Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) aids the driver by providing information or automating the driving related tasks to improve driver comfort, reduce workload and improve safety. The vehicle senses its external environment using sensors, building a representation of the world used by the control systems. In on-road applications, the perception focuses on establishing the location of other road participants such as vehicles and pedestrians and identifying the road trajectory. Perception in the off-road environment is more complex, as the structure found in urban environments is absent. Off-road perception deals with the estimation of surface topography and surface type, which are the factors that will affect vehicle behaviour in unstructured environments. Off-road perception has seldom been explored in automotive context. For autonomous off-road driving, the perception solutions are primarily related to robotics and not directly applicable in the ADAS domain due to the different goals of unmanned autonomous systems, their complexity and the cost of employed sensors. Such applications consider only the impact of the terrain on the vehicle safety and progress but do not account for the driver comfort and assistance. This work addresses the problem of processing vision sensor data to extract the required information about the terrain. The main focus of this work is on the perception task with the constraints of automotive sensors and the requirements of the ADAS systems. By providing a semantic representation of the off-road environment including terrain attributes such as terrain type, description of the terrain topography and surface roughness, the perception system can cater for the requirements of the next generation of off-road ADAS proposed by Land Rover. Firstly, a novel and computationally efficient terrain recognition method was developed. The method facilitates recognition of low friction grass surfaces in real-time with high accuracy, by applying machine learning Support Vector Machine with illumination invariant normalised RGB colour descriptors. The proposed method was analysed and its performance was evaluated experimentally in off-road environments. Terrain recognition performance was evaluated on a variety of different surface types including grass, gravel and tarmac, showing high grass detection performance with accuracy of 97%. Secondly, a terrain geometry identification method was proposed which facilitates semantic representation of the terrain in terms of macro terrain features such as slopes, crest and ditches. The terrain geometry identification method processes 3D information reconstructed from stereo imagery and constructs a compact grid representation of the surface topography. This representation is further processed to extract object representation of slopes, ditches and crests. Thirdly, a novel method for surface roughness identification was proposed. The surface roughness descriptor is then further used to recommend a vehicle velocity, which will maintain passenger comfort. Surface roughness is described by the Power Spectral Density of the surface profile which correlates with the acceleration experienced by the vehicle. The surface roughness descriptor is then mapped onto vehicle speed recommendation so that the speed of the vehicle can be adapted in anticipation of the surface roughness. Terrain geometry and surface roughness identification performance were evaluated on a range of off-road courses with varying topology showing the capability of the system to correctly identify terrain features up to 20 m ahead of the vehicle and analyse surface roughness up to 15 m ahead of the vehicle. The speed was recommended correctly within +/- 5 kph. Further, the impact of the perception system on the speed adaptation was evaluated, showing the improvements in speed adaptation allowing for greater passenger comfort. The developed perception components facilitated the development of new off-road ADAS systems and were successfully applied in prototype vehicles. The proposed off-road ADAS are planned to be introduced in future generations of Land Rover products. The benefits of this research also included new Intellectual Property generated for Jaguar Land Rover. In the wider context, the enhanced off-road perception capability may facilitate further development of off-road automated driving and off-road autonomy within the constraints of the automotive platform.

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The possible proactive inhibition effect of long-term past experiences upon the reproduction of discrete measurements was investigated. Ten subjects were assigned to each of the eight cells of a 2x2x2 factorial design. The two retention intervals were, 0 sec. and 30 sec; the two locations, 60° and 120°; the two movement lengths, 10° and 50°. Each subject received five standard-reproduction trials with an intertrial interval of 30 sec. The biasing effect of long-term past experiences measured by constant error, was not significant. Different target locations did not influence the intraindividual variability of a given movement length. Significant differences were obtained between movement lengths for both constant error, in that the shorter movement was overshot to a greater extent than the longer movement; and variable error, showing a greater variability for the longer movement. The significant increase in variable error over the retention intervals indicates that the memory trace weakened as time elapsed between the presentation of the standard and its reproduction. / Education, Faculty of / Curriculum and Pedagogy (EDCP), Department of / Graduate

The experiment was designed to divide the attention demands of a total motor response time into two components, the initiation of a response and the execution of a movement. The purpose was to determine the effects of movement complexity on the relative degree of attention required during these component processes. Six male right handed S's were tested in a situation involving two discrete reactions to two stimuli separated by a short time interval. The first stimulus was associated with the performance of a primary motor task that was varied in complexity and that was performed with the S's right hand. The second or probe stimulus was associated with a simple reaction time performed with the left hand. The probe stimulus was presented during the S's performance of the primary task and the reaction to this stimulus was used as an index of the attentional demands of the primary task. The results of the primary task indicate that the reaction time (RT) component of the response was not a function of movement complexity, although there was an apparent difference between the simplest response and responses of greater complexity. Movement complexity affected the movement time (MT) component of the response in that MT increased as complexity increased. The second or probe reaction time (PRT) was delayed when the probe occurred during the initiation of the response and during the execution of the response. When the probe was presented during the initiation of the response, the PRT was related directly to the RT, and when presented during the execution of the response, the PRT related directly to MT. PRT was also seen to vary throughout the range of movement with the longest PRTs occurring at the beginning and end of a movement terminated at a target. These results provide evidence for a model of human performance that suggests component processes of limited capacity in that the attention demands of initiating and executing a motor task tend to vary with task complexity and position of the responding limb in moving to a target. Further, the results indicated that in general RT and MT can be used to assess the attention demands of a particular motor response. / Education, Faculty of / Curriculum and Pedagogy (EDCP), Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this study was to assess the effects that a specialized program in which emphasis was placed on fine and gross motor skill training had on the reading readiness of a group of grade one boys and girls deficient in perceptual-motor skills. Ten grade one students were selected from the Sir Richard McBride Elementary School in Vancouver. These pupils were chosen on the basis of their low scores recorded on the Metropolitan Reading Readiness Test, Form R and the Winter Haven Perceptual Copy Forms Test. A group of ten pupils, which would act as a control group, was selected from Laura Secord Elementary School. The two groups were matched according to age, sex, the results of the reading readiness test, and the perceptual forms test. The experimental group received eighteen weeks of special motor training which was carried on for sixty minutes a day, five days a week. The control group received regular classroom instruction during this same sixty minute interval. At the completion of the training period all subjects were given the Metropolitan Reading Readiness Test Form S and the Winter Haven Perceptual Copy Forms Test. Descriptive relationships were also drawn from data obtained from the parents’ interview, homeroom teacher's questionnaire, personal observation and an 8mm. film. The results of the reading readiness and perceptual form tests of the control and the experimental groups involved in the study were not statistically significant from each other and there was no real difference in reading readiness between the groups at the end of the study. The results of the interviews indicated that the majority of parents of the children in the experimental and control groups were either semi or unskilled workers, were not involved in community organizations or clubs, and had a relatively low educational level. They did not participate in physical or recreational activities themselves or with their child and did not encourage their children to participate in sports activities. Similarly these parents spent most of their time watching television, reading little, and regarded education solely as a means of obtaining a decent job. Although most of the children in the study had easy access to recreational facilities, little use was made of them due to the restrictions placed on the child by their parents. The majority of the children in the study, moreoever, were classed by their partents as being extremely hypo or hyper active, having an extremely short attention span, having few close friends, and experiencing sibling rivalry. They did not participate in any form of organized sport. The results of the homeroom teacher's questionnaire showed that the majority of students in the experimental group changed a great deal in relation to their attitude and interaction within the class. They improved in their ability to work and play within the classroom, with their teacher, and with their classmates. The students in the control group, however, were less willing to participate effectively within the classroom. That is, their attitude towards their teacher, school work, and school mates had changed little over the eighteen weeks of the study. Finally, it was noted that towards the end of the training session the subjects in the experimental group improved their fine and gross motor skills. Moreover, as these children met with unaccustomed success their attitude reflected a more aggressive and confident nature which appeared to carry over to their speech, mannerisms, dress, and reaction within the class. Their attitude and interaction to the class changed markedly, they were willing to participate in class activities, they were able to work for longer periods of time independently, and their new found confidence carried over into all phases of classroom activity. The subjects in the control group, however, had not improved their fine and gross motor skills. They were much less aggressive and confident than those subjects in the experimental group. They were unwilling to participate in class activities, or work independently for any length of time effectively. It was therefore concluded that the socio-economic status of the childs' parents, as well as, the parents' attitude towards education may have hindered the normal development of their child. Similarly, it was also concluded that the program of special motor training given to the experimental group may have accounted for the improvement in skills involving laterality, directionality, balance, coordination, and various perceptual skills. This improvement in turn, increased the aggressiveness and confidence of the slow learner interacting with his class, and his classroom activity. / Education, Faculty of / Curriculum and Pedagogy (EDCP), Department of / Graduate

The purpose of this thesis was to explore the behavior in power sharing and control of Hybrid Motor Drives. In this research, a solar-based hybrid adjustable-speed pump, which has been developed in the laboratory, was used to investigate the power-sharing in hybrid (dual-input) motor-drive systems. The laboratory test setup contained a DC-DC module connected to the DC-bus capacitors of a 2.5hp 230V PWM-based adjustable-speed motor-drive. The experimental results demonstrate that the power-sharing of a Photovoltaic (PV) array/DC-DC converter is not a function of motor speed in hybrid solar-based motor-drives, as long as the power contribution of the AC-grid stays above zero. In these conditions, the PV-DC-DC module behaves like a current source, and the dynamic behavior of the motor is decoupled from the dynamic behavior of the AC-grid, given that the PV-DC-DC module can provide the motor load.

Orientador: Luiz Fernando Milanez / Dissertação (mestrado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Engenharia de Campinas / Made available in DSpace on 2018-07-16T07:09:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Souza_EduardoGodoyde_M.pdf: 4233314 bytes, checksum: 431da8392afee63bfdeb9c898bb351a7 (MD5) Previous issue date: 1987 / Resumo: A partir de dados obtidos em ensaios de desempenho na tomada de potência de três tratores agrícolas foram propostos três métodos para a avaliação indireta do torque de motores diesel: medição do consumo de combustível, medição da temperatura dos gases de escape e medição da posição da alavanca de acionamento da bomba injetora. A medição do consumo de combustível foi feita utilizando-se um medidor digital com pré-fixação de volume de combustível a ser utilizado e leitura do tempo gasto. A variável independente, neste caso, para a modelagem do torque foi a massa de combustível injetada por cilindro e por ciclo. A temperatura dos gases de escape foi medida utilizando-se um termo-elemento. A variável independente, neste caso, foi a diferença entre a temperatura de escape e a temperatura do ar de admissão. A posição da alavanca de acionamento da bomba injetora foi avaliada através da rotação máxima livre do motor, sendo esta rotação tomada como a variável independente. A análise estatística dos resultados mostrou que na modelagem matemática, em todos os métodos, deveria ser incluida a rotação do motor que se mostrou significativa. Foram feitas considerações a respeito da utilização de cada método em função da precisão, custo e facilidade de adaptação. / Abstract: Three methods for indirect evaluation of the torque of diesel engines were proposed from data obtained in performance tests in the power take-off of agricultural tractors: measurement of the fuel consumption, measurement of exhaust gas temperature and measurement of the position of the fuel pump control lever. The fuel consumption was measured by means of a digital sensor that records the time taken for a fixed amount of fuel to be burned. The independent variable in this case for the mathematical modeling of the torque was the mass of fuel delivered per cylinder per cycle. The exhaust gas temperature was me1sured by a thermo-couple. The independent variable here was the difference between the exhaust temperature and the admission air temperature. The position of the fuel pump control lever was evaluated as a function of the engine maximum engine speed, with this speed being taken as the independent variable. A statistical analysis of the results indicated that in the mathematical modeling, for all methods, the engine speed should be included as an additional independent variable. Considerations were made regarding the utilization of each method as function of accuracy, costs and adaptability. / Mestrado / Mestre em Engenharia Mecânica

Clinically significant motor impairment affects 50-100% of those with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Although not included in the diagnostic criteria, research suggests that motor impairments appear during infancy, precipitate the onset and progression of classical autistic symptomology, and are associated with the severity of autist deficits. Presently, few studies directly address motor impairment in ASD. In those that do, physical education, exercise, and exergaming interventions have been found to enhance motor skill proficiency. Little is known about the effect of unstructured physical activity on motor skills in children with autism. Thus, this pilot study sought to examine the impact of unstructured, one-on-one, physically active play on motor skill proficiency as defined by the Test of Gross Motor Development-2 (TGMD-2) in autistic children between ages 3 and 10. Twenty, one-on-one, 60-minute play-based physical activity sessions were administered over a 10-week period (2x/week). The physical activity environment was arranged according to the North Carolina Treatment and Education of Autistic and Related Communications Handicapped Children (TEACCH) guidelines. Session structure precluded skill teaching and sought to elicit gross and fine motor activity within physical activity opportunity stations, but without regard to type or intensity of activity. A comparison of pre-and post-intervention TGMD-2 scores captured motor skill outcomes. Findings suggest that unstructured physically active play is not sufficient to improve global motor skill competency in young children with autism. However, active play fostered significant improvements in two in running skill scores. The TGMD-2 is designed to assess those skills that would foster participation in physical education and recreational settings. Improved running may advance play-abilities and support other forms of activity. Future research should consider using assessments more sensitive to acute changes in motor skill efficacy, measurement of time spent in physically active play, and qualitative analysis of parent-perceived outcome and improvement.

In this diploma thesis, universal inverter was manufactured and successfully tested with DC, BLDC and AC motor. Inverter is composed of the power board for driving extralow voltage supplied electric motors (from +12V to +24V) and control board with microcontroller MC56F8257. There is also explained the principle of driving DC, BLDC and AC motor as well as description of the most frequently used peripherals and inverter. components