Applied sciences

Metrology and Measurement Systems

Content

Metrology and Measurement Systems | 2018 | vol. 25 | No 2

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Abstract

Automatic gender detection is a process of determining the gender of a human according to the characteristic properties that represent the masculine and feminine attributes of a subject. Automatic gender detection is used in many areas such as customer behaviour analysis, robust security system construction, resource management, human-computer interaction, video games, mobile applications, neuro-marketing etc., in which manual gender detection may be not feasible. In this study, we have developed a fully automatic system that uses the 3D anthropometric measurements of human subjects for gender detection. A Kinect 3D camera was used to recognize the human posture, and body metrics are used as features for classification. To classify the gender, KNN, SVM classifiers and Neural Network were used with the parameters. A unique dataset gathered from 29 female and 31 male (a total of 60 people) participants was used in the experiment and the Leave One Out method was used as the cross-validation approach. The maximum accuracy achieved is 96.77% for SVM with an MLP kernel function.
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Authors and Affiliations

Robertas Damaševičius
Camalan Seda
Sengul Gokhan
Misra Sanjay
Maskeliūnas Rytis
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Abstract

This work shows a time-domain method for the discrimination and digitization of parameters of voltage pulses coming from optical detectors, taking into account the presence of electronic noise and afterpulsing. Our scheme is based on an FPGA-based time-to-digital converter as well as an adjustable-threshold comparator complemented with commercial elements. Here, the design, implementation and optimization of a multiphase TDC using delay lines shorter than a single clock period is also described. The performance of this signal processing system is discussed through the results from the statistical code density test, statistical distributions of measurements and information gathered from an optical detector. Unlike dual voltage threshold discriminators or constant-fraction discriminators, the proposed method uses amplitude and time information to define an adjustable discrimination window that enables the acquisition of spectra.
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Authors and Affiliations

del Mar Correa Maryam
Freddy R. Pérez
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Abstract

The paper deals with frequency estimation methods of sine-wave signals for a few signal cycles and consists of two parts. The first part contains a short overview where analytical error formulae for a signal distorted by noise and harmonics are presented. These formulae are compared with other accurate equations presented previously by the authors which are even more accurate below one cycle in the measurement window. The second part contains a comparison of eight estimation methods (ESPRIT, TLS, Prony LS, a newly developed IpDFT method and four other 3-point IpDFT methods) in respect of calculation time and accuracy for an ideal sine-wave signal, signal distorted by AWGN noise and a signal distorted by harmonics. The number of signal cycles is limited from 0.1 to 3 or 5. The results enable to select the most accurate/ fastest estimation method in various measurement conditions. Parametric methods are more accurate but also much slower than IpDFT methods (up to 3000 times for the number of samples equal to 5000). The presented method is more accurate than other IpDFT methods and much faster than parametric methods, which makes it possible to use it as an alternative, especially in real-time applications.
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Authors and Affiliations

Józef Borkowski
Dariusz Kania
Janusz Mroczka
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Abstract

Noise spectroscopy as a highly sensitive method for non-destructive diagnostics of semiconductor devices was applied to solar cells based on crystalline silicon with a view to evaluating the quality and reliability of this solar cell type. The experimental approach was used in a reverse-biased condition where the internal structure of solar cells, as well as pn-junction itself, was electrically stressed and overloaded by a strong electric field. This gave rise to a strong generation of a current noise accompanied by local thermal instabilities, especially in the defect sites. It turned out that local temperature changes could be correlated with generation of flicker noise in a wide frequency range. Furthermore, an electrical breakdown in a nonstable form also occurred in some specific local regions what created micro-plasma noise with a two-level current fluctuation in the form of a Lorentzian-like noise spectrum. The noise research was carried out on both of these phenomena in combination with the spectrally-filtered electroluminescence mapping in the visible/near-infrared spectrum range and the dark lock-in infrared thermography in the far-infrared range. Then the physical origin of the light emission from particular defects was searched by a scanning electron microscope and additionally there was performed an experimental elimination of one specific defect by the focused ion beam milling.
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Authors and Affiliations

Lubomir Skvarenina
Robert Macku
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Abstract

Due to the difficulty of detecting traces of organic acid mixture in an aqueous sample and the complexity of resolving UV-Vis spectra effectively, a combinatory method based on a self-made radical electric focusing solid phase extraction (REFSPE) device, UV-Vis detection and partial least squares (PLS) calculation is proposed here. In this study, REFSPE was used to enhance the extraction process of analytes between the aqueous phase and the membrane phase to enrich the trace of mixed organic acid efficiently. Then, the analytes, which were eluted from the adsorption film by ethanol with the assistance of an ultrasonic cleaning machine, were detected with UV-Vis spectrophotometry. After that, the PLS method was introduced to solve the problem of overlapping peaks in UV-Vis spectra of mixed substances and to quantify each compound. The linearly dependent coefficients between the predicted value of the model and the actual concentration of the sample were all higher than 0.99. The limit values of detection for benzoic acid, phthalic acid and p-toluene sulfonic acid were found at 9.9 µg/L, 12.2 µg/L and 13.8 µg/L with the relative recovery values between 84.8% and 117.9%. The RSD (n = 20) values of each component are 1.17%, 1.11% and 0.86%, respectively. Therefore, the proposed combined method can determine traces of complex materials in an aqueous sample efficiently and has wonderful potential applications.
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Authors and Affiliations

Guo Yugao
Liu Xia
Liu Jianyi
Bian Xihui
Zhang Qingyin
Pan Jie
Wan Dong
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Abstract

The paper deals with multiple soft fault diagnosis of analogue circuits. A method for diagnosis of linear circuits is developed, belonging to the class of the fault verification techniques. The method employs a measurement test performed in the frequency domain, leading to the nonlinear least squares problem. To solve this problem the Powell minimization method is applied. The diagnostic method is adapted to real circumstances, taking into account deviations of fault-free parameters and measurement uncertainty. Two examples of electronic circuits encountered in practice demonstrate that the method is efficient for diagnosis of middle-sized circuits. Although the method is dedicated to linear circuits it can be adapted to multiple soft fault diagnosis of nonlinear ones. It is illustrated by an example of a CMOS circuit designed in a sub-micrometre technology.
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Authors and Affiliations

Michał Tadeusiewicz
Stanisław Hałgas
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Abstract

The void fraction is one of the most important parameters characterizing a multiphase flow. The prediction of the performance of any system operating with more than single phase relies on our knowledge and ability to measure the void fraction. In this work, a validated simulation study was performed in order to predict the void fraction independent of the flow pattern in gas-liquid two-phase flows using a gamma ray 60Co source and just one scintillation detector with the help of an artificial neural network (ANN) model of radial basis function (RBF). Three used inputs of ANN include a registered count under Compton continuum and counts under full energy peaks of 1173 and 1333 keV. The output is a void fraction percentage. Applying this methodology, the percentage of void fraction independent of the flow pattern of a gas-liquid two-phase flow was estimated with a mean relative error less than 1.17%. Although the error obtained in this study is almost close to those obtained in other similar works, only one detector was used, while in the previous studies at least two detectors were employed. Advantages of using fewer detectors are: cost reduction and system simplification.
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Authors and Affiliations

Roshani Gholam H.
Nazemi Ehsan
Shama Farzin
Imani Mohammad A.
Mohammadi Salar
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Abstract

In this paper, two new sinusoidal signal frequency estimators calculated on the basis of four equally spaced signal samples are presented. These estimators are called four-point estimators. Simulation and experimental research consisting in signal frequency estimation using the invented estimators have been carried out. Simulation has also been performed for frequency tracking. The simulation research was carried out applying the MathCAD computer program that determined samples of a sinusoidal signal disturbed by Gaussian noise. In the experimental research, sinusoidal signal samples were obtained by means of a National Instruments PCI-6024E data acquisition card and an Agilent 33220A function generator. On the basis of the collected samples, the values of four-point estimators invented by the authors and, for comparison, the values of three- and four-point estimators proposed by Vizireanu were determined. Next, estimation errors of the signal frequency were determined. It has been shown that the invented estimators can estimate a signal frequency with greater accuracy.
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Authors and Affiliations

Sergiusz Sienkowski
Mariusz Krajewski
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Abstract

Touch-trigger probes for CNC milling machines usually use wireless communication in the radio or IR band. Additionally they enable triggering signal filtering in order to avoid false triggers of the probe. These solutions cause a delay in trigger signal transmission from the probe to the machine tool controller. This delay creates an additional pre-travel component, which is directly proportional to the measurement speed and which is the cause of a previously observed but not explained increase of the pre-travel with the increase of the measurement speed. In the paper, a method of testing the delay time of triggering signal is described, an example of delay time testing results is presented and the previous, unexplained results of other researchers are analysed in terms of signal transmission delay.
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Authors and Affiliations

Michał Jankowski
Adam Woźniak
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Abstract

A limited ability to discriminate between different materials is the fundamental problem with all conventional eddy-current-based metal detectors. This paper presents the use, evaluation and classification of nontraditional excitation signals for eddy-current metal detectors to improve their detection and discrimination ability. The presented multi-frequency excitation signals are as follows: a step sweep sine wave, a linear frequency sweep and sin(x)/x signals. All signals are evaluated in the frequency domain. Amplitude and phase spectra and polar graphs of the detector output signal are used for classification and discrimination of the tested objects. Four different classifiers are presented. The classification results obtained with the use of poly-harmonic signals are compared with those obtained with a classical single-tone method. Multifrequency signals provide more detailed information, due to the response function – the frequency characteristic of a detected object, than standard single-tone methods. Based on the measurements and analysis, a metal object can be better distinguished than when using a single-tone method.
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Authors and Affiliations

Jakub Svatoš
Tomáš Pospíšil
Josef Vedral
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Abstract

Development of facial recognition or expression recognition algorithms requires input data to thoroughly test the performance of algorithms in various conditions. Researchers are developing various methods to face challenges like illumination, pose and expression changes, as well as facial disguises. In this paper, we propose and establish a dataset of thermal facial images, which contains a set of neutral images in various poses as well as a set of facial images with different posed expressions collected with a thermal infrared camera. Since the properties of face in the thermal domain strongly depend on time, in order to show the impact of aging, collection of the dataset has been repeated and a corresponding set of data is provided. The paper describes the measurement methodology and database structure. We present baseline results of processing using state-of-the-art facial descriptors combined with distance metrics for thermal face reidentification. Three selected local descriptors, a histogram of oriented gradients, local binary patterns and local derivative patterns are used for elementary assessment of the database. The dataset offers a wide range of capabilities – from thermal face recognition to thermal expression recognition.
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Authors and Affiliations

Marcin Kowalski
Artur Grudzień
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Abstract

The paper presents the properties of a strain sensor, which was made using the micro hole collapse method and operates in the configuration of a Mach-Zehnder modal interferometer with a PM-1550-01 polarization maintaining photonic crystal fibre. The sensor’s transfer curve was determined analytically. Its strain sensitivity, determined from measurements, decreases slightly with increasing wavelength and is in a range from −2.01 to −2.23 pm/µε in the wavelength range 1520–1580 nm. Based on the Fourier analysis of the wavelength spectrum of the constructed sensor, the difference of the group refractive indices of the core and the cladding of the photonic crystal fibre was determined, which are in a range from 7.45·10−3 to 1.01·10−2. The temperature sensitivity of the sensor, determined on the basis of measurements performed in a range from 23 to 60◦C, is positive and equals 5.9 pm/K.
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Authors and Affiliations

Cezary Kaczmarek

Instructions for authors



Sample article with Author guidelines



Author guidelines



Types of contributions

Metrology and Measurement Systems welcomes submissions of the following article types:

• invited special issue or review papers presenting the current stage of the knowledge within scope of the journal (about 20 edited pages, approximately 3000 characters each),
• research papers reporting high-quality original scientific or technological advancements (max. 12 pages),
• papers based on extended and updated contributions presented at scientific conferences (max. 12 pages),
• short notes, i.e. book reviews, conference reports, short news (max. 2 pages).


Manuscript preparation

General The text of a manuscript should be written in clear and concise English. The camera-ready format – with attached separate files containing illustrations, tables and photographs – is required. A cover letter with clear explanation of scientific novelty of the paper is strongly recommended. Papers based on extended and updated contributions presented at scientific conferences, or strongly related to previous authors’ works, must be accompanied with a cover letter file, which should explain in details changes made in the manuscript in comparison with the original conference paper and highlight the novelty in reference to other authors’ works.
The main text of a manuscript should be printed on an A4 page (with margins of 2.5 cm) using Times New Roman style with a font size of 12 pt; the paragraphs should start with the indentation of 5 mm, and titles should be written in bold. That text can be divided into sections (numbered 1, 2, …), first-order subsections (numbered 1.1., 1.2., …, written in italics), and – if needed – second-order subsections (numbered 1.1.1., 1.1.2., …, written same as first-order subsections). The only acceptable manuscript formats are in Microsoft Word (.doc, .docx).

The Editor encourages the Authors of submitted papers who are not English native speakers, to use a language service checking the language correctness not only with respect to grammar, but also in the way of presentation of research results accepted by renowned publishers, e.g. presented on the website of the European Association of Science Editors. The Editor encourages the Authors of submitted papers who are not English native speakers, to use a language service checking the language correctness not only with respect to grammar, but also in the way of presentation of research results accepted by renowned publishers, e.g. presented on the website of the European Association of Science Editors.


Figures
Figures (illustrations, photographs) and tables, provided in the camera-ready form suitable for reproduction (which may include reduction), should be additionally submitted (one per page), larger than the final size. While preparing figures we encourage to start with defining expected size and minimum font size that fit to all graphics in the manuscript – using the same style in all of your graphics visually improves the article. Final figure formats must be in one of the following: (vectors) .eps, .pdf, .ai or .cdr, and (bitmaps) .bmp, .gif, .tif or .jpg.
As far as plots, block diagrams, schematics etc. are concerned, we suggest to use one of vector formats to improve quality and scalability. Figures in vector formats must be saved using RGB colours and with fully white background (0% K). Hidden layers are unacceptable. Minimum line thickness printed in a single colour is 0.25 pt (0.09 mm), and 1 pt (0.36 mm) when using more colours. Typically we suggest 0.2-0.5 mm but in particular cases the range 0.1–1.0 mm will be accepted. Lines in plots should be distinguished not only by using different colours but also using different line types and markers, if needed.


Equation
All equations must be numbered consecutively throughout the text. Each equation should be preceded and followed by a 6-point spacing. Punctuate equations when they are part of a sentence. Equation numbers should be enclosed in parentheses. Equations should be prepared with the use of MathType or Microsoft Equation editors. The type size in the equation is the same as for the text. To make your equations more compact, you may use the appropriate mathematical symbols or expressions. The symbols used in an equation have to be defined before that equation or immediately after it. Use italics for variables (e.g. i, x, n), physical quantity symbol (e.g. voltage U, temperature T), letter pointers and general function symbols. Do not use italics for constants, indexes, minimum, maximum and trigonometric functions, mathematical operators, differentials, etc. To refer to the equation use “(1)”, not “Eq. (1)” or “equation (1)”, except at the beginning of a sentence where “Equation (1)” should be used. We recommend to use International System of Units SI i.e. metre-kilogram-second system of units. As a decimal separator dot should be used in the entire manuscript (text, figures, tables).


References
The paper has to be clearly positioned in the context of relevant literature in the field of measurements and instrumentation. Note that lack of references from the main field of Metrology and Measurement Systems interest may suggest that the content of manuscript does not exactly correspond to the scope of metrological journals. It may reduce possibility that a proposed paper will be read by audience society. In such a case our Editorial Board may suggest to send the manuscript to a more appropriate journal. Also note that the use of possibly up-to-date references may indicate importance of your work. Table below gives examples of some relevant and renewable journals related to widely understood metrology.


Journal

Publisher

ISSN

Metrologia

IOP Publishing

0026-1394

IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement

IEEE

0018-9456

Measurement

Elsevier

0263-2241

Measurement Science and Technology

IOP Publishing

0957-0233

Metrology and Measurement Systems

PAS

0860-8229

Review of Scientific Instruments

IOP Publishing

0034-6748

IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics

IEEE

1557-9948

IET Science, Measurement & Technology

IET

1751-8822

Journal of Instrumentation

SISSA, IOP Publishing

1748-0221

Measurement Science Review

Walter de Gruyter

1335-8871

IEEE Instrumentation and Measurement Magazine

IEEE

1094-6969

Bulletin of the Polish Academy of Sciences: Technical Sciences

PAS

2300-1917

Opto-Electronics Review

PAS

1896-3757

IEEE Sensors Journal

IEEE

1558-1748

Sensors

MDPI

1424-8220




References should be inserted in the text in square brackets, i.e. [1]; their list, numbered in citation order, should appear at the end of the manuscript. The format of the references should follow the APA 7th edition formatting style, i.e.: for an journal paper – surname(s) and initial(s) of author(s), year in brackets, title of the paper, full journal name, volume, issue (in brackets) and page numbers. Put all author names unless there are more than 20. Otherwise, after the first 19 authors’ names, use an ellipsis in place of the remaining author names. Then, end with the final author’s name (do not place an ampersand before it).


Submission process
Manuscript should be submitted via the Internet Editorial System (IES) – an online submission and peer review system. In order to submit the manuscript via the IES, the authors (first-time users) must create an author account to obtain a user ID and password required to enter the system. The submission of the manuscript in a single file, i.e. “Article File” containing the complete manuscript (with all figures of high quality and tables embedded in the text), is preferred. All figures have to be uploaded in separate files. The generated PDF file has to be approved. The PDF file has lower quality of the embedded figures to limit its size only.
The submission of a manuscript means that its content has not been published previously, it is not under consideration for publication elsewhere, and that – if accepted – it will not be published elsewhere. The Author hereby grants the Polish Academy of Sciences (the Journal Owner) the license for commercial use of the article according to the Open Access License ( CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which has to be signed before publication. The copyright form is available in the IES.
The Authors are urged to suggest 4 to 5 reviewers in their application (with names, affiliations and addresses) with whom the Editorial Board could co-operate while processing the paper. Proposed reviewers should be experts deeply involved in issues related to the subject matter of the paper and they are intended to come from different universities or research centres.
Each submitted manuscript is subject to a single-blind peer-review procedure, and the publication decision is based on the reviewers’ comments. If necessary, the authors may be invited to revise their manuscripts. On acceptance, manuscripts are subject to editorial amendment to exactly fit the journal style.
An essential criterion for the evaluation of submitted manuscripts is their potential impact on the research field, measured by the number of repeated quotations. Such papers are preferred at the evaluation and publication stages.
Proofs will be sent to the corresponding author by e-mail and should be returned within 48 hours from receipt. The publication in the journal is free of charge. A sample copy of the journal will be sent to the corresponding author free of charge. For colour pages the authors will be charged at the rate of 160 PLN or 80 EUR per page. The payment to the bank account of the main distributor (given in “Subscription Information”) must be completed before the date indicated by the Editorial Office.


Other information
It is possible to include supplementary files related to the article content, such as e.g. developed databases. These files can be then used by other researchers to compare their algorithms using the same input data. For more details about supplementary files please contact the Editorial Board: metrology@wat.edu.pl. The biographical statements, at the very end of the article, are not obligatory, however, they are kindly recommended. Each statement should include the author’s full name and brief personal history focused on areas of research and scientific achievements. The biographical statement may not exceed 100 words and should be written using Times New Roman style with a font size of 8 pt.
The publication of your article is a great achievement but then it needs to be further promoted to make it more visible to the research community. Responsibility for this task lies with the Authors and our Editorial Board. We guarantee free access to the article in the Journals PAN of the Polish Academy of Science, including articles in Early Access form (published just after acceptance decision), indexing in popular and renewable databases (e.g. Thomson Scientific Master Journal List, Elsevier’s Scopus, Google Scholar). Furthermore, selected articles are highlighted on the journal website and are reprinted for promotion at conferences and other events. The Authors can share the final form of the article on various social networks and research-sharing platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, ResearchGate, Academia.edu, SciProfiles. They are also encouraged to update personal and institutional webpages by adding the title and a link of the article. Feel free also to share your work with your colleagues using any other methods that do not conflict with the CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license.
For more detailed description about how to write a paper for the Metrology and Measurement Systems journal please look at the Author guidelines for manuscript preparation. We strongly recommend using this file as a template for manuscript preparation.


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