Haptic Glove TV Device for People with Visual Impairment.

Immersive video is changing the way we enjoy TV. It is no longer just about receiving sequential images with audio, but also playing with other human senses through smells, vibrations of movement, 3D audio, feeling water, wind, heat, and other emotions that can be experienced through all human senses. This work aims to validate the usefulness of an immersive and interactive solution for people with severe visual impairment by developing a haptic glove that allows receiving signals and generating vibrations in hand, informing about what happens in a scene. The study case presented here shows how the haptic device can take the information about the ball's location in the playing field, synchronized with the video reception, and deliver it to the user in the form of vibrations during the re-transmission of a soccer match. In this way, we take visually impaired people to live a new sensory experience, allowing digital and social inclusion and accessibility to audiovisual technologies that they could not enjoy before. This work shows the methodology used for the design, implementation, and results evaluation. Usability tests were carried out with fifteen visually impaired people who used the haptic device to attend a soccer match synchronized with the glove's vibrations.

Three-D Wide Faces (3DWF): Facial Landmark Detection and 3D Reconstruction over a New RGB⁻D Multi-Camera Dataset.

Latest advances of deep learning paradigm and 3D imaging systems have raised the necessity for more complete datasets that allow exploitation of facial features such as pose, gender or age. In our work, we propose a new facial dataset collected with an innovative RGB⁻D multi-camera setup whose optimization is presented and validated. 3DWF includes 3D raw and registered data collection for 92 persons from low-cost RGB⁻D sensing devices to commercial scanners with great accuracy. 3DWF provides a complete dataset with relevant and accurate visual information for different tasks related to facial properties such as face tracking or 3D face reconstruction by means of annotated density normalized 2K clouds and RGB⁻D streams. In addition, we validate the reliability of our proposal by an original data augmentation method from a massive set of face meshes for facial landmark detection in 2D domain, and by head pose classification through common Machine Learning techniques directed towards proving alignment of collected data.

A novel crystalline SiCO compound.

Ab initio evolutionary structural searches have been performed on SixCyO2(x+y) compounds. A novel structure, with SiC2O6 stoichiometry and the P21/c space group is calculated to be stable against decomposition within a wide pressure window from 7.2 to 41 GPa, and metastable under ambient conditions. It consists of CO3 units, linked to SiO6 octahedra, supporting previous experimental studies. The evolution of the carbon environment towards tetrahedral CO4 units, thus resembling the crystal chemistry of silicon, is predicted at higher pressures.

From ELF to compressibility in solids.

Understanding the electronic nature of materials' compressibility has always been a major issue behind tabulation and rationalization of bulk moduli. This is especially because this understanding is one of the main approaches to the design and proposal of new materials with a desired (e.g., ultralow) compressibility. It is well recognized that the softest part of the solid will be the one responsible for its compression at the first place. In chemical terms, this means that the valence will suffer the main consequences of pressurization.It is desirable to understand this response to pressure in terms of the valence properties(charge, volume, etc.). One of the possible approaches is to consider models of electronic separability, such as the bond charge model (BCM), which provides insight into the cohesion of covalent crystals in analogy with the classical ionic model. However, this model relies on empirical parametrization of bond and lone pair properties. In this contribution, we have coupled electron localization function (ELF) ab initio data with the bond charge model developed by Parr in order to analyze solid state compressibility from first principles and moreover, to derive general trends and shed light upon superhard behavior.

Assessment of cognitive games to improve the quality of life of Parkinson's and Alzheimer's patients.

Objectives: The core objectives of this study centre on enhancing the quality of life and well-being of individuals diagnosed with Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. Our aim is to facilitate the monitoring of patient information, benefiting both caregivers and healthcare professionals. Methods: As part of the PROCare4Life platform sensorial ecosystem, a web application with six engaging cognitive games focusing on developing cognitive training and stimulating brain activity are developed. A set of metrics calculated by the application feed machine learning predictive models to evaluate the cognitive status and evolution over time. Long-term analysis of the daily cognitive ability information is used to generate high-level outcomes and identify deviations for each patient from the multimodal fusion engine. And based on these results, a recommender system provides a set of personalized notifications. Results: A 3-month pilot study that took place in five different countries shows the results obtained from 93 patients. An average of 22.4 games were completed per day and the recommender system generated a total of 260 game notifications, 37.7% of them were marked as read by the patients. The Cognitive State Score and the Deviations in Cognitive Abilities measurement, calculated by the multimodal fusion engine, when used in conjunction present a good overview of the patient's current state and potential deviations. Conclusion: The cognitive games application was well-received by elderly individuals who took part in the study. This tool can be valuable for caregivers and healthcare providers in assessing the cognitive function of patients through engaging in cognitive games.

II National Congress of Paediatrics: The fight against child mortality.

In the present work, we present an overview of the contents of the communications presented at the Second National Congress of Paediatrics, held in San Sebastian in 1923, on the occasion of the 100th year anniversary. The problem of infant mortality stands out as a common thread, which in those years was very high in Spain and was a concern of politicians, intellectuals and the medical profession. It is worth noting that some of the proposals and concerns of the paediatricians who attended that congress continue to be relevant today.

[Prevalence of dental and mucosal lesions among the pediatric population who attended the emergency department of a general hospital].

BACKGROUND: The high prevalence of oral pathology in children encourages to gain further understanding on their manifestations and urgent nature, objective of the present study Methodology. Cross-sectional study that included patients aged <14 years of age who attended an emergency department over a one-year period. The relationship between the variables collected and oral pathology was analyzed. RESULTS: Fifty-five patients were included, 45.5% girls, mean age 4.11 years (10 days to 13 years). Overall, mucosal pathology (74.5%) prevailed over dental ones, and lesions of infectious origin (54.6%) over the traumatic ones (14.5%). Dental pathology (50% toothache and 35.7% infections) was significantly associated with being >6 years (66.7 vs 10%), pain (40.7 vs 10.7%) and absence of fever (37.9 vs 11.5%). Mucosal pathology (61% infections: 53.7% viral and 31.7% due to herpangina) was significantly associated with being =6 years (60 vs 6.7%) and having fever (76.9 vs 17.2%). Six traumatic lesions on the mucosa and two on the teeth were observed; significantly more patients attended the emergency room within 24 hours (median =1 hour) than in the case of infection (100 vs 51.7%). Being =6 years was significantly associated with fever, mucosal pathology, mucosal infection, and herpangina, and being >6 years was associated with pain, previous antibiotic treatment and at discharge, and previous NSAID regimen. CONCLUSIONS: The analyzed pediatric oral pathologies treated in the emergency department are of mucosal and infectious origin. Dental disease prevail in children >6 years of age and mucosal lesions in those =6 years; no sex differences are observed.

Stereoscopic system for inexpensive hazardous area three-dimensional robot localization applications based on incoherent optical fiber bundle calibrated for high-resolution image transmission.

Computer vision, despite all the recent progress, still cannot be employed technically in most hazardous and harsh industrial areas. Most of the alternative solutions to this modern issue are usually unavailable mainly due to the global visual inspection solution cost. The best suitable option is the use of an incoherent optical fiber bundle (IOFB) that obviously requires a calibration step before image transmission purpose. We already presented our contribution to this topic improving the calibration method of the IOFB for image transmission, with some additional and essential steps that considerably improve the reconstructed image quality while also drastically reducing the processing time needed. We also proposed and evaluated a new full-resolution calibration method in a very recent study. We present and discuss in this paper an application using the IOFB for robot guiding in hazardous areas, based on a stereoscopic vision system. Conclusions compare the low- and full-resolution IOFB calibration methods for the depicted application and introduce some advantages of a specially designed IOFB that could perfectly fit with some industrial applications.

On the influence of low-level visual features in film classification.

BACKGROUND: In this paper we present a model of parameters to aesthetically characterize films using a multi-disciplinary approach: by combining film theory, visual low-level video descriptors (modeled in order to supply aesthetic information) and classification techniques using machine and deep learning. METHODS: Four different tests have been developed, each for a different application, proving the model's usefulness. These applications are: aesthetic style clustering, prediction of production year, genre detection and influence on film popularity. RESULTS: The results are compared against high-level information to determine the accuracy of the model to classify films without knowing such information previously. The main difference with other film characterization approaches is that we are able to isolate the influence of high-level descriptors to really understand the relevance of low-level features and, accordingly propose a useful set of low-level visual descriptors for that purpose. This model has been tested with a representative number of films to prove that it can be used for different applications.

Robust vehicle detection in different weather conditions: Using MIPM.

Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) allow us to have high quality traffic information to reduce the risk of potentially critical situations. Conventional image-based traffic detection methods have difficulties acquiring good images due to perspective and background noise, poor lighting and weather conditions. In this paper, we propose a new method to accurately segment and track vehicles. After removing perspective using Modified Inverse Perspective Mapping (MIPM), Hough transform is applied to extract road lines and lanes. Then, Gaussian Mixture Models (GMM) are used to segment moving objects and to tackle car shadow effects, we apply a chromacity-based strategy. Finally, performance is evaluated through three different video benchmarks: own recorded videos in Madrid and Tehran (with different weather conditions at urban and interurban areas); and two well-known public datasets (KITTI and DETRAC). Our results indicate that the proposed algorithms are robust, and more accurate compared to others, especially when facing occlusions, lighting variations and weather conditions.

Correction: Improving vehicle tracking rate and speed estimation in dusty and snowy weather conditions with a vibrating camera.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0189145.].

[On the 50th anniversary of Anales de Pediatría, official publication of the Spanish Association of Paediatrics]. / En los 50 años de Anales de Pediatría, publicación oficial de la Asociación Española de Pediatría.

The 50th Anniversary of Anales de Pediatría is a good time for the celebration of events and tributes, and also for critical thought. Anales de Pediatría is the official publication of scientific expression of the Spanish Association of Paediatrics (AEP). It has been published continuously since October 1968. Anales has contributed so much to the narrative of the advances in Spanish paediatrics, as well as the AEP. Throughout its 50 years of history, the editorial teams of the journal have worked to streamline its management, improve the quality of the content, and to ensure its dissemination and national-international visibility. From 1968 to 1972, Anales was published as a Journal-bulletin. From 1977 until 2000, presence of original articles. Since the year 2000, continuous modernisation and recognition with international journals of prestige, indexing in SCI-JCR, impact from 2009, electronic management of manuscripts, Spanish/English from the 2014 Edition. The evolution of the journal is reviewed in this article. With this, the AEP history committee wants to collaborate in a greater understanding of the development of Spanish paediatrics, as well as to present the history of Anales to its authors and readers. The History committee proposes that a small percentage of space is destined for the humanities and to the humanisation of paediatrics. Best information will ensure the best care for children and also for paediatricians.

Distribution of the internal pudendal artery in male and female llama (Lama glama).

The aim of this research has been to describe the internal pudendal artery distribution in male and female llama and to compare it with that of other domestic animals including the one-humped camel (Camelus dromedarius). The arterial system was perfused with a solution of 14% coloured plaster and preserved in a solution of a 10% formalin, 3% carbolic acid and 3% glycerine. The systematic dissection was made using traditional working techniques and standard instruments. The internal pudendal artery is the ventral terminal branch of the internal iliac artery at the level of the third sacral vertebra. The main supply of the pelvic organs comes from the prostatic or vaginal arteries; notwithstanding these arteries arise from the internal pudendal artery, showing an important difference between ruminants and pig (long iliac type). Similarities between the distribution of the internal pudendal artery of the llama and those obtained in the camel provide strong evidence of a common phylogenetic origin.

Improving vehicle tracking rate and speed estimation in dusty and snowy weather conditions with a vibrating camera.

Traffic surveillance systems are interesting to many researchers to improve the traffic control and reduce the risk caused by accidents. In this area, many published works are only concerned about vehicle detection in normal conditions. The camera may vibrate due to wind or bridge movement. Detection and tracking of vehicles is a very difficult task when we have bad weather conditions in winter (snowy, rainy, windy, etc.), dusty weather in arid and semi-arid regions, at night, etc. Also, it is very important to consider speed of vehicles in the complicated weather condition. In this paper, we improved our method to track and count vehicles in dusty weather with vibrating camera. For this purpose, we used a background subtraction based strategy mixed with an extra processing to segment vehicles. In this paper, the extra processing included the analysis of the headlight size, location, and area. In our work, tracking was done between consecutive frames via a generalized particle filter to detect the vehicle and pair the headlights using the connected component analysis. So, vehicle counting was performed based on the pairing result, with Centroid of each blob we calculated distance between two frames by simple formula and hence dividing it by the time between two frames obtained from the video. Our proposed method was tested on several video surveillance records in different conditions such as dusty or foggy weather, vibrating camera, and in roads with medium-level traffic volumes. The results showed that the new proposed method performed better than our previously published method and other methods, including the Kalman filter or Gaussian model, in different traffic conditions.

Systematic study of the internal iliac artery in llama (Lama glama).

The aim of this research was to determine the origins of the parietal and visceral branches of the internal iliac artery of the llama and to match those with the known types and classifications in the human being and domestic animals. The internal iliac artery divides at the level of the third sacral vertebra into the caudal gluteal and internal pudendal arteries corresponding to an intermediate long iliac type. It gives off the following collateral branches: umbilical, cranial gluteal, obturator and iliolumbar arteries. The intrapelvic visceral branches, vaginal or prostatic arteries, arise from the internal pudendal artery as occurs in carnivores. This is an important difference in relation to the distribution in characteristic long iliac and artiodactyla types. The origins of the parietal and visceral branches of internal iliac artery in the llama have characteristics in common with the domestic cat, which belongs to the carnivores. In relation to the Adachi classification, the internal iliac artery of the llama will be included in the IVa type. We believe that this study is a contribution of a new aspect in teaching and research in comparative anatomy.

Magic cards: a new augmented-reality approach.

Augmented reality (AR) commonly uses markers for detection and tracking. Such multimedia applications associate each marker with a virtual 3D model stored in the memory of the camera-equipped device running the application. Application users are limited in their interactions, which require knowing how to design and program 3D objects. This generally prevents them from developing their own entertainment AR applications. The Magic Cards application solves this problem by offering an easy way to create and manage an unlimited number of virtual objects that are encoded on special markers.

[Usefulness of Hybrid Capture II detection of high-risk human papillomavirus in women with abnormal pap-smears of the uterine cervix]. / Utilidad de la detección del virus del papiloma humano de alto riesgo mediante Hybrid Capture II en mujeres con citologías anormales del cuello uterino.

INTRODUCTION: The objectives of the study were to investigate the usefulness of high-risk human papillomavirus (HR-HPV) detection in women with abnormal pap-smears as an adjunct to screening by cervical cytology, and to determine the viral load distribution according to the histological grade of the lesions. METHODS: A total of 75 women were referred for cytological study of atypical cells of unknown origin (ASCUS), low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (LG-SIL) or high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (HG-SIL). All patients underwent colposcopy, histological study and HR-HPV detection using the Hybrid Capture II test. RESULTS: In the pap-smear studies, HR-HPV was detected in 31.2% of women with ASCUS and 65.7% with LG-SIL. Histological examination showed HR-HPV in 46.4% of women without lesions, 69.5% of those with LG-SIL and 75% with HG-SIL. Negative predictive values for HG-SIL in women with cytological diagnoses of ASCUS and LG-SIL were 81.8% and 92.3%, respectively. Percentages of infection with high viral load significantly increased in accordance with the histological grade. CONCLUSIONS: The Hybrid Capture II test can be useful for the management of women with cytological evidence of ASCUS because of the low prevalence of HR-HPV infection and the high negative predictive value for HG-SIL. The usefulness in women with a cytological diagnosis of LG-SIL is limited due to the high prevalence of HR-HPV infection. High viral load can be a risk factor for the development of premalignant cervical lesions.