CORF3D contour maps with application to Holstein cattle recognition using RGB and thermal images

Livestock management involves the monitoring of farm animals by tracking certain physiological and phenotypical characteristics over time. In the dairy industry, for instance, cattle are typically equipped with RFID ear tags. The corresponding data (e.g. milk properties) can then be automatically assigned to the respective cow when they enter the milking station. In order to move towards a more scalable, affordable, and welfare-friendly approach, automatic non-invasive solutions are more desirable. Thus, a non-invasive approach is proposed in this paper for the automatic identification of individual Holstein cattle from the side view while exiting a milking station. It considers input images from a thermal-RGB camera. The thermal images are used to delineate the cow from the background. Subsequently, any occluding rods from the milking station are removed and inpainted with the fast marching algorithm. Then, it extracts the RGB map of the segmented cattle along with a novel CORF3D contour map. The latter contains three contour maps extracted by the Combination of Receptive Fields (CORF) model with different strengths of push-pull inhibition. This mechanism suppresses noise in the form of grain type texture. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is demonstrated by means of experiments using a 5-fold and a leave-one day-out cross-validation on a new data set of 3694 images of 383 cows collected from the Dairy Campus in Leeuwarden (the Netherlands) over 9 days. In particular, when combining RGB and CORF3D maps by late fusion, an average accuracy of was obtained for the 5-fold cross validation and for the leave–one day–out experiment. The two maps were combined by first learning two ConvNet classification models, one for each type of map. The feature vectors in the two FC layers obtained from training images were then concatenated and used to learn a linear SVM classification model. In principle, the proposed approach with the novel CORF3D contour maps is suitable for various image classification applications, especially where grain type texture is a confounding variable

Thermographic imaging in diabetic patients with critical limb ischemia undergoing endovascular revascularisation

Introduction: The success of endovascular intervention for lower limb arterial occlusive disease is usually based on radiological evidence and physiological testing. However current tools to assess peripheral arterial disease (PAD) have significant limitations particularly in patients with diabetes and critical limb ischaemia (CLI). Method: Forty patients undergoing endovascular treatment of stenotic or occlusive lower limb arterial disease were recruited and underwent physiological testing (ankle brachial pressure index, toe pressure index, pulsatility index, spectral waveforms) as well as infrared thermography of both lower limbs at pre-intervention (pre) and at two separate time points after intervention (post 1 within 48 hours and post 2 at 6-8 weeks). The pre and post results of both the thermographic images as well as the physiological data were compared. Results: Thermography could be performed in all subjects, while standard physiological tools could not and were only found useful in a small proportion of patients. In the treated limbs there was a significant increase in temperature readings in the metatarsal aspect of the foot (p-value of 0.0001 between pre and post 1, p-value of 0.056 between pre and post two), heels (p-value 0.009 between pre and post one, p-value of 0.045 at pre and post two) and shins (p-value 0.008 at pre and post one, p-value of 0.006 between pre and post two) after revascularisation, while no change was seen in the untreated limb, indicating thermography usefulness in assessing the success of endovascular intervention. Standard physiological tools were only found useful in 10 out of the 40 treated limbs. Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that thermography has significant potential in assessing the success of endovascular revascularisation in patients with CLI compared to standard physiological testing.peer-reviewe

Brain symmetry index in healthy and stroke patients for assessment and prognosis

Quantitative neurophysiological signal parameters are of value in predicting motor recovery after stroke.Thenovel role of EEG-derived brain symmetry index formotor function prognostication in the subacute phase after stroke is explored. Ten male stroke patients and ten matched healthy controls were recruited. Motor function was first assessed clinically using the MRC score, its derivativeMotricity Index, and the Fugl–Meyer assessment score. EEG was subsequently recorded firstwith subjects at rest and then during hand graspingmotions, triggered by visual cues. Brain symmetry index (BSI) was used to identify the differences in EEG-quantified interhemispheric cortical power asymmetry observable in healthy versus cortical and subcortical stroke patients. Subsequently, any correlation between BSI and motor function was explored. BSI was found to be significantly higher in stroke subjects compared to healthy controls ( = 0.023). The difference in BSI was more pronounced in the cortical stroke subgroup ( = 0.016). BSI showed only a mild general decrease on repeated monthly recording. Notably, a statistically significant correlation was observed between early BSI and Fugl–Meyer score later in recovery ( < 0.050). Brain symmetry index is increased in the subacute poststroke phase and correlates with motor function 1-2 months after stroke.peer-reviewe

Emotional testing on Facebook’s user experience

This study aims at understanding how a user's emotions fluctuate when undertaking certain tasks on a social media platform such as Facebook or other software products which may have emotional effects on its user. Speci cally, we explored the difference in the usability aspect of Facebook concerning frequent and new Facebook users. The study involves a qualitative study on eighteen participants, nine of whom were Facebook users and nine non-Facebook users who had never used Facebook before participating in this study. During the testing procedure, users were asked to complete several tasks on Facebook, while the electrophysiological activity of their brain was recorded using an EEG (electroencephalogram) acquisition system. Certainly, this study can be applied to any software product, before its release, to improve its user interface by acquiring insight into how user-friendly it is for new users when compared to frequent users. Additionally, a correlation in user friendliness between new users and frequent users is investigated. Furthermore, the study will help us discern which parts of the brain had the most signi cant difference between groups and discuss the motives behind an individual's emotional state, concerning user experience. Based on the analysis of the power spectrum of the characteristic brain waves, this research establishes that there is a substantial statistical difference between new and frequent Facebook users. Also, it resulted that there is a signi cant difference between the central, temporal and occipital lobes of new and frequent users. These results will assist developers in creating optimal and user-friendly software products.peer-reviewe

The influence of blood flow on skin surface temperature in the lower-limbs : a research article

Background: Peripheral arterial disease (PAD) tends to be associated with lower foot skin temperatures, however it is dubious whether there is enough evidence to support this claim. Skin temperature monitoring, and its ability to be an independent diagnostic modality for PAD, particularly in diabetes, has gained remarkable interest in recent years, but its ability to detect and diagnose PAD is not yet clear.Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted in: Academic Search Ultimate, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, LISTA, and MEDLINE Complete until February 2022.Results: A total of nine studies were eligible for review. For the purpose of this review, the inclusion studies were grouped according to the type of investigation analysed: those investigating lower-limb thermal patterns in various populations and those investigating comparisons between various outcome measures to assess blood flow to the feet, including skin temperature measurement. Findings suggest that higher foot skin temperatures were found in PAD patients with Diabetes Mellitus (DM). Foot skin temperature measurements also showed a clear correlation with blood flow to the feet, evaluated by ABI.Conclusions: Variations in foot skin temperature play an important role in the diagnosis of PAD. Current evidence shows that the influence of blood flow on surface skin temperature is complex. The interpretation of thermography as a diagnostic modality for PAD and its severity needs to be considered within the context of the overall medical condition of the individual patient.peer-reviewe

Brain Symmetry Index in Healthy and Stroke Patients for Assessment and Prognosis

Objective. Quantitative neurophysiological signal parameters are of value in predicting motor recovery after stroke. The novel role of EEG-derived brain symmetry index for motor function prognostication in the subacute phase after stroke is explored. Methods. Ten male stroke patients and ten matched healthy controls were recruited. Motor function was first assessed clinically using the MRC score, its derivative Motricity Index, and the Fugl-Meyer assessment score. EEG was subsequently recorded first with subjects at rest and then during hand grasping motions, triggered by visual cues. Brain symmetry index (BSI) was used to identify the differences in EEG-quantified interhemispheric cortical power asymmetry observable in healthy versus cortical and subcortical stroke patients. Subsequently, any correlation between BSI and motor function was explored. Results. BSI was found to be significantly higher in stroke subjects compared to healthy controls ( = 0.023). The difference in BSI was more pronounced in the cortical stroke subgroup ( = 0.016). BSI showed only a mild general decrease on repeated monthly recording. Notably, a statistically significant correlation was observed between early BSI and Fugl-Meyer score later in recovery ( &lt; 0.050). Conclusions. Brain symmetry index is increased in the subacute poststroke phase and correlates with motor function 1-2 months after stroke

The effects of skin temperature changes on the integrity of skin tissue : a systematic review

OBJECTIVE To determine whether changes in skin temperature can affect the integrity of skin.METHODOLOGY The authors conducted a systematic literature search as per the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses) guidelines. They searched the CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature), Cochrane, MEDLINE Complete, Academic Search Ultimate, and HyDi databases for articles examining the effects of skin temperature on skin integrity published through April 2020. Two independent reviewers scored the methodologic quality of the 13 included studies.RESULTS Only 11 studies were included in the qualitative analysis, as the other two articles had a critical risk of bias. There is strong evidence to indicate that an increase in skin temperature leads to changes in skin structure and function. However, ulcer formation was more affected by intrinsic and extrinsic factors, rather than by temperature alone.CONCLUSION Further high-quality randomized controlled trials are required to investigate the direct effect of skin temperature on ulceration.peer-reviewe

Non–invasive vital signs monitoring in the adult population in clinical settings — current state of the art and beyond

The aim is to delineate the current state of the art in non-contact red-green-blue (RGB) camera-based heart rate and rhythm monitoring in adult populations in the clinical setting. In addition, the challenges that still exist for more widespread use of this technology are outlined, as well as potential ways to overcome them. A search using Boolean operators was carried out in PubMed, Google Scholar, IEEE Xplore, CINAHL and Cochrane databases using predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria. Studies within hospital settings that extract heart rate data from videos of adult patients were identified and their successes and limitations were analysed from a clinical perspective. Fifteen studies were identified that fit the inclusion criteria. Many of these studies took place in emergency department settings, with the postoperative care unit being another environment that was investigated. Although good correlation between gold standard measurements and camera-based values were obtained overall, there are still challenges related to patient movement, changes in illumination and standardisation of techniques. This may be the reason that the use of this technology is not yet commonplace. Although a lot of valuable work has been performed highlighting the advantages and feasibility of using camera-based photoplethysmography to extract heart rate data in clinical scenarios, challenges still need to be overcome before these systems can become more mainstream in clinical practise. Therefore more research needs to be conducted in the eld of non-invasive vital signs monitoring in the clinical setting.peer-reviewe

Non-contact vital signs monitoring in paediatric anaesthesia – current challenges and future direction

Non-contact vital sign monitoring is an area of increasing interest in the clinical scenario since it offers advantages over traditional monitoring using leads and wires. These advantages include reduction in transmission of infection and more freedom of movement. Yet there is a paucity of studies available in the clinical setting particularly in paediatric anaesthesia. This scoping review aims to investigate why contactless monitoring, specifically with red-green-blue cameras, is not implemented in mainstream practise. The challenges, drawbacks and limitations of non-contact vital sign monitoring, will be outlined, together with future direction on how it can potentially be implemented in the setting of paediatric anaesthesia, and in the critical care scenario.peer-reviewe

Thermographic patterns of the upper and lower limbs : baseline data

This study was supported by an internal University of Malta Research Grant PODRP01-1. The study sponsor had no involvement in the execution and analysis of this study.To collect normative baseline data and identify any significant differences between hand and foot thermographic distribution patterns in a healthy adult population. Design. A single-centre, randomized, prospective study. Methods. Thermographic data was acquired using a FLIR camera for the data acquisition of both plantar and dorsal aspects of the feet, volar aspects of the hands, and anterior aspects of the lower limbs under controlled climate conditions. Results. There is general symmetry in skin temperature between the same regions in contralateral limbs, in terms of both magnitude and pattern. There was also minimal intersubject temperature variation with a consistent temperature pattern in toes and fingers. The thumb is the warmest digit with the temperature falling gradually between the 2nd and the 5th fingers. The big toe and the 5th toe are the warmest digits with the 2nd to the 4th toes being cooler. Conclusion. Measurement of skin temperature of the limbs using a thermal camera is feasible and reproducible. Temperature patterns in fingers and toes are consistent with similar temperatures in contralateral limbs in healthy subjects. This study provides the basis for further research to assess the clinical usefulness of thermography in the diagnosis of vascular insufficiency.peer-reviewe