The aim of platooning is to enable several Heavy Duty Vehicles (HDVs) to drive in a convoy and act as one unit to decrease the fuel consumption. By introducing wireless communication and tight control, the distance between the HDVs can be decreased significantly. This implies a reduction of the air drag and consequently the fuel consumption for all the HDVs in the platoon. The challenge in platooning is to keep the HDVs as close as possible to each other without endangering safety. Therefore, sensor fusion is necessary to get an accurate estimate of the relative distance and velocity, which is a pre-requisite for the controller. This master thesis aims at developing a sensor fusion framework from on-board sensor information as well as other vehicles’ sensor information communicated over a WiFi link. The most important sensors are GPS, that gives a rough position of each HDV, and radar that provides relative distance for each pair of HDV’s in the platoon. A distributed solution is developed, where an Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) estimates the state of the whole platoon. The state vector includes position, velocity and length of each HDV, which is used in a Model Predictive Control (MPC). Furthermore, a method is discussed on how to handle vehicles outside the platoon and how various road surfaces can be managed. This master thesis is a part of a project consisting of three parallel master’s theses. The other two master’s theses investigate and implement rough pre-processing of data, time synchronization and MPC associated with platooning. It was found that the three implemented systems could reduce the average fuel consumption by 11.1 %.

Fusion of information from multiple modalities in Human Computer Interfaces (HCI) has gained a lot of attention in recent years, and has far reaching implications in many areas of human-machine interaction. However, a major limitation of current HCI fusion systems is that the fusion process tends to ignore the semantic nature of modalities, which may reinforce, complement or contradict each other over time. Also, most systems are not robust in representing the ambiguity inherent in human gestures. In this work, we investigate an evidential reasoning based approach for intelligent multimodal fusion, and apply this algorithm to a proposed multimodal system consisting of a Hand Gesture sensor and a Brain Computing Interface (BCI). There are three major contributions of this work to the area of human computer interaction. First, we propose an algorithm for reconstruction of the 3D hand pose given a 2D input video. Second, we develop a BCI using Steady State Visually Evoked Potentials, and show how a multimodal system consisting of the two sensors can improve the efficiency and the complexity of the system, while retaining the same levels of accuracy. Finally, we propose an semantic fusion algorithm based on Transferable Belief Models, which can successfully fuse information from these two sensors, to form meaningful concepts and resolve ambiguity. We also analyze this system for robustness under various operating scenarios.

Development of fueling technologies for modern and future tokamak reactors is essential for their implementation in a commercial energy production setting. Compared to the presently available fueling technologies, gas or cryogenic pellet injection, compact torus injection presents an effective and efficient method for directly fueling the central core of tokamak plasmas. Fueling of the central core of a tokamak plasma is pivotal for providing efficient energy production. The central core plasma of a reactor contains the greatest density of fusion processes. For consistent and continuous fueling of tokamak fusion reactors, compact torus injectors must be operated in a repetitive mode.<p> The goal of this thesis was to study the feasibility of firing the University of Saskatchewan Compact Torus Injector (USCTI) in a repetitive mode. In order to enable USCTI to fire repetitively, modifications were made to its electrical system, control system and data acquisition system. These consisted primarily of the addition of new power supplies, to enable fast charging of the many capacitor banks used to form and accelerate the plasma. The maximum firing rate achieved on USCTI was 0.33 Hz, an increase from the previous maximum firing rate of 0.2 Hz achieved at UC Davis.<p> Firing USCTI in repetitive modes has been successful. It has been shown that the CTs produced in any given repetitive series are properly formed and repeatable. This is made evident through analysis of data collected from the CTs' magnetic fields and densities as they traveled along the injector barrel. The shots from each experiment were compared to the series' mean data and were shown to be consistent over time. Calculations of their correlations show that there are only minimal deviations from shot to shot in any given series.

Sammanfattning Arbetsrätt – fusion av två universitetssjukhus Då jag tidigare arbetade vid Karolinska sjukhuset föll det sig naturligt att studera organisationsförändring eftersom sjukhuset fusionerade med Huddinge universitetssjukhus 2004. Det nya sjukhuset Karolinska universitetssjukhuset fick stora besparingsuppdrag av landstinget i samband med fusionen. Istället för att avskeda den övertaliga personalen så gjorde man omfattande omstruktureringar för alla chefstjänster, vilket innebar att alla chefer fick söka sin egen tjänst i konkurrens med andra. Under 2004 tillsattes 590 chefstjänster. Från 2003 fram till våren 2005 har sjukhuset minskat sin personal med 700 personer. Under 2005 ligger ett besparingsuppdrag på ytterligare 401 miljoner och bland annat den administrativa personalen skall minskas med ytterligare 20 %. Jag frågade mig, hur går detta till? Hur fast är en tills vidare tjänst egentligen? I min upp-sats tittade jag på Karolinskas praktiska tolkning av arbetsrätten och jag ser en arbetsrätt i förändring. När chefen ställs inför faktum att tjänsten ser helt annorlunda ut, geografiskt finns vid två skilda platser (Huddinge och Solna, flygvägen cirka 3 mil) och den grupp chefen har under sig är större än tidigare och chefen omgående kan bli uppsagd om han inte har en acceptabel ledarstil alternativt om chefen inte faller verksamhetschefen i smaken, och därtill få sin lön förändrad och den första uppgiften blir att utarbeta en bemanningsprofil över personalen för att ytterligare uppnå en ekonomi i balans - vilka metoder använder sig chefen då av för att minska övertalig personal? Sjukhuset har uppnått sitt besparingskrav för 2004, men det skall märkas att omställnings-kostnaderna bärs av landstinget och inte sjukhuset. Då hade resultatet blivit ett annat. Inom arbetsrätten i övrigt ställs krav ifrån arbetsgivarhåll att inte tillåta stridsåtgärder på arbetsplatser med personal som ej tillhör den fackliga organisationen. Måhända är det ett led i arbetskraftens frihet att arbeta i andra länder. Blockaden i Vaxholm mot ett byggföretag som hade utländsk arbetskraft hade till exempel omfattats av detta. De svenska fackförbundet ställde krav på svenskt kollektivavtal, vilket företaget inte hade, men väl egna avtal. I detta fall överstiger kostnaden för advokaterna lönekostnaden för arbetarnas löner ifall de fått vad som motsvaras i svensk lön. Principen ses dock som viktig då både företag och arbetskraft rör sig alltmer gränslöst inom Europeiska unionen. Inte bara ifrån arbetsgivarhåll utan även ifrån advokater ställs krav på en förändrad arbetsrätt – innan vi blir tvungna att ändra. Jag har intervjuat sjukhusdirektören och en divisionschef. En politiker har gjort sin röst hörd men en tidigare projektledare har avböjt och istället hänvisat till Karolinska. De fackli-ga organisationerna Sktf och Ledarna, kanske mest förvånande, har lyst med sin frånvaro på information gällande konsekvenser av fusionen för den fackliga verksamheten. Denna uppsats gör inte anspråk på hela sanningen, då en arbetsrätt i förändring är kom-plex och mångbottnad, men väl en del av den.

No description available.

Possible fuel cycle scenarios for a helium-cooled, sub-critical, fast reactor with a fusion neutron source for the transmutation of spent nuclear fuel have been analyzed. The transmutation rate was set by the 3000MWth fission power output. The primary objective was to achieve greater than 90% burn of the transuranic (TRU) fuel obtained from spent nuclear fuel. A secondary objective was to examine the possibility of achieving this deep burn without reprocessing after initial fabrication of the TRU into coated particle TRISO fuel. Four sets of 5-batch fuel cycle scenarios, differing in the constraints imposed on the beginning of cycle (BOC) k-eff and the end of cycle (EOC) neutron source strength (characterized by the fusion neutron source power level), were evaluated. In scenario A, BOC k-eff was required to be 0.95 and EOC Pfus less than 200 MWth was required. In scenario B, the restriction was removed to allow less reactive BOC fuel loadings, while the 200 MW upper limit on EOC Pfus was retained. It was found that the primary objective of greater than 90% TRU burn-up could be achieved by repeatedly reprocessing the TRISO TRU fuel particles to remove fission products and add fresh TRU makeup at the end of each 5-batch burn cycle, without needing to increase the fusion neutron source power above 100 MWth when the BOC k-eff is restricted to 0.95. The secondary objective of obviating processing could only be accomplished when the restriction was removed and recycling was employed or when both EOC Pfus and BOC k-eff restrictions were removed in a single-pass deep burn fuel cycle. In scenario C, with both the BOC k-eff limit and the fusion power limit unrestricted, greater than 90% TRU burn-up was achieved without reprocessing the TRISO TRU fuel particles, which could then be buried intact in a high-level waste repository, but a neutron source rate of 3370 MWth was required. In scenario D, with only the BOC k-eff limit unrestricted, greater than 90% TRU burn-up was achieved without reprocessing by the continuous recycle of TRISO particles through the reactor.

The heat transfer performance of the Helium-cooled Multi-jet (HEMJ) divertor was investigated. The HEMJ design uses impinging jets to significantly enhance its heat transfer capability. The convective heat transfer coefficient predicted by computational fluid dynamics software packages is on the order of 50,000 W/(m2-K). The high predicted values of the convective heat transfer coefficient necessitated experimental validation, which was the focus of this investigation. A test section which simulates the thermal performance of the HEMJ divertor was designed, constructed, and instrumented for testing an in air flow loop. The operating conditions of the air flow loop were chosen to match the non-dimensional operating conditions expected for the HEMJ divertor in a post-ITER fusion power plant. The air flow loop experiments were performed for mass flow rates of 2.0 g/s to 8.0 g/s and with incident nominal heat fluxes of 0.8 MW/m2 and 1.0 MW/m2. The angular variation of the heat transfer coefficient was also investigated. Numerical simulations which matched the experimental operating conditions were performed using the computational fluid dynamics software package, FLUENT® 6.2. Comparisons of the experimental and numerical pressure drop, temperature, and heat transfer coefficient were made. The experimental results agreed with the numerical predictions for all operating conditions in this investigation. This provided a strong degree of confidence in using the FLUENT® software package to analyze the HEMJ divertor design.

Wireless sensor network(WSN) is made up of a large number which are deployed in the environment to collect observations. Each sensor node preprocesses and extracts information from the raw observations. Each sensor node also has the ability to communicate with other sensor nodes or a fusion center via wireless channels. Many aspects of WSNs have been investigated recently, such as efficient routing protocols, distributed data compression and transmission, and collaborative signal processing. We investigate the information processing task at the fusion center. Radio transmission is one of the major power consumer, and the required transmission power not linear in distance between the transmitter and the receiver. Hence in this thesis, we consider a decision made at local sensor may need to go through multi- hop for minimal energy consumption. Sensor and relay employed decode and forward protocol. We investigate how to transmission reliability and how to combine the reliability and we proposed a fusion rule when observations are encoded by Turbo code.

The connection between the devices of optical fiber system is an important part of optical communication equipment. For reducing the power loss in single transfer process, we couple the light from one device to another by connecting with splicer and connector. In the optical fiber communication system, the fiber must be coupled with light source or detectors and optical amplifier. The way connect fiber by fusion splice is different from the mechanical connectors, which is small joint volume, higher mechanical strength and much stable after connecting. It is more suitable to apply on micro-package optical communication device. In the study, we confer with the temperature profile and thermal stress of fusion splice module during splicing Cr4+¡GYAG crystal fiber and single mode fiber by numerical simulations. Through adjusting the parameters, like fusion current, fusion place and the processes of splice to examine the trend of change of temperature and thermal stress.

These developmental grade samples were supplied by the Union Chemical Laboratories of Industrial Technology Research Institute(ITRI). The compositions of a series of copolyesters were identified by C1-NMR and H1-NMR. The ethylene terephthalate(ET) units are 8.9¡B33.7¡B37.9% and trimethylene terephthalate(PT) units are 91.1¡B66.3¡B62.1% in the copolyesters with sample codes of C2¡BC3¡BC4. Differential scanning calorimeter(DSC) was used to study the isothermal crystallization kinetics and melting behaviors and Polarizing Microscope(PLM) was used to study the spherulite growth rates and spherulite patterns. The Hoffman-Weeks linear plot and M-X nonlinear plot gave an equilibrium meiting temperature(Tmo ) oC of C2¡BC3¡BC4 are (240.6¡B275.5)¡B(208.8¡B247.0)¡B(194.3¡B229.4). The growth rates (£gm/s )of different samples in the different crystallination temperature(Tc) oC are C2(0.614~0.061, 180~207)¡BC3(0.112~0.021, 130~166)¡BC4(0.0213~0.003, 120~160). From the different equilibrium meiting temperature(Tmo ) and different T¡Û = ( Tg-30, Tg-51.6 oC) to analysis the regime transition temperature (T¢º¡÷¢») in units of oC are C2(234.0¡B237.1¡B240.6¡B275.5¡A195.9¡Ó0.3, 196.2¡Ó0.4)¡BC3(193.1¡B198.9¡B208.8¡B247.0¡A147.5¡Ó0.2, 147.5¡Ó0.1)¡BC4(184.1¡B187.9¡B194.3¡B229.4¡A133.3¡Ó0.4, 133.6¡Ó0.2). Compare the results with the results that using the half-time of crystallization(t1/2) from DSC (C2(193.6 oC)¡BC3(147.3 oC)¡BC4(1140.4 oC)). It can find that C2 is over 2.3 and 2.6 oC and C3 is the same and C4 is under 6.8 and 7.1 oC. From the morphology of spherulite patterns and regime transition temperature (T¢º¡÷¢») oC, the results indicated that the change from the morphology is closed to regime transition temperature. Regular spherlites were exhibited at temperature(Tc) between 180 and 196 oC and banded spherulites were observed between 197 and 208 oC in the C2. The band spacing increase with increasing crystallization temperature. Regular spherlites were exhibited at temperature(Tc) between 130 and 147 oC and banded spherulites were observed between 148 and 172 oC in the C3. The band spacing increase with increasing crystallization temperature. Regular spherlites were exhibited at temperature(Tc) between 120 and 134 oC and banded spherulites were observed between 135 and 160 oC in the C4. The band spacing increase with increasing crystallization temperature. Combine the results of M-X plot and spherulites pattern and melting behaviors at a heating rate of 80 oC/min . It indicated that the regime transition temperature (T¢¹¡÷¢º) oC are in the range of crystallization temperature of C2¡BC3¡BC4 are (210~213¡B174~178¡B160~164 oC). The heat of fusion (¡µHu) of C3 is 4.88¡Ó0.06 kcal/mol and B is 1.47¡Ó0.05 cal/c.c from the experimental. The heat of fusion(¡µHu) of C4 is 2.56¡Ó0.22 kcal/mol and B is 4.45¡Ó0.36 cal/c.c from the experimental. Compare the results with PET(¡µHu = 5.6 kcal/mol) and PTT(¡µHu = 7.2 kcal/mol). It indicated that PTT > PET > C3 > C4.