A quantitative taxonomy of human hand grasps

Background: A proper modeling of human grasping and of hand movements is fundamental for robotics, prosthetics, physiology and rehabilitation. The taxonomies of hand grasps that have been proposed in scientific literature so far are based on qualitative analyses of the movements and thus they are usually not quantitatively justified. Methods: This paper presents to the best of our knowledge the first quantitative taxonomy of hand grasps based on biomedical data measurements. The taxonomy is based on electromyography and kinematic data recorded from 40 healthy subjects performing 20 unique hand grasps. For each subject, a set of hierarchical trees are computed for several signal features. Afterwards, the trees are combined, first into modality-specific (i.e. muscular and kinematic) taxonomies of hand grasps and then into a general quantitative taxonomy of hand movements. The modality-specific taxonomies provide similar results despite describing different parameters of hand movements, one being muscular and the other kinematic. Results: The general taxonomy merges the kinematic and muscular description into a comprehensive hierarchical structure. The obtained results clarify what has been proposed in the literature so far and they partially confirm the qualitative parameters used to create previous taxonomies of hand grasps. According to the results, hand movements can be divided into five movement categories defined based on the overall grasp shape, finger positioning and muscular activation. Part of the results appears qualitatively in accordance with previous results describing kinematic hand grasping synergies. Conclusions: The taxonomy of hand grasps proposed in this paper clarifies with quantitative measurements what has been proposed in the field on a qualitative basis, thus having a potential impact on several scientific fields

Perceptions and Attitudes to a Terrorist Shock: Evidence from the UK

The emergence of transnational terrorism in Western countries has raised the debate about security measures, some of which could constrain civil liberties. This is the first paper that uses terrorist attacks (on 7th July, 2005 in London) as an exogenous source of variation to study the dynamics of risk perceptions and its impact on the readiness to trade off civil liberties for enhanced security. In this framework we show that the willingness to trade off security for liberties is dramatically affected by changes in individual risk assessments brought on after a terrorist attack, and document the extent of its persistence

On the Determinants of Terrorism Risk Concern in Europe

We investigate whether differences in terrorism risk are mirrored on terrorism risk concern across European countries for the period 2003-2007. We find that the average propensity for terrorism risk concern is indeed affected by actual risk levels. Furthermore, country and individual heterogeneity contribute substantially to the variation of observed risk concern. According to our findings, males, singles and individuals with white collar jobs are less likely to mention terrorism as one of the most pressing issues their country faces. In contrast, political positioning towards the right end of the spectrum and living in rural areas make it more likely to be concerned about terrorism. As far as competing risks are concerned, we find that the likelihood terrorism is mentioned increases when competing risks' drivers also increase such as taxation, inflation, unemployment and poverty risk at work. In contrast, terrorism is less likely to be mentioned when the determinants of crime, immigration rates, housing costs and pensions are higher. Finally, based on the Bayesian framework we also examine the formation of terrorism risk perceptions, and decompose the observed country level time series of terrorism activity into a long and a short run component. We conclude that the observed risk concern variation is mostly explained by the trend part of terrorism activity countries face, although cyclical variations are also important

The Threat of Terrorism: The Perspective of a Policy-Maker

This note defines and analyzes the most important issues concerning decisionmaking about human-induced insecurities such as terrorism and organized crime from the perspective of a policymaker. By means of modeling the policymakers trade-o_ between the e_ectiveness and costs of policy measures targeted at reducing the threat of terrorism, we aim at helping to understand the role economic research can take to enable e_cient decisionmaking in the context of human-induced insecurities in general and terrorism in particular

Terrorism Risk Concern in Europe

We explore whether differences of terrorism risk perception across all European countries reflect their underlying differences in terrorism risk, which we decompose into a long term and innovation component. We employ longitudinal country-level data on terrorism risk concern and our modeling approach is motivated by the Bayesian framework. We conclude that the observed risk perception variation is significantly explained by the long term terrorism countries face, while the cyclical part of terrorism activity does not affect risk perception

Highlighting the Major Trade-Offs Concerning Anti-Terrorism Policies

Human-induced security, or terrorism, is a threat to wellbeing in Europe and beyond. In this Policy Briefing, we investigate the risks involved in terrorism, both with respect to the likelihood and with respect to the consequences of acts of terrorism. Furthermore, we provide a basic analysis of existing anti-terrorism policies, the costs involved in them and their effectiveness. We show that terrorism is a very broad term, but that one can make a number of broad policy recommendations, including the fact that the rational economic approach to terrorism recognizes that terrorists respond to the incentives they are provided with

How Rational Is the Response of Individuals to the Threat of Terrorism in Europe?

In this Policy Briefing, we address two important questions. We look at the drivers of concern about terrorism and find that beyond individual characteristics, it is also affected by the occurrence of terrorism. When distinguishing between permanent and transitory terrorism, the first has a much stronger impact than the first. The second question concerns how terrorism affects the policy preferences of voters. We find that while a higher level of terrorist concern does increase people's willingness to trade off civil liberties for more security, a singular attack has only a temporary effect. After only a few months, people's preferences return towards their pre-attack levels

Synthesis of diarylamines in the benzo[b]thiophene series bearing electron donating or withdrawing groups by Buchwald–Hartwig C–N coupling

Diarylamines in the benzo[b]thiophene series bearing electron donating or withdrawing groups, were prepared by Buchwald– Hartwig C–N coupling in moderate to high yields. The conditions used were Pd(OAc)2 (3 mol%), BINAP as ligand (4 mol%) and Cs2CO3 as base (1.4 equiv.), in toluene at 1008C, being 6-bromo or amino benzo[b]thiophenes coupled, respectively, with substituted anilines or phenylbromides. The 6-aminobenzo[b]thiophene derivatives were also prepared by palladium catalyzed C–N coupling of the corresponding 6-bromo compounds with benzophenone imine, followed by acidic hydrolysis of the imino derivatives. When 4-nitrobromobenzene and 4-bromobenzonitrile were used as coupling components, triarylamines were also isolated in small amounts. The presence of a fluorine atom on the phenylbromide highly increases the diarylamine yield

Competitive-Binding Based Optical DNA Mapping - From Bacterial Plasmids to the Human Genome

Significant advances within the field of DNA sequencing have allowed us to study DNA at a level of detail that was previously impossible. However, dynamic genomic regions with a high degree of structural variations, while being linked to disease in humans and increased resistance to antibiotics, are still challenging to characterize. Furthermore, DNA sequencing for bacterial diagnostics and detection of resistance genes is presently hampered by the excessive lead times associated with the overall complexity of the applied methods.This Thesis describes the development of novel assays based on optical DNA mapping, which, although studying DNA at a lower resolution, is capable of rapid processing of significantly larger DNA fragments compared to sequencing. The fluorescent labeling in the assays presented here relies on competitive DNA binding between the emissive YOYO-1 and the sequence-specific, non-emissive, netropsin. The labeled DNA is then stretched in nanofluidic channels and imaged using fluorescence microscopy, enabling extraction of coarse-grained sequence information from ultralong DNA molecules at the single-molecule level.The results demonstrate how competitive binding-based optical DNA mapping can be used to characterize and trace bacterial DNA, responsible for the spread of antibiotic resistance. The mapped bacterial DNA can also be used to identify bacterial species in complex mixtures and directly from clinical samples. Additionally, so-called long-range sequence information of the human genome can be obtained, with possible future applications including detection of disease-related structural variations and epigenetic profiling

Does Form follow Function? Connecting Function Modelling and Geometry Modelling for Design Space Exploration

The aerospace industry, representative of industries developing complex products, faces challenges from changes in user behaviour, legislation, environmental policy. Meeting these challenges will require the development of radically new products. Radically new technologies and solutions need to be explored, investigated, and integrated into existing aerospace component architectures. The currently available design space exploration (DSE) methods, mainly based around computer-aided design (CAD) modelling, do not provide sufficient support for this exploration. These methods often lack a representation of the product’s architecture in relation to its design rationale (DR)—they do not illustrate how form follows function. Hence, relations between different functions and solutions, as well as how novel ideas relate to the legacy design, are not captured. In particular, the connection between a product’s function and the embodiment of its solution is not captured in the applied product modelling approaches, and can therefore not be used in the product development process.To alleviate this situation, this thesis presents a combined function and geometry-modelling approach with automated generation of CAD models for variant concepts. The approach builds on enhanced function means (EF-M) modelling for representation of the design space and the legacy design’s position in it. EF-M is also used to capture novel design solutions and reference them to the legacy design’s architecture. A design automation (DA) approach based on modularisation of the CAD model, which in turn is based on the functional decomposition of the product concepts, is used to capture geometric product information. A combined function-geometry object model captures the relations between functions, solutions, and geometry. This allows for CAD models of concepts based on alternative solutions to be generated.The function- and geometry-exploration (FGE) approach has been developed and tested in collaboration with an aerospace manufacturing company. A proof-of-concept tool implementing the approach has been realised. The approach has been validated for decomposition, innovation, and embodiment of new concepts in multiple studies involving three different aerospace suppliers. Application of FGE provides knowledge capture and representation, connecting the teleological and geometric aspects of the product. Furthermore, it supports the exploration of increasingly novel solutions, enabling the coverage of a wider area of the design space.The connection between the modelling domains addresses a research gap for the “integration of function architectures with CAD models”.While the FGE approach has been tested in laboratory environments as well as in applied product development projects, further development is needed to refine CAD integration and user experience and integrate additional modelling domains