A Supporting Tool for Enhancing User’s Mental Model Elicitation and Decision-Making in User Experience Research

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction on April 18, 2022, available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10447318.2022.2041885User Experience (UX) research is intended to find insights and elicit applicable requirements to guide usable designs. Card Sorting is one of the most utilized methods. It is used to uncover the user's mental model and increase the usability of existing products. However, although Card Sorting has been widely utilized, most applications are based on spreadsheets. Furthermore, existing tools are principally intended to obtain qualitative information or customized quantitative outcomes to improve the information architecture. In this paper, a supporting tool based on the Card Sorting method is presented and detailed, including a comprehensive use case showing the main features. The tool implements predictive analysis of results through advanced statistics and machine learning techniques, providing comprehensive reports that enable evaluators and UX researchers to obtain high-level knowledge and important quantitative clues to enhance decision-making. The tool has been evaluated with participants and evaluators, obtaining relevant usability results and feedback.This work was partially supported by the Spanish Government under grant number RTI2018- 095255-B-I00]; and the Madrid Research Council under Grant number P2018/TCS-4314

Development of usable applications featuring QR codes for enhancing interaction and acceptance: a case study

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Behaviour & Information Technology on Jan 11, 2022, available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929X.2021.2022209QR codes provide potential opportunities to improve interaction in different areas of application. Even so, this technology has been utilised in punctual and specific standalone applications, being barely applied to broader contexts, such as the educational one, where different scenarios can be considered to take advantage of the same QR-code approach. In this paper, key issues for the development of applications that utilise QR codes to improve sharing and availability of resources are presented, specifically focusing on improving interaction and acceptance. In this way, a holistic approach has been developed where the system is aimed at improving the interaction between educators and students. On the one hand, educators use a web interface to manage educational resources and announcements and automatically generate QR codes. On the other hand, students scan those QR codes using a mobile device, obtaining updated information related to their lectures. This scenario has been evaluated by educators and students, obtaining good results in terms of acceptance, cognitive burden, and overall usability. The approach provides development clues and the evaluation method that can be applied to different contexts, thus representing a generalisable solution.This work was supported by Madrid Research Council: [grant Number P2018/TCS-4314]; Spanish Government: [grant Number RTI2018-095255-B-I00]

Monitoring and forecasting usability indicators: a business intelligence approach for leveraging user-centered evaluation data

Monitoring performance indicators has become a main concern for most organizations today. While much attention has been paid to developing economic, bioinformatics, health, and social media dashboards, little or no attention has been devoted to monitoring and forecasting usability indicators. This can be of interest for analyzing the degree of perceived satisfaction and usability of interactive software products designed or just developed, being also useful as general strategic indicators in human-centered organizations. This paper presents an approach including main measures, Key Performance Indicators, trends, and forecasts to deal with usability information over time and produce new knowledge based on historical data. Also, an instance has been implemented, including data obtained from real software evaluations. Target users have evaluated the approach to validate its suitability, obtaining successful usability results that denote the adequacy of the approach presentedThis work was partially supported by the Spanish Research Agency [grant numbers TED2021-129381B-C21 and PID2021- 122270OB-I00

An automated solution to integrating information architecture into the interactive web-application development process

Information architects are mostly focused on the conceptual modeling and analysis of non-functional aspects in the early stages of interactive web projects. The resulting output is then processed by software engineers to design the needed web interface. However, this flow of information is somehow difficult to automate due to the implicit differences in the conceptual level of information processed by each expert. In order to facilitate this flow of information we propose a tool called Interarch , which helps to establish bridges between the information processed by both professionals, automatically creating analysis and design information for software engineers from the content models created by the information professionals

Synthesis, antibacterial and antifungal activities of naphthoquinone derivatives: a structure–activity relationship study

The synthesis of 1,4-naphthoquinone derivatives is of great interest since these compounds exhibit strong activity as antimalarial, antibacterial, antifungal and anticancer agents. A series of 50 naphthoquinone derivatives was synthesized and evaluated for antibacterial and antifungal activity against Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Enterococcus faecalis, Staphylococcus aureus, Candida krusei, Candida parapsilosis and Cryptococcus neoformans using the broth microdilution method. The Candida species were the most susceptible microorganisms. Halogen derivatives of 1,4-naphthoquinone presented strong activity, e.g., 2-bromo-5-hydroxy-1,4-naphthoquinone, which exhibited inhibition at an MIC of 16 lg/ mL in S. aureus, and 2-chloro-5,8-dihydroxy-1,4-naphthoquinone, with an MIC of 2 lg/mL in C. krusei. These compounds showed higher activity against fungi, but the antibacterial activities were very low. The study of structure–activity relationships is very important in the search for new antimicrobial drugs due to the limited therapeutic arsenal

Isolation and characterization of salt-sensitive mutants of the moderate halophile Halomonas elongata and cloning of the ectoine synthesis genes

The moderate halophile Halomonas elongata Deustche Sommlung fur Mikroorganismen 3043 accumulated ectoine, hydroxyectoine, glutamate, and glutamine in response to osmotic stress (3 M NaCl). Two Tn1732-induced mutants, CHR62 and CHR63, that were severely affected in their salt tolerance were isolated. Mutant CHR62 could not grow above 0.75 M NaCl, and CHR63 did not grow above 1.5 M NaCl. These mutants did not synthesize ectoine but accumulated ectoine precursors, as shown by 13C NMR and mass spectroscopy. Mutant CHR62 accumulated low levels of diaminobutyric acid, and mutant CHR63 accumulated high concentrations of N-γ-acetyl-diaminobutyric acid. These results suggest that strain CHR62 could be defective in the gene for diaminobutyric acid acetyltransferase (ectB), and strain CHR63 could be defective in the gene for the ectoine synthase (ectC). Salt sensitivity of the mutants at 1.5-2.5 M NaCl could be partially corrected by cytoplasmic extracts of the wild-type strain, containing ectoine, and salt sensitivity of strain CHR62 could be partially repaired by the addition of extracts of strain CHR63, which contained N-γ-acetyldiaminobutyric acid. This is the first evidence for the role of N-γ-acetyldiaminobutyric acid as osmoprotectant. Finally, a cosmid from the H. elongata genomic library was isolated which complemented the Ect- phenotype of both mutants, indicating that it carried at least the genes ectB and ectC of the biosynthetic pathway of ectoin

Seminario de Economía Mexicana

Serie de ponencias referentes al Seminario de Economía Mexicana. Memorias del Seminario de Economía Mexicana de 199

Healthcare workers hospitalized due to COVID-19 have no higher risk of death than general population. Data from the Spanish SEMI-COVID-19 Registry

Aim To determine whether healthcare workers (HCW) hospitalized in Spain due to COVID-19 have a worse prognosis than non-healthcare workers (NHCW). Methods Observational cohort study based on the SEMI-COVID-19 Registry, a nationwide registry that collects sociodemographic, clinical, laboratory, and treatment data on patients hospitalised with COVID-19 in Spain. Patients aged 20-65 years were selected. A multivariate logistic regression model was performed to identify factors associated with mortality. Results As of 22 May 2020, 4393 patients were included, of whom 419 (9.5%) were HCW. Median (interquartile range) age of HCW was 52 (15) years and 62.4% were women. Prevalence of comorbidities and severe radiological findings upon admission were less frequent in HCW. There were no difference in need of respiratory support and admission to intensive care unit, but occurrence of sepsis and in-hospital mortality was lower in HCW (1.7% vs. 3.9%; p = 0.024 and 0.7% vs. 4.8%; p<0.001 respectively). Age, male sex and comorbidity, were independently associated with higher in-hospital mortality and healthcare working with lower mortality (OR 0.211, 95%CI 0.067-0.667, p = 0.008). 30-days survival was higher in HCW (0.968 vs. 0.851 p<0.001). Conclusions Hospitalized COVID-19 HCW had fewer comorbidities and a better prognosis than NHCW. Our results suggest that professional exposure to COVID-19 in HCW does not carry more clinical severity nor mortality

Soy isoflavones and their relationship with microflora: beneficial effects on human health in equol producers

The bioavailability of soy isoflavones depends on the composition of the microflora for each subject. Bacteria act on different isoflavones with increased or reduced absorption and cause biotransformation of these compounds into metabolites with higher biological activity. S-equol is the most important metabolite and only 25–65 % of the population have the microflora that produces this compound. The presence of equol-producing bacteria in soy product consumers means that the consumption of such products for prolonged periods leads to lower cardiovascular risk, reduced incidence of prostate and breast cancer, and greater relief from symptoms related to the menopause such as hot flushes and osteoporosis

Spatiotemporal Characteristics of the Largest HIV-1 CRF02_AG Outbreak in Spain: Evidence for Onward Transmissions

Background and Aim: The circulating recombinant form 02_AG (CRF02_AG) is the predominant clade among the human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1) non-Bs with a prevalence of 5.97% (95% Confidence Interval-CI: 5.41–6.57%) across Spain. Our aim was to estimate the levels of regional clustering for CRF02_AG and the spatiotemporal characteristics of the largest CRF02_AG subepidemic in Spain.Methods: We studied 396 CRF02_AG sequences obtained from HIV-1 diagnosed patients during 2000–2014 from 10 autonomous communities of Spain. Phylogenetic analysis was performed on the 391 CRF02_AG sequences along with all globally sampled CRF02_AG sequences (N = 3,302) as references. Phylodynamic and phylogeographic analysis was performed to the largest CRF02_AG monophyletic cluster by a Bayesian method in BEAST v1.8.0 and by reconstructing ancestral states using the criterion of parsimony in Mesquite v3.4, respectively.Results: The HIV-1 CRF02_AG prevalence differed across Spanish autonomous communities we sampled from (p &lt; 0.001). Phylogenetic analysis revealed that 52.7% of the CRF02_AG sequences formed 56 monophyletic clusters, with a range of 2–79 sequences. The CRF02_AG regional dispersal differed across Spain (p = 0.003), as suggested by monophyletic clustering. For the largest monophyletic cluster (subepidemic) (N = 79), 49.4% of the clustered sequences originated from Madrid, while most sequences (51.9%) had been obtained from men having sex with men (MSM). Molecular clock analysis suggested that the origin (tMRCA) of the CRF02_AG subepidemic was in 2002 (median estimate; 95% Highest Posterior Density-HPD interval: 1999–2004). Additionally, we found significant clustering within the CRF02_AG subepidemic according to the ethnic origin.Conclusion: CRF02_AG has been introduced as a result of multiple introductions in Spain, following regional dispersal in several cases. We showed that CRF02_AG transmissions were mostly due to regional dispersal in Spain. The hot-spot for the largest CRF02_AG regional subepidemic in Spain was in Madrid associated with MSM transmission risk group. The existence of subepidemics suggest that several spillovers occurred from Madrid to other areas. CRF02_AG sequences from Hispanics were clustered in a separate subclade suggesting no linkage between the local and Hispanic subepidemics