In this paper, we proposed two models, the full multiple MCS (Multicast Server) model and the hybrid multiple MCS model to support multiple MCS over a single large cluster in ATM (Asynchronous Transfer Mode) networks. Also, we presented two methods for MCS assignment which are known as 2PSPMT (2 Phase Shortest Path based on Multicast tree) and hybrid-2PSPMT, and evaluated its performance by simulation. When an ATM host requests joining a specific multicast group, the MARS (Multicast Address Resolution Server) designates a proper MCS among the multiple MCSs for the group member to minimize the average path delay between the sender and the group members. Each method for MCS assignment construct a 2-phase partial multicast tree based on the shortest path algorithm. We reduced the average path delay in the multicast tree using these methods with various cluster topologies and MCS distribution scenarios in addition to distributing the load among multiple MCSs.

High-speed digital data transmission services with mobile equipment are becoming available. Though the visual signal is one of the expected media to be used with such transmission capabilities, the bandwidth of visual signal is much broader than the provided transmission bandwidth in general. Therefore efficient video encoding algorithms have to be introduced. The ITU-T Recommendation H.263 and ISO/IEC MPEG-4 are very powerful encoding algorithms for a wide range of video sequences. But a large amount of bits are generated in highly active scenes to encode them using such conventional methods. This results in frame skipping and degradation of decoded picture quality. In order to keep these degradations as low as possible, we proposed a Dynamic Resolution Conversion (DRC) method of the prediction error. In the method, a reduced resolution encoding is carried out when the input scene is highly active. Simulation results show that the proposed scheme can improve both coding frame rate and picture quality in a highly active scene. We also present in this paper that some analysis for the performance of the DRC method under the error prone environment that is inevitable with mobile communications.

In this paper, a Wiener filtering method in wavelet domain is proposed for restoring an image corrupted by additive white noise. The proposed method utilizes the multiscale characteristics of wavelet transform and the local statistics of each subband. The size of a filter window for estimating the local statistics in each subband varies with each scale. The local statistics for every pixel in each wavelet subband are estimated by using only the pixels which have a similar statistical property. Experimental results show that the proposed method has better performance over the Lee filter with a window of fixed size.

The rapid growth of mobile systems and the exponential spread of the Internet have requested technologies for efficient and seamless delivery of IP data to mobile users. However, the Mobile Internet Protocol and the IETF Mobile IPv6 proposal are not scalable and capable of handling real time applications. The Mobile Internet Protocol employs mobility agents to support Internet-wide mobility, and mobile node employs the concept of care-of address to communicate with its correspondent node when it changes its point of attachment to the Internet. This paper proposes a new addressing scheme for mobile node based on IPv6. The concept of Mobile Internet is introduced, which is a logical subnet of IPv6 Internet and supports IP layer mobility. Mobile Internet is geographically overlaid on the Internet. It has a fixed subnet prefix, and each mobile node in it is only identified by its home IP address, regardless of its current location. Some new kinds of mobility agents (LRPC, LRPS/FLR) are defined. The proposed scheme is considered as a long-term solution for the Internet with mobile computers, several defects in the current Mobile IP protocol are solved.

To achieve a sound field reproduction system, it is important to design multichannel inverse filters which cancel the effects of room transfer functions. The design method in the frequency domain based on the least-norm solution (LNS) requires less memory and less calculation than the design method in the time domain. However, the LNS method cannot guarantee the causality or stability of the filters. In this paper, a design method of a time-domain inverse filter using iterative processing in the frequency domain for multichannel sound field reproduction is proposed, and the result of numerical analysis is described. The proposed method can decrease the squared error of every control point by 3-12 dB. Furthermore, the sound reproduced by this method attains over 13 dB improvement in the segmental signal-noise ratio (SNR) compared with that designed by the LNS method for real environment impulse responses.

This paper describes an improved multiresolution telescopic search algorithm (MRTlcSA) for block-matching motion estimation. The algorithm uses images with full and reduced bit resolution, and uses motion-track and adaptive-search-window strategies. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm has low computational complexity and achieves good image quality. We have developed a systolic-architecture-based search engine that has split data paths. In the case of low bit-resolution, the throughput is increased by enhancing the operating parallelism. The new motion estimator works at a low clock frequency and a low supply voltage, and therefore has low power consumption.

Equivalent-time sampling is a well-known technique to capture repetitive signals at finer time intervals than a sampling clock cycle time and it is widely used to implement waveform measurement with high time resolution. There are three techniques for implementing its time base (i.e., sequential sampling, random sampling and coherent sampling), and they have their respective advantages and disadvantages. In this paper we propose a new coherent sampling system which incorporates a pretrigger and time jitter reduction function for a fluctuating input signal which a random sampling system has, while maintaining the waveform recording efficiency of a conventional coherent sampling system. We also report on a technique for measuring a reference trigger time period accurately which is necessary to implement the proposed sampling system, and show its effectiveness through numerical calculations of its data recording time.

This paper proposes a method of supporting behavioral decision-making with a rule-based system to be used for the design stage of service specifications or service scenarios based on a state transition model. We consider telecommunication services as service scenarios of state transitions. A state transition can be described as a transition rule that is represented as the notation of an IF-THEN rule : "if < condition > then < action >. " Thus, behaviors or service scenarios are assumed to be treated as a set of IF-THEN rules in this paper. In general, an "if < condition > then < action >" rule is called a production rule, and production rules are often used to represent knowledge in expert systems. Thus, rules treated in this paper are a kind of production rule. It is still difficult to decide if behaviors are concurrent, cooperative, or exclusive as a whole system when many service scenarios are combined, even if each rule is clearly described and easy to understand. When several service scenarios are combined, it is necessary for the sub-elements of each state transition to cooperate. The method proposed in this paper consists of the following techniques: (1) decompositions of a state transition to sub-elements, (2) rule descriptions for the decomposed sub-elements and the application of rules, (3) use of conflict and cooperation strategies, and (4) support for behavioral decision-making by showing recommendations for cooperative, exclusive, or concurrent behavior. We provide examples of telecommunication services to show the effectiveness of the proposed method in an easy-to-understand manner. We also show cooperative resolution in the interactions among several services.

The micro positioning systems using magnetic suspension technique, which is one of precision actuating method, have been suggested. Utilizing the various potentials such as the exclusion of a mechanical friction, they are being applied broadly to multi degrees of freedom (d.o.f) system requesting high accuracy or hybrid system requesting to be controlled position and force simultaneously. This paper presents the entire development procedure of a novel six d.o.f micro positioning system using mag-netic levitation, with a repulsive force mechanism covering the all d.o.f. First, the interactions between magnetic elements are modeled and the system design flow by an optimal location of the elements is given. A kinematic relationship between the measuring instruments and the levitated object is derived, and dynamic characteristics are identified by the narrow gap principles. And the main issues for control are discussed.

Recently, an efficient algorithm has been proposed for finding all solutions of systems of nonlinear equations using linear programming. In this algorithm, linear programming problems are formulated by surrounding component nonlinear functions by rectangles. In this letter, it is shown that weakly nonlinear functions can be surrounded by smaller rectangles, which makes the algorithm very efficient.

An optimization of the smoothing preprocessing for the correlated signal parameter estimation was considered. Although the smoothing factor (the number of subarrays) is a free parameter in the smoothing preprocessing, a useful strategy to determine it has not yet been established. In this paper, we investigated thoroughly about the smoothing factor and also proposed a new scheme to optimize it. The proposed method, using the smoothed equivalent diversity profile (SED profile), is able to evaluate the effect of smoothing preprocessing without any a priori information. Therefore, this method is applicable in the real multipath parameter estimation.

We have built a pulse-compressed high-resolution radar for surveying polar ice caps and ice sheet. In experiments with this instrument at the Agassiz ice cap, radio echoes from the bedrock and internal layers measured with high resolution. The resolution of the radar in ice is about 1 meter. The greatest depth from which signals from bedrock were received was more than 400 meters and that from which signals from internal ice were received was about 200 meters. Such performances are suitable for generating data that can be used for detailed comparison between ice core analysis and radar data. This radar is expected to be an effective tool for revealing the three-dimensional extension of event-layer in the ice core and to give information about the scattering mechanism of internal echoes.

An airborne X- and L-band synthetic aperture radar system was developed by the Communications Research Laboratory and the National Space Development Agency of Japan in their joint project from 1993 to 1996. It is installed in the airplane, Gulfstream II. In both the azimuth and range directions, the resolution is 1.5 m for the X-band and 3 m for the L-band. Both SARs can make fully polarimetric observations. The X-band SAR has a cross-track interferometric function. In this paper we describe the SAR system, its ground processing system, and its performance. We also discuss motion compensation and interferogram quality.

We have developed a map-based approach that enables us to efficiently extract information about man-made objects, such as buildings, from aerial images. An image is matched with a corresponding map in order to estimate the object information in the image (i. e. , presence, location, shape, size, kind, and surroundings). This approach is characterized by using a figure contained in a map as an object model for a top-down (model-driven) analysis of an object in the aerial image. We determined the principal steps of the map-based approach needed to extract object information and update a map. These steps were then applied to obtain the locations of missing buildings and the heights of existing buildings. The extraction results of experiments using aerial images of Kobe City (taken after the 1995 earthquake) show that the approach is effective for automatically extracting building information from aerial images and for rapidly updating map data.

I describe a software reliability growth model that yields accurate parameter estimates even with a small amount of input data. The model is based on a proposed discrete analog of a Gompertz equation that has an exact solution. The difference equation tends to a differential equation on which the Gompertz curve model is defined, when the time interval tends to zero. The exact solution also tends to the exact solution of the differential equation when the time interval tends to zero. The discrete model conserves the characteristics of the Gompertz model because the difference equation has an exact solution. Therefore, the proposed model provides accurate parameter estimates, making it possible to predict in the early test phase when software can be released.

This paper describes a highly performance scalable video coder. Wavelet transform is employed to decompose the video frame into different resolutions. Novel features of this coder are 1) a highly efficient multi-resolution motion estimation that requires minimum compuation and overhead motion information is embedded in this scheme; 2) the wavelet coefficients are organized in an extended zero tree (EZT) which is much more efficient than the simple zerotree. We show with experimental results that this video coder achieves good performances both in processing time and compression ratio when applied to typical test video sequences.

This paper describes the Profit-Sharing, a reinforcement learning approach which can be used to design a coordination strategy in a multi-agent system, and demonstrates its effectiveness empirically within a coil-yard of steel manufacture. This domain consists of multiple cranes which are operated asynchronously but need coordination to adjust their initial plans of task execution to avoid the collisions, which would be caused by resource limitation. This problem is beyond the classical expert's hand-coding methods as well as the mathematical analysis, because of scattered information, stochastically generated tasks, and moreover, the difficulties to transact tasks on schedule. In recent few years, many applications of reinforcement learning algorithms based on Dynamic Programming (DP), such as Q-learning, Temporal Difference method, are introduced. They promise optimal performance of the agent in the Markov decision processes (MDPs), but in the non-MDPs, such as multi-agent domain, there is no guarantee for the convergence of agent's policy. On the other hand, Profit-Sharing is contrastive with DP-based ones, could guarantee the convergence to the rational policy, which means that agent could reach one of the desirable status, even in non-MDPs, where agents learn concurrently and competitively. Therefore, we embedded Profit-Sharing into the operator of crane to acquire cooperative rules in such a dynamic domain, and introduce its applicability to the realistic world by means of comparing with RAP (Reactive Action Planner) model, encoded by expert's knowledge.

In this paper, the recent development of GaN bulk substrates is reviewed. Among various works on HVPE thick epitaxial growth, the largest free-standing GaN substrates upto 34 cm2 has been first obtained by the HVPE method using NGO substrates, whose lattice constant has a good matching with that of GaN. For developing larger GaN substrates with lower production cost, the ultra-high pressure solution growth method is being developed not only in Poland but also in Japan under "The Light for the 21st Century" national project.

RSPICE, a fast timing simulator for large digital MOS circuits, is presented in this paper. A new table-based region-wise linear MOS transistor model and the analytical solution of the generic sub-circuit primitive are applied to calculate the transient response of digital MOS circuits. The body effect of pass transistors is included in the MOS model and the floating capacitor network can be handled by this sub-circuit primitive as well. In RSPICE, MOS transistors with a DC path are grouped into a DC-connected block (DCCB), and DCCBs with a feedback path are combined as a strongly connected component (SCC). RSPICE orders SCCs by Tarjan's algorithm and simulates ordered SCCs one by one. DCCBs are basic cells in RSPICE and any DCCB can be mapped into one or more sub-circuit primitives. In order to calculate the transient response of these primitives analytically, RSPICE approximates the input signals of the primitive by piecewise linear functions. To compromise the simulation accuracy and run time, partial waveform and partial time convergent (PWPTC) combined with dynamic windowing technique is applied to simulate SCCs. Other key issues of RSPICE, such as circuit partition, pass-transistor and floating-capacitor processing, simulation-flow control and waveform modification are also discussed in detail. Compared with HSPICE , the simulation result of RSPICE is very accurate with an error less than 3%, but the speed is 1-2 orders over HSPICE.

We proposed a new method to evaluate display legibility as a function of resolution. This method was able to evaluated display legibility without being restricted to the display resolution. Using this method, subjective psychological experiments were carried out to investigate display resolution, which provides legibility, in observing small characters. Samples viewed by subjects were images displayed on a high-resolution TFT-LCD that we developed, CRT images and printed documents for comparison. We have found that TFT-LCD legibility was much better than that of CRT, and that minimum resolution of about 175 dpi was needed for use in legible document viewers.