Measured pedestrian movement and bodyworn terminal effects for the indoor channel at 5.2 GHz

[Summary]: Human body effects such as antenna-body interaction and scattering caused by pedestrian movement are important indoor radio propagation phenomena at microwave frequencies. This paper reports measurements and statistical analysis of the indoor narrowband propagation channel at 5.2 GHz for two scenarios: a fixed line-of-sight (LOS) link perturbed by pedestrian movement and a mobile link incorporating a moving bodyworn terminal. Two indoor environments were considered for both types of measurements: an 18 m long corridor and a 42 m2 office. The fixed-link results show that the statistical distribution of the received envelope was dependent on the number of pedestrians present. However, fading was slower than expected, with an average fade duration of more than 100 ms for a Doppler frequency of 8.67 Hz. For the bodyworn terminal, mean received power values were dependent on whether or not the user's body obstructed the LOS. For example, in the corridor the average non-line-of-sight (NLOS) pathloss was 5.4 dB greater than with LO

Health Care in the Motor City: Thriving or Surviving?

This site visit explored the forces shaping the delivery of health care in Detroit. Health care providers in Detroit face the twin challenges of controlling costs and serving a bifurcated metropolitan area that includes large numbers of uninsured, low-income, and vulnerable residents as well as more prosperous residents of a reviving inner core and the surrounding suburbs and counties. The program looked at the underlying economic, social, and physical conditions that make improving the health of the city\u27s residents extremely challenging. Efforts to contain costs through payment innovations such as the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan\u27s Physician Group Incentive Program and accountable care organizations (ACOs) were featured. The program also focused on the status of the health care safety net serving Detroit\u27s low-income residents and the likely effects of Medicaid expansion and other market dynamics on patients and providers. Participants visited the city’s two large health care systems, Henry Ford Health System and Detroit Medical Center, and the CHASS Center, a federally-qualified community health center. They conversed with experts, community leaders, public officials, providers, and individuals representing employers and unions. A report of participants\u27 impressions was published on April 30, 2014

Making sense of game-play: how can we examine learning and involvement?

It has been argued that there is still much to be understood about the game-play experience, while there is a need for more rigorous examination of how players interact with games and the sorts of thinking they engage in during play. This paper introduces a set of methods developed to explore these issues via a multiple case study approach, including; game-play observation, cued post-play interview, the collection of physiological data and the use of gaming diaries over a three week period. An examination of the strengths and limitations of the approach adopted is presented with reference to two particular methodological issues (i) how to identify breakdowns and breakthroughs that occur during game-play; (ii) how to identify learning occurring beyond game-play. The paper will conclude by emphasising the importance of taking both micro and macro level experiences into account when it comes to capturing learning and involvement within this context

A Time Series Based Study of Correlation, Channel Power Imbalance and Diversity Gain in Indoor Distributed Antenna Systems at 60 GHz

In this article, we investigate the potential enhancements in signal reliability which can be achieved using a millimeter-wave distributed antenna system (DAS) within an indoor environment. To achieve this, we measured the signal power simultaneously received at nine ceiling-mounted access point (AP) locations likely to be used in future indoor DAS deployments while a mobile user imitated making a voice call on a hypothetical user equipment. Key metrics, associated with the performance of multiple antenna systems, such as the cross correlation coefficient (CCC) and channel power imbalance (CPI) are determined. It was found that line-of-sight (LOS) and quasi-LOS (QLOS) links with the APs typically led to higher CCC values than the non-LOS (NLOS) cases. Similarly, LOS and QLOS links typically produced higher CPI values between APs than the NLOS case. To enable the reproduction of our results, we have successfully applied autoregressive moving average and autoregressive integrated moving average modeling to the CCC and CPI time series. The performance improvement that can be achieved using a DAS instead of a single AP was evaluated using three commonly deployed diversity combining schemes, namely, selection combining, equal gain combining, and maximal ratio combining along with three AP selection mechanisms, namely, per-sample random AP selection, one-shot AP selection, and per-sample optimal AP selection. Finally, we have provided some useful insight into the influence of differing AP numbers on the diversity gain when considering the aforementioned AP selection methods