Abstract: A method for monitoring a step motor is provided, wherein the step motor rotates from a start position to an end position and then back to the start position repeatedly. The monitoring method includes: detecting a status signal of the step motor and a command signal received by the step motor in real time; recording a variation of the difference between the command signal and the status signal vs. time as an error data; and determining whether the step motor is starting from the start position, in action, reaching the end position, or returning to the start position according to the status signal and the command signal. If it is determined that the step motor is in action, the error data is recorded as a tracking error, and whether an alarm is issued is determined according to the tracking error.

Abstract: A joint set of linear precoder designs is provided for single cell uplink multiuser space-time block coded multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems with multi-packet reception by exploiting outdated channel state information. By deriving the pairwise error probability with respect to both minimum and average codeword distance design metrics, the technique solves an optimization problem subject to transmit power constraint for each user and dependent on the outdated channel state information. Due to the non-convex nature of the optimization problem, an iterative technique based on alternating minimization and projected gradient can be used to solve for a joint linear preceding structure for general space-time block coding. The linear precoding structure is then sent from the base station to various consumer premise equipment for use in later transmissions. For orthogonal space-time block code, a simplified distributed technique is provided to solve for a closed-form solution of the optimization problem.

Abstract: A fuel cell has at least one electrode having channels for delivering reactants, products, or both. The electrode is an anode or cathode of the fuel cell, or both. The electrode can serve as both a liquid diffusion layer and a flow field plate, thus replacing the traditional elements of carbon paper, cloth diffusion layer, and anode current collector. In some aspects, the fuel cell uses methanol, and the electrode is formed from flexible graphite. The electrode can have a structure sufficient to permit methanol diffusion while preventing methanol crossover. The electrode can also improve volumetric power density and eliminate contact resistance typically present between a conventional flow field plate and conventional diffusion electrode layer.

Abstract: Provided is an information storage medium using a ferroelectric, including a substrate having an amorphous crystal structure, an electrode layer formed on the substrate, and a ferroelectric layer in a (001) direction formed on the electrode layer.

Abstract: GPU-based intra frame processing techniques are provided to selectively offload computation loading from a CPU to a GPU. By rearranging the 4×4 block encoding order, the process can benefit from a parallel processing mechanism available on the GPU. Block list size has an effect on speed and by using the optimal block list size for a selection, up to about two times speed improvement in intra frame processing can be achieved.

Abstract: Scalable Video Coding is recently attracting attentions due to its high flexibility. The current H.264/AVC scalable extension has adopted the Motion Compensated Temporal Filter (MCTF) framework to provide temporal scalability. In this paper, described is another fast motion estimation (ME) algorithm based on the MCTF framework. Simulation results show that the herein described algorithm can reduce the encoding complexity significantly while maintaining similar bit rate and PSNR, comparing with existing fast ME algorithms implemented in the reference software.

Abstract: Encoding techniques are provided that consider decoder complexity when encoding video data. A complexity adaptive encoding algorithm encodes video data by encoding current frame data based on reference frame data taking into account an expected computational complexity cost of decoding the current frame data.

Abstract: A full-rate distributed space-time (ST) code design is provided for amplify-and-forward cooperative wireless channels. A signal space diversity technique is employed at the source node and a unique signature vector at each relay node. The distributed space-time (ST) codes can achieve full cooperative diversity and full rate. The achievable diversity gain is M+1, where M is the number of relay nodes. Optimal power allocation can be used to maximize the coding gain under a total power constraint.

Abstract: Various embodiments of multi input multi output (MIMO) communication systems include a transmit Tomlinson-Harashima Precoding (THP) technique and a single carrier frequency domain equalization (SC-FDE) technique. Parallel THP-FDE and successive THP-FDE are proposed based on the minimum mean square error (MMSE) criterion. For the successive THP-FDE technique, where all transmit streams are subsequently precoded, both suboptimal and optimal MMSE ordering algorithm are set forth. Since the feedback processing is performed at the transmitter, no error propagation problem exists in the THP-FDE MIMO techniques, yielding significant performance improvements over conventional FDE MIMO techniques. Applying channel prediction and THP compensation techniques can also further enhance performance.

Abstract: Optimal Heegard-Berger coding methods, devices, and systems are provided based on the disclosed coding schemes. The disclosed schemes facilitate decoding even in the absence of side information, with lower coding complexity than conventional Wyner-Ziv based distributed coding techniques. The disclosed details enable various refinements and modifications according to system design considerations.

Abstract: Systems and methodologies for concealing errors related to INTRA-frame losses in a transmitted video signal are provided herein. Systems and methodologies provided herein can refine a lost INTRA-coded frame and its subsequent INTER-coded frames using INTRA-coded macroblocks that are provided in a video bitstream in accordance with a Random INTRA Refresh (RIR) scheme. When an INTRA-frame is lost, INTRA-coded macroblocks can be used to refine neighboring INTER-coded macroblocks based on region filling, spatial interpolation, or other algorithms that are based on the strong correlation between values of adjacent pixels in a video signal. Further, motion compensation can be used to refine an INTER-coded pixel having an INTRA-coded pixel in its motion trajectory.

Abstract: Generalized non-limiting embodiments include employing a dipole antenna and/or a half slot antenna. Each of the antennas constitutes three mutually perpendicular radiating elements to achieve good isolation and low antenna signal correlation between the three ports. In one generalized non-limiting embodiment the antennas are fabricated on FR-4 epoxy boards. Experimental results show that the antennas resonate a reasonable frequency and have a desired mutual coupling. In addition experimental results for the diversity performance and the MIMO channel capacity are also provided for these antennas and these results show that the herein described antennas offer good diversity gain and the channel capacity can be increased by as much as three times by using these antennas over conventional antennas.

Abstract: An antenna that is easily fabricated on a low resistivity CMOS-grade silicon substrate is herein described. The antenna has a reasonable radiation efficiency. One generalized non-limiting embodiment includes employing an antenna that resonates at about 5.8 GHz. Another generalized non-limiting embodiment includes a differential feed operationally coupled to a first and a second half-antenna portion. Each of the herein described antennas have an efficiency of greater than approximately 20%.

Abstract: A cross-layer multi-packet reception media access control and resource allocation technique is provided for wireless networks having receivers with multiple antennas. User devices on the wireless network access the network for data transmission by making a request to send (RTS) request after a random backoff time. In response to a request to send, an access point (or other receiver) determines transmission parameters that optimize the use of the physical layer based at least in part on channel state information. Those transmission parameters are transmitted along with a clear to send (CTS) message from the receiver to an indicated transmitter. Once the CTS message is received, data is transmitted in accordance with transmission parameters.

Abstract: Low power Viterbi decoder techniques using Scarce State Transition (SST) and path pruning and related methods and systems are provided, which facilitate practical implementations that reduce the computational overhead and power consumption. In addition, the invention provides uneven-partitioned memory architectures for the survivor memory unit that advantageously exploits the characteristic of the maximum likelihood state probability distribution of the SST decoder facilitating further power reduction. The disclosed details enable various refinements and modifications according to decoder and system design considerations.

Abstract: Systems and methodologies for embedding a watermark in a few-color image are provided herein. A digital watermarking algorithm named Spatial Unified Key Insertion (SUKI) can be utilized, wherein adaptive threshold halftoning can be performed in combination with contour shaping and modification to embed a binary logo into a digital image. Watermarking can be performed for an image using SUKI without introducing “salt-and-pepper” artifacts into the image. Further, watermarking techniques described herein can embed data into an image with a considerably high payload while providing excellent resistance against JPEG compression and other attacks and introducing no additional colors into an image.

Abstract: In advanced video coding standards such as H.264, macro-blocks belong to more advanced MB types, such as skipped and non-skipped macro-blocks. In non-skipped macro-blocks, the encoder determines whether each of 8×8 luminance sub-blocks and 4×4 chrominance sub-block of a macro-block is to be encoded, giving the different number of sub-blocks at each macro-block encoding times. It has been found that the correlation of bits between consecutive frames is high. This correlation is even higher after macro-block normalization by considering advanced macro-block types. Based on this bit characteristic, a fast real-time H.264 rate control scheme is herein described. The empirical example results suggest that this scheme can achieve PSNR gain over JM10.2.

Abstract: An apparatus and method for joint reconstruction of multiple data streams is provided. An MD encoder can include a plurality of sub-encoders for encoding an input signal into a plurality of unique descriptions based on linear transformations and quantization of the input signal. An MD decoder can decode a plurality of unique descriptions associated with at least one input signal by utilizing a plurality of sub-decoders. Each sub-decoder can decode the plurality of unique descriptions based on coding noise variance and a coding error correlation coefficient associated with the plurality of unique descriptions. The MD decoder can include a joint reconstruction component that reconstructs the at least one input signal based on, at least in part, extracting a unique coding characteristic associated with each description of the plurality of unique descriptions and estimating a weighting factor for each description of the plurality of unique descriptions.

Abstract: Optimal selection of an inter mode is provided for video data being encoded to achieve enhanced error resilience when the video data is decoded. End to end distortion cost from encoder to decoder for inter mode selection is determined based on residue energy and quantization error. Using the distortion cost function based on residue energy and quantization error, and an optimal Lagrangian parameter, the optimal inter mode is selected for use during encoding for maximum error resilience. The optimal Lagrangian parameter can be set to be proportional to an error-free Lagrangian parameter with a scale factor determined by packet loss rate.

Abstract: A high suction double-cell extractor includes an outer cell defining an outer chamber, and an open-ended inner cell defining an inner chamber. The inner chamber is bottle-shaped and has a neck. The high suction double-cell extractor also includes a vertical loading system for applying axial force on a soil specimen during extraction. The high suction double-cell extractor also includes a port for introduction of pressurized air supply into the outer and inner cells. The introduced pressurized air can apply cell pressure on the soil specimen during extraction. The high suction double-cell extractor also includes a relative humidity control system and a differential pressure detector system. The high suction double-cell extractor can be used to measure stress-dependent soil-water characteristics curve (SDSWCC) under various stress states three-dimensionally and more accurately, and under total suction up to 8,000 kPa.