Signal Processing, Sensor Fusion, and Data Fusion in Measurement Systems

A special issue of Electronics (ISSN 2079-9292). This special issue belongs to the section "Circuit and Signal Processing".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 June 2024 | Viewed by 7158

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Measurement and Electronics, AGH University of Science and Technology, 30-059 Kraków, Poland
Interests: measurements of physical quantities; phase angle measurements; WIM systems and measurement of road traffic parameters; modeling and simulations of measurement systems; signal processing and data fusion in measurement systems
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In any technical system, the cooperation of sensors and measuring systems is essential element enabling the collection of information about the current state of the tested object. The credibility and accuracy of these data are crucial for its further processing and use. Increasingly, in the case of important phenomena and objects, we simultaneously use many different sensors and other types of knowledge resources. Therefore, it has become extremely important to use all available data wisely. Since the early 2000s, methods of data fusion at various levels of the data acquisition and processing process have been intensively developed worldwide.

In the case of measurement systems, the basic aim of data fusion is to reduce the uncertainty of the measurement results or to increase the effectiveness of the classification, detection, or location of the object. This idea involved the joint use of signals and measurement data from many sensors and information derived from other sources (e.g., apriori knowledge). The method used to combine this information depends on the specifics of the object being measured and on the used measurement tools. This method can take diverse forms, starting with the simple averaging of results and continuing on to the use of models based on, for e.g., Bayes theory or Kalman’s filtration theory.

In measurement systems, the fusion process can be located at different levels, from the hardware to advanced methods of signal processing. The methods used for the fusion of data can be divided into three groups:

  • Competitive fusion, where different types of sensors are used to measure the same physical quantity. This may lead to information redundancy.
  • Complementary fusion, where each sensor is used to measure a different property of the studied object.
  • Cooperative fusion, where the correct operation of a single sensor is dependent on the results of some other sensor. Without cooperation, the operation of the first sensor would be impossible or undesirable.

Therefore, it is extremely important from the point of view of measurement systems to review possible data fusion methods, hardware solutions enabling the desired fusion, as well as examples of specific applications of such solutions.

This Special Issue invites papers presenting innovative works on all aspects related to fusion in measurement systems, especially in the following areas:

  • Sensor level fusion
  • Data fusion methods
  • Application of fusion in measurement systems
  • Data fusion in WIM systems
  • Multi-sensor data fusion
  • Signal processing in measurement system

Prof. Dr. Ryszard Sroka
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • data fusion
  • information fusion
  • data fusion in WIM
  • sensor fusion
  • signal processing
  • measurement systems
  • fusion methods
  • data fusion applications
  • multi-sensor fusion
  • sensor networks
  • vehicle sensor fusion
  • robot sensor fusion
  • sensor fusion algorithms
  • smart sensors
  • applications of sensor fusion
  • multimodal sensor fusion

Published Papers (8 papers)

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Research

16 pages, 7973 KiB  
Article
Kalman Filter with Adaptive Covariance Estimation for Carrier Tracking under Weak Signals and Dynamic Conditions
by Yan Cheng, Shengkang Zhang, Xueyun Wang, Haifeng Wang and Huijun Yang
Electronics 2024, 13(7), 1288; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13071288 - 30 Mar 2024
Viewed by 438
Abstract
Kalman filtering (KF)-based tracking has been commonly employed in global navigation satellite system (GNSS) receivers to achieve robust tracking. However, under more serious conditions, such as severe strength attenuation and abrupt dynamic coexisting environments, it is difficult for KF-based tracking to keep tracking [...] Read more.
Kalman filtering (KF)-based tracking has been commonly employed in global navigation satellite system (GNSS) receivers to achieve robust tracking. However, under more serious conditions, such as severe strength attenuation and abrupt dynamic coexisting environments, it is difficult for KF-based tracking to keep tracking well due to the fixed noise statistics. To further enhance the carrier tracking performance, this paper proposes an adaptive KF carrier tracking method for resisting signal strength fading and high dynamic environments. The proposed method introduces the adaptive factor to adjust the process noise covariance to accommodate the noise statistics in actual variable situations. Moreover, we apply the chi-square hypothesis test to detect system stability. The adaptive factor is only applied when the system is not stable, which can enhance computational efficiency. The proposed method is conducted in the GPS L1 software receivers. According to the results, the proposed algorithm can improve the robustness in tracking performance compared with other tracking methods under signal serious fading and high dynamic conditions. Using the proposed method, GNSS receivers’ navigation performance can be improved under complex conditions. Full article
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17 pages, 5814 KiB  
Article
Robust State Estimation Using the Maximum Correntropy Cubature Kalman Filter with Adaptive Cauchy-Kernel Size
by Xiangzhou Ye, Siyu Lu, Jian Wang, Dongjie Wu and Yong Zhang
Electronics 2024, 13(1), 114; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics13010114 - 27 Dec 2023
Viewed by 501
Abstract
The maximum correntropy criterion (MCC), as an effective method for dealing with anomalous measurement noise, is widely applied in the design of filters. However, its performance largely depends on the proper setting of the kernel bandwidth, and currently, there is no efficient adaptive [...] Read more.
The maximum correntropy criterion (MCC), as an effective method for dealing with anomalous measurement noise, is widely applied in the design of filters. However, its performance largely depends on the proper setting of the kernel bandwidth, and currently, there is no efficient adaptive kernel adjustment mechanism. To deal with this issue, a new adaptive Cauchy-kernel maximum correntropy cubature Kalman filter (ACKMC-CKF) is proposed. This algorithm constructs adaptive factors for each dimension of the measurement system and establishes an entropy matrix with adaptive kernel sizes, enabling targeted handling of specific anomalies. Through simulation experiments in target tracking, the performance of the proposed algorithm was comprehensively validated. The results show that the ACKMC-CKF, through its flexible kernel adaptive mechanism, can effectively handle various types of anomalies. Not only does the algorithm demonstrate excellent reliability, but it also has low sensitivity to parameter settings, making it more broadly applicable in a variety of practical application scenarios. Full article
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20 pages, 504 KiB  
Article
One-Dimensional Quaternion Discrete Fourier Transform and an Approach to Its Fast Computation
by Dorota Majorkowska-Mech and Aleksandr Cariow
Electronics 2023, 12(24), 4974; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12244974 - 12 Dec 2023
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 812
Abstract
This paper proposes a new method for calculating the quaternion discrete Fourier transform for one-dimensional data. Although the computational complexity of the proposed method still belongs to the O(Nlog2N) class, it allows us to reduce the total [...] Read more.
This paper proposes a new method for calculating the quaternion discrete Fourier transform for one-dimensional data. Although the computational complexity of the proposed method still belongs to the O(Nlog2N) class, it allows us to reduce the total number of arithmetic operations required to perform it compared to other known methods for computing this transform. Moreover, compared to the method using symplectic decomposition, the presented method does not require changing the basis in the subspace of pure quaternions and, consequently, calculating the new basis vectors and change-of-basis matrix. Full article
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31 pages, 34550 KiB  
Article
Relative Jitter Measurement Methodology and Comparison of Clocking Resources Jitter in Artix 7 FPGA
by Andrzej A. Wojciechowski, Krzysztof Marcinek and Witold A. Pleskacz
Electronics 2023, 12(20), 4297; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12204297 - 17 Oct 2023
Viewed by 815
Abstract
Phase jitter is one of the crucial factors in modern digital electronics, determining the reliability of a design. This paper presents a novel approach to designing a jitter comparison system and methodology for FPGA chips using a Tapped Delay Line (TDL)—commonly used to [...] Read more.
Phase jitter is one of the crucial factors in modern digital electronics, determining the reliability of a design. This paper presents a novel approach to designing a jitter comparison system and methodology for FPGA chips using a Tapped Delay Line (TDL)—commonly used to implement a Time-to-Digital Converter (TDC). The design and its revision utilizing latches replacing some of the flip-flops are presented and discussed, with potential further improvements. A minimal temperature influence is verified and presented. The methodology of automated relative jitter measurements is discussed. Multiple different FPGA clock signal path configurations are measured, and the results are presented. The influence of clock routing is identified as critical when MMCM or PLL modules are omitted. It is demonstrated that with careful resource and routing allocation, the clock signal’s jitter performance does not have to be deteriorated by the absence of jitter filtering blocks. The proposed technique was implemented and verified and relative jitter performance was measured in the AMD/Xilinx Artix 7 35T FPGA platform. Full article
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15 pages, 9028 KiB  
Article
Self-Tuning Process Noise in Variational Bayesian Adaptive Kalman Filter for Target Tracking
by Yan Cheng, Shengkang Zhang, Xueyun Wang and Haifeng Wang
Electronics 2023, 12(18), 3887; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12183887 - 14 Sep 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 673
Abstract
Many practical systems, such as target tracking, navigation systems, autonomous vehicles, and other applications, are usually applied in dynamic conditions. Thus, the actual noise statistics characteristics of these systems are generally time varying and unknown, which will deteriorate the state estimation accuracy of [...] Read more.
Many practical systems, such as target tracking, navigation systems, autonomous vehicles, and other applications, are usually applied in dynamic conditions. Thus, the actual noise statistics characteristics of these systems are generally time varying and unknown, which will deteriorate the state estimation accuracy of the Kalman filter (KF) and even cause filter diverging. To address this issue, this paper proposes an adaptive process noise covariance (Qk)-based variational Bayesian adaptive Kalman filter (AQ-VBAKF) algorithm. Firstly, the adaptive factor is introduced to self-tune the process noise covariance; the adaptive factor is obtained based on the innovation sequences, which can adapt to the input measurement values. Then, the VB solution is applied to approximate the time variant and unknown measurement noise covariance. Therefore, this proposed algorithm can adjust the process noise covariance and the measurement noise covariance simultaneously based on the variable input signals, which can improve the self-adaptive ability of the state estimation filter in dynamic conditions. According to the dynamic target tracking test results, the proposed AQ-VBAKF outperforms several other existing filtering methods in estimation accuracy, robustness, and computational efficiency. Full article
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19 pages, 4391 KiB  
Article
Spatial Modeling of Air Pollution Using Data Fusion
by Adrian Dudek and Jerzy Baranowski
Electronics 2023, 12(15), 3353; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12153353 - 05 Aug 2023
Viewed by 1199
Abstract
Air pollution is a widespread issue. One approach to predicting air pollution levels in specific locations is through the development of mathematical models. Spatial models are one such category, and they can be optimized using calculation methods like the INLA (integrated nested Laplace [...] Read more.
Air pollution is a widespread issue. One approach to predicting air pollution levels in specific locations is through the development of mathematical models. Spatial models are one such category, and they can be optimized using calculation methods like the INLA (integrated nested Laplace approximation) package. It streamlines the complex computational process by combining the Laplace approximation and numerical integration to approximate the model and provides a computationally efficient alternative to traditional MCMC (Markov chain Monte Carlo) methods for Bayesian inference in complex hierarchical models. Another crucial aspect is obtaining data for this type of problem. Relying only on official or professional monitoring stations can pose challenges, so it is advisable to employ data fusion techniques and integrate data from various sensors, including amateur ones. Moreover, when modeling spatial air pollution, careful consideration should be given to factors such as the range of impact and potential obstacles that may affect a pollutant’s dispersion. This study showcases the utilization of INLA spatial modeling and data fusion to address multiple problems, such as pollution in industrial facilities and urban areas. The results show promise for resolving such problems with the proposed algorithms. Full article
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18 pages, 5022 KiB  
Article
Wavelet Threshold Ultrasound Echo Signal Denoising Algorithm Based on CEEMDAN
by Zhiwei Li, Huyue Xu, Bibo Jiang and Fangfang Han
Electronics 2023, 12(14), 3026; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12143026 - 10 Jul 2023
Viewed by 1125
Abstract
In this study, an algorithm for denoising ultrasound echo signals in industrial settings is proposed to address the problem of high noise and low signal-to-noise ratio. The algorithm combines complete ensemble empirical mode decomposition with adaptive noise (CEEMDAN), mutual information entropy (MIE [...] Read more.
In this study, an algorithm for denoising ultrasound echo signals in industrial settings is proposed to address the problem of high noise and low signal-to-noise ratio. The algorithm combines complete ensemble empirical mode decomposition with adaptive noise (CEEMDAN), mutual information entropy (MIE), and wavelet threshold denoising to ensure effectiveness given the unique structure of ultrasound echo signals. Initially, CEEMDAN is used to decompose the signal into intrinsic mode function (IMFs) and residual signals. The MIE is then used to determine the correlation of neighboring IMF signals, which are then divided into a noise- and a signal-dominated part. Finally, using wavelet thresholding, noise is suppressed in the signal-dominant part, and the resulting denoised signal is reconstructed using the residual signal. The performance of the algorithm is verified through simulations and physical experiments, and the results show that it is superior to traditional signal denoising methods. Full article
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14 pages, 5008 KiB  
Article
Accuracy Maps of Weigh-In-Motion Systems for Direct Enforcement
by Janusz Gajda, Piotr Burnos, Ryszard Sroka and Mateusz Daniol
Electronics 2023, 12(7), 1621; https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics12071621 - 30 Mar 2023
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1038
Abstract
The need to protect road infrastructure and the environment, as well as to increase the safety of road users and to ensure fair conditions of competition in road transport, requires an increase in the efficiency of the elimination of overloaded vehicles from road [...] Read more.
The need to protect road infrastructure and the environment, as well as to increase the safety of road users and to ensure fair conditions of competition in road transport, requires an increase in the efficiency of the elimination of overloaded vehicles from road traffic. The replacement of “manual” vehicle control (carried out by inspectors of the relevant services) by automatic control can ensure that these are highly effective. Such control can be implemented directly on the basis of weighing results obtained from weigh-in-motion (WIM) systems. The high sensitivity of WIM systems to various interfering factors is an obstacle to the full implementation of this goal. This paper presents a concept for accuracy maps determined for direct enforcement WIM systems. The use of such maps allows for the minimization of the probability of an error consisting in classifying a normative vehicle as an overloaded one. Full article
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