The control of prostheses and their complexities is one of the greatest challenges limiting wide amputees’ use of upper limb prostheses. The main challenges include the difficulty of extracting signals for controlling the prostheses, limited number of degrees of freedom (DoF), and cost-prohibitive for complex controlling systems. In this study, a real-time hybrid control system, based on electromyography (EMG) and voice commands (VC) is designed to render the prosthesis more dexterous with the ability to accomplish amputee’s daily activities proficiently. The voice and EMG systems were combined in three proposed hybrid strategies, each strategy had different number of movements depending on the combination protocol between voice and EMG control systems. Furthermore, the designed control system might serve a large number of amputees with different amputation levels, and since it has a reasonable cost and be easy to use. The performance of the proposed control system, based on hybrid strategies, was tested by intact-limbed and amputee participants for controlling the HANDi hand. The results showed that the proposed hybrid control system was robust, feasible, with an accuracy of 94%, 98%, and 99% for Strategies 1, 2, and 3, respectively. It was possible to specify the grip force applied to the prosthetic hand within three gripping forces. The amputees participated in this study preferred combination Strategy 3 where the voice and EMG are working concurrently, with an accuracy of 99%.
Wireless Multimedia Sensor Networks (WMSNs) are networks of wirelessly interconnected sensor nodes equipped with multimedia devices, such as cameras and microphones. Thus a WMSN will have the capability to transmit multimedia data, such as video and audio streams, still images, and scalar data from the environment. Most applications of WMSNs require the delivery of multimedia information with a certain level of Quality of Service (QoS). This is a challenging task because multimedia applications typically produce huge volumes of data requiring high transmission rates and extensive processing; the high data transmission rate of WMSNs usually leads to congestion, which in turn reduces the Quality of Service (QoS) of multimedia appli
... Show MoreWireless Multimedia Sensor Networks (WMSNs) are networks of wirelessly interconnected sensor nodes equipped with multimedia devices, such as cameras and microphones. Thus a WMSN will have the capability to transmit multimedia data, such as video and audio streams, still images, and scalar data from the environment. Most applications of WMSNs require the delivery of multimedia information with a certain level of Quality of Service (QoS). This is a challenging task because multimedia applications typically produce huge volumes of data requiring high transmission rates and extensive processing; the high data transmission rate of WMSNs usually leads to congestion, which in turn reduces the Quality of Service (QoS) of multimedia applications. To
... Show MoreAbstract. This work presents a detailed design of a three-jointed tendon-driven robot finger with a cam/pulleys transmission and joint Variable Stiffness Actuator (VSA). The finger motion configuration is obtained by deriving the cam/pulleys transmission profile as a mathematical solution that is then implemented to achieve contact force isotropy on the phalanges. A VSA is proposed, in which three VSAs are designed to act as a muscle in joint space to provide firm grasping. As a mechatronic approach, a suitable type and number of force sensors and actuators are designed to sense the touch, actuate the finger, and tune the VSAs. The torque of the VSAs is controlled utilizing a designed Multi Input Multi Output (MIMO) fuzzy controll
... Show MoreFocusing of Gaussian laser beam through nonlinear media can induce spatial self- phase modulation which forms a far field intensity pattern of concentric rings. The nonlinear refractive index change of material depends on the number of pattern rings. In this paper, a formation of tunable nonlinear refractive index change of hybrid functionalized carbon nanotubes/silver nanoparticles acetone suspensions (F-MWCNTs/Ag-NPs) at weight mixing ratio of 1:3 and volume fraction of 6x10-6 , 9x10-6 , and 18x10-6 using laser beam at wavelength of 473nm was investigated experimentally. The results showed that tunable nonlinear refractive indices were obtained and increasing of incident laser power density led to increase the nonlinear refractive inde
... Show MoreSummary This research, entitled (Distinguishing Voice Features of Qalqales Voices and their Expressive Values in the Holy Quran), aims to shed light on five of the voices that are characterized by strength and intensity, whose pronunciation requires loud vocal tone, great effort and semantic dimensions.The research consists of two topics .in the first topic. We talked about the voices of Alqalqal , their definition, their degrees, their ranks, and the opinions of scholars about them.
In the second topic, titled Expressive Values for Weak Voices in the Holy Qur’an, we talked about the relationship between sound and meaning, and we clarified in it the expressive values of Qalqa
... Show MoreClinical keratoconus (KCN) detection is a challenging and time-consuming task. In the diagnosis process, ophthalmologists must revise demographic and clinical ophthalmic examinations. The latter include slit-lamb, corneal topographic maps, and Pentacam indices (PI). We propose an Ensemble of Deep Transfer Learning (EDTL) based on corneal topographic maps. We consider four pretrained networks, SqueezeNet (SqN), AlexNet (AN), ShuffleNet (SfN), and MobileNet-v2 (MN), and fine-tune them on a dataset of KCN and normal cases, each including four topographic maps. We also consider a PI classifier. Then, our EDTL method combines the output probabilities of each of the five classifiers to obtain a decision b
This work presents an innovative approach to enhancing the performance of concrete with reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP) aggregates using titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles. Traditional limestone coarse aggregates were partially replaced with 30% and 50% RAP aggregates; a subset of mixtures containing RAP aggregates was treated with TiO2 nanoparticles. The rheological, mechanical, and long-term properties of concrete, along with changes in its chemical composition following the addition of RAP and TiO2, were evaluated. Results revealed that using 30% and 50% RAP in concrete mixtures reduced their compressive strength by 18% and 27%, respectively. However, using TiO2 in those mixtures enhanced their compressive strength by 8.7% an
... Show MoreThe convolutional neural networks (CNN) are among the most utilized neural networks in various applications, including deep learning. In recent years, the continuing extension of CNN into increasingly complicated domains has made its training process more difficult. Thus, researchers adopted optimized hybrid algorithms to address this problem. In this work, a novel chaotic black hole algorithm-based approach was created for the training of CNN to optimize its performance via avoidance of entrapment in the local minima. The logistic chaotic map was used to initialize the population instead of using the uniform distribution. The proposed training algorithm was developed based on a specific benchmark problem for optical character recog
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