Search results for "Robot"

Implementation and microbiological stability of dose-banded ganciclovir infusion bags prepared in series by a robotic system.

2018

Objectives The implementation of dose-banding (DB) in centralised, pharmacy-based cytotoxic drug preparation units allows the preparation of standardised doses in series. The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of DB for the prescribing of ganciclovir (GV) infusion solutions and to investigate the microbiological stability of dose-banded, automatically prepared ready-to-administer GV infusion bags by media-fill simulation tests and sterility tests. Methods The frequency of prescription of GV doses was retrospectively analysed before and after implementing the DB scheme. Four dose-ranges or ‘bands’ and the corresponding standard doses (250, 300, 350, 400 mg) were identified. Th…

Smooth Three-Dimensional Route Planning for Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles With Double Continuous Curvature

2022

This paper presents a smooth flight path planner for maneuvering in a 3D Euclidean space, which is based on two new space curves. The first one is called 'Elementary Clothoid-based 3D Curve (ECb3D)', which is built by concatenating two symmetric Clothoid-based 3D Curves (Cb3D). The combination of these curves allows to reach an arbitrary orientation in 3D Euclidean space. This new curve allows to generate continuous curvature and torsion profiles that start and finish with a null value, which means that they can be concatenated with other curves, such as straight segments, without generating discontinuities on those variables. The second curve is called 'Double Continuous Curvature 3D Curve…

Robots Like Me: Challenges and Ethical Issues in Aged Care.

2018

Robots have become a big issue in the twenty-first century, not least in elderly assistance. There are hopes that robots will make aged-care jobs less demanding, for example, they could help senior citizens maintain a longer independent life in their own home, assist caregivers in the nursing home, or provide company to the lonely. However, there are different opinions about the use of robots in our society. In 2012, a survey was conducted in 27 EU countries to examine the public's attitudes toward robots (Special Eurobarometer 382).1 More than 26.000 European citizens responded about the areas where they believe robots should be used as a priority or banned. The survey indicated that, in g…

Efficiency Analysis Of Resource Request Patterns In Classification Of Web Robots And Humans

2018

The paper deals with the problem of classification of Web traffic generated by robots and humans on e-commerce websites. Due to the still growing proliferation and specialization of bots, a large body of research into characterization and recognition of their traffic has been conducted so far. In particular, some approaches to classify bot and human sessions on websites have been proposed in the literature. In this paper we verify and discuss the efficiency of such recently proposed approach, which uses differences in resource request patterns of bots and humans. We reconstructed Web sessions from actual HTTP log data for three different e-commerce sites, varying in the traffic intensity an…

Communities of Communication: Making Sense of the “Social” in Social Media

2012

As social media usage permeates people's lives, an increasing portion of their daily behavior leaves digital traces to be used by researchers. Social scientists can hope to gain new insight into the previously hidden but digitally recorded aspects of our digital social lives. Beyond aggregate and individual-level studies of user behavior, the digital traces also enable scientific examination of the structure of social interaction through networks. At the same time, the large scale and networked nature of social media data pose a new set of challenges to be overcome through the development of sound methodologies. We take stock of current methodological promises and challenges in social media…

Learning Laparoscopic Radical Hysterectomy: Are We Facing an Emerging Situation?

2023

Despite wide screening campaigns and early detection, cervical cancer remains the fourth most common cancer among women. Radical hysterectomy, whether by open, laparoscopic or by robotic-assisted techniques, is the mainstay treatment. However, for adequate surgical results and good oncological prognosis, a gynecological surgeon should be trained to perform those procedures. The learning curve of radical hysterectomy, especially by laparoscopy, is influenced by several factors. The LACC trial, the decrease in cervical cancer incidence and radical hysterectomy procedures have widely reduced the learning curve for surgeons. This article mainly discusses the learning curve of laparoscopic radic…

2019

Despite substantial advances in many different fields of neurorobotics in general, and biomimetic robots in particular, a key challenge is the integration of concepts: to collate and combine research on disparate and conceptually disjunct research areas in the neurosciences and engineering sciences. We claim that the development of suitable robotic integration platforms is of particular relevance to make such integration of concepts work in practice. Here, we provide an example for a hexapod robotic integration platform for autonomous locomotion. In a sequence of six focus sections dealing with aspects of intelligent, embodied motor control in insects and multipedal robots-ranging from comp…

Robotic transanal total mesorectal excision: Is the future now?

2021

Total mesorectal excision (TME) is the standard surgical treatment for the curative radical resection of rectal cancers. Minimally invasive TME has been gaining ground favored by the continuous technological advancements. New procedures, such as transanal TME (TaTME), have been introduced to overcome some technical limitations, especially in low rectal tumors, obese patients, and/or narrow pelvis. The earliest TaTME reports showed promising results when compared with the conventional laparoscopic TME. However, recent publications raised concerns regarding the high rates of anastomotic leaks or local recurrences observed in national series. Robotic TaTME (R-TaTME) has been proposed as a nove…

"That's Real! That's What You Want!": Producing Fear in George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead (1978) vs Zack Snyder's remake (2004)

2011

International audience; This article examines traditional oppositions between terror and horror in Dawn of the Dead (1978) and its recent remake (2004), by focusing on one of the major changes made by the producers of the remake: the use of running zombies, which emphasizes the danger the creatures represent to the characters, and enables the film-makers to resort to the kind of cheap startle effects that abound in contemporary slasher and action movies. That the living dead of 1978 were slow-moving allowed for contemplation of their pathetic state and questioned the border between living and dead. The 1978 film underlined how incompatible the living dead were with such techniques that rely…

Force/Torque-Sensorless Joint Stiffness Estimation in Articulated Soft Robots

2022

Currently, the access to the knowledge of stiffness values is typically constrained to a-priori identified models or datasheet information, which either do not usually take into ac- count the full range of possible stiffness values or need extensive experiments. This work tackles the challenge of stiffness estimation in articulated soft manipulators, and it proposes an innovative solution adding value to the previous research by removing the necessity for force/torque sensors and generalizing to multi-degree- of-freedom robots. Built upon the theory of unknown input-state observers and recursive least-square algorithms, the solution is independent of the actuator model parameters and its in…