A convex optimization framework for global tractography

In this article we present a novel approach for diffusion MRI global tractography. Our formulation models the signal in each voxel as a linear combination of fiber-tract basis func- tions, which consist of a comprehensive set of plausible fiber tracts that are locally compatible with the measured MR signal. This large dictionary of candidate fibers is directly estimated from the data and, subsequently, efficient convex optimization techniques are used for recovering the smallest subset globally best fitting the measured signal. Experimen- tal results conducted on a realistic phantom demonstrate that our approach significantly reduces the computational cost of global tractography while still attaining a reconstruction quality at least as good as the state-of-the-art global methods.

The Swiss regulatory framework for pædiatric health research

Medical research on minors entails both risks and benefits. Under Swiss law, clinical trials on children, including nontherapeutic drug trials, are permissible. However, ethics committees must systematically verify that all clinical studies have a favorable risk-benefit profile. Additional safeguards are designed to ensure that children are not unnecessarily involved in research and that proper consent is always obtained. Federal Swiss law is undergoing revision to extend these protections beyond clinical trials to a broad array of health research. The Swiss drug agency also seeks to improve the incentives for pharmaceutical firms to develop new paediatric drugs and relevant paediatric drug labels.

DEL FESTIVAL A LA ACADEMIA. Informe sobre la institucionalización de una disciplina híbrida (arte digital)

Aquest document és un esborrany. Amb l'objectiu d'aprofundir en el procés d'institucionalització, vam dissenyar una investigació empírica que permetés visualitzar les tendències discursives i àmbits d'activitats de les pràctiques relacionades amb les interseccions entre l'art, la ciència i la tecnologia. La metodologia va consistir en la implementació de tres bases de dades que recullen l'activitat dels últims anys en relació a: 1) els congressos (i festivals associats) realitzats a nivell internacional 2) les publicacions acadèmiques i divulgatives centrades en aquest àmbit interdisciplinar 3) els programes acadèmics.

Disseny i implementació d'un marc de treball (framework) de presentació per aplicacions J2EE

Disseny d'un framework per a la capa de presentació en projectes Java Empresarials J2EE.

Disseny i implementació d'un framework de persistència

El present PFC requereix l'anàlisi i desenvolupament d'un conjunt de components que simplifiquin i agilitzin el desenvolupament de la capa de persistència en aplicacions multicapa en entorn JEE.

Disseny i implementació d'un framework de presentació per al desenvolupament d'aplicacions J2EE

El projecte de fi de carrera se centra en el disseny d'un marc de treball per a la capa de presentació pel desenvolupament d'aplicacions en tecnologia J2EE.

Desenvolupament J2EE de framework de capa de presentació

El present document proposa un framework de presentació de disseny i implementació propis desenvolupat amb J2EE.

Gender inequality in health among elderly people in a combined framework of socioeconomic position, family characteristics and social support

This study analyses gender inequalities in health among elderly people in Catalonia (Spain) by adopting a conceptual framework that globally considers three dimensions of health determinants : socio-economic position, family characteristics and social support. Data came from the 2006 Catalonian Health Survey. For the purposes of this study a sub-sample of people aged 65–85 years with no paid job was selected (1,113 men and 1,484 women). The health outcomes analysed were self-perceived health status, poor mental health status and long-standing limiting illness. Multiple logistic regression models separated by sex were fitted and a hierarchical model was fitted in three steps. Health status among elderly women was poorer than among the men for the three outcomes analysed. Whereas living with disabled people was positively related to the three health outcomes and confidant social support was negatively associated with all of them in both sexes, there were gender differences in other social determinants of health. Our results emphasise the importance of using an integrated approach for the analysis of health inequalities among elderly people, simultaneously considering socio-economic position, family characteristics and social support, as well as different health indicators, in order fully to understand the social determinants of the health status of older men and women.

Knowledge management for systems biology a general and visually driven framework applied to translational medicine

Background: To enhance our understanding of complex biological systems like diseases we need to put all of the available data into context and use this to detect relations, pattern and rules which allow predictive hypotheses to be defined. Life science has become a data rich science with information about the behaviour of millions of entities like genes, chemical compounds, diseases, cell types and organs, which are organised in many different databases and/or spread throughout the literature. Existing knowledge such as genotype - phenotype relations or signal transduction pathways must be semantically integrated and dynamically organised into structured networks that are connected with clinical and experimental data. Different approaches to this challenge exist but so far none has proven entirely satisfactory. Results: To address this challenge we previously developed a generic knowledge management framework, BioXM™, which allows the dynamic, graphic generation of domain specific knowledge representation models based on specific objects and their relations supporting annotations and ontologies. Here we demonstrate the utility of BioXM for knowledge management in systems biology as part of the EU FP6 BioBridge project on translational approaches to chronic diseases. From clinical and experimental data, text-mining results and public databases we generate a chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) knowledge base and demonstrate its use by mining specific molecular networks together with integrated clinical and experimental data. Conclusions: We generate the first semantically integrated COPD specific public knowledge base and find that for the integration of clinical and experimental data with pre-existing knowledge the configuration based set-up enabled by BioXM reduced implementation time and effort for the knowledge base compared to similar systems implemented as classical software development projects. The knowledgebase enables the retrieval of sub-networks including protein-protein interaction, pathway, gene - disease and gene - compound data which are used for subsequent data analysis, modelling and simulation. Pre-structured queries and reports enhance usability; establishing their use in everyday clinical settings requires further simplification with a browser based interface which is currently under development.

Convention-cadre pour la lutte antitabac: un instrument puissant de santé publique. [The Framework Convention for Tobacco Control (FCTC): a powerful public health instrument].

The Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) isa global and comprehensive legal framework for reducing demand for tobacco (e.g. price measures; ban on smoking in enclosed places; contents of tobacco products; packaging and labeling; advertising, promotion and sponsorship; liability, tobacco cessation, etc.) and supply (e.g. illicit trade; sales to/by minors, etc.). Adopted in 2003, the FCTC has been ratified by 174 countries so far. Switzerland has signed the treaty in 2004 but ratification will necessitate the implementation of stronger tobacco control measures at the national level. The FCTC is a priority of any strategy to reduce noncommunicable diseases in populations. Broad implementation of the FCTC has the potential to prevent a substantial proportion of the billion of tobacco-related deaths expected in the 21st

Monitoring of illicit pill distribution networks using an image collection exploration framework

This paper proposes a novel approach for the analysis of illicit tablets based on their visual characteristics. In particular, the paper concentrates on the problem of ecstasy pill seizure profiling and monitoring. The presented method extracts the visual information from pill images and builds a representation of it, i.e. it builds a pill profile based on the pill visual appearance. Different visual features are used to build different image similarity measures, which are the basis for a pill monitoring strategy based on both discriminative and clustering models. The discriminative model permits to infer whether two pills come from the same seizure, while the clustering models groups of pills that share similar visual characteristics. The resulting clustering structure allows to perform a visual identification of the relationships between different seizures. The proposed approach was evaluated using a data set of 621 Ecstasy pill pictures. The results demonstrate that this is a feasible and cost effective method for performing pill profiling and monitoring.

Study of common database feeding with results coming from different analytical methods in the framework of illicit drugs chemical profiling

Analytical results harmonisation is investigated in this study to provide an alternative to the restrictive approach of analytical methods harmonisation which is recommended nowadays for making possible the exchange of information and then for supporting the fight against illicit drugs trafficking. Indeed, the main goal of this study is to demonstrate that a common database can be fed by a range of different analytical methods, whatever the differences in levels of analytical parameters between these latter ones. For this purpose, a methodology making possible the estimation and even the optimisation of results similarity coming from different analytical methods was then developed. In particular, the possibility to introduce chemical profiles obtained with Fast GC-FID in a GC-MS database is studied in this paper. By the use of the methodology, the similarity of results coming from different analytical methods can be objectively assessed and the utility in practice of database sharing by these methods can be evaluated, depending on profiling purposes (evidential vs. operational perspective tool). This methodology can be regarded as a relevant approach for database feeding by different analytical methods and puts in doubt the necessity to analyse all illicit drugs seizures in one single laboratory or to implement analytical methods harmonisation in each participating laboratory.

Marco metodológico para la definición de un perfil profesional en educación superior = Methodological framework for the definition of a professional profile in higher education

En el marco del Espacio Europeo de Educación Superior 1 se inscriben innumerables acciones que están desarrollando todas las universidades europeas con la intención de llegar al 2010 con un bagaje lo suficientemente importante como para afrontar este cambio con entereza y sobretodo conservando (o incrementando) la calidad de los procesos de enseñanza- aprendizaje que hasta el momento han predominado. Dentro de este amplio proceso de transformación se encuentra el diseño de los nuevos Grados que brinda la oportunidad de replantear los planes de estudios, por tanto, la organización de las asignaturas, estructura de los contenidos, metodologías y sistemas de evaluación. Toda esta reflexión debe girar, a nuestro entender, alrededor de tres núcleos que se encuentran en estado deinterdependencia: los escenarios profesionales, los perfiles profesionales y las competencias que en ellos se inscriben.Para poder plantear los nuevos Grados en coherencia con la era del EEES debe hacerse un análisis minucioso de los perfil profesionales demandados por el mercado de trabajo que, al fin y al cabo será el destino de los profesionales que se forman en nuestras universidades, es por ello, que la tarea de definir el perfil profesional a priori del diseño de los nuevos Grados resulta una máxima para garantizar la calidad de estos. En este trabajo se presenta un ejemplo de metodología a seguir para la definición de un perfil profesional en Educación Superior, concretamente, el del Ingeniero TIC mediante el Análisis Funcional.

Perfil dos egressos de gerenciamento de enfermagem dos programas da área de enfermagem da região Sul

Estudo exploratório-descritivo, em base documental, de natureza quantitativa com o objetivo de descrever o perfil dos egressos dos Programas de Pós-Graduação da Área de Enfermagem da Região Sul titulados nas linhas de pesquisa de gerenciamento de enfermagem, de 2006 a 2009. A coleta dos dados ocorreu mediante consulta aos Cadernos de Indicadores da CAPES e busca dos Currículos Lattes/CNPq dos egressos. Os Programas de Pós-Graduação em Enfermagem da Região Sul titularam 409 alunos, sendo 129 (31,5%) nas linhas de pesquisa de gestão/gerenciamento em enfermagem: 116 (89,9%) Mestres e 13 (10,1%) Doutores, que atuam majoritariamente na docência. Dos Mestres titulados, dois (1,7%) já são Doutores e 39 (33,6%) estão cursando o Doutorado. A produção intelectual após titulação soma um total 501 artigos científicos publicados, com uma média de 1,1 e 1,8 artigo/ano entre mestres e doutores, respectivamente. Apontam-se indicativos para a formação de mestres e doutores diferenciados para atuar na gestão/gerência em saúde e enfermagem.

Framework multitouch per a la creació fàcil d'aplicacions interactives

El projecte que aquí es presenta explora un nou enfocament a la interacció amb elssistemes interactius que típicament es proposen en museus. En aquests sistemes lainteracció i el feedback visual venen determinats per l’aplicació programada per l’arstista i no permet a l’usuari modificar-ne el seu comportament sinó tan sols interactuar amb les accións predefinides.L’enfocament que es planteja en aquest projecte és convertir als usuaris consumidorsd’aquests sistemes interactius en creadors i editors de les seves pròpies experiències.D’aquesta manera un sistema interactiu podrà ser modificat per l’usuari i així oferirdiferents respostes donada una mateixa entrada. Això es fa utilitzant un dispositiumultitouch com a sistema de configuració visual d’aquestes aplicacions així com un segon dispositiu com a sortida de l’aplicació visual.Aquest projecte neix de la idea de desenvolupar una eina útil i de fàcil ús per a crear aplicacions interactives, sense necessitat de tenir nocions de programació, de manera que qualsevol usuari inexpert pugui partir d’una idea i crear la seva pròpia aplicació interactiva.Així doncs, a través de diversos prototips i proves d’usabilitat es perfila una interfície de programació visual sobre una superfície tangible que sigui intuïtiva i fàcil d’utilitzar per a tot tipus d’usuaris.Per tal de dur a terme això s’ha dissenyat un sistema on s’utilitzen dos pantallesmultitouch, una amb la interfície de programació visual i l’altre amb la sortida del sistema creat. Això permet la interacció simultània entre usuaris creadors i usuaris consumidors de manera que l’experiència del consumidor pugui ser modificada en viu pel creador, segons interactuï amb la interfície de configuració.