A novel in-bed body posture monitoring for decubitus ulcer prevention using body pressure distribution mapping.

BACKGROUND: Decubitus ulcers are prevalent among the aging population due to a gradual decline in their overall health, such as nutrition, mental health, and mobility, resulting in injury to the skin and tissue. The most common technique to prevent these ulcers is through frequent repositioning to redistribute body pressures. Therefore, the main goal of this study is to facilitate the timely repositioning of patients through the use of a pressure mat to identify in-bed postures in various sleep environments. Pressure data were collected from 10 healthy participants lying down on a pressure mat in 19 various in-bed postures, correlating to the supine, prone, right-side, and left-side classes. In addition, pressure data were collected from participants sitting at the edge of the bed as well as an empty bed. Each participant was asked to lie in these 19 postures in three distinct testing environments: a hospital bed, a home bed, and a home bed with a foam mattress topper. To categorize each posture into its respective class, the pre-trained 2D ResNet-18 CNN and the pre-trained Inflated 3D CNN algorithms were trained and validated using image and video pressure mapped data, respectively. RESULTS: The ResNet-18 and Inflated 3D CNN algorithms were validated using leave-one-subject-out (LOSO) and leave-one-environment-out (LOEO) cross-validation techniques. LOSO provided an average accuracy of 92.07% ± 5.72% and 82.22% ± 8.50%, for the ResNet-18 and Inflated 3D CNN algorithms, respectively. Contrastingly, LOEO provided a reduced average accuracy of 85.37% ± 14.38% and 77.79% ± 9.76%, for the ResNet-18 and Inflated 3D CNN algorithms, respectively. CONCLUSION: These pilot results indicate that the proposed algorithms can accurately distinguish between in-bed postures, on unseen participant data as well as unseen mattress environment data. The proposed algorithms can establish the basis of a decubitus ulcer prevention platform that can be applied to various sleeping environments. To the best of our knowledge, the impact of mattress stiffness has not been considered in previous studies regarding in-bed posture monitoring.

Cross-sectional associations between temporal patterns and composition of upright and stepping events with physical function in midlife: Insights from the 1970 British Cohort Study.

INTRODUCTION: Age-related decline in physical functioning has significant implications for health in later life but declines begin earlier in midlife. Physical activity (PA) volume is associated with physical function, but the importance of the pattern in which PA is accumulated is unclear. This study investigates associations between patterns of PA accumulation, including the composition, variation, and temporal distribution of upright and stepping events, with physical function in midlife. METHODS: Participants (n = 4378) from the 1970 British Cohort Study wore an activPAL3 accelerometer on the thigh for 7 consecutive days. Exposure measures included a suite of metrics describing the frequency, duration, and composition of upright events, as well as the duration and volume (total steps) of stepping events. In addition, patterns of accumulation of upright and sedentary events were examined including how fragmented/transient they were (upright-to-sedentary transition probability [USTP]) and their burstiness (the tendency for events to be clustered together followed by longer interevent times). Physical function outcomes included grip strength (GS), balance, and SF-36 physical functioning subscale (SF-36pf). Cross-sectional analyses included multivariable linear regression models to assess associations, adjusting for covariates including overall PA volume (mean daily step count). RESULTS: Higher upright event burstiness was associated with higher GS, and higher USTP was associated with lower GS. Duration and step volume of stepping events were positively associated with SF-36pf in females. Step-weighted cadence was positively associated with SF-36pf and balance. Contradictory findings were also present (e.g., more transient stepping events were associated with better GS) particularly for GS in males. Inconsistencies between sexes were observed across some associations. CONCLUSION: Our study reveals that diverse patterns of PA accumulation exhibit distinct associations with various measures of physical function in midlife, irrespective of the overall volume. Contradictory findings and inconsistency between sexes warrant further investigation. Patterns of PA accumulation, in addition to volume, should be considered in future PA research. Longitudinal studies are required to determine whether a given volume of activity accumulated in different patterns, impacts associations between PA and health outcomes.

Unravelling upright events: a descriptive epidemiology of the behavioural composition and temporal distribution of upright events in participants from the 1970 British Cohort Study.

BACKGROUND: Continued proliferation of accelerometers in physical activity research has opened new avenues for understanding activity behaviours beyond simple aggregate measures of frequency and duration. This study explores the standing and stepping composition, and the temporal distribution, of upright events, and investigates their associations with sociodemographic and health factors. METHODS: Participants from the 1970 British Cohort Study wore activPAL3 accelerometers for seven days. Event-based analysis was used to extract a time series of upright, standing, and stepping events. Derived metrics included daily number of upright and stepping events, total upright and stepping time, the burstiness of upright events and burstiness of sedentary events (burstiness refers to the pattern of how physical activity and sedentary behaviour are distributed throughout a given time period), within-event stepping proportion, within-event step count, and stepping cadence. Generalized linear regression models, adjusted for total step count, were employed to explore associations between derived metrics and sociodemographic and health-related factors. RESULTS: A total of 4527 participants, provided 30992 valid days (≥ 10 h of waking wear) and 1.64 million upright events. Upright event composition and temporal distribution varied across a range of sociodemographic and health-related factors. Females had more upright events than males (4.39 [3.41,5.38] n), spent more time upright, and exhibited burstier patterns of upright events (0.05 [0.04,0.05] Bn). Individuals with higher BMI had fewer upright events and a lower daily step count, but their temporal distribution of upright events was less bursty (overweight -0.02 [-0.02,-0.01] Bn; obese -0.03 [-0.04,-0.02] Bn), and upright events had a higher step count. People in active occupations were upright for longer, displayed burstier patterns of upright events (standing 0.04 [0.03,0.05] Bn; physical work 0.05 [0.04,0.05] Bn; heavy manual 0.06 [0.04,0.07] Bn), with more variable durations and shorter, slower paced stepping events compared with sedentary occupations. CONCLUSIONS: This study has revealed novel phenotypes of standing and sitting that go beyond simple aggregate measures of total steps, step event duration or time between events. People with the same volume of stepping and frequency of gaps between upright events can accumulate their steps in very different ways. These differences and associations with population sub-groups, which persisted after adjustment for total stepping volume, may have important relations with functional and health outcomes. The findings lay the groundwork for future studies to investigate how different sitting and standing phenotypes can add to our understanding of the relationship between physical activity and health.

sEMG-Based Robust Recognition of Grasping Postures with a Machine Learning Approach for Low-Cost Hand Control.

The design and control of artificial hands remains a challenge in engineering. Popular prostheses are bio-mechanically simple with restricted manipulation capabilities, as advanced devices are pricy or abandoned due to their difficult communication with the hand. For social robots, the interpretation of human intention is key for their integration in daily life. This can be achieved with machine learning (ML) algorithms, which are barely used for grasping posture recognition. This work proposes an ML approach to recognize nine hand postures, representing 90% of the activities of daily living in real time using an sEMG human-robot interface (HRI). Data from 20 subjects wearing a Myo armband (8 sEMG signals) were gathered from the NinaPro DS5 and from experimental tests with the YCB Object Set, and they were used jointly in the development of a simple multi-layer perceptron in MATLAB, with a global percentage success of 73% using only two features. GPU-based implementations were run to select the best architecture, with generalization capabilities, robustness-versus-electrode shift, low memory expense, and real-time performance. This architecture enables the implementation of grasping posture recognition in low-cost devices, aimed at the development of affordable functional prostheses and HRI for social robots.

A Rapid Review on the Effectiveness and Use of Wearable Biofeedback Motion Capture Systems in Ergonomics to Mitigate Adverse Postures and Movements of the Upper Body.

Work-related diseases and disorders remain a significant global health concern, necessitating multifaceted measures for mitigation. One potential measure is work technique training utilizing augmented feedback through wearable motion capture systems. However, there exists a research gap regarding its current effectiveness in both real work environments and controlled settings, as well as its ability to reduce postural exposure and retention effects over short, medium, and long durations. A rapid review was conducted, utilizing two databases and three previous literature reviews to identify relevant studies published within the last twenty years, including recent literature up to the end of 2023. Sixteen studies met the inclusion criteria, of which 14 were of high or moderate quality. These studies were summarized descriptively, and the strength of evidence was assessed. Among the included studies, six were rated as high quality, while eight were considered moderate quality. Notably, the reporting of participation rates, blinding of assessors, and a-priori power calculations were infrequently performed. Four studies were conducted in real work environments, while ten were conducted in controlled settings. Vibration feedback was the most common feedback type utilized (n = 9), followed by auditory (n = 7) and visual feedback (n = 1). All studies employed corrective feedback initiated by the system. In controlled environments, evidence regarding the effectiveness of augmented feedback from wearable motion capture systems to reduce postural exposure ranged from strong evidence to no evidence, depending on the time elapsed after feedback administration. Conversely, for studies conducted in real work environments, the evidence ranged from very limited evidence to no evidence. Future reach needs are identified and discussed.

The TACOs (time-based assessment computerized strategy) approach to evaluating occupational working postures.

Many investigations of biomechanical overload concentrate on upper limbs and manual handling: certain jobs require an evaluation on spinal and lower limb postures. While existing methodologies adequately describe postures, they often poorly consider the organisation. This shortcoming prompted the development of TACOs for spinal and lower limb postures, using organisational factors to adjust the risk indexes. The TACOs is set out in steps: task identification, posture assessment, duration, and a final evaluation also for complex cycles. Given the complexity, tools have been devised, free downloadable, to facilitate evaluation. Studies on the TACOs reliability indicate excellent intra-observer and moderate interobserver agreement. TACOs, defining the task as a measurement unit, offers the advantage of assessing postures more easily and, considering duration, provides precise evaluation of the final risk. While the method does not demonstrate predictive validity regarding related diseases, it nonetheless enables the classification of exposure levels, even in complex multitask scenarios.

The development of TACOs strategy for posture analysis stems from the need to modulate the intensity of posture risk factors in relation with duration. It estimates final exposure scores in real work through detailed preliminary organisational studies. This involves identifying tasks, assessing postures for type and duration in work period.

Review on design of real-time posture monitoring system for the cervical region.

In cervical health, the Posture Monitoring System (PMS) employs sensors to capture and transmit posture data to the cloud via Wi-Fi. This systematic review examines wearable PMS devices for cervical posture, analysing their attributes, findings, and limitations. Using systematic literature analysis, related studies were collected from diverse databases concentrating on wearable cervical posture devices. The review analysed the outcomes of each neck posture and each monitor type on the CVA ratio based on PMS. However, limitations, such as small sample sizes, limited functions, and privacy concerns were noted across the devices. The findings underscore the importance of considering user comfort and data accuracy in designing and implementing wearable posture monitors. Future studies should also explore the integration of advanced technologies and user-centred design principles to develop more accurate and user-friendly devices.

For accurate diagnosis and prevention of cervical spondylosis, the review focuses on a survey of PMS in the cervical region. Here, research related to wearable monitoring devices regarding the cervical region is investigated. The major finding is the necessity for designing the PMS device with limited sensors, which effectively monitor the cervical region.

Quantifying the impacts of posture changes on office worker productivity: an exploratory study using effective computer interactions as a real-time indicator.

BACKGROUND: Working in a standing posture is considered to improve musculoskeletal comfort and can help enhance office workers' performance in the long term. However, there is a lack of a quantitative, real-time measure that reflects on whether office workers can immediately become more concentrated and work more efficiently when they switch to a standing posture. METHODS: To tackle this problem, this study proposed that the number of effective computer interactions could be used as a real-time indicator to measure the productivity of office workers whose work is primarily computer-based. Using this metric, we conducted an exploratory study to investigate the correlation between posture and productivity changes at a 10-minute resolution for eight participants. RESULTS: The study found that when allowed to use sit-stand desks to adjust postures, participants chose to switch to standing posture for about 47 min on average once a day; standing work was most frequent between 2:30 - 4:00 pm, followed by 10:30 - 11:30 am, during which time the number of computer interactions also became higher, showing a significant positive correlation. In addition, participants were approximately 6.5% more productive than when they could only work in a sitting posture. CONCLUSION: This study revealed that posture changes could have an immediate improvement in productivity.

In-Bed Posture Classification Using Deep Neural Network.

In-bed posture monitoring has become a prevalent area of research to help minimize the risk of pressure sore development and to increase sleep quality. This paper proposed 2D and 3D Convolutional Neural Networks, which are trained on images and videos of an open-access dataset consisting of 13 subjects' body heat maps captured from a pressure mat in 17 positions, respectively. The main goal of this paper is to detect the three main body positions: supine, left, and right. We compare the use of image and video data through 2D and 3D models in our classification. Since the dataset was imbalanced, three strategies were evaluated, i.e., down sampling, over sampling, and class weights. The best 3D model achieved accuracies of 98.90 ± 1.05% and 97.80 ± 2.14% for 5-fold and leave-one-subject-out (LOSO) cross validations, respectively. To compare the 3D model with 2D, four pre-trained 2D models were evaluated, where the best-performing model was the ResNet-18 with accuracies of 99.97 ± 0.03% for 5-fold and 99.62 ± 0.37% for LOSO. The proposed 2D and 3D models provided promising results for in-bed posture recognition and can be used in the future to further distinguish postures into more detailed subclasses. The outcome of this study can be used to remind caregivers at hospitals and long-term care facilitiesto reposition their patients if they do not reposition themselves naturally to prevent pressure ulcers. In addition, the evaluation of body postures and movements during sleep can help caregivers understand sleep quality.

Characterization of Detailed Sedentary Postures Using a Tri-Monitor ActivPAL Configuration in Free-Living Conditions.

Objective monitors such as the activPAL characterize time when the thigh is horizontal as sedentary time. However, there are physiological differences between lying, bent-legged sitting, and straight-legged sitting. We introduce a three-monitor configuration to assess detailed sedentary postures and demonstrate its use in characterizing such positions in free-living conditions. We explored time spent in each sedentary posture between prolonged (>1 h) versus non-prolonged (<1 h) sedentary bouts. In total, 35 healthy adults (16♀, 24 ± 3 years; 24 h/day for 6.8 ± 1.0 days) wore an activPAL accelerometer on their thigh, torso, and shin. Hip and knee joint flexion angle estimates were determined during sedentary bouts using the dot-product method between the torso−thigh and thigh−shin, respectively. Compared to lying (69 ± 60 min/day) or straight-legged sitting (113 ± 100 min/day), most time was spent in bent-legged sitting (439 ± 101 min/day, p < 0.001). Most of the bent-legged sitting time was accumulated in non-prolonged bouts (328 ± 83 vs. 112 ± 63 min/day, p < 0.001). In contrast, similar time was spent in straight-legged sitting and lying between prolonged/non-prolonged bouts (both, p > 0.26). We document that a considerable amount of waking time is accumulated in lying or straight-legged sitting. This methodological approach equips researchers with a means of characterizing detailed sedentary postures in uncontrolled conditions and may help answer novel research questions on sedentariness.

Exploring the influence of individual factors on the perception of mental workload and body postures.

Studies have revealed that physical and mental demands, psychosocial factors, and individual factors can contribute to the development of WMSDs. Yet, much is still unknown regarding the effects of individual characteristics on WMSDs susceptibility. Previous studies discovered people assumed more awkward body postures to perform an activity when the perception of mental workload is higher. This research study explored if individual characteristics such as age, sex, personality, and anxiety help explain changes or differences in the perception of mental workload and body postures assume when performing activities. The study provided evidence that these individual characteristics have a modifying role on perceived mental workload and body postures. The results suggest that perceived mental workload is influenced to a higher extent by individual characteristics such as anxiety, sex, and personality traits. Women have a higher (18.7%) mental workload perception than men. Likewise, NASA-TLX scores are 22% higher for feelers than thinkers. In general, higher perceptions of mental workload were observed in participants with higher anxiety levels. On the other hand, body postures seem to be influenced by different individual factors depending on the nature of the activity. RULA scores increased on average by 13.1% between baseline and time constraint conditions. Larger differences were observed in certain individuals (e.g. introverts (19.7%) and intuitors (13.8%)) across conditions.

This study looked to explore if individual factors such as age, sex, personality, and anxiety have any effect in perceived mental workload and body postures. Participants performed two physical activities under four levels of mental workload. Results indicated that personality traits (sensors/intuitors), anxiety, and sex exhibited the higher contributions.

Different standing postures are the influencing factors for the efficacy of laminoplasty in the treatment of K-Line (-) patients with ossification of the posterior longitudinal ligament.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the relationship between different standing postures and surgical outcomes of K-Line (-) ossification of the posterior longitudinal ligament (OPLL) patients after laminoplasty with a titanium basket. There is a lack of data evaluating the relationship between the postoperative satisfaction of K-Line (-) patients and their standing postures. METHODS: OPLL patients enrolled in the study were divided into a K-Line (+) group (Group A) and a K-Line (- group (Group B) in natural and relaxed standing positions. We compared the postoperative outcomes after cervical laminoplasty with titanium basket surgery using the Japanese Orthopaedic Association score (JOA), recovery rate and the degree of improvement in the six JOA score items. The degree of satisfaction with the outcome was assessed at the 1-year follow-up using a 7-point numerical rating scale. RESULTS: A total of 34 K-Line (+) patients with OPLL (age 61.9 ± 2.9 years) in Group A and 40 K-Line (-)patients with OPLL (age 60.4 ± 3.5 years) in Group B in natural and relaxed standing positions were recruited. In Group A, the mean preoperative and postoperative JOA scores were 10.1 ± 1.4 and 13.1 ± 0.8 points, respectively, and in Group B, the mean preoperative and postoperative JOA scores were 9.7 ± 1.3 and 11.1 ± 0.9 points, respectively. A significant improvement in the JOA score was seen in both groups postoperatively, but the recovery rate of the patients' JOA scores was significantly lower in Group B. In Group A, significant improvements were seen in all JOA score items, but in Group B, improvements were seen only in upper- and lower-extremity sensory functions. CONCLUSION: Different standing postures are risk factors in the treatment of K-Line (-) patients, and therefore, natural and relaxed standing positions should be given more attention before devising the surgical plan.

Classification of body postures using smart workwear.

BACKGROUND: Despite advancing automation, employees in many industrial and service occupations still have to perform physically intensive work that may have negative effects on the health of the musculoskeletal system. For targeted preventive measures, precise knowledge of the work postures and movements performed is necessary. METHODS: Prototype smart work clothes equipped with 15 inertial sensors were used to record reference body postures of 20 subjects. These reference postures were used to create a software-based posture classifier according to the Ovako Working Posture Analysing System (OWAS) by means of an evolutionary training algorithm. RESULTS: A total of 111,275 posture shots were recorded and used for training the classifier. The results show that smart workwear, with the help of evolutionary trained software classifiers, is in principle capable of detecting harmful postures of its wearer. The detection rate of the evolutionary trained classifier ([Formula: see text] for the postures of the back, [Formula: see text] for the arms, and [Formula: see text] for the legs) outperforms that of a TensorFlow trained classifying neural network. CONCLUSIONS: In principle, smart workwear - as prototypically shown in this paper - can be a helpful tool for assessing an individual's risk for work-related musculoskeletal disorders. Numerous potential sources of error have been identified that can affect the detection accuracy of software classifiers required for this purpose.

The Associations between Evacuation Movements and Children's Physiological Demands Analyzed via Wearable-Based Sensors.

During fire evacuations, crawling is recommended to prevent harm from toxic smoke and to access more breathable air. Few studies have evaluated the physiological burden of crawling, especially for children. The method of using wearable sensors to collect data (e.g., electrodermal activity, EDA; skin temperature, SKT) was used to evaluate the effects of different locomotive postures on children's velocity and physiological demands. Twenty-eight (28) children (13 boys and 15 girls), aged 4 to 6 years old, traveled up to 22.0 m in different postures: Upright walking (UW), stoop walking (SW), knee and hand crawling (KHC). The results showed that: (1) Gender and age had significant impacts on children's velocity (p < 0.05): Boys were always faster than girls in any of the three postures and the older the child, the faster the velocity for KHC. (2) Physiological results demonstrated that KHC was more physically demanding than bipedal walking, represented by higher scores of the EDA and SKT indicators, similar to the findings of adults. (3) Gender and age had significant impacts on children's physiological demands (p < 0.05). The physiological demands were greater for boys than girls. In addition, the higher the age, the less physiological demands he/she needs. Overall, the findings suggest that children are unnecessarily required to choose crawling precisely as adults as the best posture to respond to emergency scenarios. In a severe fire, stoop walking is suggested, as there is more respired air and children could move quickly and avoid overworking physiological burdens. The results of this study are expected to be considered in the evaluation of current evacuation recommendations and for the safety guide of preparedness to improve the effectiveness of risk reduction for children.

Development of a Smart Chair Sensors System and Classification of Sitting Postures with Deep Learning Algorithms.

Nowadays in modern societies, a sedentary lifestyle is almost inevitable for a majority of the population. Long hours of sitting, especially in wrong postures, may result in health complications. A smart chair with the capability to identify sitting postures can help reduce health risks induced by a modern lifestyle. This paper presents the design, realization and evaluation of a new smart chair sensors system capable of sitting postures identification. The system consists of eight pressure sensors placed on the chair's sitting cushion and the backrest. A signal acquisition board was designed from scratch to acquire data generated by the pressure sensors and transmit them via a Wi-Fi network to a purposely developed graphical user interface which monitors and stores the acquired sensors' data on a computer. The designed system was tested by means of an extensive sitting experiment involving 40 subjects, and from the acquired data, the classification of the respective sitting postures out of eight possible postures was performed. Hereby, the performance of seven deep-learning algorithms was assessed. The best accuracy of 91.68% was achieved by an echo memory network model. The designed smart chair sensors system is simple and versatile, low cost and accurate, and it can easily be deployed in several smart chair environments, both for public and private contexts.

Using a Passive Back Exoskeleton During a Simulated Sorting Task: Influence on Muscle Activity, Posture, and Heart Rate.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate using a back exoskeleton in a simulated sorting task in a static forward bent trunk posture on muscle activity, posture, and heart rate (HR). BACKGROUND: Potentials of exoskeletons for reducing musculoskeletal demands in work tasks need to be clarified. METHODS: Thirty-six healthy males performed the sorting task in 40°-forward bent static trunk posture for 90 seconds, in three trunk orientations, with and without exoskeleton. Muscle activity of the erector spinae (ES), biceps femoris (BF), trapezius descendens (TD), rectus abdominis (RA), vastus laterals (VL), and gastrocnemius medialis was recorded using surface electromyography normalized to a submaximal or maximal reference electrical activity (%RVE (reference voluntary electrical activity)/%MVE). Spine and lower limb postures were assessed by gravimetric position sensors, and HR by electrocardiography. RESULTS: Using the exoskeleton resulted in decreased BF muscle activity [-8.12%RVE], and minor changes in ES [-1.29%MVE], RA [-0.28%RVE], VL [-0.49%RVE], and TD [+1.13%RVE] muscle activity. Hip and knee flexion increased [+8.1°; +6.7°]. Heart rate decreased by 2.1 bpm. Trunk orientation had an influence on BF muscle activity. CONCLUSION: Using the back exoskeleton in a short sorting task with static trunk posture mainly reduced hip extensor muscle activity and changed lower limb but not spine posture. Implications of using a back exoskeleton for workers' musculoskeletal health need further clarification. APPLICATION: The detected changes by using the Laevo® illustrate the need for further investigation prior to practical recommendations of using exoskeletons in the field. Investigating various work scenarios in different kind of workers and long-term applications would be important elements.

Development of an educational protocol for ergonomic risk assessment of working postures to enhance the competence of occupational health nurses.

AIM: To develop a protocol and provide a valid, evidence-based procedure for identifying the ergonomic risk of working postures by occupational health nurses. BACKGROUND: Although ergonomic risk assessment tools have been used for the early detection of risky working postures, their operational procedures and validations do not target the competence of occupational nursing personnel. DESIGN: This study developed and validated an educational protocol, comprised of 13 procedures in five stages. First, the number of work tasks in the workplace is determined. Second, the working postures are confirmed. Third, the raters are trained to use the assessment tools. Fourth, high-risk postures are identified and categorized. Fifth, the inter-rater reliability of the tool is reported. The content of the protocol is validated by experts, with a validity value of 0.87. DATA SOURCES: The protocol was created through review of literature published from 1991 to 2021, protocol development (between 2018 to 2020) and expert validation (2020). CONCLUSION: The protocol can be applied to educate occupational health nurses and increase their competence in detecting workers' ergonomic risks. It can be used as a reference in occupational health nursing education to evaluate work tasks and detect risky postures.

Robustness of lateral tongue bracing under bite block perturbation.

Lateral tongue bracing is a lingual posture in which the sides of the tongue are held against the palate and upper molars, and has been observed cross-linguistically. However, it is unknown whether lateral bracing makes adjustments to external perturbation like other body postures. The present study aims to test the robustness of lateral tongue bracing with three experiments. The first baseline experiment was an analysis of an electropalatogram database and the results showed lateral bracing being continuously maintained. The second experiment applied an external perturbation during speech production. A bite block was held between participants' teeth while intra-oral video was used to record contact between the sides of the tongue and upper molars during speech. The results indicated that lateral bracing was maintained most of the time during speech. The third experiment included simulations investigating the activation of tongue muscles relevant to lateral bracing at different degrees of jaw opening. The results show that bracing requires higher activation of bracing agonists and lower activation of bracing antagonists as jaw opening increases. Our results suggest that lateral tongue bracing is actively maintained and robust under external perturbation and further indicate it serves as an essential lingual posture during speech production.

Beyond Correct Postures and Flexible Bodies: Exploring the Relevance of Yoga in End-of-Life care.

Since the mid-twentieth century, Yoga has emerged as a multi-million US dollar global fitness industry. It has drawn worldwide followers to practice postural and breathing techniques. However, the fitness model only elucidates how to live well and not how to die well. This article contends that the body-centric approach has little relevance to those who are dying. It espouses that yogic values like transcendence, holistic healing, harmony, and death-acceptance that qualify a 'good' death are regrettably lost in modern times. In conclusion, the soteriological aim needs to be retained in the modern yogic discourse to live well and die gracefully.

Dexterity and technique in termite fishing by chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes troglodytes) in the Goualougo Triangle, Republic of Congo.

Although the phenomenon of termite fishing by chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) has historical and theoretical importance for primatology, we still have a limited understanding of how chimpanzees accomplish this activity, and in particular, about details of skilled actions and the nature of individual variation in fishing techniques. We examined movements, hand positions, grips, and other details from remote video footage of seven adult and subadult female chimpanzees using plant probes to extract Macrotermes muelleri termites from epigeal nests. Six chimpanzees used exclusively one hand (left or right) to grip the probe during termite fishing. All chimpanzees used the same repertoire of actions to insert, adjust, and withdraw the probe but differed in the frequency of use of particular actions. Chimpanzees have been described as eating termites in two ways-directly from the probe or by sweeping them from the probe with one hand. We describe a third technique: sliding the probe between the digits of one stationary hand as the probe is extracted from the nest. The sliding technique requires complementary bimanual coordination (extracting with one hand and grasping lightly with the other, at the same time). We highlight the importance of actions with two hands-one gripping, one assisting-in termite fishing and discuss how probing techniques are correlated with performance. Additional research on digital function and on environmental, organismic, and task constraints will further reveal manual dexterity in termite fishing.