Capture and generalisation of close interaction with objects

Robust manipulation capture and retargeting has been a longstanding goal in both the fields of animation and robotics. In this thesis I describe a new approach to capture both the geometry and motion of interactions with objects, dealing with the problems of occlusion by the use of magnetic systems, and performing the reconstruction of the geometry by an RGB-D sensor alongside visual markers. This ‘interaction capture’ allows the scene to be described in terms of the spatial relationships between the character and the object using novel topological representations such as the Electric Parameters, which parametrise the outer space of an object using properties of the surface of the object. I describe the properties of these representations for motion generalisation and discuss how they can be applied to the problems of human-like motion generation and programming by demonstration. These generalised interactions are shown to be valid by demonstration of retargeting grasping and manipulation to robots with dissimilar kinematics and morphology using only local, gradient-based planning

Reductions in emergency department visits after primary healthcare use of the UK National Poisons Information Service

<p><b>Background:</b> Suspected poisoning is a common cause of hospital admission internationally. In the United Kingdom, the National Poisons Information Service (NPIS), a network of four poisons units, provides specialist advice to health professionals on the management of poisoning by telephone and via its online poisoning information and management database, TOXBASE^®.</p> <p><b>Objective:</b> To demonstrate the impact of NPIS telephone advice and TOXBASE^® guidance on poisoning-related referrals to emergency departments (ED) from primary healthcare settings.</p> <p><b>Methods:</b> A telephone survey of primary healthcare providers calling the NPIS and an online survey of TOXBASE^® primary care users were conducted to evaluate the effect of these services on poisoning-related ED referrals. Enquirers were asked to indicate whether referral was needed before and after using these information sources.</p> <p><b>Results:</b> The number of cases considered by enquirers appropriate for ED referral was reduced from 1178 (58.1%) before to 819 (40.4%) after the provision of telephone advice for 2028 cases (absolute reduction 17.7%, 95% CI 14.6, 20.7%) and from 410 (48.2%) before to 341 (40.1%) after consideration of TOXBASE^® guidance for 851 cases (absolute reduction 8.1%, 95% CI 3.3, 12.9%). By extrapolating these figures over a full year, it is estimated that these services prevent approximately 41,000 ED referrals annually.</p> <p><b>Conclusions:</b> The use of NPIS services significantly reduced ED referrals from primary healthcare services with resulting avoided healthcare costs exceeding the current annual NPIS budget. Further studies are needed to evaluate other potential benefits of accessing NPIS services.</p

Contos de Camp Wilde: tornando queer a pesquisa em educação ambiental Tales from Camp Wilde: queer(y)ing environmental education research

Este artigo questiona o relativo silêncio da teoria e da teorização queer sobre a pesquisa em educação ambiental. Exploramos algumas possibilidades para tornar queer a pesquisa em educação ambiental ao criar (estimulando outras/os a fazer o mesmo) narrativas de Camp Wilde, um local imaginário que nos ajuda a expor o fato de este ser um campo marcado por uma construção heteronormativa. Essas narrativas propõem métodos alternativos de representação e (re)produção do sujeito e do objeto de nossas indagações e nossas identidades como pesquisadoras/es. As/os colaboradoras/es utilizam-se de diferentes recursos teóricos como história da arte, desconstrução, ecofeminismo, crítica literária, estudos culturais populares e pós-estruturalismo feminista a fim de desenvolver uma nova orientação para a pesquisa em Educação Ambiental, a qual esperamos que jamais seja categorizada como um 'novo gênero'.<br>This paper questions the relative silence of queer theory and theorizing in environmental education research. We explore some possibilities for queering environmental education research by fabricating (and inviting colleagues to fabricate) stories of Camp Wilde, a fictional location that helps usto expose the facticity of the field's heteronormative constructedness. These stories suggest alternative ways of (re)presenting and (re)producing both the subjects/objects of our inquiries and our identities as researchers. The contributors draw on a variety of theoretical resources from art history, deconstruction, ecofeminism, literary criticism, popular cultural studies, and feminist poststructuralism to perform an orientation to environmental education research that we hope will never be arrested by its categorization as a "new genre.