Efficient bipedal robots based on passive-dynamic walkers

Passive-dynamic walkers are simple mechanical devices, composed of solid parts connected by joints, that walk stably down a slope. They have no motors or controllers, yet can have remarkably humanlike motions. This suggests that these machines are useful models of human locomotion; however, they cannot walk on level ground. Here we present three robots based on passive-dynamics, with small active power sources substituted for gravity, which can walk on level ground. These robots use less control and less energy than other powered robots, yet walk more naturally, further suggesting the importance of passive-dynamics in human locomotion.     

New trends in precision agriculture: a novel cloud-based system for enabling data storage and agricultural task planning and automation

It is well-known that information and communication technologies enable many tasks in the context of precision agriculture. In fact, more and more farmers and food and agriculture companies are using precision agriculture-based systems to enhance not only their products themselves, but also their means of production. Consequently, problems arising from large amounts of data management and processing are arising. It would be very useful to have an infrastructure that allows information and agricultural tasks to be efficiently shared and handled. The cloud computing paradigm offers a solution. In this study, a cloud-based software architecture is proposed with the aim of enabling a complete crop management system to be deployed and validated. Such architecture includes modules developed by using Google App Engine, which allows the information to be easily retrieved and processed and agricultural tasks to be properly defined and planned. Additionally, Google’s Datastore (which ensures a high scalability degree), hosts both information that describes such agricultural tasks and agronomic data. The architecture has been validated in a system that comprises a wireless sensor network with fixed nodes and a mobile node on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), deployed in an agricultural farm in the Region of Murcia (Spain). Such a network allows soil water and plant status to be monitored. The UAV (capable of executing missions defined by an administrator) is useful for acquiring visual information in an autonomous manner (under operator supervision, if needed). The system performance has been analysed and results that demonstrate the benefits of using the proposed architecture are detailed.     

WTO争端解决机制执行程序研究

《关于争端解决规则与程序的谅解》(以下简称《谅解》或DSU)对执行程序规定了明确的时间界限,通过监督机制、补偿程序、报复程序,尤其是交叉报复程序加大了DSB裁决的执行力度。但DSU也有其缺陷:合理期间被恶意使用,执行监督程序规则过于简单,交叉报复对发展中国家欠公平。应建立集体报复制度、惩罚制度,完善执行监督程序,尤其是给予发展中国家的特殊待遇条款应具有可操作性。     

关于新时期高校人才工作的探索与实践

人才问题始终是高等学校改革与发展的核心问题。高校必须着眼于国家发展和战略需要，统筹发展学校内部各支人才队伍，坚持“党管人才”原则，更新观念，完善工作机制，加大人才队伍建设的工作力度，尊重人才，培养人才，激励人才，以人才工作为强校之本，推动学校的事业发展。     

TELESCOPES: Astronomers Overcome 'Aperture Envy'

Many users of small telescopes are disturbed by the trend of shutting down smaller instruments in order to help fund bigger and bolder ground-based telescopes. Small telescopes can thrive in the shadow of giant new observatories, they say--but only if they are adapted to specialized projects. Telescopes with apertures of 2 meters or less have unique abilities to monitor broad swaths of the sky and stare at the same objects night after night, sometimes for years; various teams are turning small telescopes into robots, creating networks that span the globe and devoting them to survey projects that big telescopes don't have a prayer of tackling.     

查收查引文献数据的自动分析及其报告内容的自动实现

文章为简化查收查引工作流程,减少人工操作干预,提高查收查引服务质量,将Web of Science核心合集(以下简称WoS)相关的查收查引工作中对文献题录的数据分析、查收查引报告文献列表的更新环节交给程序进行处理。笔者利用Java的Word文档编辑库docx4j结合自编程序对检索到的文献和引证文献题录进行自动分析比较归类并更新Word版的查收查引报告,同时导出文献自引、他引情况等统计数据。实现查收查引工作中人工操作与程序处理部分分离,减少了机械性的人工劳动,提高效率的同时使业务流程更加紧凑简洁。     

German farmers’ intention to use autonomous field robots: a PLS-analysis

Autonomous field robots are a promising technology for solving several problems in agriculture, as they are electrical driven, can control weeds single-plant based mechanically or with microdoses of pesticides and exert less ground pressure on the field. Whether such robots will be applied on a large scale in German agriculture depends on various parameters. Therefore, the factors influencing the behavioural intention of farmers with respect to their future adoption of autonomous field robots were investigated. The analysis applies a structural equation model based on an extended version of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology. The dataset, collected in 2019, consists of 500 German farmers. The results reveal significantly positive effects of farmers’ expected performance, social influence and trust as well as significantly negative effects of farmers’ effort expectancy and anxiety on the behavioural intention to use autonomous field robots. Additionally, moderating effects of age on the relationship of individual constructs to the behavioural intent to use robots could be confirmed. The results provide important information for various stakeholders. Robot suppliers should better inform farmers about the performance of their products, for instance by involving farmers in the development process of the robots. The ecological benefits attributed to field robots could meet public expectations and should be better communicated to address farmers’ social influence on the behavioural intention to use the robots. Policymakers could try to create better framework conditions, for example by establishing a stable legal situation for autonomous systems or promote its use.

     

国家土地督察制度建设中存在的问题与建议

分析了国家土地督察制度实施5年来存在的主要问题,主要是:土地督察制度建设的法制化不足;土地督察业务建设不规范;工作机制不完善;土地督察队伍仍需加强。针对这些问题,提出了推进土地督察制度建设的建议:加强土地督察制度的法制化和制度化建设;完善土地督察核心业务建设;完善土地督察工作机制;加强土地督察队伍建设。     

Mobile robots: motor challenges and materials solutions

Bolted-down robots labor in our factories, performing the same task over and over again. Where are the robots that run and jump? Equaling human performance is very difficult for many reasons, including the basic challenge of demonstrating motors and transmissions that efficiently match the power per unit mass of muscle. In order to exceed animal agility, new actuators are needed. Materials that change dimension in response to applied voltage, so-called artificial muscle technologies, outperform muscle in most respects and so provide a promising means of improving robots. In the longer term, robots powered by atomically perfect fibers will outrun us all.     

ROBOTICS: Rescue Droids Stumble in an Urban Jungle

AUSTIN, TEXAS--Here at the 17th Annual National Conference on Artificial Intelligence, four teams of engineers fielded mechanical contestants in the first annual urban ruin search-and-rescue competition--a simulated catastrophe created to test intelligent lifesaving robots that may one day lead rescuers to people trapped in the precarious rubble of collapsed buildings. The competition indicated that the technology still has a way to go.     

Social integration of robots into groups of cockroaches to control self-organized choices

Collective behavior based on self-organization has been shown in group-living animals from insects to vertebrates. These findings have stimulated engineers to investigate approaches for the coordination of autonomous multirobot systems based on self-organization. In this experimental study, we show collective decision-making by mixed groups of cockroaches and socially integrated autonomous robots, leading to shared shelter selection. Individuals, natural or artificial, are perceived as equivalent, and the collective decision emerges from nonlinear feedbacks based on local interactions. Even when in the minority, robots can modulate the collective decision-making process and produce a global pattern not observed in their absence. These results demonstrate the possibility of using intelligent autonomous devices to study and control self-organized behavioral patterns in group-living animals.     

机器人足球比赛防守与进攻队形转换的研究

随着机器人足球的发展，机器人防守和进攻的队形对于比赛显得尤为重要。为了加强机器人足球比赛中的防守和进攻，文章通过分析足球在不同区域时防守队形的选择、防守与进攻的队形转换、以及在极端情况下剩余机器人的有效利用等几个问题，研究和设计机器人防守和进攻队形转换的算法和策略。机器人队形的选择采用人性化的方法，大大提高了队形的形成速度，在极端状态下也做出相应的策略来加强进攻。通过实验表明，该策略增加了防守和进攻的效率，提高了进球的几率。     

高校CCT联合考试系统终端机的故障解析

高校联合考试系统目前得到广泛应用,由于软、硬件等方面的原因,发生故障比较频繁,通过对系统进行分析,提出了一套评分机和终端机的安装方案,同时提出一套故障排除的机制,确保系统运行稳定。     

细菌非可培养状态复苏方法的研究进展

细菌在不良环境胁迫下仍保持新陈代谢活性和毒性,但会失去在常规培养基上生长繁殖能力而进入活的非可培养状态(visablebut nonculturable state,VBNC)。处于VBNC状态下的细菌,包括很多病原菌,在一定的条件下可复苏并重新获得可培养能力。这为人类对未知微生物资源的开发和利用提供了新的方向,同时对公共健康安全和食品安全的监督与防控提出了全新的挑战。文中综述了VBNC细菌的复苏方法,并分析了其潜在的复苏机制,旨在为今后的研究提供更多的研究思路。     

High-resolution thin-film device to sense texture by touch

Touch (or tactile) sensors are gaining renewed interest as the level of sophistication in the application of minimum invasive surgery and humanoid robots increases. The spatial resolution of current large-area (greater than 1 cm(2)) tactile sensor lags by more than an order of magnitude compared with the human finger. By using metal and semiconducting nanoparticles, a approximately 100-nm-thick, large-area thin-film device is self-assembled such that the change in current density through the film and the electroluminescent light intensity are linearly proportional to the local stress. A stress image is obtained by pressing a copper grid and a United States 1-cent coin on the device and focusing the resulting electroluminescent light directly on the charge-coupled device. Both the lateral and height resolution of texture are comparable to the human finger at similar stress levels of approximately 10 kilopascals.     

新建管道通信干线的传输容量

已建设和拟建设的管道专用通信网，因其容量小（均为３４Ｍｂｉｔ／ｓ）且主要用于电话业务，已不适应计算机网络通信、电视会议、多媒体信息传输等业务开展的需要，扩大新的通信干线容量势在必行。邮电部、中国联合通信总公司均采用了同步数字等级（ＳＤＨ）制，以取代准册步数字等级（ＰＤＨ）制，扩大其通信系统容量，面向全国开放。而石油专用网也具备了向同步数字等级（ＳＤＨ）制过渡的条件，建议再建长途通信干线时，其容量还     

民族地区培育村镇银行的法律问题研究

为了克服制约村镇银行发展的诸多不利因素,从法律角度提出了在民族地区培育村镇银行的对策：一是完善村镇银行立法;二是放宽村镇银行的发起人资格限制;三是完善财政支持制度;四是依据税法给予民族地区村镇银行税收优惠;五是探索建立存款保险制度;六是重构村镇银行监管法律责任制度;七是健全政策性农业保险制度,构建农业巨灾风险分散机制;八是对民族地区村镇银行实施倾斜性的货币政策;九是制定和完善相关法律法规和规章。     

符离集烧鸡检验实验室认可的思考与探索

分析实验室认可存在的问题,指出实验室认可的必要性。通过对学校符离集烧鸡检验实验室认可进行探索,对实验室功能进行整合,加强人员培训和关键岗位人员的配备,建立文件化的质量管理体系,强化认可实验室的运行监督,为符离集烧鸡安全提供保障。     

农药可信流通管理与服务应用研究初探

本文通过分析农药流通管理过程中存在的问题以及实现可信流通管理与服务的需求,提出了农药可信流通管理与服务应用研究的内容,即通过构建农药批发企业和零售企业管理与服务系统和农药可信流通查询监督系统,对企业购销业务中商品流通过程的信息进行全程管理,提高农药流通渠道内批发与零售企业的管理与服务水平以及对农药品质和农药流通企业的监督管理水平,为消费者提供农药可信流通查询监督服务。     

Ethics in computer software design and development

Over the past 20 years, computer software has become integral and commonplace for operational and management tasks throughout agricultural and natural resource disciplines. During this software infusion, however, little thought has been afforded human impacts, both good and bad. This paper examines current ethical issues of software system design and development in relation to privacy, accuracy, property, accessibility, and effects on quality of life. These issues are explored in the context of simulation models, databases, geographic information systems and artificial intelligence programs, especially expert systems. New approaches to system development place a much higher emphasis on the effects of system deployment within a complex human environment. Software design decisions often depend on more than one ethical issue, possibly conflicting, where the appropriate ethical choice is not always clear cut. Professional codes of ethics do little to change peoples’ behavior; rather, incentives for using an ethical approach to software development may lie in significantly increased likelihood of system success.