Learning the Designer's Preferences to Drive Evolution

This paper presents the Designer Preference Model, a data-driven solution that pursues to learn from user generated data in a Quality-Diversity Mixed-Initiative Co-Creativity (QD MI-CC) tool, with the aims of modelling the user's design style to better assess the tool's procedurally generated content with respect to that user's preferences. Through this approach, we aim for increasing the user's agency over the generated content in a way that neither stalls the user-tool reciprocal stimuli loop nor fatigues the user with periodical suggestion handpicking. We describe the details of this novel solution, as well as its implementation in the MI-CC tool the Evolutionary Dungeon Designer. We present and discuss our findings out of the initial tests carried out, spotting the open challenges for this combined line of research that integrates MI-CC with Procedural Content Generation through Machine Learning.Comment: 16 pages, Accepted and to appear in proceedings of the 23rd European Conference on the Applications of Evolutionary and bio-inspired Computation, EvoApplications 202

AI Researchers, Video Games Are Your Friends!

If you are an artificial intelligence researcher, you should look to video games as ideal testbeds for the work you do. If you are a video game developer, you should look to AI for the technology that makes completely new types of games possible. This chapter lays out the case for both of these propositions. It asks the question "what can video games do for AI", and discusses how in particular general video game playing is the ideal testbed for artificial general intelligence research. It then asks the question "what can AI do for video games", and lays out a vision for what video games might look like if we had significantly more advanced AI at our disposal. The chapter is based on my keynote at IJCCI 2015, and is written in an attempt to be accessible to a broad audience.Comment: in Studies in Computational Intelligence Studies in Computational Intelligence, Volume 669 2017. Springe

Imaging of the urinary tract: the role of CT and MRI

Computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) are increasingly valuable tools for assessing the urinary tract in adults and children. However, their imaging capabilities, while overlapping in some respects, should be considered as complementary, as each technique offers specific advantages and disadvantages both in actual inherent qualities of the technique and in specific patients and with a specific diagnostic question. The use of CT and MRI should therefore be tailored to the patient and the clinical question. For the scope of this article, the advantages and disadvantages of these techniques in children will be considered; different considerations will apply in adult practice

Gemcitabine delivered by fucoidan/chitosan nanoparticles presents increased toxicity over human breast cancer cells

Aim: To produce marine-origin nanoparticles (NPs) aiming to develop more effective and tolerated therapies for breast cancer. Materials & methods: NPs based in two marine-origin polymers (fucoidan and chitosan) were prepared by polyelectrolyte complexation, for the delivery of an antitumor drug model (gemcitabine [Gem]). Results: Final formulation resulted in stable NPs around 115â 140 nm in size and with a polydispersity index less than 0.2. Gem was encapsulated at a maximum entrapment efficiency of 35â 42%. Drug-release studies demonstrated that around 84% of Gem is released within 4 h. Cytotoxicity results of Gem-loaded NPs showed increased toxicity (around 25%) when compared with free Gem. Conclusion: The drug-loaded NPs present increased toxicity over human breast cancer cells without increasing toxic effects over endothelial cells.The authors thank the PhD scholarship of C Oliveira for ‘NORTE-08-5369-000037’ financed by NORTE 2020, Portuguese Foundation for Science and Tecnology (FCT) for the investigator grant of A Martins for (IF/00376/2014) and the support from European Research Council under the Advanced Grant ComplexiTE. The work here reported also received financial support from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) under the Structured Project ‘Accelerating tissue engineering and personalized medicine discoveries by the integration of key enabling nanotechnologies, marine-derived biomaterials and stem cells’ (NORTE-01-0145FEDER-000021),supported by Norte Portugal Regional Operational Program(NORTE2020), under the PORTUGAL2020 Partnership Agreement. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed. No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Embracing additive manufacture: implications for foot and ankle orthosis design

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The design of foot and ankle orthoses is currently limited by the methods used to fabricate the devices, particularly in terms of geometric freedom and potential to include innovative new features. Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies, where objects are constructed via a series of sub-millimetre layers of a substrate material, may present the opportunity to overcome these limitations and allow novel devices to be produced that are highly personalised for the individual, both in terms of fit and functionality.</p> <p>Two novel devices, a foot orthosis (FO) designed to include adjustable elements to relieve pressure at the metatarsal heads, and an ankle foot orthosis (AFO) designed to have adjustable stiffness levels in the sagittal plane, were developed and fabricated using AM. The devices were then tested on a healthy participant to determine if the intended biomechanical modes of action were achieved.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The adjustable, pressure relieving FO was found to be able to significantly reduce pressure under the targeted metatarsal heads. The AFO was shown to have distinct effects on ankle kinematics which could be varied by adjusting the stiffness level of the device.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The results presented here demonstrate the potential design freedom made available by AM, and suggest that it may allow novel personalised orthotic devices to be produced which are beyond the current state of the art.</p

Surveying uveitis specialists—a call for consensus

Thomas Brennan became disillusioned with popular law school rankings and so decided to survey 100 academics, judges, and lawyers on his own, asking them to rank a list of ten schools he provided. He used a composite index similar in structure, but different in content, to those used by main-stream surveyors, such as U.S. News &amp; World Report. As expected, many of the big name schools—Harvard, Yale, Stanford—made it to the top of the list. Penn State, as Brennan recalled, “[Was] about in the middle of the pack. Maybe fifth among the 10 schools listed. ” There was one small problem, however. Penn State had no law school at the time. Brennan had included it to make a point: surveys are limited by both the quality of the questions asked and by how familiar respondents are with the subject being surveyed [1, 2]

A randomised feasibility study to investigate the impact of education and the addition of prompts on the sedentary behaviour of office workers

Abstract Background Office workers have been identified as being at risk of accumulating high amounts of sedentary time in prolonged events during work hours, which has been associated with increased risk of a number of long-term health conditions. There is some evidence that providing advice to stand at regular intervals during the working day, and using computer-based prompts, can reduce sedentary behaviour in office workers. However, evidence of effectiveness, feasibility and acceptability for these types of intervention is currently limited. Methods A 2-arm, parallel group, cluster-randomised feasibility trial to assess the acceptability of prompts to break up sedentary behaviour was conducted with office workers in a commercial bank (n = 21). Participants were assigned to an education only group (EG) or prompt and education group (PG). Both groups received education on reducing and breaking up sitting at work, and the PG also received hourly prompts, delivered by Microsoft Outlook over 10 weeks, reminding them to stand. Objective measurements of sedentary behaviour were made using activPAL monitors worn at three time points: baseline, in the last 2 weeks of the intervention period and 12 weeks after the intervention. Focus groups were conducted to explore the acceptability of the intervention and the motivations and barriers to changing sedentary behaviour. Results Randomly generated, customised prompts, delivered by Microsoft Outlook, with messages about breaking up sitting, proved to be a feasible and acceptable way of delivering prompts to office workers. Participants in both groups reduced their sitting, but changes were not maintained at follow-up. The education session seemed to increase outcome expectations of the benefits of changing sedentary behaviour and promote self-regulation of behaviour in some participants. However, low self-efficacy and a desire to conform to cultural norms were barriers to changing behaviour. Conclusions Prompts delivered by Microsoft Outlook were a feasible, low-cost way of prompting office workers to break up their sedentary behaviour, although further research is needed to determine whether this has an additional impact on sedentary behaviour, to education alone. The role of cultural norms, and promoting self-efficacy, should be considered in the design of future interventions. Trial registration This study was registered retrospectively as a clinical trial on ClinicalTrials.gov (ID no. NCT02609282 ) on 23 March 2015

N‒substituted 5‒hydroxy‒pyrrol‒2‒ones based cholecystokinin‒2 antagonists as experimental anticancer agents for the treatment of lung cancer

Background: Cholecystokinin and gastrin are endocrine growths factors for certain tumours and CCK1 R and CCK2R receptors are ideal molecular targets for novel smart chemo‒ therapeutics with a beneficial overall profile due to their anxiolytic and antidepressant properties. Lung cancers are fuelled by gastrin and therefore, selective gastrin (CCK2 R) antagonists are ideal experimental drug candidates. Objective: Synthesis and evaluation of novel CCK antagonists, most preferred CCK2 / gastrin selective for the treatment of lung cancers. Methods: A fast and efficient synthesis of hydroxy‒pyrrolones in 2 steps from renewable biomass was performed. After initial radiolabelled receptor binding studies with hot CCK8, subsequent in vitro evaluation with isolated duodenum preparations confirmed CCK antagonism. Cell based studies using the MTT assay provided a candidate for in vivo xenograft models with nude mice. Rational drug design was supported by molecular modelling experiments. Results: Potent and selective CCK antagonists were prepared as stable crystalline materials in high yields. Gastrin antagonists were in vitro active on isolated tissue preparations and inhibited breast, colon and lung cancer cell lines in vitro with IC50 to 45nM for the privileged hydroxyl‒pyrrolone lead structure in the MTT assay for human cancer cell lines. PNB‒101, a fluorinated 5‒hydroxy‒5‒aryl‒pyrrol‒2‒one, gave up to 80% inhibition of tumour growths by oral administration in athymic mice transplanted with the human lung cancer cell line H727. Conclusion: PNB‒101 is a potential chemotherapeutic agent for CCK‒gastrin related cancers and entered preclinical development