On the performance of a blind source separation based I/Q-corrector

I and Q Channel phase and gain mismatches are of great concern in communications receiver design. In this paper we carry out a detailed performance analysis of the Blind-Source Seperation (BSS) based imbalance compensation structure. The results indicate that the BSS structure can offer adequate performance for most communication systems. Since the compensation is carried out before any modulation specific processing, the proposed compensation method works with all standard modulation formats.

Technology transfer in Britain: the case of monoclonal antibodies

In 1975 two Cambridge scientists published a short article in Nature which announced the discovery of monoclonal antibodies. The article concluded ‘Such cultures could be valuable for medical and industrial use’. The interest which developed by the end of the decade in the industrial and financial possibilities of the new prospects opening up in biotechnology was to throw the apparent ‘failure’ to follow‐up the potentialities of this discovery into a public prominence rarely achieved by scientific discoveries. By the time Mrs Thatcher came to power it had become a scandal, another example of Britain's apparent inability to exploit effectively the brilliance of its scientific base. It was to explore both the process of scientific discovery and the conditions in Cambridge which nurtured it, and the issues which this particular discovery raised in the area of technology transfer (and the changes of policy that ensued), that the Wellcome Trust's History of Twentieth Century Medicine Group and the Institute of Contemporary British History organised this special witness seminar. It was held at the Wellcome Trust in London on 24 September 1993. The seminar was chaired by Sir Christopher Booth and introduced by Dr Robert Bud of the Science Museum. Those participating included the two authors of the Nature article, Dr César Milstein and Dr Georges Köhler, who received a Nobel Prize for their research, Dr Basil Bard (National Research Development Corporation [NRDC] 1950–74), Sir James Gowans (Secretary of the Medical Research Council [MRC] 1977–87), Sir John Gray (Secretary of the MRC 1968–77), John Newell (BBC World Service science correspondent 1969–79), Dr David Owen (MRC), and Dr David Secher (Laboratory of Molecular Biology [LMB], Cambridge). There were also contributions from Dr Ita Askonas (former head of immunology at the National Institute for Medical Research), Dr John Galloway (former member of MRC headquarters staff), Dr David Tyrrell (former Director, MRC Common Cold Unit), Professor Miles Weatherall (head of Therapeutic Research Division, Wellcome Research Laboratories 1967–75), Dr Guil Winchester (post‐doctoral fellow, Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine), and Dr Peter Williams (former Director of the Wellcome Trust). The organisers would like to thank the Wellcome Trust for hosting and sponsoring the seminar. We would like to dedicate this publication to the memory of Georges Köhler, who sadly died in April 1995 before this could appear.

The river solofrana bicycle network: a project of green mobility

The article presents the “LungoSolofrana” project, carried out during the course “Urban and Mobility” in the academic year 2009/2010, held during the bachelor in Environmental Engineering at the University of Naples “Federico II”. The work has also been chosen as a finalist at the “UrbanPromo 2010” contest, the urban and territorial marketing event sponsored by the National Institute of Urban Planning and Urbit which was held in Venice in 2010. The project consists in a green mobility proposal, developed with an approach based on the integration of the environmental redevelopment of a portion of river Solofrana, located in the Salerno Province, and of the renewal of seven local stations of the railway line Mercato San Severino – Nocera Inferiore, including the realization of a cycle-path network for the natural environment fruition. Furthermore the work drew attention to the local and regional administration. The main intent of the project is to integrate sustainable mobility themes with the environment recovery in a territory affected by high environmental troubles. The area includes the municipalities of Nocera Inferiore, Nocera Superiore, Mercato San Severino, Castel San Giorgio and Roccapiemonte, situated in Salerno’s province, with a total population about 114.000 (font Demo ISTAT 2010). The area extension is about 84,30 sqkm and it is crossed by river Solofrana that is the central point of the project idea. The intervention strategy is defined in two kinds of actions: internal and external rail station interventions. The external rail station interventions regard the construction of pedestrian-cycle paths with the scope of increasing the spaces dedicated to cyclists and to pedestrians along the river Solofrana sides and to connect the urban areas with the railway station. In this way, it’s also possible to achieve an urban requalification of the interested area. On the other side, the interventions inside the station , according to Transit Oriented Development principles, aim at redeveloping common spaces with the insertion of new activities and at realizing new automatic cycle parks covered by photovoltaic panels. The project proposal consists of the urban regeneration of small railway stations along the route-Nocera-Codola Mercato San Severino in the province of Salerno, through interventions aimed at improving pedestrian accessibility. The project involves in particular the construction of pedestrian paths protected access to the station and connecting with neighboring towns and installation of innovative bike parking stations in elevation, covering surfaces coated with solar panels and spaces information. The project is aimed to propose a new model of sustainable transport for small and medium shifts as an alternative to private transportation