Managing the variability of biomechanical characteristics before the preliminary design stage of a medical device

The very high level of requirements for certification procedures often limit research and development departments to innovate using increments and iterations during the design process for medical devices (MD). Instead of this semi-empirical approach, a structured procedure, a breakthrough innovation should be used when designing an articular MD (prosthesis, implant). The search for concepts can be based on functional analysis and producing behavioural models of the joint in its natural state and/or equipped with the prosthesis. This paper shows how anatomical variables can be managed and integrated using a modular design approach.This study has been realized under the two joint action projects PESSOA 14630YA and PTDC/EME-PME/112977

A programme to determine the exact interior of any connected digital picture

Region filling is one of the most important and fundamental operations in computer graphics and image processing. Many filling algorithms and their implementations are based on the Euclidean geometry, which are then translated into computational models moving carelessly from the continuous to the finite discrete space of the computer. The consequences of this approach is that most implementations fail when tested for challenging degenerate and nearly degenerate regions. We present a correct integer-only procedure that works for all connected digital pictures. It finds all possible interior points, which are then displayed and stored in a locating matrix. Namely, we present a filling and locating procedure that can be used in computer graphics and image processing applications