Bulletin of the Polish Academy of Sciences Technical Sciences

Iterative learning control is a technique especially developed for application to processes which are required to repeat the same operation over a finite duration. The exact sequence of operation is that the task is completed, the process is reset and then the operation is repeated. Applications are widespread among many industries, e.g. a gantry robot which is required to place items on a conveyor under synchronization as part of a food manufacturing process. In effect, iterative learning control exploits the fact that once a single execution of the task is complete then the input control action and output response produced are available to update the control input for the next trial and thereby sequentially improve performance. Moreover, it may be possible to undertake the required computations during the time between completing one trial and the start of the next. This paper gives an overview of some very significant recent progress in this general area, including results from experimental benchmarking, and also some areas for on-going/future research are outlined.

Pulsed laser deposition technique was applied for covering elastic cast-polyurethane membranes with titanium nitride and boron nitride layers. The deposition process was realized using a Nd:YAG laser with Qswitch in stages; firstly the membranes were coated with ultra-thin titanium nitride layer (TixN) by evaporation of a metallic titanium disk in nitrogen gas atmosphere and then a layer of boron nitride (BN) was deposited by ablation of hexagonal h-BN target in argon atmosphere. The surface morphology was observed by scanning electron microscopy. Chemical composition was analyzed by energy dispersive X-ray spectrometry. The phase analysis was performed by means of grazing incidence X-ray diffraction and attenuated total reflection infrared spectroscopy. The crystallographic texture was measured. The wear test was performed by pin-on-disk method. Hexagonal boron nitride layers with (0001)[uvtw] texture with flake-like grains were fabricated. The structure and texture of boron nitride was identical irrespectively of substrate roughness or BN thickness. Pin-on-disk wear tests showed that the coatings effectively decreased the friction coefficient from two to even four times comparing to pure polyurethane and polyurethane covered with graphite. This proved that deposited layers can replace graphite as a lubricating material used to protect polymer surfaces.

Hybryd PLD method was used for deposition high quality thin Ti, TiN, Ti(C,N) and DLC coatings. The kinetic energy of the evaporated particles was controlled by application of variation of different reactive and non reactive atmospheres during deposition. The purpose was to improve adhesion by building a bridge between the real ceramic coating and the substrate. A new layer composition layout was proposed by application of a buffer, starting layer. Advanced HRTEM investigation based on high resolution transmission electron microscopy was used to reveal structure dependence on specific atmosphere in the reactive chamber. New experimental technique to examine the crystallographic orientation based on X-ray texture tomography was applied to estimate contribution of the atmosphere to crystal orientation. Using Dictyostelium discoideum cells as a model organism for specific and nonspecific adhesion, kinetics of shear flow-induced cell detachment was studied. For a given cell, detachment occurs for critical stress values caused by the applied hydrodynamic pressure above a threshold. Cells are then removed from the substrate with an apparent first-order rate reaction that strongly depends on the stress. The threshold stress depends on cell size and physicochemical properties of the substrate, but it is not affected by depolymerization of the actin and tubulin cytoskeleton.

The dual core bit-byte CPU must be equipped with properly designed circuits, providing interface between the two processor units, and making it possible to exploit all its advantages like versatility of the byte unit and speed of the bit unit. First of all, the interface circuits should be designed in such a way, that they don’t disturb maximally parallel operation of the units, and that the CPU as a whole works in the same manner as in a standard PLC. The paper presents hardware solutions supporting effective operation of PLC CPU-s. Possibilities of solving problems concerning data exchange between a CPU and peripheral circuits were presented, with a special stress on timers and counters, and also on data exchange between the bit unit and the byte unit. The objective of the proposed solutions is to decrease the time necessary for a CPU to access its peripheries.

The paper deals with the application of the feed-forward and cascade-forward neural networks to mechanical state variable estimation of the drive system with elastic coupling. The learning procedure of neural estimators is described and the influence of the input vector size and neural network structure to the accuracy of state variable estimation is investigated. The quality of state estimation by neural estimators of different types is tested and compared. The simple optimisation procedure is proposed. Optimised neural estimators of the torsional torque and the load machine speed are tested in the open-loop and closed-loop control structure of the drive system with elastic joint, with additional feedbacks from the shaft torque and the difference between the motor and the load speeds. It is shown that torsional vibrations of the two-mass system are damped effectively using the closed-loop control structure with additional feedbacks obtained from the developed neural estimators. The simulation results are confirmed by laboratory experiments.

The significance of the famous Shannon's publication "A mathematical theory of communication" is discussed. The author states that this theory was a breakthrough for the times it was created. The present-day communications is so highly developed, that some old maxims should be up-dated, particularly the definition of the lower bound of signal reception. The author claims that this bound is no longer a constant value, ln(2), as the Shannon's theory states, but depends on many factors such, as the ratio of bandwidth-to-information transmission rate, the class of a receiver (adaptive, cognitive, MIMO1), the kind of reception system (on-line or off-line), and - of course - on the characteristics of noise, including entropy. Then, an absolute limit (Eb/N0)abs = 0 is suggested. An example of an advanced adaptive system approaching this bound is given.

The paper presents magnetic fluid as an excellent material platform for producing more complex magnetic drug delivery systems. In addition, the paper discusses the nanoparticle morphological (electron microscopy) and structural (X-ray diffraction) characterizations. M ossbauer spectroscopy and photoacoustic spectroscopy are revisited as key tools in the characterization of the magnetic core and diamagnetic shell of the magnetic nanoparticle, respectively.

The present investigation is concerned with the reflection in thermo-microstretch elastic solid in the presence of a transverse magnetic field, at the boundary surface. The generalized theories of thermoelasticity developed by Lord and Shulman [1](L-S) and Green and Lindsay [2](G-L) theories have been used to investigate the problem. The variations of amplitude ratios with angle of incidence have been shown graphically. It is noticed that the amplitude ratios of the reflected waves are affected by magnetic field, stretch and thermal properties of the medium.

A new class of positive fractional 2D hybrid linear systems is introduced. The solution of the hybrid system is derived. The classical Cayley-Hamilton theorem is extended for fractional 2D hybrid systems. Necessary and sufficient conditions for the positivity are established.

In the paper finite-dimensional time-variable dynamical control systems described by linear stochastic ordinary differential state equations with single time-variable point delay in the control are considered. Using notations, theorems and methods taken directly from deterministic controllability problems necessary and sufficient conditions for different kinds of stochastic relative controllability in a given time interval are formulated and proved. It will be proved that under suitable assumptions relative controllability of a deterministic linear associated dynamical system is equivalent to stochastic relative exact controllability and stochastic relative approximate controllability of the original linear stochastic dynamical system. Some remarks and comments on the existing results for stochastic controllability of linear dynamical systems are also presented.

A novel phase shift full bridge (PSFB) converter with voltage-doubler and decoupling integrated magnetics in photovoltaic (PV) systems is proposed. Considering the demand that the output voltage is higher than the input voltage in PV systems, the voltage-doubler is added to achieve higher voltage gain compared with the traditional PSFB. In order to avoid current oscillation caused by the voltage-doubler and obtain the wide zero voltage switching (ZVS) ranges, an external inductor is imposed on the circuit. Especially, to obtain much higher power density, the external inductor and transformer are integrated into one magnetic core. The operation and voltage gain of proposed converter are analyzed. Also, in order to reveal the effects the integrated magnetics gives to the converter, the decoupling condition and the expression of leakage inductor of integrated magnetics are obtained in detail. Finally a 100 W prototype converter is made and the experimental results are given to verify the analysis.

Hydrogen (H2) and liquid petroleum gas (LPG) sensing properties of SnO2 thin films obtained by direct oxidation of chemically deposited SnS films has been studied. The SnS film was prepared by a chemical technique called SILAR (Successive Ionic Layer Adsorption and Reaction). The sensor element comprises of a layer of chemically deposited SnO2 film with an overlayer of palladium (Pd) sensitiser. The Pd sensitiser layer was also formed following a chemical technique. The double layer element so formed shows significantly high sensitivity to H2 and LPG. The temperature variation of sensitivity was studied and the maximum sensitivity of 99.7% was observed at around 200°C for 1 vol% H2 in air. The response time to target gas was about 10 seconds and the sensor element was found to recover to its original resistance reasonably fast. The maximum sensitivity of 98% for 1.6 vol% LPG was observed at around 325°C. The sensor response and recovery was reasonably fast (less than one minute) at this temperature.