When we use a telephone-handset, the frequency response of the telephone-earphone becomes degraded because of the leak through the slit between the ear and the earphone. Consequently, it is very important to establish the design method of the telephone-handset which reduces the effect of leak. No one has tried to design the telephone-handset to reduce the effect. We are the only ones to have proposed an automatic design method by nonlinear optimization techniques. However, this method gives only one set of the acoustic parameters aiming at a certain specific target frequency response, and therefore lacks flexibility in the actual design problem. On the other hand, the design method proposed in this paper, which uses Monte-Carlo method, gives an infinite number of sets of acoustic parameters that realize infinite frequency responses within the target allowable region. As these infinite number of sets become directly the design ranges of acoustic parameters, the proposed method has the flexibility that any set of the acoustic parameters belonging to the design ranges guarantees the corresponding response to be within the target allowable region, and at the same time reduces the effect of leak. This flexibility is advantageous to the actual design problem.

This paper is concerned with bandwidth reservation for circuit groups which handle calls requesting asymmetric forward and backward multi-connections. A model of circuit group with sub-group configuration is treated, and two types of the bandwidth reservation schemes for the model are studied in this paper. One is a global scheme with monitoring the whole circuit group, and the other is a local scheme with monitoring each sub-group independently. The problems of optimizing the reservation parameters are formulated, and optimization methods for the problems are proposed. Numerical example are presented, and effectiveness of the reservation schemes with using the optimized parameters is numerically examined.

This paper presents a vision-based human interface system that enables a user to move a target object in a 3D CG world by moving his hand. The system can interpret hand motions both in a frame fixed in the world and a frame attached to the user. If the latter is chosen, the user can move the object forward by moving his hand forward even if he has changed his body position. In addition, the user does not have to keep in mind that his hand is in the camera field of view. The active camera system tracks the user to keep him in its field of view. Moreover, the system does not need any camera calibration. The key for the realization of the system with such features is vision algorithms based on the multiple view affine invariance theory. We demon-strate an experimental system as well as the vision algorithms. Human operation experiments show the usefulness of the system.

Neural network hardware using time-shared bus and integer representation architecture has already been fabricated and reported from the design viewpoint. However, nothing related to performance evaluation of hardware has yet been presented. Computation-speed, scalability and learning accuracy of hardware are evaluated theoretically and experimentally using a Back Propagation (BP) algorithm. In addition, a mirror-weight assignment technique is proposed for high-speed computation in the BP. NETTalk, an English-pronunciation-reasoning task, has been chosen as the target application for the BP. In the experiment, recently-developed neuro-hardware based on the above architecture and its parallel programming language are used. An outline of the language is described along with BP programming. Mirror-weight assignment allows maximum speed at 55.0 MCUPS (Million Connections Updated Per Second) using 256 neurons in the hidden-layer (numbers of neurons in input-and output-layers are fixed at 203 and 26 respectively in NETTalk). In addition, if scalability is defined as a function of the number of neurons in the hidden-layer, the machine retains high scalability at 0.5 if such a maximum speed needs to be used. No degradation in learning accuracy occurs when experimental results computed using the neuro-hardware are compared with those obtained by floating-point representation architecture (workstation). The experiment indicates that the present integer representational design of the neuro-hardware is sufficient for NETTalk. Performance has been evaluated theoretically. For evaluation purposes, it is assumed that most of the total execution-time is taken up by bus cycles. On the basis of this assumption, an analytical model of computation-speed and scalability is proposed. Analytical predictions agreed well with experimental results.

This paper designs recursive least-squares fixed-point smoother and filter, which use the observed value, the probability that the signal exists, and the covariance information relevant to the signal and observation noises, on the estimation problem associated with the uncertain observations in linear continuous-time systems.

The MU radar of Japan is one of important candidates for providing accurate ground truth for the TRMM precipitation radar. It can provide the dropsize distribution data together with the background atmospheric wind data with high accuracy and high spatial resolution. Special observation scheme developed for TRMM validation using the MU radar is described, and preliminary results from its test experiment are shown. The high-resolution MU radar data are also used in numerical simulations to validate the rain retrieval algorithm for the TRMM PR data analysis. Among known sources of errors in the rain retrieval, the vertical variability of the dropsize distribution and the partial beam-filling effect are examined in terms of their significance with numerical simulations based on the MU radar data. It is shown that these factors may seriously affect the accuracy of the TRMM rain retrieval, and that it is necessary to establish statistical means for compensation. However, suggested means to improve the conventional α-adjustment method require careful treatment so that they do not introduce new sources of errors.

The reception level of a round-trip signal from a VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) was monitored continuously for three years starting October 1991.For these experimental measurements, a commercial satellite channel (up-link 14GHz/downlink 12GHz, bandwidth 100kHz) was used and rainfall was measured simultaneously. Data gathering time interval of 2 seconds was adopted to elucidate very rapid variation and lower percentage statistics. In this paper, attenuation due to rainfall is shown using the data obtained in this three-year period. It is shown that so far, the measured rain attenuation agrees very well with the values estimated using the CCIR model, and limits the range where the cumulative time exceeds 0.01%, even for our VSAT system in Tagajo, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan.

Rate-based congestion control is a promising scheme as data transfer service in ATM networks, and has been standardized in the ATM Forum. To migrate the existing upper layer protocols to ATM networks, however, further investigation is necessary. In particular, when ABR service class is applied to TCP (Transmission Control Protocol), duality of congestion control schemes in different protocol layers, i.e., conventional window-based congestion control in the Transport layer and ratebased congestion control in the ATM layer, may have a unexpected influence on performance. As an alternative approach for supporting TCP protocol, EPD (Early Packet Discard) has been recently proposed, which adds the function to the UBR (Unspecified Bit Rate) service. It does not have a "duality problem" since EPD only discards cells selectively to improve packet-level performance. In this paper, we exhibit performance of TCP protocol over ATM networks by using a simulation technique. We first compare rate-based control of ABR service and EPD applied to UBR service, and show that rate-control achieves better fairness and higher throughput in most circumstances. However, rate-based control requires careful tuning of control parameters to obtain its effectiveness and a duality problem leads to unexpected degradation of TCP-level performance. By the rate-based congestion control, temporal congestion at the switch is quickly relieved by the rate down of the source terminals. However, our simulation explores that if the parameter set of the rate-based congestion control is not appropriately used, the congestion is also recognized at TCP due to packet drops and TCP unnecessarily throttles its window size. To avoid this sort of the problem, we develop the appropriate parameter set suitable to TCP on ABR service, and point out that some modification of TCP may be necessary for further performance improvement.

We have shown a non-invasive method for estimating transient changes in aortic flow and ventricular volume based on optimal control theory by using successful simulations of reported experimental data. The performance function to evaluate the optimality of the cardiovascular system was proposed based oh physical, fluid mechanical and pathophysiological considerations. It involved the work of the ventricle, the rate of changes in the aortic flow and the ventricular pressure. We determined that the cardiovascular system operates optimally when the performance function has been minimized. The relative magnitudes of the reductions of changes in these terms were expressed by the weighting coefficients. The arterial system was described by the Wind Kessel model using arterial resistance, aortic compliance and aortic valvular resistance. We set boundary conditions and transitional conditions derived from the systolic and diastolic phases of the aortic flow and the arterial pressure. The optimized system equations were converted to 6 linear simultaneous differential equations with 6 boundary conditions. The optimal ventricular pressure and aortic flow rate that minimize the performance function were obtained by solving these differential equations. By alternating the weighting coefficients of the work of ventricle and the rate of change in the ventricular ejection pressure, successful simulations of the ventricular pressures recorded from human subjects and those from isolated canine ventricle were obtained. Once the sets of weighting coefficients had been determined by successful simulations of ventricular pressures, the calculated aortic flow curves and pressure volume loops by the present method coincided with the reported experimental data. The changes in ventricular pressure and aortic flow produced by alternating the weighting coefficients to simulate the reported ventricular pressures and aortic flow curves under the different afterload conditions were consistent with biophysical experimental data. The present method is useful to estimata aortic flow curve and ventricular pressure volume loops non-invasively.

There are many instances in which character shape of a class changes smoothly to that of another class. Although there are many ways of the change, the most delicate change is curvature feature. The paper treat this problem systematically in both theoretically and experimentally. Specifically some confusing pairs were constructed which are well known in the field of OCR, such as 2 Z and 4 9. A series of samples generated using each model which change subtly were provided to conduct a psychological experiment. The results exhibit a monotone change of recognition rates from nearly 100% to 0% as the shape changes continuously. To imitate the humans' performance, feature of curvature was extracted based on continuous function representation based on Bezier's spline curve. Specifically two methods were tried from theoretical and engineering points of view and very successful results were obtained.

We propose burst based bandwidth reservation method called FRP (Fast Reservation Protocol) in ATM LAN with general topology, and evaluate its performance. In FRP, the bandwidth is allocated on each link on burst basis, not on call basis. This enables an effective use of network resources when it is applied to highly bursty traffic, which can be typically found in data communications. The problem of FRP is that VCs traversing the different number of links experience different blocking probabilities as can be found in the conventional circuit-switching networks. In this paper, we treat a fairness issue in FRP-based ATM local area networks. The Max-Min flow control is adopted as the fair bandwidth allocation method to accomplish the fairness in the throughput. However, the original Max-Min flow control works in a centralized fashion, which is not desirable in the FRP-based ATM LAN. We therefore propose a "semi"-distributed Max-Min flow control suitable to FRP, in which each switch maintains its own local information about bandwidth usage of the connected links. Through simulation experiments, we show that the proposed semi-distributed Max-Min flow control can achieve the fairness among VCs as the original Max-Min flow control when the propagation delays are not large and the number of VCs is not so much.

An improved gate current model of GaAs FET's is presented. A conventional gate current and the reverse breakdown characteristics. Conseguentli, the model has been determined only by the forward current model fails to fit measured results in the reverse bias range, under which power amplifiers operate. The proposed model improves this problem and shows a great enhancement in accuracy throughout the whole operation range of FET's. The model consists of three diodes and a resistor, which are standerd elements implemented in commercially available circuit simulators, and thus it can easily be used for analyzing performances of various FET circits.

The benefits of ATM techniques have been widely recognized and many organizations envisage the introduction of ATM techniques into their telecommunication networks. The ATM benefits can, however, be fully exploited only after effective network resource management techniques have been developed. This paper focuses on CBR-VP management techniques. The ATM transport network architecture and VP roles are summarized. Next, the issues of VP accommodation design are described. The point is how to create a design that accommodates cell loss and cell delay jitter, both of which depend on various network parameters and conditions. For this purpose, analytical procedures based on an M/D/1 queueing model are adopted. The approximation method is shown to be very effective in practical use through computer analysis. The method guarantees conservative QOSs. Finally, the proposed method is applied to several design examples to illustrate VP management issues. The proposed method will enable ATM techniques to be introduced to our telecommunication networks by the mid-1990's.

A filter configuration that allows configuration of any transfer function used the state variable is discribed as an application of the second generation current conveyors (CCIIs) to RC networks. The filter types discussed are low-pass filter (LPF), high-pass filter (HPF), band-pass filter (BPF), all-pass filter (APF), and band-elimination filter (BEF). The filter circuit consists of four CCIIs and allows tandem connections. The device sensitivity and CCII's sensitivity to transfer coefficient are relatively low. The filter circuit that allow simultaneous configuration wewe fabricated. An experimental result at around 10kHz was obtained for the filters. In the case, the LPF, HPF, BPF, APF, and BEF characteristics are obtained at Q value of 5.0.

We present a new method for the identification of time-invariant multichannel autoregressive (AR) processes corrupted by additive white observation noise. The method is based on the Yule-Walker equations and identifies the autoregressive parameters from a finite set of measured data. The input signals to the underlying process are assumed to be unknown. An inverse filtering technique is used to estimate the AR parameters and the observation noise variance, simultaneously. The procedure is iterative. Computer simulation results that demonstrate the performance of the identification method are presented.

This paper deals with on-line signature verification. A signature is obtained as a sequence of x, y-coordinates of pen-tip movement and writing pressure. The features of a signature are derived from the coordinates and the writing pressure and are decomposed into two principal features, shape and motion, using the DP-matching technique. We found that each point of a signature varies each time to some degree. However, the degrees of local variations subject to points, as some points are relatively stable and do not vary much while some of them are not. In this paper, we propose to incorporate weighted local variations based on the stability of each point so as to evaluate the difference of two signatures locally as well as globally. The dissimilarity measures are presented with respect to the corresponding features and are combined into one for efficient verification. In addition to the x, y-coordinates, the writing pressure is also considered to be part of shape. Experiments were carried out with a database which consists of 300 genuine signatures and 300 forgeries collected from 10 subjects. The effectiveness of incorporating the weighted local variation is shown by the experimental results. It contributes to an average increase in the correct verification rate as the correct verification rate increased 1.0% and was found to be 98.7%.

We propose an architecture of a high-speed internetworking device using central control method. Co-operations of hardware and software is required to realize high relay performance. For the hardware, we have designed an original bus arbitration control method to achieve a high throughput of a data bus. For the software, we have devided a normal relay processing from other processing and built it as a basic function of the monitor. By this method, relay perfomance improves dramatically, because of a multiple effect of the reduction of software overheads and the improvement of cache hit ratio. We have developed the prototype device and confirmed the effects of the proposed method.

For similarity methods to work well, the image must be blurred before being input. However, the relationship between the blurring operation and the similarity is not fully understood. To solve the problem of this relationship, in this paper, the effect of blurring is investigated by expressing figure f(x) in the form of the sum of higher derivatives of f (x,σ), and then a simple similarity between figures was mathematically formulated in terms of the relation between visual patterns. By modifying this formulation, we propose pluralized simple similarity to increase the allowance in different view of multiple similarity. The similarity maintains higher allowance without any discernible loss of distinguishing power. We verify the effectiveness of the pluralized simple similarity throughout some experiments.

Digital halftoning is a well-known technique in image processing to convert an image having several bits for brightness levels into a binary image consisting only of black and white dots. A great number of algorithms have been presented for this problem, some of which have only been evaluated just by comparison with human eyes. In this paper we formulate the digital halftoning problem as a combinatiorial problem which allows an exact solution with graph-theoretic tools. For this, we consider a d-dimensional grid of n := Nd pixels (d 1). For each pixel, we define a so-called k-neighborhood, k {0,...N - 1}, which is the set of at most (2k + 1)d pixels that can be reached from the current pixel in a distance of k. Now, in order to solve the digital halftoning problem, we are going to minimize the sum of distances of all k-neighborhoods between the original picture and the halftoned one. We show that the problem can be solved in linear time in the one-dimensional case while it looks hopeless to have a polynomial-time algorithm in higher dimension including the usual two-dimensional case. We present an exact algorithm for the one-dimensional case which runs in O(n) time if k is regarded to be a constant. For two-dimensional case we present fast approximation techniques based on space filling curves. An experimental comparison of several implementations of approximate algorithms proves that our algorithms are of practical interest.

This letter proposes a new shaping algorithm (CRSA: CDV Reduction Shaping Algorithm) that can freely reduce the maximum CDV value of a cell stream to any predetermined value. There is a trade off between shaping delay and the maximum CDV value reduction achieved when using CRSA. The shaper using CRSA (CR-shaper) output satisfies the Peak Cell Rate Reference Algorithm set with the CR-shaper parameters.