The central nervous system simplifies motor control by sending motor commands activating groups of muscles, known as synergies. Physiological locomotion can be described as a coordinated recruitment of four to five muscle synergies. The first studies on muscle synergies in patients affected by neurological diseases were on stroke survivors. They showed that synergies can be used as biomarkers for motor impairment as they vary in patients with respect to healthy people. Likewise, muscle synergy analysis has been applied to developmental diseases (DD). The need for a comprehensive view of the present findings is crucial for comparing results achieved so far and promote future directions in the field. In the present review, we screened three scientific databases and selected thirty-six papers investigating muscle synergies extracted from locomotion in children affected by DD. Thirty-one articles investigate how cerebral palsy (CP) influences motor control, the currently exploited method in studying motor control in CP and finally the effects of treatments in these patients in terms of synergies and biomechanics; two articles investigate how muscle synergies vary in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), and three other articles assess other developmental pathologies, such as chronic and acute neuropathic pain. For CP, most of the studies demonstrate that the number of synergies is lower and that the synergy composition varies in the affected children with respect to normal controls. Still, the predictability of treatment's effects and the etiology of muscle synergy variation are open questions, as it has been reported that treatments minimally modify synergies, even if they improve biomechanics. The application of different algorithms in extracting synergies might bring about more subtle differences. Considering DMD, no correlation was found between non-neural muscle weakness and muscle modules' variation, while in chronic pain a decreased number of synergies was observed as a possible consequence of plastic adaptations. Even if the potential of the synergistic approach for clinical and rehabilitation practices is recognized, there is not full consensus on protocols nor widely accepted guidelines for the systematic clinical adoption of the method in DD. We critically commented on the current findings, on the methodological issues and the relative open points, and on the clinical impact of muscle synergies in neurodevelopmental diseases to fill the gap for applying the method in clinical practice.

In clinical scenarios, the use of biomedical sensors, devices and multi-parameter assessments is fundamental to provide a comprehensive portrait of patients' state, in order to adapt and personalize rehabilitation interventions and support clinical decision-making. However, there is a huge gap between the potential of the multidomain techniques available and the limited practical use that is made in the clinical scenario. This paper reviews the current state-of-the-art and provides insights into future directions of multi-domain instrumental approaches in the clinical assessment of patients involved in neuromotor rehabilitation. We also summarize the main achievements and challenges of using multi-domain approaches in the assessment of rehabilitation for various neurological disorders affecting motor functions. Our results showed that multi-domain approaches combine information and measurements from different tools and biological signals, such as kinematics, electromyography (EMG), electroencephalography (EEG), near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS), and clinical scales, to provide a comprehensive and objective evaluation of patients' state and recovery. This multi-domain approach permits the progress of research in clinical and rehabilitative practice and the understanding of the pathophysiological changes occurring during and after rehabilitation. We discuss the potential benefits and limitations of multi-domain approaches for clinical decision-making, personalized therapy, and prognosis. We conclude by highlighting the need for more standardized methods, validation studies, and the integration of multi-domain approaches in clinical practice and research.

Smart living, an increasingly prominent concept, entails incorporating sophisticated technologies in homes and urban environments to elevate the quality of life for citizens. A critical success factor for smart living services and applications, from energy management to healthcare and transportation, is the efficacy of human action recognition (HAR). HAR, rooted in computer vision, seeks to identify human actions and activities using visual data and various sensor modalities. This paper extensively reviews the literature on HAR in smart living services and applications, amalgamating key contributions and challenges while providing insights into future research directions. The review delves into the essential aspects of smart living, the state of the art in HAR, and the potential societal implications of this technology. Moreover, the paper meticulously examines the primary application sectors in smart living that stand to gain from HAR, such as smart homes, smart healthcare, and smart cities. By underscoring the significance of the four dimensions of context awareness, data availability, personalization, and privacy in HAR, this paper offers a comprehensive resource for researchers and practitioners striving to advance smart living services and applications. The methodology for this literature review involved conducting targeted Scopus queries to ensure a comprehensive coverage of relevant publications in the field. Efforts have been made to thoroughly evaluate the existing literature, identify research gaps, and propose future research directions. The comparative advantages of this review lie in its comprehensive coverage of the dimensions essential for smart living services and applications, addressing the limitations of previous reviews and offering valuable insights for researchers and practitioners in the field.

Recent human-centered developments in the industrial field (Industry 5.0) lead companies and stakeholders to ensure the wellbeing of their workers with assessments of upper limb performance in the workplace, with the aim of reducing work-related diseases and improving awareness of the physical status of workers, by assessing motor performance, fatigue, strain and effort. Such approaches are usually developed in laboratories and only at times they are translated to on-field applications; few studies summarized common practices for the assessments. Therefore, our aim is to review the current state-of-the-art approaches used for the assessment of fatigue, strain and effort in working scenarios and to analyze in detail the differences between studies that take place in the laboratory and in the workplace, in order to give insights on future trends and directions. A systematic review of the studies aimed at evaluating the motor performance, fatigue, strain and effort of the upper limb targeting working scenarios is presented. A total of 1375 articles were found in scientific databases and 288 were analyzed. About half of the scientific articles are focused on laboratory pilot studies investigating effort and fatigue in laboratories, while the other half are set in working places. Our results showed that assessing upper limb biomechanics is quite common in the field, but it is mostly performed with instrumental assessments in laboratory studies, while questionnaires and scales are preferred in working places. Future directions may be oriented towards multi-domain approaches able to exploit the potential of combined analyses, exploitation of instrumental approaches in workplace, targeting a wider range of people and implementing more structured trials to translate pilot studies to real practice.

Smart living, a concept that has gained increasing attention in recent years, revolves around integrating advanced technologies in homes and cities to enhance the quality of life for citizens. Sensing and human action recognition are crucial aspects of this concept. Smart living applications span various domains, such as energy consumption, healthcare, transportation, and education, which greatly benefit from effective human action recognition. This field, originating from computer vision, seeks to recognize human actions and activities using not only visual data but also many other sensor modalities. This paper comprehensively reviews the literature on human action recognition in smart living environments, synthesizing the main contributions, challenges, and future research directions. This review selects five key domains, i.e., Sensing Technology, Multimodality, Real-time Processing, Interoperability, and Resource-Constrained Processing, as they encompass the critical aspects required for successfully deploying human action recognition in smart living. These domains highlight the essential role that sensing and human action recognition play in successfully developing and implementing smart living solutions. This paper serves as a valuable resource for researchers and practitioners seeking to further explore and advance the field of human action recognition in smart living.

Over the last 2 decades, the topic of earthquaketriggered landslides (EQTLs) has shown increasing relevance in the scientific community. This interest is confirmed by the numerous articles published in international, peer-reviewed journals. In this work we present a database containing a selection of articles published on this topic from 1984 to 2021. The articles were selected through a systematic search on the Clarivate(TM) Web of Science(TM) Core Collection online platform and were catalogued into a web-based GIS (web-GIS), which was specifically designed to show different types of information. After a general analysis of the database, for each article the following aspects were identified: the bibliometric information (e.g. author(s), title, publication year), the relevant topic and sub-topic category (or categories), and the earthquake(s) addressed. The analysis allowed us to infer general information and statistics on EQTLs (e.g. relevant methodological approaches over time and in relation to the scale of investigation, most studied events), which can be useful to obtain a spatial distribution of the articles and a general overview of the topic.

The development of innovative technologies based on employing green energy carriers, such as hydrogen, is becoming high in demand, especially in the automotive sector, as a result of the challenges associated with sustainable mobility. In the present review, a detailed overview of the entire hydrogen supply chain is proposed, spanning from its production to storage and final use in cars. Notably, the main focus is on Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cells (PEMFC) as the fuel-cell type most typically used in fuel cell electric vehicles. The analysis also includes a cost assessment of the various systems involved; specifically, the materials commonly employed to manufacture fuel cells, stacks, and hydrogen storage systems are considered, emphasizing the strengths and weaknesses of the selected strategies, together with assessing the solutions to current problems. Moreover, as a sought-after parallelism, a comparison is also proposed and discussed between traditional diesel or gasoline cars, battery-powered electric cars, and fuel cell electric cars, thus highlighting the advantages and main drawbacks of the propulsion systems currently available on the market.

Background: Polypharmacy is a prevalent condition in older adults, especially those with multiple chronic diseases, and has been largely associated with adverse outcomes, including disability, hospitalizations, and death. Aims: This systematic review focused on diabetes and aimed to investigate the prevalence and impact of polypharmacy in older adults affected by such disease. Methods: Observational (either cross-sectional or longitudinal) or experimental studies investigating the frequency and impact of polypharmacy in older adults with diabetes were identified from scientific databases and grey literature until August 2021. The prevalence and the 95% Confidence Interval (95% CI) of polypharmacy in older people with diabetes were summarized by a random-effects meta-analysis. Results: From a total of 1465 records, 9 were selected for the qualitative synthesis, and 8 for the quantitative synthesis. Most studies defined polypharmacy using a cut-off for the minimum number of medications ranging from 4 to 6 drugs/day. The pooled prevalence of polypharmacy in older people with diabetes was 64% (95% CI 45-80%). Considering studies that used the same definition of polypharmacy (i.e. >= 5 drugs/day), the pooled prevalence was 50% (95% CI 37-63%). The between-studies heterogeneity was high. Across the selected studies, polypharmacy seemed to negatively influence both diabetes-specific (poor glycemic control and risk of hypoglycemia) and health-related (risk of incident falls, syncope, hospitalization, and death) outcomes. Conclusion: This systematic review confirms the high prevalence of polypharmacy in older people with diabetes and its strong impact on several health-related outcomes, including mortality. These results strengthen the need to improve care strategies for management of these patients.

The study outlines the state-of-art on interoperability between Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Building Performance Simulation (BPS). First, the paper organises the result of a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) on the topic into three main strategies to achieve interoperability: the scripting to automate the information transfer between BIM and BPS environments, the pipelines supported by current practices, and the MVD and IFC schema extension approach. Software applications, types of files involved, building features, life cycle phases and model geometry considered by the literature along with reported interoperability issues, are also analysed. Secondly, an expert review of grey literature focusing on EU funded projects, guidelines, reports, best practices and key initiatives on the field of BIM to BPS interoperability is presented. The study wraps up by reporting on six major research trends identified by the review and highlighting future developments. The results of the review seem to indicate that effective interoperability can be achieved with the definition of a commonly accepted strategy, integrating shared guidelines for modelling, a better inclusion of energy evaluations through the whole life cycle of a building and the upgrade of software application for the accurate production of information with open format exchange files.

Recent evolutions in the e-commerce market have led to an increasing importance attributed by consumers to product reviews made by third parties before proceeding to purchase. The industry, in order to improve the offer intercepting the discontent of consumers, has placed increasing attention towards systems able to identify the sentiment expressed by buyers, whether positive or negative. From a technological point of view, the literature in recent years has seen the development of two types of methodologies: those based on lexicons and those based on machine and deep learning techniques. This study proposes a comparison between these technologies in the Italian market, one of the largest in the world, exploiting an ad hoc dataset: scientific evidence generally shows the superiority of language models such as BERT built on deep neural networks, but it opens several considerations on the effectiveness and improvement of these solutions when compared to those based on lexicons in the presence of datasets of reduced size such as the one under study, a common condition for languages other than English or Chinese.

Background: Riboflavin/UV-A corneal cross-linking (CXL) for treating keratoconus and iatrogenic corneal ectasia has been well-established as first treatment option to stabilize corneal tissue biomechanical instability. Although the plethora of clinical studies has been published into the field, there is no systematic review assessing the type and frequency of adverse events after CXL. Methods: A systemic literature review on clinical safety and adverse events after CXL in patients with keratoconus and corneal ectasia was performed using PubMed. A literature search was performed for relevant peer-reviewed publications. The main outcome measures extracted from the articles were adverse events, endothelial cell density, corrected distance visual acuity and maximum simulated keratometry. Results: The most frequent adverse events after CXL were corneal haze and corneal edema, which were mild and transient. The severe adverse events were infrequent (cumulative incidence: < 1.3%) after CXL. The clinical benefits of CXL highly outweighed the risks for the treatment of keratoconus and corneal ectasia. Conclusions: The severe adverse events with permanent sequelae are infrequent after CXL.. and all are associated with.. corneal de-epithelialization, such as infectious keratitis and corneal scarring.

In the field of air analysis, highlights within this review period included: a review paper of developments in new personal air samplers for workplace air measurements; a new passive air sampler for Hg-0; new filter-based RMs; a new field-deployable carbon analyser for speciation measurements of carbonaceous aerosols and advances in the measurement of RCS using vibrational spectroscopic techniques. The maturity of AAS methods for the analysis of waters was highlighted this year by the lack of significant developments. All the novelty was in sample preparation as reflected in Tables 1 and 2. The tables also reflect the large interest in the use of graphene oxide as a solid phase for preconcentration and the continued use of magnetic nanoparticles. There are now enough methods and application to warrant the inclusion of the analysis of nanoparticles as a separate section rather than as a subsection in speciation. This trend is set to continue as instrumental improvements allow lower size LODs and the determination of lower particle numbers. Notable advances in the analysis of soils and plants included work on the preparation of new RMs as alternatives to NIST soil SRMs that are now in short supply. There was increased interest in the development of miniaturised AES instruments with the potential for field deployment. In the analysis of soil by LIBS, more studies included some form of external validation e.g. comparison with results of an established analytical method, which is most welcome. The availability of well-characterised matrix-matched reference materials continues to be a limitation in the production of high-quality geoanalytical data, particularly when exploring the fine structure of geological materials by microanalytical techniques such as LA-ICP-MS and SIMS. It is heartening to see that many of the researchers working in this area appreciate the importance of making new RMs available to the wider geochemical community. Although the development of portable LIBS systems continues to attract much interest, the current generation of instruments do not appear to be able to match the capabilities of techniques like pXRFS, particularly for the quantification of minor and trace elements in geological settings. Some of the LIBS calibration issues highlighted are reminiscent of those encountered in the early days of pXRFS and should be overcome in time. Many of the reported improvements to in situ measurements of isotope ratios were in support of geochronological studies. Likely future trends include the increased use of imaging in U-Pb geochronology given that LA-ICP-QMS mapping is now capable of acquiring all the required compositional and U-Pb age information at high-spatial resolution.

Section Board for 'Natural Hazards' of Geosciences-MDPI

Detection and continuous monitoring of Earth's ground surface changes, triggered by natural phenomena or induced by human activities, is nowadays possible using Earth Observation (EO) technologies. Indeed, the exploitation of remotely sensed data collected by constellations of new-generation satellite platforms, complemented with in-situ measurements and ground-based observation systems, represents a well-established practice to get valuable information on Earth's crust and subsurface dynamics. The effects of extreme natural or man-induced events (e.g., earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, flooding phenomena, sea-level rise, big fires, etc.) have severe societal and economic impacts. In particular, the technologies based on the use of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images reached significant improvements in the last decade due to the growing availability of vast amounts of data collected by multiple-satellite sensors operating at different frequency bands and with complementary viewing angles, polarization and acquisition modes. Accordingly, to process a large amount of SAR data in a timely fashion, up-to-date high-performance computing (HPC) methods and tools are required. This paper addresses the state-of-the-art of SAR technologies for the analysis of long sequences of multiple sets of SAR images and provides a perspective on the forthcoming improvements of these technologies. In particular, the emphasis is placed on novel interferometric SAR and change detection methods, giving an overview of how those processing techniques have been used for investigating sites located in South and Central America. Moreover, an overview of the new generation of SAR sensors' observational capability, especially in the field of ground deformation analysis for mitigating the risk associated with natural and human-induced hazards, is provided. COSMO-SkyMed, ALOS, Sentinel-1, and SAOCOM data are exploited to show how natural and human-induced terrain displacement phenomena can be detected and investigated in different portions (X-, L- and C-band) of the microwave spectrum using SAR technologies.

The acceleration of global warming and increased vulnerability of marine social-ecological systems affect the benefits provided by the ocean. Spatial planning of marine areas is vital to balance multiple human demands and ensure a healthy ocean, while supporting global ocean goals. To thrive in a changing ocean though, marine spatial planning (MSP) must effectively integrate climate change. By reviewing existing literature on MSP and climate change, we explore the links between them and with ocean sustainability, highlight management challenges, and identify potential pathways to guide action towards the effective integration of climate impacts in MSP.

The present paper focuses on the reflectance spectral imaging of painted surfaces in the visible-near infrared spectral region (400-2500 nm). Other spectral ranges and methods are mentioned, to contextualize the spectral investigation of works of art.

Microplastics are increasingly recognized as being globally widespread, but relatively little is known about the presence and abundance of microplastics in samples collected in Polar Regions. Here we review the current knowledge about microplastic occurrence and distribution in polar environments, with a particular focus on the relevance of the data and comparability between Arctic and Antarctic investigations. In the Arctic, microplastics have been found in seawater, marine sediments, ice, and snow and in the gut content of several species at different trophic levels. Antarctica is still, by far, the least affected region by human activity than anywhere else in the world, and the few studies carried out in this region find microplastics at very low concentrations. Studies focusing on microplastic threats to key species of Arctic and Antarctic marine food webs are urgently needed as are coordinated long-term studies on microplastic pollution, which are mandatory to follow the temporal trend of human impact in these remote regions.

The automatic detection of eye positions, their temporal consistency, and their mapping into a line of sight in the real world (to find where a person is looking at) is reported in the scientific literature as gaze tracking. This has become a very hot topic in the field of computer vision during the last decades, with a surprising and continuously growing number of application fields. A very long journey has been made from the first pioneering works, and this continuous search for more accurate solutions process has been further boosted in the last decade when deep neural networks have revolutionized the whole machine learning area, and gaze tracking as well. In this arena, it is being increasingly useful to find guidance through survey/review articles collecting most relevant works and putting clear pros and cons of existing techniques, also by introducing a precise taxonomy. This kind of manuscripts allows researchers and technicians to choose the better way to move towards their application or scientific goals. In the literature, there exist holistic and specifically technological survey documents (even if not updated), but, unfortunately, there is not an overview discussing how the great advancements in computer vision have impacted gaze tracking. Thus, this work represents an attempt to fill this gap, also introducing a wider point of view that brings to a new taxonomy (extending the consolidated ones) by considering gaze tracking as a more exhaustive task that aims at estimating gaze target from different perspectives: from the eye of the beholder (first-person view), from an external camera framing the beholder's, from a third-person view looking at the scene where the beholder is placed in, and from an external view independent from the beholder.

Virtual Coaches, also known as e-coaches, are a disruptive technology in healthcare. Indeed, among other usages, they might provide cost-effective solutions for increasing human wellbeing in different domains, such as physical, nutritional, cognitive, social, and emotional. This paper presents a systematic review of virtual coaches specifically aimed at improving or maintaining older adults' health in the aforementioned domains. Such digital systems assume various forms, from classic apps, to more advanced conversational agents or robots. Fifty-six articles describing a virtual coach for older adults and aimed at improving their wellbeing were identified and further analyzed. In particular, we presented how previous studies defined their virtual coaches, which behavioral change models and techniques they adopted and the overall system architecture, in terms of monitoring solutions, processing methods and modalities for intervention delivery. Our results show that few thorough evaluations of e-coaching systems have been conducted, especially regarding multi-domain coaching approaches. Through our analysis, we identified the wellbeing domains that should be addressed in future studies as well as the most promising behavior change models and techniques and coaching interfaces. Previous work illustrates that older adults often appreciate conversational agents and robots. However, the lack of a multidomain intervention approach in the current literature motivates us to seek to define future solutions.

Background: Environmental exposures across the life course may be a contributor to the increased worldwide prevalence of respiratory and allergic diseases occurring in the last decades. Asthma and rhinoconjunctivitis especially contribute to the global burden of disease. Greenness has been suggested to have beneficial effects in terms of reduction of occurrence of allergic respiratory diseases. However, the available evidence of a relationship between urban greenness and childhood health outcomes is not yet conclusive. The current review aimed at investigating the current state of evidence, exploring the relationship between children's exposure to residential urban greenness and development of allergic respiratory diseases, jointly considering health outcomes and study design. Methods: The search strategy was designed to identify studies linking urban greenness exposure to asthma, rhinoconjunctivitis, and lung function in children and adolescents. This was a narrative review of literature following PRISMA guidelines performed using electronic search in databases of PubMed and Embase (Ovid) from the date of inception to December 2018. Results: Our search strategy identified 2315 articles; after exclusion of duplicates (n ¼ 701), 1614 articles were screened. Following review of titles and abstracts, 162 articles were identified as potentially eligible. Of these, 148 were excluded following full-text evaluation, and 14 were included in this review. Different methods for assessing greenness exposure were found; the most used was Normalized Difference Vegetation Index. Asthma, wheezing, bronchitis, rhinoconjunctivitis, allergic symptoms, lung function, and allergic sensitization were the outcomes assessed in the identified studies; among them, asthma was the one most frequently investigated. Conclusions: The present review showed inconsistencies in the results mainly due to differences in study design, population, exposure assessment, geographic region, and ascertainment of outcome. Overall, there is a suggestion of an association between urban greenness in early life and the occurrence of allergic respiratory diseases during childhood, although the evidence is still inconsistent. It is therefore hard to draw a conclusive interpretation, so that the understanding of the impact of greenness on allergic respiratory diseases in children and adolescents remains difficult.