Current Issue : October - December Volume : 2011 Issue Number : 4 Articles : 5 Articles
The objective of this paper is to present a short research about the overall broadband penetration in Greece. In this research, a new empirical deterministic model is proposed for the short-term forecast of the cumulative broadband adoption. The fitting performance of the model is compared with some widely used diffusion models for the cumulative adoption of new telecommunication products, namely, Logistic, Gompertz, Flexible Logistic (FLOG), Box-Cox, Richards, and Bass models. The fitting process is done with broadband penetration official data for Greece. In conclusion, comparing these models with the empirical model, it could be argued that the latter yields well enough statistics indicators for fitting and forecasting performance. It also stresses the need for further research and performance analysis of the model in other more mature broadband markets....
Background\nRecently two major manufacturers of hearing aids introduced two distinct frequency-lowering techniques that were designed to compensate in part for the perceptual effects of high-frequency hearing impairments. The Widex ââ?¬Å?Audibility Extenderââ?¬Â is a linear frequency transposition scheme, whereas the Phonak ââ?¬Å?SoundRecoverââ?¬Â scheme employs nonlinear frequency compression. Although these schemes process sound signals in very different ways, studies investigating their use by both adults and children with hearing impairment have reported significant perceptual benefits. However, the modifications that these innovative schemes apply to sound signals have not previously been described or compared in detail.\nMethods\nThe main aim of the present study was to analyze these schemes'technical performance by measuring outputs from each type of hearing aid with the frequency-lowering functions enabled and disabled. The input signals included sinusoids, flute sounds, and speech material. Spectral analyses were carried out on the output signals produced by the hearing aids in each condition.\nConclusions\nThe results of the analyses confirmed that each scheme was effective at lowering certain high-frequency acoustic signals, although both techniques also distorted some signals. Most importantly, the application of either frequency-lowering scheme would be expected to improve the audibility of many sounds having salient high-frequency components. Nevertheless, considerably different perceptual effects would be expected from these schemes, even when each hearing aid is fitted in accordance with the same audiometric configuration of hearing impairment. In general, these findings reinforce the need for appropriate selection and fitting of sound-processing schemes in modern hearing aids to suit the characteristics and preferences of individual listeners....
To include user interactions in simulations of product use, the most common approach is to couple human subjects to simulation models, using hardware interfaces to close the simulation-control loop. Testing with virtual human models could offer a low-cost addition to evaluation with human subjects. This paper explores the possibilities for coupling human and artefact models to achieve fully software-based interaction simulations. We have critically reviewed existing partial solutions to simulate or execute control (both human control and product-embedded control) and compared solutions from literature with a proof-of-concept we have recently developed. Our concept closes all loops, but it does not rely on validated algorithms to predict human decision making and low-level human motor control. For low-level control, validated solutions are available from other approaches. For human decision making, however, validated algorithms exist only to predict the timing but not the reasoning behind it. To identify decision-making schemes beyond what designers can conjecture, testing with human subjects remains indispensable....
In the field of noninvasive sensing techniques for civil infrastructures monitoring, this paper addresses the problem of crack detection, in the surface of the French national roads, by automatic analysis of optical images. The first contribution is a state of the art of the image-processing tools applied to civil engineering. The second contribution is about fine-defect detection in pavement surface. The approach is based on a multi-scale extraction and a Markovian segmentation. Third, an evaluation and comparison protocol which has been designed for evaluating this difficult taskââ?¬â?the road pavement crack detectionââ?¬â?is introduced. Finally, the proposed method is validated, analysed, and compared to a detection approach based on morphological tools....
We present some of the ongoing standardisation work in M2M communications followed by the application of machine-to-machine (M2M) communications to smart grid. We analyse and discuss the enabling technologies in M2M and present an overview of the communications challenges and research opportunities with a focus on wireless sensor networks and their applications in a smart grid environment....
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