Spectral Finite Element Modeling of Complex Structures for Applications in Real-time Structural Health Monitoring

In this paper we discuss the recent progresses in spectral finite element modeling of complex structures and its application in real-time structural health monitoring system based on sensor-actuator network and near real-time computation of Damage Force Indicator (DFI) vector. A waveguide network formalism is developed by mapping the original variational problem into the variational problem involving product spaces of 1D waveguides. Numerical convergence is studied using a h()-refinement scheme, where is the wavelength of interest. Computational issues towards successful implementation of this method with SHM system are discussed.

Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) Using Strain Gauges, PVDF Film and Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) Sensors: A Comparative Study

The term Structural Health Monitoring has gained wide acceptance in the recent pastas a means to monitor a structure and provide an early warning of an unsafe conditionusing real-time data. Utilization of structurally integrated, distributed sensors tomonitor the health of a structure through accurate interpretation of sensor signals andreal-time data processing can greatly reduce the inspection burden. The rapidimprovement of the Fiber Bragg Grating sensor technology for strain, vibration andacoustic emission measurements in recent times make them a feasible alternatives tothe traditional strain gauges transducers and conventional Piezoelectric sensors usedfor Non Destructive Evaluation (NDE) and Structural Health Monitoring (SHM).Optical fiber-based sensors offers advantages over conventional strain gauges, PVDFfilm and PZT devices in terms of size, ease of embedment, immunity fromelectromagnetic interference(EMI) and potential for multiplexing a number ofsensors. The objective of this paper is to demonstrate the feasibility of Fiber BraggGrating sensor and compare its utility with the conventional strain gauges and PVDFfilm sensors. For this purpose experiments are being carried out in the laboratory on acomposite wing of a mini air vehicle (MAV). In this paper, the results obtained fromthese preliminary experiments are discussed.

Solid state electrochemical sensor for monitoring Mg in Al refining process

Novel solid-state electrochemical sensors have been designed using the Mg2+ cation conductors incorporating novel solid-state reference electrodes for in-line monitoring of Mg in molten Al during the refining process and also for in-line monitoring of Mg content in molten Al in the alloying process. In this paper we report the preparation of Mg2+ ion conductors, MgAl2O4 and MgZr4(PO4)6, by the solid state ceramic synthesis route, measurement of their electrical properties using ac-impedance spectroscopy and application of the above cation conductors for designing novel electrochemical sensors for monitoring Mg dissolved in molten Al. The activation energy for Mg2+ ion conduction in MgAl2O4 is 2.08 eV and in MgZr4(PO4)6 is 1.7 eV, respectively. The sensors have been found to respond rapidly to change in Mg content in molten aluminium around 1000 K.

Monitoring Himalayan cryosphere using remote sensing techniques

In the Himalayas, large area is covered by glaciers, seasonal snow and changes in its extent can influence availability of water in the Himalayan Rivers. In this paper, changes in glacial extent, glacial mass balance and seasonal snow cover have been discussed. Field and satellite based investigations suggest, most of the Himalayan glaciers are retreating though the rate of retreat is varying from glacier to glacier, ranging from few meters to almost 50 meters per year, depending upon the numerous glacial, terrain and meteorological parameters. Retreat was estimated for 1868 glaciers in eleven basins distributed across the Indian Himalaya since 1962 to 2001/02. Estimates show an overall reduction in glacier area from 6332 to 5329 sq km, an overall deglaciation of 16 percent.Snow line at the end of ablation season on the Chhota Shigri glacier suggests a change in altitude from 4900 to 5200 m from late 1970’s to the present. Seasonal snow cover monitoring of the Himalaya has shown large amounts of snow cover depletion in early part of winter, i.e. from October to December. For many basins located in lower altitude and in south of Pir Panjal range, snow ablation was observed through out the winter season. In addition, average stream runoff of the Baspa basin during the month of December shows an increase by 75 per cent. This combination of glacial retreat, negative mass balance, early melting of seasonal snow cover and winter time increase in stream runoff suggest an influence of climate change on the Himalayan cryosphere.

Monitoring of seasonal snow cover in Bhutan using remote sensing technique

All major rivers in Bhutan depend on snowmelt for discharge. Therefore, changes in snow cover due to climate change can influence distribution and availability of water. However, information about distribution of seasonal snow cover in Bhutan is not available. The MODIS snow product was used to study snow cover status and trends in Bhutan. Average snow cover area (SCA) of Bhutan estimated for the period 2002 to 2010 was 9030 sq. km, about 25.5% of the total land area. SCA trend of Bhutan for the period 2002-2010 was found to decrease (-3.27 +/- 1.28%). The average SCA for winter was 14,485 sq. km (37.7%), for spring 7411 sq. km (19.3%), for summer 4326 sq. km (11.2%), and for autumn 7788 sq. km (20.2%), mostly distributed in the elevation range 2500-6000 m amsl. Interannual and seasonal SCA trend both showed a decline, although it was not statistically significant for all sub-basins. Pho Chu sub-basin with 19.5% of the total average SCA had the highest average SCA. The rate of increase of SCA for every 100 m elevation was the highest (2.5%) in the Pa Chu sub-basin. The coefficient of variance of 1.27 indicates high variability of SCA in winter.

Real-time monitoring of critical nodes with minimal number of Phasor Measurement Units

This paper presents a method for placement of Phasor Measurement Units, ensuring the monitoring of vulnerable buses which are obtained based on transient stability analysis of the overall system. Real-time monitoring of phase angles across different nodes, which indicates the proximity to instability, the very purpose will be well defined if the PMUs are placed at buses which are more vulnerable. The issue is to identify the key buses where the PMUs should be placed when the transient stability prediction is taken into account considering various disturbances. Integer Linear Programming technique with equality and inequality constraints is used to find out the optimal placement set with key buses identified from transient stability analysis. Results on IEEE-14 bus system are presented to illustrate the proposed approach.

Guided-wave based structural health monitoring of built-up composite structures using spectral finite element method

The paper discusses basically a wave propagation based method for identifying the damage due to skin-stiffener debonding in a stiffened structure. First, a spectral finite element model (SFEM) is developed for modeling wave propagation in general built-up structures, using the concept of assembling 2D spectral plate elements and the model is then used in modeling wave propagation in a skin-stiffener type structure. The damage force indicator (DFI) technique, which is derived from the dynamic stiffness matrix of the healthy stiffened structure (obtained from the SFEM model) along with the nodal displacements of the debonded stiffened structure (obtained from 2D finite element model), is used to identify the damage due to the presence of debond in a stiffened structure.

Resource Usage Monitoring in Clouds

Monitoring of infrastructural resources in clouds plays a crucial role in providing application guarantees like performance, availability, and security. Monitoring is crucial from two perspectives - the cloud-user and the service provider. The cloud user’s interest is in doing an analysis to arrive at appropriate Service-level agreement (SLA) demands and the cloud provider’s interest is to assess if the demand can be met. To support this, a monitoring framework is necessary particularly since cloud hosts are subject to varying load conditions. To illustrate the importance of such a framework, we choose the example of performance being the Quality of Service (QoS) requirement and show how inappropriate provisioning of resources may lead to unexpected performance bottlenecks. We evaluate existing monitoring frameworks to bring out the motivation for building much more powerful monitoring frameworks. We then propose a distributed monitoring framework, which enables fine grained monitoring for applications and demonstrate with a prototype system implementation for typical use cases.

Accelerated multistress aging of polymer nanocomposites and its condition monitoring

In recent years, the time dependant maintenance of expensive high voltage power equipments is getting replaced by condition based maintenance so as to detect apriori an impending failure of the equipment. For condition based maintenance, most monitoring systems concentrate on the electrical quantities such as measurement and evaluation of partial discharges, tan delta, tip-up test, dielectric strength, insulation resistance, polarization and depolarization current. However, in the case of equipments being developed with novel nanodielectric insulating materials, the variation in these parameters before an impending failure is not available. Hence in this work, accelerated electrothermal aging studies have been conducted on unfilled epoxy as well as epoxy nanocomposite samples of 5 wt% filler loading, and the tan d values were continuously monitored to obtain the condition of the samples under study. It was observed that those samples whose tan d increased at a rapid rate failed first.

Mobile agent based node monitoring protocol for MANETs

Mobile ad-hoc network is a wireless ad-hoc network with dynamic network topology. The Dynamicity, due to the random node movement, and scarcity of resources lead to a challenge in monitoring the nodes in a MANET. Monitoring the lack of resources (bandwidth, buffer, and energy), misbehavior, and mobility at node level remains, a challenge. In a MANET the proposed protocol uses both static as well as mobile agents, where the mobile agents migrate to different clusters of the zones respectively, collect the node status information periodically, and provide a high level information to the static agent (which resides at the central node) by analyzing the raw information at the nodes. This, in turn, reduces the network traffic and conserves the workload of the central node, where a static agent is available with high level information and in coordination with other modules. The protocol has been tested in different size MANETs with variable number of nodes and applications. The results shown in the simulation indicates the effectiveness of the protocol.

SeaMo plus : a virtual real-time multimedia service framework on handhelds to enable remote real-time patient monitoring for mobile doctors

The key requirements for enabling real-time remote healthcare service on a mobile platform, in the present day heterogeneous wireless access network environment, are uninterrupted and continuous access to the online patient vital medical data, monitor the physical condition of the patient through video streaming, and so on. For an application, this continuity has to be sufficiently transparent both from a performance perspective as well as a Quality of Experience (QoE) perspective. While mobility protocols (MIPv6, HIP, SCTP, DSMIP, PMIP, and SIP) strive to provide both and do so, limited or non-availability (deployment) of these protocols on provider networks and server side infrastructure has impeded adoption of mobility on end user platforms. Add to this, the cumbersome OS configuration procedures required to enable mobility protocol support on end user devices and the user's enthusiasm to add this support is lost. Considering the lack of proper mobility implementations that meet the remote healthcare requirements above, we propose SeaMo+ that comprises a light-weight application layer framework, termed as the Virtual Real-time Multimedia Service (VRMS) for mobile devices to provide an uninterrupted real-time multimedia information access to the mobile user. VRMS is easy to configure, platform independent, and does not require additional network infrastructure unlike other existing schemes. We illustrate the working of SeaMo+ in two realistic remote patient monitoring application scenarios.