bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Validation and Experimentation of a Tourism Recommender Agent based on a Graded BDI Model
Authors: Casali Ana  , Godo Lluís  , Sierra Carles
Published: February 2025

In this paper, a validation and an experimentation of the use of graded BDI agents is reported. This agent model has been proposed to specify agents capable to deal with the environment uncertainty and with graded attitudes in an efficient way. As a case study we focus on a Tourism Recommender Agent specified using this agent model. The experimentation on the case study aims at proving that this agent model is useful to develop concrete agents showing different and rich behaviours. We also show that the results obtained by these particular recommender agents using graded attitudes improve those achieved by agents using non-graded attitudes.
Minimal Unsatisfiability and Autarkies
Authors: Kleine Büning Hans  , Kullmann Oliver
Published: February 2025

Minimal unsatisfiability describes the reduced kernel of unsatisfiable formulas. The investigation of this property is very helpful in understanding the reasons for unsatisfiability as well as the behaviour of SAT-solvers and proof calculi. Moreover, for propositional formulas and quantified Boolean formulas the computational complexity of various SAT-related problems are strongly related to the complexity of minimal unsatisfiable formulas.
Worst-Case Upper Bounds
Authors: Dantsin Evgeny  , Hirsch Edward A.
Published: February 2025

The chapter is a survey of ideas and techniques behind satisfiability algorithms with the currently best asymptotic upper bounds on the worst-case running time. The survey also includes related structural-complexity topics such as Schaefer's dichotomy theorem, reductions between various restricted cases of SAT, the exponential time hypothesis, etc.
Non-Clausal SAT and ATPG
Authors: Drechsler Rolf  , Junttila Tommi  , Niemelä Ilkka
Published: February 2025

When studying the propositional satisfiability problem (SAT), that is, the problem of deciding whether a propositional formula is satisfiable, it is typically assumed that the formula is given in the conjunctive normal form (CNF). Also most software tools for deciding satisfiability of a formula (SAT solvers) assume that their input is in CNF. An important reason for this is that it is simpler to develop efficient data structures and algorithms for CNF than for arbitrary formulas. On the other hand, using CNF makes efficient modeling of an application cumbersome. Therefore one often employs a more general formula representation in modeling and then transforms the formula into CNF for SAT solvers. Transforming a propositional formula in CNF either increases the formula size exponentially or requires the use of auxiliary variables, which can have an negative effect on the performance of a SAT solver in the worst-case. Moreover, by translating to CNF one often loses information about the structure of the original problem. In this chapter we survey methods for solving propositional satisfiability problems when the input formula is not given in CNF but as a general formula or even more compactly as a Boolean circuit. We show how the techniques applied in CNF level Davis-Putnam-Loveland-Logemann algorithm generalize to Boolean circuits and how the problem structure available in the circuit form can be exploited. Then we consider a closely related area of automatic test pattern generation (ATPG) for digital circuits and review classical ATPG algorithms, formulation of ATPG as a SAT problem, and advanced techniques for SAT-based ATPG.
Fuzzy Dynamical Model of Epidemic Spreading Taking into Account the Uncertainties in Individual Infectivity
Authors: dos Santos Fabiano de Sant'Ana  , Ortega Neli Regina Siqueira  , Zanetta Dirce Maria Trevisan  , Massad Eduardo
Published: February 2025

In this paper we present a fuzzy approach to the Reed-Frost model for epidemic spreading taking into account uncertainties in the diagnostic of the infection. The heterogeneities in the infected group is based on the clinical signals of the individuals (symptoms, laboratorial exams, medical findings, etc.), which are incorporated to the dynamic of the epidemic. The infectivity level is time-varying and the classification of the individuals is performed through fuzzy relations. Simulations considering a real problem data of the influenza epidemic in the baby daycare are performed and the results are compared with a stochastic Reed-Frost generalization developed by the authors in a previous work.
Paraconsistent Autonomous Mobile Robot Emmy III
Authors: Abe Jair Minoro  , Torres Cláudio Rodrigo  , Lambert-Torres Germano  , da Silva Filho João Inácio  , Martins Helga Gonzaga
Published: February 2025

This work presents some improvements regarding to the autonomous mobile robot Emmy based on Paraconsistent Annotated Evidential Logic Eτ. A discussion on navigation system is presented.
Business Rule Management in Enterprise Resource Planning Systems
Authors: Avdejenkov Vladimir  , Vasilecas Olegas  , Smaizys Aidas
Published: February 2025

Nowadays Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems are not only supplying information for all departments within an enterprise to support decisions, but also are used together with other software systems to automate business processes. Business processes are running according to the business rules. However business processes are changing rapidly and especially because of changes in business logics and sequentially changes in rules system. To implement such changes into the business system, all software systems of information system (IS), which are supporting business, should be readjusted to be in alignment with business. Separation and centralisation of business logics represented by business rules from the code of software system of IS is one of the ways to solve the problem. The paper analyses problems and available solutions of integration tasks to allow ERP system the collaboration with other software systems of IS. The main contribution of the paper is a business rule management system based method for solution of such a problems by providing of the separated component of shared business logics for all software systems of IS that are servicing the business system.
Ontology Revisited: Concepts, Languages, and the World(s)
Authors: Palomäki Jari
Published: February 2025

In this paper the role of ontology is considered in the context of information systems and conceptual modelling. Firstly we describe information systems and conceptual modelling without using the word “ontology”. Then two senses of ontology are presented: philosophical and knowledge representation views. In this connection both Gruber's and Guarino's definitions of “ontology” are scrutinized. It is proposed that the kind of terminological shifts concerning the word “ontology”, and practiced e.g. by Gruber and Guarino, have caused more confusion than clarification in the field of information systems and conceptual modelling. Instead of given a new or a better definition of our own, our view is that the word “ontology” should be used in its traditional philosophical sense only, whereas our aim in the field of information systems and conceptual modelling is to reach conceptual clarity.
Copyright Licenses Reasoning an OWL-DL Ontology
Authors: García Roberto  , Gil Rosa
Published: February 2025

In order to extract the full potential from Internet-wide content sharing and reuse, the underlying copyright issues must be taken into account. The novel requirements are not satisfied by traditional Digital Rights Management. Open licensing initiatives seem more appropriate, but they lack the required computerised support. Our proposal facilitates interoperation while providing a rich framework that accommodates copyright law and copes with custom licensing schemes. It is based on the Description Logic variant of the Web Ontology Language (OWL-DL) and constitutes an ontology that conceptualizes the copyright domain. The ontology provides the building blocks for flexible machine-understandable licenses and facilitates implementation because DL reasoners can be directly used for license checking. However, some preliminary transformations of the licenses models are required in order to overcome the Open World Assumption inherent in OWL-DL, which limits DL-based license reasoning.
Ontology learning from Italian legal texts
Authors: Lenci Alessandro  , Montemagni Simonetta  , Pirrelli Vito  , Venturi Giulia
Published: February 2025

The paper reports on the methodology and preliminary results of a case study in automatically extracting ontological knowledge from Italian legislative texts. We use a fully–implemented ontology learning system (T2K) that includes a battery of tools for Natural Language Processing (NLP), statistical text analysis and machine language learning. Tools are dynamically integrated to provide an incremental representation of the content of vast repositories of unstructured documents. Evaluated results, however preliminary, show the great potential of NLP–powered incremental systems like T2K for accurate large–scale semi–automatic extraction of legal ontologies.
Concept and Context in Legal Information Retrieval
Authors: Maxwell K. Tamsin  , Schafer Burkhard
Published: February 2025

There exist two broad approaches to information retrieval (IR) in the legal domain: those based on manual knowledge engineering (KE) and those based on natural language processing (NLP). The KE approach is grounded in artificial intelligence (AI) and case-based reasoning (CBR), whilst the NLP approach is associated with open domain statistical retrieval. We provide some original arguments regarding the focus on KE-based retrieval in the past and why this is not sustainable in the long term. Legal approaches to questioning (NLP), rather than arguing (CBR), are proposed as the appropriate jurisprudential and cognitive underpinning for legal IR. Recall within the context of precision is proposed as a better fit to law than the ‘total recall’ model of the past, wherein conceptual and contextual search are combined to improve retrieval performance for both parties in a dispute.
Towards Semantic Wikis: Modelling Intensions, Topics, and Origin in Content Management Systems
Authors: Fiedler Gunar  , Thalheim Bernhard
Published: February 2025

Content management is the process of handling information within an organization or community. Therefore, content management systems have to provide generic functionality for generation, extraction, storage, and exchange of digital assets. Because of the heterogeneity and complexity of content, a sufficient semantical and user-oriented annotation of content is crucial. Although semantical annotation by metadata and ontologies together with reasoning support has been extensively studied for a long time, commercially available content management systems provide only basic support for semantic modelling. Conceptual aspects of content users and support of user specific intensions are neglected. In this paper we will analyze the mismatch between the requirements of content management and semantical description and propose a data model for content which treats semantic information not only as describing metadata but incorporates the data itself, the intension behind the data, the usage of data and the origin of data on the same level.
A News Index System for Global Comparisons of Many Major Topics on the Earth
Authors: Noro Tomoya  , Liu Bin  , Nakagawa Yosuke  , Han Hao  , Tokuda Takehiro
Published: February 2025

In this paper, we propose a news index system which supports users who would like to observe difference in various topics (e.g. politics, economy, education, and culture) among countries/regions. General news sites just provide news articles and we can only read articles which we are interested in by using a keyword search engine or selecting some topic categories provided by each site. Our system has a large index word list, a news index database, and a news directory system. The word list is constructed, expanded, and updated by collecting topic keywords from various Web sites. The news directory system consists of the word list. News articles are collected by using keyword search engines which news sites provide, then index of the collected articles is stored in the database and classified by the news directory system. We can see the difference in various topics among countries/regions by observing co-occurrence of two or more words in the word list.
Temporal Entities in the Context of Cross-Cultural Meetings and Negotiations
Authors: Heimbürger Anneli
Published: February 2025

Time is an essential dimension in our knowledge space. Understanding different temporal dimensions and dynamics in cross-cultural meetings and negotiation processes will improve our skills in cross-cultural communication and increase our cultural competence. It also helps us to identify and formalize cross-cultural concepts and related temporal entities and to construct for example cross-cultural XML Schemas. We address three issues in our paper. First, we discuss implications of cross-cultural differences for meetings and negotiations and introduce the concept of a temporal entity in this context. Second, we present three relevant ontological approaches – OWL-Time, temporal aggregates and temporal regions of the Span ontology – for modelling temporal entities in the context of cross-cultural meetings and negotiations. Third, we give proof-of-concept examples of applying those ontological approaches to scheduling meetings and recurrent actions over time zones and to describing temporal parts of cross-cultural meetings and negotiations between Finland and Japan. Cross-cultural XML Schemas and temporal entities have important roles in design and implementation of culture-sensitive information systems.
Information Modelling for Preference Analysis of Musical Instrument Sounds
Authors: Shirota Yukari
Published: February 2025

In the paper, I propose a new information modeling for preference analysis of musical instrument sounds. I think that the Gunji's classification method is suitable as the base of the model. Concerning the preference analysis, I am planning to use the conjoint analysis methods and I discuss the problems to overcome while conducting the conjoint analysis on the model.
Fiber-based Fracture Model for Simulating Soft Tissue Tearing
Authors: Allard Jérémie  , Marchal Maud  , Cotin Stéphane
Published: February 2025

In this paper, we propose a novel approach for simulating soft tissue tearing, using a model that takes into account the existence of fibers within the tissue. These fibers influence the deformation by introducing anisotropy, and impact the direction of propagation for the fracture during tearing. We describe our approach for simulating, in real-time, the deformation and fracture of anisotropic membranes, and we illustrate our method with the simulation of capsulorhexis, one of the critical steps of cataract surgery.
Game-Based Mass Casualty Burn Training
Authors: Kurenov Sergei N.  , Cance William W.  , Noel Ben  , Mozingo David W.
Published: February 2025

An interactive, video game-based training module, Burn Center, was developed to simulate the real-life emergency events of a mass casualty disaster scenario, involving in 40 victims.
Robotic Telepresence for Medical Training and Education
Authors: Lai Fuji
Published: February 2025

“See one, do one, teach one” has long been the paradigm for medical education. The challenge is that it is not always easy to be exposed to the entire spectrum of cases that is possible. One way to standardize the experiential training is to “open up” the OR or Angio Suite to more than the immediate team at the patient site. The Remote Presence system has been used to enable trainees and mentors to remotely observe cases and to be “virtually present” for a procedure taking place across the country or even around the world. This new paradigm for timely clinical expertise delivery and dissemination will have a palpable impact on clinical training and the availability of quality patient care across geographical barriers.
An Ultrasonic Navigation System for Endovascular Aortic Repair
Authors: Mung Jay  , Han Sukgu  , Fullerton Daniel  , Bond Aaron  , Liu Brent  , Weaver Fred  , Yen Jesse
Published: February 2025

The objective of our research is to develop an ultrasound, time-of-flight triangulation based system for real-time, intraoperative 3-dimensional tracking of minimally invasive surgical instruments. We have chosen to first apply this technology towards tracking catheters used in endovascular aortic stent-grafting. To demonstrate the feasibility of this concept, we have developed a system involving a custom catheter based transducer and performed an experiment in excised porcine tissue with a model aorta.
A Virtual Reality Simulator for Training of Needle Biopsy of Thyroid Gland Nodules
Authors: Souza Ilana A.  , Sanches-jr Claudiney  , Zuffo Marcelo K.
Published: February 2025

The fine needle biopsy is an important minimally invasive procedure for providing accurate diagnosis in cases of thyroid gland nodules. This paper presents the research, development and evaluation of a virtual reality simulator for the training of ultrasound guided needle biopsy of thyroid gland nodules, using 3D models and haptic devices. The system is also an educative tool, where the user can interact with a thyroid 3D model to feel its texture, as well as rotate a complete model of the neck with transparency in order to study all its internal organs.
Estimating Similarity of Surgical Situations with Case-Retrieval-Nets
Authors: Sudra Gunther  , Becker Anne  , Braun Michael  , Speidel Stefanie  , Mueller-Stich Beat Peter  , Dillmann Ruediger
Published: February 2025

Representation and recognition of surgical situations is a prerequisite for the development of context-aware surgical assistance systems. In this publication a method for recognition of surgical situations with Case-Retrieval-Nets is presented. It enables the estimation of similarity between models of surgical situations. The main advantage of this approach is the combined use of domain knowledge and reasoning algorithms to estimate similarity. Domain knowledge about human anatomy is based on a reference ontology. Evaluation is performed on situations of two cholecystectomies.
Medical Documentation Using a Gaze-Driven Camera
Authors: Vockeroth Johannes  , Bartl Klaus  , Pfanzelt Sandra  , Schneider Erich
Published: February 2025

Medical treatments of a surgeon or a dentist are sometimes documented for teaching, telemedicine, or liability issues using a scene oriented video camera. But the most interesting parts of the scene are often covered by the operators hand or body. The best view to the scene is next to the operators field of view or perfectly: Within his head. Head-mounted scene cameras are used to create this exclusive point of view. Eye tracking systems could be used to emphasize the point of gaze within the scene image. The presented system improves classical eye trackers with an additional gaze-driven camera. The resulting scene image maintains the overall context, while the image from the gaze driven camera acts like a magnifying glass and provides a high-resolution image of the gazed detail using an independent exposure, thus creating a high dynamic range image. We show an application in a real dental treatment scenario.
Evolution of a National Approach to Evaluating the Benefits of the Electronic Health Record
Authors: Hagens Simon  , Krose Angela
Published: February 2025

Demonstrating the value of eHealth investments to users and other stakeholders, and driving ongoing optimization of benefits are increasingly important components of eHealth implementations in Canada. For these reasons, Canada Health Infoway is working with provincial partners to make research and evaluation an important component in Electronic Health Record (EHR) investments. Leading provinces working with Infoway, including British Columbia, the Province of Quebec, and Newfoundland and Labrador, are making evaluation a central part of their eHealth strategies and using evaluation results to optimize the benefits of investments. We provide an overview of benefits evaluation strategies and lessons learned. Examples of early evaluations completed and those currently underway provide insights into the challenges and benefits of investments in EHR.
Extending the Infoway Benefits Evaluation Framework for Health Information Systems
Authors: Lau Francis
Published: February 2025

A proposal is made that extends the current Canada Health Infoway Benefits Evaluation (BE) Framework for Health Information Systems (HIS) being deployed in Canada. The current BE framework takes a micro view of HIS quality, use and impact at the local level whereas the extended framework takes into account the broader socio-organizational and contextual aspects known as the meso and macro views of HIS deployment. The meso view addresses the people, organization, network and implementation dimensions. The macro view focuses on the contextual dimensions of technology standard, funding/incentive, legislation/policy and professional practice. Validation of this extended BE framework is being planned through a comparative review of recent HIS evaluation literature, a Delphi-consensus process with HIS experts and users, and multiple validation studies with recent HIS implementation projects in British Columbia.
Normalization of Reported Lab Results
Authors: Simkus Raymond  , Hughes John
Published: February 2025

It is possible for physicians to review electronic lab results in the format of the sending lab and, as well, to see them using advanced visualization techniques. When lab results for a particular patient are reviewed by a physician, they must be integrated with other lab results and other issues of the patient. Viewing the results can present a number of difficulties. One problem relates to normal ranges that can change over time and can be different when sent by different labs. This is not an issue when results are printed but when the results are graphed with their normal range displayed, distortions often prompt questions from patients who are shown the results. There are also situations were it is important to review a cluster of four or five different tests to properly understand the clinical situation. Tests in the cluster, however, can have interrelated result values that differ by orders of magnitude. Normalization, which can be used to scale the graphs, has been proposed in the past but not gained any popularity. The benefits of this approach are discussed.
Medical Text Analytics Tools for Search and Classification
Authors: Huang Jimmy  , An Aijun  , Hu Vivian  , Tu Karen
Published: February 2025

A text-analytic tool has been developed that accepts clinical medical data as input in order to produce patient details. The integrated tool has the following four characteristics. 1) It has a graphical user interface. 2) It has a free-text search tool that is designed to retrieve records using keywords such as “MI” for myocardial infarction. The result set is a display of those sentences in the medical records that contain the keywords. 3) It has three tools to classify patients based on the likelihood of being diagnosed for myocardial infarction, hypertension, or their smoking status. 4) A summary is generated for each patient selected. Large medical data sets provided by the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences were used during the project.
Information Management Framework; a Model for Clinical Departments
Authors: Shahpori Reza  , de los Angeles Alan  , Laupland Kevin
Published: February 2025

The information management system of Department of Critical Care Medicine in Calgary Health Region was modeled using a departmental information management framework. The clinical, administrative, research and educational, decision-making and quality improvement information needs of the department are served by the system.
An Experimental Comparison of Kernel Clustering Methods
Authors: Filippone Maurizio  , Masulli Francesco  , Rovetta Stefano
Published: February 2025

In this paper, we compare the performances of some among the most popular kernel clustering methods on several data sets. The methods are all based on central clustering and incorporate in various ways the concepts of fuzzy clustering and kernel machines. The data sets are a sample of several application domains and sizes. A thorough discussion about the techniques for validating results is also presented. Results indicate that clustering in kernel space generally outperforms standard clustering, although no method can be proven to be consistently better than the others.
Diffusion Learning and Regularization
Authors: Gori Marco
Published: February 2025

Most of the emphasis in machine learning has been placed on parametric models in which the purpose of the learning algorithm is to adjust weights mainly according to appropriate optimization criteria. However, schemes based on a direct data inference, like for instance K-nearest neighbor, have also become quite popular. Recently, a number of people have proposed methods to perform classification and regression that are based on different forms of diffusion processes from the labelled examples. The aim of this paper is to provide motivations for diffusion learning from the continuum setting by using Tikhnov's regularization framework. Diffusion learning is discussed in both the continuous and discrete setting and an intriguing link is established between the Green function of the regularization operators and the structure of the graph in the corresponding discrete structure. It is pointed out that an appropriate choice of the smoothing operators allows one to implement a regularization that gives rise to Green functions whose corresponding matrix is sparse, which imposes a corresponding structure on the graph associated to the training set. Finally, the choice of the smoothness operator is given a Bayesian interpretation in terms of prior probability on the expected values of the function.
Multiresolution Minimization of Renyi's Mutual Information for fetal-ECG Extraction
Authors: La Foresta Fabio  , Mammone Nadia  , Inuso Giuseppina  , Morabito Francesco C.  , Azzerboni Andrea
Published: February 2025

Fetal electrocardiogram (fECG) monitoring yields important information about the fetus condition during pregnancy and it consists in collecting electrical signals by some sensors on the body of the mother. In literature, Independent Component Analysis (ICA) has been exploited to extract fECG. Wavelet-ICA (WICA), a technique that merges Wavelet decomposition and INFOMAX algorithm for Independent Component Analysis, was recently proposed to enhance fetal ECG extraction. In this paper, we propose to enhance WICA introducing MERMAID as the algorithm to perform independent component analysis because it has shown to outperform INFOMAX and the other standard ICA algorithms.
Land use/cover mapping using multisensor image fusion technique
Authors: Abdikan S.  , Balik Sanli F.  , Esetlili M.T.  , Kurucu Y.
Published: February 2025

Remote Sensing is an important technique for mapping land use and land cover in the vast acreages. In this sense, the fusion of optical and radar remote sensing data offers the opportunity to combine complementary sensors with different features. In this study, beside the capability of the combined multi source imagery, the contribution of SAR images to the optical images for identifying land use/cover types was investigated. For this purpose, using the synergy between SAR and Optical data, the improvement in the classification accuracy was analyzed. The study area, covering urban and agricultural areas, lies in the Menemen Plain to the west of Gediz Basin in the Aegean Region of Turkey. The satellite data used in this study are multispectral SPOT, ENVISAT-ASAR, and ALOS-PALSAR images. The 3-2-1 band combination of a SPOT-2 image was fused with C band ASAR imagery and with the new mission L band PALSAR imagery. The land use/cover types were defined from both of the fused images. In this case, since the SAR images have different bands (C band and L band) the penetration property is the key factor to see the affects on extracting information from fused images. Before the fusion application, the speckle reducing filter techniques were used for the preprocessing of SAR images. For the filtering of SAR images, kernel windows with different size were tried. Then the SPOT image was registered to SAR images. For the registration of SAR images, image to image registration method was used with a root mean square error of less than 1 pixel. A pixel based fusion method was carried out. Both of the fused images (SPOT-ASAR and SPOT-PALSAR) were classified to determine the land use/cover map. The results were compared with a classified SPOT image, which is commonly used to define land cover types. While processing the classification, the training areas were selected covering a large portion of the individual fields and were away from the field boundaries to reduce the mixed pixels. The ground truth data were used for the accuracy assessment process.
The causes of the floods on the streams flowing to Bosphorus and the precautions needed: Kozdere case study
Authors: Celik H.E.  , Aydin A.  , Esin I.  , Coskun H.G.  , Alganci U.  , Usta G.  , Cigizoglu H.K.
Published: February 2025

Istanbul faced several floods in different districts after the heavy rainfall dated 11 August 2004 which affected the whole Marmara Region. These floods caused 3 deaths and huge economical losses. One of these floods occurred on the Kozdere River flowing into the middle Bosporus in Istanbul. The aid amount to suffering losses made by different governmental and non governmental bodies is around 350.000 $. Climatic and physiographic factors are the main factors of floods. Rainfall type, rainfall intensity etc. are some of the climatic factors. Basin shape, elevation information etc. and land use changes are some of the physiographic factors. According to land use classification, lands classified as forest area must not be used as settlement or agriculture. This kind of miss land uses encourages flood formation. In this connection, it should be investigated whether forest area is used as settlement or agriculture or are there any land use changes against forest area.
An Economic Traffic Management Approach to Enable the TripleWin for Users, ISPs, and Overlay Providers
Authors: Hoßfeld Tobias  , Hausheer David  , Hecht Fabio  , Lehrieder Frank  , Oechsner Simon  , Papafili Ioanna  , Racz Peter  , Soursos Sergios  , Staehle Dirk  , Stamoulis George D.  , Tran-Gia Phuoc  , Stiller Burkhard
Published: February 2025

Socio-economic aspects play an increasingly important role in the Future Internet. To enable a TripleWin situation for the involved players, i.e. the end users, the ISPs and telecommunication operators, and the service providers, a new, incentive-based concept is proposed referred to as Economic Traffic Management (ETM). It aims at reducing costs within the network while improving the Quality-of-Experience (QoE) for end users. In particular, peer-to-peer (P2P) overlay applications generate a large amount of costs due to inter-domain traffic. ETM solution approaches have to take into account (a) the traffic patterns stemming from the overlay application, (b) the charging models for transit traffic, and (c) the applicability and efficiency of the proposed solution. The complex interaction between these three components and its consequences is demonstrated on selected examples. As a result it is shown that different ETM approaches have to be combined for an overall solution. To this end, the paper derives functional and non-functional requirements for designing ETM and provides a suitable architecture enabling the implementation of a TripleWin solution.
Survey on P2P Overlay Streaming Clients
Authors: Sentinelli Alexandro  , Celetto Luca  , Lefol Damien  , Palazzi Claudio  , Pau Giovanni  , Zahariadis Theodore  , Jari Ahola
Published: February 2025

Peer-to-peer (P2P) streaming systems grow in numbers and potential and several commercial products are already competing. Internet home users – through the diffusion of xDSL connections – represent the potential market of IPTV channels that Content Generators may distribute at reduced costs. This work describes the state of the art of P2P streaming clients and poses some questions about the end-user perspective in heterogeneous networks. To this aim, a representative set of experiments has been performed on a popular P2P system. The client offers live streaming content from some European broadcasters, start-up delay is a few seconds and the user satisfaction rank is good. The trend moves toward solutions that try to optimize the whole network stack, pursuing flexibility in terms of user needs and system requirements. This work is aimed at focusing on the key-drives in the design of P2P streaming clients.
Motion planning and bimanual coordination in humanoid robots
Authors: Morasso Pietro  , Mohan Vishwanathan  , Metta Giorgio  , Sandini Giulio
Published: February 2025

Humanoid robots have a large number of “extra” joints, organized in a humanlike fashion with several kinematic chains. In this chapter we describe a method of motion planning that is based on an artificial potential field approach (Passive Motion Paradigm) combined with terminal-attractor dynamics. No matrix inversion is necessary and the computational mechanism does not crash near kinematic singularities or when the robot is asked to achieve a final pose that is outside its intrinsic workspace: what happens, in this case, is the gentle degradation of performance that characterizes humans in the same situations. Moreover, the remaining error at equilibrium is a valuable information for triggering a reasoning process and the search of an alternative plan. The terminal attractor dynamics implicitly endows the generated trajectory with human-like smoothness and this computational framework is characterized by a feature that is crucial for complex motion patterns in humanoid robots, such as bimanual coordination or interference avoidance: precise control of the reaching time.
Cybersickness and Anxiety During Simulated Motion: Implications for VRET
Authors: Bruck Susan  , Watters Paul
Published: February 2025

Some clinicians have suggested using virtual reality environments to deliver psychological interventions to treat anxiety disorders. However, given a significant body of work on cybersickness symptoms which may arise in virtual environments – especially those involving simulated motion – we tested (a) whether being exposed to a virtual reality environment alone causes anxiety to increase, and (b) whether exposure to simulated motion in a virtual reality environment increases anxiety. Using a repeated measures design, we used Kim's Anxiety Scale questionnaire to compare baseline anxiety, anxiety after virtual environment exposure, and anxiety after simulated motion. While there was no significant effect on anxiety for being in a virtual environment with no simulated motion, the introduction of simulated motion caused anxiety to significantly increase, but not to a severe or extreme level. The implications of this work for virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) are discussed.
A Rehabilitation Protocol for Empowering Spatial Orientation in MCI. A Pilot Study
Authors: Gadler Erminia  , Grassi Alessandra  , Riva Giuseppe
Published: February 2025

Spatial navigation is among the first cognitive functions to be impaired in Alzheimer's disease [1] and deficit in this domain is detectable earlier in patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment [2]. Since efficacy of cognitive training in persons with MCI was successfully assessed [3], we developed a multitasking training protocol using virtual environments for stimulating attention, perception and visuo-spatial cognition in order to empower spatial orientation in MCI. Two healthy elders were exposed to the training over a period of four weeks and both showed improved performances in attention and orientation after the end of the intervention.
Cognitive Therapy Using Mixed Reality for Those Impaired by a Cerebrovascular Accident (CVA)
Authors: Salva Angela M.  , Wiederhold Brenda K.  , Alban Antonio J.  , Hughes Charles  , Smith Eileen  , Fidopiastis Cali  , Wiederhold Mark D.
Published: February 2025

There is new research showing that interactive multimodal rehabilitation may enhance cognitive therapy after cerebrovascular accident. A well-designed Mixed Reality system provides a diverse, controllable and versatile therapeutic environment to help promote neural plasticity during recovery. In addition to stroke patients, there are other groups, such as those with traumatic brain injury (TBI) that could benefit from the system. Initial results, both paper-and-pencil measures and physiological measures, in a trial with fourteen participants are discussed.
A Multimedia Holistic Rehabilitation Method for Patients after Stroke
Authors: Probosz Karolina  , Wcislo Rafał  , Otfinowski Janusz  , Slota Renata  , Kitowski Jacek  , Pisula Małgorzata  , Sobczyk Artur
Published: February 2025

The rehabilitation of patients after a stroke must provide polisensoric cognitive therapy. A specially designed computer/information system suits well to these requirements and offers a complementary and holistic treatment, which can be used in a rehabilitation center and later at the patient's home.
Virtual Reality Therapy Controlled Study for War Veterans with PTSD. Preliminary Results
Authors: Gamito Pedro  , Oliveira Jorge  , Morais Diogo  , Oliveira Susana  , Duarte Nuno  , Saraiva Tomaz  , Pombal Miguel  , Rosa Pedro
Published: February 2025

More than 30 years after signing truces, there are still around 20,000 Portuguese war veterans that fill PTSD (Posttraumatic Stress Disorder) diagnose criteria. Despite many of them attending therapy, the outcome is not cheerful. In this way, a research protocol was devised to investigate the opportunity of adopting virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) to reduce PTSD symptomathology. This protocol consists on a controlled study (VRET vs. traditional psychotherapy vs. waiting list), where in the VRET condition patients will be graded by being exposed to a virtual reality jungle scenario. The activating episodes, that are comprised of three cues (ambush, mortar blasting and waiting for injured rescue), are repeated 3 times each session. The cues' intensity and frequency increase from session to session. Patients are exposed to the VR world through a HMD (Head Mounted Display). This paper reports on the ongoing research where 4 VRET patients that filled CAPS DSM-IV PTSD criteria were assessed at pretreatment and at the middle of treatment (5th session). Results from IES and SCL-90R dimensions showed no statistical significant differences between assessments, with exception to obsession-compulsion dimension of SCL-90R (F(1;3)=21.235; p<.05), indicating a decrease in obsessive thoughts. However, through descriptive analysis, it was observed a reduction in all IES and SCL-90R dimensions, except for hostility and psychoticism of SCL-90R.
Affective Robot for Elderly Assistance
Authors: Carelli Laura  , Gaggioli Andrea  , Pioggia Giovanni  , De Rossi Federico  , Riva Giuseppe
Published: February 2025

Recently, several robotic solutions for the elderly have been proposed. However, to date, the diffusion of these devices has been limited: available robots are too cumbersome, awkward, and expensive to become widely adopted. Another key issue which reduces the appeal of assistive robots is the lack of socio-emotional interaction: affective interchanges represent key requirements to create sustainable relationships between elderly and robots. In this paper, we propose a new approach to enhance the acceptability of robotic systems, based on the introduction of affective dimensions in human-robot interaction. This strategy is aimed at designing a new generation of relational and cognitive robots fusing information from embodied unobtrusive sensory interfaces. The final objective is to develop embodied interfaces, which are able to learn and adapt their affective responses to the user's behavior. User and robot will engage in natural interactions, involving verbal and non-verbal communication, improving empathic exchange of moods and feelings. Relevant independent living and quality of life related issues will be addressed: on-going monitoring of health parameters, assistance in everyday's activities, social support and cognitive/physical exercises. We expect that the proposed strategy will enhance the user's acceptance and adoption of the assistive robotic system.
Rehabilitation as Empowerment: The Role of Advanced Technologies
Authors: Riva Giuseppe  , Gaggioli Andrea
Published: February 2025

Rehabilitation is placing increasing emphasis on the construct of empowerment as the final goal of any treatment approach. This reflects a shift in focus from deficits and dependence to assets and independence. According to this approach, rehabilitation should aim to improve the quality of the life of the individual by means of effective support to his/her activity and interaction. Here we suggest that advanced technologies can play a significant role in this process. By enhancing the experienced level of “Presence” - the non-mediated perception of successfully transforming intentions into action - these emerging technologies can foster optimal experiences (Flow) and support the empowerment process. Finally, we describe the “NeuroVR” system (http://www.neurovr.org) as an example of how advanced technologies can be used to support Presence and Flow in the rehabilitation process.
A Text Messaging Trial in Family Planning Clinics
Authors: Mackenzie Helen
Published: February 2025

The New Zealand Family Planning Association (Family Planning) is a national not-for-profit organization providing sexual and reproductive primary care health services as well as health promotion, professional training and advocacy on issues of sexual and reproductive health.
Four-level Process Modeling in Healthcare SOA Analysis and Design
Authors: Mykkänen Juha  , Paakkanen Esa  , Toivanen Marika
Published: February 2025

Process and activity modeling are widely used in healthcare work and systems development projects. There are various approaches and abstractions available for process modeling. This study describes a four-level approach to activity and process modeling which has been used in modeling healthcare activities in relation to the specification of service-oriented information systems solutions. Based on the material and experience from these efforts: 1) overview level descriptions are well capable of illustrating the domain of the development, 2) many current notations and techniques on process level fail to describe diverse practices in healthcare, 3) descriptions on activity level should be generalized and combined in novel ways to achieve reuse and to support complex domains, 4) very accurate and detailed action-level modeling should be used cautiously to reduce unnecessary workload and to focus on the essential features of the solutions.
Representation of Patients' Health Asset Concepts in the International Classification of Nursing Practice (ICNP)®
Authors: Rotegaard Ann Kristin  , Ruland Cornelia M.
Published: February 2025

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the representation of health asset concepts in the International Classification of Nursing Practice® (ICNP). In a previous study we conducted a concept analysis of health assets, building a conceptual model. The terms included in our conceptual model were cross-mapped to the ICNP terminology system, Version 1.0/1.1. Most of the health asset terms in the conceptual model were represented in ICNP. However, for maximum support of both clinical nursing care and patient self-care, a complete set of health asset terms is needed in the ICNP. We advocate for more research to uncover patients' and clinicians' detailed use of health asset terms. This should result in a richer and more specific health assets vocabulary that could be integrated into ICNP or other nursing terminologies as a means to improve nursing care and to strengthen patients' self-management of their illnesses. However, the findings from this first evaluation of health asset terms in the ICNP are promising, at least on a global level.
Intensive Care Admission and Discharge – Critical Decision-Making Points
Authors: Lundgrén-Laine Heljä  , Suominen Hanna  , Kontio Elina  , Salanterä Sanna
Published: February 2025

Delivery of intensive care has many critical points impacting the outcomes of critically ill patients. Two important key events in intensive care are patients' admission and discharge procedures. The decision making of intensive care experts should be supported in these two points, in order to attain good quality and safe care. We hypothesize that in the future this decision-making process can be effectively supported with information technology. To reveal the complex decision-making, we studied the decision-making processes and information needs of intensive care charge nurses during patients' admission and discharge procedures. We identified several interconnected decision-making steps during these procedures.
Nursing Informatics; is IT for All Nurses?
Authors: Spiste Bond Carol  , Lewis Ruth  , Joy Ros
Published: February 2025

Given the definition if nursing informatics it should be a core activity for all nurses, and seen as a tool to support high quality care giving. Three studies reported in this paper show that this is not the case. Qualified nurses are perceived as having poor skills and knowledge, and as being resistant to IT as it takes them away from patient care. Educators share this lack of knowledge, and neither academics nor students consider nursing informatics to be a clinical skill. In order to use computers while on placement students were found to need confidence in their skills, and to feel that the use of computers was encouraged. Socialisation into the profession is an important part of nurse education, and currently students are being socialised into a professional role where they are not encouraged to use computers, or to consider their use to be a key nursing task. If nursing informatics is to truly become a way of improving patient care this needs to be changed, and pre-registration education is a key place to start to bring this change about.
Survey of Actual Conditions of Reasons for Nurse Calls: Comparing a Surgical Ward and a Medical Ward
Authors: Majima Yukie  , Tamura Yoko  , Maekawa Yasuko  , Ohira Masao  , Ikegawa Mitsuhiro
Published: February 2025

We believe that nurse calls can play a role not merely as a means to convey patients' needs, but also as a medium to analyze and predict patients' needs using historical data of nurse calls. Therefore, we conducted a survey of actual conditions of nurse calls using “call history management system” developed for welfare institutions. The survey was intended to show patients' needs accurately by individually associating historical data, which can be collected through an information system, with reasons for calling, which usually cannot be collected automatically. Total quantities of nurse calls were 5397 (174.1 per day, 4.59 per day per person) in the Surgery Ward and 3404 (109.8 per day, 2.85 per day per person) in the Internal Medicine Ward; the incoming calls to the Surgical Ward were more numerous than those to the Medical Ward. The most common reason for calling was “assistance related to toileting”. During the day shift and evening shift, that reason was followed by “fluid management” such as finishing of fluid administration and fluid exchange.