Development and Characterisation of a Multi-material 3D Printed Torsion Spring

Compliant actuation methods are popular in robotics applications where interaction with complex and unpredictable environments and objects is required. There are a number of ways of achieving this, but one common method is Series Elastic Actuation (SEA). In a recent version of their Unified Snake robot, Choset et al. incorporated a Series Elastic Element (SEE) in the form of a rubber torsional spring. This pa- per explores the possibility of using multi-material 3D printing to produce similar SEEs. This approach would facilitate the fabrication and testing of different spring variants and minimise the assembly required. This approach is evaluated by characterizing the behavior of two printed SEEs with different dimensions. The springs exhibit predictable viscoelastic behavior that is well described by a five element Wiechert model. We find that individual springs behave predictably and that multiple copies of the same spring design exhibit good consistency

CLONES : a closed-loop simulation framework for body, muscles and neurons

International audienc

Macro-Scale Tread Patterns for Traction in the Intestine

Goal: Tread patterns are widely used to increase traction on different substrates, with the tread scale, geometry and material being tailored to the application. This work explores the efficacy of using macro-scale tread patterns for a medical application involving a colon substrate - renowned for its low friction characteristics. Methods: Current literature was first summarized before an experimental approach was used, based on a custom test rig with ex vivo porcine colon, to assess different macro-scale tread patterns. Performance was based on increasing traction while avoiding significant trauma. Repeated testing (n = 16) was used to obtain robust results. Results: A macro-scale tread pattern can increase the traction coefficient significantly, with a static traction coefficient of 0.74 ± 0.22 and a dynamic traction coefficient of 0.35 ± 0.04 compared to a smooth (on the macro-scale) Control (0.132 ± 0.055 and 0.054 ± 0.015, respectively). Decreasing the scale and spacing between the tread features reduced apparent trauma but also reduced the traction coefficient. Conclusion: Significant traction can be achieved on colon tissue using a macro-scale tread but a compromise between traction (large feature sizes) and trauma (small feature sizes) may have to be made. Significance: This work provides greater insight into the complex frictional mechanisms of the intestine and gives suggestions for developing functional tread surfaces for a wide range of clinical applications

RollerBall: a mobile robot for intraluminal locomotion

There are currently a number of major drawbacks to using a colonoscope that limit its efficacy. One solution to this may be to use a warm liquid to distend the colon during inspection. Another is to replace the colonoscope with a small mobile robot – a solution many believe is the future of gastrointestinal intervention. This paper presents RollerBall, an intraluminal robot that uses wheeled-locomotion to traverse the length of a fluid-filled colon. The device provides a central, stable platform within the lumen for the use of diagnostic and therapeutic tools. The concept is described in detail and the feasibility demonstrated in a series of tests in a synthetic colon

RepAtt: Achieving Swarm Coordination through Chemotaxis

Swarm foraging is a common test case application for multi-robot systems. In this paper we present a novel algorithm for improving coordination of a robot swarm by selectively broadcasting repulsion and attraction signals. Robots use a chemotaxis-inspired search behaviour based on the temporal gradients of these signals in order to navigate towards more advantageous areas. Hardware experiments were used to model and validate realistic, noisy sound communication. We then show through extensive simulation studies that our chemotaxis-based coordination algorithm significantly improves swarm foraging time and robot efficiency

The experience of linking Victorian emergency medical service trauma data

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The linking of a large Emergency Medical Service (EMS) dataset with the Victorian Department of Human Services (DHS) hospital datasets and Victorian State Trauma Outcome Registry and Monitoring (VSTORM) dataset to determine patient outcomes has not previously been undertaken in Victoria. The objective of this study was to identify the linkage rate of a large EMS trauma dataset with the Department of Human Services hospital datasets and VSTORM dataset.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The linking of an EMS trauma dataset to the hospital datasets utilised deterministic and probabilistic matching. The linking of three EMS trauma datasets to the VSTORM dataset utilised deterministic, probabilistic and manual matching.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>There were 66.7% of patients from the EMS dataset located in the VEMD. There were 96% of patients located in the VAED who were defined in the VEMD as being admitted to hospital. 3.7% of patients located in the VAED could not be found in the VEMD due to hospitals not reporting to the VEMD. For the EMS datasets, there was a 146% increase in successful links with the trauma profile dataset, a 221% increase in successful links with the mechanism of injury only dataset, and a 46% increase with sudden deterioration dataset, to VSTORM when using manual compared to deterministic matching.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This study has demonstrated that EMS data can be successfully linked to other health related datasets using deterministic and probabilistic matching with varying levels of success. The quality of EMS data needs to be improved to ensure better linkage success rates with other health related datasets.</p

Patients' experiences of post radiotherapy skin reactions

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Computational exploration of molecular receptive fields in the olfactory bulb reveals a glomerulus-centric chemical map

© The Author(s) 2020. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.Progress in olfactory research is currently hampered by incomplete knowledge about chemical receptive ranges of primary receptors. Moreover, the chemical logic underlying the arrangement of computational units in the olfactory bulb has still not been resolved. We undertook a large-scale approach at characterising molecular receptive ranges (MRRs) of glomeruli in the dorsal olfactory bulb (dOB) innervated by the MOR18-2 olfactory receptor, also known as Olfr78, with human ortholog OR51E2. Guided by an iterative approach that combined biological screening and machine learning, we selected 214 odorants to characterise the response of MOR18-2 and its neighbouring glomeruli. We found that a combination of conventional physico-chemical and vibrational molecular descriptors performed best in predicting glomerular responses using nonlinear Support-Vector Regression. We also discovered several previously unknown odorants activating MOR18-2 glomeruli, and obtained detailed MRRs of MOR18-2 glomeruli and their neighbours. Our results confirm earlier findings that demonstrated tunotopy, that is, glomeruli with similar tuning curves tend to be located in spatial proximity in the dOB. In addition, our results indicate chemotopy, that is, a preference for glomeruli with similar physico-chemical MRR descriptions being located in spatial proximity. Together, these findings suggest the existence of a partial chemical map underlying glomerular arrangement in the dOB. Our methodology that combines machine learning and physiological measurements lights the way towards future high-throughput studies to deorphanise and characterise structure-activity relationships in olfaction.Peer reviewe