Overhead Localization of Mobile Robots

The objective of this thesis has been to develop a system that detects a mobile robot with tracking and controlling its position with the help of one or more cameras. This has been done by implementing different algorithms that are able to detects markers. By using several cameras one can track over a bigger area and estimate the markers position with better precision by using triangulation where the marker has been detected by at least two cameras. A tracking marker is mounted on a robot which enables the camera to detect the robot and a reference marker is placed on the ground in order for the mobile robot to move towards the reference marker. When the tracking and reference marker has been detected the direct commands are then sent to the mobile robot for controlling its position. Topics that are of interest in this report are image analysis in general, image analysis algorithms, camera calibration, different libraries for implementation, Lego mindstorms NXT, sockets TCP/UDP, bluetooth

Den osynliga användaren : hur kan bibliotek förbättra servicen för användare med osynliga funktionsnedsättningar?

The aim of this masters’ thesis is to examine how libraries can better services for patrons with invisible disabilities. My hypothesis is that although libraries are legally obliged to pay special attention to persons with disabilities, in reality the special needs of persons with invisible disabilities are often ignored. Invisible disabilities are disabilities that are not immediately apparent. This poses special challenges for libraries. Invisible disabilities include ADHD, depression, dyslexia, schizophrenia and anxiety disorder but the major focus in this thesis will be on people with autism spectrum disorders, although the issues discussed in the thesis will be more or less relevant for all the groups with invisible disabilities. My research focuses on three different areas that are of special concern for this group. The first is a tendency for the modern public library to become a community center and part of the experience industry. Most people with autism spectrum disorders have difficulties with sensory overload and this development could mean that these public places might become less accessible. Are modern libraries welcoming to patrons suffering from sensory overload? The second area of research focuses on how many persons with invisible disabilities do not wish to disclose their disabilities to their surroundings. At the same time libraries are expected to take their disabilities into account. Can special treatment in the library stigmatize patrons with invisible disabilities? Finally I aim to research how libraries can work to make this public resource a welcoming and inclusive environment for people with very different needs. The method used is a combination of interviews and comparative studies of international research on the subject. Four interviews were conducted, including both users and librarians with or without disabilities. The aim was to approach the research problems from both a librarian and a user perspective in order to get a more general picture of how this group of patrons experience the library and how the library approaches this challenge. I come to the conclusion that the modern library is not an environment that welcomes persons with sensory overload issues, but could be if these problems were taken into account in library space planning. I also conclude that libraries need to take stigmatization of persons with invisible disabilities in account when planning special services. Finally, education of staff and a proactive and collaborative stance is needed to make libraries welcoming and inclusive for persons with different needs

Protein structure validation and refinement using amide proton chemical shifts derived from quantum mechanics

We present the ProCS method for the rapid and accurate prediction of protein backbone amide proton chemical shifts - sensitive probes of the geometry of key hydrogen bonds that determine protein structure. ProCS is parameterized against quantum mechanical (QM) calculations and reproduces high level QM results obtained for a small protein with an RMSD of 0.25 ppm (r = 0.94). ProCS is interfaced with the PHAISTOS protein simulation program and is used to infer statistical protein ensembles that reflect experimentally measured amide proton chemical shift values. Such chemical shift-based structural refinements, starting from high-resolution X-ray structures of Protein G, ubiquitin, and SMN Tudor Domain, result in average chemical shifts, hydrogen bond geometries, and trans-hydrogen bond (h3JNC') spin-spin coupling constants that are in excellent agreement with experiment. We show that the structural sensitivity of the QM-based amide proton chemical shift predictions is needed to refine protein structures to this agreement. The ProCS method thus offers a powerful new tool for refining the structures of hydrogen bonding networks to high accuracy with many potential applications such as protein flexibility in ligand binding.Comment: PLOS ONE accepted, Nov 201

Nursing students’ perceptions of their verbal and social interaction skills in Sweden and China during their first semester

Aim: This study aimed to investigate the similarities and differences related to verbal and social interaction skills between nursing students attending universities in Sweden and China, two countries with different educational systems, during the students’ first semester. Background: Nurses need a high level of interaction skills in order to interact effectively with patients and their families. Thus, practical nursing education focusing on clinical skills is essential. Method: Students at one university in Sweden and two universities in China completed the Verbal and Social Interactions for Nursing Students (VSI-NS) questionnaire. Results: The students perceived ‘Building a caring relationship’ and ‘Caring towards health and well-being’ as the most frequently occurring and important types of caring interactions. The students perceived that talking with a patient about his/her feelings and thoughts was the least frequently occurring and least important type of caring interaction. Conclusion: The students appear to understand from the initial phase of their education that the caring relationship and the patients’ health and well-being will be the major focus of their role as nurses. Résumé But : Cette étude visait à étudier les similitudes et les différences liées aux habiletés d’interaction verbale et sociale entre des étudiantes en sciences infirmières d’universités en Suède et en Chine, deux pays avec des systèmes d’enseignement différents, au cours du premier semestre des étudiantes. Contexte : Les infirmières ont besoin d’un niveau élevé d’habiletés interactionnelles afin d’interagir avec les patients et leurs familles. Ainsi, il est essentiel qu’elles puissent bénéficier d’une formation en sciences infirmières axée sur les habiletés cliniques. Méthode : Des étudiantes d’une université en Suède et de deux universités en Chine ont rempli le questionnaire Verbal and Social Interactions for Nursing Students (Interactions verbales et sociales pour les étudiantes en sciences infirmières; VSI-NS). Résultats : Les étudiantes percevaient qu’« Établir une relation de caring » et « Se soucier de la santé et du bien-être » étaient les formes d’interactions caring les plus fréquentes et les plus importantes. Les étudiantes ont perçu que parler avec un patient de ses sentiments et de ses pensées était le type d’interaction de caring le moins fréquent et le moins important. Conclusion : Les étudiantes semblent comprendre dès le début de leur formation que la relation de caring ainsi que la santé et le bien-être des patients se trouveront au centre de leur rôle d’infirmière

Potentials of Mean Force for Protein Structure Prediction Vindicated, Formalized and Generalized

Understanding protein structure is of crucial importance in science, medicine and biotechnology. For about two decades, knowledge based potentials based on pairwise distances -- so-called "potentials of mean force" (PMFs) -- have been center stage in the prediction and design of protein structure and the simulation of protein folding. However, the validity, scope and limitations of these potentials are still vigorously debated and disputed, and the optimal choice of the reference state -- a necessary component of these potentials -- is an unsolved problem. PMFs are loosely justified by analogy to the reversible work theorem in statistical physics, or by a statistical argument based on a likelihood function. Both justifications are insightful but leave many questions unanswered. Here, we show for the first time that PMFs can be seen as approximations to quantities that do have a rigorous probabilistic justification: they naturally arise when probability distributions over different features of proteins need to be combined. We call these quantities reference ratio distributions deriving from the application of the reference ratio method. This new view is not only of theoretical relevance, but leads to many insights that are of direct practical use: the reference state is uniquely defined and does not require external physical insights; the approach can be generalized beyond pairwise distances to arbitrary features of protein structure; and it becomes clear for which purposes the use of these quantities is justified. We illustrate these insights with two applications, involving the radius of gyration and hydrogen bonding. In the latter case, we also show how the reference ratio method can be iteratively applied to sculpt an energy funnel. Our results considerably increase the understanding and scope of energy functions derived from known biomolecular structures

Associations between cognition and serotonin receptor 1B binding in patients with major depressive disorder : a pilot study

The neurotransmitter serotonin has been widely implicated in the pathophysiology of major depressive disorder (MDD). In animal studies and human neuroimaging studies, involvement of the serotonin receptor 1B (5-HT1BR) in MDD and memory performance has been reported. However, the role of the 5-HT1BR in cognitive functions affected in MDD remains to be clarified. Ten patients with MDD diagnosis were examined with positron emission tomography (PET) and a battery of cognitive tests before and after Internet-based Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (ICBT). The results were compared to ten matched control subjects in order to investigate putative changes in 5-HT1BR availability and cognitive performance. Patients treated with ICBT showed statistically significant improvement relative to baseline in Verbal fluency, both letter and category production. Significant correlations were found between improvement in letter production and changes in 5-HT1BR availability in ventral striatum, between category production and amygdala, as well as between the improvement in Trailmaking test B and change in 5-HT1BR binding in dorsal brainstem, in amygdala and in hippocampus. The results suggest an association between 5-HT1BR binding and improvement in cognitive functioning. Replications in larger-scale studies are required to confirm these findings.Swedish Research Council (523-2013-2982)Birgitta and Sten WesterbergSwedish Society of MedicineStiftelsen Söderström-Königska sjukhemmetStockholm County CouncilThe Stockholm Centre for Psychiatric ResearchKarolinska InstitutetAccepte

Prevalence of BRCA1 and BRCA2 pathogenic variants in a large, unselected breast cancer cohort.

Breast cancer patients with BRCA1/2-driven tumors may benefit from targeted therapy. It is not clear whether current BRCA screening guidelines are effective at identifying these patients. The purpose of our study was to evaluate the prevalence of inherited BRCA1/2 pathogenic variants in a large, clinically representative breast cancer cohort and to estimate the proportion of BRCA1/2 carriers not detected by selectively screening individuals with the highest probability of being carriers according to current clinical guidelines. The study included 5,122 unselected Swedish breast cancer patients diagnosed from 2001 to 2008. Target sequence enrichment (48.48 Fluidigm Access Arrays) and sequencing were performed (Illumina Hi-Seq 2,500 instrument, v4 chemistry). Differences in patient and tumor characteristics of BRCA1/2 carriers who were already identified as part of clinical BRCA1/2 testing routines and additional BRCA1/2 carriers found by sequencing the entire study population were compared using logistic regression models. Ninety-two of 5,099 patients with valid variant calls were identified as BRCA1/2 carriers by screening all study participants (1.8%). Only 416 study participants (8.2%) were screened as part of clinical practice, but this identified 35 out of 92 carriers (38.0%). Clinically identified carriers were younger, less likely postmenopausal and more likely to be associated with familiar ovarian cancer compared to the additional carriers identified by screening all patients. More BRCA2 (34/42, 81.0%) than BRCA1 carriers (23/50, 46%) were missed by clinical screening. In conclusion, BRCA1/2 mutation prevalence in unselected breast cancer patients was 1.8%. Six in ten BRCA carriers were not detected by selective clinical screening of individuals

The FANCM:p.Arg658* truncating variant is associated with risk of triple-negative breast cancer.

Breast cancer is a common disease partially caused by genetic risk factors. Germline pathogenic variants in DNA repair genes BRCA1, BRCA2, PALB2, ATM, and CHEK2 are associated with breast cancer risk. FANCM, which encodes for a DNA translocase, has been proposed as a breast cancer predisposition gene, with greater effects for the ER-negative and triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) subtypes. We tested the three recurrent protein-truncating variants FANCM:p.Arg658*, p.Gln1701*, and p.Arg1931* for association with breast cancer risk in 67,112 cases, 53,766 controls, and 26,662 carriers of pathogenic variants of BRCA1 or BRCA2. These three variants were also studied functionally by measuring survival and chromosome fragility in FANCM -/- patient-derived immortalized fibroblasts treated with diepoxybutane or olaparib. We observed that FANCM:p.Arg658* was associated with increased risk of ER-negative disease and TNBC (OR = 2.44, P = 0.034 and OR = 3.79; P = 0.009, respectively). In a country-restricted analysis, we confirmed the associations detected for FANCM:p.Arg658* and found that also FANCM:p.Arg1931* was associated with ER-negative breast cancer risk (OR = 1.96; P = 0.006). The functional results indicated that all three variants were deleterious affecting cell survival and chromosome stability with FANCM:p.Arg658* causing more severe phenotypes. In conclusion, we confirmed that the two rare FANCM deleterious variants p.Arg658* and p.Arg1931* are risk factors for ER-negative and TNBC subtypes. Overall our data suggest that the effect of truncating variants on breast cancer risk may depend on their position in the gene. Cell sensitivity to olaparib exposure, identifies a possible therapeutic option to treat FANCM-associated tumors