Orthogonally Linearly Polarized Dual Frequency Nd：YAG Lasers with Tunable Frequency Difference and Its Application in Precision Angle Measurement

The orthogonally linearly polarized dual frequency Nd： YA G lasers with two quarter wave plates in laser resonator are proposed. The intra-cavity variable birefringence, which is caused by relative rotation of these two wave plates in laser inner cavity, results in the frequency difference of the dual frequency laser also changeable. The theory model based on the Jones matrix is presented, as well as experimental results. The potential application of this phenomenon in precision roll-angle measurement is also discussed.

Measurement of Temperature and Residual Strain during Fatigue of a CFRP Composite Using Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors

Fatigue behaviour has important implications for engineering composite structures in sectors ranging from automotive to aerospace. Optical sensing technology displays excellent performance in these fields for monitoring. In this paper, temperature and residual strain during fatigue of a carbon fiber reinforced polymer（CFRP） are investigated. Four autoclaved CFRP beam specimens, with fiber Bragg grating（FBG） sensors and thermocouples embedded at selected locations, are subjected to three-point bending cyclic loading on the BOSE testing machine for fatigue testing. Thennocouples are used to measure the temperature while FBGs can sense the temperature and strain as well. Seven tests in total are conducted at different frequencies, and each test lasts for several days. From the experimental results, transient steep peaks of temperature increases （up to 2.3℃） are discovered at the beginning of the load. The following constant temperature increments are around 1.0℃, which is not relevant to frequencies from 0.1 Hz to 20 Hz and suspected due to fatigue. Residual strains of 1×10^-5-2×10^-5 during fatigue, fading away rapidly when unloading, are also reported. Embedded FBGs here are validated to sense temperature and strains in composite structures, which demonstrates promising potentials in structure monitoring fields. CFRP are verified to have an excellent performance during fatigue with low temperature increase and residual strain.

Cold atom clocks and their applications in precision measurements

Cold atom clocks have made remarkable progresses in the last two decades and played critical roles in precision measurements. Primary Cs fountain frequency standards have achieved a total uncertainty of a few parts in 1016, and the best optical clock has reached a type B uncertainty below 10-18. Besides applications in the metrology, navigation, etc.,ultra-stable and ultra-accurate atomic clocks have also become powerful tools in the basic scientific investigations. In this paper, we focus on the recent developments in the high-performance cold atomic clocks which can be used as frequency standards to calibrate atomic time scales. The basic principles, performances, and limitations of fountain clocks and optical clocks based on signal trapped ion or neutral atoms are summarized. Their applications in metrology and other areas are briefly introduced.

Fast prototype and rapid construction of three-dimensional and multi-scaled pitcher for controlled drainage by systematic biomimicry

Biomimetic materials that use natural wisdom to solve practical problems are developing rapidly.The trend for systematic biomimicry is towards in-situ characterization of naturalcreatures with high spatial resolutions.Furthermore,rapid reconstruction of digital twin models with the same complex features as the prototype is indispensable.However,it faces bottlenecks and limits in fast characterization and fabrication,precise parameter optimization,geometricdeviations control,and quality prediction.To solve these challenges,here,we demonstrate astate-of-the-art method taking advantage of micro-computed tomography and three-dimensional printing for the fast characterization of the pitcher plant Nepenthes x ventrata and fabrication of its biomimetic model to obtain a superior drainage controller with multiscale structures withprecise surface morphology optimization and geometric deviation control.Thefilm-rupture-based drainage dynamic and mechanisms are characterized by x-ray and high-speed videography,which determines the crucial structures for unique directionaldrainage.Then the optimized artificial pitchers are further developed into sustained drainage devices with novel applications,such as detection,reaction,and smoke control.

External-cavity birefringence feedback effects of microchip Nd:YAG laser and its application in angle measurement

External-cavity birefringence feedback effects of the microchip Nd：YAG laser are presented. When a birefringence element is placed in the external feedback cavity of the laser, two orthogonally polarized laser beams with a phase difference are output. The phase difference is twice as large as the phase retardation in the external cavity along the two orthogonal directions. The variable extra-cavity birefringence, caused by rotation of the external-cavity birefringenee element, results in tunable phase difference between the two orthogonally polarized beams. This means that the roll angle information has been translated to phase difference of two output laser beams. A theoretical analysis based on the Fabry-Perot cavity equivalent model and refractive index ellipsoid is presented, which is in good agreement with the experimental results. This phenomenon has potential applications for roll angle measurement.

FPGA-based High-precision Measurement Algorithm for the Ultrasonic Echo Time of Flight

Based on the evaluation of advantages and disadvantages of high-precision digital time interval measuring algorithms, and combined with the principle of the typical time-difference ultrasonic flow measurement, the requirements for the measurement of echo time of flight put forward by the ultrasonic flow measurement are analyzed. A new high-precision time interval measurement algorithm is presented, which combines the pulse counting method with the phase delay interpolation. The pulse counting method is used to ensure a large dynamic measuring range, and a double-edge triggering counter is designed to improve the accuracy and reduce the counting quantization error. The phase delay interpolation is used to reduce the quantization error of pulse counting for further improving the time measurement resolution. Test data show that the systexn for the measurement of the ultrasonic echo time of flight based on this algorithm and implemented on an Field Programmable Gate Army（FleA） needs a relatively short time for measurement, and has a measurement error of less than 105 ps.

Design and error analysis of a high accurate star simulator based on optical splicing technology

Dynamic tar simulator has been widely used in calibration and validation for star trackers.To achieve both high accuracy and large view field,a dynamic star simulatorbased on optical splicing technology with 2 1920 × 1080- LCDs and a half-transmission and half- reflection prisms was proposed in this paper.The physical principal and error model due to the splicing structure has been discussed and analyzed in detail.Based on the Tsinghua Micro star tracker,the error effect and system accuracy has been carefully tested and calibrated.The result showed that this simulator can get the accuracy of 10.4 "(3sigma) within a field of view of,which can meet the simulating requirement of modern star tracker,whose accuracy can reach 3"(3sigma) 。

Active Low-frequency Vertical Vibration Isolation System for Precision Measurements

Low-fi＇equency vertical vibration isolation systems play important roles in precision measurements to reduce seismic and environmental vibration noise. Several types of active vibration isolation systems have been developed. However, few researches focus on how to optimize the test mass install position in order to improve the vibration transmissibility. An active low-frequency vertical vibration isolation system based on an earlier instrument, the Super Spring, is designed and implemented. The system, which is simple and compact, consists of two stages： a parallelogram-shaped linkage to ensure vertical motion, and a simple spring-mass system. The theoretical analysis of the vibration isolation system is presented, including terms erroneously ignored before. By carefully choosing the mechanical parameters according to the above analysis and using feedback control, the resonance frequency of the system is reduced from 2.3 to 0.03 Hz, a reduction by a factor of more than 75. The vibration isolation system is installed as an inertial reference in an absolute gravimeter, where it improved the scatter of the absolute gravity values by a factor of 5. The experimental results verifies the improved performance of the isolation system, making it particularly suitable for precision experiments. The improved vertical vibration isolation system can be used as a prototype for designing high-performance active vertical isolation systems. An improved theoretical model of this active vibration isolation system with beam-pivot configuration is proposed, providing fundamental guidelines for vibration isolator design and assembling.

Effects of surface adsorbed oxygen, applied voltage, and temperature on UV photoresponse of ZnO nanorods

The ultraviolet（UV） photoresponses of ZnO nanorods directly grown on and between two micro Au-electrodes by using electric-field-assisted wet chemical method are measured comprehensively under different conditions, including ambient environment, applied bias voltage, gate voltage and temperature. Experimental results indicate that the photoresponses of the ZnO nanorods can be modulated by surface oxygen adsorptions, applied voltages, as well as temperatures. A model taking into account both surface adsorbed oxygen and electron-hole activities inside ZnO nanorods is proposed. The enhancement effect of the bias voltage on photoresponse is also analyzed. Experimental results shows that the UV response time（to 63%） of ZnO nanorods in air and at 59°C could be shortened from 34.8 s to 0.24 s with a bias of 4 V applied between anode and cathode.

3D Characteristic Diagram of Acoustically Induced Surface Vibration with Different Landmines Buried

The 3D characteristic diagram of acoustically induced surface vibration was employed to study the influence of different buried landmines on the acoustic detection signal. By using the vehicular experimental system for acoustic landmine detection and the method of scanning detection, the 3D characteristic diagrams of surface vibration were measured when different objects were buried underground, including big plastic landmine, small plastic landmine, big metal landmine and bricks. The results show that, under the given conditions, the surface vibration amplitudes of big plastic landmine, big metal landmine, small plastic landmine and bricks decrease in turn. The 3D characteristic diagrams of surface vibration can be used to further identify the locations of buried landmines.

Measurement of the peripheral aberrations of human eyes:A comprehensive review

It has been nearly 50 years since the first glimpse of the relationship between myopia and peripheral refractive errors. According to experiments on both animals and humans, the eyes with hyperopic peripheral vision appear to be at higher risk of developing myopia than those with myopic peripheral refractive errors. Despite the first measurement of peripheral refraction being achieved by a modified manual optometer, the concept of emmetropization triggered a rapidly increasing number of studies on peripheral aberrations. Not only the horizontal off-axis aberrations but also the meridional aberrations at different angles are measured by researchers during the development of peripheral aberrations measuring techniques. According to the differences among the working principles, a variety of techniques have been adopted for performing such measurements. The methods developed to realize the high-performance measurement involve the subject cooperating actively by rotating the head or eyes, the rotation of the whole optical path, and the combination of measurements of many light paths. This paper provides a review of the peripheral aberrations measuring techniques and their current status. This article also highlights the development trend of the measuring techniques of peripheral aberrations and practical applications of peripheral aberration measurements, such as the control of the accommodation, the measuring time, and the dynamic range problem of the wavefront sensor. Although wavefront sensing peripheral measurement is widely recognized for its capability to reveal both lower-order aberrations and higher-order aberrations, the efficiency of an autorefractometer is incomparable. The current study reveals that the most widely used peripheral aberration measurement methods are the use of an open field autorefractometer and Hartman-shack wavefront sensor-based techniques.

Characterization of a velocity-tunable ^(87)Rb cold atomic source with a high-speed imaging technology

This paper has developed and characterized a method to produce a velocity-tunable ^87Rb cold atomic source for atomic interferometry application. Using a high speed fluorescence imaging technology, it reports that the dynamic process of the atomic source formation is observed and the source performances including the flux and the initial velocity are characterized. A tunable atomic source with the initial velocity of 1.4-2.6 m/s and the atomic source flux of 2× 10^8 - 6 × 10^9 atoms/s has been obtained with the built experimental setup.

Highly sensitive and stretchable piezoelectric strain sensor enabled wearable devices for real-time monitoring of respiratory and heartbeat simultaneously

The World Health Organization has declared COVID-19 a pandemic.The demand for devices or systems to diagnose and track COVID-19 infections noninvasively not only in hospitals but also in home settings has led to increased interest in consumer-grade wearables.A common symptom of COVID-19 is dyspnea,which may manifest as an increase in respiratory and heart rates.In this paper,a novel piezoelectric strain sensor is presented for real-time monitoring of respiratory and heartbeat signals.A highly sensitive and stretchable piezoelectric strain sensor is fabricated using a piezoelectric film with a serpentine layout.The thickness of the patterned PVDF flexible piezoelectric strain sensor is only 168μm,and the voltage sensitivity reaches 0.97 mV/με.The effective modulus is 13.5 MPa,which allows the device to fit to the skin and detect the small strain exhibited by the human body.Chest vibrations are captured by the piezoelectric sensor,which produces an electrical output voltage signal conformally mapped with respiratory–cardiac activities.The separate heart activity and respiratory signals are extracted from the mixed respiratory–cardiac signal by an empirical mode decomposition data processing algorithm.By detecting vital signals such as respiratory and heart rates,the proposed device can aid early diagnosis and monitoring of respiratory diseases such as COVID-19.

Analysis and Prevention for Oscillation Failure of Capacitive Micro-accelerometers

As actuator of the force-rebalanced servo loop, the electrostatic force generator of the micro-accelerometer shows high nonlinearity while the interpole of the micro-electro-mechanical system（MEMS） sensor is far away from its balance position. The control system cannot rebalance itself with the limited bandwidth after an external long overload, because the characteristics of the force generator differ from normal case. Although for similar problems, solutions with cascading lead-lag blocks, with the anti-windup（AW） technology, or with the sliding-mode control, are widely reported, the problems such as performance loss or difficulty to synthesize a digital controller still remain. Based on existing researches, remedies are developed by analyzing the characteristic of the system not only near the balance position, but also corresponding to the whole moveable range of the interpole, and a new controller is proposed. The solution is compared with the common solutions of cascading lead-lag blocks method, AW methods, and sliding mode methods. Comparison results show that the proposed solution avoid performance loss, compared to cascading lead-lag blocks solution; the proposed solution is easily synthesized and implemented in the analog servo loop of the micro-accelerometer, compared to digital AW methods; at the same time, the proposed solution avoids suffering the chattering effect problem but just utilize it, compared to the sliding-mode control solution. Nevertheless, comparison results show the solution is lack of commonality, since the solution is only more suitable to micro electrostatic force-rebalance system. The SIMULINK models with and without the proposed solution, taking typical micro-accelerometer parameters, have been set up for simulation; corresponding experiments utilizing electrometric method are also conducted after the successful simulations. Simulation and experiment results verify that the micro-accelerometer will reliably return to normal operation after external long overload with the proposed solution. Therefore, it is expected to design the analog servo loop of high performance micro electrostatic force-rebalance system so as to ensure the rebalance after long overload without performance loss.

Non-thermal effects of 0.1 THz radiation on intestinal alkaline phosphatase activity and conformation

Alkaline phosphatase(ALP) plays an integral role in the metabolism of liver and development of the skeleton in humans. To date, the interactions between different-duration terahertz(THz) radiation and ALP activities, as well as the influence mechanism are still unclear. In this study, using the para-nitro-phenyl-phosphate(p NPP) method, we detect changes in ALP activities during 40-minute THz radiation(0.1 THz, 13 m W/cm^2). It is found that the activity of ALP decreases in the first 25 min, and subsequently increases in the later 15 min. Compared with the activity of ALP being heated, the results suggest that short-term terahertz radiation induces a decrease in enzyme activity through the non-thermal mechanism. In order to explore the non-thermal effects of THz radiation on ALP, we focus on the impacts of 0.1 THz radiation for 20 min on the activity of ALP in different concentrations. The results reveal that the activity of ALP decreases significantly after exposure to THz radiation. In addition, it could be deduced from fluorescence, ultraviolet-visible(UV-vis), and THz spectra results that THz radiation has induced changes in ALP structures. Our study unlocks non-thermal interactions between THz radiation and ALP, as well as suggests that THz spectroscopy is a promising technique to distinguish ALP structures.

Application of 2-D Position Sensitive Detector in Spatial Straightness Measurement of Guide Rails

A laser collimating system based on 2-D position sensitive detector (PSD) is presented in this paper. The working principle of PSD is depicted in detail. A calibration device was developed to check the nonlinearity errors of PSD and a multilayer feedforward neural network based on error back-propagation algorithm was used to compensate errors. With the aid of computer-based data acquisition system, an automatic dynamic measuring process was realized. A series of experiments, including comparison tests with laser interferometer, were done to evaluate the performance of the measuring system. The experimental results show that the spatial straightness errors of guide rails can be measured with high accuracy. The maximum differences between the device and laser interferometer are 0.027 mm in Y direction, and 0.053 mm in X direction in the measuring distance of 6 m.

Model analysis and resonance suppression of wide-bandwidth inertial reference system

In the fields of earth observation,deep space detection,laser communication,and directional energyweapon,the target needs to be observed and pointed at accurately.Acquisition,tracking,and pointing(ATP)systems are usually designed to stabilize the line of sight(LOS)within sub-micro radian levels.In the case of an ATP system mounted on a mobile platform,angular disturbances experienced by the mobile platform will seriously affect the LOS.To overcome the problemthat the sampling frequency of detectors is usually limited and achieving several hundreds of hertz is difficult,thewide-bandwidth inertial reference system(WBIRS)and fast steeringmirror are usually integrated into ATP systems to mitigate these angular disturbances.To reduce the structural stress,a flexible support providing two rotational degrees of freedomis usually adopted for the system.However,the occurrence of resonant points within the bandwidthwill be inevitable.Measurements have to be taken to compensate these low-frequency resonant points to realize a wide bandwidth and high precision.In this paper,the lowfrequency resonant points of a systemwere simulated using finite element analysis and tested by a systemidentification method.The results show that the first-order resonance happened at 34.5 Hz with a gain of 28 dB.An improved double-T notch filter was designed and applied in a real-time system to suppress the resonance at 34.5 Hz.The experimental results show that the resonance was significantly suppressed.In particular,the resonance peak was reduced by 79.37%.In addition,the closed-loop system settling time was reduced by 36.2%.

Comparison Between MIR and NIR Spectroscopic Techniques for the Determination of Fat and Protein Contents in Milk

To compare mid-infrared(MIR)and near-infrared(NIR)spectroscopies for the determination of the fat and protein contents in milk,the same sample sets with varying concentrations of fat and protein were measured in the MIR range of 3 200-700 cm-1 and NIR range of 9 000-4 000 cm-1.The spectral features in the two regions were analyzed.The MIR spectra of milk were characteristic due to the MIR inherent molecular specificity,whereas the NIR spectra were relatively characterless due to the NIR low selectivity.Partial least squares(PLS)regression models for fat and protein were developed by using both MIR and NIR spectra.MIR data with no pretreatment gave better results than NIR data.The square correlation coefficient(R2)and the root mean square error of prediction(RMSEP)were 0.98 and 0.10 g/dL for fat and 0.97 and 0.11 g/dL for protein.With NIR techniques,satisfactory results were not obtained with raw data.However,NIR data after pretreatment gave similarly good results to the ones using MIR method.This paper indicates that either of the MIR and NIR spectral methods is reliable for the determination of the fat and protein contents.

Position detection of component aperture based on integral imaging technology

Aiming at the problem that it is difficult to locate all the aperture positions of the large size component using Houghcircle detection method,this article presents a non-contact measurement method combining the integral imaging technology withHough circle detection algorithm.Firstly,a set of integral imaging information acquisition algorithms were proposed accordingto the classical imaging theory.Secondly,the camera array experiment device was built by using two-dimensional translationstage and charge coupled device(CCD)camera.When the system is operating,element image array captured with the camera isused to achieve the positioning of the component aperture using Hough circle detection and coordinate acquisition algorithm.Based on the above theory,a verification experiment was carried out.The results show that the detection error of the componentaperture position is within0.3mm,which provides effective theoretical support for the application of integral imagingtechnology in high precision detection

Vision testing method for diameter,roundness and hardness of table tennis ball

Under the premise of fully respecting current national standard of table tennis ball,this paper presents an integrated and effective method for testing diameter,roundness and hardness of table tennis ball based on vision measurement. Firstly,camera calibration is performed by 40 mm gauge block to capture the images of table tennis ball in static and pressed state in an appropriate lighting condition. Then image binarization and extraction of image contour are carried out. The least square method is used to fit its center. Finally,the diameter,roundness and hardness are calculated. The measurement data are analyzed by using the method presented in this paper for table tennis ball with known parameter data and with unknown parameter data. Experimental results show that this method can improve measurement accuracy and provide a technical basis for the online testing and integration measurement of table tennis ball.