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Since few studies have investigated whether the Distress Thermometer (DT) in Asian adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancer patients (between 15 and 39 years), we investigated the appropriateness of the DT as a screening tool for psychological symptom burden in these AYA patients and to evaluate AYA patients’ distress across a trajectory of three time points longitudinally over a 6-month period. This was a prospective, longitudinal study. Recruited Asian AYA patients were diagnosed with lymphomas, sarcomas, primary brain malignancies, or germ cell tumors. Patients completed the DT, PedsQL Generic Core Scales, and the Rotterdam Symptom Checklist. Data were analyzed using STATA version 15. Approximately half of the patients experienced clinically significant DT distress (distress score ≥ 4) early in their cancer journey with 43.1% patients presenting with distress at time of diagnosis and 47.7% patients 1 month after diagnosis. Among AYA patients > 24 years old, worry (68.3%), insurance/financial issues (61%), treatment decisions (43.9%), work/school issues (41.5%), nervousness (41.5%), and sadness (41.5%) were the top five identified problems. On the other hand, the top five identified problems among AYA ≤ 24 years were worry (54.2%), nervousness (41.7%), bathing/dressing problems (37.5%), work/school issues (33.3%), and fatigue (33.3%). DT scores were significantly associated with certain psychological symptom burden items such as worry (p

A dolphin had previously been trained to perform a cross-modal matching-to-sample task. In one version of this task the animal had to investigate a sample object that was concealed in a box through its echolocation sense alone, then select the correct match among up to three alternative objects visually in air. Given the frequency range of a dolphin click and the limited number of sensors that the dolphin receives the sonar returns with, the dolphin should have difficulties resolving the details of the object. We suggested earlier that the dolphin might be using synthetic aperture to gain a higher resolution of the stimulus. To test this hypothesis we proposed to restrict the movement of the dolphin by stationing him on a bite-plate that was fixed in front of the box that contained the sample object. We trained the dolphin to station on the bite-plate while performing the cross-modal task (echolocation to vision) while recording the sound field around the dolphin through a 16-hydrophone array that was placed in a variety of positions and configurations between the object and the dolphin stationed on the bite-plate. The acoustic data were recorded at 500 kHz and later analyzed. To our surprise the dolphin was still able to perform the discrimination task. In this paper, we present the analysis of the data collected and show that the dolphin employs techniques such as beam steering and beam shaping while acoustically interrogating the object. This suggests that while the dolphin might still employ a synthetic aperture when possible, he might not need it to resolve the details of the object. We are planning to extend the range of objects to new and unfamiliar objects to explore whether the dolphin is indeed able to resolve details of the object acoustically without the need for synthetic aperture.

The design goal of the Age Invaders system is to make a mixed reality interaction platform that can facilitate meaningful social interaction with players, from many backgrounds and demographics, at appropriate levels of physical exertion for their age. This paper discusses a multidisciplinary approach to analyzing the user experience and reassessment of the context of use of the Age Invaders system. This paper tests the effectiveness of the system in promoting the intended design goals and the results show strong support for intergenerational interaction using digital technology. Additionally, the results of the study help to focus the refinements of the existing platform and development of further novel games and interactive applications for this mixed reality system, and provide insights into the user in complex mixed reality experiences.

A bottlenose dolphin performing a cross-modal matching-to-sample task was stationed on a biteplate while echolocating on a sample object concealed in an opaque box. This procedure prevented the animal from gaining different aspects of the stimulus. Despite these restrictions on his location the dolphin was still able to recognize the object and successfully perform a match. The echolocation signals emitted by the dolphin were recorded with a rectangular array of 16 hydrophones mounted on a frame and placed between the dolphin on the biteplate and the object inside the box. A custom high-frequency data acquisition system recorded the signals at 500 kS per second and also collected synchronized video from several locations around the animal. The collected data was filtered and processed. The results presented here show that the dolphin was scanning the object and steering his echolocation beam without moving his head thus avoiding the possible acoustic clutter from multiple reflections from the object. The ...

Single Input Single Output (SISO) Orthogonal Frequency Division-Multiplexing (OFDM) over short to medium range shallow water channels suffers from low bandwidth efficiency. This happens due to large Cyclic Prefix (CP) and relative small number of sub-carriers. To increase the bandwidth efficiency, a time domain channel shortening equalizer (CSE) can be inserted before the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). The CSE shortens the channel impulse response (CIR) so that a smaller CP is needed. This paper analyses the performance of four time domain CSEs: 1) Minimum Mean Square Error (MMSE) Unit Tap Constraint (UTC) 2) MMSE Unit Energy Constraint (UEC) 3) Maximum Shortening Signal to Noise Ratio (MSSNR) 4) Minimum Inter Symbol Interference (Min ISI) and Frequency Domain Decision Feedback Equalizer (FD-DFE). Analysing simulated and real data, the MMSE UTC equalizer shows the best performance in terms of Bit Error Rate (BER). When bit-loading is applied, the BER of Min ISI approach has comparable performance to UTC.