In recent years, autonomous driving technologies are being developed for vehicles and personal mobility devices including golf carts and autonomous wheelchairs for various use cases, not only outside areas but inside areas like shopping malls, hospitals and airpots. The main purpose of developing these autonomous vehicles is to avoid the traffic accidents caused by human errors, to assist people with walking, and to improve human comfort by relieving them from driving. Most relevant research focuses on the efficiency and safety of autonomous driving, however, in order to use by the widespread of people in the society, it is important to consider passenger comfort inside vehicles as well as safety and efficiency. Therefore, in this work, we emphasize the importance of considering passenger comfort in designing the control loop of autonomous navigation for the concept of comfortable intelligence in the future autonomous mobility. Moreover, passenger characteristics, in terms of ride comfort in an autonomous vehicle, have not been investigated with regard to safety and comfort, depending on each passenger's driving experience, habits, knowledge, personality, and preference. There are still few studies on the optimization of autonomous driving control reflecting passenger characteristics and different stress factors during the ride. In this study, passenger stress characteristics with different stress factors were objectively analyzed using physiological indices (heart rate and galvanic skin response sensors) during autonomous wheelchair usages. Two different experimental results from 12 participants suggest that there are always at least two types of passengers: one who experiences stress and the other who does not, depending on the stress factors considered. Moreover, with regard to the classification result for the stress reduction method, there are two types of passenger groups, for whom the solution method is, respectively, either effective or ineffective.

This paper presents a theoretical design of novel THz bandpass filters composed of M-PhC (metallic-photonic-crystal) point-defect-cavities (PDCs) with a centrally-loaded-rod. After a brief review of the properties of the recently-proposed M-PhC PDCs, two inline-type bandpass filters are synthesized in terms of the coupling matrix theory. The FDTD simulation results of the synthesized filters are in good agreement with the theoretical ones, which confirms the validity of the proposed filters' structures and the design scheme.

This paper studies the secrecy throughput performance of the three-node wireless-powered networks and proposes two secure transmission schemes, namely the half-duplex maximal ratio combining (HD&MRC) scheme and the full-duplex jamming scheme based on time switching simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (FDJ&TS-SWIPT). The closed-form expressions of the secrecy throughput are derived, and intuitive comparison of the two schemes is provided. It is illustrated that the HD&MRC scheme only applies to the low and medium signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regime. On the contrary, the suitable SNR regime of the FDJ&TS-SWIPT is much wider. It is depicted that FDJ&TS-SWIPT combing with current passive self-interference cancellation (SIC) algorithm outperforms HD&MRC significantly, especially when a medium or high transmit SNR is provided. Numerical simulations are conducted for verifying the validity of the analysis.

A frequently occurring subcircuit consists of a loop of a resistor (R), a field-effect transistor (FET), and a capacitor (C). The FET acts as a switch, controlled at its gate terminal by a clock voltage. This subcircuit may be acting as a sample-and-hold (S/H), as a passive mixer (P-M), or as a bandpass filter or bandpass impedance. In this work, we will present a useful analysis that leads to a simple signal flow graph (SFG), which captures the FET-R-C circuit's action completely across a wide range of design parameters. The SFG dissects the circuit into three filtering functions and ideal sampling. This greatly simplifies analysis of frequency response, noise, input impedance, and conversion gain, and leads to guidelines for optimum design. This paper focuses on the analysis of a single-path FET-R-C circuit's signal transfer characteristics including the reconstruction of the complete waveform from the discrete-time sampled voltage.

Internal quantum efficiency (IQE) is usually estimated from temperature dependence of photoluminescence (PL) intensity by assuming that the IQE at cryogenic temperature is unity. III-nitride samples, however, usually have large defect density, and the assumption is not necessarily valid. In 2016, we proposed a new method to estimate accurate IQE values by simultaneous PL and photo-acoustic (PA) measurements, and demonstratively evaluated the IQE values for various GaN samples. In this study, we have applied the method to InGaN quantum-well active layers and have estimated the IQE values and their excitation carrier-density dependence in the layers.

A novel adaptive code division multiplexing system with hybrid electrical and optical codes is proposed for flexible and dynamic resource allocation in next generation asynchronous optical access networks. We analyze the performance of a 10Gbps × 12 optical node unit, using hierarchical 8-level optical and 4-level electrical phase shift keying codes.

The 1-bit band-pass delta-sigma modulator (BP-DSM) achieves high resolution if it uses an oversampling technique. This method can generate concurrent dual-band RF signals from a digitally modulated signal using a 1-bit digital pulse train. It was previously reported that the adjacent channel leakage ratio (ACLR) deteriorates owing to the asymmetrical waveform created by the pulse transition mismatch error of the rising and falling waveforms in the time domain and that the ACLR can be improved by distortion compensation. However, the reported distortion compensation method can only be performed for single-band transmission, and it fails to support multi-band transmission because the asymmetrical waveform compensated signal extends over a wide frequency range and is itself a harmful distortion outside the target band. Unfortunately, the increase of out-of-band power causes the BP-DSM unstable. We therefore propose a distortion compensator for a concurrent dual-band 1-bit BP-DSM that consists of a noise transfer function with a quasi-elliptic filter that can control the out-of-band gain frequency response against out-of-band oscillation. We demonstrate that dual-band LTE signals, each with 40MHz (2×20MHz) bandwidth, at 1.5 and 3.0GHz, can be compensated concurrently for spurious distortion under various combinations of rising and falling times and ACLR of up to 48dB, each with 120MHz bandwidth, including the double sided adjacent channels and next adjacent channels, is achieved.

Massive multiple-input and multiple-output (MIMO) is a key technology to meet the increasing capacity demands that must be satisfied by next generation wireless systems. However, it is expensive to use linear power amplifiers when implementing a massive MIMO system as it will have hundreds of antennas. In this paper, considering that low peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) of transmit signals can facilitate hardware-friendly equipment with nonlinear but power-efficient amplifiers, we first formulate the precoding scheme as a PAPR minimization problem. Then, in order to obtain the optimal solution with low complexity, the precoding problem is recast into a Bayesian estimation problem by leveraging belief propagation algorithm. Eventually, we propose a low-PAPR approximate message passing (LP-AMP) algorithm based on belief propagation to ensure the good transmission performance and minimize the PAPR to realize practical deployments. Simulation results reveal that the proposed method can get PAPR reduction and adequate transmission performance, simultaneously, with low computational complexity. Moreover, the results further indicate that the proposed method is suitable for practical implementation, which is appealing for massive multiuser MIMO (MU-MIMO) systems.

Investigative reports plagiarized from the web should be eliminated because such reports result in ineffective knowledge construction. In this study, we developed an investigative report writing support system for effective knowledge construction from the web. The proposed system attempts to prevent plagiarism by restricting copying and pasting information from web pages. With this system, students can verify information through web browsing, externalize their constructed knowledge as notes for report materials, write reports using these notes, and remove inadequacies in the report by reflection. A comparative experiment showed that the proposed system can potentially prevent web page plagiarism and make knowledge construction from the web more effective compared to a conventional report writing environment.

We present an 82.5GS/s over-sampling based burst-mode clock and data recovery (BM-CDR) IC chip-set comprising an 82.5GS/s over-sampling IC using 8×10.3GHz multi-phase clocks and a dual-rate data selector logic IC to realize the 10.3Gb/s and 1.25Gb/s dual-rate burst-mode fast-lock operation required for 10-Gigabit based fiber-to-the-x (FTTx) services supported by 10-Gigabit Ethernet passive optical network (10G-EPON) systems. As the key issue for designing the proposed 82.5GS/s BM-CDR, a fresh study of the optimum number of multi-phase clocks, which is equivalent to the sampling resolution, is undertaken, and details of the 10.3Gb/s cum 1.25/Gb/s dual-rate optimum phase data selection logic based on a blind phase decision algorithm, which can realize a full single-platform dual-rate BM-CDR, ate also presented. By using the power of the proposed 82.5GS/s over-sampling BM-CDR in cooperation with our dual-rate burst-mode optical receiver, we further demonstrated that a short dual-rate and burst-mode preamble of 256ns supporting receiver settling and CDR recovery times was successfully achieved, while obtaining high receiver sensitivities of -31.6dBm at 10.3Gb/s and -34.6dBm at 1.25Gb/s and a high pulse-width distortion tolerance of +/-0.53UI, which are superior to the 10G-EPON standard.

A purpose of password-based anonymous authentication schemes is to provide not only password-based authentication but also user anonymity. In [19], Yang et al., proposed a password-based anonymous authentication scheme (we call it YZWB10 scheme) using the password-protected credentials. In this paper, we discuss user anonymity of the YZWB10 scheme [19] against a third-party attacker, who is much weaker than a malicious server. First, we show that a third-party attacker in the YZWB10 scheme can specify which user actually sent the login request to the server. This attack also indicates that the attacker can link different login requests to be sent later by the same user. Second, we give an effective countermeasure to this attack which does not require any security for storing users' password-protected credentials.

IoT (Internet of Things) services are emerging and the bandwidth requirements for rich media communication services are increasing exponentially. We propose a virtual edge architecture comprising computation resource management layers and path bandwidth management layers for easy addition and reallocation of new service node functions. These functions are performed by the Virtualized Network Function (VNF), which accommodates terminals covering a corresponding access node to realize fast VNF migration. To increase network size for IoT traffic, VNF migration is limited to the VNF that contains the active terminals, which leads to a 20% reduction in the computation of VNF migration. Fast dynamic bandwidth allocation for dynamic bandwidth paths is realized by proposed Hierarchical Time Slot Allocation of Optical Layer 2 Switch Network, which attain the minimum calculation time of less than 1/100.

We present a design approach and analysis of a multimode stripline resonator (MSR). Furthermore, a bandpass filter (BPF) using a single MSR is presented. MSR has three fundamental modes, incorporating two transmission resonance modes and one quasi-lumped component (LC) resonance mode. The resonant frequencies and unloaded Q factors of those modes are theoretically derived by transmission modes and LC modes. By our equations, it is also explained that the resonant frequencies can be shown to be easily handled by an increase and decrease in the number of via holes. These frequencies calculated by our equations are in good agreement with those of 3-D simulations and measurements. Finally, design approach of a narrow bandpass filter using our resonator is introduced. Good agreement between measured and computed result is obtained.

Multiple Subcarrier Multiple Access (MSMA) enables concurrent sensor data streamings from multiple wireless and batteryless sensors using the principle of subcarrier backscatter used extensively in passive RFID. Since the interference cancellation performance of MSMA depends on the Signal to Interference plus Noise Ratio of each subcarrier, the choice of channel allocation scheme is essential. Since the channel allocation is a combinatorial problem, obtaining the true optimal allocation requires a vast amount of examinations which is impracticable in a system where we have tens of sensor RF tags. It is particularly true when we have variable distance and variable bandwidth sensor RF tags. This paper proposes a channel allocation scheme in the variable distance and variable bandwidth MSMA system based on a newly introduced performance index, total contamination power, to prioritize indecision cases. The performance of the proposal is evaluated with existing methods in terms of average communication capacity and system fairness using MATLAB Monte Carlo simulation to reveal its advantage. The accuracy of the simulation is also verified with the result obtained from the brute force method.

This paper studies a simultaneous wireless information and power transfer (SWIPT) system in which the transmitter not only sends data and energy to many types of wireless users, such as multiple information decoding users, multiple hybrid power-splitting users (i.e., users with a power-splitting structure to receive both information and energy), and multiple energy harvesting users, but also prevents information from being intercepted by a passive eavesdropper. The transmitter is equipped with multiple antennas, whereas all users and the eavesdropper are assumed to be equipped with a single antenna. Since the transmitter does not have any channel state information (CSI) about the eavesdropper, artificial noise (AN) power is maximized to mask information as well as to interfere with the eavesdropper as much as possible. The non-convex optimization problem is formulated to minimize the transmit power satisfying all signal-to-interference-plus-noise (SINR) and harvested energy requirements for all users so that the remaining power for generating AN is maximized. With perfect CSI, a semidefinite relaxation (SDR) technique is applied, and the optimal solution is proven to be tight. With imperfect CSI, SDR and a Gaussian randomization algorithm are proposed to find the suboptimal solution. Finally, numerical performance with respect to the maximum SINR at the eavesdropper is determined by a Monte-Carlo simulation to compare the proposed AN scenario with a no-AN scenario, as well as to compare perfect CSI with imperfect CSI.

The performance of secret-sharing (SS)-based multiparty computation (MPC) has recently increased greatly, and several efforts to implement and use it have been put into practice. Authentication of clients is one critical mechanism for implementing SS-based MPC successfully in practice. We propose a password-based authentication protocol for SS-based MPC. Our protocol is secure in the presence of secure channels, and it is optimized for practical use with SS-based MPC in the following ways. Threshold security: Our protocol is secure in the honest majority, which is necessary and sufficient since most practical results on SS-based MPC are secure in the same environment. Establishing distinct channels: After our protocol, a client has distinct secure and two-way authenticated channels to each server. Ease of implementation: Our protocol consists of SS, operations involving SS, and secure channels, which can be reused from an implementation of SS-based MPC. Furthermore, we implemented our protocol with an optimization for the realistic network. A client received the result within 2 sec even when the network delay was 200 ms, which is almost the delay that occurs between Japan and Europe.

By using Password-based Authenticated Key Exchange (PAKE), a server can authenticate a user who has only the same password shared with the server in advance and establish a session key with the user simultaneously. However, in the real applications, we may have a situation where a user needs to share a session key with server A, but the authentication needs to be done by a different server B that shares the password with the user. Further, to achieve higher security on the server side, it may be required to make PAKE tolerant of a server breach by having multiple authentication servers. To deal with such a situation, Abdalla et al. proposed a variant of PAKE called Gateway Threshold PAKE (GTPAKE) where a gateway corresponds to the aforementioned server A being an on-line service provider and also a potential adversary that may try to guess the passwords. However, the schemes of Abdalla et al. turned out to be vulnerable to Undetectable On-line Dictionary Attack (UDonDA). In this paper, we propose the first GTPAKE provably secure against UDonDA, and in the security analysis, we prove that our GTPAKE is secure even if an adversary breaks into parts of multiple authentication servers.

This paper presents a programmable wideband low pass filter (LPF) with Continuous-Time (CT)/Discrete-Time (DT) hybrid architecture. Unlike the conventional DT LPF, the proposed LPF eliminates sample & hold circuits, enabling to expand available bandwidth. The transfer function and the influence of the circuit imperfection are derived from CT/DT hybrid analysis. A prototype has been fabricated in 40 nm CMOS process. The proposed LPF achieves 2.5 GHz bandwidth by wideband equalization, which offers capacitance ratio (Cratio) and clock frequency (fCK) programmability. The proposed LPF occupies only 0.048 mm2 of active area.

In both theoretical analysis and practical use for an antidictionary coding algorithm, an important problem is how to encode an antidictionary of an input source. This paper presents a proposal for a compact tree representation of an antidictionary built from a circular string for an input source. We use a technique for encoding a tree in the compression via substring enumeration to encode a tree representation of the antidictionary. Moreover, we propose a new two-pass universal antidictionary coding algorithm by means of the proposal tree representation. We prove that the proposed algorithm is asymptotic optimal for a stationary ergodic source.

To drastically increase the splitting ratio of extended-reach (40km span) time- and wavelength-division multiplexed passive optical networks (WDM/TDM-PONs), we modify the gain control scheme of our automatic gain controlled semiconductor optical amplifiers (AGC-SOAs) that were developed to support upstream transmission in long-reach systems. While the original AGC-SOAs are located outside the central office (CO) as repeaters, the new AGC-SOAs are located inside the CO and connected to each branch of an optical splitter in the CO. This arrangement has the potential to greatly reduce the costs of CO-sited equipment as they are shared by many more users if the new gain control scheme works properly even when the input optical powers are low. We develop a prototype and experimentally confirm its effectiveness in increasing the splitting ratio of extended-reach systems to 512.