Search Results (7)

This paper presents a novel hallway gait extraction system that enables an individual’s spatiotemporal gait parameter extraction at each gait cycle using a single FMCW (Frequency Modulated Continuous Wave) radar. The purpose of the proposed system is to detect changes in gait that may be the signs of changes in mobility, cognition, and frailty, particularly for older adults in retirement homes. We believe that one of the straightforward applications for gait monitoring using radars is in corridors and hallways, which are commonly available in most retirement and long-term care homes. To achieve in-corridor coverage, we designed an in-package hyperbola-based lens antenna integrated with a radar module package empowered by our fast and easy-to-implement gait extraction method. We validated system functionality by capturing spatiotemporal gait values (e.g., speed, step points, step time, step length, and step count) of people walking in a hallway. The results achieved in this work pave the way to explore the use of stand-alone radar-based sensors in long hallways in retirement apartment buildings or individual’s homes for use in day-to-day long-term monitoring of gait parameters of older adults. Full article

(1) Background: surveillance data from the Saudi Ministry of Health shows that the Kingdom’s large-scale immunisation programme has significantly reduced the mortality and morbidity of the target diseases among children. In this study, we review relevant literature and test a number of hypotheses related to the association between demographic, socio-economic, clinic-related, and parents-related variables and completion of childhood immunisation. In doing so, this study identifies critical factors associated with completion of childhood immunisation and presents important implications to healthcare practitioners, particularly in Saudi Arabia; (2) Literature review: a systematic literature review was conducted to understand what is currently published concerning parents’ immunisation compliance in Saudi Arabia and the factors associated with immunisation compliance. (3) Methods: from March to May 2022, an online survey was administered to parents attending one of the 27 primary health care (PHC) centres in Qatif. Data from parents (n = 353) were analysed using exploratory factor analysis, correlation, and a series of OLS and logistic regression models; (4) Results: parental (child) age was negatively (positively) associated with the completion status of childhood immunisation (both p < 0.05). Parents with positive attitudes, social norms, perceptions towards immunisation, and those working in private companies were more likely to immunise their children (all p < 0.05). Conversely, living in an apartment building, walking to PHCs, waiting longer at PHCs, and having higher knowledge of immunisation were negatively associated with the completion of childhood immunisation (all p < 0.05); (5) Conclusions: several factors that positively or negatively influence the completion of childhood immunisation have been identified. Future studies may investigate the causal link between these factors and parental decision-making regarding childhood immunisation. Full article

This work introduces a high-performance, quadruped-assistive-robot expandable platform with wheel–leg mode transformation functions. The robot platform is designed for transporting goods in residential areas such as apartments, private houses, and office buildings. It is capable to move fast on flat ground on wheels or use legs to move in other places, especially for moving on and off residential staircases and wheelchair accessible ramps. To achieve higher load capacity and combine the knee joint with the drive wheel, we designed a compact torso–leg structure, driving the lower link through a ligament-like structure. Because the distance between the wheel and the torso is short, the mass centroid drops and the force arm caused by the load is reduced; the designed sample robot is capable to transport uniform mass loads up to 15 kg while keeping it affordable. The proposed ligament-like transmission structure also ensures the torso’s even gesture and load capability in its walking mode. Gait motion planning, finite element analysis, and task-oriented simulation have been conducted to prove its applicability and feasibility when given a heavy load to transport across flat and staired scenarios. Full article

When children run and jump or adults walk indoors, the impact sounds conveyed to neighbouring households have relatively high energy in low-frequency bands. The experience of and response to low-frequency floor impact sounds can differ depending on factors such as the duration of exposure, the listener’s noise sensitivity, and the level of background noise in housing complexes. In order to study responses to actual floor impact sounds, it is necessary to investigate how the response is affected by changes in the background noise and differences in the response when focusing on other tasks. In this study, the author presented subjects with a rubber ball impact sound recorded from different apartment buildings and housings and investigated the subjects’ responses to varying levels of background noise and when they were assigned tasks to change their level of attention on the presented sound. The subjects’ noise sensitivity and response to their neighbours were also compared. The results of the subjective experiment showed differences in the subjective responses depending on the level of background noise, and high intensity rubber ball impact sounds were associated with larger subjective responses. In addition, when subjects were performing a task like browsing the internet, they attended less to the rubber ball impact sound, showing a less sensitive response to the same intensity of impact sound. The responses of the group with high noise sensitivity showed an even steeper response curve with the same change in impact sound intensity. The group with less positive opinions of their neighbours showed larger changes in their subjective response, resulting in the expression of stronger opinions even to the same change in loudness of the impact sound. It was found that subjective responses were different when subjects were performing activities of daily living, such as reading or watching TV in the evening, and when they were focused on floor impact sounds in the middle of the night. Full article

The level of spatial accessibility is directly related to how street networks are connected. Connected or so-called “permeable” network systems encourage walking, cycling, and riding public transit. Fast urbanization during the recent decades in the world metropolises has created separated urban areas. Gated-style apartment complexes have led this segregation more obviously with their inaccessible internal networks. Opening the internal network of apartment complexes and redesigning the pedestrian paths among apartment buildings will significantly mitigate these networks’ adverse effects on network permeability and increase spatial accessibility. This paper analyzes how such an opening design proposal for apartment complexes can change spatial accessibility using the case study of Mapo-gu, Seoul, Korea. It simulates three types of street networks and compares the results of accessibility in three conditions: (1) the internal networks of apartment complexes are not used by outsiders; (2) the internal networks of apartment complexes are open to outsiders with its existing entrances and path; and (3) the internal networks of sites are opened and redesigned by the Voronoi diagram method, which generates the optimal shortest path. An urban network analysis tool, Rhinoceros three-dimensional software, and Grashopper3D visual programming language have been used for the study results, which shows that a policy change in opening the intra-network of apartment complexes is likely to make the city more permeable. In addition, this study suggests extra modification on the pedestrian path for a higher level of accessibility in neighborhoods. Full article

Increasing the energy efficiency of the housing stock has been one of the largest challenges of the built environment in the Netherlands in recent decades. Parallel with the energy transition there is an ongoing revaluation of the architectural quality of pre-war residential buildings. In the past, urban renewal was traditionally based on demolition and replacement with new buildings. This has changed to the improvement of old buildings through renovation. Housing corporations developed an approach for the deep renovation of their housing stock in the period 1995–2015. The motivation to renovate buildings varied, but the joint pattern that emerged was quality improvement of housing in cities, focusing particularly on energy efficiency, according to project data files from the NRP institute (Platform voor Transformatie en Renovatie). However, since 2015 the data from the federation of Amsterdam-based housing associations AFWC (Amsterdamse Federatie Woningcorporaties) has shown the transformation of pre-war walk-up apartment buildings has stagnated. The sales of units are slowing down, except in pre-war neighbourhoods. Housing associations have sold their affordable housing stock of pre-war property in Amsterdam inside the city’s ring road. The sales revenue was used to build new affordable housing far beyond the ring road. This study highlights the profound influence of increasing requirements established by the European Energy Performance of Building Directive (EPBD) and the revised Housing Act of 1 July 2015, for the renovation of the pre-war housing stock. The transformation process to climate-neutral neighbourhoods inside the ring road is slowing down because of new property owners, making a collective heat network difficult to realize; furthermore, segregation of residents is appearing in Amsterdam. Full article

Increasing energy efficiency of the housing stock is one of the largest challenges in the built environment today. In line with the international Paris-Climate-Change-Conference 2015, Dutch municipalities and housing associations have embraced the ambition to achieve carbon neutrality for their social housing stock by 2050. However, most deep renovation designs for increasing the energy efficiency of dwellings focus on the relatively easy portion of the housing stock: postwar row housing. Furthermore, such design solutions are mostly produced without much care for architectural quality and cultural heritage, nor for testing for consumer preferences. Yet, such aspects are of major importance in tenement housing, particularly regarding the architectural quality of the huge numbers of walk-up apartment buildings from the inter- and postwar periods owned by housing associations in the larger cities. Renovation of buildings of this typology is more complex because of, among others, technical, social, and heritage factors. To support decisions in this complex context, a General Transformation Framework and a Roadmap has been developed for generating design solutions for deep renovation of representative parts of postwar walk-up apartment buildings with the aim to increase energy efficiency; retain its architectural legibility and cultural heritage value; and allow for the presentation of (end) users, with various options for adaptation to assess their preferences. Full article