Therapeutic and educational objectives in robot assisted play for children with autism

“This material is presented to ensure timely dissemination of scholarly and technical work. Copyright and all rights therein are retained by authors or by other copyright holders. All persons copying this information are expected to adhere to the terms and constraints invoked by each author's copyright. In most cases, these works may not be reposted without the explicit permission of the copyright holder." “Copyright IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. However, permission to reprint/republish this material for advertising or promotional purposes or for creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or to reuse any copyrighted component of this work in other works must be obtained from the IEEE.” DOI: 10.1109/ROMAN.2009.5326251This article is a methodological paper that describes the therapeutic and educational objectives that were identified during the design process of a robot aimed at robot assisted play. The work described in this paper is part of the IROMEC project (Interactive Robotic Social Mediators as Companions) that recognizes the important role of play in child development and targets children who are prevented from or inhibited in playing. The project investigates the role of an interactive, autonomous robotic toy in therapy and education for children with special needs. This paper specifically addresses the therapeutic and educational objectives related to children with autism. In recent years, robots have already been used to teach basic social interaction skills to children with autism. The added value of the IROMEC robot is that play scenarios have been developed taking children's specific strengths and needs into consideration and covering a wide range of objectives in children's development areas (sensory, communicational and interaction, motor, cognitive and social and emotional). The paper describes children's developmental areas and illustrates how different experiences and interactions with the IROMEC robot are designed to target objectives in these areas.Final Published versio

The SAMI Galaxy Survey: the intrinsic shape of kinematically selected galaxies

Using the stellar kinematic maps and ancillary imaging data from the Sydney AAO Multi Integral field (SAMI) Galaxy Survey, the intrinsic shape of kinematically-selected samples of galaxies is inferred. We implement an efficient and optimised algorithm to fit the intrinsic shape of galaxies using an established method to simultaneously invert the distributions of apparent ellipticities and kinematic misalignments. The algorithm output compares favourably with previous studies of the intrinsic shape of galaxies based on imaging alone and our re-analysis of the ATLAS3D data. Our results indicate that most galaxies are oblate axisymmetric. We show empirically that the intrinsic shape of galaxies varies as a function of their rotational support as measured by the "spin" parameter proxy Lambda_Re. In particular, low spin systems have a higher occurrence of triaxiality, while high spin systems are more intrinsically flattened and axisymmetric. The intrinsic shape of galaxies is linked to their formation and merger histories. Galaxies with high spin values have intrinsic shapes consistent with dissipational minor mergers, while the intrinsic shape of low-spin systems is consistent with dissipationless multi-merger assembly histories. This range in assembly histories inferred from intrinsic shapes is broadly consistent with expectations from cosmological simulations.Comment: 15 pages, 11 figures, MNRAS in prin

Results from two years of ozone data taken with a new, ground-based microwave instrument: An overview

An overview of two years of data obtained with a ground-based microwave instrument is given. Intercomparisons with data obtained by the co-located JPL lidar and by SAGE 2 during near overpasses of the site are discussed, as are comparisons with mesospheric data taken earlier by SME and LIMS. Observations of diurnal variations of mesospheric ozone are shown

Historical geography II: traces remain

The second report in this series turns to focus on the trace in relation to life-writing and biography in historical geography and beyond. Through attention to tracing journeys, located moments and listening to the presence of ghosts (Ogborn, 2005), this report seeks to highlight the range of different ways in which historical geographers have explored lives, deaths, and their transient traces through varied biographical terrains. Continuing to draw attention in historical geography to the darkest of histories, this piece will pivot on moments of discovering the dead to showcase the nuanced ways in which historical geography is opening doors into uncharted lives and unspoken histories

SimSpin v2.6.0 -- Constructing synthetic spectral IFU cubes for comparison with observational surveys

In this work, we present a methodology and a corresponding code-base for constructing mock integral field spectrograph (IFS) observations of simulated galaxies in a consistent and reproducible way. Such methods are necessary to improve the collaboration and comparison of observation and theory results, and accelerate our understanding of how the kinematics of galaxies evolve over time. This code, SimSpin, is an open-source package written in R, but also with an API interface such that the code can be interacted with in any coding language. Documentation and individual examples can be found at the open-source website connected to the online repository. SimSpin is already being utilised by international IFS collaborations, including SAMI and MAGPI, for generating comparable data sets from a diverse suite of cosmological hydrodynamical simulations.Comment: 20 pages, 15 figures, 2 tables. Accepted for publication in PASA. 30/08/2

Modelling the spatial distribution of DEM Error

Assessment of a DEM’s quality is usually undertaken by deriving a measure of DEM accuracy – how close the DEM’s elevation values are to the true elevation. Measures such as Root Mean Squared Error and standard deviation of the error are frequently used. These measures summarise elevation errors in a DEM as a single value. A more detailed description of DEM accuracy would allow better understanding of DEM quality and the consequent uncertainty associated with using DEMs in analytical applications. The research presented addresses the limitations of using a single root mean squared error (RMSE) value to represent the uncertainty associated with a DEM by developing a new technique for creating a spatially distributed model of DEM quality – an accuracy surface. The technique is based on the hypothesis that the distribution and scale of elevation error within a DEM are at least partly related to morphometric characteristics of the terrain. The technique involves generating a set of terrain parameters to characterise terrain morphometry and developing regression models to define the relationship between DEM error and morphometric character. The regression models form the basis for creating standard deviation surfaces to represent DEM accuracy. The hypothesis is shown to be true and reliable accuracy surfaces are successfully created. These accuracy surfaces provide more detailed information about DEM accuracy than a single global estimate of RMSE

Responsibility modelling for civil emergency planning

This paper presents a new approach to analysing and understanding civil emergency planning based on the notion of responsibility modelling combined with HAZOPS-style analysis of information requirements. Our goal is to represent complex contingency plans so that they can be more readily understood, so that inconsistencies can be highlighted and vulnerabilities discovered. In this paper, we outline the framework for contingency planning in the United Kingdom and introduce the notion of responsibility models as a means of representing the key features of contingency plans. Using a case study of a flooding emergency, we illustrate our approach to responsibility modelling and suggest how it adds value to current textual contingency plans

Chemical tracers of high-metallicity environments

We present for the first time a detailed study of the properties of molecular gas in metal-rich environments such as early-type galaxies (ETGs). We have explored Photon-Dominated Region (PDR) chemistry for a wide range of physical conditions likely to be appropriate for these sources. We derive fractional abundances of the 20 most chemically reactive species as a function of the metallicity, as a function of the optical depth and for various volume number gas densities, Far-Ultra Violet (FUV) radiation fields and cosmic ray ionisation rates. We also investigate the response of the chemistry to the changes in $\alpha-$element enhancement as seen in ETGs. We find that the fractional abundances of CS, H$_{2}$S, H$_{2}$CS, H$_{2}$O, H$_{3}$O$^{+}$, HCO$^{+}$ and H$_{2}$CN seem invariant to an increase of metallicity whereas C$^{+}$, CO, C$_{2}$H, CN, HCN, HNC and OCS appear to be the species most sensitive to this change. The most sensitive species to the change in the fractional abundance of $\alpha-$elements are C$^{+}$, C, CN, HCN, HNC, SO, SO$_{2}$, H$_{2}$O and CS. Finally, we provide line brightness ratios for the most abundant species, especially in the range observable with ALMA. Discussion of favorable line ratios to use for the estimation of super-solar metallicities and $\alpha$-elements are also provided.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, 4 tables, Accepted for publication into MNRA