The ability of manipulating flexible objects, such as rubber belts and paper sheets, is important in automated manufacturing systems. This paper describes a novel approach to vision-guided assembly of flexible objects. The operation dealt with in this paper is to assemble a rubber belt with fixed pulleys. By analyzing possible states of the belt based on the empirical knowledge of the belt, we ...

Timing belt transmission is a key subsystem of international combustion engines. Faults in such belt systems lead to power loss, increased emissions and, in case of failure, may even cause severe damage to the whole engine. Hitherto, the physical condition of the belt has been assessed manually, which is both inconvenient and inaccurate. It is well known that driving belts emit noise according ...

In epithelial cells, myosin-II-dependent forces regulate many aspects of animal morphogenesis, such as apical constriction, cell intercalation, cell sorting, and the formation and maintenance of the adherens junction. These forces are mainly generated by the circumferential actomyosin belt, which is composed of F-actin-myosin II bundles located along apical cell-cell junctions. Although several...

30 Children show precocious ability in the learning of languages; is this the case with motor 31 learning? We used split-belt walking to probe motor adaptation (a form of motor 32 learning) in children. Data from 27 children (aged 8-36 months) were compared with 33 that from 10 adults. Children walked with the treadmill belts at the same speed (tied34 belt), followed by walking with the belts m...

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of a pelvic belt on the activities of trunk and lower extremity muscles in normal adults. [Subjects and Methods] The subjects were 20 normal individuals without a history of orthopedic problems. The pelvic compression belt (The Com-Pressor, OPTP, Minneapolis, MN, USA) was an adjustable body belt with four elastic compression ban...

On July 9, 1962, at 0900 UT (Universal Time) a nuclear device of 1.4-megatons yield was detonated at 400 km above Johnston Island in the Pacific Ocean. Since the explosion took place in the trapping region of the magnetosphere, an artificial radiation belt of considerable intensity was produced. The possible sources of the radiation belt were: (I ) beta-decay electrons from the fission fragment...

Context. The mysterious solar system object 133P/(7968) Elst-Pizarro is dynamically asteroidal, yet displays recurrent comet-like dust emission. Two scenarios were hypothesized to explain this unusual behavior: (1) 133P is a classical comet from the outer solar system that has evolved onto a main-belt orbit, or (2) 133P is a dynamically ordinary main-belt asteroid on which subsurface ice has re...

with the introduction of the use of seatbelts in cars, mortality following motor vehicle crashes has decreased significantly. however, two patterns of injuries, the ‘seatbelt sign’ and ‘seatbelt syndrome’ have emerged. injuries may consist of traumatic abdominal wall disruption. we present two cases of severe abdominal wall disruption caused by a seatbelt injury and treated with primary repair....

We discuss the structure of the Kuiper belt as it can be inferred from the first decade of observations. In particular, we focus on its most intriguing properties – the mass deficit, inclination distribution, the apparent existence of an outer edge and of a correlation among inclinations, colours and sizes – which clearly show that the belt has lost its pristine structure of a dynamically cold ...

We describe calculations of the evolution of an ensemble of small planetesimals in the outer solar system. In a solar nebula with a mass of several times the Minimum Mass Solar Nebula, objects with radii of 100–1000 km can form on timescales of 10–100 Myr. Model luminosity functions derived from these calculations agree with current observations of bodies beyond the orbit of Neptune (Kuiper Bel...