Smart homes and their users:a systematic analysis and key challenges

Published research on smart homes and their users is growing exponentially, yet a clear understanding of who these users are and how they might use smart home technologies is missing from a field being overwhelmingly pushed by technology developers. Through a systematic analysis of peer-reviewed literature on smart homes and their users, this paper takes stock of the dominant research themes and the linkages and disconnects between them. Key findings within each of nine themes are analysed, grouped into three: (1) views of the smart home-functional, instrumental, socio-technical; (2) users and the use of the smart home-prospective users, interactions and decisions, using technologies in the home; and (3) challenges for realising the smart home-hardware and software, design, domestication. These themes are integrated into an organising framework for future research that identifies the presence or absence of cross-cutting relationships between different understandings of smart homes and their users. The usefulness of the organising framework is illustrated in relation to two major concerns-privacy and control-that have been narrowly interpreted to date, precluding deeper insights and potential solutions. Future research on smart homes and their users can benefit by exploring and developing cross-cutting relationships between the research themes identified

The Benefits of Costly Voting

We present a costly voting model in which each voter has a private valuation for their preferred outcome of a vote. When there is a zero cost to voting, all voters vote and hence all values are counted equally regardless of how high they may be. By having a cost to voting, only those with high enough values would choose to incur this cost. Hence, the outcome will be determined by voters with higher valuations. We show that in such a case welfare may be enhanced. Such an effect occurs when there is both a large enough density of voters with low values and a high enough expected value

Degradation of haloaromatic compounds

An ever increasing number of halogenated organic compounds has been produced by industry in the last few decades. These compounds are employed as biocides, for synthetic polymers, as solvents, and as synthetic intermediates. Production figures are often incomplete, and total production has frequently to be extrapolated from estimates for individual countries. Compounds of this type as a rule are highly persistent against biodegradation and belong, as "recalcitrant" chemicals, to the class of so-called xenobiotics. This term is used to characterise chemical substances which have no or limited structural analogy to natural compounds for which degradation pathways have evolved over billions of years. Xenobiotics frequently have some common features. e.g. high octanol/water partitioning coefficients and low water solubility which makes for a high accumulation ratio in the biosphere (bioaccumulation potential). Recalcitrant compounds therefore are found accumulated in mammals, especially in fat tissue, animal milk supplies and also in human milk. Highly sophisticated analytical techniques have been developed for the detection of organochlorines at the trace and ultratrace level

Improving the retention of aurally presented information

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Sonolência diurna excessiva pós-traumatismo de crânio: associação com movimentos periódicos de pernas e distúrbio de comportamento do sono REM: relato de caso Excessive daytime sleepiness after traumatic brain injury: association with periodic limb movements and REM behavior disorder: case report

Um homem de 52 anos, procurou o Hospital. Universitário de Brasília com queixa de sono agitado. Sua esposa relatava, desde há cerca de 10 anos, intensa movimentação de membros e agressividade em meio a sonhos violentos. Desde então apresentava sonolência diurna excessiva. Havia relato de traumatismo de crânio há 34 anos e coma de 2 meses de duração. A vídeo-polissonografia revelou comportamento agressivo e agitado durante o sono REM, e movimentos periódicos de pernas. Havia importante sonolência diurna no teste de latências de sono. Foi instituído tratamento com levodopa-benzerazida 100/25 mg à noite. Após 10 semanas de evolução, houve melhora da movimentação noturna global, e desaparecimento dos episódios ligados a sonhos de conteúdo violento. Este caso nos permite analisar a associação entre trauma craniano e alterações nas vias dopaminérgicas (movimentos periódicos das pernas e distúrbio de comportamento do sono REM) e revisar a importância dos distúrbios na produção de hipocretina hipotalâmica na fisiopatologia desse quadro clínico.<br>A 52 year-old male patient, had complaint of "restless sleep". His wife informed that for the past ten years the patient had presented intense and aggressive body movements, and sometimes, violent dreams. The patient also complained of excessive daytime sleepiness. His relevant previous medical history included a traumatic brain injury at the age of 28 which left him in coma for two months. A video-polysomnography showed periodic leg movements and, during REM sleep, aggressive and agitated behaviour. The multiple sleep latency test revealed extremely short latencies. Initially, he was treated with levodopa-benzerazide, 100/25 mg, 2 hours before bedtime. After 10 weeks his overnight behaviour pattern improved and leg movements diminished. This case supports the hypothesis of an association between cranial trauma and alterations in the dopaminergic pathways represented by periodic leg movements during sleep and a sleep behaviour disorder and proposes the possibility of hypothalamic hypocretin involvement in its pathophysiology

Standards for Smart Living: A Historical Overview

This chapter provides an introduction into the current state of acceptance of smart home technology and its history. It starts with examining four stages of domestic technology, the current situation, and the future of smart home technology. This chapter aims to apply concepts from literature on the diffusion of innovation on the past, present, and future of smart home technology. Lastly, this chapter examines the analogies between technology adoption discussed in the first three stages of domestic technology with the present and future situation of home automation and robotics