Agile Co-Creation for Robots and Aging (ACCRA) Project

__Introduction__ Worldwide population is getting older. The older persons want to stay independent and wish to increase their engagement in social activities to tackle loneliness, depression, and isolation. Starting from these assumptions, we developed the ACCRA project (Agile Co-Creation for Robots and Aging) with the aim to enable the development of advanced ICT Robotics-based solutions for extending active and healthy aging in daily life by defining, developing and demonstrating an agile co-creation development process. __Methods__ ACCRA robotics solutions will be designed and developed to be tested in three different domains: mobility, daily life, socialization support in four countries (i.e., France, Netherlands, Italy, and Japan). The proposed approach identifies four different phases: (1) needs analysis, (2) agile co-creation, (3) experimentation, and (4) sustainability analysis. Currently, the first two phases were almost completed. For the needs phase, we have used the following recruitment criteria: (1) for mobility: age ≥ 60 years, the and presence of mobility issues assessed by Older Mobility Scale (EMS) with a score > 13; (2) for daily life: age ≥ 60 years, and the presence of difficulties engaging in housework assessed by Autonomie Gérontologie Groupes Iso-Ressources (AGGIR) with a GIR score ≥ 4; (3) for socialization support: age ≥ 60 years, and the absence or mild level of cognitive impairment assessed by Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) with a score ≥ 24. __Results__ The needs analysis and first co-creation sessions focus attention on the experience of older in the four countries. Preliminary results showed how, in all the pilot sites, many expectations were raised from older, formal and informal caregivers about the application of the technology into their life. Minor concerns existed about privacy, real efficacy and modularity in a real-world environment. Overall, a good attitude was recorded towards the use of technologies to support life and promote independent living. Moreover, the older engaged in our studies showed a great interest to be actively involved in the developing phase of something built based on their needs. __Conclusions__ The availability of new solutions to increase independence and quality of life in a sustainable manner appears to be mandatory in the actual society considering the actual socio-economic situation over the industrial countries

Behavior of pseudomonas aeruginosa and enterobacter aerogenes in water from filter jugs

Careless use conditions of filter jugs were applied to simulate and evaluate the behavior of two ubiquitous aquatic bacterial species, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterobacter aerogenes. According to a reference protocol, nine different jugs of popular brands sold in the Italian market were used for the test. Separately, a suspension of the two bacteria was spiked in water used for filling the jugs. The concentration of the test organisms and total aerobic microbial count (TAMC) was measured daily in the filtered water along a period corresponding to the cartridge lifetime. Results showed a different trend of bacterial behavior. E. aerogenes was detectable exclusively on the first day after jug filling, while P. aeruginosa confirmed its persistence over time in all the jugs and its ability to potentially colonize surfaces and cartridges. The TAMC was detected at a concentration range from 102 to 107 CFU/100 mL in all the tests, high values that were not far from those raised in bottled flat natural mineral water weeks after bottling

Evaluation of the Biosorption Capacity and the Methanogenic Inhibition in the Removal of Copper by an Anaerobic Sludge

Proceedings (senza ISBN) del Convegno Gricu "Ingegneria Chimica: Le Nuove Frontiere\u201d, Le Castella (KR), 14-17 settembre 2008. - Biosorption of Cu(II) on anaerobic sludge was investigated in a batch reactor. The study demonstrated the effectiveness of biosorption process: the percentage of copper adsorbed onto sludge particles was 99.5%. Equilibrium data were fitted using Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm models and the results compared by non-linear regression. A better agreement with equilibrium data was shown by Freundlich isotherm. Effects on methane production were also studied in order to investigate if the biosorption process can take place without any change in the biogas production capacity of anaerobic sludge. Results demonstrated that methane production rapidly drops for low metal concentration, and it can be partially recovered with further metals additions