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Remanufacturing, which benefits the environment and saves resources, is attracting increasing attention. Disassembly is arguably the most critical step in the remanufacturing of end-of-life (EoL) products. Human–robot collaborative disassembly as a flexible semi-automated approach can increase productivity and relieve people of tedious, laborious, and sometimes hazardous jobs. Task allocation in human–robot collaborative disassembly involves methodically assigning disassembly tasks to human operators or robots. However, the schemes for task allocation in recent studies have not been sufficiently refined and the issue of component placement after disassembly has not been fully addressed in recent studies. This paper presents a method of task allocation and sequence planning for human–robot collaborative disassembly of EoL products. The adopted criteria for human–robot disassembly task allocation are introduced. The disassembly of each component includes dismantling and placing. The performance of a disassembly plan is evaluated according to the time, cost, and utility value. A discrete Bees Algorithm using genetic operators is employed to optimise the generated human–robot collaborative disassembly solutions. The proposed task allocation and sequence planning method is validated in two case studies involving an electric motor and a power battery from an EoL vehicle. The results demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed method for planning and optimising human–robot collaborative disassembly solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aiming at effectively generating safe and reliable motion paths for quadruped robots, a hierarchical path planning approach driven by dynamic 3D point clouds is proposed in this article. The developed path planning model is essentially constituted of two layers: a global path planning layer, and a local path planning layer. At the global path planning layer, a new method is proposed for calculating the terrain potential field based on point cloud height segmentation. Variable step size is employed to improve the path smoothness. At the local path planning layer, a real-time prediction method for potential collision areas and a strategy for temporary target point selection are developed. Quadruped robot experiments were carried out in an outdoor complex environment. The experimental results verified that, for global path planning, the smoothness of the path is improved and the complexity of the passing ground is reduced. The effective step size is increased by a maximum of 13.4 times, and the number of iterations is decreased by up to 1/6, compared with the traditional fixed step size planning algorithm. For local path planning, the path length is shortened by 20%, and more efficient dynamic obstacle avoidance and more stable velocity planning are achieved by using the improved dynamic window approach (DWA). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Keywords: reflection confocal microscope; scabies EN reflection confocal microscope scabies 1 3 3 02/27/23 20230201 NES 230201 Scabies is an infectious skin disease caused by scabies mites parasitic on the skin. In these microscopic features, it is highly specific to find scabies mites, scabies eggs, or dung ball structures for the diagnosis of scabies, and scabies can be diagnosed when one of the three is found under skin CT. Direct microscopic examination or biopsy to find scabies mites, eggs, or fecal balls is the gold standard for the diagnosis of scabies. [Extracted from the article]

Dear Editor, Skin, the largest organ of the human body, is organized into an elaborate layered structure consisting mainly of the outermost epidermis and the underlying dermis. Stratum lucidum: It is located between stratum granulosum and stratum corneum, and is only found in the thicker epidermis such as palm and plantar. The five fingers of the hand from the small finger to the thumb represent stratum basale, stratum spinosum, stratum granulosum, stratum lucidum, and stratum corneum. [Extracted from the article]

This paper presents a novel diaphragm-type fiber Bragg grating (FBG) force transducer with a high sensitivity through combining the axial property of the optical fiber and the transverse property of a circular diaphragm. The theoretical model of the presented sensor was derived, and its sensing characteristics were analyzed by numerical simulation and finite element analysis. A specimen of this type of sensor was manufactured with a 0.6mm-thickness diaphragm and a 0.1-ratio of the radius of the hard core and the outer radius of the diaphragm. Experiments were conducted to show that its experimental force sensitivity 441.84 pm/N was consistent with the theoretical value 422.4 pm/N within a working range of 0~4.9 N, which verified the effectiveness of the proposed theoretical model. Moreover, experimentally the designed transducer provided a broad flat frequency range from 0 to 200 Hz and a dynamic resolution of 0.15 mN $\cdot $ (Hz−0.5). The temperature cross-sensitivity of this sensor was suppressed effectively in the range of 16.7 °C~53.6 °C after implementing the temperature compensation. Compared with the existing FBG force sensors, the proposed sensor provided higher and more easily adjustable sensitivity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]