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This paper presents an embarking and disembarking process for the hyperloop, a future high-speed transportation of passengers and goods in tubes. A concept of the (dis)embarking process has been designed and tested with two experiments. The first experiment was performed to compare the new concept to one that is more similar to the current embarking setup of trains on the aspects of efficiency and experience. Participants were asked to (dis)embark in the test settings that simulate the new concept and the conventional situation with luggage. As a result, new passenger flow saves 40% of the time for vehicles to stay on the platform. Follow-up questionnaires and interviews with the participants show that the proposed passenger flow gives a better experience in terms of efficiency, seamlessness and friendliness. The new solution increases the number of doors, which increases the manufacturing complexity and the chance of failure. Narrowing the door size minimizes this effect. Subsequently, a second experiment has been carried out to study the influence of door width on (dis)embarking efficiency and passenger experience following a similar method. It turns out that narrowing the door width does not noticeably influence the embarking time, but the disembarking time does increase. Interviews show that half of the participants sense a negative experience with narrower doors, while the other half do not notice a difference.

International audience; This article aims to present the activity as an interface amongst different actors in a project process. As based on the ergonomic intervention in a university restaurant, the kitchen assistants’ activity at the meal serving counter is presented as an interface among nutritionists, managers and operators of this food supply system. Building this interface in the re-evaluation meetings of this project aimed to support the dialog amongst heterogeneous actors, thus allowing for the transformation of this system and the improvement of the work conditions for the kitchen assistants.

The synergies and the relevant interdisciplinary existing between Sustainability and Ergonomics (HFE) are paramount to document the cultural evolution of design interventions that can be made when creating innovative artefacts, such as products, services, and product-service systems, since both disciplines aim at investigating the interactions between humans and living ecosystems. However, studies linking Sustainability and HFE mainly tackle the problems at the macro-scales, though several interplays between human behaviours, creative practices, and contexts of use can be identified at the micro-scales within the Human Centred Design domain (HCD). Ergonomic interventions performed under the Sustainability domain should employ design-driven strategies, which means that there is the need to further investigate the interdisciplinary contributions under a HCD lens (e.g.: investigations made at the human dimension). A research agenda for future explorations on Sustainable HCD is proposed in this work. The agenda is composed by six main research themes that employ design-driven scenarios to frame the complex set of open research topics pointed out by HFE in relation to Sustainability goals. Results achieved in this study set a body of knowledge through which systematically explore the possible contributions that Sustainable HCD may produce at all design scales, and for which a choral research effort is needed of all HFE community.

Among the technologies included in Industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution, Digital Manufacturing (DM) represents a new approach to evaluate the performance of production processes in a virtual environment. DM can be seen as the industrial declination of Virtual Reality (VR) that, by using an integrated computer-based system, allows creating simulation, 3D visualization and provides different tools to define the product and the manufacturing process simultaneously. Virtualization and simulation of production processes generate benefits for companies in terms of time and costs, optimizing the assembly line and providing parameters for studying human-machine interaction. Regarding this last topic, the aim of this paper is to propose an innovative procedure to support the workplaces design, based on simulation techniques that allow setting a virtual scenario in which a Digital Human Model (DHM) is able to carry on assembly tasks. Data from simulations can be analyzed and used to assess ergonomic indexes in a preventive and proactive approach. As other automotive manufacturers, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) applies EAWS (European Assessment Work Sheet), a first level screening, to assess the ergonomic biomechanical overload of workplaces in the design phase, according to international standards (ISO 11226 and ISO 11228-1, -2, -3). The ergonomics risk assessment, since the design phase, allows identifying critical issues and to define and put in practice corrective actions in the earlier phase, being more successful and less expensive. In order to support the procedure proposed in this research, a case study is described, based on the EAWS index evaluation of a workstation in a FCA plant assembly shop. The simulation has been realized by using PLM software Tecnomatix Process Simulate by Siemens® and the EAWS analysis has been performed by using EAWSdigital by MTM®. The procedure can be considered innovative to support human-centered design of production process in developing new products.

The capability to be resilient in the face of crises and disasters is a topic of highest political concern in Europe especially as far as critical infrastructures and urban environments are concerned. Critical infrastructures are systems or part of systems essential for the maintenance of vital societal functions, the disruption or destruction of which would have a significant impact on the well-being of people. Examples of them are transportation services, energy infrastructures, water and wastewater systems, health and emergency services, financial services, communication infrastructures, etc. The symposium focuses on the experience of four different projects funded under the Horizon 2020 Programme: DARWIN, RESILIENS, RESOLUTE, SMR. The projects are all dealing with the application of resilience engineering, community resilience and urban resilience concepts to concrete examples of crises and situations of emergency. Such principles are translated into guidelines covering different resilience abilities that the organizations managing critical infrastructure should possess.

An extensive literature documents a high prevalence of errors in clinical diagnosis discovered at autopsy. Multiple studies have suggested no significant decrease in these errors over time. Despite these findings, autopsies have dramatically decreased in frequency in the United States and many other countries. In 1994, the last year for which national U.S. data exist, the autopsy rate for all non-forensic deaths fell below 6%. The marked decline in autopsy rates from previous rates of 40–50% undoubtedly reflects various factors, including reimbursement issues, the attitudes of clinicians regarding the utility of autopsies in the setting of other diagnostic advances, and general unfamiliarity with the autopsy and techniques for requesting it, especially among physicians-in-training. The autopsy is valuable for its role in undergraduate and graduate medical education, the identification and characterization of new diseases, and contributions to the understanding of disease pathogenesis. Although extensive, these benefits are difficult to quantify. This review of the last three years of hospital autopsy in Lucca studied the more easily quantifiable benefits of the autopsy as a tool in performance measurement and improvement. Such benefits largely relate to the role of the autopsy in detecting errors in clinical diagnosis and unsuspected complications of treatment. It is hoped that characterizing the extent to which the autopsy provides data relevant to clinical performance measurement and improvement will help inform strategies for preserving the benefits of routinely obtained autopsies and for considering its wider use as an instrument for quality improvement.

The frequent mounting and dismounting the tractor required by many farming operations increases the risk of falls, particularly for older farmers. The present study explored the risk factors related to tractor ingress and egress in older farmers from two countries with a different tradition in terms of safety culture: Sweden and Italy. Eighteen male farmers aged 65 + (8 from Skåne region, southern Sweden, and 10 from Piedmont region, northwestern Italy) were observed while mounting and dismounting their most used tractor, to investigate the routine behaviors adopted and to identify possible sources of risk of fall. The presence of three critical behaviors was recorded: the maintenance of three-point contact with the machine when entering and exiting the cab; facing the cab and the use of the last step when exiting. Farmers were also interviewed about their health status, attitudes toward safety, and perceived risks while performing the task. The results showed that similar unsafe behaviors were adopted by most of both Swedish and Italian participants; in particular, none of the farmers got off the tractor by facing the cab. Older farmers from both countries referred to age and previous experience as the major protective factors against falls, without acknowledging that new risks can rise from the age-related changes in their motor skills. The results raised some considerations about the need to develop targeted elderly-centered solutions to support the correct mounting/dismounting behaviors, both in the design of the machines and in information campaigns and training courses, which may have a cross-cultural validity.