Multimodal exercise intervention improves frontal cognitive functions and gait in Alzheimer's disease: A controlled trial

Aim: The objective of the present study was to investigate the effect of a multimodal exercise intervention on frontal cognitive functions and kinematic gait parameters in patients with Alzheimer's disease. Methods: A sample of elderly patients with Alzheimer's disease (n=27) were assigned to a training group (n=14; aged 78.0±7.3years) and a control group (n=13; aged 77.1±7.4years). Multimodal exercise intervention includes motor activities and cognitive tasks simultaneously. The participants attended a 1-h session three times a week for 16weeks, and the control participants maintained their regular daily activities during the same period. The frontal cognitive functions were evaluated using the Frontal Assessment Battery, the Clock Drawing Test and the Symbol Search Subtest. The kinematic parameters of gait-cadence, stride length and stride speed were analyzed under two conditions: (i) free gait (single task); and (ii) gait with frontal cognitive task (walking and counting down from 20 - dual task). Results and discussion: The patients in the intervention group significantly increased the scores in frontal cognitive variables, Frontal Assessment Battery (P<0.001) and Symbol Search Subtest (P<0.001) after the 16-week period. The control group decreased the scores in the Clock Drawing Test (P=0.001) and increased the number of counting errors during the dual task (P=0.008) after the same period. Conclusion: The multimodal exercise intervention improved the frontal cognitive functions in patients with Alzheimer's disease. © 2012 Japan Geriatrics Society.

A interferência da tarefa dupla, motora e cognitiva, no andar de pacientes com doença de Parkinson

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Atividade física e funções cognitivas frontais associadas aos parâmetros cinemáticos da marcha em pacientes com demência de Alzheimer

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Funções cognitivas frontais e controle postural na doença de Alzheimer: efeitos do programa de intervenção motora com tarefa dupla

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Lower limb muscle coactivation levels in healthy younger and older adults during functional dual-task gait

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of daily cognitive task on stiffness of old and young female adults during the gait. The study included 17 physically active younger and 18 older women, with low risk of falls. The volunteers were asked to walk on the treadmill at two different gait conditions: normal gait and functional dual-task gait. The electromyographic signals were collected of the lower limb muscles. The percentage of coactivation for the tibialis anterior/gastrocnemius lateralis and tibialis anterior/soleus were significantly higher in elderly than in younger in the normal gait and dual-task gait. Our results suggest that the elderly have a greater stiffness in the ankle joint during gait normal and daily dual task gait. Thus, we conclude that challenging cognitively situations during the gait may increase the risk of falls in this population.

Comparação dos parâmetros espaçotemporais da marcha durante a execução do TUG associado à dupla tarefa em adultos jovens

Introduction: Biomechanical analysis of gait can be used effectively to identify changes in movement patterns and functional decline. Objective: To analyze the effect of dual task on gait spatio-temporal variables. Methods: The sample was made up of 32 subjects of both genders aged between 18 and 25 years. The test Timed Up and Go was performed under two conditions: original form and associated with a cognitive task (verbalize backwards the months of the year). We evaluated the total execution time, number of steps, cadence, time spent to lift, average speed and variability of the step time. Results: Significant changes were observed with the addition of the cognitive task in many gait spatio-temporal variables analyzed. Conclusion: The tests showed that the increase of cognitive tasks during walking may lead to changes in the performance of this task.

Autismo: aspectos cognitivos, educacionais e neurobiológicos com base na análise dos livros Mundo singular: entenda o autismo e o Os gatos nunca mentem sobre o amor e na literatura especializada

The autism is a severe mental illness that involves psychological, social, educational and neurobiological aspects. The Education plays an important role in recovering, preserving and increasing the cognitive task of people with autism. There are several ways to observe a person with autism. Through the studying of cases, it is also possible to address issues of everyday life of the person with the illness, its cognitive issues and its obstacles of psychosocial involvement, as well as psychological aspects such as illness acknowledgement. Through specialized literature, it is possible to identify characteristics referring to the learning process and neurobiological components involved in the condition, such as brain activity disorder and genetic factors. The objectives of this paper are: from the analysis of two books: Unique World: comprehend the Autism (SILVA, A. B. B; GAIATO, M.B; REVELES, L.T) and The cats never lie about love (DILLON, J.), it is intended to describe cognitive and psychosocial aspects of the autism. Based on the specialized literature, the goal is to identify cognitive and neurobiological components in the illness. The methods that were used: analysis of the books Unique World: comprehend the Autism and The cats never lie about love to describe psychosocial and educational aspects of the autism; analysis of the specialized literature to identify clinical and neurobiological components of the illness, such as changes in brain activity, genetic factors or clinical evolution; and also details of the Education role in preserving the person with autism and his cognitive and emotional development. The study had the documentary research as reference for the methodological design, including book analysis and research in specialized literature. It is intended to deepen discussions about the Education roles related to the cognitive and neurobiological aspects of the autism

Usability of car stereo

Automotive sound systems vary widely in terms of functions and way of use between different brands and models what can bring difficulties and lack of consistency to the user. This study aimed to analyze the usability of car stereo commonly found in the market. Four products were analyzed by task analysis and after use reports and the results indicate serious usability issues with respect to the form of operation, organization, clarity and quality of information, visibility and readability, among others.

Cuidado com o Cuidador! uma análise da tarefa

The home care is a growing activity in homes around the world. Many benefits are related to the practice, but the health risks involving the caregiver is the issue of this analysis. Through field interviews and in loco evaluation is raised a previous scope of this peculiar and complex task.

Fractal analysis of leaf-texture properties as a tool for taxonomic and identification purposes: a case study with species from Neotropical Melastomataceae (Miconieae tribe)

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

An Intelligent System for Petroleum Well Drilling Cutting Analysis

Cutting analysis is a important and crucial task task to detect and prevent problems during the petroleum well drilling process. Several studies have been developed for drilling inspection, but none of them takes care about analysing the generated cutting at the vibrating shale shakers. Here we proposed a system to analyse the cutting's concentration at the vibrating shale shakers, which can indicate problems during the petroleum well drilling process, such that the collapse of the well borehole walls. Cutting's images are acquired and sent to the data analysis module, which has as the main goal to extract features and to classify frames according to one of three previously classes of cutting's volume. A collection of supervised classifiers were applied in order to allow comparisons about their accuracy and efficiency. We used the Optimum-Path Forest (OPF), Artificial Neural Network using Multi layer Perceptrons (ANN-MLP), Support Vector Machines (SVM) and a Bayesian Classifier (BC) for this task. The first one outperformed all the remaining classifiers. Recall that we are also the first to introduce the OPF classifier in this field of knowledge. Very good results show the robustness of the proposed system, which can be also integrated with other commonly system (Mud-Logging) in order to improve the last one's efficiency.

Brazilian Students and Working Capital: An Analysis of Their Decisions When Using Virtual Market Business Games

This study aims to demonstrate that data from business games can be an important resource for improving efficiency and effectiveness of learning. The proposal presented here was developed from preliminary studies of data from Virtual Market games that pointed the possibility of identifying gaps in learning by analyzing the decisions of students. This proposal helps students to refine their learning processes and equips tutors with strategies for teaching and student assessment. The proposal also complements the group discussion and/or debriefing, which are widely used to enhance learning mediated by games. However, from a management perspective the model has the potential to be erroneous and miss opportunities, which cannot be detected because of the dependence on the characteristics of the individual, such as ability to communicate and work together. To illustrate the proposed technique, data sets from two business games were analyzed with the focus on managing working capital and it was found that students had difficulties managing this task. Similar trends were observed in all categories of students in the study-undergraduate, postgraduate and specialization. This discovery led us to the analysis of data for decisions made in the performance of the games, and it was determined that indicators could be developed that were capable of indentifying inconsistencies in the decisions. It was decided to apply some basic concepts of the finance management, such as management of the operational and non-operational expenditures, as well as production management concepts, such as the use of the production capacity. By analyzing the data from the Virtual Market games using the indicator concept, it was possible to detect the lack of domain knowledge of the students. Therefore, these indicators can be used to analyze the decisions of the players and guide them during the game, increasing their effectiveness and efficiency. As these indicators were developed from specific content, they can also be used to develop teaching materials to support learning. Viewed in this light, the proposal adds new possibilities for using business games in learning. In addition to the intrinsic learning that is achieved through playing the games, they also assist in driving the learning process. This study considers the applications and the methodology used.

Influência da textura na preensão de indivíduos com Síndrome de Down

INTRODUÇÃO: Diversos estudos disponibilizam evidências sobre características do desempenho motor e cognitivo de indivíduos com Síndrome de Down (SD), porém poucos estudos analisam a força muscular nestes indivíduos. As alterações apresentadas por indivíduos com SD podem manifestar-se funcionalmente e interferir na sua capacidade de desempenhar de forma independente diversas atividades e tarefas da rotina diária. OBJETIVO: O presente estudo teve como objetivo analisar a influência da textura do objeto na força de preensão palmar em indivíduos com Síndrome de Down. Participaram do estudo dez indivíduos com SD, com idade entre 4 e 30 anos. MÉTODO: A análise da força de preensão palmar foi mensurada por meio de um transdutor de força. A tarefa proposta para a coleta dos dados foi realizar a preensão do transdutor, revestido com diferentes texturas, transportá-lo até um ponto previamente demarcado, e posteriormente o retorno à posição inicial. Os dados obtidos foram analisados por meio de estatística descritiva e não-paramétrica. RESULTADOS: Os dados da estatística descritiva permitiram observar que a textura áspera foi a que exigiu menor força de preensão palmar dos participantes neste estudo, no entanto a análise não-paramétrica indicou não haver diferença estatisticamente significativa. CONCLUSÃO: Os resultados deste estudo indicam que textura do objeto não influenciou a força de preensão palmar executada pelos indivíduos com Síndrome de Down.

Analysis of speech fluency in Williams syndrome

Williams syndrome (WS) is a neurodevelopmental genetic disorder, often referred as being characterized by dissociation between verbal and non-verbal abilities, although the number of studies disputing this proposal is emerging. Indeed, although they have been traditionally reported as displaying increased speech fluency, this topic has not been fully addressed in research. In previous studies carried out with a small group of individuals with WS, we reported speech breakdowns during conversational and autobiographical narratives suggestive of language difficulties. In the current study, we characterized the speech fluency profile using an ecologically based measure - a narrative task (story generation) was collected from a group of individuals with WS (n = 30) and typically developing group (n = 39) matched in mental age. Oral narratives were elicited using a picture stimulus - the cookie theft picture from Boston Diagnosis Aphasia Test. All narratives were analyzed according to typology and frequency of fluency breakdowns (non-stuttered and stuttered disfluencies). Oral narratives in WS group differed from typically developing group, mainly due to a significant increase in the frequency of disfluencies, particularly in terms of hesitations, repetitions and pauses. This is the first evidence of disfluencies in WS using an ecologically based task (oral narrative task), suggesting that these speech disfluencies may represent a significant marker of language problems in WS. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Armadilhas cognitivas: o caso das omissões na gênese dos acidentes de trabalho

Neste artigo discute-se o tema das omissões na gênese de acidentes do trabalho, tendo como referência contribuições de James Reason. Os autores descrevem três acidentes de trabalho ocorridos em atividades de manutenção, e nos quais a omissão de passos na execução da atividade foi apontada como causa nas análises efetuadas pelas empresas, acarretando atribuição de culpa aos acidentados. Nos três casos, a análise efetuada pelos autores revelou que, na seqüência de passos da atividade havia presença simultânea de pelo menos quatro das características apontadas por Reason como geradoras de omissões, caracterizando as denominadas armadilhas cognitivas.