177,375 research outputs found
Monte Carlo design for a new neutron collimator at the ENEA Casaccia TRIGA reactor
No full textThe TRIGA RC-1 1MW reactor operating at ENEA Casaccia Center is currently being developed as a second neutron imaging facility that shall be devoted to computed tomography as well as neutron tomography. In order to reduce the gamma-ray content in the neutron beam, the reactor tangential piercing channel was selected. A set of Monte Carlo simulation was used to design the neutron collimator, to determine the preliminary choice of the materials to be employed in the collimator design. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved
The Problem of Monitoring Activities of Older People in Multi-Resident Scenarios: An Innovative and Non-Invasive Measurement System Based on Wearables and PIR Sensors
No full textThis paper presents an innovative multi-resident activity detection sensor network that uses the Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) signal emitted by tags worn by residents and passive infrared (PIR) motion sensors deployed in the house to locate residents and monitor their activities. This measurement system solves the problem of monitoring older people and measuring their activities in multi-resident scenarios. Metrics are defined to analyze and interpret the collected data to understand daily habits and measure the activity level (AL) of older people. The accuracy of the system in detecting movements and discriminating residents is measured. As the sensor-to-person distance increases, the system decreases its ability to detect small movements, while still being able to detect large ones. The accuracy in discriminating the identity of residents can be improved by up to 96% using the Decision Tree (DT) classifier. The effectiveness of the measurement system is demonstrated in a real multi-resident scenario where two older people are monitored during their daily life. The collected data are processed, obtaining the AL and habits of the older people to assess their behavior
Immunotherapy in geriatric surgery [L'IMMUNOTERAPIA NEL PAZIENTE CHIRURGICO ANZIANO]
No full textAfter some important comments regarding the physiopathology of the immune system in elderly patients, the Authors focus on the possibilities currently made available by the studies on therapeutic procedures (TPN) and substances which influence the defence mechanisms in high risk geriatric surgery. Owing to the preliminary nature of studies and the initial stage of research on immunotherapy, the subjects requires further clinical verification and more extensive research. It is certain, however, that the subject is of considerable interest due to its potential future clinical applications
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
No full textWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Design of an Epithermal Facility for Treating Patients with Brain Gliomas at the TAPIRO Fast Reactor at ENEA Casaccia
No full textBy means of Monte Carlo, the feasibility is shown of converting the epithermal neutron beam at the TAPIRO reactor at ENEA, Casaccia, from sample irradiations to patient treatment. The irradiation position had to be moved to outside the reactor at more than twice the distance from the core (2.6m) with a consequent redesign of the column. The characteristic of a low power source (5kW) suggests that the solutions to the design problems may have implications for other limited neutron source NCT facilities
Measurement of activities of daily living: A simulation tool for the optimisation of a passive infrared sensor network in a smart home environment
No full textIn this paper, a tool for the simulation of home environment capable of representing human moving patterns, related to Activities of Daily Living (ADL), and modelling Passive Infrared (PIR) sensor networks is presented. PIR sensors have been chosen because they are non-intrusive, contactless and low-cost. The tool has been programmed in MATLAB and provides a graphic interface from which the developer can change key simulation parameters. It makes it possible to load and visualise the 2D map of the home environment used for simulation as well as add, customise and place ceiling or wall mounted PIR sensors, and regulate users' trajectory parameters, such as walking speed, step length or path efficiency. The simulator is useful for quickly generating synthetic data to train machine learning (ML) algorithms able to recognize user behavior, without the necessity to perform long acquisition periods. In order to demonstrate its applicability, the tool has been used to create normal and wandering trajectories and their related sensor activations. These data were employed to develop a ML algorithm able to detect overnight wandering, a common behaviour in patients with dementia. The results show that a Decision Tree (DT) algorithm is reliable for the purpose of distinguishing normal trajectories from the wandering ones detected by PIR sensor activations, obtaining an accuracy level of over 95% using a cross-validation approach
Well-being and comfort of ageing people based on indoor environmental conditions: preliminary study on human-coach conversation
No full textThis paper presents a scientific methodology to define human-coach conversation for ageing people through virtual coaches by using indoor environmental quality (IEQ) measurements and Knowledge Graphs (KG). The impact of IEQ, i.e., acoustic, thermal, visual comfort and air quality, specifically for ageing people, is provided to define the use-case focused on improving the well-being and comfort of users starting from the environmental measurements. The sensor network to measure the IEQ in the living environment is composed of an air temperature and humidity sensor, acoustic sensor, CO2 sensor, lux meter, etc. A KG is developed, based on these measurements, in order to define a data-driven conversational strategy between the virtual coach and the user at home. An example of KG is presented to define how the measured parameters in the living environment can affect the human-coach conversation
Restriction endonuclease analysis of adenoviruses isolated from outbreaks of pancreatitis in Guinea Fowl (Numida melagris) and in an ostrich (Struthio camelus)
No full text"Closing the R&D Gap, Evaluating the Sources of R&D Spending"
No full textBoth spending and tax policies have been implemented in the United States with the goal of stimulating private sector research and development (R&D). Karier questions whether current R&D policy, especially the research and experimentation tax credit, can contribute to closing the gap between nondefense expenditures on R&D in the United States and such expenditures in other countries, such as Japan and Germany. He also explores possible changes to our current R&D policy to make it more effective.
- …
