Terahertz (THz) ultra-massive multiple-input multiple-output (UM-MIMO) is envisioned as a key enabling technology of 6G wireless communication. In UM-MIMO systems, downlink channel state information (CSI) has to be fed to the base station for beamforming. However, the feedback overhead becomes unacceptable because of the large antenna array. In this letter, the characteristic of CSI is explored from the perspective of data distribution. Based on this characteristic, a novel network named Attention-GRU Net (AGNet) is proposed for CSI feedback. Simulation results show that the proposed AGNet outperforms other advanced methods in the quality of CSI feedback in UM-MIMO systems.

Wafer-level performance prediction techniques have been increasingly gaining attention in production LSI testing due to their ability to reduce measurement costs without compromising test quality. Despite the availability of several efficient methods, the site-to-site variation commonly observed in multi-site testing for radio frequency circuits remains inadequately addressed. In this manuscript, we propose a wafer-level performance prediction approach for multi-site testing that takes into account the site-to-site variation. Our proposed method is built on the Gaussian process, a widely utilized wafer-level spatial correlation modeling technique, and enhances prediction accuracy by extending hierarchical modeling to leverage the test site information test engineers provide. Additionally, we propose a test-site sampling method that maximizes cost reduction while maintaining sufficient estimation accuracy. Our experimental results, which employ industrial production test data, demonstrate that our proposed method can decrease the estimation error to 1/19 of that a conventional method achieves. Furthermore, our sampling method can reduce the required measurements by 97% while ensuring satisfactory estimation accuracy.

This paper proposes a determination method of the cascaded number for lumped parameter models (LPMs) of the transmission lines. The LPM is used to simulate long-distance transmission lines, and the cascaded number significantly impacts the simulation results. Currently, there is a lack of a system-level determination method of the cascaded number for LPMs. Based on the theoretical analysis and eigenvalue decomposition of network matrix, this paper discusses the error in resonance characteristics between distributed parameter model and LPMs. Moreover, it is deduced that optimal cascaded numbers of the cascaded π-type and T-type LPMs are the same, and the Γ-type LPM has a lowest analog accuracy. The principle that the maximum simulation frequency is less than the first resonance frequency of each segment is presented. According to the principle, optimal cascaded numbers of cascaded π-type, T-type, and Γ-type LPMs are obtained. The effectiveness of the proposed determination method is verified by simulation.

We study the device length and/or band characteristics examined by two coupling analysis methods for our proposed fiber-type polarization splitter (FPS) composed of single mode fiber and polarization maintaining fiber. The first method is based on the power transition characteristics of the coupled-mode theory (CMT), and the second, a more accurate analysis method, is based on improved fundamental mode excitation (IFME). The CMT and IFME were evaluated and investigated with respect to the device length and bandwidth characteristics of the FPS. In addition, the influence of the excitation point shift of the fundamental mode, which has not been almost researched so far, is also analysed by using IFME.

Statistical wafer-level characteristic variation modeling offers an attractive method for reducing the measurement cost in large-scale integrated (LSI) circuit testing while maintaining test quality. In this method, the performance of unmeasured LSI circuits fabricated on a wafer is statistically predicted based on a few measured LSI circuits. Conventional statistical methods model spatially smooth variations in the wafers. However, actual wafers can exhibit discontinuous variations that are systematically caused by the manufacturing environment, such as shot dependence. In this paper, we propose a modeling method that considers discontinuous variations in wafer characteristics by applying the knowledge of manufacturing engineers to a model estimated using Gaussian process regression. In the proposed method, the process variation is decomposed into systematic discontinuous and global components to improve estimation accuracy. An evaluation performed using an industrial production test dataset indicates that the proposed method effectively reduces the estimation error for an entire wafer by over 36% compared with conventional methods.

We evaluated the transmission performance, including received power and transmission throughput characteristics, in 4×4 single-user multiple-input multiple-output (SU-MIMO) transmission for synchronous time division duplex (TDD) and downlink data channels in comparison with single-input single-output (SISO) transmission in an environment where a local 5G wireless base station was installed on the roof of a research building at our university. Accordingly, for the received power characteristics, the difference between the simulation value, which was based on the ray tracing method, and the experimental value at 32 points in the area was within a maximum difference of approximately 10 dB, and sufficient compliance was obtained. Regarding the transmission throughput versus received power characteristics, after showing a simulation method for evaluating throughput characteristics in MIMO, we compared the results with experimental results. The cumulative distribution function (CDF) of the transmission throughput shows that, at a CDF of 50%, in SISO transmission, the simulated value is approximately 115Mbps, and the experimental value is 105Mbps, within a difference of approximately 10Mbps. By contrast, in MIMO transmission, the simulation value is 380Mbps, and the experimental value is approximately 420Mbps, which is a difference of approximately 40Mbps. It was shown that the received power and transmission throughput characteristics can be predicted with sufficient accuracy by obtaining the delay profile and the system model at each reception point using the both ray tracing and MIMO simulation methods in actual environments.

Text detection is a crucial pre-processing step in optical character recognition (OCR) for the accurate recognition of text, including both fonts and handwritten characters, in documents. While current deep learning-based text detection tools can detect text regions with high accuracy, they often treat multiple lines of text as a single region. To perform line-based character recognition, it is necessary to divide the text into individual lines, which requires a line detection technique. This paper focuses on the development of a new approach to single-line detection in OCR that is based on the existing Character Region Awareness For Text detection (CRAFT) model and incorporates a deep neural network specialized in line segmentation. However, this new method may still detect multiple lines as a single text region when multi-line text with narrow spacing is present. To address this, we also introduce a post-processing algorithm to detect single text regions using the output of the single-line segmentation. Our proposed method successfully detects single lines, even in multi-line text with narrow line spacing, and hence improves the accuracy of OCR.

Recent character detectors have been modeled using deep neural networks and have achieved high performance in various tasks, such as text detection in natural scenes and character detection in historical documents. However, existing methods cannot achieve high detection accuracy for wooden slips because of their multi-scale character sizes and aspect ratios, high character density, and close character-to-character distance. In this study, we propose a new U-Net-based character detection and localization framework that learns character regions and boundaries between characters. The proposed method enhances the learning performance of character regions by simultaneously learning the vertical and horizontal boundaries between characters. Furthermore, by adding simple and low-cost post-processing using the learned regions of character boundaries, it is possible to more accurately detect the location of a group of characters in a close neighborhood. In this study, we construct a wooden slip dataset. Experiments demonstrated that the proposed method outperformed existing character detection methods, including state-of-the-art character detection methods for historical documents.

In this study, aiming at clarifying the characteristics of air-to-ground radio wave propagation in mountainous areas, a transmission experiment was performed between a drone equipped with a transmitter and three receivers set up on the ground using a 920MHz band wireless system at Uchigatani forest, which is located in Yamato-cho, Gujo-shi, Gifu Prefecture. In the experiment, we simultaneously measured the received signal strength indicator (RSSI) and the drone's latitude, longitude, and height from the ground. Then, we verified whether the measured data has the line-of-sight between the transmitter and receivers using a geographic information system and analyzed characteristics of the RSSI, packet loss rate, and fading concerning the height from the ground and distance between the transmitter and receivers. The results showed that increasing the drone's altitude to 90m or more makes the link more stable and that the fading distribution in mountainous terrains is different from in other terrains.

In order to improve the anomaly detection efficiency of network traffic, firstly, the model is established for network flows based on complex networks. Aiming at the uncertainty and fuzziness between network traffic characteristics and network states, the deviation extent is measured from the normal network state using deviation interval uniformly, and the intuitionistic fuzzy sets (IFSs) are established for the various characteristics on the network model that the membership degree, non-membership degree and hesitation margin of the IFSs are used to quantify the ownership of values to be tested and the corresponding network state. Then, the knowledge measure (KM) is introduced into the intuitionistic fuzzy weighted geometry (IFWGω) to weight the results of IFSs corresponding to the same network state with different characteristics together to detect network anomaly comprehensively. Finally, experiments are carried out on different network traffic datasets to analyze the evaluation indicators of network characteristics by our method, and compare with other existing anomaly detection methods. The experimental results demonstrate that the changes of various network characteristics are inconsistent under abnormal attack, and the accuracy of anomaly detection results obtained by our method is higher, verifying our method has a better detection performance.

Incorporating a tool for administering medication, such as a syringe, is required in microneedles (MNs) for medical use. This renders it easier for non-medical personnel to administer medication. Because it is difficult to fabricate a hollow MN, we fabricated a capillary groove on an MN and its substrate to enable the administration of a higher dosage. MN grooving is difficult to accomplish via the conventional injection molding method used for polylactic acid. Therefore, biodegradable polyacid anhydride was selected as the material for the MN. Because polyacid anhydride is a low-viscosity liquid at room temperature, an MN can be grooved using a processing method similar to vacuum casting. This study investigated the performance of the capillary force of the MN and the optimum shape and size of the MN by a puncture test.

Conventional enzymatic biofuel cells (EBFCs) use glucose solution or glucose from human body. It is desirable to get glucose from a substance containing glucose because the glucose concentration can be kept at the optimum level. This work developed a biofuel cell that generates electricity from cellulose, which is the main components of plants, by using decomposing enzyme of cellulase. Cellulose nanofiber (CNF) was chosen for the ease of decomposability. It was confirmed by the cyclic voltammetry method that cellulase was effective against CNF. The maximum output of the optimized proposed method was 38.7 μW/cm2, which was 85% of the output by using the glucose solution at the optimized concentration.

Animating 3D characters using motion capture data requires basic expertise and manual labor. To support the creativity of animation design and make it easier for common users, we present a sketch-based interface DualMotion, with rough sketches as input for designing daily-life animations of characters, such as walking and jumping. Our approach enables to combine global motions of lower limbs and the local motion of the upper limbs in a database by utilizing a two-stage design strategy. Users are allowed to design a motion by starting with drawing a rough trajectory of a body/lower limb movement in the global design stage. The upper limb motions are then designed by drawing several more relative motion trajectories in the local design stage. We conduct a user study and verify the effectiveness and convenience of the proposed system in creative activities.

This paper concentrates on a class of pseudorandom sequences generated by combining q-ary m-sequences and quadratic characters over a finite field of odd order, called binary generalized NTU sequences. It is shown that the relationship among the sub-sequences of binary generalized NTU sequences can be formulated as combinatorial structures called Hadamard designs. As a consequence, the combinatorial structures generalize the group structure discovered by Kodera et al. (IEICE Trans. Fundamentals, vol.E102-A, no.12, pp.1659-1667, 2019) and lead to a finite-geometric explanation for the investigated group structure.

We propose an open source cell library characterizer. Recently, free and open-sourced silicon design communities are attracted by hobby designers, academies and industries. These open-sourced silicon designs are supported by free and open sourced EDAs, however, in our knowledge, tool-chain lacks cell library characterizer to use original standard cells into digital circuit design. This paper proposes an open source cell library characterizer which can generate timing models and power models of standard cell library.

In this letter, we give a new construction of a family of sequences of period pk-1 with low correlation value by using additive and multiplicative characters over Galois rings. The new constructed sequence family has family size (M-1)(pk-1)rpkr(e-1) and alphabet size Mpe. Based on the characters sum over Galois rings, an upper bound on the correlation of this sequence family is presented.

High-Altitude Platform Station (HAPS) provides communication services from an altitude of 20km via a stratospheric platform such as a balloon, solar-powered airship, or other aircraft, and is attracting much attention as a new mobile communication platform for ultra-wide coverage areas and disaster-resilient networks. HAPS can provide mobile communication services directly to the existing smartphones commonly used in terrestrial mobile communication networks such as Fourth Generation Long Term Evolution (4G LTE), and in the near future, Fifth Generation New Radio (5G NR). In order to design efficient HAPS-based cell configurations, we need a radio wave propagation model that takes into consideration factors such as terrain, vegetation, urban areas, suburban areas, and building entry loss. In this paper, we propose a new vegetation loss model for Recommendation ITU-R P.833-9 that can take transmission frequency and seasonal characteristics into consideration. It is based on measurements and analyses of the vegetation loss of deciduous trees in different seasons in Japan. Also, we carried out actual stratospheric measurements in the 700MHz band in Kenya to extend the lower frequency limit. Because the measured results show good agreement with the results predicted by the new vegetation loss model, the model is sufficiently valid in various areas including actual HAPS usage.

Platform-mounted small antennas increase dielectric loss and conductive loss and decrease the radiation efficiency. This paper proposes a novel antenna design method to improve radiation efficiency for platform-mounted small antennas by characteristic mode analysis. The proposed method uses mapping of modal weighting coefficient (MWC) and infinitesimal dipole and evaluate the metal casing with 100mm × 55mm × 23mm as a platform excited by an inverted-F antenna. The simulation and measurement results show that the radiation efficiency of 5% is improved with the whole system from 2.5% of the single antenna.

Most existing object detection methods and text detection methods are mainly designed to detect either text or objects. In some scenarios where the task is to find the target word pointed-at by an object, results of existing methods are far from satisfying. However, such scenarios happen often in human-computer interaction, when the computer needs to figure out which word the user is pointing at. Comparing with object detection, pointed-at word localization (PAWL) requires higher accuracy, especially in dense text scenarios. Moreover, in printed document, characters are much smaller than those in scene text detection datasets such as ICDAR-2013, ICDAR-2015 and ICPR-2018 etc. To address these problems, the authors propose a novel target word localization network (TWLN) to detect the pointed-at word in printed documents. In this work, a single deep neural network is trained to extract the features of markers and text sequentially. For each image, the location of the marker is predicted firstly, according to the predicted location, a smaller image is cropped from the original image and put into the same network, then the location of pointed-at word is predicted. To train and test the networks, an efficient approach is proposed to generate the dataset from PDF format documents by inserting markers pointing at the words in the documents, which avoids laborious labeling work. Experiments on the proposed dataset demonstrate that TWLN outperforms the compared object detection method and optical character recognition method on every category of targets, especially when the target is a single character that only occupies several pixels in the image. TWLN is also tested with real photographs, and the accuracy shows no significant differences, which proves the validity of the generating method to construct the dataset.

We developed a mantle-cloak antenna by controlling the surface reactance of a dielectric-loaded dipole antenna. First, a mantle-cloak antenna with an assumed ideal metasurface sheet was designed, and band rejection characteristics were obtained by controlling the surface reactance of the mantle cloak. The variable range of the frequency spacing between the operating and stopband frequencies of the antenna was clarified by changing the value of the surface reactance. Next, a mantle-cloak antenna that uses vertical strip conductors was designed to clarify the characteristics and operating principle of the antenna. It was confirmed that the stopband frequency was 1130MHz, and the proposed antenna had a 36.3% bandwidth (|S11| ≤ -10dB) from 700 to 1010MHz. By comparing the |S11| characteristics and the input impedance characteristics of the proposed antenna with those of the dielectric-loaded antenna, the effect of the mantle cloak was confirmed. Finally, a prototype of the mantle-cloak antenna that uses vertical strip conductors was developed and measured to validate the simulation results. The measurement results were consistent with the simulation results.