Sensors are the most important component in any system and engineers in any field need to understand the fundamentals of how these components work, how to select them properly and how to integrate them into an overall system. This book has outlined the fundamentals, analytical concepts, modelling and design issues, technical details and practical applications of different types of sensors, electromagnetic, capacitive, ultrasonic, vision, Terahertz, displacement, fibre-optic and so on.

The book: addresses the identification, modeling, selection, operation and integration of a wide variety of sensors, demonstrates the concepts of different sensors technology through simulation, design and real implementations, discusses the design and fabrication of high performance modern sensors technology, presents a selection of cutting-edge applications.

Written by experts in their area of research, this book will be useful reference book for engineers and scientist especially the post-graduate students find this book as reference book for their research.

This Special Issue titled "Recent Advances in Sensing Technology" in the book series of "Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering" contains the extended version of the papers selected from those that were presented at the 3rd International Conference on Sensing Technology (ICST 2008) which was held in November 30 to December 3, 2008 at National Cheng-Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan. A total of 131 papers were presented at ICST 2008, of which 19 papers have been selected for this special issue.

This Special Issue has focussed on the recent advancements of the different aspects of sensing technology, i.e. information processing, adaptability, recalibration, data fusion, validation, high reliability and integration of novel and high performance sensors. The advancements are in the areas of magnetic, ultrasonic, vision and image sensing, wireless sensors and network, microfluidic, tactile, gyro, flow, surface acoustic wave, humidity, gas, MEMS thermal and ultra-wide band. While future interest in this field is ensured by the constant supply of emerging modalities, techniques and engineering solutions, many of the basic concepts and strategies have already matured and now offer opportunities to build upon.

Gathered here are research papers, speeches, and lecture notes, a multifaceted survey of Chinese history embracing a wide range of subjects, from historical antecedents, relevant Western experience, and recent revelations to locus classicus and statistics. All lead to Huang's grand synthesis: That the one-and-a-half-century-long Chinese revolution is nearing fulfillment as Chinese civilization merges with Western history. While not everyone will agree with Ray Huang, no one who is seriously concerned with these issues can afford to ignore the provocative and erudite challenge of his vision.

Gathered here are research papers, speeches, and lecture notes, a multifaceted survey of Chinese history embracing a wide range of subjects, from historical antecedents, relevant Western experience, and recent revelations to locus classicus and statistics. All lead to Huang's grand synthesis: That the one-and-a-half-century-long Chinese revolution is nearing fulfillment as Chinese civilization merges with Western history. While not everyone will agree with Ray Huang, no one who is seriously concerned with these issues can afford to ignore the provocative and erudite challenge of his vision.

Traces the history of China from prehistoric times to the present and discusses the prospects for the reintegration of Macao and Hong Kong.

Distinguished scholar Ray Huang takes a fresh look at the full sweep of Chinese history from Neolithic times to the present.

Originally published in 1974, this is a detailed study of the financial administration of the Chinese government during the Ming dynasty (1368-1644), with particular attention to the sixteenth century, a topic about which very little has been published either in Chinese or any Western language. Professor Huang has worked through an enormous quantity and variety of source material - in particular the 133 substantial volumes of the Ming Veritable Records - and has compared the documents on financial matters with the entries in local gazetteers. The complicated workings of government finance present great difficulties to all specialists in Chinese financial and administrative history and in different branches of local Chinese history from the fifteenth century onwards. Professor Huang's study will provide all such researchers with an authoritative work of reference.

This Special Issue titled "Recent Advances in Sensing Technology" in the book series of "Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering" contains the extended version of the papers selected from those that were presented at the 3rd International Conference on Sensing Technology (ICST 2008) which was held in November 30 to December 3, 2008 at National Cheng-Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan. A total of 131 papers were presented at ICST 2008, of which 19 papers have been selected for this special issue. This Special Issue has focussed on the recent advancements of the different aspects of sensing technology, i.e. information processing, adaptability, recalibration, data fusion, validation, high reliability and integration of novel and high performance sensors. The advancements are in the areas of magnetic, ultrasonic, vision and image sensing, wireless sensors and network, microfluidic, tactile, gyro, flow, surface acoustic wave, humidity, gas, MEMS thermal and ultra-wide band. While future interest in this field is ensured by the constant supply of emerging modalities, techniques and engineering solutions, many of the basic concepts and strategies have already matured and now offer opportunities to build upon.

Sensors are the most important component in any system and engineers in any field need to understand the fundamentals of how these components work, how to select them properly and how to integrate them into an overall system. This book has outlined the fundamentals, analytical concepts, modelling and design issues, technical details and practical applications of different types of sensors, electromagnetic, capacitive, ultrasonic, vision, Terahertz, displacement, fibre-optic and so on.

The book: addresses the identification, modeling, selection, operation and integration of a wide variety of sensors, demonstrates the concepts of different sensors technology through simulation, design and real implementations, discusses the design and fabrication of high performance modern sensors technology, presents a selection of cutting-edge applications.

Written by experts in their area of research, this book will be useful reference book for engineers and scientist especially the post-graduate students find this book as reference book for their research.

Welcome to the proceedings of 9th Pacific-Rim Conference on Multimedia (PCM 2008) held at the National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan during Dec- ber 9-13, 2008. The first PCM was held in Sydney in 2000. Since then, it has been held successfully around the Pacific Rim, including Beijing in 2001, Hsinchu in 2002, Singapore in 2003, Tokyo in 2004, Jeju in 2005, Zhejiang in 2006, Hong Kong in 2007 and finally Tainan. PCM is a major annual international conference bringing together researchers, developers, and educators in the field of multimedia from around the world. It covers a wide spectrum of multimedia research, from state-of-the-art theoretical breakthroughs to the practical systems of multimedia analysis and processing. PCM 2008 featured a comprehensive program including tutorials, keynote talks, regular oral presentations, special sessions, and poster sessions. This year, we - cepted 79 papers out of 210 submissions, giving an acceptance rate of 37%. In addition, 39 papers were accepted for poster presentation. The submissions were categorized into five different tracks: multimedia compression, communication and networking, multimedia processing, analysis and retrieval, multimedia databases, systems, and applications, multimedia human-computer interfaces, multimedia security and digital right management, with a total of 210 submissions from 18 countries and regions. Among the five tracks, "multimedia analysis and retrieval" received the most submissions (34% of the submissions). We kindly appreciate the great effort made by the Program Committee members and the additional reviewers in the reviewing of submissions.

Distinguished scholar Ray Huang takes a fresh look at the full sweep of Chinese history from Neolithic times to the present.

It would be difficult to overstate the importance of Joseph Needham's Science and Civilisation in China series. For nearly fifty years, Needham and his collaborators have revealed the ideals, concepts and achievements of China's scientific and technological traditions from the earliest times to about 1800 through this great enterprise. During his long working lifetime, Needham kept in draft various essays, some written with collaborators, in which he set out his broad views on the Chinese social and historical context. These essays, edited by one of his closest collaborators, Kenneth Robinson, are contained in the present volume. A reading of this material makes it possible to reconstruct the assumptions and problematics that underpinned and drove the Needham project throughout the nearly one half century during which he was at the helm. The documents gathered here reveal the intellectual foundations of one of the greatest scholarly enterprises of the twentieth century.

"If you buy only one work on pre-modern Chinese history this year, make it this one."-W. S. Atwell, History Winner of the American Book Award for History In 1587, the Year of the Pig, nothing very special happened in China. Yet in the seemingly unspectacular events of this ordinary year, Ray Huang finds exemplified the roots of China's perennial inability to adapt to change. Through fascinating accounts of the lives of seven prominent officials, he fashions a remarkably vivid portrayal of the court and the ruling class of late imperial China. In revealing the subtle but inexorable forces that brought about the paralysis and final collapse of the Ming dynasty, Huang offers the reader perspective into the problems China has faced through the centuries.