4,293 research outputs found
Assessing the effectiveness of multi-touch interfaces for DP operation
Navigating a vessel using dynamic positioning (DP) systems close to offshore installations is a challenge. The operator's only possibility of manipulating the system is through its interface, which can be categorized as the physical appearance of the equipment and the visualization of the system. Are there possibilities of interaction between the operator and the system that can reduce strain and cognitive load during DP operations? Can parts of the system (e.g. displays) be physically brought closer to the user to enhance the feeling of control when operating the system? Can these changes make DP operations more efficient and safe? These questions inspired this research project, which investigates the use of multi-touch and hand gestures known from consumer products to directly manipulate the visualization of a vessel in the 3D scene of a DP system. Usability methodologies and evaluation techniques that are widely used in consumer market research were used to investigate how these interaction techniques, which are new to the maritime domain, could make interaction with the DP system more efficient and transparent both during standard and safety-critical operations. After investigating which gestures felt natural to use by running user tests with a paper prototype, the gestures were implemented into a Rolls-Royce DP system and tested in a static environment. The results showed that the test participants performed significantly faster using direct gesture manipulation compared to using traditional button/menu interaction. To support the results from these tests, further tests were carried out. The purpose is to investigate how gestures are performed in a moving environment, using a motion platform to simulate rough sea conditions. The key results and lessons learned from a collection of four user experiments, together with a discussion of the choice of evaluation techniques will be discussed in this paper
Wetting of gradient fields: pathwise estimates
We consider the wetting transition in the framework of an effective interface
model of gradient type, in dimension 2 and higher. We prove pathwise estimates
showing that the interface is localized in the whole thermodynamically-defined
partial wetting regime considered in earlier works. Moreover, we study how the
interface delocalizes as the wetting transition is approached. Our main tool is
reflection positivity in the form of the chessboard estimate.Comment: Some typos removed after proofreading. Version to be published in
PTR
A submillimetre survey of the star-formation history of radio galaxies
We present the results of the first major systematic submillimetre survey of
radio galaxies spanning the redshift range 1 < z < 5. The primary aim of this
work is to elucidate the star-formation history of this sub-class of elliptical
galaxies by tracing the cosmological evolution of dust mass. Using SCUBA on the
JCMT we have obtained 850-micron photometry of 47 radio galaxies to a
consistent rms depth of 1 mJy, and have detected dust emission in 14 cases. The
radio galaxy targets have been selected from a series of low-frequency radio
surveys of increasing depth (3CRR, 6CE, etc), in order to allow us to separate
the effects of increasing redshift and increasing radio power on submillimetre
luminosity. Although the dynamic range of our study is inevitably small, we
find clear evidence that the typical submillimetre luminosity (and hence dust
mass) of a powerful radio galaxy is a strongly increasing function of redshift;
the detection rate rises from 15 per cent at z 2.5,
and the average submillimetre luminosity rises as (1+z)^3 out to z~4. Moreover
our extensive sample allows us to argue that this behaviour is not driven by
underlying correlations with other radio galaxy properties such as radio power,
radio spectral index, or radio source size/age. Although radio selection may
introduce other more subtle biases, the redshift distribution of our detected
objects is in fact consistent with the most recent estimates of the redshift
distribution of comparably bright submillimetre sources discovered in blank
field surveys. The evolution of submillimetre luminosity found here for radio
galaxies may thus be representative of massive ellipticals in general.Comment: 31 pages - 10 figures in main text, 3 pages of figures in appendix.
This revised version has been re-structured, but the analysis and conclusions
have not changed. Accepted for publication in MNRA
Instrumented Load Test on a Bent Pile
The load carrying capacity of a bent shell pile in soft silts and clays was determined from an instrumented test. Lateral pile displacements along the pile were measured during loading and unloading using an inclinometer traveling in a plastic casing. Pile capacity was estimated by Johnson\u27s (1962) method prior to the load test and by the STRUDL structural engineering program after performing the load test. Both methods adequately predicted the pile performance. STRUDL, however, accommodated more realistic soil parameter variation and boundary conditions necessary for an integral soil-pile-structure interaction analysis
The final two redshifts for radio sources from the equatorial BRL sample
Best, Rottgering and Lehnert (1999, 2000a) defined a new sample of powerful
radio sources from the Molonglo Reference Catalogue, for which redshifts were
compiled or measured for 177 of the 178 objects. For the final object,
MRC1059-010 (3C249), the host galaxy is here identified using near-infrared
imaging, and the redshift is determined from VLT spectroscopy. For one other
object in the sample, MRC0320+053 (4C05.14), the literature redshift has been
questioned: new spectroscopic observations of this object are presented,
deriving a corrected redshift. With these two results, the spectroscopic
completeness of this sample is now 100%.
New redshifts are also presented for PKS0742+10 from the Wall & Peacock 2.7
GHz catalogue, and PKS1336+003 from the Parkes Selected Regions. PKS0742+10
shows a strong neutral hydrogen absorption feature in its Lyman-alpha emission
profile.Comment: 4 pages. LaTeX. Accepted for publication in MNRA
Cavity Optomechanical Magnetometer
A cavity optomechanical magnetometer is demonstrated where the magnetic field
induced expansion of a magnetostrictive material is transduced onto the
physical structure of a highly compliant optical microresonator. The resulting
motion is read out optically with ultra-high sensitivity. Detecting the
magnetostrictive deformation of Terfenol-D with a toroidal whispering gallery
mode (TWGM) resonator a peak sensitivity of 400 nT/Hz^.5 was achieved with
theoretical modelling predicting that sensitivities of up to 500 fT/Hz^.5 may
be possible. This chip-based magnetometer combines high-sensitivity and large
dynamic range with small size and room temperature operation
T-PHOT version 2.0: improved algorithms for background subtraction, local convolution, kernel registration, and new options
We present the new release v2.0 of T-PHOT, a publicly available software
package developed to perform PSF-matched, prior-based, multiwavelength
deconfusion photometry of extragalactic fields. New features included in the
code are presented and discussed: background estimation, fitting using position
dependent kernels, flux prioring, diagnostical statistics on the residual
image, exclusion of selected sources from the model and residual images,
individual registration of fitted objects. These new options improve on the
performance of the code, allowing for more accurate results and providing
useful aids for diagnostics.Comment: 7 pages, 8 figure
A necklace of Wulff shapes
In a probabilistic model of a film over a disordered substrate, Monte-Carlo
simulations show that the film hangs from peaks of the substrate. The film
profile is well approximated by a necklace of Wulff shapes. Such a necklace can
be obtained as the infimum of a collection of Wulff shapes resting on the
substrate. When the random substrate is given by iid heights with exponential
distribution, we prove estimates on the probability density of the resulting
peaks, at small density
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