Rapid evaluation of oxidation catalysis by gas sensor system: total oxidation, oxidative dehydrogenation, and selective oxidation over metal oxide catalysts

The rapid evaluation of catalysis is an indispensable technology for the success of combinatorial chemistry. A small-sized, less expensive, easily operating screening is desirable for parallel settings which dramatically shortens the evaluation time. Recent advances in gas sensors have enabled us to use them for the rapid evaluation of oxidation catalysis. Three typical catalytic oxidations over metal oxide catalysts were evaluated by gas sensor systems optimized for each catalytic system. The first one is the total oxidation of carbon monoxide in air. Five catalytic combustion-type gas sensors were used in a parallel reactor system to shorten the evaluation time. The second one is the oxidative dehydrogenation (ODH) of ethane over the mixed oxide of nickel and iron. The evaluation of the ODH catalysis was performed by a selective olefin sensor which determines the concentration of C₂H₄ in C₂H₆. The third one is the selective oxidation catalysis of propane over alkali modified Fe/SiO₂. The effluents including CO, CO₂, aldehydes and ketones in propane were analyzed by the CO, CO₂ and semiconductor-type gas sensors selective toward aldehydes and ketones. These evaluation results indicated that gas sensors have a good potential for the rapid evaluation of oxidation catalysts.     

Design on semiconductor coupled SAW convolver

This paper presents results of a design study on a semiconductor coupled surface acoustic wave (SAW) convolver in which bi-directionally propagating SAWs, on a piezoelectric substrate with a high coupling coefficient, couple with bonded semiconductor diodes through multistrips. To obtain convolution signals with a high efficiency, we adopted a diode-balanced bridge structure for the nonlinear operation. We also found that the tapping pitches of the multi-strip electrodes have robustness against operation frequency variation and temperature-dependent variation on the delay of the SAW. We verified the effectiveness of the device in. a circuit simulation and an experiment on a test circuit, which was fabricated by using an epitaxial lift-off film-bonding process.     

Implementation of Fault-Tolerant GridRPC Applications

A task parallel application is implemented with Ninf-G, a GridRPC system. A series of experiments are conducted on the Grid testbed in Asia Pacific for three months. Through tens of long executions, typical fault patterns were collected, and instability of the network throughput was determined to be a major reason of the faults. Several important points are stressed to avoid task throughput decline due to the fault-recovery operations: Timeout minimization for fault detection, background recovery, redundant task assignments, and so on. This study also issues a steer for design of the automated fault-tolerant mechanism in an upper layer of the GridRPC framework.     

Intra-body data transmission for the personal area network

Intra-body communication is a wireless means of exchanging information within a personal area network (PAN) between wearable electronic sensors and devices. The feasibility of intra-body communication is confirmed through several experiments on signal propagation within the human body, and a human phantom is designed and used to obtain reproducible results over repeated experiments. Based on the results of these experiments, a prototype transmission system is constructed using aluminum electrodes powered by 3 V DC and operating in the 10.7 MHz frequency modulation (FM) band. This prototype is demonstrated to be capable of transmitting analog signals through the human subjects in the presence of external noise. Digital data transmission at 9600 bps is also achieved using newly fabricated 10.7 MHz frequency shift keying (FSK) transmitter and receiver devices. The carrier frequency of 10.7 MHz is the intermediate frequency of FM radio receivers, meaning that the proposed system can make use of a wide selection of inexpensive, commercial radio frequency devices.     

Multiple fuzzy state-value functions for human evaluation through interactive trajectory planning of a partner robot

The purpose of this study is to develop partner robots that can obtain and accumulate human-friendly behaviors. To achieve this purpose, the entire architecture of the robot is designed, based on a concept of structured learning which emphasizes the importance of interactive learning of several modules through interaction with its environment. This paper deals with a trajectory planning method for generating hand-to-hand behaviors of a partner robot by using multiple fuzzy state-value functions, a self-organizing map, and an interactive genetic algorithm. A trajectory for the behavior is generated by an interactive genetic algorithm using human evaluation. In order to reduce human load, human evaluation is estimated by using the fuzzy state-value function. Furthermore, to cope with various situations, a self-organizing map is used for clustering a given task dependent on a human hand position. And then, a fuzzy state-value function is assigned to each output unit of the self-organizing map. The robot can easily obtain and accumulate human-friendly trajectories using a fuzzy state-value function and a knowledge database corresponding to the unit selected in the self-organizing map. Finally, multiple fuzzy state-value functions can estimate a human evaluation model for the hand-to-hand behaviors. Several experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

Time-minimal paths amidst moving obstacles in three dimensions

A path-planning problem is considered in the presence of moving polygonal obstacles in three dimensions. A particle is to be moved from a given initial position to a destination position amidst polygonal disjoint barriers moving along known linear trajectories. The particle can move in any direction in space with a single constraint that it cannot move faster than a given speed bound. All obstacles are slowly moving, i.e., their speeds are strictly slower than the maximum speed of the particle. The destination point is also permitted to move along a known trajectory and is assumed to be collision-free at all times. Three properties are stated and proved for a time-minimal path amidst moving polygonal barriers. A few extensions are considered, including piecewise linear motions of the obstacles.     

Determination of age-related changes in the morphological structure (sagging) of the human cheek using a photonumeric scale and three-dimensional surface parameters

The usefulness of the photo standard for evaluating skin sagging in the face, especially in the cheeks, was evaluated. A six-stage photo standard was prepared using photos of women aged 17-83-years-old at three magnification rates (136-188 women in each group). Based on this photo standard, scoring was performed using a six-grade scoring system by two specialists to obtain the consensus score. Scoring was also performed in parallel by five general observers. The degree of agreement between the two scores was evaluated by calculating the Kappa value. In each group, the Kappa value was 0.452-0.563, indicating moderate agreement. Thus, the photo standard may be useful for evaluating sagging. Based on the photo standard, a score of 2, at which sagging becomes detectable appeared at the age of 40 years. In parallel, 3D analysis of replicas around the cheek was performed to morphologically analyse age-related changes in sagging. When the depth parameter was compared between the nasolabial groove and the mouth corners, a higher value was observed in the nasolabial groove until the age of 40 years, but higher values were seen in the mouth corners thereafter. This may have been because sagging in the cheeks descends to the area around the mouth, resulting in reversion in the sWv value. These findings indicated that sagging in the cheeks becomes morphologically distinct in women in their forties.     

Life satisfaction and its related factors among institutionalized patients at a Hansen's disease sanatorium

We conducted a questionnaire survey on life styles and health status for 293 patients with Hansen's disease. They were admitted to the wards for disabled and physically able patients of Ohshima Seishoen, in Kagawa prefecture, in 1991. This institution is one of Japan's national leprosy sanitarians. We measured patients' life satisfaction with the Delighted-Terrible Scale. In this report, the distribution of life satisfaction and its associated factors were examined for 210(71.7%) respondents. Factors examined were length of treatment, physical health, and social aspects of life at the sanatorium. The major findings were as follows; 1. The patients aged under 60 had lower proportions of being satisfied with life than those aged 60 or older. The proportions of life satisfaction of the 40-59 age group were 17% for men and 22% for women, while for the 60 or older age groups were 33-44% for men and 41-45% for women. The proportions of life satisfaction in the 60 or older age groups were lower than those of community dwelling elderly persons. 2. We examined factors associated with life satisfaction for the respondents aged 60 or older. Dependence on activities of daily living (ADL) was associated with life satisfaction in some ADL items. Care and aid provided by the staff of the sanatorium may modify the relationship between ADL impairment and life satisfaction. For social aspects of life at the sanatorium, both having networks with family members and having resources other than family were associated with life satisfaction. Going out and positively spending their daily lives were associated with life satisfaction, too. These associations were significant for men. Similar patterns of association were observed for women, but were insignificant. This finding suggests that it is important for the health and medical care staff to pay attention to the social aspects of the life of elderly patients with Hansen's disease.