Contextual barriers to mobile health technology in African countries: a perspective piece

On a global scale, healthcare practitioners are now beginning to move from traditional desktop-based computer technologies towards mobile computing environments[1]. Consequently, such environments have received immense attention from both academia and industry, in order to explore these promising opportunities, apparent limitations, and implications for both theory and practice[2]. The application of mobile IT within a medical context, referred to as mobile health or mHealth, has revolutionised the delivery of healthcare services as mobile technologies offer the potential of retrieving, modifying and entering patient-related data/information at the point-of-care. As a component of the larger health informatics domain mHealth may be referred as all portable computing devices (e.g. mobile phones, mobile clinical assistants and medical sensors) used in a healthcare context to support the delivery of healthcare services

Trustworthy AI Alone Is Not Enough

The aim of this book is to make accessible to both a general audience and policymakers the intricacies involved in the concept of trustworthy AI. In this book, we address the issue from philosophical, technical, social, and practical points of view. To do so, we start with a summary definition of Trustworthy AI and its components, according to the HLEG for AI report. From there, we focus in detail on trustworthy AI in large language models, anthropomorphic robots (such as sex robots), and in the use of autonomous drones in warfare, which all pose specific challenges because of their close interaction with humans. To tie these ideas together, we include a brief presentation of the ethical validation scheme for proposals submitted under the Horizon Europe programme as a possible way to address the operationalisation of ethical regulation beyond rigid rules and partial ethical analyses. We conclude our work by advocating for the virtue ethics approach to AI, which we view as a humane and comprehensive approach to trustworthy AI that can accommodate the pace of technological change

Taking iRAT Outside The Classroom: Using an Interactive Book to Modify Team-Based Learning in a First-Year Programming Course

Team-Based Learning (TBL) is an evidence-based collaborative learning teaching strategy designed around units of instruction, known as “modules” that are taught in a three-step cycle: preparation, inclass readiness assurance test (RAT), and application-focused exercise. The in-class RAT includes two sub-tests; individual RAT (iRAT) and team RAT (tRAT). In first-year programming classes, the instructors rely on the mini-lecture to deliver advanced concepts or present a programming exercise to the students. Meanwhile, most of the class time is consumed by the iRAT, tRAT, and application-focused exercise. This paper sheds light on an attempt to modify the conventional TBL approach by taking the iRAT outside the classroom and exploit its time to extend the mini-lecture time. This modification is achieved by the aid of an interactive online book, which ensures that the students finished their reading assignments before the class. Hence, the interactive book can allow us to take the iRAT outside the classroom, which will save at least 20% of the class time. The proposed approach was implemented to a class of 165 students in Fall 2019 and 47 students in Spring 2020, and the preliminary results show that the students finish each class reading assignment with an average percentage of 87%

Women and Heart Disease: Neglected Directions for Future Research

Before age 65, women have less heart disease than men. For many years, estrogen was the most popular explanation for this female advantage, and observational studies through the 1980s showed a lower risk of heart attacks in postmenopausal women taking “replacement” estrogen. But the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI), the first placebo-controlled trials of hormone therapy with the size and statistical power necessary to study clinical cardiovascular outcomes, did not confirm the hormone-healthy heart hypothesis. Now, at least 5 years later, the most unexpected WHI result may be how resilient the estrogen hypothesis has been. Where, beyond estrogen therapy, should we go from here to explain the striking sex differences in heart disease rates? A broader spectrum of research about the female cardiovascular advantage and its translation is needed

Measurement and physical interpretation of the mean motion of turbulent density patterns detected by the BES system on MAST

The mean motion of turbulent patterns detected by a two-dimensional (2D) beam emission spectroscopy (BES) diagnostic on the Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak (MAST) is determined using a cross-correlation time delay (CCTD) method. Statistical reliability of the method is studied by means of synthetic data analysis. The experimental measurements on MAST indicate that the apparent mean poloidal motion of the turbulent density patterns in the lab frame arises because the longest correlation direction of the patterns (parallel to the local background magnetic fields) is not parallel to the direction of the fastest mean plasma flows (usually toroidal when strong neutral beam injection is present). The experimental measurements are consistent with the mean motion of plasma being toroidal. The sum of all other contributions (mean poloidal plasma flow, phase velocity of the density patterns in the plasma frame, non-linear effects, etc.) to the apparent mean poloidal velocity of the density patterns is found to be negligible. These results hold in all investigated L-mode, H-mode and internal transport barrier (ITB) discharges. The one exception is a high-poloidal-beta (the ratio of the plasma pressure to the poloidal magnetic field energy density) discharge, where a large magnetic island exists. In this case BES detects very little motion. This effect is currently theoretically unexplained.Comment: 28 pages, 15 figures, submitted to PPC

Jost Function for Singular Potentials

An exact method for direct calculation of the Jost function and Jost solutions for a repulsive singular potential is presented. Within this method the Schrodinger equation is replaced by an equivalent system of linear first-order differential equations, which after complex rotation, can easily be solved numerically. The Jost function can be obtained to any desired accuracy for all complex momenta of physical interest, including the spectral points corresponding to bound and resonant states. The method can also be used in the complex angular-momentum plane to calculate the Regge trajectories. The effectiveness of the method is demonstrated using the Lennard-Jones (12,6) potential. The spectral properties of the realistic inter-atomic He4-He4 potentials HFDHE2 and HFD-B of Aziz and collaborators are also investigated.Comment: 12 pages, latex, 2 eps-figures, submitted to Phys.Rev.