In the next coming years, many of our basic activities such as reading an e-mail, checking our bank account, buying on-line, etc., will be performed by using a smartphone in a mobile environment. It is quite obvious that the degree of security granted by a classic username-password access is not sufficient and that a stronger level of safeness is required. However, usually adopted additional in...

The micro-Digital Sun Sensor (μDSS) is a sun detector which senses a satellite’s instant attitude by detecting its attitude angle with respect to the sun. It is composed of a solar cell power supply, a RF communication block and an imaging chip, which is called APS+. The APS+ integrates a CMOS Active Pixel Sensor (APS) of 368×368 pixels, a 12 bit Analogue to Digital Converter (ADC), and digital...

The bidirectional reflectance characteristics of vegetation canopies vary with time of day and through the growing season. In this study the effects of sun and view angles on bidirectional reflectance factors from corn (Zea mays L.) canopies ranging in development from the six leaf stage to harvest maturity were examined. For nadir-acquired reflectance factors there was a strong solar angle dep...

We introduce the sensor-utility-network (SUN) method for occupancy estimation in buildings. Based on inputs from a variety of sensor measurements, along with historical data regarding building utilization, the SUN estimator produces occupancy estimates through the solution of a recedinghorizon convex optimization problem. State-of-the-art on-line occupancy algorithms rely on indirect measuremen...

A Digital Sun Sensor (DSS) has several advantages if compared to the analogue one. It achieves higher accuracy and avoids the problems with light being reflected from the Earth’s surface. The gradual degradation of the sensitivity of the elements due to radiation effects is not crucial for its proper functioning. The advances in CCD and recently in CMOS technology make possible to implement the...

The micro-Digital Sun Sensor (μDSS) is a sun detector which senses a satellite’s instant attitude by detecting its attitude angle with respect to the sun. It is composed of a solar cell power supply, a RF communication block and an imaging chip, which is called APS+. The APS+ integrates a CMOS Active Pixel Sensor (APS) of 368×368 pixels, a 12 bit Analogue to Digital Converter (ADC), and digital...

We explore techniques for a slender and untethered stylus prototype enhanced with a full suite of inertial sensors (three-axis accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer). We present a taxonomy of enhanced stylus input techniques and consider a number of novel possibilities that combine motion sensors with pen stroke and touchscreen inputs on a pen + touch slate. These inertial sensors enable m...

Magnetic fields generated by the brain or the heart are very useful in clinical diagnostics. Therefore, magnetic signals produced by other organs are also of considerable interest. Here we show first evidence that thoracic muscles can produce a strong magnetic flux density during respiratory activity, that we name respiratory magnetogram. We used a small magnetometer based on microelectromechan...

Optically pumped helium magnetometers are important instruments whichhave many applications in military, mass spectroscopy and space applications. In thispaper, the working principles of helium magnetometers have been explained. There isalso an introduction of a new method for finding the resonant frequency, which hasadvantages to the typical method such as more sample r...

Results of experimental measurements of aero-optical distortions caused by turbulent boundary layers at subsonic speeds M = 0.4...0.6 are presented. Measurements were performed using a high-speed Shack-Hartmann sensor and a Malley probe to collect instantaneous wavefronts with high spatial and temporal resolution. Effects of different aperture sizes on levels of aero-optical aberrations and cor...