This study presents a method that yields quantitative solutions through optimization analysis of a basic product design incorporating lifecycle considerations. We consider two types of optimization approaches from the view point of the 3R concept that have different aims, namely, (1) to reduce the use of materials and energy consumption, and (2) to facilitate the reuse of the product or its parts after the end of its useful life. We also focus on how the optimization results differ according to the approach used, and obtain optimum solutions by evaluating objectives fitted to each of these two approaches with respect to the product's lifecycle stages, which are manufacturing, use, maintenance, disposal, reuse and recycling. As an applied example, a simple linear robot model is presented, and Pareto optimum solutions are obtained for the two-objective optimization problem whose evaluated objectives are the operating accuracy and the different lifecycle costs for the two approaches. The characteristics of the evaluated objectives and design variables, as well as the effects of using material properties as design parameters, are also examined.

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In order to solve environmental issues, transition form conventional business to sustainable business is eagerly required. In order to promote sustainable businesses, it will be effective to support finding out sustainable business ideas based on general rules derived from existing ones. To this end, this paper proposes an idea generation method for sustainable businesses based on 16 general rules, which are derived from 130 examples of sustainable businesses in Japan, by clarifying their effects and influence on 19 business parameters that describe the structure of utility values, environmental load and cost throughout whole life cycle of corresponding products. Idea generation procedure based on these rules is also illustrated with a simplified example of a laptop computer business.

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In order to minimize environmental loads and costs during a whole life cycle of a product, adequate life cycle design as well as product design is indispensable. In life cycle design, the anticipated life cycle of a product can be clarified by describing a life cycle scenario. Modular design is an important elemental technique to link life cycle design to appropriate product architecture, and improves, e.g., maintainability, upgradability, reusability, and recyclability by unifying components applicable to the same life cycle scenario. This paper proposes a modular design method based on various attributes related to a product life cycle scenario; e.g., while the modular structure for recycling is based on material kinds, the structure for reuse is based on lifetime of components. Furthermore, we define an evaluation index for evaluating derived modular structure from the viewpoint of resource efficiency. This paper also illustrates the prototype system that implements the proposed method and a case study of an ink-jet printer.

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Recently, a new academic field, "service engineering" has been very actively investigated. However, there are few effective software tools to simulate and evaluate services designed based on the concept of service engineering. In the past, the authors proposed a service flow simulation method using scene transition nets (STN) which is a graphic modeling and simulation method for discrete-continuous hybrid system. However, this method cannot simulate complex service flows including customers' decision-making. This method cannot simulate customers' behaviors which are described as follows: (1) How do customers behave when service providers give them a number of options in their service? (2) Do customers select designed services when there are some competing services? It is essential to simulate above customers' behaviors in order to evaluate designed services. Nowadays, it turned out that mechanism of reinforcement learning concerns behavioral selections of customers. In this paper, the authors propose to develop decision-making processes models of customers and to simulate customers' behaviors and service flows by using reinforcement learning models and STN. This paper shows the usefulness of proposal simulation models by using some examples and describes the authors' observations about the experimental results.

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Research on traditional service marketing can be divided into two types: characteristic-based approach and activity-based approach. In order to develop an engineering methodology for services, these two approaches should be utilized in such methodology. This paper aims to present a method for analyzing structures of service processes described in the modeling method the authors have proposed. It uses three indices of service delivery process according to customer satisfaction elements: (1) visibility to receiver, (2) interactivity with receiver, and (3) degree of receiver participation. Through an application case study, it is found that the method can indicate the features of services, and contribute to acquirement of clues for improving services. Furthermore, the relationship between the indices and four well known characteristics of services are discussed in this paper.

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Recently, the number of products made from fiber-reinforced plastics (FRP) has been increasing due to their low cost, high rigidity, and high strength. Generally, injection molded FRP parts are known to be anisotropic, i.e. mechanical properties are different in the flow and transverse directions. Therefore, it is important to consider the flow direction during structural analysis and design for FRP products. In this study, a new method for structural analysis with consideration of flow direction is proposed. In this method, the flow analysis component was substituted with thermal analysis, whereby the flow direction was simply predicted on the basis of the direction of heat flux. Furthermore, it is easier to couple the thermal and structural analysis components and incorporate them into conventional software for structural analysis. In order to verify the prediction of flow direction by means of thermal analysis, fiber orientation was observed by X-ray CT. Verification was also conducted by performing static and modal analysis for a propeller fan. It was confirmed by means of fiber orientation observation that the heat flux direction was comparable to the resin flow direction. The results from both static and modal analysis with consideration of flow direction also agreed well with that of the actual product.

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Recently, some people have problem of splayfoot. The splayfoot is the state with less arch than the average data. This symptom may not seem serious. However, it causes pain in walking. Splayfooted people become getting tired easily. It causes fatigue in daily life. In addition, these symptoms levels depend on the patients. Therefore a commercial arch support produced by the same mold is not always suitable for all patients. Thus arch support designed for individual patient is necessary. In this research, we develop ideal arch support for individual patient by using roentgenogram and approximate multi-objective optimization. We used convolute RBF as approximation of objective functions, and Genetic Range Genetic Algorithms (GRGAs) as optimizer. To meet the requirements simultaneously, we use satiscifing method. We have developed this method for years, and in that sense, this study is an application of it with experimental data. And we also verify the result successfully by using electromyogram.

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In the design of emotional qualities, setting quantitative evaluation criteria to evaluate such qualities is important. Without such criteria, the designer has to rely on his/her sensitivity, which may be different from the customer's making it difficult to set a clear design goal. The customer's sensitivity towards such qualities is subjective, latent and diverse. In our previous study, we proposed a quantification method of emotional qualities with attention paid to its diversity and applied the method to quantify the product sound quality. The authors formalized several emotional qualities expressed by adjectives using the proposed method with sound samples recorded from existing products. However, the variety of existing products was limited. The obtained evaluation criteria may not cover areas in a design space where future designs would appear. In this paper, we aim to cover such untouched design area using composite samples and extract a potential factor for the future design. To create such composite samples, we set efficiest design features that take into consideration the completeness of design space and the diversity of a target emotional quality that we quantify using the results of sensory tests with existing product. We conduct a new set of sensory tests with composite samples and compare the results with those from previous test, in order to discuss changes introduced by adding created sounds. We extracted a new emotional scale of target emotional quality "expensiveness of machine sound" that was not found in 1st sensory test based only on the existing product sound. The emotional scale contains two different viewpoints of "reliable sound". One is associated with silent and composed sound and another is powerful and obstructed sound. Using a factor analysis considering the diversity of human sensitivities, we found those two viewpoints of "reliable sound" in 1st and 2nd factors respectively. The first factor negatively related to loudness. The second factor related to lower sharpness and the existence of a perceivable peak tone around 500Hz. Most product makers are aware of the need to reduce loudness, i.e., the first factor. We extracted the second factor as a new evaluation criterion.

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This paper proposes a method of inputting a planar log-aesthetic curve with compound-rhythm by use of four control points. The log-aesthetic curve does not exhibit any undulations of curvature since its curvature monotonically increases or decreases and it is suitable to be used for practical product design. The input methods by use of control points presented so far can generate only one log-aesthetic curve and it is not capable enough to represent characteristic lines of industrial products. We show that the compound rhythm log-aesthetic curve made up of two log-aesthetic curve segments connected with C^3 continuity has an enough expression ability to represent character lines of cars by illustrating practical design examples.

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We propose a method for medial voxel extraction from large volumetric models scanned by CT scanners. Our method extends geodesic-based approaches so that it handles large objects. We first construct distance fields from input volumes. Next, medial voxels are extracted from these distance fields through multi-phase evaluation processes. At first, trivial medial or non-medial voxels are evaluated by the low-cost pseudo-geodesic distance method. The rest voxels are evaluated by more expensive geodesic distance computation. This strategy allows most of the voxels can be extracted in the low-cost process. This paper demonstrates a number of results of medial voxel extraction from scanned engineering objects. In addition, we also demonstrate a medial surface reconstruction from medial voxels.

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In this paper, the authors propose computerized support for fault tree analysis (FTA) based on a new design knowledge management approach called quantity dimension indexing. When a designer finds or encounters a problem during a product design and development process, an effective way of ensuring the security and safety of the product is to identify all the possible causes of the problem by FTA and fix them. Although FTA is an effective method, it is not easy for a designer to construct a complete fault tree without any misunderstanding or oversight. A promising approach for supporting FTA is to utilize a computerized knowledge management method. Although many knowledge management techniques for literal expression have been developed, they are not necessarily suitable for managing the engineering design knowledge of physical phenomena. To solve this problem, the authors propose a new design knowledge management approach called quantity dimension indexing and computerized support for FTA such as the verification of consistency of a fault tree and fault tree construction advice. By analyzing fault tree examples based on actual design activities in a company, the possible feasibility and future promise of the proposed approach are indicated.

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Any engineering analysis model is indispensable to predict the behavior of a product for its rational evaluation and optimization. In the process of modeling engineering analysis, an engineer makes model idealizations, which depend on a various factors of design such as the kinds or types of products, the objectives of the engineering analysis, and design leadtime constraints. Because the knowledge of engineering analysis exists in modeling process, it is important to capture and manage the modeling process for enhancement of rationality and reusability of engineering analysis models. This research aims to develop the knowledge management framework for engineering analysis modeling. This paper proposes a concise and comprehensive description format of modeling process called Engineering Analysis Modeling Matrix (EAMM). Three modeling levels, i.e., conceptual model, mathematical model and computational model, three modeling aspects, i.e., target objects, governing principles and behavior, and seven modeling operations are defined as fundamental terms of modeling process. A modeling example of heater analysis shows the EAMM's capability as a foundation of the management framework of engineering analysis modeling knowledge.

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Fine particle bombarding (denoted hereafter as FPB) has a superior effect on improving tooth surface strength (pitting resistance) of gears compared to conventional shot peening, which was reported by the author. Since it is well known that the conventional shot peening increases tooth bending strength of gears, double peening using FPB after the conventional shot peening is expected to improve both tooth surface strength and tooth bending strength of gears. The purpose of this study is to clarify the effect of the double peening on the bending strength of carburized gears. First, the author measured the residual stress distribution of the tooth root of the gears treated with the double peening under different peening conditions. The results showed that high residual compressive stress was produced near the surface by the secondary FPB. On the other hand, it was found that certain conditions of FPB released the residual compressive stress produced by the primary shot peening in a deeper region. Next, durability tests were carried out using the gears to measure the tooth bending strength. As a result of the tests, tooth bending strength was improved by using suitable conditions of FPB as the secondary peening. However, when the secondary FPB released the residual compressive stress produced by the primary shot peening in a deeper region, no improvement of tooth bending strength obtained because subsurface fatigue fracture was induced.

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This paper presents the influence of pH of water-soluble cutting fluids with and without synthetic lubricating additive for hobbing; Fluid A and Fluid B, on the cutting performance; flank wear, crater wear and finished surface roughness. Experiments were conducted by simulating hobbing by fly tool cutting on a milling machine. The following results were clarified: (1) When using both Fluid A and Fluid B, the flank wear decreases with decreasing pH, in which the Fluid A having pH 8.0 and the Fluid B having pH 9.0 showed the smallest flank wear width not only at cutting speed of 117m/min, but also at 159m/min. (2) The crater wear obtained with the Fluid A decreases with decreasing pH, but that obtained with the Fluid B increases with decredasing pH at cutting speed of 117m/min. At 159m/min, the crater wear could not be measured because of adhesion of deposited metal on the face. (3) The finished surface roughness is small from the beginning of cutting to the end of cutting in the case of pH 8.0 of the Fluid A at cutting speed of 117m/min. It is big and shows no difference even when changing pH at 159m/min. (4) From the view points of the tool wear and the finished surface roughness, pH 8.0 of the cutting fluid with synthetic lubricating additive is effective.

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A damping model of the satellite panels during pyroshock responses was proposed in order to improve the prediction accuracy of the simplified pyroshock response analysis established in our previous paper. Through a statistical analysis for pyroshock test data measured in the deployment test of the solar paddles, it was clarified that the distribution of the damping ratio of the satellite panels during pyroshock responses does not follow a normal distribution but a log-normal distribution, and average of the damping ratio, which depends on frequency, is in the range of 5% to 10%. Then, a regression curve representing the damping model of the satellite panels was derived from the results. By conducting the pyroshock response analysis with the derived damping model, it was presented that the prediction accuracy of the simplified pyroshock response analysis was improved by about 6dB in high frequency range, while confirming effectiveness of the derived damping model.

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In the previous paper, a nonlinear vibration in a continuous system excited by periodic displacement with arbitrary function was analyzed by the authors. A system of the steady state forced vibration was treated as a simply-supported-beam connected with a nonlinear spring at midpoint of the span. In order to analyze an exact solution of the resulting vibration, the Fourier series method was applied to the system. And some resonance curves were constructed by numerical calculation. This paper deals with the method of stability analysis for the resulting vibration obtained in the former paper. Stability criterion for the periodic solutions is analyzed utilizing variational equation of motion given from modal equation. Next, the stability charts for the resulting vibrations are constructed by numerical calculation. The stability criterion for the periodic solutions on the steady state vibration is discussed utilizing their charts. By using these charts, the stable branches for the resonance curves obtained in the former paper are distinguished from the unstable ones. Furthermore, in order to clarify the influence of nonlinearity for the stability, the stability chart is also constructed taking the nonlinearity as parameter.

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In Japan, the seismic design methods for structures are developed in the civil and architectural fields. And these seismic design technologies have also been brought to mechanical structures such as piping facilities and boiler structures, etc. But, for the geometric time varying structure of which geometric configuration is dependent on time such as cranes, the kinetic and the dynamic characteristics of such structures are not fully considered in the seismic response analyses. In this paper, we try the modeling of the geometric time varying structure systems by means of the method of multibody dynamics. And we examine the effect of the geometric time varying system on the seismic response. The beam elements formulated by the absolute nodal coordinate are used to model the structure that has large displacement motion of the base of the structure. The carne structure for the building construction is modeled in the numerical example.

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For the past several years, seismic isolation systems have been focused in the seismic design of industrial facilities. This paper deals with the response reduction effect by friction. Friction is expected to decrease the relative displacement by dissipating the vibration energy. The relative displacement between structure and support becomes larger at long period in the case of linear system. Therefore, the response reduction effect by friction should be utilized positively in the seismic design. However, the response magnification of acceleration is used in the seismic design. The acceleration becomes larger by stick and slip motion. Therefore, the response reduction effect by friction is evaluated from the viewpoint of energy. The ratio between elastic energy and input energy is utilized. In this paper, "Response Reduction Map" based on energy for long period friction system is suggested. This map shows the range that energy response ratio is less than the ratio of the linear system. The response reduction map without complex non-linear time history calculation can easily obtain the proper parameters, such as natural period or friction force. At first in this study, the response reduction map by actual earthquake wave is shown. Next, the response reduction map by the artificial earthquake wave calculated from the design spectrum is shown.

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For the development of high speed flywheel rotation in a vacuum chamber, technology for establishing magnetic bearing in ultra low loss and measures for preventing spillover vibration are necessary. For these purpose, two test rigs, one involving magnetic bearing and the other, a medium-size flywheel were conducted in the present study. With the former, a technique for reducing magnetic bearing loss was investigated. In the latter, many trials were carried out in attempt to find means for preventing spillover vibration. Based on the results, two important finds became evident. First, bearing loss could be reduced to 1/6 that in conventional control, through use of zero power control and homo-polar magnetic poles. Secondly, flywheel rotation as much as 12000rpm was possible with no significant vibration through phase lead adjustment and the use of a stabilizing filter. Both these possibilities may be attributed to the very precise measurement of eigen frequency and the damping ratio.

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A practical system has been developed for the measurement of roll that occurs with the movement of a machine tool unit. The system consists of a double-path optical heterodyne laser interferometer, and a V-shaped reflector composed of two plane mirrors. To take a measurement, a laser head, the interferometer, and the reflector are set in a straight line, as for standard types of laser measurement. The sensitivity of the measurement which reflects a laserbeam at 8-points on the plane mirrors of the reflector was estimated at 1.6704×10^<-5>mm/" (detected length/unit angle of roll). The sensitivity was twice of the system that uses 4-points reflection which has been previously reported by the authors. In order to investigate the roll that occurs in a machining center with a milling space of 800mm×550mm×500mm, measurements were taken by means of 8-points system. From the results, it was confirmed that the reproducibility better than 10" in 99% confidence interval can be achieved.

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The poor operation for information systems such as car navigation systems may result in the visual workload. To reduce the visual workload produced by information systems and their use during vehicle operation, we propose a user-adaptive vehicle information interface with a reconfigured navigation sequence. We propose the information assistance interface which recommends a preferred content in short time without following the hierarchical steps because of the hierarchical structure of most car navigation systems. Our proposed user-adaptive interface consists of user modeling using a hidden Markov model (HMM) and symbol matching which is the reconfiguration of a navigation sequence. The interface learns a user's navigation patterns based on accumulated navigation sequences. The navigation sequence is reconfigured by the user model and a clue. The symbol matching is performed in compliance with the user's selection and the navigation sequence is recommended to the user. Experimental results showed that reconfiguring the navigation sequence and switches reduced navigation reaction time.

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CPM (continuous passive motion) is an orthopedic treatment or a physiotherapy after surgery. After surgery to injury of UCL (ulna, collateral ligament) in the elbow, excessive extension of the UCL aggravates the injury, and reaction force at hand of patient increases excessively near the end of the range of motion due to increased stiffness. It is known that controlling pro-/supination is effective to suppress the reaction force, but the UCL may be extended excessively by the pro-/supination. In this paper, we focus on the treatment after the surgery to UCL and propose the trajectory generation method to control the pro-/supination in order to suppress both the reaction force and the UCL extension based on skeleton model. Finally, experimental results with simulated patient show the effectiveness of the proposed method.

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The operation system that detects the grasping intention of people has been developed. In order to operate the Power-Assist Glove with appropriate drive mode corresponding to human grasping intention, we focused on three principal grasping modes and showed that each mode could be predicted by analyzing the initial movement patterns of the finger joint angles. Applying the pattern classification method to the control algorithm, the operation system predicts the grasp mode from slight movement of the fingers. As a result, the operation system achieved an 80% success rate in distinguishing the grasping modes of people. The Power-Assist Glove features a simple drive mechanism using soft actuators, that endows it with great affinity for human movement.

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An above knee prosthesis that is used by femoral amputees has a knee joint mechanism as an alternative function of a knee. A Knee brace also has a knee joint mechanism for securing stability of a knee during the stance phase. Performance of the prosthetic knee joint highly affects activity and a cure of the patient. However, the practical knee joint mechanism that can generate active joint torque has almost never appeared, because of the problems of overweight, mechanical noise and energy consumption. In this study, a new joint mechanism that would be able to generate extensional knee joint torque by utilizing ground reaction force without an external energy source was examined. The torque generator composed of hydraulic cylinders was designed by considering the results of gait analysis. The experimental trial model of a knee brace was made for a normal subject. Effect of the torque generator was experimentally examined by electromyogram of vastus medialis and by measuring generative torque during extension of a knee joint.

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Near-infrared radiation is absorbed much more by intravascular hemoglobin than by water. This characteristic is exploited in personal certification technology. However, so far there have been few applications of blood vessel imaging using near-infrared radiation to medical instrumentation. In this study, we constructed an experimental system that uses near-infrared radiation to obtain images of blood vessels in a subject's finger while the upper arm of the subject is compressed. Using this system, we investigated the effects of two parameters, the compression pressure applied to the upper arm and the age of the subjects, on the imaging of blood vessels. Forty-five normal men and women (aged 20-64 years) participated in this study. In the results for the influence of compression of the upper arm, there was a significant increase (p<0.05) in the change in the average brightness (gray scale value) of the imaging of blood vessels with an increase in the compression when the compression was less than 80mmHg. However, the change in the average brightness for a compression of 150mmHg was significantly (p<0.01) lower than those for compressions of 80mmHg and 100mmHg; this is thought to be due to the arterial and venous compliances. There was a negative correlation (r=-0.608, p<0.001) between the age of the subjects and the time to reach the half the convergent value for the change in the average brightness. One of the contributing factors for this is considered to be the reduction in the venous compliance with age.

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We have developed a new type of knee prosthesis which is capable to make 180° knee flexion, and have designated it as Complete flexion knee (CFK). Since the kinematics and kinetics of knee prosthesis varies depending not only on its articulating surface shape but also on the stiffness of soft tissues, its performance should be assessed under various kinds of lower limb activities. The objective of this study is to perform simulation analysis of level walking, ascending stars and squatting to evaluate the performance of CFK using the 2D/3D mathematical models. Our mathematical model of total knee arthroplastic joint includes the tibio-femoral and patello-femoral compartments. Furthermore, our models allow for the "thigh and calf" contact in deep knee flexion. First, the simulation was performed up to high knee flexion using our 3D model. After that we had to alternate the model from the 3D to the 2D, because the patella stacked into the femoral intercondylar, the thigh-calf contact occurred and the 3D model did not introduce the converged solution. The results demonstrated that at the level walking, post/cam contact did not occur. At the ascending stars, both post/cam and femoral condyle-tibial plateau contact occurred. At the squatting, only post/cam contact occurred and maximum contact stress was 52MPa.

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The acquisition of scientific information with respect to the interior of the Moon is a considerably significant goal for the next lunar exploration missions. The purpose of this research is to develop a robotic subsurface explorer that can burrow into the lunar soils by itself in order to sample and analyze the subsoil or to bury scientific instruments. Firstly, this paper qualitatively describes the conceptual definitions of subsurface locomotive robots. In addition, as one of the essential components for the development of such a robotic explorer, an effective screw drilling mechanism, which can cancel the reaction forces to the main body and loosen fore-soils, is proposed. With respect to the proposed mechanism, the remarks of the validation analysis with some mechanical discussions and fundamental experiments are presented.

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This research aims at proposing an intelligent flight control system which makes unmanned aerial vehicles tolerant of actuator faults. The proposed system can detect, identify and accommodate the faults automatically. To make the unmanned system downsizing and low-cost, this study focuses on keeping the redundancy by software approach. The purpose of this study is to establish the systematic learning-based design method of control system with the evaluation function based on control purpose. The proposed technique adds to normal flight control system (Navigation, Guidance, and Control) with detection, identification, and accommodation mechanisms. Each mechanism consists of neural network. In this study, the availability of the proposed system is verified by six-degree-of-freedom nonlinear simulation. In the simulation, it was assumed that an unmanned aerial vehicle is in steady flight and the elevon fault (lock-in-place) is happened. Under various conditions, the proposed technique can evaluate the flight condition and decouple the broken actuator and generate a new flight path. Then, it can achieve the stable flight in spite of the actuator fault.

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In this paper, non-linear and bi-linear dynamic models including dominant dynamics of the pneumatic pressure and flow of the fuel cell system are derived. In addition, two-degree-of-freedom sliding mode control is designed using the linear time invariant state-space model which is derived from the non-linear model. The pre-compensator considering exhaust gas flow passing through a throttle valve is also designed. The pre-compensator shapes the pressure and flow references and makes the exhaust gas flow close to the desired flow which is passing through the throttle in transient response. Furthermore, the pre-compensator makes the references close to static references which appropriately operates the fuel cell system in a static state. The paper presents the architecture of the pre-compensator, considering the passing flow in transient state and the tracking performance to the static references. Finally, numerical calculations and experimental results verify that the non-linear model accurately simulates the actual system transient responses and the proposed techniques improve the transient responses of the pneumatic pressure and the flow of the fuel cell system.

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Tapered roller bearings can support heavy combined radial and thrust loads, and are widely used for automobiles, railcars and industrial machines. The bearings have an inner ring rib into which roller large ends are thrust, and the contacts are accompanied with rolling-sliding motion. The roller large end and the rib surface are spherical and conical in shape, respectively. The typical lubrication regime of the contact is elastohydrodynamic lubrication (EHL), however, some surface damage may occur if the oil film formation is not enough due to low-rotational and/or heavy-load operations. The film thickness is desired to be thick enough to prevent the damage in a given operating condition. In this paper, an EHL numerical model is developed in consideration of both asperity contact and roller skewing. A parameter study shows that the optimum radius of the roller large end face is about 85% of that of the rib face conical surface to form thicker oil films.

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We propose a new approximation method, which calculates shearing forces of a liquid meniscus bridge between parallel plates with small clearance, and discuss the effect of three geometrical parameters, the volume of the bridge, clearance of the planes, and contact angle, on the shearing forces. The method introduces the nonaxisymmetry of the liquid meniscus-bridge by permitting the change of the contact angle on the triple lines, and thereby the calculated shearing forces increase with the shearing distance in the region of lower shearing distance. Experiments were carried out to measure the spring constants of the meniscus bridge in the shearing direction, and showed that the experimental results agreed with the calculated ones qualitatively. Moreover, the shape of the liquid meniscus bridge under shear is consistent with the assumptions of the approximation method. Shearing forces increased with both the volume of the liquid meniscus bridge and the contact angle or with the decrease of clearance.

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This paper describes the method of measuring the geometric deviations inherent to five axis machining centers with an inclined A-axis and a rotary table. As the conventional method is not applicable to the machine with the inclined A-axis, four axis movements are newly proposed. However, the inherent deviations are defined same as the machine with a cradle type table, if the inclination angle of the A-axis is an initial value and its angular deviation is also superimposed on it. Simultaneous three axis control movement which has already been proposed applies to the C-axis for rotary table. Relational expressions between geometric deviations and eccentricities of the trajectories of three axis control movement of C, X and Y and of four axis control movement of A, X, Y and Z were derived. The procedure for identifying the deviation by using the relational expressions was shown. The relational expressions clarify that the cradle type is also applicable. In addition, validity and the application limit of the proposed method are clarified.

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This paper presents the experimental data and the analytical explanation of the cutting of an acrylic cylinder with lateral fluid pressure. In the experiment, the relationship between the cutting pressure and various ratios of the internal to external diameter of the cylinder were examined. Also the cutting pressure and the various sizes of the cylinders with constant ratios of the internal to external diameter were examined. Then it was shown that the cutting of the cylinders was influenced by the ratio of the internal to external diameter, and that there were two kinds of cutting of the cylinders, one with the necking and one without the necking. In order to analyze the experimental data, the starting point of the cutting appearing in the outer surface of the cylinder was found from the experiment, and then the cutting pressure of the cylinder was analyzed by considering the stress on the starting point of the cutting. The analytical results match very closely with our experimental data.

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This research deals with a two-layered dynamic supply chain model representing decision-making processes of individual clients and suppliers, and also negotiation processes among all clients and suppliers. In the model, suitable prices and delivery times are determined through both the scheduling processes of the individual suppliers and the negotiation processes among the clients and the suppliers. Dynamic production scheduling processes of the suppliers are newly considered in the model to deal with the trade-off between the prices and the delively times. The effectiveness of the proposed model is verified through computational experiments from the viewpoints of the profits of the suppliers.

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Instruments for measuring the internal pressure of digestive organs are used for diagnosing functional diseases, judging how critical the condition is, and deciding the treatment method or determining the degree of alleviation. However, the technique wherein the internal pressure of the small intestine is measured is highly invasive and painful for patients, and the insertion of the catheter via transducers is not preferred because it involves the insertion of an electric instrument in the body. In this study, we developed a system that measures the pressure of the small intestine with an ileus tube, which is generally used for the treatment of ileus. The main feature of our system is that can be used to measure internal pressure without the insertion of electric instruments such as transducers into the body, allowing the assessment of ileus without causing pain to the patient being treated. In this note, we present a brief description of the structure and function of this instrument used to measure the internal pressure of the small intestine.

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This paper describes a neuro-control scheme for motion control of nonlinear mechanical systems. A two-link manipulator with an unactuated first joint, wherein the motion of the system is confined to a horizontal plane, is treated as an example for the nonlinear systems. The control objective is to move the first joint from an initial angle to a target angle. Radial basis function neural networks (RBFNs) are used as the neuro-controller (NC), and particle swarm optimization (PSO), which is one of evolutionary computation techniques like genetic algorithm, is adopted for the learning algorithm. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is verified by a comparison of simulation and experimental results.

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