Learning-Based Adaptation for Personalized Mobility Assistance

Mobility assistance is of key importance for people with disabilities to remain autonomous in their preferred environments. In severe cases, assistance can be provided by robotized wheelchairs that can perform complex maneuvers and/or correct the user’s commands. User’s acceptance is of key importance, as some users do not like their commands to be modified. This work presents a solution to improve acceptance. It consists of making the robot learn how the user drives so corrections will not be so noticeable to the user. Case Based Reasoning (CBR) is used to acquire a user’s driving model reactive level. Experiments with volunteers at Fondazione Santa Lucia (FSL) have proven that, indeed, this customized approach at assistance increases acceptance by the user.This work has been partially supported by the Spanish Ministerio de Educacion y Ciencia (MEC), Project TEC2011-29106-C02-01. The authors would like to thank Santa Lucia Hospedale and all volunteers for their kind cooperation and Sauer Medica for providing the power wheelchair

Estimation of the Interaction Forces in a Compliant pHRI Gripper

Physical human–robot interaction (pHRI) is an essential skill for robots expected to work with humans, such as assistive or rescue robots. However, due to hard safety and compliance constraints, pHRI is still underdeveloped in practice. Tactile sensing is vital for pHRI, as constant occlusions while grasping make it hard to rely on vision or range sensors alone. More specifically, measuring interaction forces in the gripper is crucial to avoid injuries, predict user intention and perform successful collaborative movements. This work exploits the inherent compliance of a gripper with four underactuated fingers which was previously designed by the authors and designed to manipulate human limbs. A new analytical model is proposed to calculate the external interaction forces by combining all finger forces, which are estimated by using the gripper proprioceptive sensor readings uniquely. An experimental evaluation of the method and an example application in a control system with active compliance have been included to evaluate performance. The results prove that the proposed finger arrangement offers good performance at measuring the lateral interaction forces and torque around the gripper’s Z-axis, providing a convenient and efficient way of implementing adaptive and compliant grasping for pHRI applications.This work was supported by the Universidad de Málaga, project UMA20-FEDERJA-052. Partial funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málag

Guia breu de difusió científica per a docents. Com publicar el meu treball?

Departament d'Educació. Codi d’assignatura: SAP00

Efetividade de intervenções fisioterapêuticas para o vaginismo: uma revisão da literatura

Vaginismus is an involuntary contraction of the vaginal muscles which makes sexual intercourse difficult or impossible - hence interfering in personal and marital relationships - for which physical therapy strategies have been proposed. The aim of this review was to assess the effectiveness of physical therapy interventions for vaginismus. Clinical trials in which participants were diagnosed with vaginismus were searched for in Scielo and Pubmed databases between 1998 and 2009. Exclusion criteria were: review and transversal studies; studies where patients presented signs and symptoms of vaginismus resulting from other diseases; and studies in which the interventions proposed can't be carried out by physical therapists. Only three studies were found, in which the following therapies were used: Master & Johnson's; sexual cognitive-behavioural therapy plus functional electrical stimulation-biofeedback; and desensitization by silicone dilators. All three studies were evaluated as having poor methodological quality and did not provide consistent evidence for clinical interventions in vaginismus. Due to the scarcity of studies found, no metanalysis was done, only a critical review. No consistent evidence could thus be found on satisfactory clinical physical therapies for vaginismus. Further randomized clinical trials, of high quality, are needed to assess the effectiveness of the treatments proposed.O vaginismo é uma persistente contração involuntária da musculatura da vagina que interfere na penetração, impedindo a relação sexual e podendo comprometer as relações interpessoais e conjugais, para o qual algumas estratégias de fisioterapia têm sido propostas. O objetivo desta revisão foi avaliar a efetividade de tratamentos fisioterapêuticos propostos para o vaginismo. Foram levantados estudos em que o diagnóstico clínico da amostra fosse vaginismo, nas bases de dados Pubmed e Scielo, entre 1998 e 2009. Foram excluídos artigos de revisão, estudos transversais, ou em que as participantes referiam sinais e sintomas de vaginismo decorrentes de outras doenças, ou ainda com intervenções não realizadas por fisioterapeutas. Foram identificados apenas três estudos que se adequaram a esses critérios, em que foram utilizadas as terapias: sexual cognitiva comportamental associada à estimulação elétrica funcional com biofeedback; de dessensibilização por dilatadores de silicone; e a proposta por Masters & Johnson. Os estudos foram avaliados como de baixa qualidade metodológica e não forneciam evidências consistentes para a intervenção fisioterapêutica no vaginismo. Não foi possível efetuar uma metanálise, mas uma revisão crítica, devido à escassez de trabalhos. Portanto, não foram encontradas evidências consistentes de intervenção clínica satisfatória para o vaginismo. Requerem-se estudos clínicos randomizados, de alta qualidade, para comprovar a efetividade dos tratamentos propostos

Association between habitual school travel and muscular fitness in youth

Objective: To determine whether active school travel is associated with muscular fitness, which is an emerging marker of youth health. Methods: Handgrip strength, vertical jump and vertical jump peak power were measured in n=6829 English schoolchildren (53% males, age 12.9 ± 1.2. years) between 2007 and 2011. Participants were grouped according to self-reported habitual school travel modality. Results: Cyclists had greater handgrip strength than passive travelers. Vertical jump height was greater in walkers and cyclists compared with passive travelers. Jump peak power was also higher in walkers than in the passive travel group. Compared with passive travelers, cyclists had a higher (age, sex and BMI-adjusted) likelihood of good handgrip strength (OR 1.42, 95%CI;1.14-1.76) and walkers were more likely to have good measures for vertical jump peak power (OR 1.14, 95%CI;1.00-1.29). Cyclists' likelihood of having good handgrip strength remained significantly higher when adjusted for physical activity (OR 1.29, 95%CI;1.08-1.46). Conclusion: Muscular fitness differs according to school travel habits. Cycling is independently associated with better handgrip strength perhaps due to the physical demands of the activity. Better muscular fitness may provide another health-related reason to encourage active school travel. © 2014

Pautes per a elaborar el Treball Final de Grau al Grau de Mestre i Mestra d’Educació Primària

Grau de Mestre i Mestra d’Educació Primaria. Codi assignatura: MP1040 - Treball Fi de Gra

SuperTarget and Matador: resources for exploring drug-target relationships

The molecular basis of drug action is often not well understood. This is partly because the very abundant and diverse information generated in the past decades on drugs is hidden in millions of medical articles or textbooks. Therefore, we developed a one-stop data warehouse, SuperTarget that integrates drug-related information about medical indication areas, adverse drug effects, drug metabolization, pathways and Gene Ontology terms of the target proteins. An easy-to-use query interface enables the user to pose complex queries, for example to find drugs that target a certain pathway, interacting drugs that are metabolized by the same cytochrome P450 or drugs that target the same protein but are metabolized by different enzymes. Furthermore, we provide tools for 2D drug screening and sequence comparison of the targets. The database contains more than 2500 target proteins, which are annotated with about 7300 relations to 1500 drugs; the vast majority of entries have pointers to the respective literature source. A subset of these drugs has been annotated with additional binding information and indirect interactions and is available as a separate resource called Matador. SuperTarget and Matador are available at http://insilico.charite.de/supertarget and http://matador.embl.d

Método de obtención de anticuerpos anti-hHDC y aplicaciones de los mismos

La presente invención proporciona un método para la obtención de anticuerpos, mono y/o policlonales, que interaccionan frente a la histidina descarboxilasa humana (hHDC), así como los polinucleótidos y polipéptidos necesarios para llevarlo a cabo. Del mismo modo, los usos de los mencionados anticuerpos, así como los kits de diagnóstico de los que formen parte también son objeto de la presente invención.REIVINDICACIONES: 1. Polinucleótido, capaz de codificar un polinpéptido capaz de generar de anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos específicos frente a hHDC, cuya secuencia es elegida del grupo: a.Secuencia que comprende SEQ ID 1 b.Secuencia que consiste en SEQ ID 1 o comprende fragmentos de ésta. c.Secuencia que difiera de las secuencias a o b debido a la degeneración del código genético. d.Secuencias que compartan al menos un 80%, 90%, 95% ó 98% de homología con cualquiera de las secuencias anteriores. 2. Polipéptido, según la reivindicación 1, capaz de generar anticuerpos específicos frente a hHDC y cuya secuencia es elegida del grupo: a.Secuencia que comprende SEQ ID 2 b.Secuencia que consiste en SEQ ID 2 o comprende fragmentos de ésta. c.Secuencia que comparta al menos un 80%, 90%, 95% ó 98% de homología la secuencia a o b. 3. Anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos específicos frente a hHDC, en donde dichos anticuerpos interaccionan específicamente frente cualquiera de los polipéptidos de la reivindicación 2. 4. Uso de cualquiera de los polipéptidos según la reivindicación 2 para la generación de anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos específicos frente a hHDC. 5. Uso según la reivindicación 4 en donde los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos son obtenidos por técnicas de generación de hibridomas. 6. Uso según la reivindicación 4 en donde los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos son obtenidos por la tecnología de "phage display". 7. Uso según la reivindicación 4 en donde los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos son obtenidos por inmunización de mamíferos no humanos. 8. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3, para la elaboración de un medicamento. 9. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3, para la elaboración de un medicamento para el tratamiento de la degeneración neurológica. 10. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3, para la elaboración de un medicamento para el tratamiento de la anafilaxis y/o procesos alérgicos. 11. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3, para la elaboración de un medicamento para el tratamiento la degeneración de epitelios digestivos. 12. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3, para la elaboración de un medicamento para el tratamiento para el tratamiento de diferentes tipos de cáncer. 13. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3, para la elaboración de un medicamento para el tratamiento de procesos infecciosos. 14. Uso de los anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3 para el diagnóstico in vitro de enfermedades. 15. Kit de diagnóstico que comprende la utilización de anticuerpos o fragmentos de los mismos según la reivindicación 3.Cuando una patente se hace internacional, se puede encontrar en el idioma de cada país en que se ha solicitado. En Espacenet se tiene acceso a los documentos en cada idioma.Instituto de Salud Carlos III; Universidad de MálagaSolicitud de patent