Optical Odor Imaging by Fluorescence Probes

2012 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hirotaka Matsuo ◽  
◽  
Yudai Furusawa ◽  
Masashi Imanishi ◽  
Seiichi Uchida ◽  
...  

Odor gas detection is important for the detection of explosives, environmental sensing, biometrics, foodstuffs and a comfortable life. Such odor-source localizations is an active research area for robotics. In this study, we tried to detect odor chemicals with an optical method that can be applied for the spatiotemporal detection of odor. We used four types of fluorescence dyes; tryptophan, quinine sulfate, acridine orange, and 1-anilinonaphthalene-8-sulfonate (ANS). As analyses, we measured the following four odor chemicals, 2-furaldehyde, vanillin, acetophenone, and benzaldehyde. The fluorescence-quenching mechanism of PET (Photoinduced Electron Transfer) or FRET (Fluorescence Resonance Electron Transfer), which occur between fluorescence dyes and odor compounds, could prevent unintended detection of various odorants that is caused by their unspecific adsorption onto the detecting materials. The fluorescence changes were then observed. Thus, we could detect the odor substances through fluorescent quenching by using the fluorescence dyes. Odor information could be obtained by response patterns across all the fluorescence dyes. Moreover, we captured odor images with a cooled CCD camera. Shapes of the targets that emitted odor could be roughly recognized by the odor-shape images. From the spatiotemporal images of odors, twodimensional odor expanse could be obtained.

2017 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Elliott ◽  
D. Dafydd Jones

The single-molecule properties of metalloproteins have provided an intensely active research area in recent years. This brief review covers some of the techniques used to prepare, measure and analyse the electron transfer properties of metalloproteins, concentrating on scanning tunnelling microscopy-based techniques and advances in attachment of proteins to electrodes.


Author(s):  
W.F. Marshall ◽  
K. Oegema ◽  
J. Nunnari ◽  
A.F. Straight ◽  
D.A. Agard ◽  
...  

The ability to image cells in three dimensions has brought about a revolution in biological microscopy, enabling many questions to be asked which would be inaccessible without this capability. There are currently two major methods of three dimensional microscopy: laser-scanning confocal microscopy and widefield-deconvolution microscopy. The method of widefield-deconvolution uses a cooled CCD to acquire images from a standard widefield microscope, and then computationally removes out of focus blur. Using such a scheme, it is easy to acquire time-lapse 3D images of living cells without killing them, and to do so for multiple wavelengths (using computer-controlled filter wheels). Thus, it is now not only feasible, but routine, to perform five dimensional microscopy (three spatial dimensions, plus time, plus wavelength).Widefield-deconvolution has several advantages over confocal microscopy. The two main advantages are high speed of acquisition (because there is no scanning, a single optical section is acquired at a time by using a cooled CCD camera) and the use of low excitation light levels Excitation intensity can be much lower than in a confocal microscope for three reasons: 1) longer exposures can be taken since the entire 512x512 image plane is acquired in parallel, so that dwell time is not an issue, 2) the higher quantum efficiently of a CCD detect over those typically used in confocal microscopy (although this is expected to change due to advances in confocal detector technology), and 3) because no pinhole is used to reject light, a much larger fraction of the emitted light is collected. Thus we can typically acquire images with thousands of photons per pixel using a mercury lamp, instead of a laser, for illumination. The use of low excitation light is critical for living samples, and also reduces bleaching. The high speed of widefield microscopy is also essential for time-lapse 3D microscopy, since one must acquire images quickly enough to resolve interesting events.


2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 1199-1211
Author(s):  
Jennifer Parker ◽  
Kristen Miller ◽  
Yulei He ◽  
Paul Scanlon ◽  
Bill Cai ◽  
...  

The National Center for Health Statistics is assessing the usefulness of recruited web panels in multiple research areas. One research area examines the use of close-ended probe questions and split-panel experiments for evaluating question-response patterns. Another research area is the development of statistical methodology to leverage the strength of national survey data to evaluate, and possibly improve, health estimates from recruited panels. Recruited web panels, with their lower cost and faster production cycle, in combination with established population health surveys, may be useful for some purposes for statistical agencies. Our initial results indicate that web survey data from a recruited panel can be used for question evaluation studies without affecting other survey content. However, the success of these data to provide estimates that align with those from large national surveys will depend on many factors, including further understanding of design features of the recruited panel (e.g. coverage and mode effects), the statistical methods and covariates used to obtain the original and adjusted weights, and the health outcomes of interest.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (9) ◽  
pp. 323-1-323-8
Author(s):  
Litao Hu ◽  
Zhenhua Hu ◽  
Peter Bauer ◽  
Todd J. Harris ◽  
Jan P. Allebach

Image quality assessment has been a very active research area in the field of image processing, and there have been numerous methods proposed. However, most of the existing methods focus on digital images that only or mainly contain pictures or photos taken by digital cameras. Traditional approaches evaluate an input image as a whole and try to estimate a quality score for the image, in order to give viewers an idea of how “good” the image looks. In this paper, we mainly focus on the quality evaluation of contents of symbols like texts, bar-codes, QR-codes, lines, and hand-writings in target images. Estimating a quality score for this kind of information can be based on whether or not it is readable by a human, or recognizable by a decoder. Moreover, we mainly study the viewing quality of the scanned document of a printed image. For this purpose, we propose a novel image quality assessment algorithm that is able to determine the readability of a scanned document or regions in a scanned document. Experimental results on some testing images demonstrate the effectiveness of our method.


Author(s):  
Bella Yigong Zhang ◽  
Mark Chignell

With the rapidly aging population and the rising number of people living with dementia (PLWD), there is an urgent need for programming and activities that can promote the health and wellbeing of PLWD. Due to staffing and budgetary constraints, there is considerable interest in using technology to support this effort. Serious games for dementia have become a very active research area. However, much of the work is being done without a strong theoretical basis. We incorporate a Montessori approach with highly tactile interactions. We have developed a person-centered design framework for serious games for dementia with initial design recommendations. This framework has the potential to facilitate future strategic design and development in the field of serious games for dementia.


Materials ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (11) ◽  
pp. 2950
Author(s):  
Hongwei Song ◽  
Xinle Li

The most active research area is nanotechnology in cementitious composites, which has a wide range of applications and has achieved popularity over the last three decades. Nanoparticles (NPs) have emerged as possible materials to be used in the field of civil engineering. Previous research has concentrated on evaluating the effect of different NPs in cementitious materials to alter material characteristics. In order to provide a broad understanding of how nanomaterials (NMs) can be used, this paper critically evaluates previous research on the influence of rheology, mechanical properties, durability, 3D printing, and microstructural performance on cementitious materials. The flow properties of fresh cementitious composites can be measured using rheology and slump. Mechanical properties such as compressive, flexural, and split tensile strength reveal hardened properties. The necessary tests for determining a NM’s durability in concrete are shrinkage, pore structure and porosity, and permeability. The advent of modern 3D printing technologies is suitable for structural printing, such as contour crafting and binder jetting. Three-dimensional (3D) printing has opened up new avenues for the building and construction industry to become more digital. Regardless of the material science, a range of problems must be tackled, including developing smart cementitious composites suitable for 3D structural printing. According to the scanning electron microscopy results, the addition of NMs to cementitious materials results in a denser and improved microstructure with more hydration products. This paper provides valuable information and details about the rheology, mechanical properties, durability, 3D printing, and microstructural performance of cementitious materials with NMs and encourages further research.


2013 ◽  
Vol 710 ◽  
pp. 217-220 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fei Wang ◽  
Lei Feng ◽  
Meng Ran Tang ◽  
Ji Yuan Li ◽  
Qing Guo Tang

Synthetic nanomaterials have the disadvantages of large-scale investment, high energy consumption, complex production process and heavy environmental load. Mineral nanomaterials such as sepiolite group mineral nanomaterials are characterized by small size effect, quantum size effect and surface effect. Water treatment application of sepiolite group mineral nanomaterials has become an active research area and showed good development and application prospects. Based on the above reasons, this paper systematically summarizes the water treatment application of sepiolite group mineral nanomaterials, and development trend related to water treatment application of sepiolite group mineral nanomaterials were also proposed.


2001 ◽  
Author(s):  
Naoki Saitoh ◽  
Kenro Kuroki ◽  
Kenji Kurosawa ◽  
Norimitsu Akiba

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (11) ◽  
pp. 3284
Author(s):  
Ingvild B. Espedal ◽  
Asanthi Jinasena ◽  
Odne S. Burheim ◽  
Jacob J. Lamb

Energy storage systems (ESSs) are critically important for the future of electric vehicles. Despite this, the safety and management of ESSs require improvement. Battery management systems (BMSs) are vital components in ESS systems for Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs). One parameter that is included in the BMS is the state-of-charge (SoC) of the battery. SoC has become an active research area in recent years for battery electric vehicle (BEV) LIBs, yet there are some challenges: the LIB configuration is nonlinear, making it hard to model correctly; it is difficult to assess internal environments of a LIB (and this can be different in laboratory conditions compared to real-world conditions); and these discrepancies can lead to raising the instability of the LIB. Therefore, further advancement is required in order to have higher accuracy in SoC estimation in BEV LIBs. SoC estimation is a key BMS feature, and precise modeling and state estimation will improve stable operation. This review discusses current methods use in BEV LIB SoC modelling and estimation. The review culminates in a brief discussion of challenges in BEV LIB SoC prediction analysis.


Author(s):  
L. Merah ◽  
◽  
P. Lorenz ◽  
A. Ali-Pacha ◽  
N. Hadj-Said ◽  
...  

The enormous progress in communication technology has led to a tremendous need to provide an ideal environment for the transmission, storing, and processing of digital multimedia content, where the audio signal takes the lion's share of it. Audio processing covers many diverse fields, its main aim is presenting sound to human listeners. Recently, digital audio processing became an active research area, it covers everything from theory to practice in relation to transmission, compression, filtering, and adding special effects to an audio signal. The aim of this work is to present the real-time implementation steps of some audio effects namely, the echo and Flanger effects on Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA). Today, FPGAs are the best choice in data processing because they provide more flexibility, performance, and huge processing capabilities with great power efficiency. Designs are achieved using the XSG tool (Xilinx System Generator), which makes complex designs easier without prior knowledge of hardware description languages. The paper is presented as a guide with deep technical details about designing and real-time implementation steps. We decided to transfer some experience to designers who want to rapidly prototype their ideas using tools such as XSG. All the designs have been simulated and verified under Simulink/Matlab environment, then exported to Xilinx ISE (Integrated Synthesis Environment) tool for the rest of the implementation steps. The paper also gives an idea of interfacing the FPGA with the LM4550 AC’97 codec using VHDL coding. The ATLYS development board based on Xilinx Spartan-6 LX45 FPGA is used for the real-time implementation.


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