A first approach to understanding and measuring naturalness in driver-car interaction

With technology changing the nature of the driving task, qualitative methods can help designers understand and measure driver-car interaction naturalness. Fifteen drivers were interviewed at length in their own parked cars using ethnographically-inspired questions probing issues of interaction salience, expectation, feelings, desires and meanings. Thematic analysis and content analysis found five distinct components relating to 'rich physical' aspects of natural feeling interaction typified by richer physical, analogue, tactile styles of interaction and control. Further components relate to humanlike, intelligent, assistive, socially-aware 'perceived behaviours' of the car. The advantages and challenges of a naturalness-based approach are discussed and ten cognitive component constructs of driver-car naturalness are proposed. These may eventually be applied as a checklist in automotive interaction design.This research was fully funded by a research grant from Jaguar Land Rover, and partially funded by project n.220050/F11 granted by Research Council of Norway

BeppoSAX LECS background subtraction techniques

We present 3 methods for the subtraction of non-cosmic and unresolved cosmic backgrounds observed by the Low-Energy Concentrator Spectrometer (LECS) on-board BeppoSAX. Removal of these backgrounds allows a more accurate modeling of the spectral data from point and small-scale extended sources. At high (>|25| degree) galactic latitudes, subtraction using a standard background spectrum works well. At low galactic latitudes, or in complex regions of the X-ray sky, two alternative methods are presented. The first uses counts obtained from two semi-annuli near the outside of the LECS field of view to estimate the background at the source location. The second method uses ROSAT Position Sensitive Proportional Counter (PSPC) all-sky survey data to estimate the LECS background spectrum for a given pointing position. A comparison of the results from these methods provides an estimate of the systematic uncertainties. For high galactic latitude fields, all 3 methods give 3 sigma confidence uncertainties of <0.9 10^-3 count/s (0.1-10 keV), or <1.5 10^-3 count/s (0.1-2 keV). These correspond to 0.1-2.0 keV fluxes of 0.7-1.8 and 0.5-1.1 10^-13 erg/cm2/s for a power-law spectrum with a photon index of 2 and photoelectric absorption of 3 10^20 and 3 10^21 atom/cm2, respectively. At low galactic latitudes, or in complex regions of the X-ray sky, the uncertainties are a factor ~2.5 higher.Comment: 13 pages. Accepted for publication in A&A

An Analysis of Terrorist Attacks on Soft and Hard Targets in the Period 2000-2019

With the aim of characterising the evolution of the phenomenon of terrorist attacks in the 20 years since 9/11, this paper conducts a broad analysis of terrorist events from 2000 to 2019, based on information made available by the Global Terrorism Database (GTD). The first part of the document illustrates the evolution of terrorist attacks worldwide, while the second part focuses on the type of targets favoured by terrorists. As a key result of the analysis, it will be shown that in recent years many attacks have been directed against simple public and private buildings, targeting and killing individuals, typically civilians. These types of targets have been referred to in the literature as soft targets, as opposed to the term hard targets or hardened structures, government, military, police and intelligence buildings and sites. In the work, specific definitions of soft target and hard target related to GTD information fields are proposed and evaluated over the period 2000-2019. Furthermore, detailed items of the terrorist targets, such as houses, schools, universities, restaurants, theatres etc., were considered and analysed. The evidence obtained provides an up-to-date view of terrorists' recent approaches to selecting targets and conducting attacks. The understanding of the evolution of these approaches can allow for better organisation of future prevention and protection of potential soft and hard targets

Human and data-driven design fictions: : Entering the near-future zone

© 2019 for this paper by its authors. Use permitted under the Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0): https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.Final Published versio

Measurements of vehicle pollutants in a high-traffic urban area by a multiwavelength dial approach: Correlation between two different motor vehicle pollutants

The development and improvement of monitoring techniques to measure the concentration of pollutants in the atmosphere are a starting point to guarantee high levels of human health and environmental safety. The combination of lidar and dial techniques, by measuring backscattering signals and reconstructing the map of their concentrations, can be used to provide detailed information about the presence of aerosols, particulate and pollutions. Moreover, by using a multiwavelength approach, it is possible to increase the measurement accuracy and reliability. In this work, the dial approach is used to monitor the pollution in a very congested urban area with high trac. In order to provide a validation of the results, correlation analyses between the measured pollutants was performed. A new lidar analysis method, based on the least-square minimization technique, was introduced and demonstrated to work properly. The dial capability to detect polluted areas was shown—and by correlation analysis—also the possibility to identify the source of pollutions can be performed

Swift-XRT observation of 34 new INTEGRAL/IBIS AGNs: discovery of Compton thick and other peculiar sources

For a significant number of the sources detected at high energies (>10 keV) by the INTEGRAL/IBIS and Swift/BAT instruments there is either a lack information about them in the 2-10 keV range or they are totally unidentified. Herein, we report on a sample of 34 IBIS AGN or AGN candidate objects for which there is X-ray data in the Swift/XRT archive. Thanks to these X-ray follow up observations, the identification of the gamma ray emitters has been possible and the spectral shape in terms of photon index and absorption has been evaluated for the first time for the majority of our sample sources. The sample, enlarged to include 4 more AGN already discussed in the literature, has been used to provide photon index and column density distribution. We obtain a mean value of 1.88 with a dispersion of 0.12, i.e. typical of an AGN sample. Sixteen objects (47%) have column densities in excess of 10^{22} cm^{-2} and, as expected, a large fraction of the absorbed sources are within the Sey 2 sample. We have provided a new diagnostic tool (NH versus F(2-10)keV/F(20-100)keV softness ratio) to isolate peculiar objects; we find at least one absorbed Sey 1 galaxy, 3 Compton thick AGN candidates; and one secure example of a "true" type 2 AGN. Within the sample of 10 still unidentified objects, 3 are almost certainly AGN of type 2; 3 to 4 have spectral slopes typical of AGN; and two are located high on the galactic plane and are strong enough radio emitters so that can be considered good AGN candidates.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures, ApJ accepte

Forest landscape restoration in the drylands of Latin America

Forest Landscape Restoration (FLR) involves the ecological restoration of degraded forest landscapes, with the aim of benefiting both biodiversity and human well-being. We first identify four fundamental principles of FLR, based on previous definitions. We then critically evaluate the application of these principles in practice, based on the experience gained during an international, collaborative research project conducted in six dry forest landscapes of Latin America. Research highlighted the potential for FLR; tree species of high socioeconomic value were identified in all study areas, and strong dependence of local communities on forest resources was widely encountered, particularly for fuelwood. We demonstrated that FLR can be achieved through both passive and active restoration approaches, and can be cost-effective if the increased provision of ecosystem services is taken into account. These results therefore highlight the potential for FLR, and the positive contribution that it could make to sustainable development. However, we also encountered a number of challenges to FLR implementation, including the difficulty of achieving strong engagement in FLR activities among local stakeholders, lack of capacity for community-led initiatives, and the lack of an appropriate institutional and regulatory environment to support restoration activities. Successful implementation of FLR will require new collaborative alliances among stakeholders, empowerment and capacity building of local communities to enable them to fully engage with restoration activities, and an enabling public policy context to enable local people to be active participants in the decision making process. © 2012 by the author(s). Published here under license by the Resilience Alliance

Exploring the Use of Experiential Learning Methods to Increase CBRNe Awareness and Emergency Preparedness of Children

In recent years, there has been an increase in chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive incidents, often involving or specifically targeting children. These emerging threats pose a significant risk to the physical, psychological, and social wellbeing of children and can cause damaging effects on their development and growth. Children are more susceptible to the lethal effects of CBRNe agents and require increased protection, specialized intervention and medical countermeasures, and expert mental health support post-incident. The Hyogo Framework established a widely adopted international commitment to educating children about disasters, through which many nations have implemented disaster risk reduction education platforms focused on increasing their knowledge about potential hazards. However, few countries have begun to explore the benefits of introducing a comprehensive CBRNe awareness and preparedness curriculum to children. Studies have shown that experiential learning methods offer a highly engaging and immersive learning experience and increase educational outcomes. This work aims to explore the potential benefits of developing an interactive educational tool to introduce basic skills to prepare children and communities against CBRNe incidents

The energy budget for X-ray to infrared reprocessing in Compton-thin and Compton-thick active galaxies

Heavily obscured active galactic nuclei (AGNs) play an important role in contributing to the cosmic X-ray background (CXRB). However, the AGNs found in deep X-ray surveys are often too weak to allow direct measurement of the column density of obscuring matter. One method adopted in recent years to identify heavily obscured, Compton-thick AGNs under such circumstances is to use the observed mid-infrared to X-ray luminosity ratio as a proxy for the column density. This is based on the supposition that the amount of energy lost by the illuminating X-ray continuum to the obscuring matter and reprocessed into infrared emission is directly related to the column density and that the proxy is not sensitive to other physical parameters of the system (aside from contamination by dust emission from, for example, star-forming regions). Using Monte Carlo simulations, we find that the energy losses experienced by the illuminating X-ray continuum in the obscuring matter are far more sensitive to the shape of the X-ray continuum and to the covering factor of the X-ray reprocessor than they are to the column density of the material. Specifically we find that it is possible for the infrared to X-ray luminosity ratio for a Compton-thin source to be just as large as that for a Compton-thick source even without any contamination from dust. Since the intrinsic X-ray continuum and covering factor of the reprocessor are poorly constrained from deep X-ray survey data, we conclude that the mid-infrared to X-ray luminosity ratio is not a reliable proxy for the column density of obscuring matter in AGNs even when there is no other contribution to the mid-infrared luminosity aside from X-ray reprocessing. This conclusion is independent of the geometry of the obscuring matter.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS. 12 pages, 7 figure