3,268 research outputs found
Serious Game Evaluation as a Meta-game
Purpose â This paper aims to briefly outline the seamless evaluation approach and its application during an evaluation of ORIENT, a serious game aimed at young adults.
Design/methodology/approach â In this paper, the authors detail a unobtrusive, embedded evaluation approach that occurs within the game context, adding value and entertainment to the player experience whilst accumulating useful data for the development team.
Findings â The key result from this study was that during the âseamless evaluationâ approach, users were unaware that they had been participating in an evaluation, with instruments enhancing rather than detracting from the in-role game experience.
Practical implications â This approach, seamless evaluation, was devised in response to player expectations, perspectives and requirements, recognising that in the evaluation of games the whole process of interaction including its evaluation must be enjoyable and fun for the user.
Originality/value â Through using seamless evaluation, the authors created an evaluation completely embedded within the âmagic circleâ of an in-game experience that added value to the user experience whilst also yielding relevant results for the development team
Tinnitus and Qigong
Subjective tinnitus is the perception of sound despite the absence of an external stimulus. This challenging sensory event affects millions of people per year. There currently is no cure for tinnitus, but there have been many different options researched to help patients manage its effects, albeit with varying efficacy. In a viral internet video, the Beating the Heavenly Drum maneuver, found in the Eastern practice of Qigong, was said to eliminate the perception of tinnitus for the participants. In this current study, the Beating the Heavenly Drum maneuver was compared to a sham maneuver and evaluated for effectiveness in relieving tinnitus. To be included in this study, participants had experienced tinnitus for at least 6 months and were not currently receiving other tinnitus care. Exclusionary criteria included a diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Traumatic Brain Injury, any neurological condition, whiplash, neck injury, or severe anxiety or depression, as determined by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. Participants completed a tinnitus case history form, Tinnitus Functional Index (TFI), Tinnitus Handicap Index (THI), and Visual Analog Scale (VAS) ranking the annoyance of their tinnitus. Participants were assigned to groups in an alternating fashion, with odd identifiers in Group 1 and even identifiers in Group 2. In Group 2, participants received the experimental maneuver (Beating the Heavenly Drum) during the first session and the sham maneuver (circles rubbed at the base of the skull) during the second. In Group 1, participants received a sham maneuver during the first session and the experimental maneuver during the second session. Within 48 hours after each session, participants completed the TFI, THI, and rated the annoyance of their tinnitus on a scale of 0 to 10 (keeping the same parameters from the VAS) via phone call. Of the twelve participants, two reported that the experimental maneuver, Qigong, was effective for tinnitus relief; while five reported the sham condition relieved their tinnitus. The remaining five participants stated that neither maneuver altered their tinnitus sensation. Across all participants, there were no significant difference scores on the THI, and only one significant difference score on the TFI. While participants reported some change in their tinnitus with either maneuver, none of the questionnaire measures corroborated their subjective report. Additionally, the sham maneuver was perceived as more effective than the experimental maneuver. The Qigong maneuver was not effective for tinnitus relief in this study. It should be noted that a limitation to this study is the small sample size. While this Qigong maneuver did not relieve tinnitus, there are other Internet tinnitus âcuresâ that should be investigated for their effectiveness in tinnitus relief. With the rise of the Internet and more patients searching for âquick fixesâ to tinnitus, it is vital that clinicians provide appropriate education and research to best help patients manage their tinnitus
In vitro efficacy of tavaborole topical solution, 5% after penetration through nail polish on ex vivo human fingernails
This document is the Accepted Manuscript of the following article: Aditya K. Gupta, et al, 'In vitro efficacy of tavaborole topical solution, 5% after penetration through nail polish on ex vivo human fingernails', Journal of Dermatological Treatment, Jan 2018. Under embargo until 10 January 2019. The final, published version is available online at doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/09546634.2017.1422078.Background: Topical antifungal treatments for onychomycosis are applied to clean, unpolished nails for 48 weeks or longer. Patients often wish to mask their infection with nail polish yet there is no evidence to suggest antifungal efficacy in the presence of nail polish. Objective: To determine if tavaborole retains the ability to penetrate the nail plate and inhibit fungal growth in the presence of nail polish. Method: Tavaborole was applied to human fingernails painted with 2 or 4 coats of nail polish, and unpainted nails in an ex vivo model. Nails were mounted on TurChub Âź chambers seeded with Trichophyton rubrum and allowed to incubate for 7 days. Antifungal activity was assessed by measuring zones of inhibition. Results and conclusion: Tavaborole exhibited antifungal activity in all experimental groups. The zones of inhibition of T. rubrum for all experimental groups (2 or 4 coats of polish, unpolished) were greater than infected controls (polished and unpolished), p s <.001. Tavaborole penetrates polished nails and kills T. rubrum in this ex vivo model.Peer reviewe
The value of the Duke Activity Status Index (DASI) in predicting ischaemia in myocardial perfusion scintigraphy — a prospective study
BACKGROUND: Functional capacity assessment may be
a useful tool to stratify patients according to risk of coronary
artery disease (CAD). The Duke Activity Status Index (DASI)
is a functional assessment based on activities of daily living
and cardiovascular fitness, assessed using a self-administered
questionnaire.
MATERIAL AND METHODS: We assessed the relationship
between established clinical risk factors for CAD and the DASI
with results of myocardial perfusion scintigraphy (MPS). The
MPS results used in the analysis were the presence of reversible
ischaemia and the resting left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF).
A DASI self-administered questionnaire was completed by 117
consecutive participants, and a patient history was taken to
ascertain established risk factors. All participants underwent
a stress test, and myocardial perfusion scintigraphy was performed. Statistical analysis consisted of logistic and linear
regression using a statistical software package.
RESULTS: The DASI was the only factor that correlated significantly
with reversible ischaemia on MPS. None of the previously
established risk factors had a significant association with reversible
ischaemia within the model. Our study found a potential
relationship between the DASI score and the left ventricular ejection
fraction (LVEF) although this was not statistically significant.
CONCLUSIONS: Our study findings suggest that the DASI may
represent a powerful tool for risk stratification prior to investigation
of CAD. A further study with a larger sample size will be
required to investigate the predictive value of the DASI and the
association with LVEF.
Nuclear Med Rev 2010; 13, 2: 59–6
In Vitro Gut Modeling as a Tool for Adaptive Evolutionary Engineering of Lactiplantibacillus plantarum
Research and marketing of probiotics demand holistic strain improvement considering both the biotic and abiotic gut environment. Here, we aim to establish the continuous in vitro colonic fermentation model PolyFermS as a tool for adaptive evolutionary engineering. Immobilized fecal microbiota from adult donors were steadily cultivated up to 72âdays in PolyFermS reactors, providing a long-term compositional and functional stable ecosystem akin to the donorâs gut. Inoculation of the gut microbiota with immobilized or planktonic Lactiplantibacillus plantarum NZ3400, a derivative of the probiotic model strain WCFS1, led to successful colonization. Whole-genome sequencing of 45 recovered strains revealed mutations in 16 genes involved in signaling, metabolism, transport, and cell surface. Remarkably, mutations in LP_RS14990, LP_RS15205, and intergenic region LP_RS05100<LP_RS05095 were found in recovered strains from different adaptation experiments. Combined addition of the reference strain NZ3400 and each of those mutants to the gut microbiota resulted in increased abundance of the corresponding mutant in PolyFermS microbiota after 10âdays, showing the beneficial nature of these mutations. Our data show that the PolyFermS system is a suitable technology to generate adapted mutants for colonization under colonic conditions. Analysis thereof will provide knowledge about factors involved in gut microbiota colonization and persistence
The Anomalous Magnetic Moment of the Muon and Higgs-Mediated Flavor Changing Neutral Currents
In the two-Higgs doublet extension of the standard model, flavor-changing
neutral couplings arise naturally. In the lepton sector, the largest such
coupling is expected to be $\mu-\tau-\phi#. We consider the effects of this
coupling on the anomalous magnetic moment of the muon. The resulting bound on
the coupling, unlike previous bounds, is independent of the value of other
unknown couplings. It will be significantly improved by the upcoming E821
experiment at Brookhaven National Lab.Comment: 7 pages Latex, 2 figure
Topological signature of deterministic chaos in short nonstationary signals from an optical parametric oscillator
Although deterministic chaos has been predicted to occur in the triply
resonant optical parametric oscillator (TROPO) fifteen years ago, experimental
evidence of chaotic behavior in this system has been lacking so far, in marked
contrast with most nonlinear systems, where chaos has been actively tracked and
found. This situation is probably linked to the high sensitivity of the TROPO
to perturbations, which adversely affects stationary operation at high power.
We report the experimental observation in this system of a burst of irregular
behavior of duration 80 microseconds. Although the system is highly
nonstationary over this time interval, a topological analysis allows us to
extract a clearcut signature of deterministic chaos from a time series segment
of only 9 base cycles (3 microseconds). This result suggests that
nonstationarity is not necessarily an obstacle to the characterization of
chaos
Testing Hall-Post Inequalities With Exactly Solvable N-Body Problems
The Hall--Post inequalities provide lower bounds on -body energies in
terms of -body energies with . They are rewritten and generalized to
be tested with exactly-solvable models of Calogero-Sutherland type in one and
higher dimensions. The bound for spinless fermions in one dimension is
better saturated at large coupling than for noninteracting fermions in an
oscillatorComment: 7 pages, Latex2e, 2 .eps figure
Uniqueness properties of the Kerr metric
We obtain a geometrical condition on vacuum, stationary, asymptotically flat
spacetimes which is necessary and sufficient for the spacetime to be locally
isometric to Kerr. Namely, we prove a theorem stating that an asymptotically
flat, stationary, vacuum spacetime such that the so-called Killing form is an
eigenvector of the self-dual Weyl tensor must be locally isometric to Kerr.
Asymptotic flatness is a fundamental hypothesis of the theorem, as we
demonstrate by writing down the family of metrics obtained when this
requirement is dropped. This result indicates why the Kerr metric plays such an
important role in general relativity. It may also be of interest in order to
extend the uniqueness theorems of black holes to the non-connected and to the
non-analytic case.Comment: 30 pages, LaTeX, submitted to Classical and Quantum Gravit
Examining a potential brown treesnake transport pathway: shipments from Guam
Shipments of cargo and household goods have been identified as pathways for brown treesnake (Boiga irregularis) transport from Guam to other locations. We analyzed data regarding shipments of military household goods leaving Guam during 2006 to 2009 to identify the potential for human transport of brown treesnakes to the United States by determining when shipments most commonly occur and identifying primary receiving areas. We found that the number of shipments was highest during the months of May and June and that California receives more shipments (23% of total shipments) than any other location. Approximately 98% of shipments originated from the U.S. Navy and U.S. Air Force, with naval shipments increasing over time. Guam is currently undergoing a military buildup during which shipments are expected to increase, suggesting the need for increased vigilance and prioritization of inspection efforts
- âŠ