A Real-Time Software Defined Networking Framework for Next-Generation Industrial Networks

Industry 4.0 brings in a whole set of new requirements to engineering industrial systems, with notorious impact at the networking layer. A key challenge posed by Industry 4.0 is the operational flexibility needed to support on-the-fly reconfiguration of production cells, stations, and machines. At the networking layer, this flexibility implies dynamic packet handling, scheduling, and dispatching. SoftwareDefined Networking (SDN) provides this level of flexibility in the general Local Area Network (LAN) domain. However, its application in the industry has been hindered by a lack of support for real-time services. This paper addresses this limitation, proposing an extended SDN OpenFlow framework that includes realtime services, leveraging existing real-time data plane Ethernet technologies. We show the OpenFlow enhancements, a real-time SDN controller, and experimental validation and performance assessment. Using a proof-of-concept prototype with 3 switches and cycles of 250µs, we could achieve 1µs jitter on timetriggered traffic and a reconfiguration time between operational modes below 10msinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Support for Technical Phases and Conceptual Model

Worldwide, many wheelchair users find it difficult to use or acquire a wheelchair that is appropriate for them, either because they do not have the necessary financial support or because they do not have access to trained healthcare professionals (HCPs), but they are essential for the correct provision of assistive products and user training. Consequently, although wheelchairs are designed to promote the well-being of many users, in many cases, they end up being abandoned or do not provide any benefit, with the chance of causing harm and potentially putting people in danger. This article proposes the creation and use of a Digital Twin (DT) of a Power Wheelchair (PWC) to promote the health of wheelchair users, by facilitating and improving the delivery of remote services by HCPs, as well as to include monitoring services to support timely maintenance. Specifically, a DT is a virtual counterpart that is seamlessly linked to a physical asset, both relying on data and information exchange for mirroring each other. Currently, DT is emerging and being applied to different areas as a promising approach to gather insightful data, which are shared between the physical and virtual worlds and facilitate the means to design, monitor, analyze, optimize, predict, and control physical entities. This article gives an overview of the Digital Twin concept, namely its definition, types, and properties, and seeks to synthesize the technologies and tools frequently used to enable Digital Twins; we also explain how a DT can be used in the technical phases of the PWC provision process and propose a conceptual model highlighting the use of an MDD approach benefiting from a Petri net formalism, which is presented to systematize the development of a PWC Dpublishersversionpublishe

Comparing Admission Control Architectures for Real-Time Ethernet

Industry 4.0 and Autonomous Driving are emerging resource-intensive distributed application domains that deal with open and evolving environments. These systems are subject to stringent resource, timing, and other non-functional constraints, as well as frequent reconfiguration. Thus, real-time behavior must not preclude operational flexibility. This combination is motivating ongoing efforts within the Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) standardization committee to define admission control mechanisms for Ethernet. Existing mechanisms in TSN, like those of AVB, its predecessor, follow a distributed architecture that favors scalability. Conversely, the new mechanisms envisaged for TSN (IEEE 802.1Qcc) follow a (partially) centralized architecture, favoring short reconfiguration latency. This paper shows the first quantitative comparison between distributed and centralized admission control architectures concerning reconfiguration latency. Here, we compare AVB against a dynamic real-time reconfigurable Ethernet technology with centralized management, namely HaRTES. Our experiments show a significantly lower latency using the centralized architecture. We also observe the dependence of the distributed architecture in the end nodes' performance and the benefit of having a protected channel for the admission control transactions.This work was supported in part by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI), in part by the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER) [AEI/FEDER, Unión Europea (UE)] under Grant TEC2015-70313-R, in part by the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) through the Operational Programme for Competitivity and the Internationalization of Portugal 2020 Partnership Agreement (PRODUTECH-SIF) under Grant POCI-01-0247-FEDER-024541, and in part by the Research Centre Instituto de Telecomunicações under Grant UID/EEA/50008/2013.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Towards remote monitoring and reconfiguration of FPGA-based controllers using IOPT-Tools

This work was partially financed by Portuguese Agency ”Fundac¸ao para a Ci ˜ encia e a Tecnologia” (FCT), in the ˆ framework of project UID/EEA/00066/2019.IOPT-Tools is a tool chain framework that supports controllers’ specification through Petri net models, models’ validation, and automatic generation of C and VHDL (VHSIC Hardware Description Language) code. Additionally, this framework supports the remote control and monitoring of embedded controllers that were implemented using the automatically generated C code. This paper presents an ongoing work where IOPT-Tools will be extended to support the remote control and monitoring of FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array) based controllers. Additionally, the IOPT-Tools will be also extended to support the remote reconfiguration of FPGA-based controllers, enabling their adaptation to new application requirements.publishersversionpublishe

Relatório de estágio pedagógico: Escola Secundária com 3ºciclo do ensino básico do Fundão

Capítulo 1. O estágio pedagógico insere-se no último ano do curso de mestrado de ensino da educação física no ensino básico e secundário da Universidade da Beira Interior. Contempla 3 grandes áreas de intervenção, a leccionação de aulas, a direcção de turma e o desporto escolar. Ao longo do ano lectivo intervi nestas áreas onde apliquei todos os conhecimentos que adquiri ao longo do primeiro ano do curso, sendo orientado na escola onde intervi, Escola Secundaria c\ 3ºCEB do Fundão, pelo professor António Belo. Na área da leccionação de aulas planeei e realizei relatórios de aula, criei unidades didácticas que facilitaram a criação dos planos de aula e a evolução do ensino-aprendizagem dos alunos, na área do desporto escolar produzi planos de aula, relatórios de período e participei em todas as actividades realizadas, e na área de direcção de turma realizei constantemente o registo de assiduidade dos alunos, ajudei na elaboração do plano curricular de turma e na preparação de reuniões de turma e de encarregados de educação. Palavras-chave: Ensino Secundário; Educação Fisica; Estágio Pedagógico Capítulo 2. Objectivo: Foi propósito deste estudo verificar a relação existente entre o nível de obesidade e a capacidade cardio-respiratória em jovens adolescentes activos, inseridos num contexto escolar com idades entre os 15 e os 17 anos. Métodos: Foram avaliados 357 jovens entre os 15 e 17 anos de idade, em que 185 eram rapazes e 172 eram raparigas. Para avaliação do nível cardio-respiratório utilizou-se o teste da milha, e para avaliação da obesidade utilizou-se o peso, a altura, a percentagem de massa gorda e o IMC. Resultados: 12,97% das raparigas apresentam pré-obesidade e 3,24% obesidade. 8,14% dos rapazes apresentam pré-obesidade e 3,49% obesidade. Aos 17 anos os rapazes com peso normal apresentam um VO2máx de 52.89±3.39ml\kg\min e as raparigas 42.86±3.45 ml \ kg \ min. Existe uma forte associação negativa entre o nível cardio-respiratorio e o IMC dos 15 aos 17 anos em ambos os sexos (r≥0,78)Conclusões: Os alunos com peso normal têm uma maior capacidade cardiorespiratória e uma menor %MG que aqueles apresentam pré-obesidade e obesidade, e que existe uma forte associação entre maiores índices de aptidão cardio-respiratória e menor percentagem de massa gorda e índice de massa corporal.Chapter 1 The teaching practice is part of the final year of master´s degree in teaching physical education in primary and secondary education of the University of Beira Interior. It contemplates three main areas, the teaching of lessons, classroom management and school sport. Throughout the school year I intervened in these areas where I applied all the knowledge that i acquired during the first year of the course, I was oriented at Fundão high school by Professor Antonio Belo. In the area of teaching classes I have planed and realized reports of all classes, I started teaching units that facilitated the creation of lesson plans and developments in teaching and learning of the students; in the area of school sports I have produce lesson plans, reports and participated in all activities undertaken; and in the area of classroom management I realized the constant attendance record of students, helped in drafting the curriculum of the classroom and helped in the preparation of all the class meetings and al the parents meetings. Key-Words: High School; Physical Education; Pedagogical Stage Chapter 2 Objective: The purpose of this study was to verify the relationship between the level of obesity and cardio-respiratory fitness in young active adolescents, within a school context with ages between 15 and 17 years. Methods: 357 young people between 15 and 17 years old, there were 185 boys and 172 girls. To assess the level of cardio-respiratory fitness we used the one-mile test, and to assess the level of obesity we used the weight, height, body fat percentage and BMI. Results: 12.97% of the girls were overweight and 3.24% were obese. 8.14% of the boys were overweight and 3.49% were obese. At 17 years old boys with normal weight have a VO2max of 52.89 ± 3.39ml \ kg \ min and girls 42.86 ± 3.45 ml \ kg \ min. There is a strong negative association between the level of cardio-respiratory and BMI from 15 to 17 years in both genders (r ≥ 0.78) Conclusions: Children with normal weight have a greater cardio-respiratory capacity and a lower body fat percentage than those who are overweight and obese, and there is a strong association between higher levels of cardiorespiratory fitness and lower body fat percentage and body mass index body

Population dynamics, structure and behavior of Anopheles darlingi in a rural settlement in the Amazon rainforest of Acre, Brazil

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p><it>Anopheles darlingi </it>is the major vector of malaria in South America, and its behavior and distribution has epidemiological importance to biomedical research. In Brazil, <it>An</it>. <it>darlingi </it>is found in the northern area of the Amazon basin, where 99.5% of the disease is reported.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The study area, known as Ramal do Granada, is a rural settlement inside the Amazon basin in the state of Acre. Population variations and density have been analysed by species behaviour, and molecular analysis has been measured by ND4 mitochondrial gene sequencing.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The results show higher density in collections near a recent settlement, suggesting that a high level of colonization decreases the vector presence. The biting activity showed higher activity at twilight and major numbers of mosquitos in the remaining hours of the night in months of high density. From a sample of 110 individual mosquitoes, 18 different haplotypes were presented with a diversity index of 0.895, which is higher than that found in other <it>Anopheles </it>studies.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p><it>An. darlingi </it>depends on forested regions for their larval and adult survival. In months with higher population density, the presence of mosquitoes persisted in the second part of the night, increasing the vector capacity of the species. Despite the intra-population variation in the transition to rainy season, the seasonal distribution of haplotypes shows no change in the structure population of <it>An. darlingi</it>.</p

NOVA mobility assistive system: Developed and remotely controlled with IOPT-tools

UID/EEA/00066/2020In this paper, a Mobility Assistive System (NOVA-MAS) and a model-driven development approach are proposed to support the acquisition and analysis of data, infrastructures control, and dissemination of information along public roads. A literature review showed that the work related to mobility assistance of pedestrians in wheelchairs has a gap in ensuring their safety on road. The problem is that pedestrians in wheelchairs and scooters often do not enjoy adequate and safe lanes for their circulation on public roads, having to travel sometimes side by side with vehicles and cars moving at high speed. With NOVA-MAS, city infrastructures can obtain information regarding the environment and provide it to their users/vehicles, increasing road safety in an inclusive way, contributing to the decrease of the accidents of pedestrians in wheelchairs. NOVA-MAS not only supports information dissemination, but also data acquisition from sensors and infrastructures control, such as traffic light signs. For that, it proposed a development approach that supports the acquisition of data from the environment and its control while using a tool framework, named IOPT-Tools (Input-Output Place-Transition Tools). IOPT-Tools support controllers’ specification, validation, and implementation, with remote operation capabilities. The infrastructures’ controllers are specified through IOPT Petri net models, which are then simulated using computational tools and verified using state-space-based model-checking tools. In addition, an automatic code generator tool generates the C code, which supports the controllers’ implementation, avoiding manual codification errors. A set of prototypes were developed and tested to validate and conclude on the feasibility of the proposals.publishersversionpublishe

Identification of Suppliers able to provide Hydraulic Fracturing Services in Unconventional Reservoirs and Risks associated with the Construction of these Wells

According to the international agencies U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) and World Energy Council (WEC), Brazil is the 10th country in the world ranking of the largest holders of shale gas reserves, with 245 Tcf (trillion cubic feet) (6.9 Tcm – trillion cubic meters) of natural gas. Due to the low permeability of these formations, the so-called unconventional reservoirs, only become viable if stimulated through horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing techniques. These techniques, like any other ones, have associated risks that should be very well managed and mitigated. This article aims to show that the benefits, in terms of fostering the local economy, job creation and energy security, outweigh the risks since they are known and well managed. In addition, suppliers present in country, able to provide these services properly, with numerous successful cases around the world, are identified in the article as well