Kidney image enhancement is challenging due to the unpredictable quality of MRI images, as well as the nature of kidney diseases. The focus of this work is on kidney images enhancement by proposing a new Local Fractional Entropy (LFE)-based model. The proposed model estimates the probability of pixels that represent edges based on the entropy of the neighboring pixels, which results in local fractional entropy. When there is a small change in the intensity values (indicating the presence of edge in the image), the local fractional entropy gives fine image details. Similarly, when no change in intensity values is present (indicating smooth texture), the LFE does not provide fine details, based on the fact that there is no edge information. Tests were conducted on a large dataset of different, poor-quality kidney images to show that the proposed model is useful and effective. A comparative study with the classical methods, coupled with the latest enhancement methods, shows that the proposed model outperforms the existing methods.
Piezoelectric bimorphs have been used as a micro-gripper in many applications, but the system might be complex and the response performance might not have been fully characterized. In this study the dynamic characteristics of bending piezoelectric bimorphs actuators were theoretically and experimentally investigated for micro-gripping applications in terms of deflection along the length, transient response, and frequency response with varying driving voltages and driving signals. In addition, the implementation of a parallel micro-gripper using bending piezoelectric bimorphs was presented. Both fingers were actuated separately to perform mini object handling. The bending piezoelectric bimorphs were fixed as cantilevers and individually driven using a high voltage amplifier and the bimorph deflection was measured using a non contact proximity sensor attached at the tip of one finger. The micro-gripper could perform precise micro-manipulation tasks and could handle objects down to 50 µm in size. This eliminates the need for external actuator extension of the microgripper as the grasping action was achieved directly with the piezoelectric bimorph, thus minimizing the weight and the complexity of the micro-gripper.