Abstract: A movable camera travels along an inspection path for optically inspecting an inspection surface of an object for defect detection. In planning the inspection path, a set of viewpoints on the inspection surface is generated. Each viewpoint is associated with a patch, which is a largest area of the inspection surface within a field of view (FOV) of the camera when the camera is located over the viewpoint for capturing an image of FOV. An effective region of the patch is advantageously predicted by a neural network according to a three-dimensional geometric characterization of the patch such that the predicted effective region is valid for defect detection based on the captured image. A valid area is one whose corresponding area on the captured image is not blurred and is neither underexposed nor overexposed. The inspection path is determined according to respective effective regions associated with the set of viewpoints.

Abstract: A lossless data compressor prevents normalization overruns on-the-fly as symbol occurrence counts are rounded to generate symbol frequencies, allowing an encoding table generator to generate encoding table entries without waiting for the symbol frequency table to finish filling. Rounding errors are accumulated as symbols are normalized and compensated for by reducing a symbol frequency when the symbol frequency is at least 2 and the accumulated errors have exceeded a threshold. The symbol frequency is also reduced when the number of remaining states in the encoding table is insufficient for a number of remaining unprocessed symbols and states for a current encoding table entry. Since error compensation occurs as symbols are being normalized, encoding table generation is not forced to wait for all symbols in the block to be processed, reducing latency. Three pipeline stages can operate on three input blocks: symbol counting, normalization/error compensation/encoding table generation, and data encoding.

Abstract: Described is a method of identifying a short-circuit (SC) like event in a circuit breaker (CB). The method comprises sampling an incoming current to the CB to determine a maximum value of a slope of a curve of the incoming current. The method includes sampling the incoming current again before a level of the incoming current reaches a predetermined, preset, selected, or calculated SC threshold value THSC for the CB. The method involves determining from the sampled incoming current that a value of the slope of the incoming current has changed from its maximum slope value to a lower slope value to thereby determine that the incoming current is indicative of a SC like event and does not comprise a real SC event.

Abstract: Used batteries are screened based on a measured Sectional Constant-Current Impulse Ratio (SCCIR). A used battery is partially charged over a small voltage range using a Constant Current (CC) until a voltage target is reached, and the current integrated to obtain the CC charge applied, Qcc. Then the battery continues to be charged using a Constant Voltage (CV) of the voltage target until the charging current falls to a midrange current target before the battery is fully charged. The current is integrated over the CV period to obtain the CV charge applied, Qcv. The measured SCCIR is the ratio of Qcc to (Qcc+Qcv) and is input to a calibration curve function to obtain a modeled State of Health (SOH) value for sorting. The calibration curve function is obtained by aging new batteries to obtain SCCIR and SOH data that are modeled using a neural network.

Abstract: An apparatus installed in a head-mounted display (HMD) has a coupling prism formed by packing diagonally-reflective (DR) prisms together. Each DR prism has an internal diagonal plane that is at least partially reflective. A captured image of eye or environmental scene received by a DR prism is reflected to an image-leaving end surface thereof. Image-leaving end surfaces of all DR prisms are oriented along a same direction to optically multiplex the captured images to create a multi-channel image. An imaging sensor on the coupling prism images the multi-channel image, avoiding inter-channel interference caused by spillover of captured-image signals while allowing one imaging sensor instead of multiple ones to image the captured images. A micro display displays a visible image to one DR prism, whose internal diagonal plane reflects the visible image along a direction towards an eye. Hence, the apparatus also enables image displaying to a HMD wearer.

Abstract: Systems and methods in which a thermal conductive composite comprises a non-uniform heat absorption profile of a thermal reactive material are described. Thermal conductive composites herein may be utilized in thermal regulatory modules with a gradient structure configured to transfer heat energy away from an area near a heat source to an area with a relatively large latent heat absorbing capacity. Thermal conductive material may be provided in a frame structure having lower porosity in a first region more near a heat source and higher porosity in a second region more distant from the heat source. A thermal reactive material may be deposited so as to be disposed within the pores of the thermal conductive material frame structure wherein the density of the thermal reactive material in the first region of the thermal conductive composite is lower than that at the second region of the thermal conductive composite.

Abstract: An iterative multi-image camera orientation estimation comprising: capturing an image of a scene before the camera; detecting line segments in the scene; computing a maximum likelihood (ML) camera orientation by maximizing a likelihood objective by rotating the camera's X-Y-Z coordinate system such that it is being optimally aligned with the line segments in at least two of the frontal, the lateral, and the vertical orthogonal directions; estimating a maximum a-posteriori (MAP) camera orientation that maximizes an a-posteriori objective such that the MAP camera orientation is an optimal value in between the priori camera orientation and the ML camera orientation, and is closer to the one with smaller uncertainty; iterating the multi-image camera orientation estimation with the priori camera orientation and its corresponding priori camera orientation uncertainty set to the computed MAP camera orientation and its corresponding uncertainty respectively until the uncertainty is lower than a threshold.

Abstract: The present invention provides a method for achieving high availability of stream control transport protocol (SCTP) connection in a microservice system. The microservice system comprises at least one access network and a core network. The access network includes at least one base station comprising at least one SCTP peer. The core network includes at least one non-SCTP-capable microservice instance acting as a SCTP service client, multiple SCTP-capable microservice instances, a service node manager and a service delegator.

Abstract: A data-compression analyzer can rapidly make a binary decision to compress or not compress an input data block or can use a slower neural network to predict the block's compression ratio with a regression model. A Concentration Value (CV) that is the sum of the squares of the frequencies and a Number of Zero (NZ) symbols are calculated from an un-sorted symbol frequency table. A rapid decision to compress is signaled when their product CV*NZ exceeds a horizontal threshold THH. During training, CV*NZ is plotted as a function of compression ratio C % for many training data blocks. Different test values of THH are applied to the plot to determine true and false positive rates that are plotted as a Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve. The point on the ROC curve having the largest Youden index is selected as the optimum THH for use in future binary decisions.

Abstract: A wearable electronic device including: a first portion and a second portion. The first portion includes a first conductive area on a first inner surface of the first portion and a third conductive area on a first outer surface of the first portion. The second portion includes one or more second conductive areas on a second outer surface of the second portion and a fourth conductive area on a second inner surface of the second portion, wherein the first portion is connected to the second portion. A circuit unit is disposed in a second space of the second portion, wherein the circuit unit is configured to enable an input/output unit of the circuit unit in response to the first conductive area and the second conductive areas are triggered.

Abstract: A level shifter circuit uses standard n-channel and p-channel transistors except for a pair of Lateral-Diffusion Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (LDMOS) transistors that have an added lateral diffusion under the gate between the source and the conduction channel, increasing the breakdown voltage. The source of each LDMOS transistor connects to a drain of a transient differential transistor that has its gate driven by a oneshot that generates a pulse after an input transition. After the pulse ends a holding differential transistor draws a smaller bias current from the LDMOS transistors. The source of each LDMOS transistor connects to the drain and gate of a p-channel sensing transistor that drives gates of mirror transistors generating mirrored currents to cross-coupled n-channel mirror transistors that drive both terminals of a bistable latch that holds the output using a floating ground between driver transistors of a Buck converter switched by the bistable latch.

Abstract: An On-Off Shift Keying (OOK) receiver has non-continuous Automatic Gain Control (AGC) that sets gain at the beginning of each frame and locks the gain setting for the remainder of the frame, preventing OOK data from causing AGC loop instability. An AGC controller initializes to maximum the gain settings for a Low-Noise Amplifier (LNA), Low-Pass Filter (LPF), and a Programmable Gain Amplifier (PGA) in series that power a rectifier generating a voltage output to a 1/0 data decision circuit. A level detector compares the voltage output to two thresholds. When both thresholds are exceeded, the AGC controller steps down gain settings until the voltage output is between the two thresholds, when the gain settings are locked for the remainder of the current frame. A frame detector resets the AGC controller between frames when a long series of 0 data between frames is detected. LNA gain is reduced last.

Abstract: A transient blockchain proxy server consolidates many individual requests to add data to a blockchain by aggregating hashed data from these requests and sending the aggregated hashed data to the blockchain network as a single request. The blockchain network adds a new block to the blockchain with the aggregated hashed data and returns a transaction identifier for the new block to the transient blockchain proxy server, which passes the transaction identifier back to all the requestors who then can directly use the blockchain network to verify the hashed data using the transaction identifier. The transient blockchain proxy server buffers all incoming requests until one of the pending requests reaches a send timepoint that is the blockchain network delay plus a buffer time before a guaranteed time of verification. All incoming requests are then consolidated and sent as a single transaction to the blockchain network. Tiered verification-time services are enabled.

Abstract: Embodiments of the present disclosure provide hierarchical, differential privacy enhancements to federated, machine learning. Local machine learning models may be generated and/or trained by data owners participating in the federated learning framework based on their respective data sets. Noise corresponding to and satisfying a first privacy loss requirement are introduced to the data owners' respective data sets, and noise corresponding to and satisfying a first privacy loss requirement are introduced to the local models generated and/or trained by the data owners. The data owners transmit model data corresponding to their respective local models to a coordinator, which in turn aggregates the data owners' model data. After introducing noise corresponding to and satisfying a third privacy loss requirement to the aggregated model data, the coordinator transmits the aggregated model data to the data owners to facilitate updating and/or re-training on their respective machine learning models.

Abstract: A fiber-optic sensor matt detects movements of a person on the matt that cause microbending of a fiber-optic cable that is arranged into a symmetric pair of radial ring groups within the matt. There are no cross-over points or overlapping of the fiber-optic cable within the symmetric pair of radial ring groups that could cause fiber wear and noisy readings. Microbending of the fiber-optic cable pressed into a mesh modulates the light intensity received, which is analyzed to extract both respiration and heart BallistoCardioGram (BCG) waveforms by convolution with Daubechies dB5 wavelet and scaling functions. The reconstructed level-4 detail waveform is output as the extracted BCG, while the reconstructed level-6 approximation waveform is output as the extracted respiration waveform. Respiration and heart rates and variations can be generated from the extracted waveforms. An integrated Fast Wavelet Transform (FWT) using dB5 wavelet thus generates both respiration rate and heart rate.

Abstract: Computer implemented methods and computerized apparatus are provided for global registration between a first point cloud and a second point cloud obtained by a scanning device on an identical spatial scene at two separate instances. The method comprises extracting a first set of discriminative line-pairs from the first point cloud and a second set of discriminative line-pairs from the second point cloud, wherein a discriminative line-pair is a line-pair having high discriminative power compared to a randomly selected line-pair. In some embodiments, then a plurality of matching line-pair groups between the two sets of discriminative line-pairs are identified in accordance with one thresholding criterion related to between-line relationship, line geometry and line location; and a compass angle criterion related to compass errors of the scanning device. The method further comprises finding most reliable correspondence between the two point clouds by voting and then computing a global transformation matrix.

Abstract: The present invention provides an apparatus and method for automatic generation and update of a knowledge graph from multi-modal sources. The apparatus comprises a conversation parsing module configured for updating a dynamic information word set VD with labelled words generated from extracted from the multi-modal sources; updating a static information word set VS based on extracted schema of relations extracted from the multi-modal sources; and generating pairs of question and answer based on the dynamic information word set VD, the static information word set VS and the one or more sentence patterns; and a knowledge graph container configured for updating a knowledge graph based on the extracted entities of interest and schema of relations. Therefore, an efficient and cost-effective way for question decomposition, query chain construction and entity association from unstructured data is achieved.

Abstract: The invention provides a power converter apparatus for converting an alternating current (AC) power input to a direct current (DC) power output. The apparatus comprises a plurality of n single-phase power converting circuits arranged in parallel, where n is equal to or greater than 2, wherein one of said n single-phase power converting circuits comprises a single-stage AC/DC converter module having an operating AC/DC converter; and each of a remaining n?1 of said single-phase power converting circuits comprises a two-stage converter module having an AC/DC converter as an input stage and a DC/DC transformer as an output stage.

Abstract: A display inspection system for inspecting a light beam emitted from a panel with pixels positioned at several focal planes is provided. The display inspection system includes a focus tunable lens adjustable in a focal distance for focusing at the panel, a first sensing unit for receiving the light beam, a reduced aberration optical system arranged between the focus tunable lens and the first sensing unit for focusing at the first sensing unit, and one or more optical elements placed within a back focal length of the reduced aberration optical system. The reduced aberration optical system comprises a first serial cascade lens group of a first aplanatic lens and a first doublet lens for correcting an optical aberration. The first aplanatic lens and the first doublet lens are co-configured that the back focal length is extended in a manner that the light beam is incident to the first sensing unit.

Abstract: A method for analyzing environmental sounds to identify repeating noises due to power equipment for purposes of controlling noise pollution is disclosed. Ambient sounds are sampled with microphones and the resulting data analyzed by an edge computing device. The samples are compared to stored data with a convolutional neural network by the edge computing device which also performs pitch shifting and cycle shifting to reduce false negatives. Positive results are reported via LoRa and/or 4G to a cloud platform and/or backend server.