Xe gas. Absolute quantum efficiencies are derived. Values for Xe and Kr are consistent with those given by the manufacturer. For the first time we show that argon scintillation (128 nm) can be detected at a quantum efficiency above 40%. Low-pressure argon gas is shown to emit significant amounts of non-UV radiation. The average energy expenditure for the creation of non-UV photons in argon gas at this pressure is measured to be below 378 eV.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figure

Control of Tension-Compression Asymmetry in Ogden Hyperelasticity with Application to Soft Tissue Modelling

This paper discusses tension-compression asymmetry properties of Ogden hyperelastic formulations. It is shown that if all negative or all positive Ogden coefficients are used, tension-compression asymmetry occurs the degree of which cannot be separately controlled from the degree of non-linearity. A simple hybrid form is therefore proposed providing separate control over the tension-compression asymmetry. It is demonstrated how this form relates to a newly introduced generalised strain tensor class which encompasses both the tension-compression asymmetric Seth-Hill strain class and the tension-compression symmetric Ba\v{z}ant strain class. If the control parameter is set to q=0.5 a tension-compression symmetric form involving Ba\v{z}ant strains is obtained with the property {\Psi}({\lambda}_1,{\lambda}_2,{\lambda}_3 )={\Psi}(1/{\lambda}_1 ,1/{\lambda}_2 ,1/{\lambda}_3 ). The symmetric form may be desirable for the definition of ground matrix contributions in soft tissue modelling allowing all deviation from the symmetry to stem solely from fibrous reinforcement. Such an application is also presented demonstrating the use of the proposed formulation in the modelling of the non-linear elastic and transversely isotropic behaviour of skeletal muscle tissue in compression (the model implementation and fitting procedure have been made freely available). The presented hyperelastic formulations may aid researchers in independently controlling the degree of tension-compression asymmetry from the degree of non-linearity, and in the case of anisotropic materials may assist in determining the role played by, either the ground matrix, or the fibrous reinforcing structures, in generating asymmetry.Comment: 20 page

Learning nominal automata

We present an Angluin-style algorithm to learn nominal automata, which are acceptors of languages over infinite (structured) alphabets. The abstract approach we take allows us to seamlessly extend known variations of the algorithm to this new setting. In particular we can learn a subclass of nominal non-deterministic automata. An implementation using a recently developed Haskell library for nominal computation is provided for preliminary experiments