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Loss of the ability to speak or hear exerts psychological and social impacts on the affected persons due to the lack of proper communication. Multiple and systematic scholarly interventions that vary according to context have been implemented to overcome disability-related difficulties. Sign language recognition (SLR) systems based on sensory gloves are significant innovations that aim to procure data on the shape or movement of the human hand. Innovative technology for this matter is mainly restricted and dispersed. The available trends and gaps should be explored in this research approach to provide valuable insights into technological environments. Thus, a review is conducted to create a coherent taxonomy to describe the latest research divided into four main categories: development, framework, other hand gesture recognition, and reviews and surveys. Then, we conduct analyses of the glove systems for SLR device characteristics, develop a roadmap for technology evolution, discuss its limitations, and provide valuable insights into technological environments. This will help researchers to understand the current options and gaps in this area, thus contributing to this line of research.

Online activism showcases how available digital tools allow social movements to emerge, scale up, and extend globally by fundamentally enabling new forms of power. This special issue brings together eight research articles that engage with the collaborative efforts embedded in various types of activism by studying features such as the socio-technical systems involved; how the activism is organized; relations between traditional and social media; and the complex network of systems, information, people, values, theories, histories, ideologies, and aesthetics that constitutes such activisms. The articles show the spaces in which this activism materializes, and particularly their situation in several intersecting dimensions including motivation, culture, language, and infrastructure. Together, these articles reflect the methodological breadth required to materialize online activism and the need to develop a more nuanced conceptualization of the media ecologies involved. By mapping out how activism is enabled and constrained by human-computer interfaces, this special issue contributes to open up the black box of online activism.

In the current digital era, technology plays a crucial role in facilitating diverse interactions that are essential for pupil engagement in the learning process. This article delves into the perspectives of secondary school teachers regarding the active participation of pupils in school activities through the utilization of digital technologies. The concept of participation is approached from two dimensions: passive presence and active involvement, with a specific focus on the latter, emphasizing active engagement. The study centers on the application of digital resources in Swedish grades 7–9 to promote pupil participation and enhance the learning experience. We examine the use, effectiveness, and areas requiring improvement of existing digital resources. Drawing from prior workshops involving teachers, we aim to elucidate educators’ viewpoints on the role of technology in enhancing pupil participation. Grounded in the Garrison and Andersson’s theoretical framework, the study advances the comprehension of the interactions necessary to foster an effective learning environment, as perceived by educators. The results derived from the thematic analysis yield four themes: 1) Interaction between teacher and pupil, 2) Interaction between pupil and content, 3) Interaction between pupil and pupil and 4) Extended interaction. The study concludes by outlining a set of guidelines in how digital resources can support pupil participation as the response to identified challenges.

Back reflection losses are a key problem that limits the performances of optical communication systems that work on wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technology based on silicon (Si) Multimode Interference (MMI) waveguides. In order to overcome this problem, we propose a novel design for a 1 × 4 optical demultiplexer based on the MMI in silicon nitride (SiN) buried waveguide structure that operates at the C-band spectrum. The simulation results show that the proposed device can transmit four channels with a 10 nm spacing between them that work in the C-band with a low power loss range of 1.98–2.35 dB, large bandwidth of 7.68–8.08 nm, and good crosstalk of 20.9–23.6 dB. Thanks to the low refractive index of SiN, a very low back reflection of 40.57 dB is obtained without using a special angled MMI design, which is usually required, using Si MMI technology. Thus, this SiN demultiplexer MMI technology can be used in WDM technique for obtaining a high data bitrate alongside a low back reflection in optical communication systems.

Microwave medical imaging (MMI) is experiencing a surge in research interest, with antenna performance emerging as a key area for improvement. This work addresses this need by enhancing the directivity of a compact UWB antenna using a Yagi-Uda-inspired reflector antenna. The proposed reflector-loaded antenna (RLA) exhibited significant gain and directivity improvements compared to a non-directional reference antenna. When analyzed for MMI applications, the RLA showed a maximum increase of 4 dBi in the realized gain and of 14.26 dB in the transmitted field strength within a human breast model. Moreover, it preserved the shape of time-domain input signals with a high correlation factor of 94.86%. To further validate our approach, another non-directional antenna with proven head imaging capabilities was modified with a reflector, achieving similar directivity enhancements. The combined results demonstrate the feasibility of RLAs for improved performance in MMI systems.

This paper discusses the initial design of an earthquake intensitymeter measuring instrument using the IoT-based MMI scale. This research is motivated by the lack of instrumentation technology applied to the community for earthquake mitigation, which is related to the geographical location of Indonesia in earthquake-prone areas. The existing earthquake intensitymeter instrument still has shortcomings in terms of hardware and data acquisition. So this paper tries to provide a solution to the problem by using an MPU6050 accelerometer sensor that can measure PGA values simultaneously on three axes. This system is also equipped with an IoT-based intensitymeter for data acquisition that can be accessed via smartphone. In this system, the MPU6050 sensor is tested for characteristics first using the UC Berkeley Seismological Myshake application, and the average linearity test data obtained is 0.994. The data acquisition system is webserver-based so that every bit of data read every second will be sent to the webserver. The webserver is also equipped with a real-time measurement graph, and every smartphone device can access the data using the IP address of the webserver.

The on-chip optical power splitter is a common and important device in photonic integrated circuits (PICs). To achieve a low insertion loss and high uniformity while splitting the guided light, multi-mode interferometer-based structures utilizing a self-imaging principle are widely used mainly in the form of a 1 × 2 configuration. Recently, an inverse design method for nanophotonic devices has emerged to overcome the limited capability of the conventional design methods and make it possible to explore the vast number of design parameters. Because of the non-intuitive shape of inverse-designed structures, they allow us to discover interesting and complex optical responses which are almost impossible to find with conventional design methods. Here, we report two kinds of inverse-designed 1 × 4 optical power splitters composed of silicon bars of different lengths, which are fabricated with a standard CMOS-compatible process. The particle swarm optimization method was used to minimize the insertion loss and divide the power evenly into each output port with finite-difference time-domain method simulation. The first optical power splitter has a compact size of 8.14 × 12 μm and the second optical power splitter has an even more compact size of 6.0 × 7.2 μm . With the inverse designed structures, we fabricated the chip with a CMOS-compatible fabrication process. Experimental verification of the structures is provided and good agreement with the numerical results is obtained. The first 1 × 4 optical power splitter has a low insertion loss of less than 0.76 dB and uniformity of less than 0.84 dB, and the second more compact optical power splitter has a low insertion loss of less than 1.08 dB and uniformity of less than 0.81 dB. As the complexity of on-chip photonic systems has steadily increased, the inverse design of photonic structures holds great potential to be an essential part of advanced design tools.

This article is devoted to the Multi-level inverters review and in particular to the form and function of modular multilevel inverters (MMI), with their different topologies, modulation, modeling and control schemes Detailed analysis with their functions of MMI has been made in comprehensive manner with existing literature available till date. All existing methods are compared in detail with proposal for the best methods available. The article has made strategic conclusions on MMI to make the system more robust in operation with less complexity in design and control.