The ability to operate in a variety of environments is an important topic in humanoid robotics research. One of the ultimate goals of this research is smooth operation in everyday environments. However, movement in a real-world environment such as a family's house is challenging because the viscous friction and elasticity of each floor, which directly influence the robot's motion and are diffic...

House dust mites produce potent allergens that exacerbate asthma in sensitized patients, whom are recommended to practice allergen avoidance within their home environment. We tested the effect of activated charcoal impregnated fibers on house dust mite survival. One hundred live adult house dust mites (Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus) were added to eight culture dishes preequilibrated at room te...

Particulate matters (PM) at the pedestrian level significantly raises the health impacts in the compact urban environment of Hong Kong. A detailed investigation of the fine-scale spatial variation of pedestrian-level PM is necessary to assess the health risk to pedestrians in the outdoor environment. However, the collection of PM data is difficult in the compact urban environment of Hong Kong d...

This study aimed to compare the dynamics of air temperature and velocity under two different ventilation and housing systems during summer and winter in Korea. The NH3 concentration of both housing systems was also investigated in relation to the pig's growth. The ventilation systems used were; negative pressure type for the enclosed pig house (EPH) and natural airflow for the conventional pig ...

In the last few years data acquisition and control systems are PC based for industrial and laboratory applications. In this paper, we present a data acquisition process to monitor the greenhouse environment. The simulation process consists of Real Time setup using Proteus software. The changes in the sensor variables such as temperature, soil moisture and humidity are monitored and are interfac...

We present CHALET, a 3D house simulator with support for navigation and manipulation. CHALET includes 58 rooms and 10 house configuration, and allows to easily create new house and room layouts. CHALET supports a range of common household activities, including moving objects, toggling appliances, and placing objects inside closeable containers. The environment and actions available are designed...

In this paper we consider the problem of mobile robot localization with range sensors in outdoor environments. Our approach applies a particle filter to estimate the full six-dimensional state of the robot. To represent the environment we utilize multi-level surface maps which allow the robot to represent vertical structures and multiple levels in the environment. We describe probabilistic moti...

Because of several advantages over traditional ceramic insulators, polymeric insulators are gaining popularity in electrical power transmission and distribution systems as outdoor insulation. However, being organic in nature, these insulators degrade in outdoor environment and their lifeexpectancy needs to be assessed in the environment prevailing at potential sites of outdoor installation. For...