Hayriye Korkmaz

A remotely accessible and configurable electronics laboratory implementation by using LabVIEW

In this article, selected applications from the experiments included in undergraduate Electronics and Computer Education curriculum are transformed into remotely accessible and configurable manner. The experiment user interfaces and publishing over the internet is developed in LabVIEW. These experiments are suitable for online conduction where students are either in‐class or laboratory on‐campus and/or at home. In this work, four different remotely configurable experiment modules are designed and implemented. Remotely configurable facility in a predefined range is performed by using switches activated by DO terminals of a data acquisition card through a web‐based application. In this way, students can select the desired experiment from the ones stored on the PCB, adjust the voltage applied to the input terminal of the circuit and change the circuit elements values by using telepresence methodology.

A study to classify Non-Dipper/Dipper blood pressure pattern of type 2 diabetes mellitus patients without Holter device

The aim of this study was to design an expert system to predict the Non-Dipping or Dipping pattern by using several basic clinical and laboratory data through an artificial intelligence algorithm. Data Mining is a technique which extracts information from data sets by using a combination of both statistical analysis methods and artificial intelligence algorithms. Also in this study, the decision tree and naivebayes classification algorithms of this technique were used. Firstly, sixty-five patients (mean age 51±7 years, 40 females,) were included in the study. Systolic and diastolic dipping were found in 13 and 15 % of the patients, respectively. In the advancing process of the experiment, the number of instances were reduced, because of some missing data of the patients. The data sets were tested using the J48 decision tree algorithm. This classification algorithm was implemented on 56 instances, and also the number of attributes was reduced from 35 to 23. 66 % of the instances (37) were reserved for training and 44 % of the instances (19) were reserved for testing. When the algorithm was run, the Non-Dipper/Dipper pattern of the instances were correctly predicted in a rate of 73.6842 %. Model was built in 0.02 seconds. This pilot study shows that a machine learning algorithm can help in the prediction of diurnal blood pressure pattern relying on some basic demographic, clinical and laboratory data, with a reasonable accuracy.

Real-time thermal expansion measurement system and the data acquisition and control application software - user interface

In order to operate the designed thermal expansion measurement system, a user interface is constructed by using Borland Delphi. This paper presents how the user interface constructed and why it is necessary.

A thermal expansion measurement system using a high temperature unguided half bridge displacement transducer

In this paper, a temperature and vacuum rate controllable furnace which is suitable for thermal expansion measurement of metal samples having predefined standard dimensions is designed and realized according to H. Korkmaz (2002).

Poster: A Mobile Application for Voice and Remote Control of Programmable Instruments

The purpose of this work is to add a new feature to bench-type conventional instruments used in Electrical and Electronics Engineering Laboratory which do not have any voice recognition and wireless communication technology. By this way, the user can control these instruments/devices remotely with voice commands and also monitor the results/values in graphical or numerical/text format as well over a mobile device screen. The only limitation is that such instruments should have a driver supported by any software such as NI LabVIEW and a PC connectivity interface such as USB, GPIB or LXI (LAN extensions for Instrumentation). Controlling the instruments (such as oscilloscope or signal generators which are frequently used for training purposes and whose functions are manually set) over a mobile device with voice commands will make life easier for disabled students who especially have difficulties in using their hands.

Personal computer-based visible spectrophotometer design:

Background It is possible to see a number of spectrophotometers produced by commercial purposes developed in line with the technical advices identified by the International Commission on Illumination (CIE) in universities’ chemistry labs. These devices are employed in measuring and testing materials with unidentified characteristics as well as reporting the results. However, these systems are not modular in design and do not allow updates or modifications. Moreover, when the literature is reviewed, it can be seen that the researches on computer-controlled devices is limited. It is also reported that the devices with user interfaces bring advantages to researchers in terms of time efficiency and safety. Methods In this study, a computer-controlled, modular and low-cost spectrophotometer is designed to measure material densities contained within liquid samples. The proposed system is composed of a main unit, a data acquisition unit and a user interface. All tasks and relevant arrangements involved in a spectrophotometer application are controlled through an interface developed on LabVIEW graphical development platform; the results of the measurements can be monitored in real time, and it is also possible to store data. Thanks to the modular design, it became possible to change and update the relevant stage as needed. The waveform filter can be selected specifically as visible range, ultraviolet range or both depending on the application. Results The experiment was conducted in the visible range and a waveform filter between 400 and 700 nm was used. In the experiments, an easily accessible materials–methylene blue and copper sulfate solutions–were preferred as samples. For these solutions, the waveforms that give the best absorption values were identified and the density was measured at those values. Furthermore, the nonlinearity and repeatability characteristics of the proposed spectrophotometer were analyzed. For this purpose, measured values were compared with the acquired values from another commercial instrument that is already used in medical field. Measurements were repeated 50 times for copper sulfate and 43 times for methylene blue solutions. Conclusions After statistical analysis, it was observed that the reliability of the proposed system is high.

Experimental investigations of viscous heating effect of thermocouples under focused ultrasound applications

Realization of temperature characterization on focused ultrasound treatment devices by using tissue-mimicking phantom systems (Tissue-Mimicking Material, TMM) is indispensible in pre-clinical studies. In this survey, in order to examine the viscous heating effect of thermocouples, temperature rise due to excitation of a HIFU transducer has been measured by using two different types of T-type thermocouples embedded inside the TMM. In order to obtain the temperature values from the thermocouples more effectively, a PC-based multi-channel data acquisition and monitoring interface were developed by using LabVIEW graphical development platform. Measurements were carried out inside a TMM which has characteristics like human liver tissue. Temperature rise has been characterized for the different input ultrasonic powers (25 W, 38 W and 50 W) and frequencies (1,1 MHz and 3.3 MHz) and the time intervals applied (1 s, 2 s and 3 s). The temperature values obtained from two different types of T-type thermocouple were compared to each other and discrepancies between these two different thermocouple measurements were shown with the study.

An interactive web-based circuit design and analysis interface for disabled students by using speech recognition technology

This paper presents a web-based interface for disabled students. When the curriculum of engineering faculties are examined, it can be seen that practice takes important place and learning outcomes of the courses is mostly depend on hand ability. In particular, the implementing and testing the electronic circuits in both real and simulated environments requires using hands. The developed hands-free interface enables the students to design DC circuits including adjustable batteries and resistors. Students can design the circuits, run the simulation and observe the results by speaking. Thus, the huge gap between the disabled students and circuit design can be closed. The circuit diagrams are designed in accordance with the mesh current method and user can design multi-loop circuits. The interface uses Web Speech API (WSA) speech recognition technology to transform the speech into text. Chrome is the only browser that can support WSA. Adobe Flash was used to visualize the circuit and Symbolic Circuit Analysis in MatLab (SCAM) program was used for circuit analysis and calculations.

RFID and XBee based automated verification of put-away operation for Warehouse Management Systems

This study proposes a system using RFID and XBee technology to address and eliminate the problems resulting from human errors in put-away operations. The human errors in such operations are a serious problem that leads to a number of difficulties in production lines and supply-chain. The use of automated verification system in put-away operations in warehouses is rather rare. Therefore, the study draws from Information Technologies. Three modules - warehouse, racks, and forklifts - have been designed to ensure automated verification of error-free placement of goods. Also, a user interface is developed in Visual Studio C#.Net and SQL server is used for database management system. The developed system also provides monitoring of all steps of operation and enables real-time checking and supervision. Thus, it offers a reliable and transparent operation system, significantly contributes to effective management of supply chain and helps to improve high quality of fast and correct product delivery by minimizing the human errors. Thus, the study highlights the importance of automated verification system for an effective management of supply chain practices by establishing coordination among rack, forklift, warehouse modules, operator and product.

Developing a graduate level embedded system programming course content by using blended programming methodologies: Text-based and graphical

This article deals with identifying the materials and the methods that will be used in this course based on “Embedded System Programming (ESP)” course for Electrical-Electronics Engineering Graduate program of MU Faculty of Technology. When the varying levels of skill and knowledge of the students is considered, it becomes necessary to adopt a blended programming method for the contents of the course. Even though the course is regarded as 3+0 ECTS of 8 credits (Theory: 3, Applied: 0), a content supported with extensive application is recommended. The content of the course allows developing applications using Xilinx Spartan 3E Starter Kit. Students taking this course are able to choose a method best fitted to their programming skills or preferences. However, it might be possible that the lecturer may not have a wide range of programming knowledge and skills. In this case, the graduate students are expected to determine and complete their own needs or shortcomings with the accumulation of knowledge they gained in their undergraduate studies. With the lecturers guidance, the students are free to choose whether to use graphical programming (LabVIEW, LabVIEW FPGA Module) or conventional text-based programming (Verilog, VHDL, Matlab HDL Coder) in their projects. In this way, we expect an improvement in understanding of the contents and an expansion in scope.