Head and pelvic movement asymmetry during lungeing in horses with symmetrical movement on the straight

REASONS FOR PERFORMING STUDY: Lungeing is commonly used as part of standard lameness examinations in horses. Knowledge of how lungeing influences motion symmetry in sound horses is needed. OBJECTIVES: The aim of this study was to objectively evaluate the symmetry of vertical head and pelvic motion during lungeing in a large number of horses with symmetric motion during straight line evaluation. STUDY DESIGN: Cross‐sectional prospective study. METHODS: A pool of 201 riding horses, all functioning well and considered sound by their owners, were evaluated in trot on a straight line and during lungeing to the left and right. From this pool, horses with symmetric vertical head and pelvic movement during the straight line trot (n = 94) were retained for analysis. Vertical head and pelvic movements were measured with body mounted uniaxial accelerometers. Differences between vertical maximum and minimum head (HDmax, HDmin) and pelvic (PDmax, PDmin) heights between left and right forelimb and hindlimb stances were compared between straight line trot and lungeing in either direction. RESULTS: Vertical head and pelvic movements during lungeing were more asymmetric than during trot on a straight line. Common asymmetric patterns seen in the head were more upward movement during push‐off of the outside forelimb and less downward movement during impact of the inside limb. Common asymmetric patterns seen in the pelvis were less upward movement during push‐off of the outside hindlimb and less downward movement of the pelvis during impact of the inside hindlimb. Asymmetric patterns in one lunge direction were frequently not the same as in the opposite direction. CONCLUSIONS: Lungeing induces systematic asymmetries in vertical head and pelvic motion patterns in horses that may not be the same in both directions. These asymmetries may mask or mimic fore‐ or hindlimb lameness

Gait Recognition By Walking and Running: A Model-Based Approach

Gait is an emerging biometric for which some techniques, mainly holistic, have been developed to recognise people by their walking patterns. However, the possibility of recognising people by the way they run remains largely unexplored. The new analytical model presented in this paper is based on the biomechanics of walking and running, and will serve as the foundation of an automatic person recognition system that is invariant to these distinct gaits. A bilateral and dynamically coupled oscillator is the key concept underlying this work. Analysis shows that this new model can be used to automatically describe walking and running subjects without parameter selection. Temporal template matching that takes into account the whole sequence of a gait cycle is applied to extract the angles of thigh and lower leg rotation. The phase-weighted magnitudes of the lower order Fourier components of these rotations form the gait signature. Classification of walking and running subjects is performed using the k-nearest-neighbour classifier. Recognition rates are similar to that achieved by other techniques with a similarly sized database. Future work will investigate feature set selection to improve the recognition rate and will determine the invariance attributes, for inter- and intra- class, of both walking and running

Complexity and biourbanism: thermodynamical architectural and urban models integrated in modern geographic mapping

The paper was presented on 5th April 2012 by Eleni Tracada in Theoretical Currents II conference in the University of Lincoln.Abstract Vital elements in urban fabric have been often suppressed for reasons of ‘style’. Recent theories, such as Biourbanism, suggest that cities risk becoming unstable and deprived of healthy social interactions. Our paper aims at exploring the reasons for which, fractal cities, which have being conceived as symmetries and patterns, can have scientifically proven and beneficial impact on human fitness of body and mind. During the last few decades, modern urban fabric lost some very important elements, only because urban design and planning turned out to be stylistic aerial views or new landscapes of iconic technological landmarks. Biourbanism attempts to re-establish lost values and balance, not only in urban fabric, but also in reinforcing human-oriented design principles in either micro or macro scale. Human life in cities and beyond emerges during ‘connectivity’ via geometrical continuity of grids and fractals, via path connectivity among highly active nodes, via exchange/movement of people and, finally via exchange of information (networks). All these elements form a hypercomplex system of several interconnected layers of a dynamic structure, all influencing each other in a non-linear manner. Sometimes networks of communication at all levels may suffer from sudden collapse of dynamic patterns, which have been proved to be vital for a long time either to landscapes and cityscapes. We are now talking about negotiating boundaries between human activities, changes in geographic mapping and, mainly about sustainable systems to support continuous growth of communities. We are not only talking about simple lives (‘Bios’) as Urban Syntax (bio and socio-geometrical synthesis), but also about affinities between developing topographies created by roadways and trajectories and the built environment. We shall also have the opportunity to show recent applications of these theories in our postgraduate students’ work, such as a 3D model as a new method of cartography of the Island of Mauritius, with intend to highlight developments in topography and architecture through a series of historical important events and mutating socio-political and economical geographies. This model may be able to predict failures in proposed and/or activated models of expansion, which do not follow strictly morphogenetic and physiological design processes. The same kind of modelling is capable to enable recognition of ‘optimal forms’ at different feedback scales, which, through morphogenetic processes, guarantee an optimal systemic efficiency, and therefore quality of life.ADT funds, university of Derby

Left gaze bias in humans, rhesus monkeys and domestic dogs

While viewing faces, human adults often demonstrate a natural gaze bias towards the left visual field, that is, the right side of the viewee’s face is often inspected first and for longer periods. Using a preferential looking paradigm, we demonstrate that this bias is neither uniquely human nor limited to primates, and provide evidence to help elucidate its biological function within a broader social cognitive framework. We observed that 6-month-old infants showed a wider tendency for left gaze preference towards objects and faces of different species and orientation, while in adults the bias appears only towards upright human faces. Rhesus monkeys showed a left gaze bias towards upright human and monkey faces, but not towards inverted faces. Domestic dogs, however, only demonstrated a left gaze bias towards human faces, but not towards monkey or dog faces, nor to inanimate object images. Our findings suggest that face- and species-sensitive gaze asymmetry is more widespread in the animal kingdom than previously recognised, is not constrained by attentional or scanning bias, and could be shaped by experience to develop adaptive behavioural significance

Design and semantics of form and movement (DeSForM 2006)

Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM) grew from applied research exploring emerging design methods and practices to support new generation product and interface design. The products and interfaces are concerned with: the context of ubiquitous computing and ambient technologies and the need for greater empathy in the pre-programmed behaviour of the ‘machines’ that populate our lives. Such explorative research in the CfDR has been led by Young, supported by Kyffin, Visiting Professor from Philips Design and sponsored by Philips Design over a period of four years (research funding £87k). DeSForM1 was the first of a series of three conferences that enable the presentation and debate of international work within this field: • 1st European conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM1), Baltic, Gateshead, 2005, Feijs L., Kyffin S. & Young R.A. eds. • 2nd European conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM2), Evoluon, Eindhoven, 2006, Feijs L., Kyffin S. & Young R.A. eds. • 3rd European conference on Design and Semantics of Form and Movement (DeSForM3), New Design School Building, Newcastle, 2007, Feijs L., Kyffin S. & Young R.A. eds. Philips sponsorship of practice-based enquiry led to research by three teams of research students over three years and on-going sponsorship of research through the Northumbria University Design and Innovation Laboratory (nuDIL). Young has been invited on the steering panel of the UK Thinking Digital Conference concerning the latest developments in digital and media technologies. Informed by this research is the work of PhD student Yukie Nakano who examines new technologies in relation to eco-design textiles

(Un-)Biasing the Morphologies of Affect for HRI Purposes

One fundamental aspect of Human-Robot Interactions is the role of the morphologies of both humans and machines. Basically, humans are naturalistically oriented towards the social interaction with other humans. Taking into account that fact that human morphologies run a social role, and that affection or emotion are fundamental aspects of the eco-cognitive and social processes, this talk tries to relate some classic and current challenges related to HRI: moral bias, emotional role into HRI, and dynamical morphologies in transhumanist scenarios

Toward a social psychophysics of face communication

As a highly social species, humans are equipped with a powerful tool for social communication—the face, which can elicit multiple social perceptions in others due to the rich and complex variations of its movements, morphology, and complexion. Consequently, identifying precisely what face information elicits different social perceptions is a complex empirical challenge that has largely remained beyond the reach of traditional research methods. More recently, the emerging field of social psychophysics has developed new methods designed to address this challenge. Here, we introduce and review the foundational methodological developments of social psychophysics, present recent work that has advanced our understanding of the face as a tool for social communication, and discuss the main challenges that lie ahead