A metrological characterization of the Kinect V2 time-of-flight camera

A metrological characterization process for time-of-flight (TOF) cameras is proposed in this paper and applied to the Microsoft Kinect V2. Based on the Guide to the Expression of Uncertainty in Measurement (GUM), the uncertainty of a three-dimensional (3D) scene reconstruction is analysed. In particular, the random and the systematic components of the uncertainty are evaluated for the single sensor pixel and for the complete depth camera. The manufacturer declares an uncertainty in the measurement of the central pixel of the sensor of about few millimetres (Kinect for Windows Features, 2015), which is considerably better than the first version of the Microsoft Kinect (Chow et al., 2012 [1]). This work points out that performances are highly influenced by measuring conditions and environmental parameters of the scene; actually the 3D point reconstruction uncertainty can vary from 1.5 to tens of millimetres

An IoT-aware AAL System to Capture Behavioral Changes of Elderly People

The ageing of population is a phenomenon that is affecting the majority of developed countries around the world and will soon affect developing economies too. In recent years, both industry and academia are focused on the development of several solutions aimed to guarantee a healthy and safe lifestyle to the elderly. In this context, the behavioral analysis of elderly people can help to prevent the occurrence of Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and frailty problems. The innovative technologies enabling the Internet of Things (IoT) can be used in order to capture personal data for automatically recognizing changes in elderly people behavior in an unobtrusive, low-cost and low-power modality. This work aims to describe the ongoing activities within the City4Age project, funded by the Horizon 2020 Programme of the European Commission, mainly focused on the use of IoT technologies to develop an innovative AAL system able to capture personal data of elderly people in their home and city environments. The proposed architecture has been validated through a proof-of-concept focused mainly on localization issues, collection of ambient parameters, and user-environment interaction aspects

Dietary differences in males and females of a strongly sexually dimorphic ungulate

Detailed knowledge of dietary preferences in wild species are important both for understanding evolutionary processes as well as for their conservation. By means of DNA metabarcoding analysis of faecal samples, we investigated the diet of Alpine ibex (Capra ibex), a mountain ungulate characterised by strong sexual dimorphism and segregation, and analysed differences between male and female diet. Despite a low level of selectivity, we found differences in the diet of males and females that consumed different plant in different quantities. Differences were maintained during both spring and summer. Males tended to feed more on plants richer in fibres (i.e., grasses and sedges) and showed stronger seasonal differences while females consumed more digestible plant families (i.e., forbs). Differences in diet between male and female Alpine ibex are compatible with the strong sexual dimorphism and segregation typical of the species and with female reproductive constraints. These results also show that conservation actions have to take into account different ecological needs of males and females in species characterized by sexual dimorphism and segregation