A multiple population genetic algorithm and its application in fuzzy controller

Genetic Algorithm is an important optimization technique, though its application in Fuzzy system is usually limited by problems like local optimal and premature convergence. With an aim to improve the performance of simple Genetic Algorithm, we propose a multi-population genetic algorithm MP-GA which uses two populations collaborating with each other, and apply it to fuzzy controller design to optimize its control rules. The simulation results of Inverted Pendulum demonstrate the effectiveness of this proposed method.

A haptically enabled CAN-based steering wheel controller

As the portable entertainment and mobility technologies migrate into the car, driver distraction has become recognized as a major factor in road crashes around the world. To help alert drivers to their distraction, active safety technologies such as lane departure warning systems and collision avoidance systems are being implemented. One issue with the implementation of yet another technology into the vehicle is how to cut through the competing demands of the mobile phone, navigation systems and other technologies. Haptic alerts present just such a method that may enable the system to short-circuit the normal auditory or visual communication channels. This paper presents a low cost haptic steering wheel controller that has been designed developed and tested and may be used as a communication device by a lane departure, collision avoidance, or other type of safety system.

The 6-PACK programme to decrease fall-related injuries in acute hospitals: protocol for a cluster randomised controlled trial

Background and aims In-hospital fall-related injuries are a source of personal harm, preventable hospitalisation costs, and access block through increased length of stay. Despite increased fall prevention awareness and activity over the last decade, rates of reported fall-related fractures in hospitals appear not to have decreased. This cluster randomised controlled trial (RCT) aims to determine the efficacy of the 6-PACK programme for preventing fall-related injuries, and its generalisability to other acute hospitals.

Methods 24 acute medical and surgical wards from six to eight hospitals throughout Australia will be recruited for the study. Wards will be matched by type and fall-related injury rates, then randomly allocated to the 6-PACK intervention (12 wards) or usual care control group (12 wards). The 6-PACK programme includes a nine-item fall risk assessment and six nursing interventions: ‘falls alert’ sign; supervision of patients in the bathroom; ensuring patient’s walking aids are within reach; establishment of a toileting regime; use of a low-low bed; and use of bed/chair alarm. Intervention wards will be supported by a structured implementation strategy. The primary outcomes are fall and fall-related injury rates 12 months following 6-PACK implementation.

Discussion This study will involve approximately 16 000 patients, and as such is planned to be the largest hospital fall prevention RCT to be undertaken and the first to be powered for the important outcome of fall-related injuries. If effective, there is potential to implement the programme widely as part of daily patient care in acute hospital wards where fall-related injuries are a problem.

Intervention for depression among palliative care patients and their families : a study protocol for evaluation of a training program for professional care staff

Background: Clinical depression is highly prevalent yet under-detected and under-treated in palliative care settings and is associated with a number of adverse medical and psychological outcomes for patients and their family members. This article presents a study protocol to evaluate a training intervention for non-physician palliative care staff to improve the recognition of depression and provide support for depressed patients and their family members. Details of the hypotheses and expected outcomes, study design, training program development and evaluation measures are described.
Methods and Design: A randomised controlled trial will be implemented across two palliative care services to evaluate the “Training program for professional carers to recognise and manage depression in palliative care settings”. Pre-, post- and three-month follow-up data will be collected to assess: the impact of the training on the knowledge, attitudes, self-efficacy and perceived barriers of palliative care staff when working with depression; referral rates for depression; and changes to staff practices. Quantitative and qualitative methods, in the form of self-report questionnaires and interviews with staff and family members, will be used to evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention.
Discussion: This study will determine the effectiveness of an intervention that aims to respond to the urgent need for innovative programs to target depression in the palliative care setting. The expected outcome of this study is the validation of an evidence-based training program to improve staff recognition and appropriate referrals for depression, as well as improve psychosocial support for depressed patients and their family members.

An enhanced watermarking protocol for electronic copyright management

In Piva et al's watermarking scheme for electronic copyright management system (ECMS), authors were considered trusted potentially, so a dishonest author could authorize more than one distributor to sell her one document, named "One Document to Multi-distributor" problem, which would damage the benefit of the distributors. To resolve the problem, in this paper, we propose an enhanced watermarking protocol based on Piva et al's scheme by introducing document nature code (DNC) and register records table. In addition, our protocol offers the distributor an efficient means to verify his right to an authorized digital document.

Watermarking protocol for protecting user's right in content based image retrieval

Content based image retrieval (CBIR) is a technique to search for images relevant to the user’s query from an image collection.In last decade, most attention has been paid to improve the retrieval performance. However, there is no significant effort to investigate the security concerning in CBIR. Under the query by example (QBE) paradigm, the user supplies an image as a query and the system returns a set of retrieved results. If the query image includes user’s private information, an untrusted server provider of CBIR may distribute it illegally, which leads to the user’s right problem. In this paper, we propose an interactive watermarking protocol to address this problem. A watermark is inserted into the query image by the user in encrypted domain without knowing the exact content. The server provider of CBIR will get the watermarked query image and uses it to perform image retrieval. In case where the user finds an unauthorized copy, a watermark in the unauthorized copy will be used as evidence to prove that the user’s legal right is infringed by the server provider.

Design of secure watermarking scheme for watermarking protocol

Watermarking technique enables to hide an imperceptible watermark into a multimedia content for copyright protection. However, in most conventional watermarking schemes, the watermark is embedded solely by the seller, and both the seller and the buyer know the watermarked copy, which causes unsettled dispute at the phase of arbitration. To solve this problem, many watermarking protocols have been proposed using watermarking scheme in the encrypted domain. In this paper, we firstly discuss many security aspects in the encrypted domain, and then propose a new method of homomorphism conversion for probabilistic public key cryptosystem with homomorphic property. Based on our previous work, a new secure watermarking scheme for watermarking protocol is presented using a new embedding strategy in the encrypted domain. We employ an El Gamal variant cryptosystem with additive homomorphic property to reduce the computing overload of watermark embedding in the encrypted domain, and RA code to improve the robustness of the watermarked image against many moderate attacks after decryption. Security analysis and experiment demonstrate that the secure watermarking scheme is more suitable for implementing the existing watermarking protocols.

Secure buyer - seller watermarking protocol

In the existing watermarking protocols, a trusted third party (TTP) is introduced to guarantee that a protocol is fair to both the seller and buyer in a digital content transaction. However, the TTP decreases the security and affects the protocol implementation. To address this issue, in this article a secure buyer–seller watermarking protocol without the assistance of a TTP is proposed in which there are only two participants, a seller and a buyer. Based on the idea of sharing a secret, a watermark embedded in digital content to trace piracy is composed of two pieces of secret information, one produced by the seller and one by the buyer. Since neither knows the exact watermark, the buyer cannot remove the watermark from watermarked digital content, and at the same time the seller cannot fabricate piracy to frame an innocent buyer. In other words, the proposed protocol can trace piracy and protect the customer’s rights. In addition, because no third party is introduced into the proposed protocol, the problem of a seller (or a buyer) colluding with a third party to cheat the buyer (or the seller), namely, the conspiracy problem, can be avoided.

A new watermarking protocol against conspiracy

A trusted third party introduced in watermarking protocols would decrease the security and affect the implementation of the protocols. In this paper, a new watermarking protocol with an un trusted third party (UTTP) was proposed. Based on the idea of all-o>nothing disclosure of secret (ANDOS), all of the buyer, the seller and the third party didn't know the exact watermark, which was embedded in a digital content for tracing piracy. The proposed protocol pro vided mechanisms to trace piracy and protect customer's right, fn addition, the problem that a seller colluded with UTTP to frame the buyer, namely, the conspiracy problem, could be avoided.

Backward modelling and look-ahead fuzzy energy management controller for a parallel hybrid vehicle

This paper focuses on a parallel hybrid electric vehicle. It first develops a model for the vehicle using the backward-looking approach where the flow of energy starts from wheels and spreads towards engine and electric motor. Next, a fuzzy logic-based strategy is developed to control the operation of the vehicle. The objectives of the controller include managing the energy flow from engine and electric motor, controlling transmission ratio, adjusting speed, and sustaining battery's state of charge. The controller examines current vehicle speed, demand torque, slope difference, state of charge of battery, and engine and electric motor rotation speeds. Then, it determines the best values for continuous variable transmission ratio, speed, and torque. A slope window scheme is also developed to take into account the look-ahead slope information and determine the best vehicle speed for better fuel economy. The developed model and control strategy are simulated. The simulation results are presented and discussed. It is shown that the use of the proposed fuzzy controller reduces fuel consumption.

Secure image retrieval based on visual content and watermarking protocol

As an interesting application on cloud computing, content-based image retrieval (CBIR) has attracted a lot of attention, but the focus of previous research work was mainly on improving the retrieval performance rather than addressing security issues such as copyrights and user privacy. With an increase of security attacks in the computer networks, these security issues become critical for CBIR systems. In this paper, we propose a novel two-party watermarking protocol that can resolve the issues regarding user rights and privacy. Unlike the previously published protocols, our protocol does not require the existence of a trusted party. It exhibits three useful features: security against partial watermark removal, security in watermark verification and non-repudiation. In addition, we report an empirical research of CBIR with the security mechanism. The experimental results show that the proposed protocol is practicable and the retrieval performance will not be affected by watermarking query images.

SMS-based medical diagnostic telemetry data transmission protocol for medical sensors

People with special medical monitoring needs can, these days, be sent home and remotely monitored through the use of data logging medical sensors and a transmission base-station. While this can improve quality of life by allowing the patient to spend most of their time at home, most current technologies rely on hardwired landline technology or expensive mobile data transmissions to transmit data to a medical facility. The aim of this paper is to investigate and develop an approach to increase the freedom of a monitored patient and decrease costs by utilising mobile technologies and SMS messaging to transmit data from patient to medico. To this end, we evaluated the capabilities of SMS and propose a generic communications protocol which can work within the constraints of the SMS format, but provide the necessary redundancy and robustness to be used for the transmission of non-critical medical telemetry from data logging medical sensors.