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We introduce StaccaToe, a human-scale, electric motor-powered single-leg robot designed to rival the agility of human locomotion through two distinctive attributes: an actuated toe and a co-actuation configuration inspired by the human leg. Leveraging the foundational design of HyperLeg's lower leg mechanism, we develop a stand-alone robot by incorporating new link designs, custom-designed power electronics, and a refined control system. Unlike previous jumping robots that rely on either special mechanisms (e.g., springs and clutches) or hydraulic/pneumatic actuators, StaccaToe employs electric motors without energy storage mechanisms. This choice underscores our ultimate goal of developing a practical, high-performance humanoid robot capable of human-like, stable walking as well as explosive dynamic movements. In this paper, we aim to empirically evaluate the balance capability and the exertion of explosive ground reaction forces of our toe and co-actuation mechanisms. Throughout extensive hardware and controller development, StaccaToe showcases its control fidelity by demonstrating a balanced tip-toe stance and dynamic jump. This study is significant for three key reasons: 1) StaccaToe represents the first human-scale, electric motor-driven single-leg robot to execute dynamic maneuvers without relying on specialized mechanisms; 2) our research provides empirical evidence of the benefits of replicating critical human leg attributes in robotic design; and 3) we explain the design process for creating agile legged robots, the details that have been scantily covered in academic literature., Comment: Submitted to 2024 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2024)

A robot guide dog has compelling advantages over animal guide dogs for its cost-effectiveness, potential for mass production, and low maintenance burden. However, despite the long history of guide dog robot research, previous studies were conducted with little or no consideration of how the guide dog handler and the guide dog work as a team for navigation. To develop a robotic guiding system that is genuinely beneficial to blind or visually impaired individuals, we performed qualitative research, including interviews with guide dog handlers and trainers and first-hand blindfold walking experiences with various guide dogs. Grounded on the facts learned from vivid experience and interviews, we build a collaborative indoor navigation scheme for a guide dog robot that includes preferred features such as speed and directional control. For collaborative navigation, we propose a semantic-aware local path planner that enables safe and efficient guiding work by utilizing semantic information about the environment and considering the handler's position and directional cues to determine the collision-free path. We evaluate our integrated robotic system by testing guide blindfold walking in indoor settings and demonstrate guide dog-like navigation behavior by avoiding obstacles at typical gait speed ($0.7 \mathrm{m/s}$)., Comment: First two authors contributed equally

Modern theories of physics tell that the vacuum is not an empty space. Hidden in the vacuum is a structure of anti-quarks $\bar{q}$ and quarks $q$. The $\bar{q}$ and $q$ pair has the same quantum number as the vacuum and condensates in it since the strong interaction of the quantum chromodynamics (QCD) is too strong to leave it empty. The $\bar{q}q$ condensation breaks the chiral symmetry of the vacuum. The expectation value $<\bar{q}q>$ is an order parameter. For higher temperature or higher matter-density, $|<\bar{q}q>|$ decreases reflecting the restoration of the symmetry. In contrast to these clear-cut arguments, experimental evidence is so far limited. First of all, the $\bar{q}q$ is nothing but the vacuum itself. It is neither visible nor perceptible. In this article, we unravel this invisible existence by high precision measurement of pionic atoms, $\pi^-$-meson-nucleus bound systems. Using the $\pi^-$ as a probe, we demonstrate that $|<\bar{q}q>|$ is reduced in the nucleus at 58% of the normal nuclear density by a factor of 77 $\pm$ 2% compared with that in the vacuum. This reduction indicates that the chiral symmetry is partially restored due to the extremely high density of the nucleus. The present experimental result clearly exhibits the existence of the hidden structure, the chiral condensate, in the vacuum.

The European Union and Eurozone present an inquisitive case of strongly interconnected network with high degree of dependence among nodes. This research focused on investment network of European Union and its major trading partners for specific time period 2001 to 2014. The changing investment patterns within Eurozone suggest strong financial and trade links with central and large economies. This study is about the association between portfolio investment and economic indicators with respect to financial networks. The analysis used the strongly connected investment network of Eurozone and its large trading partners. A strong correlation between, increasing or decreasing investment patterns with economic indicators of particular economy was found. Interestingly correlation patterns for network members other than Eurozone states were not as strong and depicted mild behavior. This as well, explains the significance of interconnectedness level among nodes of one network with varying centrality measures. Investment network visualization techniques helped to validate the results based on network`s statistical measures.

A position sensitive Cherenkov detector was built, consisting of 64 SiPMs with an active area of 3x3 mm^2 and a pixel size of 100x100 \mu m^2. The sensitive area is increased by a light concentrator which consists of 64 pyramid-shaped funnels. These funnels have an entrance area of 7x7 mm^2 and an exit area of 3x3 mm^2, guaranteeing a sufficient position resolution e.g. for the barrel DIRC detector of the PANDA experiment at FAIR. The efficiency and uniformity of the light concentrator in combination with the SiPM array was tested by scanning the array in two dimensions, using a pulsed light beam. Results of these tests and comparison with simulations are given here., Comment: 4 pages, 8 figures, VCI 2013 conference proceedings

We present results of simulations on the influence of photon propagation and the Cherenkov effect on the time resolution of LSO:Ce scintillators. The influence of the scintillator length on the coincidence time resolution is shown. Furthermore, the impact of the depth of interaction on the time resolution, the light output and the arrival time distribution at the photon detector is simulated and it is shown how these information can be used for time walk correction.

We are going to perform an inclusive spectroscopy experiment of eta' mesic nuclei with the 12C(p,d) reaction to study in-medium properties of the eta' meson. In nuclear medium, the eta' meson mass may be reduced due to partial restoration of chiral symmetry. In case of sufficiently large mass reduction and small absorption width of eta' at normal nuclear density, peak structures of eta' mesic states in 11C will be observed near the eta' emission threshold even in an inclusive spectrum. The experiment will be carried out at GSI with proton beam supplied by SIS using FRS as a spectrometer. The detail of the experiment is described., Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, to appear in the proceedings of FB20 (20th International IUPAP Conference on Few-Body Problems in Physics), 20-25 August 2012, Fukuoka, Japan

The eta' meson mass may be reduced due to partial restoration of chiral symmetry. If this is the case, an eta'-nucleus system may form a nuclear bound state. We plan to carry out a missing-mass spectroscopy with the 12C(p,d) reaction at GSI-SIS. Peak structures corresponding to such a bound state may be observed even in an inclusive measurement, if the decay width is narrow enough., Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, to appear in the proceedings of MESON2012 (12th International Workshop on Meson Production, Properties and Interaction), Krakow, Poland

A new spectrometer system was designed and constructed at the secondary beam line K1.8BR in the hadron hall of J-PARC to investigate $\bar K N$ interactions and $\bar K$-nuclear bound systems. The spectrometer consists of a high precision beam line spectrometer, a liquid $^3$He/$^4$He/D$_2$ target system, a Cylindrical Detector System that surrounds the target to detect the decay particles from the target region, and a neutron time-of-flight counter array located $\sim$15 m downstream from the target position. Details of the design, construction, and performance of the detector components are described., Comment: 33 pages, 25 figures

A novel method is proposed to measure eta'(958) meson bound states in 11C nuclei by missing mass spectroscopy of the 12C(p,d) reaction near the eta' production threshold. It is shown that peak structures will be observed experimentally in an inclusive measurement in case that the in-medium eta' mass reduction is sufficiently large and that the decay width of eta' mesic states is narrow enough. Such a measurement will be feasible with the intense proton beam supplied by the SIS synchrotron at GSI combined with the good energy resolution of the fragment separator FRS., Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in Progress of Theoretical Physics

Silicon-based photosensors (SiPMs) working in the Geiger-mode represent an elegant solution for the readout of particle detectors working at low-light levels like Cherenkov detectors. Especially the insensitivity to magnetic fields makes this kind of sensors suitable for modern detector systems in subatomic physics which are usually employing magnets for momentum resolution. In our institute we are characterizing SiPMs of different manufacturers for selecting sensors and finding optimum operating conditions for given applications. Recently we designed and built a light concentrator prototype with 8x8 cells to increase the active photon detection area of an 8x8 SiPM (Hamamatsu MPPC S10931-100P) array. Monte Carlo studies, measurements of the collection efficiency, and tests with the MPPC were carried out. The status of these developments are presented.

Many characteristics of Silicon Photomultipliers can be tuned with temperature and operation voltage. We present preliminary results of a study of the effect of these two operation parameters on the time resolution of large active area Multi-Pixel Photon Counters (MPPCs) manufactured by Hamamatsu. Measurements at -10 C, 0 C, and 10 C at different bias voltages were performed. The time resolution is best at low temperature and high over-voltage. Most significant improvements can be achieved in cases with low number of fired pixels (<10 pixels). Between the worst and best case among the considered conditions a factor of 5 improvement was observed. In cases with large number of fired pixels (>40 pixels) the effect of temperature and operation voltage becomes smaller. The timing performance still improves with decreasing temperature (~ factor of 2) but it hardly depends on the operation voltage. The study shows, that especially in applications where only few photons are available for detection a careful optimization of temperature and operation voltage are advisable to obtain optimum timing results with the MPPC., Comment: Proceedings paper for SORMA 2010 conference

The use of GEM foils for the amplification stage of a TPC instead of a con- ventional MWPC allows one to bypass the necessity of gating, as the backdrift is suppressed thanks to the asymmetric field configuration. This way, a novel continuously running TPC, which represents one option for the PANDA central tracker, can be realized. A medium sized prototype with a diameter of 300 mm and a length of 600 mm will be tested inside the FOPI spectrometer at GSI using a carbon or lithium beam at intermediate energies (E = 1-3AGeV). This detector test under realistic experimental conditions should allow us to verify the spatial resolution for single tracks and the reconstruction capability for displaced vertexes. A series of physics measurement implying pion beams is scheduled with the FOPI spectrometer together with the GEM-TPC as well., Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, Proceedings for 11th ICATTP conference in como (italy)