Multilayer and conformal antennas using synthetic dielectric substrates

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What Are Students’ Perceptions of Design Research and Approaches?

Approaches and methods used in the design research process have been discussed over the years. Yet, most of the discussions did not take into account the perceptions of the students. While a fundamental understanding of design research may assist students in the real world, those students may fail to apply the foundations to a complex design problem or only use those methods they feel comfortable with and deem useful. To offer insight on this particular area, a paper questionnaire was distributed to more than one hundred design students in order to understand students' perceptions on design research and their habits. Findings showed that design students felt that research was important to their design process and they spent more than 40% of time on researching in their design process. In general, students believe that more research is necessary at the beginning of the design process, such as the stages of planning, defining problem and parameters. In addition, undergraduate and graduate students viewed various research methods in different regards. The understanding of the perceptions of current undergraduate and graduate students regarding design research will provide teachers with a better understanding of the influence of the students' background on the design process and how to cope with those influences. The results can be used to improve the design education

Current conservative management and classification of club foot: A review

© 2016 - IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved. Clubfoot, known as congenital talipes equinovarus, is one of the complex paediatric foot deformity with the incidence of 1 in every 1000 live births. It consists of four complex foot abnormalities such as forefoot adductus, midfoot cavus, and hindfoot varus and ankle equinus. There are a number of surgical techniques (soft tissue releases, arthrodesis) used to correct clubfoot. However currently the conservative management (manipulation, serial casting, and braces) of clubfoot is considered as the best choice and it is widely accepted among orthopaedists. Clubfoot treated with surgical techniques might suffer various complications such as soft tissues contractures, neurovascular complications, infections, and shortening of the limbs. Although conservative method is generally considered as an effective method, it is still challenging to cure clubfoot in advance stages. Also, the classification of the initial severity of clubfoot is essential to evaluate the outcome of the treatment. In this review, the aim is to review the different types of conservative method and the assessment of clubfoot severity

A Composite Method for Human Foot Structural Modeling

© 2015 The Authors A novel method including range-sensing scanning with texture and foot anatomical structure morphing basing on OpenSim is proposed. Palpation of important anatomical landmarks on foot surface was conducted by a physical therapist, and a range-sensing device, Microsoft Kinect sensor, was adopted for the 3D textured model acquisition. 3D coordinate data of the landmarks were measured and harnessed in OpenSim for subject-specific skeletal scaling based on a generic foot musculoskeletal model. The muscle attachment point coordinates derived from an anatomy database basing on sampling from East Asia people were used for muscle modelling. Then the 3D textured foot surface was registered with the morphed anatomical structures so that an integrated foot model was generated. The surface landmark locations were then compared with the corresponding internal bony sites and the errors were calculated to evaluate the accuracy and validity of this method. The potential error sources such as soft tissue thickness and scaling error were also mentioned and discussed. This technique is useful to create individual anatomically accurate human digital models for product design and development

3D Foot Scan to Custom Shoe Last

Today’s customers not only look at aesthetic beauty but also quality, comfort and fit. New technologies such as digitization and virtual 3D tailoring are providing more options to consumers and designers in designing different styles with the least possible time. Next to the shoe fashion and style, good fit and comfort are the second important determinant in the purchase of footwear. Although there is a need for better fitting, there are no techniques for fit quantification. In traditional shoemaking, the shoe is categorized by the length and width (or girth), hence there is always a mismatch between the complex foot shape and shoe shape. For the industry in order to meet the demand for better footwear, new techniques for fit quantification is required in order to have a direct mapping form foot to shoe-last (a mold for making shoes). In recent years, with the rapid development of computer technology and advanced design and manufacturing technologies such as computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), the manufacturing of customized shoe lasts is becoming possible. Still research is needed to find the best shoe-last. This paper discusses the basic concepts and current methods being followed to convert foot to shoe-last, retrieve the best fitting shoe last based on the 3D foot scan of the customer, and to obtain customized shoe last

Ponseti method in the management of clubfoot under 2 years of age: A systematic review

© 2017 Ganesan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Background: Congenital talipes equinovarus (CTEV), also known as clubfoot, is common congenital orthopedic foot deformity in children characterized by four components of foot deformities: hindfoot equinus, hindfoot varus, midfoot cavus, and forefoot adduction. Although a number of conservative and surgical methods have been proposed to correct the clubfoot deformity, the relapses of the clubfoot are not uncommon. Several previous literatures discussed about the technical details of Ponseti method, adherence of Ponseti protocol among walking age or older children. However there is a necessity to investigate the relapse pattern, compliance of bracing, number of casts used in treatment and the percentages of surgical referral under two years of age for clear understanding and better practice to achieve successful outcome without or reduce relapse. Therefore this study aims to review the current evidence of Ponseti method (manipulation, casting, percutaneous Achilles tenotomy, and bracing) in the management of clubfoot under two years of age. Materials and methods: Articles were searched from 2000 to 2015, in the following databases to identify the effectiveness of Ponseti method treatment for clubfoot: Medline, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINHAL), PubMed, and Scopus. The database searches were limited to articles published in English, and articles were focused on the effectiveness of Ponseti method on children with less than 2 years of age. Results: Of the outcome of 1095 articles from four electronic databases, twelve articles were included in the review. Pirani scoring system, Dimeglio scoring system, measuring the range of motion and rate of relapses were used as outcome measures. Conclusions: In conclusion, all reviewed, 12 articles reported that Ponseti method is a very effective method to correct the clubfoot deformities. However, we noticed that relapses occur in nine studies, which is due to the non-adherence of bracing regime and other factors such as low income and social economic status

Student perceptions on future components of electronic textbook design

Electronic textbooks have been a subject of research for decades, yet student perceptions of interface components tend to be investigated in hindsight, and findings are not commonly taken into consideration for textbook design. This paper shifts the focus of electronic textbook design back toward students by identifying components that should be included in future electronic textbooks based on student perceptions in relation to the task of academic reading, as well as identifying associations with gender, experience level, academic level, and academic discipline. Findings from a university-wide online questionnaire that received more than 700 responses indicated that text, highlighting tools, bookmarks, multimedia, translation tools, dictionaries, and encyclopedias should all be incorporated in future electronic textbooks, as well as provided evidence to suggest that electronic textbooks should be tailored based on academic discipline. Understanding what students require for academic reading can facilitate the development of more suitable educational tools, and through the identification of suitable components, can enable the design of more standardized electronic textbooks

Student Views on Academic Reading and its Future in the Design and Engineering Disciplines

Electronic textbooks are becoming a common educational tool, but there is little research on the student desires, which will affect the effectiveness of this tool. This paper aims to add to the current research by outlining students’ reading habits in physical and electronic textbooks and identifying what students feel they need to study using future electronic textbooks. This paper describes a series of focus groups with a total of thirty design and engineering students. Findings illustrated the different ways in which these disciplines approach their academic readings and that future electronic textbooks require some discipline specific components. There were some similarities in views and ideas, such as being able to insert their own images into the textbooks and the desire for less text and more interactive components to facilitate their learning. Identifying design criteria based on discipline needs and including student input based on their task needs will assist in designing future electronic textbooks that will meet academic reading requirements

Effect of in-app components, medium, and screen size of electronic textbooks on reading performance, behavior, and perception

Although many app-based textbooks are available for students, reading have not been thoroughly outlined. This study aimed to understand how changes from paper to electronic textbooks have affected the academic reading task, investigate student users’ perceptions of in-app components and screen sizes, and identify issues affecting in-app components and task requirements. A mixed factorial design experiment was employed. Results showed that there were no significant changes in comprehension and time spent reading between print text and the iPad. Yet, student highlighting, notetaking, and reading behavior and perception significantly changed based on condition. In addition, students struggled to use in-app components and found them frustrating especially when accounting for sentence splitting. The findings presented can assist in understanding the changes in student reading behavior, which can be used to improve interface design of future e-textbooks

Reading Task Investigation of the Kindle app in Three Mediums

E-textbooks are often considered the future of textbooks but the current capabilities and implications of app-based textbooks and their corresponding technology are not well outlined. The goal in this study was to understand the effects of the change in medium on the academic reading task, student perception of the devices and components, and identify issues surrounding two in-app components. Students completed four reading tasks in three different size mobile devices and a paper control. The experiment also consisted of a between-subject study where students were asked to use the highlighting or annotation component while reading. Results showed that the devices and components actually changed the way the students interact with their reading. Also, students were generally unhappy with the in-app components and smallest sized device. This information is useful to identify the effects of e-textbook apps on reading behavior, which can be applied to improve the design of future e-textbooks