Due to the flexibility and adaptability of human, manual handling work is still very important in industry, especially for assembly and maintenance work. Well-designed work operation can improve work efficiency and quality; enhance safety, and lower cost. Most traditional methods for work system analysis need physical mock-up and are time consuming. Digital mockup (DMU) and digital human modeli...

Current EuroNCAP test specifications attempt to predict pedestrian lower limb injury in a lateral impact with a rigid legform test device developed by the UK's TRL (Transportation Research Lab). Research shows that the measurements taken from this device (knee bending angle, knee shear, and upper tibia acceleration) do not necessarily correspond to accurate injury prediction. Recent research su...

Extreme climatic heat is a major health concern among workers in different occupational pursuits. People in the regions of western India confront frequent heat emergencies, with great risk of mortality and morbidity. Taking account of informal occupational groups (foundry and sheet metal, FSM, N=587; ceramic and pottery, CP, N=426; stone quarry, SQ, N=934) in different seasons, the study examin...

Purpose: To further develop an ergonomic birthing support for increasing comfortable postures for midwives and mothers during deliveries. Methods and Results: First, the prototype of the birthing support and six birthing postures were tested with 8 midwives, 2 physicians, and 10 pregnant women in the last month of their pregnancy using visual analogue scales (VASs) and the System Usability Scal...

One of the major challenges in distributed systems is establishing consistency among replicated data in a timely fashion. While the consistent ordering of events has been extensively researched, the time span to reach a consistent state is mostly considered an effect of the chosen consistency model, rather than being considered a parameter itself. This paper argues that it is possible to give g...

Different structural parts of monuments and historic buildings were based on stone as the main building material, such as masonry and foundation, while many types of stones were also used for decorative, architectural elements, such as reliefs, cornices, corbels, colonnettes. The preservation of stone elements is crucial for the continuity of these structures. Mortar on the other hand is an art...

The rates of mRNA synthesis and decay determine the mRNA expression level. The two processes are under coordinated control, which makes the measurements of these rates challenging, as evidenced by the low correlation among the methods of measurement of RNA half-lives. We developed a minimally invasive method, multiplexed gene control, to shut off expression of genes with controllable synthetic ...

The application of non-viral gene delivery vectors is often accompanied with the poor correlation between transfection efficiency and the safety profiles of vectors. Vectors with high transfection efficiencies often suffer from high toxicities, making it unlikely to improve their efficiencies by increasing the DNA dosage. In the current study, we developed a ternary complex system which consist...

1. Introduction Since the first report on the synthesis of ordered mesoporous MCM-41 in 1992 [1], the interest to these materials having pore sizes in the range from 2 to 50 nm has continuously been growing. Due to a fascinating match of their structural properties and the adjustability of the surface chemistry, mesoporous materials provide very flexible options for their use in diverse applica...

The suspension system and socket fitting of artificial limbs have major roles and vital effects on the comfort, mobility, and satisfaction of amputees. This paper introduces a new pneumatic suspension system that overcomes the drawbacks of current suspension systems in donning and doffing, change in volume during daily activities, and pressure distribution in the socket-stump interface. An air ...