273 research outputs found

    Undergraduate Catalog of Studies, 2023-2024

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    Undergraduate Catalog of Studies, 2023-2024

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    Undergraduate Catalog of Studies, 2022-2023

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    Exercise-Induced Hypoalgesia in people with chronic low back pain

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    Chronic low back pain (CLBP) is one of the most prevalent musculoskeletal disorders and a major contributor to disability worldwide. Exercise is recommended in guidelines as a cornerstone of the management of CLBP. One of the manifold benefits of exercise is its influence on endogenous pain modulation. An acute bout of exercise elicits a temporary decrease in pain sensitivity, described as exercise-induced hypoalgesia (EIH). This thesis explores EIH in people with CLBP via a systematic review and observational studies. The systematic review included 17 studies in people with spinal pain. Of those, four studies considered people with CLBP revealing very low quality evidence with conflicting results. EIH was elicited following remote cycling tasks (two studies, fair risk of bias), but EIH was altered following local repetitive lifting tasks (two studies, good/fair risk of bias). The observational studies investigated EIH following three different tasks in participants with and without CLBP and explored the stability of EIH results. Conflicting results from quantitative sensory testing were found for whether EIH is impaired in people with CLBP. EIH was only elicited in asymptomatic participants following a repeated lifting task, but both participants with and without CLBP showed EIH following a lumbar resistance and a brisk walking task. This thesis demonstrates the first evidence of stability of EIH over multiple sessions. However, the interpretation of the results can be challenging as stability was poor and changes in lumbar pressure pain thresholds also occurred after rest only. These findings are important to inform future studies contributing to the elucidation of the complex phenomenon of EIH in people with/without CLBP, specifically as the stability is a prerequisite for future research

    Undergraduate Catalog of Studies, 2022-2023

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    ATHENA Research Book, Volume 2

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    ATHENA European University is an association of nine higher education institutions with the mission of promoting excellence in research and innovation by enabling international cooperation. The acronym ATHENA stands for Association of Advanced Technologies in Higher Education. Partner institutions are from France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal and Slovenia: University of OrlĂ©ans, University of Siegen, Hellenic Mediterranean University, NiccolĂČ Cusano University, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Polytechnic Institute of Porto and University of Maribor. In 2022, two institutions joined the alliance: the Maria Curie-SkƂodowska University from Poland and the University of Vigo from Spain. Also in 2022, an institution from Austria joined the alliance as an associate member: Carinthia University of Applied Sciences. This research book presents a selection of the research activities of ATHENA University's partners. It contains an overview of the research activities of individual members, a selection of the most important bibliographic works of members, peer-reviewed student theses, a descriptive list of ATHENA lectures and reports from individual working sections of the ATHENA project. The ATHENA Research Book provides a platform that encourages collaborative and interdisciplinary research projects by advanced and early career researchers

    Assessment of Physical Fitness and Training Effect in Individual Sports

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    Physical fitness is the basis for the success of players in sports, and its monitoring makes it possible to assess the effectiveness of training and identify possible errors. During training, thanks to the use of control results, these activities are modified, which better prepares players for competition. This Special Issue, entitled "Assessment of Physical Fitness and the Effect of Training in Individual Sports" presents the results of coaching control and the results of monitoring progression in training, as well as an assessment of the physical fitness of athletes practicing individual sports

    I-BaR: Integrated Balance Rehabilitation Framework

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    Neurological diseases are observed in approximately one billion people worldwide. A further increase is foreseen at the global level as a result of population growth and aging. Individuals with neurological disorders often experience cognitive, motor, sensory, and lower extremity dysfunctions. Thus, the possibility of falling and balance problems arise due to the postural control deficiencies that occur as a result of the deterioration in the integration of multi-sensory information. We propose a novel rehabilitation framework, Integrated Balance Rehabilitation (I-BaR), to improve the effectiveness of the rehabilitation with objective assessment, individualized therapy, convenience with different disability levels and adoption of an assist-as-needed paradigm and, with an integrated rehabilitation process as a whole, i.e., ankle-foot preparation, balance, and stepping phases, respectively. Integrated Balance Rehabilitation allows patients to improve their balance ability by providing multi-modal feedback: visual via utilization of Virtual Reality; vestibular via anteroposterior and mediolateral perturbations with the robotic platform; proprioceptive via haptic feedback.Comment: 37 pages, 2 figures, journal pape

    Fire and Life Safety Evaluation of an Assisted Living and Memory Care Center

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    This culminating project has been submitted as part of the graduate program in Fire Protection Engineering at Cal Poly. It documents an Assisted Living and Memory Care Center’s compliance with applicable fire safety prescriptions contained in the 2019 California Building and Fire Codes (CBC and CFC). Performance-based methods incorporating deterministic design fires were then used to verify that the final building design and operating procedures met the life safety needs of its unique occupants. The building under analysis was a 45,000 sq. ft, two-story, 58-bed residential care facility for the elderly. Occupants were all 60 years or older without acute medical conditions but with potential mild to severe mobility, sensory, and cognitive impairments. The fire- resistance-rated light-frame wood structure, its compartmentalized interior layout, and its active fire protection systems were found to satisfy the code provisions adopted by the local authority having jurisdiction. These included plentiful egress and exit capacity, localized fire and smoke containment, early smoke detection, audible and visual notification at levels appropriate to the occupants, and complete quick-response sprinkler coverage for life and property protection. The priorities of the performance-based analysis were to check the adequacy of these code-compliant fire protection features, as well as to support housing accessibility and to inform staff training. These required realistic fire models to verify available safe egress times (ASETs), which were shorter for these residents than the general population due to their lower tolerances for heat and smoke exposure. Design fires took guidance from NFPA 101 Life Safety Code and the author’s research on the history of fatal care home fires. All fires were placed in residential wings using heat release data from calorimetry tests of residential furniture and mixed natural/ synthetic hydrocarbon contents in staff supply closets. Initial growth rates were between fast (0.0469 kW/s2) and ultrafast (0.1876 kW/s2), with peak heat release rates and embodied energies appropriate to the fuel packages but ultimately determined by ventilation conditions. Model results supported the existing building design but showed that additional fuel control, compartmentation, detection/ notification, and automatic suppression would strengthen care staff’s response to and management of fires. Specifically, all rooms that communicate with residential corridors should have smoke detection and be fitted with door self-closers, following the findings of Performance Design Fires ‘B’ and ‘C.’ Where clients are housed also impacts their fire safety, so their facility intake forms/ health assessments should be used to guide placement— per Performance Design Fire ‘A,’ Assisted Living residents with the greatest cognitive, sensory, and locomotion disabilities should be housed closest to the lobby to receive prompt aid and minimize burns and smoke inhalation. These vulnerabilities also mean that sprinkler protection should be designed following the more rigorous commercial NFPA 13 standard as opposed to low- rise residential NFPA 13R, which was demonstrated in Performance Design Fire ‘D.’ Performance Design Fire ‘A’ was a nighttime living room furniture fire typical of all 40 Assisted Living dwellings. The occupant was assumed to be sleeping in the bedroom and not intimate with ignition; they were also capable of self-evacuation. Their required safe egress time (RSET) included a delay in waking to their low-frequency smoke alarm and traversing their unit to the corridor door, which totaled two minutes. At this time, the visibility through smoke was well below what would normally be accepted for design. The gasses at six feet above finished floor in the egress path were already too hot to move through (120°C), so the evacuee had to stoop, crouch, or even crawl, depending on the effectiveness of the sprinkler suppression. Since the sprinkler did temper heat, the asphyxiant fractional effective dose for incapacitation (FEDtot = 0.1) became the limiting tenability criteria; an especially respiratory-sensitive evacuee who took longer to find their door would have been incapacitated at two and a half minutes, but staff was expected to intervene by then. The slim margin for human error suggests that this scenario would benefit from a probabilistic assessment that includes ignition and suppression. A deterministic solution would be to regulate the flame spread and heat release of the furniture that residents bring in or are provided with. In scenarios ‘B’ and ‘C,’ a mixed cellulose/ plastics design fire was placed in staff supply closets with doors open to the residential hallways in the Assisted Living and Memory Care wings. The door in Performance Design Fire ‘B’ was self-closing, so wedging it open represented an n = 1 managerial failure; the closet sprinkler was operational. The nighttime RSET of Assisted Living residents to reach an adjacent smoke compartment was three to four minutes, depending on their disability. The ASET was the time for the smoke layer to descend to six feet in the corridor, which was the only evacuation route. This occurred by a minute and a half for 44% of the dwelling units along the hallway, which was the earliest staff was expected to arrive and close the fire room door. Since visibility at the staff entrance to the corridor was below two meters, and required crouching or crawling to access the room, closing the fire room door was not a certainty. This scenario necessitated partial or full defend-in-place in the Assisted Living wing. A similar result was found for the Memory Care wing in Performance Design Fire ‘C.’ A faulty sprinkler was an n = 1 device failure in this scenario because the closet door was not required to be self-closing. Occupants with dementia/ MNCD were assumed to be incapable of self-evacuation, and an RSET was not calculated for full staff evacuation of the wing, but it would have been much longer than the minute and a half ASET it took for smoke to descend to six feet in most of the corridor. Performance Design Fire ‘D’ looked at ignition within a Memory Care dwelling and NFPA 13’s requirement for sprinklers in clothes closets, which goes beyond NFPA 13R. This model also assumed an n = 1 device failure of the sprinkler. In contrast with Design Fire ‘A,’ the RSET was the time it took for an attendant to rescue the fire room occupant. This was just over a minute; since the fire was shielded from the main room sprinkler by the closet door, the fire burned uncontrolled, and the heat became intolerable overhead (200°C) after a minute and a half. This slim margin for attendant error echoes the conclusions of Design Fire ‘A.’ A summary of ASETs versus RSETs and additional observations can be found in Chapter 11. Facility operator responsibilities, including fuel control, housekeeping, fire protection systems maintenance, and emergency preparedness plans, can be found in the fire safety plan in Chapter 12. These are primarily based on the requirements of the CFC and the findings of this report\u27s prescriptive and performance chapters

    Stretch hyperreflexia in children with cerebral palsy:Assessment - Contextualization - Modulation

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    Cerebral palsy (CP) is a neurological disorder and the most frequent cause of motor impairment in children in Europe. Around 85% of children with CP experience stretch hyperreflexia, also known as “spasticity”. Stretch hyperreflexia is an excessive response to muscle stretch, leading to increased joint resistance. The joint hyper-resistance causes limitations in activities such as walking. Multiple methods have been developed to measure stretch hyperreflexia, but evidence supporting the use of these methods for diagnostics and treatment evaluation in children with CP is insufficient. Furthermore, most methods are designed to assess stretch reflexes in passive conditions, which might not translate to the limitations encountered due to stretch reflexes during activities. Furthermore, while a broad range of stretch hyperreflexia treatments is available, many are invasive, non-specific, or temporary and might have adverse side effects. Training methods to reduce stretch reflexes using biofeedback are promising non-invasive methods with potential long-term sustained effects. Still, clinical feasibility needs to be improved before implementation in clinical rehabilitation of children with CP. This thesis aimed to develop methods to assess stretch hyperreflexia of the calf muscles during passive conditions, as well as in the context of walking. Additionally, this thesis aimed to develop clinically feasible methods to modulate stretch hyperreflexia in the calf muscle of children with CP. The outcomes are described in eight different studies presented in this thesis. All in all, the work presented in this thesis shows that sagittal plane clinical gait analysis can be performed using the human body model and can be complemented with ultrasound imaging of the calf muscle. Motorized methods to assess stretch hyperreflexia in passive conditions might be useful for evaluation in adults after SCI/Stroke. Still, limitations regarding feasibility and validity limit clinical application for children with CP. Furthermore, this thesis provides additional evidence that the deviating muscle activation patterns during walking, particularly the increased activation around initial contact, are caused by stretch hyper-reflexes in children with CP. The deviating muscle activation patterns, with increased activation during early stance and reduced activation around push-off, can be modulated within one session by several children with CP. Therefore, the next step is to develop a training program to modulate the activation pattern and potentially decrease stretch hyper-reflexes in children with CP to improve the gait patter
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