The stethoscope

Stetho·scope. Function: noun : an instrument used to detect and study sounds produced in the body that are conveyed to the ears of the listener through rubber tubing connected with a usually cupshaped piece placed upon the area to be examined.peer-reviewe

Birthing pains: How cyborgs refigure medical bodies, technologies, and objectives

Cyborgs are polymorphic and not yet visibly different from humans in part because cyborgic technologies have just been developed, in part because we are not trained to see how the post human arises. The birth of cyborgs alters the core of medicine from disease-containment and death-assessment to enhancement of function and image, to transgression of previous natural bounds as established by the possibility of space and oceanic travel. Cyborgs, as postmodern/ posthuman products of medicine, make visible the current shift in the construction of medical bodies, technologies, and objectives. Medical bodies have been determined by a conception of patienthood or diseased body. The connection of body and disease as distinct species happened in the medical enclosure: the hospital-clinic, during mid-late 19th century. In the hospital-clinic, the medical body has been clearly mapped in terms of disease identity or malfunction, and it has encountered medical technologies used to aid in diagnosis. The patient-doctor relationship has shifted because of the revolution in instrumentation at the turn of the century. Another shift can be discerned, as it is again mirrored in the relations of doctor-patient, as it has been re-structured through cyberspace and expert systems. Clearly, the revolution or scientification of medicine has been fueled by the tuberculosis crisis as it challenged medical and political institutions. A similar crisis has occurred with AIDS: is cyborg-technology the fulfillment of the modem dream of immortality and total control in the face of the epidemic? An easy answer to such question cannot be produced. Cyborgs are a product of the meeting of natural and human sciences through cybernetics. Their existence and proliferation destabilize assumptions at the philosophical foundations of knowledge and medicine as well as our conceptions of identity and rights, through an unsettling of the connection between community-individuality, of the distinction between private and public domains

Scent By A Wireless Web

‘Scent Whisper’ is a jewellery project that provides a new way to send a scented message. The two pieces focus on a spider and the defence mechanism in bombardier beetles that squirt predators with a high-pressure jet of boiling liquid in a rapid-fire action. The devices involve microfluidics and wireless technology that link a remote sensor (a spider) with a fragrance-dispensing unit (a bombardier beetle) to create two items of jewellery that constitute the ‘wireless web’. A message is ‘scent by a wireless web’’ from a spider to a bombardier beetle brooch, that sprays a minute sample of fragrance. The purpose is to benefit human wellbeing, through olfaction stimulation of the autonomic nervous system, and as a novel communication system to send an aroma ‘message’ that could be healing (lavender), protective (insect repellent), seductive (pheromones) informative or communicative. The user whispers a secret message into a spider brooch, which transmits the message to a beetle brooch worn by an admirer. The spider’s sensor, implanted in its abdomen records the humidity of her breath and releases scent from the beetle onto a localized area, creating a personal ‘scent bubble’. About this conference: Wearable Futures was an interdisciplinary conference, aiming to bring together practitioners, inventors, and theorists in the field of soft technology and wearables including those concerned with fashion, textiles, sportswear, interaction design, media and live arts, medical textiles, wellness, perception and psychology, IPR, polymer science, nanotechnology, military, and other relevant research strands. Examining how some broad generic questions could be explored in relation to wearable technology the conference referred to but was not restricted to: aesthetics and design, function and durability versus market forces; the desires, needs and realities of wearable technologies; technology and culture; simplicity and sustainability; design for wearability; wearables as theatre and wearables as emotional 'tools'. Wearable Futures actively aimed to encourage debate, discussion and the formation of collaborative projects across a wide range of disciplines. Key fundamental questions across the conference in relation to wearables were: What is out there? Who wants it? What do they want? How is it achieved? Keynotes were drawn from the field of fashion and textiles through Suzanne Lee and Sarah E. Braddock Clarke; interactive design through Chris Baber; and design and computational arts through Joanna Berzowska. These diverse speakers provided an overview for the wide range of papers, poster and exhibits (over 60) presented in the panels and exhibition covering four broad themes drawn from strands taken from the initial call: Technology and Culture; Aesthetics and Making; Design for Wearability; and Desires, Need and Reality. The conference set out to highlight the growing arena for wearable technologies in an interdisciplinary context and also to look at the positive and negative applications of technology in this context. This was enhanced by the inclusion of an exhibition, supported by the Arts Council of Wales, which ensured that there was space for the rhetoric and the reality of the field to be discussed concurrently. Research within the Smart Clothes Wearable Technologies Group at University of Wales proposes the end-user as key to its practice and this conference reflected that in the approach to selection of papers and exhibits. The conference ensured that the full landscape of the field in 2005 was reflected through practitioners in design, art, craft, science, technology, cultural theory & performance, thus taking the subject beyond 80's and 90's research in which, for example, the work of Steve Mann and MIT put the individual researcher at the centre. Prototypes were an essential component to the conference and curated into the exhibition, which in 2005, in contrast to Mann, shows a focus on making the technology appear seamless rather than celebrating it through high visibility. One year on from Wearable Futures, research in the field seems to have expanded out into other areas of technology and practice with further conferences, applications and publications reflecting these developments. As 2010 becomes the present rather than the future (see Sarah E. Braddock Clarke and Marie OMahony, Tecnho Textiles: Revolutionary Fabrics for Fashion & Design, Thames and Hudson, 1997), what will the realities of wearables, smart materials and technology be in the next ten years? Wearable Futures generated a starting point for this area of debate; a key emerging strand being the focus on the body and its relationship to technology. Cyborg culture is being revisited but the concerns and relationship with the technology are different from the ones of 20 years ago. New materials evolving through Biotech and Nanoscience have the potential to supersede the machine and/or electronic driven devices, contributing to the design and creation of 'new flesh' or carrier of technology. These applications are being explored by creatives, academics and cultural theorists, whilst being applied to prototypes and industry with the end user in mind. Wearable Futures was a window on that changing role in 2005

Synopsis of an engineering solution for a painful problem Phantom Limb Pain

This paper is synopsis of a recently proposed solution for treating patients who suffer from Phantom Limb Pain (PLP). The underpinning approach of this research and development project is based on an extension of “mirror box” therapy which has had some promising results in pain reduction. An outline of an immersive individually tailored environment giving the patient a virtually realised limb presence, as a means to pain reduction is provided. The virtual 3D holographic environment is meant to produce immersive, engaging and creative environments and tasks to encourage and maintain patients’ interest, an important aspect in two of the more challenging populations under consideration (over-60s and war veterans). The system is hoped to reduce PLP by more than 3 points on an 11 point Visual Analog Scale (VAS), when a score less than 3 could be attributed to distraction alone

The strategic use of patents and its implications for enterprise and competition policies

This report was commissioned as a study into the strategic use of patents. In the course of its case investigations and legislative reviews the European Commission became aware of changes in the use of intellectual property, in particular the use of patents. It was noted that firms’ uses of intellectual property are becoming increasingly strategic. This raised concerns about the implications of firms’ patenting behaviour for enterprise and competition policy. The following report contains a comprehensive review of patenting behaviour, the extent to which patenting is becoming more strategic and the implications this has for competition and enterprise policies

Claiming Lesbian History: The Romance Between Fact and Fiction

The contested field of lesbian history exists along a continuum, with undisputed evidence on one end and informed speculation on the other. Lesbian historical fiction extends the spectrum, envisioning the lives of lesbian pirates, war heroes, pioneers, bandits, and stock romantic characters, as well as the handful of protagonists examined here whose quests specifically highlight the difficulty and importance of researching the lesbian past. The genre blossomed in the 1980s, just as the Foucauldian insistence that homosexual identity did not exist before the late nineteenth century gained sway in the academy. The proliferation of lesbian historical fictions signals the growing desire for more thorough (if not completely factual) historical underpinnings of the burgeoning lesbian identities, communities, and politics set in motion in the 1970s

Physicality in Australian patent law

It is generally understood that the patent system exists to encourage the conception and disclosure of new and useful inventions embodied in machines and other physical devices, along with new methods that physically transform matter from one state to another. What is not well understood is whether, and to what extent, the patent system is to encourage and protect the conception and disclosure of inventions that are non-physical methods – namely those that do not result in a physical transformation of matter. This issue was considered in Grant v Commissioner of Patents. In that case the Full Court of the Federal Court of Australia held that an invention must involve a physical effect or transformation to be patentable subject matter. In doing so, it introduced a physicality requirement into Australian law. What this article seeks to establish is whether the court’s decision is consistent with the case law on point. It does so by examining the key common law cases that followed the High Court’s watershed decision in National Research Development Corporation v Commissioner of Patents, the undisputed authoritative statement of principle in regard to the patentable subject matter standard in Australia. This is done with a view to determining whether there is anything in those cases that supports the view that the Australian patentable subject matter test contains a physicality requirement

A Risk Management Process for Consumers

Simply by using information technology, consumers expose themselves to considerable security risks. Because no technical or legal solutions are readily available, the only remedy is to develop a risk management process for consumers, similar to the process executed by enterprises. Consumers need to consider the risks in a structured way, and take action, not once, but iteratively. Such a process is feasible: enterprises already execute such processes, and time-saving tools can support the consumer in her own process. In fact, given our society's emphasis on individual responsibilities, skills and devices, a risk management process for consumers is the logical next step in improving information security