Culture-based artefacts to inform ICT design: foundations and practice

Cultural aspects frame our perception of the world and direct the many different ways people interact with things in it. For this reason, these aspects should be considered when designing technology with the purpose to positively impact people in a community. In this paper, we revisit the foundations of culture aiming to bring this concept in dialogue with design. To inform design with cultural aspects, we model reality in three levels of formality: informal, formal, and technical, and subscribe to a systemic vision that considers the technical solution as part of a more complex social system in which people live and interact. In this paper, we instantiate this theoretical and methodological view by presenting two case studies of technology design in which culture-based artefacts were employed to inform the design process. We claim that as important as including issues related to culture in the ICT design agenda—from the conception to the development, evaluation, and adoption of a technology—is the need to support the design process with adequate artefacts that help identifying cultural aspects within communities and translating them into sociotechnical requirements. We argue that a culturally informed perspective on design can go beyond an informative analysis, and can be integrated with the theoretical and methodological framework used to support design, throughout the entire design process

Strategies and Tools to Raise Energy Awareness Collectively

Providing smart meters and technology for feedback on energy consumption have been considered strategic in current energy policies as part of the battle against climate change. However, feedback alone does not always lead to energy savings. Beyond information on their own consumption and generic advices, people usually still need more specific guidance on how to change their behaviour in an effective and sustainable way. This research considers electricity consumption feedback as a learning element for collective knowledge building, and relies mainly on dialogue and collaboration to engage people with energy conservation as a social issue. To this end, a set of artefacts for triggering and mediating discussions on energy consumption within social groups was developed and evaluated with community leaders in the UK. In a series of 3 workshops, participants discussed how this approach and tools could help them in their mission of disseminating the energy conservation message to the community. Our results show that developing knowledge within a social group is an effective approach in raising awareness, and suggest that tangible artefacts can have an important role in engaging people. Also, initiatives aiming at engaging a wide range of the public must consider different degrees of familiarity with technology, as well as the different perceptions people may have relating energy consumption and environmental protection

Modified POF Sensor for Gaseous Hydrogen Fluoride Monitoring in the Presence of Ionizing Radiations

This paper describes the development of a sensor designed to detect low concentrations of hydrogen fluoride (HF) in gas mixtures. The sensor employs a plastic optical fiber (POF) covered with a thin layer of glass- like material. HF attacks the glass and alters the fiber transmission capability so that the detection simply requires a LED and a photodiode. The coated POF is obtained by means of low-pressure plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition that allows the glass-like film to be deposited at low temperature without damaging the fiber core. The developed sensor will be installed in the recirculation gas system of the resistive plate chamber muon detector of the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment at the Large Hadron Collider accelerator of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN

Eco-friendly gas mixtures for Resistive Plate Chambers based on Tetrafluoropropene and Helium

Due to the recent restrictions deriving from the application of the Kyoto protocol, the main components of the gas mixtures presently used in the Resistive Plate Chambers systems of the LHC experiments will be most probably phased out of production in the coming years. Identifying possible replacements with the adequate characteristics requires an intense R&D, which was recently started, also in collaborations across the various experiments. Possible candidates have been proposed and are thoroughly investigated. Some tests on one of the most promising candidate - HFO-1234ze, an allotropic form of tetrafluoropropane- have already been reported. Here an innovative approach, based on the use of Helium, to solve the problems related to the too elevate operating voltage of HFO-1234ze based gas mixtures, is discussed and the relative first results are shown.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures, 1 tabl

Ethics and Design in the Brazilian Context

Often driven by practical and immediate requirements, more and more people are incorporating technology into a variety of aspects of their lives, often without reflecting on the consequences of using them. On the other hand, studies on interactive system development that lead to behavioral change have been gaining ground on the agenda of large HCI conferences. This movement brings to the forefront the fundamental issues of ethics in design and technology use. A designer’s intentions, when directing certain actions or behaviors, are not always explicit or desired by the stakeholders affected by the use of the technology. Systems that induce an undesired purchase, or even those that use conditioning strategies to cause a behavioral change are examples of such intentions. The challenge proposed is therefore about the relationship between design and personal freedom in a way that these technology users do not become victims, either passively or submissively, of the effects of its use. This advance allows for the redefinition of the relationship between man and technology, and the application of new forms of designing and developing interactive systems that take into account the ethical aspects of this relationship

Non-Exclusive Financial Advice

We propose a simple model of non-exclusive financial advice in which two households rely on a self-interested (common) expert to make their investment choices. There is only one source of risk, and the expert is privately informed about the risky asset's volatility. When monetary transfers are unenforceable, we show that investors may delegate their investment decisions to the expert. When doing so, however, they impose restrictions on her choices which crucially depend on whether the expert perceives investors' asset allocations as complements or as substitutes. Finally, we analyze the implications of non-exclusivity in financial advice on investment behavior and welfare, and highlight a set of novel testable implications

Fiber Bragg Grating sensors for deformation monitoring of GEM foils in HEP detectors

Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) sensors have been so far mainly used in high energy physics (HEP) as high precision positioning and re-positioning sensors and as low cost, easy to mount, radiation hard and low space- consuming temperature and humidity devices. FBGs are also commonly used for very precise strain measurements. In this work we present a novel use of FBGs as flatness and mechanical tensioning sensors applied to the wide Gas Electron Multiplier (GEM) foils of the GE1/1 chambers of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment at Large Hadron Collider (LHC) of CERN. A network of FBG sensors has been used to determine the optimal mechanical tension applied and to characterize the mechanical stress applied to the foils. The preliminary results of the test performed on a full size GE1/1 final prototype and possible future developments will be discussed.Comment: Four pages, seven figures. Presented by Michele Caponero at IWASI 2015, Gallipoli (Italy

Pseudo ainhum and facial malformation secondary to Streeter's dysplasia

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