A Study on the Success Potential of Multiple Mobile Payment Technologies

Payment systems all over the world have grown into a complicated web of solutions. This is more challenging in the case of mobile based payment systems. Mobile based payment systems are many and consist of different technologies providing different services. The diffusion of these various technologies in a market is uncertain. Diffusion theorists, for example Rogers, and Davis suggest how innovation is accepted in markets. In the case of electronic payment systems, the tale of Mondex vs Octopus throws interesting insights on diffusion. Our paper attempts to understand the success potential of various mobile payment technologies. We illustrate what we describe as technology breadth in mobile payment systems using data from payment systems all over the world (n=62). Our data shows an unexpected superiority of SMS technology, over other technologies like NFC, WAP and others. We also used a Delphi based survey (n=5) with experts to address the possibility that SMS will gain superiority in market diffusion. The economic conditions of a country, particularly in developing countries, the services availed and characteristics of the user (for example number of un-banked users in large populated countries) may put SMS in the forefront. This may be true more for micro payments using the mobile.

Testing and Modeling of MR Damper and Its Application to SDOF Systems Using Integral Backstepping Technique

Magnetorheological dampers are intrinsically nonlinear devices, which make the modeling and design of a suitable control algorithm an interesting and challenging task. To evaluate the potential of magnetorheological (MR) dampers in control applications and to take full advantages of its unique features, a mathematical model to accurately reproduce its dynamic behavior has to be developed and then a proper control strategy has to be taken that is implementable and can fully utilize their capabilities as a semi-active control device. The present paper focuses on both the aspects. First, the paper reports the testing of a magnetorheological damper with an universal testing machine, for a set of frequency, amplitude, and current. A modified Bouc-Wen model considering the amplitude and input current dependence of the damper parameters has been proposed. It has been shown that the damper response can be satisfactorily predicted with this model. Second, a backstepping based nonlinear current monitoring of magnetorheological dampers for semi-active control of structures under earthquakes has been developed. It provides a stable nonlinear magnetorheological damper current monitoring directly based on system feedback such that current change in magnetorheological damper is gradual. Unlike other MR damper control techniques available in literature, the main advantage of the proposed technique lies in its current input prediction directly based on system feedback and smooth update of input current. Furthermore, while developing the proposed semi-active algorithm, the dynamics of the supplied and commanded current to the damper has been considered. The efficiency of the proposed technique has been shown taking a base isolated three story building under a set of seismic excitation. Comparison with widely used clipped-optimal strategy has also been shown.

Active Sequential Hypothesis Testing with Application to a Visual Search Problem

We consider a visual search problem studied by Sripati and Olson where the objective is to identify an oddball image embedded among multiple distractor images as quickly as possible. We model this visual search task as an active sequential hypothesis testing problem (ASHT problem). Chernoff in 1959 proposed a policy in which the expected delay to decision is asymptotically optimal. The asymptotics is under vanishing error probabilities. We first prove a stronger property on the moments of the delay until a decision, under the same asymptotics. Applying the result to the visual search problem, we then propose a ``neuronal metric'' on the measured neuronal responses that captures the discriminability between images. From empirical study we obtain a remarkable correlation (r = 0.90) between the proposed neuronal metric and speed of discrimination between the images. Although this correlation is lower than with the L-1 metric used by Sripati and Olson, this metric has the advantage of being firmly grounded in formal decision theory.

Testing approximate theories of first-order phase transitions on the two-dimensional Potts model

The two-dimensional,q-state (q>4) Potts model is used as a testing ground for approximate theories of first-order phase transitions. In particular, the predictions of a theory analogous to the Ramakrishnan-Yussouff theory of freezing are compared with those of ordinary mean-field (Curie-Wiess) theory. It is found that the Curie-Weiss theory is a better approximation than the Ramakrishnan-Yussouff theory, even though the former neglects all fluctuations. It is shown that the Ramakrishnan-Yussouff theory overestimates the effects of fluctuations in this system. The reasons behind the failure of the Ramakrishnan-Yussouff approximation and the suitability of using the two-dimensional Potts model as a testing ground for these theories are discussed.

Rationale of Length Scale-Down Model Span Testing of Transmission Lines

Length scale-down (LS) model tests have been traditionally employed for laboratory studies on aeolian vibration of transmission line conductors. The span adopted is normally 30 m and is recommended by the relevant Indian, as well as other, standards. The traditionally adopted length of the LS model is reexamined herein to establish the rationale behind the choice. Based on the theoretical studies discussed, certain guidelines for the choice of model span of conductor are emphasized. In addition, the adequacy of the LS span as a tool for predicting the performance of the full span is reestablished.

New approach to improved detection and tracking performance in track-while-scan radars. Part 3: Performance prediction, optimisation and testing

The paper presents, in three parts, a new approach to improve the detection and tracking performance of a track-while-scan radar. Part 1 presents a review of the current status of the subject. Part 2 details the new approach. It shows how a priori information provided by the tracker can be used to improve detection. It also presents a new multitarget tracking algorithm. In the present Part, analytical derivations are presented for assessing, a priori, the performance of the TWS radar system. True track initiation, false track initiation, true track continuation and false track deletion characteristics have been studied. It indicates how the various thresholds can be chosen by the designer to optimise performance. Simulation results are also presented.

Ant colony optimization for reporting cell planning in mobile computing using selective paging strategy

Location management problem that arise in mobile computing networks is addressed. One method used in location management is to designate sonic of the cells in the network as "reporting cells". The other cells in the network are "non-reporting cells". Finding an optimal set of reporting cells (or reporting cell configuration) for a given network. is a difficult combinatorial optimization problem. In fact this is shown to be an NP-complete problem. in an earlier study. In this paper, we use the selective paging strategy and use an ant colony optimization method to obtain the best/optimal set of reporting cells for a given a network.

A fluctuation-based characterization of athermal phase transitions:Application to shape memory alloys

We employ a fluctuation-based technique to investigate the athermal component associated with martensite phase transition, which is a prototype of temperature-driven structural transformation. Statistically, when the phase transition is purely athermal, we find that the temporal sequence of avalanches under constant drive is insensitive to the drive rate. We have used fluctuations in electrical resistivity or noise in nickel titanium shape memory alloys in three different forms: a thin film exhibiting well-defined transition temperatures,a highly disordered film, and a bulk wire of rectangular cross-section. Noise is studied in the realm of dynamic transition,viz.while the temperature is being ramped, which probes into the kinetics of the transformation at real time scales,and could probably stand out as a promising tool for material testing in various other systems, including nanoscale devices.

Mechanism of failure in a free-standing Pt-aluminide bond coat during tensile testing at room temperature

The room temperature (RT) tensile behaviour of a free-standing high activity Pt-aluminide bond coat has been evaluated by microtensile testing technique. The coating had a typical three-layer microstructure. The stress-strain plot for the free-standing coating was linear, indicating the coating to be brittle at RT. Different fracture features were observed across the coating layers, namely quasi-cleavage in the outer layer and inner interdiffusion zone, and cleavage in the intermediate layer. By employing interrupted tensile test and observing the cross-sectional microstructure of the tested specimens, it was determined that failure of the microtensile samples occurred by the initiation of a single crack in the intermediate layer of the coating and its subsequent inside-out propagation. Such a mechanism of failure has been explained in terms of the fracture features observed across the sample thickness. This mechanism of failure is consistent with fracture toughness values of the individual coating layers. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Random security scheme selection for mobile transactions

Security in a mobile communication environment is always a matter for concern, even after deploying many security techniques at device, network, and application levels. The end-to-end security for mobile applications can be made robust by developing dynamic schemes at application level which makes use of the existing security techniques varying in terms of space, time, and attacks complexities. In this paper we present a security techniques selection scheme for mobile transactions, called the Transactions-Based Security Scheme (TBSS). The TBSS uses intelligence to study, and analyzes the security implications of transactions under execution based on certain criterion such as user behaviors, transaction sensitivity levels, and credibility factors computed over the previous transactions by the users, network vulnerability, and device characteristics. The TBSS identifies a suitable level of security techniques from the repository, which consists of symmetric, and asymmetric types of security algorithms arranged in three complexity levels, covering various encryption/decryption techniques, digital signature schemes, andhashing techniques. From this identified level, one of the techniques is deployed randomly. The results shows that, there is a considerable reduction in security cost compared to static schemes, which employ pre-fixed security techniques to secure the transactions data.

A method of fraud & intrusion detection for e-payment systems in mobile

The need for paying with mobile devices has urged the development of payment systems for mobile electronic commerce. In this paper we have considered two important abuses in electronic payments systems for detection. The fraud, which is an intentional deception accomplished to secure an unfair gain, and an intrusion which are any set of actions that attempt to compromise the integrity, confidentiality or availability of a resource. Most of the available fraud and intrusion detection systems for e-payments are specific to the systems where they have been incorporated. This paper proposes a generic model called as Activity-Event-Symptoms(AES) model for detecting fraud and intrusion attacks which appears during payment process in the mobile commerce environment. The AES model is designed to identify the symptoms of fraud and intrusions by observing various events/transactions occurs during mobile commerce activity. The symptoms identification is followed by computing the suspicion factors for event attributes, and the certainty factor for a fraud and intrusion is generated using these suspicion factors. We have tested the proposed system by conducting various case studies, on the in-house established mobile commerce environment over wired and wire-less networks test bed.

Biologically Inspired Cooperative Routing for Wireless Mobile Sensor Networks

Biological systems present remarkable adaptation, reliability, and robustness in various environments, even under hostility. Most of them are controlled by the individuals in a distributed and self-organized way. These biological mechanisms provide useful resources for designing the dynamical and adaptive routing schemes of wireless mobile sensor networks, in which the individual nodes should ideally operate without central control. This paper investigates crucial biologically inspired mechanisms and the associated techniques for resolving routing in wireless sensor networks, including Ant-based and genetic approaches. Furthermore, the principal contributions of this paper are as follows. We present a mathematical theory of the biological computations in the context of sensor networks; we further present a generalized routing framework in sensor networks by diffusing different modes of biological computations using Ant-based and genetic approaches; finally, an overview of several emerging research directions are addressed within the new biologically computational framework.

OFDM-MAC algorithms and their impact on TCP performance in next generation mobile networks

Next generation wireless systems employ Orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) physical layer owing to the high data rate transmissions that are possible without increase in bandwidth. While TCP performance has been extensively studied for interaction with link layer ARQ, little attention has been given to the interaction of TCP with MAC layer. In this work, we explore cross-layer interactions in an OFDM based wireless system, specifically focusing on channel-aware resource allocation strategies at the MAC layer and its impact on TCP congestion control. Both efficiency and fairness oriented MAC resource allocation strategies were designed for evaluating the performance of TCP. The former schemes try to exploit the channel diversity to maximize the system throughput, while the latter schemes try to provide a fair resource allocation over sufficiently long time duration. From a TCP goodput standpoint, we show that the class of MAC algorithms that incorporate a fairness metric and consider the backlog outperform the channel diversity exploiting schemes.

Leveraging Partially Enhanced Scan for Improved Observability in Delay Fault Testing

Enhanced Scan design can significantly improve the fault coverage for two pattern delay tests at the cost of exorbitantly high area overhead. The redundant flip-flops introduced in the scan chains have traditionally only been used to launch the two-pattern delay test inputs, not to capture tests results. This paper presents a new, much lower cost partial Enhanced Scan methodology with both improved controllability and observability. Facilitating observation of some hard to observe internal nodes by capturing their response in the already available and underutilized redundant flip-flops improves delay fault coverage with minimal or almost negligible cost. Experimental results on ISCAS'89 benchmark circuits show significant improvement in TDF fault coverage for this new partial enhance scan methodology.

Multi-Tone Testing of Linear and Nonlinear Analog Circuits using Polynomial Coefficients

A method of testing for parametric faults of analog circuits based on a polynomial representation of fault-free function of the circuit is presented. The response of the circuit under test (CUT) is estimated as a polynomial in the applied input voltage at relevant frequencies in addition to DC. Classification or Cur is based on a comparison of the estimated polynomial coefficients with those of the fault free circuit. This testing method requires no design for test hardware as might be added to the circuit fly some other methods. The proposed method is illustrated for a benchmark elliptic filter. It is shown to uncover several parametric faults causing deviations as small as 5% from the nominal values.