We present a smart steering wheel that detects the gripping position and area, as well as the distance to the approaching driver's hands by measuring the resonant frequency and its resistance value in an LCR circuit composed of the floating capacitance between the gripping hand and the electrode of the steering, and the body resistance. The resonant frequency measurement provides a high sensitivity that enables the estimation of the distance to the approaching hand, the gripping area of a gloved hand, and for covering the steering surface with any type of insulating material. This system can be applied for drowsiness detection, driving technique improvements, and for customization of the driving settings.

Wireless engineers and business planners commonly raise the question on where, when, and how millimeter-wave (mmWave) will be used in 5G and beyond. Since the next generation network is not just a new radio access standard, but also an integration of networks for vertical markets with diverse applications, answers to the question depend on scenarios and use cases to be deployed. This paper gives four 5G mmWave deployment examples and describes in chronological order the scenarios and use cases of their probable deployment, including expected system architectures and hardware prototypes. The first example is a 28 GHz outdoor backhauling for fixed wireless access and moving hotspots, which will be demonstrated at the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games in 2018. The second deployment example is a 60 GHz unlicensed indoor access system at the Tokyo-Narita airport, which is combined with Mobile Edge Computing (MEC) to enable ultra-high speed content download with low latency. The third example is mmWave mesh network to be used as a micro Radio Access Network (µ-RAN), for cost-effective backhauling of small-cell Base Stations (BSs) in dense urban scenarios. The last example is mmWave based Vehicular-to-Vehicular (V2V) and Vehicular-to-Everything (V2X) communications system, which enables automated driving by exchanging High Definition (HD) dynamic map information between cars and Roadside Units (RSUs). For 5G and beyond, mmWave and MEC will play important roles for a diverse set of applications that require both ultra-high data rate and low latency communications.

This paper presents a novel identification method for hybrid dynamical system models, where parameters have stochastic and time-varying characteristics. The proposed parameter identification scheme is based on a modified implementation of particle filtering, together with a time-smoothing technique. Parameters of the identified model are considered as time-varying random variables. Parameters are identified independently at each time step, using the Bayesian inference implemented as an iterative particle filtering method. Parameters time dynamics are smoothed using a distribution based moving average technique. Modes of the hybrid system model are handled independently, allowing any type of nonlinear piecewise model to be identified. The proposed identification scheme has low computation burden, and it can be implemented for online use. Effectiveness of the scheme is verified by numerical experiments, and an application of the method is proposed: analysis of driving behavior through identified time-varying parameters.

This paper proposes a read-only memory driving circuit for RFID tags based on a-IGZO thin-film transistors. The circuit consists of a Johnson counter and monotype complementary gates. By utilizing complementary signals to drive a decoder based on monotype complementary gates, the propagation delay can be decreased and the redundant current can be reduced. The Johnson counter reduces the number of registers. The new circuit can effectively avoid glitch generation, and reduce circuit power consumption and delay.

This paper proposes the MIMO MC-CDMA channel estimation method for the various mobile environments. The distinctive feature of the proposed method is possible to robustly estimate with respect to the mobile velocity using the Kalman filter with the colored driving source. Effectiveness of the proposed method are shown by computer simulations.

Recently, cameras are equipped on cars in order to assist their drivers. These cameras often have a severe radial distortion because of their wide view angle, and sometimes it is necessary to compensate it in a fully automatic way in the field. We have proposed such a method, which uses the entropy of the histogram of oriented gradient (HOG) to evaluate the goodness of the compensation. Its performance was satisfactory, but the computational burden was too heavy to be executed by drive assistance devices. In this report, we discuss a method to speed up the algorithm, and obtain a new light algorithm feasible for such devices. We also show more comprehensive performance evaluation results then those in the previous reports.

Recently, Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) are being researched and developed briskly. As a part of ITS, detecting vehicles from images taken by a camera loaded on a vehicle are conducted. From such backgrounds, authors have been conducting vehicle detection in nighttime. To evaluate the accuracy of this detection, gold standards of the detection are required. At present, gold standards are created manually, but manually detecting vehicles take time. Accordingly, a system which detects vehicles accurately without human help is needed to evaluate the accuracy of the vehicle detection in real time. Therefore the purpose of this study is to automatically detect vehicles in nighttime images, taken by an in-vehicle camera, with high accuracy in offline processing. To detect vehicles we focused on the brightness of the headlights and taillights, because it is difficult to detect vehicles from their shape in nighttime driving scenes. The method we propose uses Center Surround Extremas, called CenSurE for short, to detect blobs. CenSurE is a method that uses the difference in brightness between the lights and the surroundings. However, blobs obtained by CenSurE will also include objects other than headlights and taillights. For example, streetlights and delineators would be detected. To distinguish such blobs, they are tracked in inverse time and vehicles are detected using tags based on the characteristics of each object. Although every object appears from the same point in forward time process, each object appears from different places in images in inverse time processing, allowing it to track and tag blobs easily. To evaluate the effectiveness of this proposed method, experiment of detecting vehicles was conducted using nighttime driving scenes taken by a camera loaded on a vehicle. Experimental results of the proposed method were nearly equivalent to manual detection.

Energy conservation is one of the hot topics within the domain of traffic problems. It is well known that shortening the distance between vehicles reduces the aerodynamic drag of the lagging (or following) vehicle and leads to energy savings, which benefits the drivers. Recently, systems have been developed in which trucks or vehicles travel in a platoon with reduced headway from the preceding vehicle by using automated driving or driver assistance systems. The objective of the present study is to investigate how human factors, such as driving style, a driver's condition, or a driver's personal characteristics, influence the decision of a driver to close the gap with a preceding vehicle and obtain the benefit of aerodynamic drag reduction. We developed a realistic experimental paradigm for investigating the relationship between distance and several factors including the driver's personal characteristics and the size of preceding vehicle. Our experimental setup made use of real vehicles on a test track, as opposed to a vehicle simulator. We examined behavior of subjects that drove the following vehicle as well as subjects that sat in the passenger seat in the following vehicle. The experimental results demonstrate that all subjects attempted to reduce the distance to the preceding vehicle in order to gain the benefit. Based on the experimental and questionnaire results, we conclude that there are relationships between the category of subjects and subject's following distances.

This paper presents the basic characteristics of a beam tilting slot antenna element whose forced resonance is realized by reactance loading; its structure complements that of a dipole antenna element. The radiation pattern is tilted using a properly determined driving point position; a single loading reactance is used to obtain the forced resonance without great changes in the tilt angle. Numerical results show that the reactance element needs to be loaded near the driving point in order to obtain the forced resonance of the antenna and the minimum changes in the beam tilt angle at the same time. When the proposed forced resonant beam tilting slot antenna with a 0.8 λ length is driven at -0.2 λ from the center, the main beam tilt angle of 57.7 degrees and the highest power gain of 3.8 dB are obtained. This slot element has a broad bandwidth, unlike the complementary dipole element.

This paper proposes a method of accurately detecting the boundary of narrow stripes, such as lane markings, by employing gradient cues of edge points. Using gradient direction cues, the edge points at the two sides of the boundary of stripes are classified into two groups before the Hough transform is applied to extract the boundary lines. The experiments show that the proposed method improves significantly the performance in terms of the accuracy of boundary detection of narrow stripes over the conventional approaches without edge point grouping.

A new sustain driving circuit, featuring an energy-recovering function with simple structure and minimal component count, is proposed as a cost-effective solution for driving plasma display panels during the sustaining period. Compared with existing solutions, the proposed circuit reduces the number of semiconductor switches and reactive circuit components without compromising the circuit performance and gas-discharging characteristics. In addition, the proposed circuit utilizes the harness wire as an inductive circuit component, thereby further simplifying the circuit structure. The performance of the proposed circuit is confirmed with a 42-inch plasma display panel.

ITS (Intelligent Transport Systems) wireless communications system has been developing based on the leading edge ICT (Information Communication Technologies) in Japan. The comfort driving systems for example VICS (Vehicular Information Communication system), ETC (Electronic Toll Collection), Telematics has already become popular and the safety driving support systems, such as ASV (Advanced Safety Vehicle) and SMARTWAY have been scheduled for introduction in the near future. However, there are many residual issues in the comfort driving system because of the existence of the traffic jam and the interest of the economical cars in the world. Moreover, the acceleration of the development of the Smart Grid and EV (Electric Vehicle) would affect the future development of the ITS wireless communications system. In this paper, it is clarified that the future development should be advanced considering the one of the basic business rule of 'market-in and product-out'.

The present study examined the evaluation of aging using the photic driving response, a measure used in routine EEG examinations. We examined 60 normal participants without EEG abnormalities, classified into three age groups (2029, 3059 and over 60 years; 20 participants per group). EEG was measured at rest and during photic stimulation (PS). We calculated Z-scores as a measure of enhancement and suppression due to visual stimulation at rest and during PS and tested for between-group and intraindividual differences. We examined responses in the alpha frequency and harmonic frequency ranges separately, because alpha suppression can affect harmonic frequency responses that overlap the alpha frequency band. We found a negative correlation between Z-scores for harmonics and age by fitting the data to a linear function (CC: -0.740). In contrast, Z-scores and alpha frequency were positively correlated (CC: 0.590).

Navigation systems providing route-guidance and traffic information are one of the most widely used driver-support systems these days. Most navigation systems are based on the map paradigm which plots the driving route in an abstracted version of a two-dimensional electronic map. Recently, a new navigation paradigm was introduced that is based on the augmented reality (AR) paradigm which displays the driving route by superimposing virtual objects on the real scene. These two paradigms have their own innate characteristics from the point of human cognition, and so complement each other rather than compete with each other. Regardless of the paradigm, the role of any navigation system is to support the driver in achieving his driving goals. The objective of this work is to investigate how these map and AR navigation paradigms impact the achievement of the driving goals: productivity and safety. We performed comparative experiments using a driving simulator and computers with 38 subjects. For the effects on productivity, driver's performance on three levels (control level, tactical level, and strategic level) of driving tasks was measured for each map and AR navigation condition. For the effects on safety, driver's situation awareness of safety-related events on the road was measured. To find how these navigation paradigms impose visual cognitive workload on driver, we tracked driver's eye movements. As a special factor of driving performance, route decision making at the complex decision points such as junction, overpass, and underpass was investigated additionally. Participant's subjective workload was assessed using the Driving Activity Load Index (DALI). Results indicated that there was little difference between the two navigation paradigms on driving performance. AR navigation attracted driver's visual attention more frequently than map navigation and then reduces awareness of and proper action for the safety-related events. AR navigation was faster and better to support route decision making at the complex decision points. According to the subjective workload assessment, AR navigation was visually and temporally more demanding.

Unlike the conventional plasma-TVs using the driving circuit with two polarities during the reset and address periods, the cost-effective driving circuit using only the positive voltage level during the reset and address periods is proposed and implemented in the 42-in. plasma-TV.

This paper presents a new hierarchical mode segmentation of the observed driving behavioral data based on the multi-level abstraction of the underlying dynamics. By synthesizing the ideas of a feature vector definition revealing the dynamical characteristics and an unsupervised clustering technique, the hierarchical mode segmentation is achieved. The identified mode can be regarded as a kind of symbol in the abstract model of the behavior. Second, the grammatical inference technique is introduced to develop the context-dependent grammar of the behavior, i.e., the symbolic dynamics of the human behavior. In addition, the behavior prediction based on the obtained symbolic model is performed. The proposed framework enables us to make a bridge between the signal space and the symbolic space in the understanding of the human behavior.

A replacement of an expensive MgO protective layer with relatively inexpensive Lanthanum Hexa Boride (LaB6) has already been proposed. Since LaB6 is not transparent, unlike MgO, the LaB6 panel employs a long sustain gap structure. Since the sustain gap is 2.6 times larger than the distance between sustain and address electrodes, different driving methods from those of the conventional PDPs have to be adopted. For the driving technique of the sustain period, an application of delayed auxiliary pulses on A electrode and the overlap sustain pulse drive are proposed. Luminance degradation with higher sustain frequency driving can be compensated by use of a 2step sustain pulse driving. Low reset luminance and low address voltage are achieved with a square-ramp technique for the reset period. TV operation is successfully realized on AC PDP which incorporated the LaB6 cathodes.

This paper presents new approaches for the estimation of range between the preceding vehicle and the experimental vehicle, estimation of vehicle size and its projective size, and dynamic camera calibration. First, our proposed approaches adopt a camera model to transform coordinates from the ground plane onto the image plane to estimate the relative position between the detected vehicle and the camera. Then, to estimate the actual and projective size of the preceding vehicle, we propose a new estimation method. This method can estimate the range from a preceding vehicle to the camera based on contact points between its tires and the ground and then estimate the actual size of the vehicle according to the positions of its vertexes in the image. Because the projective size of a vehicle varies with respect to its distance to the camera, we also present a simple and rapid method of estimating a vehicle's projective height, which allows a reduction in computational time for size estimation in real-time systems. Errors caused by the application of different camera parameters are also estimated and analyzed in this study. The estimation results are used to determine suitable parameters during camera installation to suppress estimation errors. Finally, to guarantee robustness of the detection system, a new efficient approach to dynamic calibration is presented to obtain accurate camera parameters, even when they are changed by camera vibration owing to on-road driving. Experimental results demonstrate that our approaches can provide accurate and robust estimation results of range and size of target vehicles.

This paper proposes the design of a driver to deal with a thin-disc central supporting structure ultrasonic actuator based on the vibration modes and the equivalent circuit. In order to gain the electromechanical match at resonant frequency, a spectrum analyzer should measure admittance for driving piezoelectric ceramics. The virtual analyzer also investigated the characteristics of a MODEL-E equivalent circuit based upon the admittance-frequency response. The inherent capacitance from an ultrasonic actuator became the partial component in the design of a resonant circuit. IsSpice software is introduced to simulate as well as the experimental results has demonstrated a high agreement related to the conceptual design and practical implementation for the driving circuit.

In this paper, the device performances of sub-10 nm Vertical MOSFETs are investigated. One of the drawbacks of conventional planar MOSFETs is that in the sub-10 nm generation, its cutoff leakage current increases due to the short channel effects, but even more, its driving current decreases due to the quantum mechanical confinement effects such as the sub-band effect and the depletion of the inversion layer. It is shown for the first time that by downscaling the silicon pillar diameter from 20 nm to 4 nm, the Vertical MOSFET increases its driving current per footprint to about 2 times and suppresses its total cutoff leakage current per footprint to less than 1/60 at the same time. Moreover, the mechanisms of these improvements of Vertical MOSFET performances are clarified. The results of this work show that Vertical MOSFETs can overcome the drawbacks of conventional planar MOSFETs and achieve the high device performance through the sub-10 nm generation.