The best indication of the significance of the Kuiper belt lies in its multiple connections to other aspects of the Solar system. The dust in the Zodiacal cloud, the rocks in the meteor streams, the nuclei of comets, the Centaurs, perhaps also the irregular moons of the planets and the Trojans that lead and trail planets in their orbits, are all related to the parent population in the Kuiper be...

Recent developments in Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) have opened up new possibilities in the domain of inverse problems. For inverse problems like structural identification of large structures (such as bridges) where in situ measured data are expected to be imprecise and often incomplete, ANNs may hold greater promise. This study presents a method for estimating the damage intensities of jo...

A geometry-based rigorous approach to the detection of global and internal mobility of skeletal structures (trusses and frames) is presented. The method is useful for automated design of skeletal structures at the conceptual stage where the overall topology of the structure is known, but no exact detail on geometry and size is available. Such topologies are, for example, those generated by inte...

Microphones integrated on a seat belt are an interesting alternative to conventional sensor positions used for handsfree telephony or speech dialog systems in automobile environments. In the setup presented in this contribution, the seat belt consists of three microphones which usually lay around the shoulder and chest of a sitting passenger. The main benefit of belt microphones is the small di...

The asteroid belt contains less than a thousandth of Earth's mass and is radially segregated, with S-types dominating the inner belt and C-types the outer belt. It is generally assumed that the belt formed with far more mass and was later strongly depleted. We show that the present-day asteroid belt is consistent with having formed empty, without any planetesimals between Mars and Jupiter's pre...

fundamental engineering concepts through a course in statics. Statics problems usually require the student to draw planar truss and other free-body diagrams (FBDs). In civil and mechanical engineering, visual and spatial thoughts are essential for the correct absorption of fundamental concepts. By relying on visual aids as opposed to only using the verbal channel of acquiring knowledge, the cog...

Reliability is often understood as the probability that a structure will not fail to perform its intended function. In this paper, the general formulation of consistent evaluation of the safety of structures and the associated methods of analysis are reviewed. After the reliability analysis of a cantilever beam is demonstrated, the methodology of reliability-based optimization and the related p...

This paper presents the optimization of the location and feedback gains of active bar in a closed loop control system for stochastic piezoelectric smart truss structures under stationary random excitation. The mathematical model with reliability constraints on the mean square value of the structural random dynamic displacement and stress response is developed based on maximization of dissipatio...

This paper develops the concept of a contour of complete nonuniqueness and shows its application to the optimal design (optimal layout) of simple trusses transmitting a concentrated force to a presscribed, arbitrary foundation contour. As an example, a symmetric two-bar truss with compressed bars is considered, and the constraints refer to various kinds of elastic instability of the system.