Search Results (41)

Platforms have the ability to create connected digital spaces where different actors co-exist and work together. The paper explores the power of platforms as enablers of a new channel of proximity, called digital proximity. It argues that platforms enable interactions, information flows, and network formation through digital proximity, which can effectively reinforce externalities complementing existing proximity forms or bypassing physical space barriers. Firms and industries adopting platform-based tools can create meaningful channels for increasing their proximity at an intra- and inter-firm level. The study uses data from the Digital Economy and Society database covering 25 EU countries for the years 2019 and 2021. It calculates the degree of adoption by EU firms at the national level for a set of selected platform-based technologies closely related to different proximity forms. It investigates the relationship between digital proximity, firm size, and industry, also introducing a geographical dimension. The evidence suggests that large firms have managed to integrate platform-based technologies to a greater extent, whereas small and medium firms still lack leveraging the full power of platforms. Increased adoption at the country level is also related to increased productivity, indicating the geographical dimension of platforms. The paper argues that platforms can be seen as a new means for balancing uneven spatial capabilities for producing proximity, indicating a high potential for fostering territorial cohesion. It concludes by suggesting that future research should measure the effects of digital proximity on development and their causal relationship to better elaborate on the implications of platforms on development. Full article

Cell-surface glycans are abundant and complex and play a critical role in maintaining protein stability, regulating cell behavior, and participating in cell communication. Obtaining structural information on glycans in situ is helpful to further understand the role of glycans in the physiological and pathological processes of cells and the regulatory mechanism. To achieve this, we can use recognition or labeling strategies to convert the presence of glycans on the cell surface into signals that can be detected. Currently, many different types of in situ sensing strategies for glycans have been developed. The spatial control of the conversion process can realize the restriction of glycan detection to specific proteins, and the introduction of signal amplification technology into the conversion process can improve the sensitivity of sensing. In this paper, the recent progress of glycan labeling methods and sensing technology is reviewed, and the future development direction is prospected. Full article

In recent times, the advent of innovative technological paradigms like the Internet of Things has paved the way for numerous applications that enhance the quality of human life. A remarkable application of IoT that has emerged is the Internet of Vehicles (IoV), motivated by an unparalleled surge of connected vehicles on the roads. IoV has become an area of significant interest due to its potential in enhancing traffic safety as well as providing accurate routing information. The primary objective of IoV is to maintain strict latency standards while ensuring confidentiality and security. Given the high mobility and limited bandwidth, vehicles need to have rapid and frequent authentication. Securing Vehicle-to-Roadside unit (V2R) and Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) communications in IoV is essential for preventing critical information leakage to an adversary or unauthenticated users. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a novel mutual authentication protocol which incorporates hardware-based security primitives, namely physically unclonable functions (PUFs) with Multi-Input Multi-Output (MIMO) physical layer communications. The protocol allows a V2V and V2R to mutually authenticate each other without the involvement of a trusted third-party (server). The protocol design effectively mitigates modeling attacks and impersonation attempts, where the accuracy of predicting the value of each PUF response bit does not exceed 54%, which is equivalent to a random guess. Full article

This systematic review examines the use of eye-tracking devices in optometry, describing their main characteristics, areas of application and metrics used. Using the PRISMA method, a systematic search was performed of three databases. The search strategy identified 141 reports relevant to this topic, indicating the exponential growth over the past ten years of the use of eye trackers in optometry. Eye-tracking technology was applied in at least 12 areas of the field of optometry and rehabilitation, the main ones being optometric device technology, and the assessment, treatment, and analysis of ocular disorders. The main devices reported on were infrared light-based and had an image capture frequency of 60 Hz to 2000 Hz. The main metrics mentioned were fixations, saccadic movements, smooth pursuit, microsaccades, and pupil variables. Study quality was sometimes limited in that incomplete information was provided regarding the devices used, the study design, the methods used, participants' visual function and statistical treatment of data. While there is still a need for more research in this area, eye-tracking devices should be more actively incorporated as a useful tool with both clinical and research applications. This review highlights the robustness this technology offers to obtain objective information about a person's vision in terms of optometry and visual function, with implications for improving visual health services and our understanding of the vision process. Full article

Technologies and applications developed to assist and promote museum activities and cultural exhibitions have evolved significantly during the last decade, as has been proven by many works published in the scientific literature. This paper addresses a study developed with the specific purpose of understanding the possible knowledge-transfer outcomes of a digitization process meant to replicate original drawings by Leonardo da Vinci in the digital domain, allowing museums’ visitors to explore them as if they were manipulating the original artworks through custom interactive artifacts. A report is presented here to evaluate and investigate the didactic effectiveness of the fruition devices set up during a real exhibition, with a focus on the application dedicated to the drawing Study for the Adoration of the Magi, part of five artworks by Leonardo selected for exhibition during the reported event. The results encourage the adoption of this kind of technology for disseminating information at different levels, especially when knowledge contents are successfully explicated through proper didactic mediators. Full article

Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI, or concussion), results from direct and indirect trauma to the head (i.e. a closed injury of transmitted forces), with or without loss of consciousness. The current method of diagnosis is largely based on symptom assessment and clinical history. There is an urgent need to identify an objective biomarker which can not only detect injury, but inform prognosis and recovery. Ocular motor impairment is argued to be ubiquitous across mTBI subtypes and may serve as a valuable clinical biomarker with the recent advent of more affordable and portable eye tracking technology. Many groups have positively correlated the degree of ocular motor impairment to symptom severity with a minority attempting to validate these findings with diffusion tract imaging and functional MRI. However, numerous methodological issues limit the interpretation of results, preventing any singular ocular biomarker from prevailing. This review will comprehensively describe the anatomical susceptibility, clinical measurement, and current eye tracking literature surrounding saccades, smooth pursuit, vestibulo-ocular reflex, vergence, pupillary light reflex, and accommodation in mTBI. Full article

In recent decades cities have applied a number of policy measures aimed at reducing car use and increasing public transportation (PT) patronage. Persuasive strategies to change mobility behavior present notable limitations in economic and logistical terms and have only minor impacts. The smartphone has emerged as a promising tool to overcome these challenges, as it can host persuasion strategies through mobility apps. Simultaneously, Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) schemes could open up new possibilities for addressing both sustainability goals and the needs of urban travelers. This paper carries out a literature review to identify the key elements of mobility apps that foster more sustainable travelers’ choices. The findings show that some persuasive strategies such as eco-feedback, rewards or social challenges are effective because they are well received by users. From the users’ point of view, the perceived barriers (e.g., usability, privacy) relate negatively to app adoption, and it is considered useful to include functional needs such as real-time information (e.g., to avoid congestion), cost savings (e.g., customized multimodal packages), comfort (e.g., crowding on public transport) or health (e.g., calories burned). We have found that a proper design of multimodal travel packages based on (i) financial incentives and (ii) environmental awareness, could help increase public transport patronage and reduce private car use. Full article

Expertise in laparoscopic surgery is realized through both manual dexterity and efficient eye movement patterns, creating opportunities to use gaze information in the educational process. To better understand how expert gaze behaviors are acquired through deliberate practice of technical skills, three surgeons were assessed and five novices were trained and assessed in a 5-visit protocol on the Fundamentals of Laparoscopic Surgery peg transfer task. The task was adjusted to have a fixed action sequence to allow recordings of dwell durations based on pre-defined areas of interest (AOIs). Trained novices were shown to reach more than 98% (M = 98.62%, SD = 1.06%) of their behavioral learning plateaus, leading to equivalent behavioral performance to that of surgeons. Despite this equivalence in behavioral performance, surgeons continued to show significantly shorter dwell durations at visual targets of current actions and longer dwell durations at future steps in the action sequence than trained novices (ps ≤ .03, Cohen’s ds > 2). This study demonstrates that, while novices can train to match surgeons on behavioral performance, their gaze pattern is still less efficient than that of surgeons, motivating surgical training programs to involve eye tracking technology in their design and evaluation. Full article

New medical technologies can transform healthcare, and automation of processes is becoming increasingly ubiquitous within the patient care sector. Many innovative ideas arise from academia, but regulations need to be taken into account if they want to reach the market and create a real impact. This is particularly relevant for applied fields, such as prosthetics, which continuously generates cutting-edge solutions. However, it remains unclear how well the regulatory pathway is supported within universities. This study applied a data-driven assessment of available online information regarding support of medical device regulations within universities. A total of 109,200 URLs were screened for regulatory information associated with universities in the UK and the USA. The results show that based on available online data, 55% of the selected universities in the UK and 35% in the USA did not provide any support for medical device regulations. There is a big discrepancy between universities in terms of the available support, as well as the kind of information that is made accessible by the academic institutes. It is suggested that increasing support for regulatory strategies during the early phases of research and development will likely yield a better translation of technologies into clinical care. Universities can play a more active role in this. Full article

The substitution of fossil resources by renewable alternatives is a major challenge for our society. Kolbe electrolysis converts carboxylic acids to hydrocarbons, which can be used as base chemicals, specialty chemicals, or fuels. Carboxylic acids may be retrieved from biomass or residues and, in consequence, can be a sustainable feedstock. Since the Kolbe electrolysis has only been investigated in lab scale, this work proposes the first basic engineering design study on process development for a continuously working process. Thermophysical data, including solubility and boiling point, are used to gain insight into requirements on process equipment such as separation processes or process parameters such as operating temperature. Furthermore, Aspen Plus was used to retrieve information on acid base equilibria and azeotropes. The process development for three different feedstocks (acetic acid, valeric acid and lauric acid) was performed. The process design shows that most of the process units are rather straightforward and rely on state of the art technologies. The addition of an alkaline catalyst improves the solubility and deprotonation of the carboxylic acid but on the cost of a possibly lower product selectivity. Elevation of the operating temperature above the Krafft point is necessary for long-chain fatty acids. Kolbe electrolysis can be an interesting technology for future production processes based on carboxylic acids and electricity from sustainable sources. Full article

Security presents itself as one of the biggest threats to the enabling and the deployment of the Internet of Things (IoT). Security challenges are evident in light of recent cybersecurity attacks that targeted major internet service providers and crippled a significant portion of the entire Internet by taking advantage of faulty and ill-protected embedded devices. Many of these devices reside at home networks with user-administrators who are not familiar with network security best practices, making them easy targets for the attackers. Therefore, security solutions are needed to navigate the insecure and untrusted public networks by automating protections through affordable and accessible first-hand network information sharing. This paper proposes and implements a proof of concept (PoC) to secure Internet Service Providers (ISPs), home networks, and home-based IoT devices using blockchain technologies. The results obtained support the idea of a distributed cyber threat intelligence data sharing network capable of protecting various stakeholders. Full article

Eye tracking research in art viewership is often conducted in a laboratory setting where reproductions must be used in place of original art works and the viewing environment is less natural than in a museum. Recent technological developments have made museum studies possible but head-mounted eye tracking gear and interruptions by researchers still influence the experience of the viewer. In order to find a more ecologically valid way of recording eye movements while viewing artworks, we employed a prototype of a calibration-free remote eye tracker hidden below selected paintings at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. Museum visitors were unaware of the study and informed post hoc that we had registered their viewing behavior and asked to give consent for the use of their data. This article presents the study design as well as results from over 800 participants. While the data quality from the eye tracker prototype was not sufficient to conduct the intended analysis on within-painting gaze movements, this study might serve as a step towards an unobtrusive examination of the art viewing experience. It was possible to analyze time spent viewing paintings and those results show that certain paintings consistently drew significantly more prolonged attention from viewers. Full article

Distributed monitoring sensor networks are used in an ever increasing number of applications, particularly with the advent of IoT technologies. This has led to a growing demand for unconventional analytical tools to cope with a large amount of different signals. In this scenario, the modeling of time series in similar groups represents an interesting area especially for feature subset selection (FSS) purposes. Methods based on clustering algorithms are very promising for FSS, but in their original form they are unsuitable to manage the complexity of temporal dynamics in time series. In this paper we propose a clustering approach, based on complex network analysis, for the unsupervised FSS of time series in sensor networks. We used natural visibility graphs to map signal segments in the network domain, then extracted features in the form of node degree sequences of the graphs, and finally computed time series clustering through community detection algorithms. The approach was tested on multivariate signals monitored in a 1 MW cogeneration plant and the results show that it outperforms standard time series clustering in terms of both redundancy reduction and information gain. In addition, the proposed method demonstrated its merit in terms of retention of information content with respect to the original dataset in the analyzed condition monitoring system. Full article

Eye-tracking technology is increasingly introduced in museums to assess their role in learning and knowledge transfer. However, their use provide limited quantitative and/or qualitative measures such as viewing time and/or gaze trajectory on an isolated object or image (Region of Interest “ROI”). The aim of this work is to evaluate the potential of the mobile eye-tracking to quantify the students’ experience and behaviors through their visit of the “Genocide and mass violence” area of the Caen memorial. In this study, we collected eye-tracking data from 17 students during their visit to the memorial. In addition, all visitors filled out a questionnaire before the visit, and a focus group was conducted before and after the visit. The first results of this study allowed us to analyze the viewing time spent by each visitor in front of 19-selected ROIs, and some of their specific sub-parts. The other important result was the reconstruction of the gaze trajectory through these ROIs. Our global trajectory approach allowed to complete the information obtained from an isolated ROI, and to identify some behaviors such as avoidance. Clustering analysis revealed some typical trajectories performed by specific sub-groups. The eye-tracking results were consolidated by the participants’ answers during the focus group. Full article