Using Ontologies and Intelligent Systems for Traffic Accident Assistance in Vehicular Environments

A pesar de que las medidas de seguridad en los sistemas de transporte cada vez son mayores, el aumento progresivo del número de vehículos que circulan por las ciudades y carreteras en todo el mundo aumenta, sin duda, la probabilidad de que ocurra un accidente. En este tipo de situaciones, el tiempo de respuesta de los servicios de emergencia es crucial, ya que está demostrado que cuanto menor sea el tiempo transcurrido entre el accidente y la atención hospitalaria de los heridos, mayores son sus probabilidades de supervivencia. Las redes vehiculares permiten la comunicación entre los vehículos, así como la comunicación entre los vehículos y la infraestructura [4], lo que da lugar a una plétora de nuevas aplicaciones y servicios en el entorno vehicular. Centrándonos en las aplicaciones relacionadas con la seguridad vial, mediante este tipo de comunicaciones, los vehículos podrían informar en caso de accidente al resto de vehículos (evitando así colisiones en cadena) y a los servicios de emergencia (dando información precisa y rápida, lo que sin duda facilitaría las tareas de rescate). Uno de los aspectos importantes a determinar sería saber qué información se debe enviar, quién será capaz de recibirla, y cómo actuar una vez recibida. Actualmente los vehículos disponen de una serie de sensores que les permiten obtener información sobre ellos mismos (velocidad, posición, estado de los sistemas de seguridad, número de ocupantes del vehículo, etc.), y sobre su entorno (información meteorológica, estado de la calzada, luminosidad, etc.). En caso de accidente, toda esa información puede ser estructurada y enviada a los servicios de emergencia para que éstos adecúen el rescate a las características específicas y la gravedad del accidente, actuando en consecuencia. Por otro lado, para que la información enviada por los vehículos accidentados pueda llegar correctamente a los servicios de emergencias, es necesario disponer de una infraestructura capaz de dar cobertura a todos los vehículos que circulan por una determinada área. Puesto que la instalación y el mantenimiento de dicha infraestructura conllevan un elevado coste, sería conveniente proponer, implementar y evaluar técnicas consistentes en dar cobertura a todos los vehículos, reduciendo el coste total de la infraestructura. Finalmente, una vez que la información ha sido recibida por las autoridades, es necesario elaborar un plan de actuación eficaz, que permita el rápido rescate de los heridos. Hay que tener en cuenta que, cuando ocurre un accidente de tráfico, el tiempo de personación de los servicios de emergencia en el lugar del accidente puede suponer la diferencia entre que los heridos sobrevivan o fallezcan. Además, es importante conocer si la calle o carretera por la que circulaban los vehículos accidentados ha dejado de ser transitable para el resto de vehículos, y en ese caso, activar los mecanismos necesarios que permitan evitar los atascos asociados. En esta Tesis, se pretende gestionar adecuadamente estas situaciones adversas, distribuyendo el tráfico de manera inteligente para reducir el tiempo de llegada de los servicios de emergencia al lugar del accidente, evitando además posibles atascos.Barrachina Villalba, J. (2014). Using Ontologies and Intelligent Systems for Traffic Accident Assistance in Vehicular Environments [Tesis doctoral no publicada]. Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/39004TESI

Do children with SLI use verbs to predict arguments and adjuncts: evidence from eye movements during listening

Different psycholinguistic theories have suggested the importance of verb semantics in rapidly anticipating upcoming information during real-time sentence comprehension. To date, no study has examined if children use verbs to predict arguments and adjuncts in sentence comprehension using children with specific language impairment (SLI).Twenty-five children with SLI (aged 5 years and 3 months to 8 years and 2 months), twenty-five age-matched controls (aged 5 years and 3 months to 8 years and 2 months), twenty-five MLU-w controls (aged 3 years and 3 months to 7 years and 1 month), and 31 adults took part in the study. The eye movements of participants were monitored while they heard twenty-four sentences, such as El hombre lee con atención un cuento en la cama (translation: The man carefully reads a storybook in bed), in the presence of four depicted objects, one of which was the target (storybook), another, the competitor (bed), and another two, distracters (wardrobe and grape). The proportion of looks revealed that, when the meaning of the verb was retrieved, the upcoming argument and adjunct referents were rapidly anticipated. However, the proportion of looks at the theme, source/goal and instrument referents were significantly higher than the looks at the locatives. This pattern was found in adults as well as children with and without language impairment. The present results suggest that, in terms of sentence comprehension, the ability to understand verb information is not severely impaired in children with SLI

Argument structure and the representation of abstract semantics

According to the dual coding theory, differences in the ease of retrieval between concrete and abstract words are related to the exclusive dependence of abstract semantics on linguistic information. Argument structure can be considered a measure of the complexity of the linguistic contexts that accompany a verb. If the retrieval of abstract verbs relies more on the linguistic codes they are associated to, we could expect a larger effect of argument structure for the processing of abstract verbs. In this study, sets of length-and frequency-matched verbs including 40 intransitive verbs, 40 transitive verbs taking simple complements, and 40 transitive verbs taking sentential complements were presented in separate lexical and grammatical decision tasks. Half of the verbs were concrete and half were abstract. Similar results were obtained in the two tasks, with significant effects of imageability and transitivity. However, the interaction between these two variables was not significant. These results conflict with hypotheses assuming a stronger reliance of abstract semantics on linguistic codes. In contrast, our data are in line with theories that link the ease of retrieval with availability and robustness of semantic information

Reducing emergence services arrival time by using vehicular communications and Evolution Strategies

Nowadays, traffic jams in urban areas have become a problem that keeps growing every year since the number of vehicles in our cities is continuously increasing. One of the most common causes producing traffic jams are vehicle accidents. Moreover, the arrival time of the emergency services could be raised due to traffic congestion. Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) have a key role in order to reduce or mitigate this problem. In this paper, we propose four different approaches addressing the traffic congestion problem, comparing them to obtain the best solution. Using V2I communications, we are able to accurately estimate the traffic density in a certain area, which represents a key parameter to perform efficient traffic redirection, thereby reducing the emergency services arrival time, and avoiding traffic jams when an accident occurs. Specifically, we propose two approaches based on the Dijkstra algorithm, and two approaches based on Evolution Strategies. Notice that, when an accident occurs, time is a critical issue, and the strategies here proposed contribute to find the optimal solution within a short time period.This work was partially supported by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovacion, Spain, under Grant TIN2011-27543-C03-01, as well as by the Fundacion Universitaria Antonio Gargallo, the Obra Social de Ibercaja, under Grant 2013/B010, and by the Government of Aragon and the European Social Fund (T91 Research Group).Barrachina, J.; Garrido, P.; Fogue, M.; Martínez, FJ.; Cano Escribá, JC.; Tavares De Araujo Cesariny Calafate, CM.; Manzoni, P. (2014). Reducing emergence services arrival time by using vehicular communications and Evolution Strategies. Expert Systems with Applications. 41(4):1206-1217. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eswa.2013.08.004S1206121741

Understanding Evolutionary Algorithms through Interactive Graphical Applications

It is very common to observe, especially in Computer Science studies that students have difficulties to correctly understand how some mechanisms based on Artificial Intelligence work. In addition, the scope and limitations of most of these mechanisms are usually presented by professors only in a theoretical way, which does not help students to understand them adequately. In this work, we focus on the problems found when teaching Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs), which imitate the principles of natural evolution, as a method to solve parameter optimization problems. Although this kind of algorithms can be very powerful to solve relatively complex problems, students often have difficulties to understand how they work, and how to apply them to solve problems in real cases. In this paper, we present two interactive graphical applications which have been specially designed with the aim of making Evolutionary Algorithms easy to be understood by students. Specifically, we present: (i) TSPS, an application able to solve the ”Traveling Salesman Problem”, and (ii) FotEvol, an application able to reconstruct a given image by using Evolution Strategies. The main objective is that students learn how these techniques can be implemented, and the great possibilities they offer

Therapeutic alliance impact on analgesic outcomes in a real-world clinical setting: An observational study

A good therapeutic alliance is relevant for healthcare providers exposed to patients\u27 suffering, especially since patients and physicians may understand the painful experience differently. Our aim was to explore the impact of therapeutic alliance on analgesic outcomes in a real-world interdisciplinary pain unit (PU). A cross-sectional observational study was conducted on outpatients (n = 69) using opioids on a long-term basis for the treatment of chronic non-cancer pain, where clinical pharmacologists and pharmacists advised patients about their opioid treatment. Responses to the patient-doctor relationship questionnaire (PDRQ), sociodemographic and clinical information (pain level, quality of life and hospital use) were collected, whereas pharmacology data (analgesic prescription, adverse events, and compliance) were obtained from electronic health records. Patients were predominantly middle-aged (75 % women, 72 % retired), experiencing moderate pain (VAS 40–70 mm) on average, and under a high morphine equianalgesic dosage (95 ± 88 mg per day, mainly tapentadol or fentanyl). Patients with better PDRQ outcomes, and therefore better therapeutic alliance, showed lower pain intensity than patients with worse PDRQ outcomes (pain intensity: high scores 60 ± 47 mm and medium scores 60 ± 45 mm vs. low scores 80±75 mm, p < 0.01). Along with this, pain intensity was lower when patients affirmed that, thanks to the healthcare providers, they “gained new insight”, “felt better”, or “felt content with their doctor’s treatment”. What´s more, patients who affirmed “I benefit from the treatment” experienced increased pain relief (benefit 40 ± 30 vs. non-benefit 19 ± 26 mm, p = 0.010) and improved quality of life (benefit 33 ± 25 vs. non-benefit 18 ± 16 mm, p = 0.031). However, there was a percentage of patients who did not fully understand the provided information, which is something to be taken into account to improve in clinical routine. Therapeutic alliance supported by pharmacist experts on pain management can be an effective strategy to improve analgesic outcomes. Further efforts are needed to improve communication strategies for pain management. Future directions of research should include the analysis of the role of the pharmacist in poly-professional consultations as related to the advice of patients about their medication, and the mutual trust with the patients

Impact of CYP2D6 genotype on opioid use disorder deprescription: an observational prospective study in chronic pain with sex-differences

ntroduction: Opioid deprescription is the process of supervised tapering and safe withdrawal when a potentially inappropriate use is detected. This represents a challenge in chronic non-cancer pain (CNCP) patients who may respond differently to the procedure. Our aim was to analyze the potential impact of CYP2D6 phenotypes and sex on the clinical and safety outcomes during an opioid use disorder (OUD) tapering process. Methods: A prospective observational study was conducted on CNCP ambulatory OUD patients (cases, n = 138) who underwent a 6-month opioid dose reduction and discontinuation. Pain intensity, relief and quality of life (Visual analogue scale, VAS 0-100 mm), global activity (GAF, 0-100 scores), morphine equivalent daily dose (MEDD), analgesic drugs adverse events (AEs) and opioid withdrawal syndrome (OWS, 0-96 scores) were recorded at basal and final visits. Sex differences and CYP2D6 phenotypes (poor (PM), extensive (EM) and ultrarapid (UM) metabolizers based on CYP2D6*1, *2, *3, *4, *5, *6, *10, *17, *41, 2D6*5, 2D6 × N, 2D6*4 × 2 gene variants) were analyzed. Results: Although CYP2D6-UM consumed three-times less basal MEDD [40 (20-123) mg/day, p = 0.04], they showed the highest number of AEs [7 (6-11), p = 0.02] and opioid withdrawal symptoms (46 ± 10 scores, p = 0.01) after deprescription. This was inversely correlated with their quality of life (r = -0.604, p < 0.001). Sex-differences were evidenced with a tendency to a lower analgesic tolerability in females and lower quality of life in men. Discussion: These data support the potential benefits of CYP2D6-guided opioid deprescription, in patients with CNCP when OUD is detected. Further studies are required to understand a sex/gender interaction

Towards the clinical use of concentric electrodes in ECG recordings: influence of ring dimensions and electrode position

[EN] To overcome the limited spatial resolution of standard 12-lead ECG recordings, concentric ring electrodes (CRE) have been proposed to provide valuable data for the diagnosis of a wide range of cardiac abnormalities, including infarction and arrhythmia. Although theoretical studies indicate that the dimensions of the CRE regulate the depth of the electric dipoles sensed by these electrodes, this has not been experimentally confirmed. The aim of this work was to analyze the influence of CRE dimensions and position of a wireless multi-CRE sensor node on the cardiac signal recorded. For this, four wireless multichannel ECG recording nodes based on flexible multi-ring electrodes were placed at positions CMV1 (position comparable to V1), CMV2, CMV4R and CMV5; each node providing three bipolar concentric ECG signals (BC-ECG). Standard 12-lead ECG and 12 BC-ECG signals were recorded in 29 volunteers. The results revealed that a ring with an outer diameter of 33.5 mm achieves a balance between the ease-of-use and spatial resolution of smaller electrodes and improved detectability and higher amplitudes of signals from larger ring electrodes. Although a standard 12-lead ECG outperforms BC-ECC recordings in detectability of cardiac waves, if the relative amplitude of the wave is also considered, BC-ECG at CMV1 proved superior at picking up atrial activity. In fact, in most of the BC-ECG signals picked up at CMV1, P1 and P2 atrial activity waves were more clearly identified than in simultaneous 12-Lead ECG signals. Likewise, BC-ECG signals revealed higher spatial resolution in detecting anomalous electrical activity in local regions, such as impaired intraventricular driving, or atrioventricular blocks. Finally, the wireless multi-CRE sensor node provides enhanced comfort and handling to both patient and clinician over wired systems.Research supported in part by: a grant from the Conselleria d'Educacio, Cultura i Esport, Generalitat Valenciana Conselleria (GV/2014/029), two grants from the Universitat Politecnica de Valencia (SP20120490 and INNOVA SP20120469) and by a VLC_Campus grant (Prematuro 2013-0507)Prats-Boluda, G.; Ye Lin, Y.; Bueno Barrachina, JM.; Rodríguez De Sanabria Gil, R.; Garcia-Casado, J. (2016). Towards the clinical use of concentric electrodes in ECG recordings: influence of ring dimensions and electrode position. Measurement Science and Technology. 27(2):1-11. doi:10.1088/0957-0233/27/2/025705S11127

Wireless sensor node for non-invasive high precision electrocardiographic signal acquisition based on a multi-ring electrode

[EN] Concentric ring electrodes (CRE) have been proposed for sensing bioelectrical activity with high spatial resolution. Computational studies have revealed that the CRE dimensions are closely related to the electric dipole depth they can sense, but further experimental confirmation is needed. We aimed to develop and test a wireless multichannel ECG recording system based on a new flexible multi-ring electrode and to check the influence of CRE dimensions on the acquired signals. The system provided high-precision ECG signals by a simple procedure. The bipolar concentric ECG signal amplitude and SNR increase with the CRE¿s outer ring dimension. Differences in the signal morphologies, associated with different sensitivities to the location of the active dipoles, were also obtained in the case of diameters smaller than 34 mm. A system with several wireless sensor nodes developed could be easily used by clinical staff for non-invasive cardiac monitoring and diagnosis with high spatial and temporal resolution.Research supported in part by a grant from the Conselleria d'Educacio, Cultura I Esport, Generalitat Valenciana Conselleria - Spain (GV/2014/029); by a grant from the Universitat Politecnica de Valencia - Spain (SP20120490); and by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness - Spain and the European Regional Development Fund (DPI2015-68397-R (MINECO/FEDER)).Ye Lin, Y.; Bueno Barrachina, JM.; Prats-Boluda, G.; Rodríguez De Sanabria Gil, R.; Garcia Casado, FJ. (2017). Wireless sensor node for non-invasive high precision electrocardiographic signal acquisition based on a multi-ring electrode. Measurement. 97:195-202. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.measurement.2016.11.009S1952029

Road side unit deployment: a density-based approach

© 2013 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.Currently, the number of vehicles increases every year, raising the probability of having accidents. When an accident occurs, wireless technologies enable vehicles to share warning messages with other vehicles by using vehicle to vehicle (V2V) communications, and with the emergency services by using vehicle to infrastructure (V2I) communications. Regarding vehicle to infrastructure communications, Road Side Units (RSUs) act similarly to wireless LAN access points, and can provide communications with the infrastructure. Since RSUs are usually very expensive to install, authorities limit their number, especially in suburbs and areas of sparse population, making RSUs a precious resource in vehicular environments. In this paper, we propose a Density-based Road Side Unit deployment policy (D-RSU), specially designed to obtain an efficient system with the lowest possible cost to alert emergency services in case of an accident. Our approach is based on deploying RSUs using an inverse proportion to the expected density of vehicles. The obtained results show how D-RSU is able to reduce the required number of RSUs, as well as the accident notification time.This work was partially supported by the Ministerio de Educacion y Ciencia, Spain, under Grant TIN2011-27543-C03-01, as well as by the Fundacion Universitaria Antonio Gargallo (FUAG), and the Caja de Ahorros de la Inmaculada (CAI).Barrachina, J.; Garrido, P.; Fogue, M.; Martínez, FJ.; Cano Escribá, JC.; Tavares De Araujo Cesariny Calafate, CM.; Manzoni, P. (2013). Road side unit deployment: a density-based approach. IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Magazine. 5(3):30-39. https://doi.org/10.1109/MITS.2013.2253159S30395