• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.16 no.7
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• pp.2328-2344
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• 2022

2D human pose estimation still faces difficulty in low-resolution images. Most existing top-down approaches scale up the target human bonding box images to the large size and insert the scaled image into the network. Due to up-sampling, artifacts occur in the low-resolution target images, and the degraded images adversely affect the accurate estimation of the joint positions. To address this issue, we propose a multi-resolution input feature fusion network for human pose estimation. Specifically, the bounding box image of the target human is rescaled to multiple input images of various sizes, and the features extracted from the multiple images are fused in the network. Moreover, we introduce a guiding channel which induces the multi-resolution input features to alternatively affect the network according to the resolution of the target image. We conduct experiments on MS COCO dataset which is a representative dataset for 2D human pose estimation, where our method achieves superior performance compared to the strong baseline HRNet and the previous state-of-the-art methods.

• Journal of Radiation Protection and Research
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.14-23
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• 2021

Background: For radiological protection and control, the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) provides the nominal risk coefficients related to radiation exposure, which can be extrapolated using the excess relative risk and excess absolute risk obtained from the Life Span Study of atomic bomb survivors in Hiroshima and Nagasaki with the dose and dose-rate effectiveness factor (DDREF). Materials and Methods: Since it is impossible to directly estimate the radiation risk at doses less than approximately 100 mSv only from epidemiological knowledge and data, support from radiation biology is absolutely imperative, and thus, several national and international bodies have advocated the importance of bridging knowledge between biology and epidemiology. Because of the accident at the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO)'s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in 2011, the exposure of the public to radiation has become a major concern and it was considered that the estimation of radiation risk should be more realistic to cope with the prevailing radiation exposure situation. Results and Discussion: To discuss the issues from wide aspects related to radiological protection, and to realize bridging knowledge between biology and epidemiology, we have established a research group to develop low-dose and low-dose-rate radiation risk estimation methodology, with the permission of the Japan Health Physics Society. Conclusion: The aim of the research group was to clarify the current situation and issues related to the risk estimation of low-dose and low-dose-rate radiation exposure from the viewpoints of different research fields, such as epidemiology, biology, modeling, and dosimetry, to identify a future strategy and roadmap to elucidate a more realistic estimation of risk against low-dose and low-dose-rate radiation exposure.

• Journal of the Korean Recycled Construction Resources Institute
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.223-229
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• 2017

When concrete is exposed to neutron rays for a long time, the concrete tends to become activated. If activated, it is classified as middle or low level radioactive waste. However, the great amount of the activated concrete is hard to dispose. In this study, low-activation cement was developed for decreasing the activated waste from shielding concrete around nuclear reactor. Furthermore, the manufactured low-activation was analyzed with activation nuclide Eu, Co. The low-activation cement showed great advantage for low-activation with detecting none of Eu and 3.75ppm of Co while ordinary portland cement showed 0.4~0.9ppm of Eu, 5.5~19.8ppm of Co content. As the results of physical properties of the low-activation cement, it is similar to type 1 ordinary portland cement and accords with type 4 low heat portland cement. Meanwhile, as for the chemical properties of the cement, it accords wite type 1 and 4 at the same time.

• Animal Bioscience
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• v.37 no.4
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• pp.640-654
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• 2024

Objective: The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of sodium salicylate (SS) on semen preservation and metabolic regulation in goats. Methods: Under the condition of low temperature, SS was added to goat semen diluent to detect goat sperm motility, plasma membrane, acrosome, antioxidant capacity, mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP) and metabonomics. Results: The results show that at the 8th day of low-temperature storage, the sperm motility of the 20 μM SS group was 66.64%, and the integrity rates of the plasma membrane and acrosome were both above 60%, significantly higher than those of the other groups. The activities of catalase and superoxide dismutase in the sperm of the 20 μM SS group were significantly higher than those of the control group, the contents of reactive oxygen species and malondialdehyde were significantly lower than those in the control group, the MMP was significantly higher than that in the control group, and the contents of Ca²⁺ and total cholesterol were significantly higher than those in the control group. Through metabonomics analysis, there were significant metabolic differences between the control group and the 20 μM SS group. Twenty of the most significant metabolic markers were screened, mainly involving five metabolic pathways, of which nicotinic acid and nicotinamide metabolic pathways were the most significant. Conclusion: The results indicate that SS can effectively improve the low-temperature preservation quality of goat sperm.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.806-818
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• 2015

Based on the inherent relationship between dc-bus voltage and grid feeding active power, two dc-bus voltage regulators with different references are adopted for a grid-connected PV inverter operating in both normal grid voltage mode and low grid voltage mode. In the proposed scheme, an additional dc-bus voltage regulator paralleled with maximum power point tracking controller is used to guarantee the reliability of the low voltage ride-through (LVRT) of the inverter. Unlike conventional LVRT strategies, the proposed strategy does not require detecting grid voltage sag fault in terms of realizing LVRT. Moreover, the developed method does not have switching operations. The proposed technique can also enhance the stability of a power system in case of varying environmental conditions during a low grid voltage period. The operation principle of the presented LVRT control strategy is presented in detail, together with the design guidelines for the key parameters. Finally, a 3 kW prototype is built to validate the feasibility of the proposed LVRT strategy.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.358-367
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• 2017

This paper presents a novel filtering method for speed measurements to improve the low-speed performance of the direct-drive permanent magnet traction machines for elevators. Based on the theory of nonlinear tracking differentiator (NTD), this method, which can act as a high performance filter of a raw speed signal, obtains a more accurate speed feedback signal when applying a low-resolution encoder. In addition, it can relieve the interference caused by the position derivative for speed sampling. By analyzing the frequency response of the NTD, the influence of its parameters on the performance of the speed filtering is investigated. Compared with different types of low-pass filters, the proposed method shows a shorter time delay and a stronger ability in terms of noise suppression when the parameters are selected carefully. In addition, when using the measured speed signal through a nonlinear tracking differentiator as the feedback of the system, the motor runs more steadily at low speeds. As a result, the riding comfort of a direct-drive elevator can be improved. The feasibility of the proposed strategy was verified on an 11.7kW elevator traction machine using a commercial inverter.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.1207-1216
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• 2015

In order to suppress the low frequency oscillation of the neutral-point voltage for three-level inverters, this paper proposes a new discontinuous pulse width modulation (DPWM) control method. The conventional sinusoidal pulse width modulation (SPWM) control has no effect on balancing the neutral-point voltage. Based on the basic control principle of DPWM, the relationship between the reference space voltage vector and the neutral-point current is analyzed. The proposed method suppresses the low frequency oscillation of the neutral-point voltage by keeping the switches of a certain phase no switching in one carrier cycle. So the operating time of the positive and negative small vectors is equal. Comparing with the conventional SPWM control method, the proposed DPWM control method suppresses the low frequency oscillation of the neutral-point voltage, decreases the output waveform harmonics, and increases both the output waveform quality and the system efficiency. An experiment has been realized by a neutral-point clamped (NPC) three-level inverter prototype based on STM32F407-CPLD. The experimental results verify the correctness of the theoretical analysis and the effectiveness of the proposed DPWM method.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.615-622
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• 2012

The switching frequency of the power electronic devices used in large synchronous motor drives is usually kept low (less than 1 kHz) to reduce the switching losses and to improve the converter power capability. However, this results in a couple of problems, e.g. an increase in the harmonic components of the stator current, and an undesired cross-coupling between the magnetization current component ($i_m$) and the torque component ($i_t$). In this paper, a novel complex matrix model of electrically excited synchronous motors (EESM) was established with a new control scheme for coping with the low switching frequency issues. First, a hybrid observer was proposed to identify the instantaneous fundamental component of the stator current, which results in an obvious reduction of both the total harmonic distortion (THD) and the low order harmonics. Then, a novel complex current controller was designed to realize the decoupling between $i_m$ and $i_t$. Simulation and experimental results verify the effectiveness of this novel control system for EESM drives.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.395-402
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• 2018

Floor location of adjacent buildings may be different in terms of height elevation, and thus, the slab may hit on the columns of adjacent insufficiently separated buildings during severe ground motions. Such impacts, often referred to as mid-column pounding, can be catastrophic. Substantial pounding damage or even total collapse of structures was often observed in large amount of adjacent low rise buildings. The research on the mid-column pounding between low rise buildings is in urgency need. In present study, the responses of two adjacent low rise buildings with unequal heights and different dynamic properties have been analyzed. Parametric studies have also been conducted to assess the influence of story height difference, gap distance and input direction of ground motion on the effect of structural pounding response. Another emphasis of this study is to analyze the near-fault effect, which is important for the structures located in the near-fault area. The analysis results show that collisions exhibit significant influence on the local shear force response of the column suffering impact. Because of asymmetric configuration of systems, the structural seismic behavior is distinct by varying the incident directions of the ground motions. Results also show that near-fault earthquakes induced ground motions can cause more significant effect on the pounding responses.

• Journal of Information Display
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.109-112
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• 2010

The solid phase compositions and dielectric properties of silicon nitride ($SiN_x$) films prepared using the plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) technique at a low temperature ($200^{\circ}C$) were studied. Controlling the source gas mixing ratio, R = $[N_2]/[SiH_4]$, and the plasma power successfully produced both silicon-rich and nitrogen-rich compositions in the final films. The composition parameter, X, varied from 0.83 to 1.62. Depending on the film composition, the dielectric properties of the $SiN_x$ films also varied substantially. Silicon-rich silicon nitride (SRSN) films were obtained at a low plasma power and a low R. The photoluminescence (PL) spectra of these films revealed the existence of nano-sized silicon particles even in the absence of a post-annealing process. Nitrogen-rich silicon nitride (NRSN) films were obtained at a high plasma power and a high R. These films showed a fairly high dielectric constant ($\kappa$ = 7.1) and a suppressed hysteresis window in their capacitance-voltage (C-V) characteristics.