Interactive activities for families and kids

Treball desenvolupat en el marc del programa "European Project Semester".Museums are generally considered to be essential for our current society and to play a very important role in today’s world. They are a great source of knowledge, since they preserve our heritage and educate their visitors. In addition, museums tend to create a sense of community and unite people with the same interests. For these reasons, such an important museum as the Railway Museum of Catalonia is believed to add a lot of value to the community and always wants to offer a great service offering innovative activities. This report details the project “Interactive Activities for the Railway Museum of Catalonia” developed in 2021 by five international students of the EPS. This project was elaborated at the EPSEVG (Escola Politècnica Superior d’Enginyeria de Vilanova i la Geltrú) located in Vilanova i la Geltrú. The Railway Museum of Catalonia wanted to create a set of interactive activities for families, so children could discover the museum and learn important concepts related to trains in an entertaining way. This, added to the fact that the museum was being renovated, and that other museums also offer “games” for children and families, made them decide to contact the UPC to organize this project with the goal of creating an entertaining set of activities for boys and girls. First of all, extensive research was done. Many museums offer activities, so it is important to know what exactly they offer, and if their activities are effective to educate and entertain or not. Moreover, research about the psychology related to children and interactive activities was essential to understand how to attract children and catch their attention to educate them in an effective manner while they are entertained. The following step was to think about the activities that could fit the museum in Vilanova i la Geltrú. Taking into account the results obtained in the research, different possibilities were thought. Since we had several options, we evaluated them considering the advantages and disadvantages of each of them, and we came up with a final idea. Thirdly, the activity was entirely developed. We created a set of activities implemented on a booklet, and we created a little reward for children that participate in the game. In addition, we developed an online game. This online game has two functions: firstly, it offers a free activity to users that visit the Railway Museum webpage, so people that cannot come to the museum due to different reasons can enjoy it, and secondly, it serves as an appetizer, if someone plays and likes it, there is a greater probability that this person will come to the museum to enjoy the on-site activities. While we developed the face-to-face activity, we realized that people that wanted to complete the activities would need some materials to be able to play. These materials are not free. So, a budget was prepared, and together with our company supervisor, it was decided to look for a sponsor to fund the activities, so the museum could offer them for free. In addition, a test was done. A group of children was taken to the museum and they were asked to complete the activities. When they finished the game, they were asked some questions. Thanks to the results, we were able to incorporate their feedback. Taking into account the feedback received from the families that participated in the test, we adapted the questions that were either not clear enough or too difficult. Lastly, we have added to the report a section of conclusions, where there is an explanation of the results obtained and how the activity is going to be completely implemented at the museum.Incomin

Validation of the Muscle Dysmorphic Disorder Inventory (MDDI) among Italian Women Practicing Bodybuilding and Powerlifting and in Women Practicing Physical Exercise

Studies pertaining to muscle dysmorphia (MD) have concentrated the most on males. However, a new body ideal for women is emerging: a very toned, athletic body with flat, smooth muscles. The emphasis on the level of muscularity represents a contribution to the growth of MD symptoms in women. The aim of this study was to evaluate the factorial structure and psychometric properties of the muscle dysmorphic disorder inventory (MDDI) in two samples of physically active Italian women. One-hundred and sixty-five women practicing non-competing bodybuilding/powerlifting and 353 women practicing physical exercise completed the MDDI and measures of features associated with MD. Findings of the confirmatory factor analysis showed a three-factor structure with acceptable fit and invariant across groups. Omega coefficients revealed adequate internal consistency for all the scales and for the total score of the MDDI. Furthermore, convergent and divergent validity as well as retest reliability emerged to be good. MDDI represents a reliable measure of MD symptoms in physically active Italian women

Dataset on a Small-Scale Film-Coating Process Developed for Self-Expanding 4D Printed Drug Delivery Devices

Film-coating is widely applied in pharmaceutics to enhance aspect/taste and mechanical properties of dosage forms, to protect them from the environment and to modify their release performance. In this respect, a film-coating process was recently involved in the development of 4D printed prolonged-release systems intended for organ retention. During coating processes, liquid formulations are sprayed onto moving cores, whose shape, weight and surface characteristics are essential to attain a homogeneous film. Devices of complex shapes, composed of smart materials and fabricated by hot-processing techniques, such as extrusion and fused deposition modeling 3D printing, might be poorly compatible with the requirements of traditional coating methods, e.g., need for spherical substrates with smooth surface and stable under process temperatures. This work was aimed at evaluating, at a small scale level, the feasibility of a versatile equipment for film-coating of rod-shaped extruded and printed prototypes with different section. Equipment design and set up of process parameters were performed starting from polymeric solutions and suspensions and selecting as cores 50 mm-long rod-shaped samples based on shape memory poly(vinyl alcohol). Integrity and thickness of the applied layer and its impact on shape memory and release performance of prototypes were investigated

Time-Based Formulation Strategies for Colon Drug Delivery

Despite poor absorption properties, delivery to the colon of bioactive compounds administered by the oral route has become a focus of pharmaceutical research over the last few decades. In particular, the high prevalence of Inflammatory Bowel Disease has driven interest because of the need for improved pharmacological treatments, which may provide high local drug concentrations and low systemic exposure. Colonic release has also been explored to deliver orally biologics having gut stability and permeability issues. For colon delivery, various technologies have been proposed, among which time-dependent systems rely on relatively constant small intestine transit time. Drug delivery platforms exploiting this physiological feature provide a lag time programmed to cover the entire small intestine transit and control the onset of release. Functional polymer coatings or capsule plugs are mainly used for this purpose, working through different mechanisms, such as swelling, dissolution/erosion, rupturing and/or increasing permeability, all activated by aqueous fluids. In addition, enteric coating is generally required to protect time-controlled formulations during their stay in the stomach and rule out the influence of variable gastric emptying. In this review, the rationale and main delivery technologies for oral colon delivery based on the time-dependent strategy are presented and discussed