Affective Medicine: a review of Affective Computing efforts in Medical Informatics

Background: Affective computing (AC) is concerned with emotional interactions performed with and through computers. It is defined as “computing that relates to, arises from, or deliberately influences emotions”. AC enables investigation and understanding of the relation between human emotions and health as well as application of assistive and useful technologies in the medical domain. Objectives: 1) To review the general state of the art in AC and its applications in medicine, and 2) to establish synergies between the research communities of AC and medical informatics. Methods: Aspects related to the human affective state as a determinant of the human health are discussed, coupled with an illustration of significant AC research and related literature output. Moreover, affective communication channels are described and their range of application fields is explored through illustrative examples. Results: The presented conferences, European research projects and research publications illustrate the recent increase of interest in the AC area by the medical community. Tele-home healthcare, AmI, ubiquitous monitoring, e-learning and virtual communities with emotionally expressive characters for elderly or impaired people are few areas where the potential of AC has been realized and applications have emerged. Conclusions: A number of gaps can potentially be overcome through the synergy of AC and medical informatics. The application of AC technologies parallels the advancement of the existing state of the art and the introduction of new methods. The amount of work and projects reviewed in this paper witness an ambitious and optimistic synergetic future of the affective medicine field

The Analogue Computer as a Voltage-Controlled Synthesiser

This paper re-appraises the role of analogue computers within electronic and computer music and provides some pointers to future areas of research. It begins by introducing the idea of analogue computing and placing in the context of sound and music applications. This is followed by a brief examination of the classic constituents of an analogue computer, contrasting these with the typical modular voltage-controlled synthesiser. Two examples are presented, leading to a discussion on some parallels between these two technologies. This is followed by an examination of the current state-of-the-art in analogue computation and its prospects for applications in computer and electronic music

Computers from plants we never made. Speculations

We discuss possible designs and prototypes of computing systems that could be based on morphological development of roots, interaction of roots, and analog electrical computation with plants, and plant-derived electronic components. In morphological plant processors data are represented by initial configuration of roots and configurations of sources of attractants and repellents; results of computation are represented by topology of the roots' network. Computation is implemented by the roots following gradients of attractants and repellents, as well as interacting with each other. Problems solvable by plant roots, in principle, include shortest-path, minimum spanning tree, Voronoi diagram, $\alpha$-shapes, convex subdivision of concave polygons. Electrical properties of plants can be modified by loading the plants with functional nanoparticles or coating parts of plants of conductive polymers. Thus, we are in position to make living variable resistors, capacitors, operational amplifiers, multipliers, potentiometers and fixed-function generators. The electrically modified plants can implement summation, integration with respect to time, inversion, multiplication, exponentiation, logarithm, division. Mathematical and engineering problems to be solved can be represented in plant root networks of resistive or reaction elements. Developments in plant-based computing architectures will trigger emergence of a unique community of biologists, electronic engineering and computer scientists working together to produce living electronic devices which future green computers will be made of.Comment: The chapter will be published in "Inspired by Nature. Computing inspired by physics, chemistry and biology. Essays presented to Julian Miller on the occasion of his 60th birthday", Editors: Susan Stepney and Andrew Adamatzky (Springer, 2017

Affective games:a multimodal classification system

Affective gaming is a relatively new field of research that exploits human emotions to influence gameplay for an enhanced player experience. Changes in player’s psychology reflect on their behaviour and physiology, hence recognition of such variation is a core element in affective games. Complementary sources of affect offer more reliable recognition, especially in contexts where one modality is partial or unavailable. As a multimodal recognition system, affect-aware games are subject to the practical difficulties met by traditional trained classifiers. In addition, inherited game-related challenges in terms of data collection and performance arise while attempting to sustain an acceptable level of immersion. Most existing scenarios employ sensors that offer limited freedom of movement resulting in less realistic experiences. Recent advances now offer technology that allows players to communicate more freely and naturally with the game, and furthermore, control it without the use of input devices. However, the affective game industry is still in its infancy and definitely needs to catch up with the current life-like level of adaptation provided by graphics and animation