Active sensing, which incorporates closed-loop behavioral selection of information during sensory acquisition, is an important feature of many sensory modalities. We used the rodent whisker tactile system as a platform for studying the role cortical sensory areas play in coordinating active sensing motions. We examined head and whisker motions of freely moving mice performing a tactile search for a randomly located reward, and found that mice select from a diverse range of available active sensing strategies. In particular, mice selectively employed a strategy we term contact maintenance, where whisking is modulated to counteract head motion and sustain repeated contacts, but only when doing so is likely to be useful for obtaining reward. The context dependent selection of sensing strategies, along with the observation of whisker repositioning prior to head motion, suggests the possibility of higher level control, beyond simple reflexive mechanisms. In order to further investigate a possible role for primary somatosensory cortex (SI) in coordinating whisk-by-whisk motion, we delivered closed-loop optogenetic feedback to SI, time locked to whisker motions estimated through facial electromyography. We found that stimulation regularized whisking (increasing overall periodicity), and shifted whisking frequency, changes that emulate behaviors of rodents actively contacting objects. Importantly, we observed changes to whisk timing only for stimulation locked to whisker protractions, possibly encoding that natural contacts are more likely during forward motion of the whiskers. Simultaneous neural recordings from SI show cyclic changes in excitability, specifically that responses to excitatory stimulation locked to whisker retractions appeared suppressed in contrast to stimulation during protractions that resulted in changes to whisk timing. Both effects are evident within single whisks. These findings support a role for sensory cortex in guiding whisk-by-whisk motor outputs, but suggest a coupling that depends on behavioral context, occurring on multiple timescales. Elucidating a role for sensory cortex in motor outputs is important to understanding active sensing, and may further provide novel insights to guide the design of sensory neuroprostheses that exploit active sensing context.

<p>Force control is introduced to robots to solve the problem in machining applications due to the fact that the robot compliance might cause deviation between actual and desired robot path. Also large tolerances in the casting process as well as positioning errors from the clamping create deviations for which the force control technology can adept. Force control has also shown successful in automatic learning of paths along non linear surfaces.</p><p>This study investigates the possibility of introducing robots equipped with force control at Volvo Aero Corporation in order to robotize polishing and deburring processes. These are today performed by manual labor. This study investigates more specifically the ABB Force Control machining application package. The polishing process has shown to be very complex and today’s version of the ABB force control package cannot give sufficiently robust results to be recommended for implementation. The major issue is the non-existing compliance of tool orientation needed to adapt to casting and positioning deviations due to varying work piece dimensions. The deburring process has however shown to be easier to handle, and a robot cell and methodology is proposed in this report.</p>

Force control is introduced to robots to solve the problem in machining applications due to the fact that the robot compliance might cause deviation between actual and desired robot path. Also large tolerances in the casting process as well as positioning errors from the clamping create deviations for which the force control technology can adept. Force control has also shown successful in automatic learning of paths along non linear surfaces. This study investigates the possibility of introducing robots equipped with force control at Volvo Aero Corporation in order to robotize polishing and deburring processes. These are today performed by manual labor. This study investigates more specifically the ABB Force Control machining application package. The polishing process has shown to be very complex and today’s version of the ABB force control package cannot give sufficiently robust results to be recommended for implementation. The major issue is the non-existing compliance of tool orientation needed to adapt to casting and positioning deviations due to varying work piece dimensions. The deburring process has however shown to be easier to handle, and a robot cell and methodology is proposed in this report.

More than one million people are living with spinal cord injury (SCI) in North America alone. Restoring lost motor function can alleviate SCI-related health problems, as well as markedly increase the quality of life enjoyed by individuals with SCI. Functional electrical stimulation (FES) can replace motor function in individuals with SCI by using short electrical pulses to generate contractions in paralyzed muscles. A wide range of FES applications have been proposed, but few application are actually available for community use by SCI consumers. A major factor contributing to this shortage of real-world FES applications is the lack of a feasible closed-loop control algorithm. The purpose of this thesis is to develop a closed-loop control algorithm that is suitable for use in practical FES applications. This thesis consists of three separate studies. The first study examined existing closed-loop control algorithms for FES applications, and showed that a method of testing FES control algorithms under realistic conditions is needed to evaluate their likely real-world performance. The second study provided such a testing method by developing a non-idealities block that can be used to modify the nominal response of electrically stimulated muscle in simulations of FES applications. Fatigue, muscle spasm, and tremor non-idealities are included in the block, which allows the user to specify the severity level for each type of non-ideal behaviour. This nonidealities block was tested in a simulation of electrically induced knee extension against gravity, and showed that the nominal performance of the controllers was substantially better than their performance in the realistic case that included the non-idealities model. The third study concerned the development and testing of a novel observer-based sliding mode control (SMC) algorithm that is suitable for use in real-world FES applications. This algorithm incorporated a fatigue minimization objective as well as co-contraction of the antagonist muscle group to cause the joint stiffness to track a desired value. The SMC algorithm was tested in a simulation of FES-based quiet standing, and the non-idealities block was used to determine the probable performance of the controller in the real world. This novel controller performed very well in simulation, and would be suitable for use in selected practical FES applications. The work contained in this thesis can easily be extended to a wide range of FES applications. This work represents a significant step forward in closed-loop control for FES applications, and will facilitate the development of sophisticated new electrical stimulation systems for use by consumers in their homes and communities.

Industries want to add value to their offerings but to do this, rather than just accepting customer requirements, they now need to know how their products and/or services have been embedded within their customer’s process to achieve a goal that the customer has; any gaps within the process then present an opportunity for the provider to fill these gaps. The System-In-Use (SIU) Methodology presented in this thesis facilitates customer issues in “pulling” the supply chain into creating new solutions as well as the supply chain “pushing” new value propositions into improving customer processes. It does this by drawing on a detailed theory of value and capability which was developed as part of this research. The method has been applied in five industries in processes encompassing high value-assets with very positive outcomes for each of the stakeholders involved: notably, three solutions have been adopted in industry for which a KT-Box award was granted by Cambridge University. Cont/d.

Industries want to add value to their offerings but to do this, rather than just accepting customer requirements, they now need to know how their products and/or services have been embedded within their customer’s process to achieve a goal that the customer has; any gaps within the process then present an opportunity for the provider to fill these gaps. The System-In-Use (SIU) Methodology presented in this thesis facilitates customer issues in “pulling” the supply chain into creating new solutions as well as the supply chain “pushing” new value propositions into improving customer processes. It does this by drawing on a detailed theory of value and capability which was developed as part of this research. The method has been applied in five industries in processes encompassing high value-assets with very positive outcomes for each of the stakeholders involved: notably, three solutions have been adopted in industry for which a KT-Box award was granted by Cambridge University. Cont/d.

As CMOS technologies advance to 22-nm dimensions and below, constructing analog circuits are difficult to design within permitted specifications. One of the reasons for this is a limit of voltage resolution. In this situation, time-mode processing is a technique that is believed to be well suited for solving many of these challenges. A primary advantage of this technique is the ability to achieve analog functions using digital logic structures. Time difference amplifiers (TDA) can be a key component to realize fine time solutions. TDA are an innovative method to improve the time resolution as well as the evolution of ADC. This thesis introduces a TDA that amplifies the input time difference between two signals by a fractional gain. The closed loop gain control system used in this work consists of a pseudo differential current starved delay element (PDCSDE) and a monotonic digitally controlled delay element (DCDE). By using these elements to create a delay chain and a control loop, the result is a stable fractional time difference gain (TD gain). The system was designed and simulated in 65nm process at 1.2V power supply. The measured results show that this TDA achieves a fractional TD gain offset lower than 1.3%, with supply variation of ±15%, and input range as wide as ±250ps. The new design was also more resilient to process, voltage and temperature (PVT) variations

More than one million people are living with spinal cord injury (SCI) in North America alone. Restoring lost motor function can alleviate SCI-related health problems, as well as markedly increase the quality of life enjoyed by individuals with SCI. Functional electrical stimulation (FES) can replace motor function in individuals with SCI by using short electrical pulses to generate contractions in paralyzed muscles. A wide range of FES applications have been proposed, but few application are actually available for community use by SCI consumers. A major factor contributing to this shortage of real-world FES applications is the lack of a feasible closed-loop control algorithm. The purpose of this thesis is to develop a closed-loop control algorithm that is suitable for use in practical FES applications. This thesis consists of three separate studies. The first study examined existing closed-loop control algorithms for FES applications, and showed that a method of testing FES control algorithms under realistic conditions is needed to evaluate their likely real-world performance. The second study provided such a testing method by developing a non-idealities block that can be used to modify the nominal response of electrically stimulated muscle in simulations of FES applications. Fatigue, muscle spasm, and tremor non-idealities are included in the block, which allows the user to specify the severity level for each type of non-ideal behaviour. This nonidealities block was tested in a simulation of electrically induced knee extension against gravity, and showed that the nominal performance of the controllers was substantially better than their performance in the realistic case that included the non-idealities model. The third study concerned the development and testing of a novel observer-based sliding mode control (SMC) algorithm that is suitable for use in real-world FES applications. This algorithm incorporated a fatigue minimization objective as well as co-contraction of the antagonist muscle group to cause the joint stiffness to track a desired value. The SMC algorithm was tested in a simulation of FES-based quiet standing, and the non-idealities block was used to determine the probable performance of the controller in the real world. This novel controller performed very well in simulation, and would be suitable for use in selected practical FES applications. The work contained in this thesis can easily be extended to a wide range of FES applications. This work represents a significant step forward in closed-loop control for FES applications, and will facilitate the development of sophisticated new electrical stimulation systems for use by consumers in their homes and communities.

Recycling and remanufacturing returned goods are economically beneficial for companies since the cost of obtaining used parts is lower in many cases and selling price is close to that of a new product. This leads to decreased costs and thereby increased profits for the company. In addition, there are also great environmental benefits by keeping the structural integrity of a part; the energy used for disassembly and refurbishing is much lower than the energy required for raw material extraction and machining. Encompassing the returned goods makes the supply chain to closed loop supply chain, which is different from the traditional supply chain due to reverse logistics. A reverse flow of material is however usually more complex than a forward flow of parts and components from suppliers. This means that inventory management becomes critical and needs to be viewed from a new perspective. The purpose of the report is to study FAW Co., Ltd’s inventory situation in reverse logistics. The report analysed the inventory management in the company, specifically focusing on one product as the instance Motor Engine LFTS-2000since it is in the maturity stage of product life cycle. Two scenarios were designed to consider how different parameters affect inventory levels in reverse logistics. The report analysed how different parameters affect the inventory levels and minimum cost. With the increasing returned goods are processed, inventory levels and minimum cost will decrease correspondingly.

A identificação de sistemas em malha fechada assume papel importante no contexto atual, já que reduz o custo operacional do processo de identificação no estágio de testes, evitando, por exemplo, a geração de produtos fora de especificação. Entretanto, requer uma série de cuidados especiais no tratamento dos dados a serem analisados para a obtenção dos modelos. Nesta dissertação um estudo acerca da identificação de sistemas monovariáveis lineares a partir de dados de operação em malha fechada, avaliando diferentes métodos e técnicas de identificação em malha fechada já consolidados é apresentado. Um novo método, recentemente proposto por Agüero (2005), o Virtual Closed Loop ouMétodo da Malha Virtual, que consiste na adição e remoção virtual de um controlador à malha analisada, de forma a filtrar a ação de controle real em um procedimento totalmente offline, é estudado em detalhes e uma adaptação é realizada na metodologia, com a simplificação do filtro virtual e forma de obtenção do modelo da malha aberta. O desenvolvimento e estudo da metodologia estão baseados em uma série de sistemas SISO distintos, com dinâmicas variáveis. Além disso, diferentes cenários com características peculiares são aplicados ao estudo, como distúrbios não medidos e ruído de medição, ilustrando de forma simples possíveis comportamentos dinâmicos encontrados em plantas industriais. / The identification of closed loop systems has taken on an important role in the current context, since it reduces the operational costs of the identification process in the testing stage, thus avoiding, for instance, the creation of non-specified products. However, it requires special care in the treatment of data to be analyzed for the obtainment of models. In this work, we present a study on the identification of linear models from closed loops operational data, evaluating different consolidated methods and techniques of closed loop identification. A new method is studied in detail in this work: the Virtual Closed Loop, which was proposed by Agüero (2005). It consists of the virtual addition and removal of a controller to the analyzed loop, so as to filter the input of the system in a completely offline procedure. It is also presented modifications on this methodology resulting in an simplification of the virtual filter and in the ways to obtain the open loop model. The development and study of this methodology are both based on different SISO systems, with variable dynamics. Other interesting characteristics, peculiar to the study, are considered in this work, as noise and dither signals. It illustrates, in a simple way, possible dynamic behavior patterns found in industrial plants.