Familiars: representing Facebook users’ social behaviour through a reflective playful experience

In this paper, we describe the design and development of a social game called Familiars. Inspired by the daemons in Pullman’s “Dark Material” trilogy, Familiars are animal companions that sit on your Facebook profile and change into different animal forms based on your social activity within the social network of Facebook. . Familiars takes advantage of the powerful capabilities of the developers platform of Facebook to build a multi-dimensional picture of a player’s state based on social activity, facial expression analysis on photographs and suggestions from friends. This rich information is then distilled and presented to the player in the form of animal that the familiar chooses to take. We show how the types of animals and personalities were associated in a cross-cultural user study, and present quantitative results from the social behaviours of the players within the game in addition to qualitative data gathered from questionnaire responses

Social architecture and the emergence of power laws in online social games

This paper explores the concept of the “social architecture” of games, and tests the theory that it is possible to analyse game mechanics based on the effect they have on the social behaviour of the players. Using tools from Social Network Analysis, these studies confirm that social activity in games reliably follows a power distribution: a few players are responsible for a disproportionate amount of social interactions. Based on this, the scaling exponent is highlighted as a simple measure of sociability that is constant for a game design. This allows for the direct comparison of social activity in very different games. In addition, it can act as a powerful analytical tool for highlighting anomalies in game designs that detrimentally affect players’ ability to interact socially. Although the social architectures of games are complicated systems, SNA allows for quantitative analysis of social behaviours of players in meaningful ways, which are to the benefit of game designers

Non-Smooth Dynamic Analysis of Local Seismic Damage Mechanisms of the San Felice Fortress in Northern Italy

Abstract The May 2012 seismic swarm, with epicenter in the Modena plane, in Northern Italy, had severe consequences on the historical buildings of the area. In particular, the fortified structures suffered specific, recurring damage and collapse mechanisms. The present paper deals with the case of the San Felice sul Panaro Fortress, which saw the collapse of 4 out of 5 towers and many other global and local effects. The work starts with an in-depth knowledge path, as a fundamental premise for a conscious intervention. The combination among historical analysis of the building, seismic history of the site, materials and pathological survey, structural identification, on-site inspections and tests, allowed to interpret the crack pattern and to identify the damage mechanisms activated by the earthquake, successively examined with specific structural analyses. In particular, the present paper concentrates on the numerical modelling of the identified local mechanisms, adopting a type of analysis first developed at the University of Parma for applied mechanics, based on the use of non-smooth dynamics software, through a Differential Variational Inequalities (DVI) formulation specifically developed for the 3D discrete elements method. It allows to follow large displacements and the opening and closure of cracks in dynamic field. Once the modelling instrument was calibrated, thanks to the comparison with the real damages previously inspected, it was also applied to foresee the behavior of the same mechanisms with different actions and with different types of strengthening

From Art to Science of Construction: the Permanence of Proportional Rules in the “Strange Case” of the 19th Century Ponte Taro Bridge (Parma, Italy)

The bridge commissioned by Maria Luigia to Eng. Antonio Cocconcelli and built between 1816 and 1821 over the Taro River (near Parma, Northern Italy), is a very important monument, both from a cultural and strategic point of view. This 20 arches masonry bridge reaches the length of nearly 600 meters and constitutes a very interesting case study, not only for the technical and structural issues related to its restoration and use (with increased traffic loads) but also for the role that geometry played in its history and stability. In this paper, a compared analysis on the historical ‘proportional theory’ and the constructive features of this ancient bridge is proposed with the final aim to show the importance of recovering “empiricism” in dealing with ancient monuments. Thanks to a high precision survey the realized structure has been compared to the original project, in order to detect the deformations suffered by the structure in time, thus applying the “historical monitoring” procedure to the monument. Hence, starting from the dimensional theory, a static analysis of the bridge is proposed by means of Mery’s graphic method, in order to investigate the structural safety level of the original project, also considering the current load conditions. A comparison with the static results obtained by means of limit analysis, finally shows the validity of ancient proportional theory, which can constitute a first qualitative method for structural validation of ancient masonry structures

Evaluating the Impact of Hydrophobic Silicon Dioxide in the Interfacial Properties of Lung Surfactant Films

CRUE-CSIC (Acuerdos Transformativos 2022)The interaction of hydrophobic silicon dioxide particles (fumed silicon dioxide), as model air pollutants, and Langmuir monolayers of a porcine lung surfactant extract has been studied in order to try to shed light on the physicochemical bases underlying the potential adverse effects associated with pollutant inhalation. The surface pressure−area isotherms of lung surfactant (LS) films including increasing amounts of particles revealed that particle incorporation into LS monolayers modifies the organization of the molecules at the water/vapor interface, which alters the mechanical resistance of the interfacial films, hindering the ability of LS layers for reducing the surface tension, and reestablishing the interface upon compression. This influences the normal physiological function of LS as is inferred from the analysis of the response of the Langmuir films upon the incorporation of particles against harmonic changes of the interfacial area (successive compression−expansion cycles). These experiments evidenced that particles alter the relaxation mechanisms of LS films, which may be correlated to a modification of the transport of material within the interface and between the interface and the adjacent fluid during the respiratory cycle.Depto. de Química FísicaFac. de Ciencias QuímicasTRUEUnión Europea. Horizonte 2020Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (MICINN)pu

Neighborhood radius estimation in Variable-neighborhood Random Fields

We consider random fields defined by finite-region conditional probabilities depending on a neighborhood of the region which changes with the boundary conditions. To predict the symbols within any finite region it is necessary to inspect a random number of neighborhood symbols which might change according to the value of them. In analogy to the one dimensional setting we call these neighborhood symbols the context of the region. This framework is a natural extension, to d-dimensional fields, of the notion of variable-length Markov chains introduced by Rissanen (1983) in his classical paper. We define an algorithm to estimate the radius of the smallest ball containing the context based on a realization of the field. We prove the consistency of this estimator. Our proofs are constructive and yield explicit upper bounds for the probability of wrong estimation of the radius of the context

Effect of Silica Nanoparticles on Rheological and Structural Properties of DPPC Langmuir Monolayers

The study of the interaction between nanoparticles and model of lung surfactant is of great relevance to understand possible adverse effects of inhalable nanoparticles on the respiratory function [1,2]. We report therefore a study on the interfacial properties, structure and dilational rheology of monolayers of the major lipidic component of the lung surfactant, 1,2-dipalmitoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (DPPC), in the presence of silica nanoparticles. Investigations are performed by a Langmuir trough equipped with Brewster Angle Microscopy

Association of magnesium and vitamin D status with grip strength and fatigue in older adults: a 4-week observational study of geriatric participants undergoing rehabilitation.

BACKGROUND Low magnesium and vitamin D levels negatively affect individuals' health. AIMS We aimed to investigate the association of magnesium status with grip strength and fatigue scores, and evaluate whether this association differs by vitamin D status among older participants undergoing geriatric rehabilitation. METHODS This is a 4-week observational study of participants aged ≥ 65 years undergoing rehabilitation. The outcomes were baseline grip strength and fatigue scores, and 4-week change from baseline in grip strength and fatigue scores. The exposures were baseline magnesium tertiles and achieved magnesium tertiles at week 4. Pre-defined subgroup analyses by vitamin D status (25[OH]D < 50 nmol/l = deficient) were performed. RESULTS At baseline, participants (N = 253, mean age 75.7 years, 49.4% women) in the first magnesium tertile had lower mean grip strength compared to participants in the third tertile (25.99 [95% CI 24.28-27.70] vs. 30.1 [95% CI 28.26-31.69] kg). Similar results were observed among vitamin D sufficient participants (25.54 [95% CI 22.65-28.43] kg in the first magnesium tertile vs. 30.91 [27.97-33.86] kg in the third tertile). This association was not significant among vitamin D deficient participants. At week 4, no significant associations were observed between achieved magnesium tertiles and change in grip strength, overall and by vitamin D status. For fatigue, no significant associations were observed. CONCLUSIONS Among older participants undergoing rehabilitation, magnesium status may be relevant for grip strength, particularly among vitamin D sufficient individuals. Magnesium status was not associated with fatigue, regardless of vitamin D status. STUDY REGISTRATION Clinicaltrials.gov, NCT03422263; registered February 5, 2018

Performance and reproducibility of 13C and 15N hyperpolarization using a cryogen-free DNP polarizer

The setup, operational procedures and performance of a cryogen-free device for producing hyperpolarized contrast agents using dissolution dynamic nuclear polarization (dDNP) in a preclinical imaging center is described. The polarization was optimized using the solid-state, DNP-enhanced NMR signal to calibrate the sample position, microwave and NMR frequency and power and flip angle. The polarization of a standard formulation to yield ~ 4 mL, 60 mM 1-13C-pyruvic acid in an aqueous solution was quantified in five experiments to P(13C) = (38 ± 6) % (19 ± 1) s after dissolution. The mono-exponential time constant of the build-up of the solid-state polarization was quantified to (1032 ± 22) s. We achieved a duty cycle of 1.5 h that includes sample loading, monitoring the polarization build-up, dissolution and preparation for the next run. After injection of the contrast agent in vivo, pyruvate, pyruvate hydrate, lactate, and alanine were observed, by measuring metabolite maps. Based on this work sequence, hyperpolarized 15N urea was obtained (P(15N) = (5.6 ± 0.8) % (30 ± 3) s after dissolution)

Hydrogen Chemisorption on Doubly Vanadium Doped Aluminum Clusters

Producción CientíficaThe interaction of hydrogen with doubly vanadium doped aluminum clusters, AlnV2+ (n = 1–12), is studied experimentally by time-of-flight mass spectrometry and infrared multiple photon dissociation spectroscopy. The hydrogen binding geometry is inferred from comparison with infrared spectra predicted by density functional theory and shows that for the more reactive clusters the hydrogen adsorbs dissociatively. Three sizes, n = 4, 5 and 7, are remarkably unreactive compared to the other clusters. For larger sizes the reactivity decreases, a behavior that is similar to that of singly vanadium doped aluminum clusters, and that might be attributed to geometric and/or electronic shielding of the dopants. By examining the electronic structure of Al6V2+ and Al7V2+, interactions between the frontier orbitals of the clusters and those of H2 that explain the size-dependent reactivity are identified.Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad (Project RYC-2014-15261