EEG alpha power is modulated by attentional changes during cognitive tasks and virtual reality immersion

Variations in alpha rhythm have a significant role in perception and attention. Recently, alpha decrease has been associated with externally directed attention, especially in the visual domain, whereas alpha increase has been related to internal processing such as mental arithmetic. However, the role of alpha oscillations and how the different components of a task (processing of external stimuli, internal manipulation/representation, and task demand) interact to affect alpha power are still unclear. Here, we investigate how alpha power is differently modulated by attentional tasks depending both on task difficulty (less/more demanding task) and direction of attention (internal/external). To this aim, we designed two experiments that differently manipulated these aspects. Experiment 1, outside Virtual Reality (VR), involved two tasks both requiring internal and external attentional components (intake of visual items for their internal manipulation) but with different internal task demands (arithmetic vs. reading). Experiment 2 took advantage of the VR (mimicking an aircraft cabin interior) to manipulate attention direction: it included a condition of VR immersion only, characterized by visual external attention, and a condition of a purely mental arithmetic task during VR immersion, requiring neglect of sensory stimuli. Results show that: (1) In line with previous studies, visual external attention caused a significant alpha decrease, especially in parieto-occipital regions; (2) Alpha decrease was significantly larger during the more demanding arithmetic task, when the task was driven by external visual stimuli; (3) Alpha dramatically increased during the purely mental task in VR immersion, whereby the external stimuli had no relation with the task. Our results suggest that alpha power is crucial to isolate a subject from the environment, and move attention from external to internal cues. Moreover, they emphasize that the emerging use of VR associated with EEG may have important implications to study brain rhythms and support the design of artificial systems

Short-Term Effect of a New Oral Sodium Hyaluronate Formulation on Knee Osteoarthritis: A Double-Blind, Randomized, Placebo-Controlled Clinical Trial

Objective: the aim of this pilot study was to test the short-term effect of oral supplementation with a sodium hyaluronate with a large spectrum of molecular weights (FS-HA®) on the symptoms and functionality of knee osteoarthritis (OA). Methods: 60 subjects affected by clinical and/or radiological diagnosis of symptomatic knee OA were consecutively enrolled in a randomized, double blind, placebo-controlled, clinical trial. At randomization visit, at day 28 (visit 2), and day 56 (visit 3), the Western Ontario McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC), the Lequesne Functional Index (LFI) and the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) for pain (VAS-p) were administered to the enrolled patients. Then, patients were asked how many times they used rescue medications (non-steroidal antinflammatory drugs–NSAIDs and/or anti-pain drugs) during the previous 4 weeks. Finally, the range of knee joint motion (ROM) was also instrumentally measured. Results: In FS-HA® treated subjects, VAS-p, pain and total WOMAC score, LFI and ROM significantly improved compared to the baseline values (p < 0.05). At 60 days, the VAS-p and the pain WOMAC score were significantly lower after FS-HA® treatment when compared with placebo as well (p < 0.05). The FS-HA® treated subjects significantly reduced the weekly use of NSAIDs and/or antipain drugs when compared to the placebo-treated ones (p < 0.05). Conclusion: the oral supplementation with a FS-HA® characterized by a large spectrum of molecular weight was associated with a short-term improvement in symptomatology and functionality of osteoarthritis-affected knees, and associated with a reduction in the use of NSAIDS and anti-pain drugs

Brain\u2013Computer Interface-Based Adaptive Automation to Prevent Out-Of-The-Loop Phenomenon in Air Traffic Controllers Dealing With Highly Automated Systems

Increasing the level of automation in air traffic management is seen as a measure to increase the performance of the service to satisfy the predicted future demand. This is expected to result in new roles for the human operator: he will mainly monitor highly automated systems and seldom intervene. Therefore, air traffic controllers (ATCos) would often work in a supervisory or control mode rather than in a direct operating mode. However, it has been demonstrated how human operators in such a role are affected by human performance issues, known as Out-Of-The-Loop (OOTL) phenomenon, consisting in lack of attention, loss of situational awareness and de-skilling. A countermeasure to this phenomenon has been identified in the adaptive automation (AA), i.e., a system able to allocate the operative tasks to the machine or to the operator depending on their needs. In this context, psychophysiological measures have been highlighted as powerful tool to provide a reliable, unobtrusive and real-time assessment of the ATCo's mental state to be used as control logic for AA-based systems. In this paper, it is presented the so-called "Vigilance and Attention Controller", a system based on electroencephalography (EEG) and eye-tracking (ET) techniques, aimed to assess in real time the vigilance level of an ATCo dealing with a highly automated human-machine interface and to use this measure to adapt the level of automation of the interface itself. The system has been tested on 14 professional ATCos performing two highly realistic scenarios, one with the system disabled and one with the system enabled. The results confirmed that (i) long high automated tasks induce vigilance decreasing and OOTL-related phenomena; (ii) EEG measures are sensitive to these kinds of mental impairments; and (iii) AA was able to counteract this negative effect by keeping the ATCo more involved within the operative task. The results were confirmed by EEG and ET measures as well as by performance and subjective ones, providing a clear example of potential applications and related benefits of AA

The optical head of the EnVisS camera for the Comet Interceptor ESA mission: Phase 0 study

EnVisS (Entire Visible Sky) is an all-sky camera specifically designed to fly on the space mission Comet Interceptor. This mission has been selected in June 2019 as the first European Space Agency (ESA) Fast mission, a modest size mission with fast implementation. Comet Interceptor aims to study a dynamically new comet, or interstellar object, and its launch is scheduled in 2029 as a companion to the ARIEL mission. The mission study phase, called Phase 0, has been completed in December 2019, and then the Phase A study had started. Phase A will last for about two years until mission adoption expected in June 2022. The Comet Interceptor mission is conceived to be composed of three spacecraft: spacecraft A devoted to remote sensing science, and the other two, spacecraft B1 and B2, dedicated to a fly-by with the comet. EnVisS will be mounted on spacecraft B2, which is foreseen to be spin-stabilized. The camera is developed with the scientific task to image, in push-frame mode, the full comet coma in different colors. A set of ad-hoc selected broadband filters and polarizers in the visible range will be used to study the full scale distribution of the coma gas and dust species. The camera configuration is a fish-eye lens system with a FoV of about 180°x45°. This paper will describe the preliminary EnVisS optical head design and analysis carried out during the Phase 0 study of the mission

C-KIT IS EXPRESSED IN SOFT TISSUE SARCOMA OF NEUROECTODERMIC ORIGIN AND ITS LIGAND PREVENTS APOPTOSIS OF NEOPLASTIC CELLS

During development, mice with mutations of stem cell factor (SCF) or its receptor c-kit exhibit defects in melanogenesis, as well as hematopoiesis and gonadogenesis. Consequently, accumulating evidence suggests that the c-kit/SCF system plays a crucial role in all of these processes and in tumors which derive from them. Especially in neuroblastoma (infant tumors of neuroectoderm crest derivation such as melano-cytes) it would appear that an autocrine loop exists between c-kit and SCF, and that the functional block of the c-kit receptors with monoclonal antibodies (MoAbs) results in a significant decrease in cellular proliferation. We studied the expression and role of c-kit and SCF in cell lines of soft tissue sarcoma of neuroectodermic origin, such as Ewing’s sar-coma (ES) and peripheral neuro-ectodermal tumors (PNET). Using flow cytometry with MoAb CD117 PE, c-kit expressio

Mental Workload in the Explanation of Automation Effects on ATC Performance

Automation has been introduced more and more into the role of air traffic control (ATC). As with many other areas of human activity, automation has the objective of reducing the complexity of the task so that performance is optimised and safer. However, automation can also have negative effects on cognitive processing and the performance of the controllers. In this paper, we present the progress made at AUTOPACE, a European project in which research is carried out to discover what these negative effects are and to propose measures to mitigate them. The fundamental proposal of the project is to analyse, predict, and mitigate these negative effects by assessing the complexity of ATC in relation to the mental workload experienced by the controller. Hence, a highly complex situation will be one with a high mental workload and a low complex situation will be one in which the mental workload is low

A multifiltering demodulator for adaptive estimation of muscular efforts from surface EMG

In order to estimate the muscular effort from surface electromyogram a demodulator with three level of filters has been adopted

Design of virtual reality based HMIs (Human Machine Interfaces) of complex systems

Aeronautical transport system is rapidly growing and more demanding. It has become a total system of complex systems in which the human is recognized as the decisional point that is asked to act quickly and safely. In this context, innovative technologies provide the challenge to design revolutionary Human Machine Interfaces for the people involved.In this paper a report of recent works in Human Machine Interfaces in aeronautics developed at the University of Bologna is presented. Synthetic visualization and task automation are the main commonalities in these projects. What we can expect from the future is then explored through an insight into technological aspects. \ua9 2013 IEEE

Valutazione comparativa delle prestazioni di processori di segnali EMG di superficie

Vengono valutate comparativamente le caratteristiche di mioprocessor con lunghezza del filtro fisso o con lunghezza di filtro di smoothing variabil