The key concept of Physical Optics (PO), originally developed for a perfectly electric conductor (PEC), consists in that the high frequency fields on the scatterer surface are approximated by those which would exist on the infinite flat surface tangent to the scatterer. The scattered fields at arbitrary observation points are then calculated by integrating these fields on the scatterer. This general concept can be extended to arbitrary impedance surfaces. The asymptotic evaluation of this surface integration in terms of diffraction coefficients gives us the fields in analytical forms. In this paper, uniform PO diffraction coefficients for the impedance surfaces are presented and their high accuracy is verified numerically. These coefficients are providing us with the tool for the mechanism extraction of various high frequency methods such as aperture field integration method and Kirchhoff's method.

The performance of the ARQ scheme with Erasures Correction decoding (ARQEC) used over the frequency-nonselective Nakagami fading channel subject to additive white Gaussian noise is considered and compared to hybrid ARQ.

Adaptive maximum likelihood (ML) detection implemented by the Viterbi algorithm (VA) is proposed for the reception of MPSK signals in frequency nonselective fast Rayleigh fading. M-state VA, each state in the VA trellis represents a signal constellation point, is used. Diversity reception is incorporated into the structure of Viterbi decoding. The pilot symbol (unmodulated carrier) is periodically inserted to terminate the trellis so that the phase ambiguity of the detected data sequence is avoided. Applying the per-survivor processing principle (PSPP), adaptive ML detection performs adaptive channel estimation using a simple linear predictor at all trellis states in parallel. The predictor coefficient is stochastically adapted without requiring a priori knowledge of fading channel statistics, based on a recursive least-squares (RLS) adaptation algorithm, to match changes in the statistical properties of the channel (i.e., AWGN of fast/slow fading) using both data and pilot symbols. Simulations of 4PSK signal transmission demonstrate that the proposed adaptive ML detection scheme can track fast fading, thus significantly reducing the irreducible bit error rate (BER) due to Doppler spread in the fading channel. It is also shown that adaptive ML detection provides BER performance close to ideal coherent detection (CD) in AWGN channels.

In this work, the performance evaluation of a voice and data integrated fast PRMA has been done. In this newly proposed protocol, every data terminal has an infinite buffer and voice terminals can work independently of data terminals. Thus voice terminals have the higher priority over data terminals. We can, therefore, analyze voice and data subsystems separately. For voice analysis, we use a Markov analysis, and we use the EPA method for data analysis in order to create an analytic form. As performance measures, the voice packet dropping probability, the average voice and data delays, and the total throughput have been derived. It is shown how many voice and data terminals the fast PRMA protocol can accommodate in a frame under the constraints that the voice packet dropping probability should be less than 0.01, and average data packet delay should be less than 250 msec. We also discuss the stable region for this system. Numerical results show close agreement between analysis and computer simulation.

Applying ARQ to real time video communication can significantly increase transmission delay due its retransmission operations. We analyze this delay and propose an adaptive error control scheme that uses acknowledgment from the receiver to reduce the delay. We evaluate this scheme using a computer simulation and show that the proposed scheme can reduce the delay by controlling the amount of video data by changing the quantization step size and video frame skipping. It also offers acceptable video quality as confirmed by a subjective evaluation test.

This study was conducted to assess the relationship between fatigue and pupillary responses. Pupillary responses, ECG and blood pressure were measured for 24 hours every 30 min in 8 subjects. A questionnaire was used to rate subjective feeling of fatigue. Twenty-four hours were divided equally into four 6-hour blocks. Subjective feeling of fatigue increased markedly in the fourth block, and the difference in subjective fatigue between fourth and first blocks was significant. Of nine pupillary responses, the pupil diameter was found to decrease with time. With respect to the function of the autonomic nervous system such as heart rate, systolic blood pressure and diastolic blood pressure, only heart rate was found to be sensitive to the increased subjective feeling of fatigue. A significant difference was found in the mean pupil diameter and mean heart rate between the last and first blocks. This result indicates that pupil diameter is related to fatigue and can be used to assess fatigue. Possible implications for fatigue assessment are discussed.

We propose an interactive identification scheme based on the quadratic residue problem. Prover's identity can be proved without revealing his secret information with only one accreditation. The proposed scheme requires few computations in the verification process, and a small amount of memory to store the secret information, A digital signature based on this scheme is proposed, and its validity is then proved. Lastly, analysis about the proposed scheme is presented at the end of the paper.

In this paper, we propose a modified R-ISMA (reserved idle signal multiple access) protocol for a wireless local area network (WLAN) with a hybrid system construction. The protocol can support a basic service area as large as that supported by a centralized system and allows the direct transmission between neighbor stations as in a distributed system without the problem of hidden terminals. Since a polling scheme is used during transmission of information packets, an ARQ (auto repeat request) scheme is easily applied. A dynamic analysis using transient fluid approximation analysys is used for performance evaluation. In the analysis, we use Fritchman channel model to describe a burst error environment. Some numerical examples using a set of practical system parameters are given. It is shown that the system performance is improved compared with a centralized system with R-ISMA.

A modified fully-digital code tracking loop is proposed in this paper for direct-sequence spread-spectrum signaling on a frequency-selective fading channel. A data-modulated channel estimator is used to cope with the time-varying Rayleigh fading effect and the data modulation effect, and extract the desired error signal from each path independently in the multipath environments. By taking advantage of the inherent diversity with the maximal ratio combining (MRC) or a proposed Even/odd maximal ratio combining (EMRC) technique, this modified code tracking loop can avoid the problem due to the drift or flutter effects of the error characteristics, and provide better performance on frequency selective fading channels. Extensive computer simulation has verified the analysis and indicated very attractive behavior of the proposed digital tracking loop.

We present a comparison of correlated failures for multiversion software using community error recovery (CER) and software breeding (SB). In CER, errors are detected and recovered at checkpoints which are inserted in all the versions of the software. SB is analogous to the breeding of plants and animals. In SB, versions consist of loadable modules, and a driver exchanges the modules between versions to detect and eliminate faulty modules. We formulate reliability models to estimate the probability of failure for software using either CER or SB. Our reliability models assume failures in the checkpoints in CER and the driver in SB. We use beta-binomial distribution for modeling correlated failures of versions, because much of the evidence suggests that the assumption that failures in versions occur independently is not always true. Our comparison indicates that multiversion software using SB is more reliable than that using CER when the probability of failure in the checkpoints in CER or the driver in SB is 10-7.

This paper discribes the ISDN PROtocol Testing system (I-PROT). The system consists of translation & distribution function block, layer-2 fault surveillance function block, layer-3 fault surveillance function block, cause detection function block, and HMI. The system receives data from protocol monitors and detects the error recovery sequences, (we call "quasi-normal sequences"), as well as the sequences that do not follow the protocol specifications, (we call "abnormal sequences"). In the layer-3 fault surveillance function block, we use the protocol specification database whose records are converted from the state transition rules and added the judgment which classify the rules into the "normal" and "quasi-normal." We also show the classification method which is applicable to all connection-oriented protocol specifications. In the layer-2 fault surveillance function block, we explain the another easy detecting method. In the cause function block, we describe the partial pattern matching method to relate the protocol fault to the real cause of the fault. We built the prototype of the I-PROT and examine the turn around time (TAT) performance. As a result of the examination, we find the TAT of the I-PROT is directly proportional to the number of the frames analyzed by the system, and the system can reduce the load of the conventional manual analysis by the maintenance personnel.

This paper proposes the Snow Crystal method, which aims to present the hierarchies of a large-scale telecommunication network on one screen. This will improve the user interface of a network operation system for network operations and management. With the proposed presentation method, locations of nodes are automatically set based on the number of hierarchy levels and the number of nodes. The nodes in the same hierarchy level are located on the same circle at even intervals. The center of the circle that corresponds to the top hierarchy level is set at the center of the screen. The radius of the circle is determined by the number of nodes. The centers of circles that correspond to the second hierarchy levels belonging to the nodes of the top hierarchy level, are located on a larger circle with the same center point as the top level circle at even intervals. The centers of circles that correspond to the third hierarchy levels are located at even intervals on a circle with the same center point as the second level circle, which the third levels belong to. The nodes of the subsequent levels are located in the same way. The proposed presentation method is successfully applied to a large-scale telecommunication network. Moreover, the results of an operating experiment with the proposed method show its effectiveness for presenting hierarchies of large-scale telecommunication networks.

This paper presents a character recognition method based on a dynamic model, which can be applied to character patterns from both on-line and off-line input. Other similar attempts simply treat on-line patterns as off-line input, while this method makes use of the on-line input's characteristics by representing the time information of handwriting in the character pattern representations. Experiments were carried out on the Hiragana character set. Without non-linear normalization, this method achieved recognition rates of 92.3% for on-line input and 89.1% for off-line input. When non-linear normalization is used, there is an increase in performance for both types of input with on-line input achieving 94.5% and off-line input achieving 94.1%. The reason for the difference in the effectiveness of non-linear normalization on off-line and on-line patterns could be that while the method used for off-line input was an established and proved one, we used our own initial attempt at non-linear normalization for the on-line patterns. If the same level of effectiveness of non-linear normalization as off-line input is achieved on the on-line input, however, the recognition rate for on-line input again improves becoming 96.3%. Since only one standard pattern was used per category for the dictionary patterns, the above results show the promise of this method. This result shows the compatibility of this method to both on-line and off-line input, as well as its effective use of on-line input's characteristics. The effectiveness of this use of the time information is shown by using an actual example. The data also shows the need for a method of non-linear normalization which is more suitable for on-line input.

This paper describes the effectiveness of stream-oriented data-driven scheme for achieving autonomous fault management of hyper-distributed systems such as networks based on the Telecommunications Information Networking Architecture (TINA). TINA, whose specifications are in the finalizing phase within TINA-Consortium, is aiming at achieving interoperability and reusability of telecom applications software and independent of underlying technologies. However, to actually implement TINA network, it is essential to consider the technology constraints. Especially autonomous fault management at run-time is crucial for distributed network environment because centralized control using global information is very difficult. So far many works have been done on so-called off-line management but runtime management of service failure seems immature. This paper proposes introduction of stream-oriented data-driven processors to the autonomous fault management at runtime in TINA based distributed network environment. It examines the features of distributed network applications and technology requirements to achieve fault management of those distributed applications such as effective multiprocessing of surveillance, testing, reconfiguration in addition to ordinary processing.

To enhance fabrication yield for processor arrays, many reconfiguration schemes for replacing faulty processing elements (PE's) with spare PE's have been proposed. An array grid model based on single-track switches is one of such models. For this model, some algorithms for reconfiguring processor arrays have been proposed. However, any algorithm which can reconfigure the array, whenever the array is reconfigurable, has not been proposed as yet. This paper describes reconfiguration methods of processor arrays with faulty PE's. The methods use indirect replacements for reconfiguring arrays. First, we introduce a concept of fatal fault pattern, which makes an array unreconfigurable. Then, for the reconfiguration method with fixed spare arrangement, efficient spare arrangements are given by evaluating the probability of an occurring fatal fault pattern. Furher, we present reconfiguration algorithm with relocating spare. In the algorithm, fatal fault patterns are eliminated by relocating spare. Computer simulations show that the method has good performance of reconfiguration.

Several multiuser detectors have been recently proposed to combat multiple-access interference and near-far problem for CDMA systems. The performance of a multi-user receiver in combining the decorrelating decision-feedback scheme for a synchronous DS/CDMA system is considered. Using the Gaussian approximation on the multiple-access interference and amplitude estimation errors, we derive a closed form expression for the BER performance of the decorrelating decision-feedback detector in single-path Rayleigh fading channel and power controlled system. And, we show that our analysis agrees with the results of simulations. A modified decision-feedback detector is also proposed and analyzes. Numerical results show that the modified dicision-feedback detector proposed in this paper results in enhanced performance.

In contrast to previous algorithms for reconfiguring processor arrays under the assumption that spare rows and columns are placed on the perimeter of the array or on fixed positions, our new algorithm employs movable and partitionable spare rows and columns. The objective of moving and partitioning spare rows and/or columns is the elimination of faulty processors each of which is blocked in all directions to spare processors. The results of our computer simulation indicate that reconfigurability can significantly be improved.

Rapid advancing technology and customer demand for sophisticated services are driving the global telecommunications environment into fully competitive and multi service providers environment. To cope with this new environment successfully, open network and open telecommunication management are essential. Telecommunication management is becoming more and more important to realize flexible and dynamic telecommunication services. This paper first gives a view of the new environment in the telecommunication industry and discusses the direction to be taken by service providers. Then, a concept of multi-domain management is proposed to meet a dynamically changing environment. Finally, the paper describes the subjects for the development of telecommunication management system and suggests that a competition based on harmony between the users, service providers and vendors is needed to make customers satisfied with telecommunication services.

Modern database systems have to support complex data objects, which appear in advanced data models such as object-oriented data models and nested relational data models. Set-valued objects are basic constructs to build complex structures in those models. Therefore, efficient processing of set-valued object retrieval (simply, set retrieval) is an important feature required of advanced database systems. Our previous work proposed a basic scheme to apply superimposed coded signature files to set retrieval and showed its potential advantages over the B-tree index based approach using a performance analysis model. Retrieval with signature files is always accompanied by mismatches called false drops, and proper control of the false drops is indispensable in the signature file design. This study intensively analyzes the false drops in set retrieval with signature files. First, schemes to use signature files are presented to process set retrieval involving "has-subset," "is-subset," "has-intersection," and "is-equal" predicates, and generic formulas estimating the false drops are derived. Then, three sets of concrete formulas are derived in three ways to estimate the false drops in the four types of set retrieval. Finally, their estimates are validated with computer simulations, and advantages and disadvantages of each set of the false drop estimation formulas are discussed. The analysis shows that proper choice of estimation formulas gives quite accurate estimates of the false drops in set retrieval with signature files.

This paper reviews recent developments in small-sized broadband antennas for EMI measurements, especially in the microwave frequency region. Transient EMI measurements are also discussed by introducing complex antenna factors and conversion of frequency-domain data into time-domain data. This paper also focuses on considerable improvements achieved in calibration techniques for conventional EMI antennas in VHF/UHF bands.