To effectively manage the growing number of distributed energy resources, more extensive monitoring is needed at distribution network levels, where a challenging combination of constraints and cost-effectiveness requirements must be taken into account. In this paper, we consider the idea of combining accurate phasor measurement with the capability to analyze harmonic and interharmonic phasors. This creates the need to deal with multiple phasor components having different amplitudes, including interharmonics with unknown frequency locations. For this purpose, we propose an enhanced compressive sensing-based algorithm for the estimation of Taylor-Fourier coefficients in a multifrequency dynamic phasor model. We characterize its accuracy in harmonic and interharmonic phasor measurement and discuss reporting rate and latency performance. We show that very good accuracy can also be achieved as a standard phasor measurement unit, allowing to combine multiple functions into a promising new-generation measurement, monitoring, and diagnostic device.

Monitoring of health parameters during physical exercise is an important aspect of both sports and rehabilitation medicine. Photoplethysmography (PPG) is routinely employed for low-cost heart rate (HR) measurement; however, monitoring during physical exercise is made difficult by the presence of motion artifacts. In this paper, we present an approach that combines denoising by subspace decomposition and Fourier-based HR measurement, and finally, smoothing and tracking by a Kalman filter. Using publicly available real-life PPG traces, we demonstrate accuracy and performance by an extensive set of experimental results, comparing them with similar algorithms proposed in the literature.

In this paper, the WirelessHART communication scheme is investigated. The protocol is at first described, in order to underline the key aspects of its design; then, a simulation tool is presented: it enables analysis that accounts for both protocol and physical layers issues. In particular, interference effects on protocol choices can be easily analyzed. The experimental results, obtained from simulations, highlight improvements of WirelessHART with respect to IEEE 802.15.4 standard, concerning the Packet Error Ratio (PER) degradation of interfering networks.

The paper proposes the development of an innovative prototype of smart orthosis with a fully integrated multi-electrodes matrix for electromyography (EMG), to improve non-invasive personalized recording during rehabilitation. Both electrodes and conductive tracks were effectively printed onto the three-dimensional (3D) surface of the orthosis through Aerosol Jet Printing. Results from morphological and electrical characterization of printed elements showed an average thickness of 22.2 μm (relative standard deviation of 11%) with average resistivity of about 51∙10-8 Ω∙m (relative standard deviation of 10%) and an electrode-to-skin impedance comparable to the one of commercial dry electrodes. Portability and comfort were enabled by customized light-weight conditioning electronics attached to the orthosis allowing wireless data transmission. Muscular activity from three subjects was then evaluated while performing the same tasks involving multiple muscles. Results confirmed the ability of the device to monitor the activity of gastrocnemius muscle during both a sit-to-stand task and isometric contractions, both for intra- and inter-subjects’ analyses. A comparison with commercial surface EMG electrodes and with literature confirmed similar features both in time and frequency. Overall, the results presented suggest the possibility to exploit the potential to print customized electrodes onto 3D surfaces to fabricate smart personalized wearable orthoses useful to capture valuable feedback to improve effectiveness, consciousness, and interactivity during daily activities and specific exercises, for both patient and medical personnel.

Many activities in today's organizations are becoming ever more dependent on communications and computer networks, and network managers are faced with the enormous challenge of increasing the availability and efficiency of their infrastructures, which grow both in size and complexity. This makes it crucial to plan network operation systematically, to define and implement appropriate procedures for regular monitoring and performance assessment, and to set up proper tools for maintenance and troubleshooting purposes. Furthermore, proactive network testing must be pursued; it is vital to gather some ideas of normal network operation documented in order to have a comparison term when problems occur. The article has dealt with the measurement instruments and procedures currently adopted for network testing and advances in the field for the I&M research community.

In the last years, increasing interest has been addressed on wearable devices for the continuous monitoring of biochemical profiles of patients and athletes. Among various markers, lactate represents one of the most interesting to deepen the knowledge on fatigue processes, in combination with traditional electromyographic features. In this work, we propose a new, low-cost, rapid and flexible electrochemical amperometric lactate carbon biosensor fabricated by the novel technique of Aerosol Jet Printing. The developed biosensors were combined with a paper-based microfluidic system and a chitosan-based stable functionalization to allow a long-term continuous monitoring of human daily activities. The sensor performances were evaluated by static and dynamic electrochemical tests in buffered media. The limit of detection is 11±2 mM for the static setup and of 15±6 mM for the dynamic setup, while sensitivity is 0.02 μA/mM and 0.04 μA/mM, respectively, with single sigma standard deviation lower than 8%. Increasing and decreasing concentration steps of lactate induces comparable response times below 30 s. These results obtained in-vitro under controlled laboratory conditions represent a promising starting point to pursue with ex-vivo and in-vivo validation for the future development of stand-alone wearable patches for non-invasive lactate measurements.