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The purpose of this paper is to describe a standing style transfer system, ABLE, designed to enable a person with disabled lower limbs to do daily‐life activities without special infrastructure. Actually, ABLE is mainly intended for use by people who have spinal cord injuries and who cannot move hip joints and lower extremities: the level of spinal cord injury is L1.

ABLE comprises three modules: a powered lower extremity orthosis, a pair of telescopic crutches, and a pair of mobile platforms. When traveling in a standing position, the user wears the powered lower extremity orthosis to fix his posture, and rides on the mobile platforms. The user uses crutches to keep his body stable. These telescopic crutches also play an important role of power assistance in standing‐up and sitting‐down motions, or going up/down a step. The user can enter narrow spaces, although stability is emphasized in wide spaces because it is possible to alter the contact points of the crutches freely.

Motions are discussed in a standing position: traveling and rotating, and the chair and step motions. Experimental results related to these motions confirm the design's effectiveness. The authors improve previously developed mobile platforms for better operationality and stability. An ultrasonic motor was used for steering the mobile platform instead of the prior DC motor. The benefits of the ultrasonic motor enable the new platform to reduce its backlash in steering. A supporting plate and an active ankle joint attached to each mobile platform contribute stability when traveling in the standing position. The authors show the experimental results using new mobile platforms.

The paper demonstrates novelty and originality of ABLE in its composition, which enables a person with disabled lower limbs to travel in a standing position on a pair of small mobile platforms. This system is regarded as a biped‐type leg‐wheeled robot system that has high energy efficiency and good mobility for steps because of its wheels and legs; moreover, it has a pair of crutches for stability.

This paper aims to focus on three-dimensional (3D) numerical simulation of a monitored urban underground road consisting of diaphragm walls supported by one row of temporary steel struts and a cover slab in the central area. In addition to the lateral wall displacements, the analysis focuses on the load development in the struts and the evolution of the total stresses at the soil–wall interface, and highlights the 3D effect on the behavior of the structure.

Computation by back-analysis has become an important contribution to the understanding of observed phenomena. In this context, this paper investigates a full 3D numerical back-analysis of diaphragm wall deformation using the finite difference code FLAC3D.

The instrumentation allows a deep understanding of the ground response and the soil-structure interaction phenomena. It also provides an opportunity to validate numerical models. Using a soil model with simple failure criteria, the wall displacements are strongly influenced by the soil deformation modulus. The strut stiffness considerably influences the wall behavior. The geometrical effects have a significant impact on the induced wall displacements.

In the present study, the main soil geotechnical characteristics were deduced from laboratory and in situ tests. However, Young’s modulus of the soil has been adjusted to take account of the unloading effect. In the same context, the non-linearity of the elastic characteristics of the steel struts has been taken into account by modeling the struts using their experimental stiffness instead of their theoretical rigidity.

The purpose of the work is to design a flapping wing that generates net positive propulsive force and vertical force over a flapping cycle operating at a given freestream velocity. In addition, an optimal wing is designed based on the comparison of the force estimated from the quasi‐steady theory, with the wind‐tunnel experiments. Based on the designed wing configuration, a flapping wing ornithopter is fabricated.

This paper presents a theoretical aerodynamic model of the design of an ornithopter with specific twist distribution that results generation of substantial net positive vertical force and thrust over a cycle at non‐zero advance ratio. The wing has a specific but different twist distribution during the downstroke and the upstroke that maintains the designed angle of attack during the strokes. The wing is divided into spanwise strips and Prandtl's lifting line theory is applied to estimate aerodynamic forces with the assumptions of quasi‐steady flow and the wings are without any dihedral or anhedral. Spanwise circulation distribution is obtained and hence lift is calculated. The lift is resolved along the freestream velocity and perpendicular to the freestream velocity to obtain vertical force and propulsive thrust force. Experiments are performed in a wind tunnel to find the forces generated in a flapping cycle which compares well with the theoretical estimation at low flying speeds.

The estimated aerodynamic force indicates whether the wing geometry and operating conditions are sufficient to carry the weight of the vehicle for a sustainable flight. The variation of the aerodynamic forces with varying flapping frequencies and freestream velocities has been illustrated and compared with experimental data that shows a reasonable match with the theoretical estimations. Based on the calculations a prototype has been fabricated and successfully flown.

The theory does not take into account the unsteady effects and estimates the aerodynamic forces at wing level condition. It doesn’t predict stall and ignores structural deformations due to aerodynamic loads. The airfoil section is only specified by the chord, zero lift angle of attack, lift slope, profile drag coefficient and angle of attack as given inputs. To fabricate a light weight wing that maintains a very accurate geometric twist and camber distribution as per the theoretical requirement is challenging.

Useful for designing ornithopter wing (preferably bigger) involving an unswept rigid spar with flapping and twisting.

The novelty of the present wing design is the appropriate spanwise geometric twisting about the leading edge spar.

The distance to take‐off of an aircraft has been previously examined, and in the present report the effect of atmospheric changes on the take‐off run, as in India and the Middle East, consistent with aerodromes of high altitude or under semi‐tropical conditions has been calculated.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a shape‐shifting robot with diverse configurations, named “AMOEBA‐I”, which has been developed for search and rescue operations. The accessibility of this robot to unstructured environment is efficiently enhanced by changing its configuration. So the shape and reconfiguration of the robot should be considered in AMOEBA‐I path planning to improve work ability of the robot in complex environment. The unique accessibility of AMOEBA‐I is thus fully displayed.

An auto‐adapted path‐planning method is presented for AMOEBA‐I by introducing the reconfigurable ability of the robot into the modified potential field method. The modified potential field method solves the local minimum problem and goal‐unreachable with nearby obstacles (GUWNO) effectively. A method of the shape‐shifting robot's passing through the narrow space is studied by combining the corner detection with the modified potential field method.

The ability of the robot to automatically change configuration to pass through a narrow space is proven through the experiment. Simulation results show that the robot can change its own configurations to perform auto‐adapted path planning corresponding to the environmental variation. Therefore, the proposed method can improve the probability of completing the path planning. As a result, this method will shorten the path length and complete the rescue operation more effectively.

The paper presents an effective auto‐adapted path‐planning method that integrates the reconfigurable ability of the robot into the modified potential field method in order to realize the auto‐adapted path planning.

The 2002 climbing and walking robots (CLAWAR) conference featured 130 papers on topics related to CLAWAR. This article reviews the conference, highlighting papers in the areas of modular design, inspection of tanks, weld inspection, sewer inspection/cleaning, window cleaning, medical robotics, hybrid locomotion and hopping robots.

Many companies develop vision systems, but ultrasonics is now being used for some applications. John Hartley describes an unusual force‐sensing system from Hitachi.

Naitwar Bazar in the Upper Tons valley Indian Himalaya (Uttarkashi district of Uttaranchal in India) is showing signs of an impending disaster. This settlement has witnessed active mass wastage during rainy season of 2003 which has caused damage to infrastructure (crucial road link), hospital (i.e. the sole health facility) and residential cum commercial area. The active mass wastage zone may take heavy toll of human lives during the rains. Therefore, the paper proposes examining this subject.

Field investigations were carried out to assess the damage during the past events, probe the causes of mass wasting hazard and to assess the elements at risk in order to evolve a disaster management strategy.

It is suggested that a series of prevention and mitigation measures (both structural and non‐structural) with the involvement of the local community are required to avoid the impending disaster in the area.

This paper highlights the need for hazard prognosis and vulnerability assessment in the remotest settlements of Himalayas in order to timely plan the awareness initiatives, response mechanism and structural and non structural mitigation measures. An attempt has also been made to bring forth importance of incorporating the disaster management component into the local developmental planning.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an insight into China's burgeoning sensor industry.

Following an introduction to the Chinese economy and sensor market, this paper considers a number of key sensor applications and technologies and highlights a selection of Chinese sensor manufacturers and their products. It concludes with an overview of the country's sensor research effort.

This shows that China's sensor market is expanding very rapidly and is being served by a fast‐growing community of manufacturers who are producing large numbers of sensors for physical and chemical variables. The automotive sector is one of the leading users of sensors and is aiding China's micro‐electromechanical system industry. China has a large and active sensor research community.

This paper provides an up‐to‐date review of the Chinese sensor industry, illustrating its very rapid, recent growth and huge future potential.

THE practice of Air Navigation first began to be seriously considered in this country about the year 1910. Up to that time pilots had been content to follow roads and railways on their short cross‐country trips, and had quite sufficient to occupy themselves with in maintaining their machines in the air without concerning themselves with anything other than the most elementary navigation.