Handbook of Thin Film Deposition, Fourth Edition, is a comprehensive reference focusing on thin film technologies and applications used in the semiconductor industry and the closely related areas of thin film deposition, thin film micro properties, photovoltaic solar energy applications, materials for memory applications and methods for thin film optical processes. The book is broken up into three sections: scaling, equipment and processing, and applications. In this newly revised edition, the handbook will also explore the limits of thin film applications, most notably as they relate to applications in manufacturing, materials, design and reliability.

This book presents novel research ideas and offers insights into radar system design, artificial intelligence and signal processing applications. Further, it proposes a new concept of antenna spatial polarization characteristics (SPC), suggesting that the antenna polarization is a function of the spatial direction and providing new ideas for radar signal processing (RSP) and anti-jamming. It also discusses the design of an advanced signal-processing algorithm, and proposes new polarimetric and anti-jamming methods using antenna inherent properties. The book helps readers discover the potential of radar information processing and improve its anti-interference and target identification ability. It is of interest to university researchers, radar engineers and graduate students in computer science and electronics who wish to learn the core principles, methods, algorithms, and applications of RSP.

Some of the most original and productive research specialists in the field of particle-fluid flow systems are assembled in this book, which is an important and current reference volume. It focuses on methods of measurement and options for those performing research and evaluation of particle-fluid flow systems such as pneumatic conveying. The systems and techniques covered in the text cover a wide range of particle sizes and concentrations, from tracers to packed beds.

As seen in this book, the increased use of computers, high sampling frequency and the non-invasive measurements make possible measurements of both average properties and their fluctuations. The trend toward non-invasive measurements based on acoustics, laser, nuclear, and electromagnetic devices is focused upon throughout the text.

Key Features:

- Covers the latest trends in measurement techniques.

- Serves as reference, guide, and text for academic courses.

- Authors include the most productive and original researchers in the field.

Robotic and mechatronic systems, autonomous vehicles, electric power systems and smart grids, as well as manufacturing and industrial production systems can exhibit complex nonlinear dynamics or spatio-temporal dynamics which need to be controlled to ensure good functioning and performance. In this comprehensive reference, the authors present new and innovative control and estimation methods and techniques based on dynamical nonlinear and partial differential equation systems. Such results can be classified in five main domains for the control of complex nonlinear dynamical systems using respectively methods of approximate (local) linearization, methods of exact (global) linearization, Lyapunov stability approaches, control and estimation of distributed parameter systems and stochastic estimation and fault diagnosis methods. Control and Estimation of Dynamical Nonlinear and Partial Differential Equation Systems: Theory and applications will be of interest to electrical engineering, physics, computer science, robotics and mechatronics researchers and professionals working on control problems, condition monitoring, estimation and fault diagnosis and isolation problems. It will also be useful to skilled technical personnel working on applications in robotics, energy conversion, transportation and manufacturing.

Over the past decade, the Command and Control (C2) field has been making a transformation from top-down, directive command to Network Centric Operations (NCO), peer-to-peer negation, self-synchronization, and agility. As the terms NCO and NEC suggest, C2 systems are regarded as networks, rather than a hierarchy. Accordingly, it is appropriate to view the C2 process and C2 systems through the lens of network theory. Network Topology in Command and Control: Organization, Operation, and Evolution aims to connect the fields of C2 and network science. Featuring timely research on topics pertaining to the C2 network evolution, security, and modelling, this publication is ideal for reference use by students, academicians, and security professionals in the fields of C2 and network science.

This book describes for readers various technical outcomes from the EU-project IoSense. The authors discuss sensor integration, including LEDs, dust sensors, LIDAR for automotive driving and 8 more, demonstrating their use in simulations for the design and fabrication of sensor systems. Readers will benefit from the coverage of topics such as sensor technologies for both discrete and integrated innovative sensor devices, suitable for high volume production, electrical, mechanical, security and software resources for integration of sensor system components into IoT systems and IoT-enabling systems, and IoT sensor system reliability. Describes from component to system level simulation, how to use the available simulation techniques for reaching a proper design with good performance; Explains how to use simulation techniques such as Finite Elements, Multi-body, Dynamic, stochastics and many more in the virtual design of sensor systems; Demonstrates the integration of several sensor solutions (thermal, dust, occupancy, distance, awareness and more) into large-scale system solutions in several industrial domains (Lighting, automotive, transport and more); Includes state-of-the-art simulation techniques, both multi-scale and multi-physics, for use in the electronic industry.

The continuing growth of wireless networks is being driven by ease of installation, flexibility and mobility, offering gains in efficiency, accuracy and lower business costs. This fresh perspective from two experts in the field provides professionals with a practical approach to design implementation, evaluation and problem-solving, which underscores its uniqueness as a hands-on guide to next generation wireless communications systems. The book offers practitioners a wealth of information on WLAN (wireless local area network) implementation, deployment and results. Key topics include: IP networking for wireless; wireless networking and Internet access standards; changes in the IEEE 802.11 standard; system design and implementation; and performance analysis.

"God made solids, but surfaces were the work of the devil." This statement by Nobel prize winner Wolfgang Paul emphasizes the diabolic nature of surfaces. Since surface properties deviate significantly from the bulk solid state, surface studies can be puzzling, misleading, and quite exciting! This book is an introduction to the basics of surface science including thermodynamics, surface structure, experimental probes, spectroscopy, microscopy, and ion-scattering. Surfaces are the external border of materials to the external worlds, thus by exploring surfaces one can investigate the material.

The growing presence of smart phones and smart devices has caused significant changes to wireless networks. With the ubiquity of these technologies, there is now increasingly more available data for mobile operators to utilize. Big Data Applications in the Telecommunications Industry is a comprehensive reference source for the latest scholarly material on the use of data analytics to study wireless networks and examines how these techniques can increase reliability and profitability, as well as network performance and connectivity. Featuring extensive coverage on relevant topics, such as accessibility, traffic data, and customer satisfaction, this publication is ideally designed for engineers, students, professionals, academics, and researchers seeking innovative perspectives on data science and wireless network communications. Topics Covered The many academic areas covered in this publication include, but are not limited to: Anomaly Detection Co-Occurrence Data Modeling Consumer Feedback Customer Satisfaction and Retention Network Accessibility Social Networks Traffic Data

The book describes an approach to the multi-agent systems (MAS) design for applications of robotic soccer in the MiroSot category. The described MAS is designed for dynamic, quickly changing environments, in which not only the actions of our MAS are observed, but also those of the opposing MAS. It actively tries to affect the environment to score goals faster than the opposing MAS. Multi-agent systems (MAS) are mostly applied in the environments in which they exist and act without an opposing system. The book also describes strategies based on a supervisor that makes decisions depending on behavior prediction of the opposing MAS and the ball movement in the working place. A sophisticated distribution of tasks was designed for each agent to cooperate in order score goals as fast as possible. Simultaneously, these agents try, by permitted means, to prevent the enemy agents from scoring goals. The approach described is an excellent guide to the constantly evolving abilities of mobile robotics, both for real-world applications, such as cooperation of multiple robots in life-saving activities, and for the steadily developing applications of mobile robots in various robotic competitions (e.g. Robocup, etc.). The book provides readers with high-level knowledge on how to design strategies and how to implement such systems, and the ideas presented enable them to further refine the approach utilizing the latest hardware and use it in new systems implementations of sophisticated intelligent engineering.

This book describes the bottleneck faced soon by designers of traditional CMOS devices, due to device scaling, power and energy consumption, and variability limitations. This book aims at bridging the gap between device technology and architecture/system design. Readers will learn about challenges and opportunities presented by "beyond-CMOS devices" and gain insight into how these might be leveraged to build energy-efficient electronic systems.

This book offers a complete guide to designing Linear Fresnel Reflector Systems for concentrating solar radiation. It includes theoretical analyses, computational tools and mathematical formulae to facilitate the development, design, construction and application of these systems. In addition, the book presents a concise yet thorough treatment of the theory behind these systems, and provides useful and efficient calculation procedures that can be used to model and develop their practical applications. Along with the theoretical analyses provided in the book, the physical background is explained using mathematical formulae, illustrations, graphs and tables. Methods are presented for solving the non-linear mathematical systems that describe a significant variety of cases. In addition, MATLAB codes are supplied (both in the text and online). Consequently, readers interested in applying the methodology presented here will have all the source codes at hand, allowing them to easily expand on them by introducing appropriate modifications for their respective design configuration. Given its scope, the book will be of interest to engineers and researchers, who can use their scientific background to help them develop more energy-efficient Linear Fresnel Reflector systems. It will also appeal to students studying these systems for the first time, as it supplies a comprehensive overview of their theoretical analysis and applications.

PID Control with Intelligent Compensation for Exoskeleton Robots explains how to use neural PD and PID controls to reduce integration gain, and provides explicit conditions on how to select linear PID gains using proof of semi-global asymptotic stability and local asymptotic stability with a velocity observer. These conditions are applied in both task and joint spaces, with PID controllers compensated by neural networks. This is a great resource on how to combine traditional PD/PID control techniques with intelligent control. Dr. Wen Yu presents several leading-edge methods for designing neural and fuzzy compensators with high-gain velocity observers for PD control using Lyapunov stability. Proportional-integral-derivative (PID) control is widely used in biomedical and industrial robot manipulators. An integrator in a PID controller reduces the bandwidth of the closed-loop system, leads to less-effective transient performance and may even destroy stability. Many robotic manipulators use proportional-derivative (PD) control with gravity and friction compensations, but improved gravity and friction models are needed. The introduction of intelligent control in these systems has dramatically changed the face of biomedical and industrial control engineering.

This book highlights practical solutions for flight safety improvement techniques, which are currently the focus of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). It has become clear that, in order to rapidly and significantly improve flight safety, the integrated use of new aeronautical technologies is called for. Considering the size of the aviation fleet, its constant growth and the long service lives of aircraft, new technologies should be adapted both to cutting-edge air navigation systems and to those that have been used for over a decade. Concretely, the book discusses methodological approaches to the construction of ground and on-board avionics that make it possible to achieve improved flight safety using innovative new methods. The proposed approaches are illustrated with real-world examples of e.g. satellite-based navigation systems and enhanced ground proximity warning systems. The book is written for professionals involved in the development of avionics systems, as well as students, researchers and experts in the field of radiolocation, radio navigation and air traffic control, the book will support the development and modeling of radio technical complexes, as well as the analysis of complex radio technical systems.

Adaptive Wireless Transceivers provides the reader with a broad overview of near-instantaneously adaptive transceivers in the context of TDMA, CDMA and OFDM systems. The adaptive transceivers examined employ powerful turbo codecs, turbo equalisers and space-time codecs, equipping the reader with a future-proof technological road map. It demonstrates that adaptive transceivers are capable of mitigating the channel quality fluctuations of the wireless channel as a lower-complexity alternative to space-time coding. By contrast, if the higher complexity of multiple transmitters and multiple receiver-assisted systems is deemed acceptable, the advantages of adaptability erode.

• Provides an in-depth introduction to channel equalisers and Kalman filtering and discusses the associated complexity versus performance trade-offs

• Introduces wideband near-instantaneously adaptive transceivers and studies their performance both with and without turbo channel coding

• Describes how to optimise adaptive modulation mode switching and highlights a range of practical considerations

• Introduces neural network based channel equalisers and discusses Radial Basis Function (RBF) assisted equalisers embedded into adaptive modems supported by turbo channel coding and turbo channel equalisation

• Employs the above adaptive principles also in the context of CDMA and OFDM transceivers and discusses the pros and cons of space-time coding versus adaptive modulation

Robots challenge humans' beliefs and expectations. Hence, regardless of whether they are the audience of a conference, the visitors of a lab, the citizens in general, some journalists, or the European Parliament, the first step in order to gain a better understanding of the field of robotics is obviously to consult the experts. Roboticists seem indeed to be in the best position to guide society in this matter, whether it is in the everyday life or within an official institution. Today however, there is a gap between the robots, as they are actually thought and built, and the intelligent and autonomous machines, as they are perceived by the society. How can we explain it? Do the words borrowed from the living organisms and used to describe robots play a role in the confusion about the status of the discipline of robotics? The texts gathered within this book focus on the problematic of wording robotics from various perspectives. They are the results of a unique interdisciplinary meeting gathering roboticists, linguists, philosophers and neuroscientists, the 4th Workshop of Anthropomorphic Motion Factory held at LAAS-CNRS in Toulouse on Nov 31st - Dec 1st 2017.

Recent developments in model-predictive control promise remarkable opportunities for designing multi-input, multi-output control systems and improving the control of single-input, single-output systems. This volume provides a definitive survey of the latest model-predictive control methods available to engineers and scientists today. The initial set of chapters present various methods for managing uncertainty in systems, including stochastic model-predictive control. With the advent of affordable and fast computation, control engineers now need to think about using "computationally intensive controls," so the second part of this book addresses the solution of optimization problems in "real" time for model-predictive control. The theory and applications of control theory often influence each other, so the last section of Handbook of Model Predictive Control rounds out the book with representative applications to automobiles, healthcare, robotics, and finance. The chapters in this volume will be useful to working engineers, scientists, and mathematicians, as well as students and faculty interested in the progression of control theory. Future developments in MPC will no doubt build from concepts demonstrated in this book and anyone with an interest in MPC will find fruitful information and suggestions for additional reading.

This book covers ALL aspects of projected capacitive touch sensors including basic principles, the physics of PCAP, capacitance measurements, touch sensor materials and construction, electrical noise, software drivers, and testing. It is targeted at working engineers who are implementing touch into their products as well as anyone else with an interest in how touch screens work. * Offers readers the first book on the use of projected capacitive (PCAP) touch technology for touch screens; * Explains not only how PCAP touch works, but also addresses the implementation details an engineer needs when incorporating PCAP into their product; * Includes explanations of different cover lens materials, cover lens coatings, software drivers, touch testing, and many other areas of general knowledge that would be useful to a design engineer.

This authoritative new book focuses on recent developments in the instrumentation for sending voltages and currents. It covers new trends and challenges in the field, such as measurements of biocurrents, the increased speed of the components for data taking, testing of computers and integrated circuits where the measurement of rapid voltage and current variations on a very small geometrical scale is necessary. The first chapter concentrates on recent methods to sense voltages and currents, while the rest of the book investigates the applied side, covering for instance electrical power and energy measurements. The main purpose of this volume is to illustrate commonly employed techniques rather than track the scientific evolution and merits and therefore mainly covers patent literature aimed at industrial applications. It is an exciting addition, justifying the series' claim to cover state-of-the-art developments in both the applied and theoretical fields of sensors and actuators.

The measurement of voltages and currents is a common task in the field of electricity and electronics. From a technical point of view it is useful to identify schematically different steps of such a measurement. In a first step a voltage or a current is sensed, intermediate steps such as amplification, transmission and further treatment may follow to yield the result in the final step. Today in most cases microprocessors perform the final steps of such measurements. Analog-to digital converters digitise a voltage that is proportional to the value to be measured and a processor performs further computations and handles the storage and the display of the results. The prerequisite for such measurements are sensors or transducers that respond in a known way to the voltage or current to be measured. The emphasis of this book is put on recent developments of the instrumentation for sensing voltages and currents.

Aside from the general trend towards smaller, cheaper and more reliable instrumentation, new demands have arisen. New applications, like measurements of biocurrents, ask for higher sensitivities. Computers and integrated circuits pose new challenges. To exploit the increased speed of the components for data taking, suitable sensors are required. The accuracy that can be achieved depends more than ever on the first step, the acquisition of the raw data. The influence of the measurement process on the results becomes more crucial. Testing of integrated circuits themselves is a completely new application. For such tests one has to measure rapid voltage and current variations on very small geometrical scales. Here, as well as in the traditional high voltage applications, contactless measurements play an important role.

The organisation of this book is as follows: In the first chapter different methods to sense voltages and currents are described. For the sake of completeness most commonly used methods are mentioned, we concentrate, however, on those developed recently. The chapters address the subject from the side of different applications in which voltages and currents are sensed.

Since the main purpose of this publication is to illustrate commonly employed techniques rather than to track the scientific evolution and merits in particular fields, in general those publications that illustrate a particular measurement principle best have been cited. The citation of a particular reference does therefore not imply that this is the first or most pertinent publication in the respective field.

Organic Materials as Smart Nanocarriers for Drug Delivery presents the latest developments in the area of organic frameworks used in pharmaceutical nanotechnology. An up-to-date overview of organic smart nanocarriers is explored, along with the different types of nanocarriers, including polymeric micelles, cyclodextrins, hydrogels, lipid nanoparticles and nanoemlusions. Written by a diverse range of international academics, this book is a valuable reference for researchers in biomaterials, the pharmaceutical industry, and those who want to learn more about the current applications of organic smart nanocarriers.

Now fully revised and updated, "VSAT Networks" continues to cover all of the essential issues involved with the installation and operation of networks of small earth stations called 'Very Small Aperture Terminal'. VSATs are typically one to two meters in antenna reflector diameter and communicate with one another, or with a central earth station called a 'hub', via a relay satellite in space. This informative volume enables the reader to understand how services, economics and regulatory aspects condition the success of such networks.

Key features include: configuration and practical applications of VSAT networks radio frequency (RF) link analysis, focusing on basic formulae and the evaluation of the RF link performance protocols used, with emphasis on the necessary adaptation of protocols used in terrestrial networks procedures for the dimensioning of the network according to the type and volume of generated traffic and to the expected quality of service

Written by a well-known, highly respected academic, this authoritative volume will appeal to students of telecommunications, electronics and computer science. Practising telecommunications engineers and technical managers involved in the planning, design and operation of networks and service provision will all find this book a valuable reference source.

This "Second Edition" has taken full advantage of the author's experience gained from the success of the first edition. The theoretical background has been expanded and the operational contents have been updated in view of recent developments in the field.