Full Body Interaction beyond Fun: Engaging Museum Visitors in Human-Data Interaction

Engaging museum visitors in data exploration using full-body interaction is still a challenge. In this paper, we explore four strategies for providing entry-points to the interaction: instrumenting the floor; forcing collaboration; implementing multiple body movements to control the same effect; and, visualizing the visitors' silhouette beside the data visualization. We discuss preliminary results of an in-situ study with 56 museum visitors at Discovery Place, and provide design recommendations for crafting engaging Human-Data Interaction experiences

Hydraulic Characterization of a Self-Weight Compacted Coal

AbstractWater infiltration through coal stocks exposed to weather elements represents a key issue for many old mining sites and coal-fired power plants from the environmental point of view, considering the negative impact on human health of the deriving groundwater, soil and air pollution. Within this context, the paper investigates the hydraulic behaviour of a self-weight compacted unsaturated coal mass and its impact on the numerical prediction of infiltration induced by rainfall events. In particular, the work focuses on the experimental investigation carried out at different representative scales, from the grain scale to physical modelling. The material, when starting from uncompacted conditions, seems to be characterized by metastable structure, which tends to collapse under imbibition. In addition, direct numerical predictions of the seepage regime through a partially saturated coal mass have been performed. As the compaction of the coal stock induced by dozers has not been taken into account, the numerical simulations represent a conservative approach for the assessment of chemical pollution hazard associated to water infiltration into a real stockpile under operational conditions

How Image-Based Social Media Websites Support Social Movements

The Internet has disrupted the traditional progression of social movements. We explore common characteristics of image-based activism on Instagram by qualitatively analyzing 300 Instagram posts from three social movements: Black Lives Matter, the battle against defunding Planned Parenthood, and the backlash against the Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act. We found that common types of images emerged among the three social movements, indicating a possible underlying pattern in social movement content posted on Instagram. Users also engage in workarounds to leverage Instagram toward a collective goal, going beyond the features offered by the platform to communicate their message. These findings have implications for future work studying social movement theories online

A Geomechanical Approach to Landslide Hazard Assessment: The Multiscalar Method for Landslide Mitigation

AbstractThe landslide hazard assessment, when based on the deterministic diagnosis of the processes, can be pursued only through the interpretation and the geo-hydro-mechanical modelling of the slope equilibrium. In practice, though, landslide hazard assessment is still seldom dealt with slope modelling, in particular when it addresses vast areas, where either heuristic or statistical methods do not entail any geo-hydro-mechanical knowledge of slope features and stability. The Multiscalar Method for Landslide Mitigation (MMLM) is an original methodological approach for intermediate to regional landslide hazard assessment. It is based on the geo-hydro-mechanical knowledge achieved from the application of a stage-wise diagnostic methodology of the landslide mechanism at the slope scale. The paper discusses the main steps of the MMLM aiming at diagnoses of landslide hazard based on hydro-mechanics, for small scale hazard mapping (at the large area)

Microstructural Changes in Clays Generated by Compression Explored by Means of SEM and Image Processing

AbstractA study on the microstructure of an illitic marine clay is carried out through a thorough investigation of the clay origin, composition and current microstructure. The clay fabric is investigated by means of scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and statistically analysed by means of image processing. The nature and strength of the clay bonding are probed by means of direct chemical micro-analyses and on purpose strain paths. The same investigation is carried out both on the natural and on the reconstituted clay, at the initial state and after one-dimensional compression to medium and large pressures

Designing embodied interactions for informal learning: two open research challenges

Interactive installations that are controlled with gestures and body movements have been widely used in museums due to their tremendous educational potential. The design of such systems, however, remains problematic. In this paper, we reflect on two open research challenges that we observed when crafting a Kinect-based prototype installation for data exploration at a science museum: (1) making the user aware that the system is interactive; and, (2) increasing the discoverability of hand gestures and body movements

Show Me How You Interact, I Will Tell You What You Think: Exploring the Effect of the Interaction Style on Users’ Sensemaking about Correlation and Causation in Data

Findings from embodied cognition suggest that our whole body (not just our eyes) plays an important role in how we make sense of data when we interact with data visualizations. In this paper, we present the results of a study that explores how different designs of the ”interaction” (with a data visualization) alter the way in which people report and discuss correlation and causation in data. We conducted a lab study with two experimental conditions: Full body (participants interacted with a 65” display showing geo-referenced data using gestures and body movements); and, Gamepad (people used a joypad to control the system). Participants tended to agree less with statements that portray correlation and causation in data after using the Gamepad system. Additionally, discourse analysis based on Conceptual Metaphor Theory revealed that users made fewer remarks based on FORCE schemata in Gamepad than in Full-Body

Global Earthing System: Can Buried Metallic Structures Significantly Modify the Ground Potential Profile?

Global earthing systems (GESs), which are created by the interconnection of local earthing systems, should guarantee the absence of dangerous touch voltages. According to international standards, one of the reasons for this safety characteristic of GESs is that medium-voltage and low-voltage grounding systems form a quasi-equipotential area. Typical examples of GESs are in city centers due to the high number of interconnected grounding systems in the area. For this reason, in addition to ground grids, other metallic parts with different primary functions shall be also considered, e.g., water and gas pipes, tramway tracks, and building foundations can modify the electric potential distribution in the area. In this paper, a model based on the Maxwell's subareas method (MaSM) is used to evaluate how buried metallic parts, which are not intentionally connected to ground grids, modify the electric potential on the soil surface. First, the MaSM model is validated with experimental measurements on a simple electrode configuration. The measured voltages are compared with the MaSM results and with the results obtained with a finite-element method model simulated with COMSOL Multiphysics. Then, the simulations are carried out on a realistic urban test case

Ground Resistance of Buried Metallic Parts in Urban Areas: an Extensive Measurement Campaign

In urban and industrial areas, a relevant presence of buried metallic objects (e.g., gas and water pipes, etc.) can be detected. Usually, these elements are imagined as widespread meshed metallic grids in a good contact with the soil. In the last years, an arising interest on their role in the identification of a global earthing system has been expressed by the scientific community. Unfortunately, the geometrical and electrical properties of this kind of buried metallic parts cannot be provided by any documentations. This is mostly due to the fact that no trustworthy schemes are provided, as the management of these metallic parts is responsibility of different companies, which have installed them during several years. In order to characterize the buried metallic elements with reference to the electrical safety issue, the main quantity of interest is their resistance to earth. With this aim, a field measurement campaign was organized and the resistance to earth of more than 800 metallic objects has been evaluated through a simplified measurement protocol. In this paper, the measurement protocol, the setup, the results, and their analysis are reported