Real-time mobile 3D temperature mapping

The ability to measure surface temperature and represent it on a metrically accurate 3D model has proven applications in many areas such as medical imaging, building energy auditing, and search and rescue. A system is proposed that enables this task to be performed with a handheld sensor, and for the first time with results able to be visualized and analyzed in real-time. A device comprising a thermal-infrared camera and range sensor is calibrated geometrically and used for data capture. The device is localized using a combination of ICP and video-based pose estimation from the thermal-infrared video footage which is shown to reduce the occurrence of failure modes. Furthermore, the problem of misregistration which can introduce severe distortions in assigned surface temperatures is avoided through the use of a risk-averse neighborhood weighting mechanism. Results demonstrate that the system is more stable and accurate than previous approaches, and can be used to accurately model complex objects and environments for practical tasks.

The serious and playful work of gender : talk and social order in a preschool classroom

This chapter reports some observations made of the social interactions of girls and boys, aged 3 to 5 years, in play situations in a preschool classroom of a childcare centre. It provides an alternate framework for early childhood educators to become aware of how preschool children construct their gendered social organizations. As girls and boys organise and build their social worlds of play through their talk-in-interaction, they are building their social orders. In this chapter, an analysis of one episode of children's play has, as its focus , the methods that some girls and boys use in their talk and activity to make sense of their everyday interactions. The analysis of play shows the children's real life work of constructing and maintaining gendered social orders in their lived everyday social worlds. A close reading of the transcript of an episode illustrates how two girls turn they boys' masculine practices o ritualized threats into performance. By so doing, they show that while they know masculine discourse, and can perform it themselves, they do not actually 'own' it in the same way that the boys do. In this way, gender is established not as a social density but as a shaped dynamic practice that is ongoing, build by relational encounters and shaped by the collective performances of the participants.

Enabling safe autonomous driving in real-world city traffic using multiple criteria decision making

This paper addresses the topic of real-time decision making for autonomous city vehicles, i.e., the autonomous vehicles' ability to make appropriate driving decisions in city road traffic situations. The paper explains the overall controls system architecture, the decision making task decomposition, and focuses on how Multiple Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) is used in the process of selecting the most appropriate driving maneuver from the set of feasible ones. Experimental tests show that MCDM is suitable for this new application area.

Towards increased road safety : real-time decision making for driverless city vehicles

This work elaborates on the topic of decision making for driverless city vehicles, particularly focusing on the aspects on how to develop a reliable approach which meets the requirements of safe city traffic. Decision making in this context refers to the problem of identifying the most appropriate driving maneuver to be performed in a given traffic situation. The overall decision making problem is decomposed into two consecutive stages. The first stage is safety-crucial, representing the decision regarding the set of feasible driving maneuvers. The second stage represents the decision regarding the most appropriate driving maneuver from the set of feasible ones. The developed decision making approach has been implemented in C++ and initially tested in a 3D simulation environment and, thereafter, in real-world experiments. The real-world experiments also included the integration of wireless communication between vehicles.

A runtime integrity monitoring framework for real-time relative positioning systems based on GPS and DSRC

This paper provides a three-layered framework to monitor the positioning performance requirements of Real-time Relative Positioning (RRP) systems of the Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) that support Cooperative Collision Warning (CCW) applications. These applications exploit state data of surrounding vehicles obtained solely from the Global Positioning System (GPS) and Dedicated Short-Range Communications (DSRC) units without using other sensors. To this end, the paper argues the need for the GPS/DSRC-based RRP systems to have an autonomous monitoring mechanism, since the operation of CCW applications is meant to augment safety on roads. The advantages of autonomous integrity monitoring are essential and integral to any safety-of-life system. The autonomous integrity monitoring framework proposed necessitates the RRP systems to detect/predict the unavailability of their sub-systems and of the integrity monitoring module itself, and, if available, to account for effects of data link delays and breakages of DSRC links, as well as of faulty measurement sources of GPS and/or integrated augmentation positioning systems, before the information used for safety warnings/alarms becomes unavailable, unreliable, inaccurate or misleading. Hence, a monitoring framework using a tight integration and correlation approach is proposed for instantaneous reliability assessment of the RRP systems. Ultimately, using the proposed framework, the RRP systems will provide timely alerts to users when the RRP solutions cannot be trusted or used for the intended operation.

What makes e-learning work?

This chapter examines lessons learnt from a study of the use of e-learning within the rail sector in Australia and explores factors that inhibit or advance its organisational effectiveness. We examine the social, organisational and technical influences on the way employees perceive and use e-learning. By examining these issues, we aim to demonstrate that successful organisational adoption of e-learning is influenced by factors beyond the systems themselves and requires a more holistic understanding of the target workforce and the suitability of the e-learning tasks. Without a clear understanding of these relationships, organisations run the real risk of investing heavily in e-learning without receiving benefits or, worse still, impacting negatively on their ability to deliver training.

Multiple criteria-based real-time decision making by autonomous city vehicles

This paper addresses the topic of real-time decision making for autonomous city vehicles, i.e. the autonomous vehicles’ ability to make appropriate driving decisions in city road traffic situations. After decomposing the problem into two consecutive decision making stages, and giving a short overview about previous work, the paper explains how Multiple Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) can be used in the process of selecting the most appropriate driving maneuver.

An efficient and robust system for multi-person event detection in real world indoor surveillance scenes

Due to the popularity of security cameras in public places, it is of interest to design an intelligent system that can efficiently detect events automatically. This paper proposes a novel algorithm for multi-person event detection. To ensure greater than real-time performance, features are extracted directly from compressed MPEG video. A novel histogram-based feature descriptor that captures the angles between extracted particle trajectories is proposed, which allows us to capture motion patterns of multi-person events in the video. To alleviate the need for fine-grained annotation, we propose the use of Labelled Latent Dirichlet Allocation, a “weakly supervised” method that allows the use of coarse temporal annotations which are much simpler to obtain. This novel system is able to run at approximately ten times real-time, while preserving state-of-theart detection performance for multi-person events on a 100-hour real-world surveillance dataset (TRECVid SED).

Impact of real-time traffic characteristics on freeway crash occurrence: Systematic review and meta-analysis

The development of methods for real-time crash prediction as a function of current or recent traffic and roadway conditions is gaining increasing attention in the literature. Numerous studies have modeled the relationships between traffic characteristics and crash occurrence, and significant progress has been made. Given the accumulated evidence on this topic and the lack of an articulate summary of research status, challenges, and opportunities, there is an urgent need to scientifically review these studies and to synthesize the existing state-of-the-art knowledge. This paper addresses this need by undertaking a systematic literature review to identify current knowledge, challenges, and opportunities, and then conducts a meta-analysis of existing studies to provide a summary impact of traffic characteristics on crash occurrence. Sensitivity analyses were conducted to assess quality, publication bias, and outlier bias of the various studies; and the time intervals used to measure traffic characteristics were also considered. As a result of this comprehensive and systematic review, issues in study designs, traffic and crash data, and model development and validation are discussed. Outcomes of this study are intended to provide researchers focused on real-time crash prediction with greater insight into the modeling of this important but extremely challenging safety issue.

Chirp-spread-spectrum-based real time location system for construction safety management: A case study

Observing the working procedure of construction workers is an effective means of maintaining the safety performance of a construction project. It is also difficult to achieve due to a high worker-to-safety-officer ratio. There is an imminent need for the development of a tool to assist in the real-time monitoring of workers, in order to reduce the number of construction accidents. The development and application of a real time locating system (RTLS) based on the Chirp Spread Spectrum (CSS) technique is described in this paper for tracking the real-time position of workers on construction sites. Experiments and tests were carried out both on- and off-site to verify the accuracy of static and dynamic targets by the system, indicating an average error of within one metre. Experiments were also carried out to verify the ability of the system to identify workers’ unsafe behaviours. Wireless data transfer was used to simplify the deployment of the system. The system was deployed in a public residential construction project and proved to be quick and simple to use. The cost of the developed system is also reported to be reasonable (around 1800USD) in this study and is much cheaper than the cost of other RTLS. In addition, the CCS technique is shown to provide an economical solution with reasonable accuracy compared with other positioning systems, such as ultra wideband. The study verifies the potential of the CCS technique to provide an effective and economical aid in the improvement of safety management in the construction industry.

Inertial sensor real-time feedback enhances the learning of cervical spine manipulation: A prospective study

Background Cervical Spinal Manipulation (CSM) is considered a high-level skill of the central nervous system because it requires bimanual coordinated rhythmical movements therefore necessitating training to achieve proficiency. The objective of the present study was to investigate the effect of real-time feedback on the performance of CSM. Methods Six postgraduate physiotherapy students attending a training workshop on Cervical Spine Manipulation Technique (CSMT) using inertial sensor derived real-time feedback participated in this study. The key variables were pre-manipulative position, angular displacement of the thrust and angular velocity of the thrust. Differences between variables before and after training were investigated using t-tests. Results There were no significant differences after training for the pre-manipulative position (rotation p = 0.549; side bending p = 0.312) or for thrust displacement (rotation p = 0.247; side bending p = 0.314). Thrust angular velocity demonstrated a significant difference following training for rotation (pre-training mean (sd) 48.9°/s (35.1); post-training mean (sd) 96.9°/s (53.9); p = 0.027) but not for side bending (p = 0.521). Conclusion Real-time feedback using an inertial sensor may be valuable in the development of specific manipulative skill. Future studies investigating manipulation could consider a randomized controlled trial using inertial sensor real time feedback compared to traditional training.

The trend toward pre-graduation professional work experience for Australian young planners: Essential experience or essentially exploitation

This paper explores the changing employment expectations that frame the early professional work experiences of young planners in Australia. In particular, it considers the rising popularity of pre-graduation professional work experience as a precursor to formal entry into the workforce as a practising planner. This shift is being driven in part by employer expectations that graduates will already have ‘real world’ and relevant work experience. However, an equally significant driver appears to be a growing desire for early career and graduate planners to find ways to distinguish themselves from their peers in an increasingly tight labour market. Using data from an ongoing research project into the formative work experiences of young people this paper describes the three main types of pre-graduation professional work experience undertaken by young planners. It highlights the potential challenges and benefits of pre-graduation work experience from a legal, social and ethical perspective as well as from the perspective of young planners themselves. The paper concludes by reflecting on the role of the planning profession – employers, peak bodies and planning educators – in managing the tensions between producing ‘work ready’ graduates and safeguarding the employment conditions of early career planning professionals.

Embedding sustainability in a real-world context: Developing a world class early learning centre

This symposium describes what is possible when early childhood professionals work with designers to develop a vision for an exemplary early childhood centre with a focus on Education for Sustainability (EfS). The symposium provides insights into cross-disciplinary initiatives between QUT Early childhood and Design staff and students, who have worked together with the iconic Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary in Brisbane, to explore imperatives around EfS, including leadership and professionalism. This practical, real world project has seen all stakeholders engage in a focus on sustainability which has opened new ways of thinking about early childhood centre design. Cross-disciplinarity has created space to re-think the potential of the disciplines to interweave, and in so doing opened different ways for thinking about early childhood centres – their operation and their function. For the first time in Queensland, this project creates strategic alliances between EfS, childcare, business and sustainable design. EfS is essential for addressing local and global environmental issues and early childhood EfS research has been gaining international momentum, with governments nominating this area as having significant capacity to empower communities and promote change. While models for collaboration exist in the early childhood programs in Reggio Emilia, we offer sustainability as a unique and contemporary focus with immense potential to generate international and national interest. To date Early Childhood degree students enrolled in a leadership and management unit/subject have worked collaboratively with Design students to explore the sustainable design of the proposed Lone Pine early childhood centre. Providing students with a ‘real world’ project sees them re-positioned from ‘novice’ to ‘professional’, where their knowledge, expertise and perspectives are simultaneously validated and challenged. These learning experiences are enabling students to practice a new model of early childhood leadership, one that is vital for leading in an increasingly complex world. The symposium will be comprised of three discrete, though interconnected presentations, that work together to tell the story of this project. Three key facets of the project will be explored during the 90 minute session, as the perspectives of key stakeholders are shared. The first presentation (A/Prof Julie Davis, Dr Lyndal O’Gorman& Dr Megan Gibson) will outline the role of QUT School of Early Childhood staff and students, with attention to the ways in which the project was embedded in students’ work in the final year of their degree program of study. The second presentation (Ms Lindy Osborne) will provide insights into the Design students’ collaborative work in the project. Finally, the key role of the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary and their commitment for EfS (Ms Peta Wilson & Dr Sue Elliott) will map out the philosophy that underpins the project. Together, the authors will conclude key project outcomes that have been achieved through this real-world, cross-disciplinary work.

Real-time wide-area loading margin sensitivity (WALMS) in power systems

Loading margin sensitivity (LMS) has been widely used in applications in the realm of voltage stability assessment and control. Typically, LMS is derived based on system equilibrium equations near bifurcation and therefore requires full detailed system model and significant computation effort. Availability of phasor measurement units (PMUs) due to the recent development of wide-area monitoring system (WAMS) provides an alternative computation-friendly approach for calculating LMS. With such motivation, this work proposes measurement-based wide-area loading margin sensitivity (WALMS) in bulk power systems. The proposed sensitivity, with its simplicity, has great potential to be embedded in real-time applications. Moreover, the calculation of the WALMS is not limited to low voltage near bifurcation point. A case study on IEEE 39-bus system verifies the proposed sensitivity. Finally, a voltage control scenario demonstrates the potential application of the WALMS.