Recent Patents on Engineering - Volume 10, Issue 3, 2016

Background: Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) technology has exploded in recent years. Presently UAVs are beginning to be major in roads into geographical mapping, site inspection, agriculture, and search and rescue. Methods: This paper reviewed patents and papers worldwide related to both hardware and software for the construction and deployment of UAVs and is intended to provide a snapshot of currently available UAV technologies, as well as to identify recent trends and future opportunities in affiliated hardware and software. Results: Basic components related to self-designed units are explained (e.g. platform selection, autopilot control comparison and sensor selection), and current applications and research areas are discussed. Since autonomous navigation is a key technology in UAV applications, concepts about this are also explained. Conclusions: Both in the self-designed and commercial markets, UAV components are becoming modularized. By following a standard components list, it is no longer difficult to make a customised UAV. In this way, commercial products are becoming cheaper and more standardized in their performance. Current limitations of UAVs has also become more readily detectible. Extending the flight time, improving autonomous navigation abilities, and enriching the payload capacity will be the future research focus to address these limitations.

Background: Intelligent, adaptive, wireless, and GPS-enabled heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) control devices have significant potential with regards to energy efficiency and cost savings through reduction of utility bills when implemented into the mechanical controls of a home. Objective: The aim of this paper is to conduct a patent search in order to evaluate the recent advances on smart HVAC control devices and provide a summary of key patents in this technical field. Methods: A patent search was conducted to identify recent U.S. patent publications covering smart HVAC control devices. The study adopts an empirical approach to analyze patent data combined with a qualitative review of selected patent publications in this technical field. Results: The patent search yielded a total of 90 patents and patent applications with approximately 65% of the advances made in the past five years. Twenty-eight patents are reviewed in this article representing the direction HVAC control has taken over the past two years. Conclusion: While there has been significant developments in this technical field in the last 5 years, there is room for focused developments in the area of energy conservation. This may be accomplished by means of suggestive temperature control through the use of wireless networking, GPS enabled mobile devices, localized recognition, sensing technologies and occupant incentive methods.

Background: The review of patents reveals that with the high incidence of breast cancer, the therapeutic methods are further becoming increasingly important. In traditional breast interventional procedures, particle was manually injected into the body of cancer patients by a doctor according to the image. However, the operation could not be performed with image navigation in real-time, and the manual implantation can also produce large errors. Objective: Breast intervention robot with image-guided is one of the research contents of the medical intervention therapy robot, which is a combination of medical technology, material science and robot technology, to assist surgeons to complete the breast interventional procedures, such as biopsies and particle’s implantation. It’s possible to accurately complete the operation under navigation in real-time. Method: The breast intervention robots are designed with sufficient degrees of freedom to achieve the function in various navigation environment under considering material, structure and driver compatibility of the robot. Results: Many scholars have focused on the study of breast interventional robots in MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging), CT (Computed Tomography), and ultrasound navigation, and have achieved some research results. Besides, the mortality of breast cancer is gradually reduced, and the cure rate is progressively increased owing to the improvement of treatment equipment. Conclusion: The methods of cancer treatment have gradually been developed towards minimally invasive, precision and individual. Thus, minimally invasive surgery based on image navigation is widely used. In addition, the combination of robot and medical image technology, which makes the positioning more accurate, will lead to the success rate of the operation greatly improved.

Background: A significant effort has been underway to put renewable energy sources at the heart of the current energy model. Hydrogen produced via water electrolysis has been identified as one of the most promising means to help achieve this goal, especially by enabling energy storage in a sustainable and non-polluting way. In recent years, this situation has triggered novel developments in water electrolysis technologies and patenting of new inventions. Objective: The aim of this work is to review the state-of-the-art in hydrogen production from water electrolysis using a patent search and analysis. The paper also reviews, in brief, some relevant patents on water electrolysis technologies. Method: The patent search was carried out on the European Espacenet database. The research method was based on the use of keywords and subsequent content analysis. Patent data was discussed and analyzed in terms of production technology, year of publication, geographical area of the holder and applicant type. Results: A total of 103 patent documents were identified, most of them (75%) reporting developments on conventional water electrolysis technologies. Patents on emergent technologies were mostly granted after 2005. Global research effort was mainly supported by academia both in Europe and the US. Industry played an important role in Japan. Conclusion: Patent data suggests that water electrolysis technologies are either in their early stages of growth (High Steam Temperature Electrolysis, High Pressure Electrolysis) or in a phase of growth/maturity (Alkaline Electrolysis, Solid Polymer Electrolysis) with novel developments still needed and more patents foreseen in the future.

Background: The review of patents reveals that the Microstrip patch antennas are frequently used in UWB technologies, due to its advantages such as lightweight, ease of integration, small size and compactness. A novel printed monopole antenna based on quadratic Bézier curves for ultra-wideband applications, has been introduced. Methods: The goal of this research focuses mainly on antenna’s miniaturization with high efficiency and omnidirectional radiation patterns with a good UWB characteristics, and time-domain characteristics. The proposed antenna geometries are based on quadratic Bézier outlines most known as Splines. This curves are generated by quadratic interpolation between few control points. Its numerical model has been designed and simulated in CST microwave studio using the finite integrate technique (FIT). Both shapes of radiating element and ground plane are simultaneously optimized by Genetic Algorithm. Results: The proposed antenna operates over bandwidth (3.12 to 17.6GHz) for return loss S11< -10 dB; and shows omnidirectional radiation patterns with good and flatness gain over the frequency range of interest. These antenna also satisfy time-domain characteristics that shown a variation of the group delay less than 0.5 ns, and a small pulse distortion. Conclusion: All these performances indicate that the proposed antenna is suitable for UWB applications, such as high data rate transmission over wireless local area networks. The antenna has a small sized (40 × 32 mm) and can be easily integrated in such systems.

Background: When fire occurs, smoke spreads from the bottom of the building to the top through the stairwell, and spreads over the stairwell. This horizontal movement of high temperature smoke is dangerous because people can only reach the subway exit by stairs during the fire. Methods: To control horizontal movement of the smoke, a novel fire smoke-free double-jet air curtain system (DJACS), which has been granted the Chinese Patent (Patent Number ZL201010580513.6) is invented and studied. Performance optimization and the validation of implementation effects are carried out via numerical simulation and visual experiments Result: It is demonstrated that the smoke spread situation in stairwells is significantly different with or without using the blowing air curtain. Conclusion: Without the air curtain, the smoke is driven by the buoyancy force to form ceiling jet along the corridor ceiling, and diffuses into the stairwell, and ultimately covers and blocks the entire stairwell. With the air curtain, the piston wind is formed at the entrance of stairwell and on the stairwell to prevent fire smoke. The CO concentration in the stairwell is significantly smaller with DJACS than without DJACS.

Background: Poisson’s ratio is one of the basic concepts of mechanics. The review of patents reveals that the radial deformation of a cylindrical specimen is one of the main parameters for the determination of Poisson’s ratio. However, the widely used chain-type circumferential extensometer needs to be fixed onto such samples and will result in damage when the tested specimens are weak. Methods: To provide an economic, convenient, measuring method, a new device is proposed to avoid the disadvantages of existing measuring methods, which include bedframe and three linear displacement sensors. The linear displacement sensors are evenly distributed around the circumference and the included angle between adjacent sensors is 120 degrees. The maximum observed value of the three sensors is chosen as the measurement recorded by the device. Results: To compare the robustness of transverse deformation measurement methods, a comparative analysis of measurement errors arising from the three measuring methods (circumferential extensometer, collinear displacement sensors, and the proposed device) is conducted, and computational formulae for their error bounds are derived. Comparison indicates that the proposed device is robust and insensitive to centralisation error. Conclusion: We propose a radial deformation measurement device for cylindrical specimens which is composed of a bedframe and three evenly-distributed linear displacement sensors. The device is independent and imposes little contact force on the specimen. It can therefore be used in tests on weak samples such as gypsum and analogue materials. The proposed device is robust to installation deviation of specimens and has a smaller error compared to existing measurement methods. Meanwhile, the proposed device has good adaptability to low strength materials and is economic and convenient in practice. The low-complexity requirements imposed at sample installation will facilitate the test procedure, especially for mass production testing.