A review on humanoid robotics in healthcare

Humanoid robots have evolved over the years and today it is in many different areas of applications, from homecare to social care and healthcare robotics. This paper deals with a brief overview of the current and potential applications of humanoid robotics in healthcare settings. We present a comprehensive contextualization of humanoid robots in healthcare by identifying and characterizing active research activities on humanoid robot that can work interactively and effectively with humans so as to fill some identified gaps in current healthcare deficiency

I-Support: A robotic platform of an assistive bathing robot for the elderly population

In this paper we present a prototype integrated robotic system, the I-Support bathing robot, that aims at supporting new aspects of assisted daily-living activities on a real-life scenario. The paper focuses on describing and evaluating key novel technological features of the system, with the emphasis on cognitive human–robot interaction modules and their evaluation through a series of clinical validation studies. The I-Support project on its whole has envisioned the development of an innovative, modular, ICT-supported service robotic system that assists frail seniors to safely and independently complete an entire sequence of physically and cognitively demanding bathing tasks, such as properly washing their back and their lower limbs. A variety of innovative technologies have been researched and a set of advanced modules of sensing, cognition, actuation and control have been developed and seamlessly integrated to enable the system to adapt to the target population abilities. These technologies include: human activity monitoring and recognition, adaptation of a motorized chair for safe transfer of the elderly in and out the bathing cabin, a context awareness system that provides full environmental awareness, as well as a prototype soft robotic arm and a set of user-adaptive robot motion planning and control algorithms. This paper focuses in particular on the multimodal action recognition system, developed to monitor, analyze and predict user actions with a high level of accuracy and detail in real-time, which are then interpreted as robotic tasks. In the same framework, the analysis of human actions that have become available through the project’s multimodal audio–gestural dataset, has led to the successful modeling of Human–Robot Communication, achieving an effective and natural interaction between users and the assistive robotic platform. In order to evaluate the I-Support system, two multinational validation studies were conducted under realistic operating conditions in two clinical pilot sites. Some of the findings of these studies are presented and analyzed in the paper, showing good results in terms of: (i) high acceptability regarding the system usability by this particularly challenging target group, the elderly end-users, and (ii) overall task effectiveness of the system in different operating modes

The avocado pear tree

For twenty years Elsie September has refused to visit her uncle, Hannie, a state patient at Valkenberg mental hospital. At her grandmother's insistence, she almost goes to see him one day, but she only gets as far as the building and cannot bring herself to go inside. Instead, she meets Shaun and, as a relationship develops, Elsie begins to tell him the stories of her childhood. But Elsie's relationship with Shaun is troubled and unbalanced. Before Elsie reaches the point in her narrative where she will explain why she refuses to see her uncle, she and Shaun part acrimoniously and he disappears. Elsie has, by now, become so caught up in the telling of her story that not even Shaun's disappearance can stop her from going back to the day her world changed beneath the sheltering arms of the avocado pear tree

Hair Trigger 14

An anthology, edited by students, featuring the fiction, prose and creative non-fiction work of students, alumni, and staff. Editors: Al Aviles, Jr., Donna Maria Chappell, Don Gennaro De Grazi, Ken Harris, Ann Langlais, Dave Mead, Jennifer Shanahan, Keturah Shaw. Cover photograph: Bill Brandt. 151 pages.https://digitalcommons.colum.edu/hairtrigger/1011/thumbnail.jp

Речевой обиход современного английского языка

1. Столярчук, Н. Н., Ярошук, М. В. Речевой обиход современного английского языка : пособие / Н. Н. Столярчук, М. В. Ярошук ; Брест. гос. ун-т им. А.С. Пушкина. – Брест : БрГУ, 2016. – 65 с.Пособие предполагает развитие навыков устного общения на социально-бытовые темы. Содержит тексты и диалоги, а также систему упражнений, направленных на развитие разговорной речи

Baba Yaga and Vasilisa : immersive fairy tales created for and by young audiences

textThis paper addresses how theatre design can be employed in elementary education and how theatre artists translate children's ideas and perceptions of fairy tales into professional theatrical designs. I explore how children visualize fairy tales and how their ideas can inform professional theatre designers. In order to accomplish this, I employed an inverted pedagogical system in which the children became the teachers from whom the adult artists learn. This system empowered the children to think deeply and explore the fairy tale rather than be dependent on adult perceptions. The fairy tale environment therefore, was established through child inspired and theatrically designed scenery, costumes, lighting, and sound. The process, as described above, culminated in the creation of a fairy tale performance in promenade style theatre, which invited the audience, be it a child or adult, to come onstage and experience the story along with the performer. I, with the assistance of the Community Engagement Dramaturge Meredyth Pederson, conducted a residency at St. Francis School, Austin, TX in a first grade classroom. We presented the Russian fairy tale Baba Yaga and Vasilisa the Beautiful and observed how the first graders perceived the story and visualized each design element: set, sound, costumes, and light. Each forty-five minute residency session with the first grade students focused upon a specific design discipline. After each residency session, Pederson and I reviewed the ideas and artifacts the first graders shared with us that day. The artifacts included drawings, recordings of conversations, soundscapes, photos of costumes, and their analysis of the story. We then shared this information with the adult theatrical environment design team. The design team discussed that which was identified by Meredyth and myself as important to the participating six or seven-year-old project collaborators' experience of the story. The adult design team then discussed how to transform their ideas into three-dimensional environmental design. The experience in the classroom did not drastically alter any of the professionals design processes but added another layer of research and ideas to the mix. The process was a positive introduction of young people into the world of design and professional story telling which encouraged and honored their ideas and interpretations of the story.Theatre and Danc

New Europe, Old Jails: The European Integration of Romanian Penitentiary Culture and Civilization

The book presents the prisons in Romania from two perspectives: on the one hand, from a cultural one, which addresses aspects such as symbols, rituals, heroes and values. On the other hand, from the perspective of indicators measuring the degree of civilization, you group in three categories: population, places and services

Sanctuaries

Sanctuaries navigates the environment of home via interrelated essays and vignettes personal to my upbringing in rural Southwest Indiana. By exploring my own childhood, youth, and family traumas and successes, I have crafted a collection that speaks volumes about seeing the world from a perspective both privileged and underprivileged simultaneously. I uncover my lineage\u27s numerous bouts with physical and mental illness and unrealized dreams, but I also bring to light our traditions of spreading kindness, treading lightly in the world, and preparing inordinate amounts of food and festive cheer to balance out times of hardship. Few writers have attempted to paint the Southern-Midwest\u27s landscape and to characterize its people as more than caricatures caught between the factories of the north and the tobacco fields of the south, so I rose to that challenge. What results is an essay collection rife with excess and squalor, abandon and abandonment, humor and deep sorrow, atheism and fervent belief in the supernatural, and snippets of what it really means, by my home region\u27s estimation, to be part of a family

Scientific and technological progress. Advantages and disadvantages

The theme under consideration is divided into two parts: The History of Telephone and Innovations in Telephone Communications. In the past, people relied on letters to learn about what was going on in the lives of their friends or family members. The first electrical telegraph was constructed by Sir William Cooke. Another telegraph was developed and patented in the USA in 1837 by Samuel Morse. When you are citing the document, use the following link http://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/handle/123456789/2807