User-Centered Design Customization of Rugby Wheelchairs Based on the Taguchi Method

2014 ◽  
Vol 136 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Clara C. Usma-Alvarez ◽  
Franz K. Fuss ◽  
Aleksandar Subic
Keyword(s):  
Taguchi Method ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Design Space ◽  
Sport Performance ◽  
Configuration Model ◽  
User Centered Design ◽  
Negative Contribution ◽  
True Value ◽  
Design Factors

Competitive wheelchair sport performance is dependent on three factors: the athlete, the wheelchair, and the interaction between the athlete and the wheelchair (Goosey-Tolfrey, 2010, “Supporting the Paralympic Athlete: Focus on Wheeled Sports,” Disabil Rehabil., 32(26), pp. 2237–2243). In order to effectively refine the user interphase design of the wheelchair, it is essential to narrow down the key dimensions within the design space, which are likely to have an effect on the performance of an individual athlete. This paper provides a case study analysis of the test data obtained from five elite wheelchair rugby athletes, using a purpose-built adjustable wheelchair on a wheelchair ergometer. Four design factors (wheel diameter, camber angle, seat height, and camber bar depth) were tested at incremental dimensional levels to the athlete's current chair configuration; and tests were performed according to an L9 Taguchi orthogonal array. The case study analyzes acceleration, velocity, and time in the push phase of the propulsion cycle; as well as recovery time for each of the participating athletes performing a linear sprint task. The Taguchi method is applied to determining the positive/negative contribution of each of the four design factors to the outlined performance variables as well as their combined effect in a specific wheelchair configuration model. A performance ranking system and magnitude-based inferences on the true value of the effect statistic are used to define a high performance design space for individual athlete wheelchairs. Finally, the athlete's preferred ergonomics are considered to assess the narrowed high performance wheelchair options. As such, when adopting the approach presented in this paper, it becomes possible to customize an athlete's wheelchair design to meet the athlete's anthropometric needs as well as their performance requirements.

The Role of Performance Pyramid in Sports Management Case Study - The Athletics Section in CSM Onesti

2015 ◽  
Vol 24 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 215-234
Author(s):  
Ingrid Vasilica Istrate ◽  
Sabina Macovei ◽  
Monica Bucur
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Sport Performance ◽  
Sports Management ◽  
Sports Activity ◽  
Number Of Children ◽  
Use Of Resources ◽  
Management Case Study

Abstract Sport represents the joy of living, to succeed, to self-exceed! Whereas the Romanian sport is at a crossroads, regarding the fewer and fewer number of children who want to practice a sport, as well as the economic situation in which it is situated, the goal of reviving the entire sports activity and to bring it to the top where Romania stayed many years in the past becomes a must. In this sense, there must be found solutions and proper strategies that lead to its revival. This issue requires a systemic approach capable to reestablish “the pyramid of sport performance” on functional principles. The present thesis is a way of organizing sports activities at club’s level, wards, groups, based on the performance pyramid, in order to achieve a high performance management, which is part of the sports reform, ranging from all of its forms, such as: human resources, financial, material, taking into account modern mechanisms (for attraction and use of resources considering the means which are available and necessary).

THE USE OF CASE STUDY METHOD IN TEACHING THE TERMINOLOGY IN THE FIELD OF AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY

2019 ◽  
pp. 123-130
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
The United States ◽  
Machine Building ◽  
Soil Tillage ◽  
Case Study Method ◽  
Agricultural Machine ◽  
Manufacturing Machine

The scientific research works concerning the field of mechanical engineering such as, manufacturing machine slate, soil tillage, sowing and harvesting based on the requirements for the implementation of agrotechnical measures for the cultivation of plants in its transportation, through the development of mastering new types of high-performance and energy-saving machines in manufacturing machine slate, creation of multifunctional machines, allowing simultaneous soil cultivation, by means of several planting operations, integration of agricultural machine designs are taken into account in manufacturing of the local universal tractor designed basing on high ergonomic indicators. For this reason, this article explores the use of case studies in teaching agricultural terminology by means analyzing the researches in machine building. Case study method was firstly used in 1870 in Harvard University of Law School in the United States. Also in the article, we give the examples of agricultural machine-building terms, teaching terminology and case methods, case study process and case studies method itself. The research works in the field of mechanical engineering and the use of case studies in teaching terminology have also been analyzed. In addition, the requirements for the development of case study tasks are given in their practical didactic nature. We also give case study models that allow us analyzing and evaluating students' activities.

scholarly journals Neighborhood Energy Modeling and Monitoring: A Case Study

Energies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (12) ◽  
pp. 3716
Author(s):  
Francesco Causone ◽  
Rossano Scoccia ◽  
Martina Pelle ◽  
Paola Colombo ◽  
Mario Motta ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Performance ◽  
High Efficiency ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Energy Performance ◽  
Monitoring Plan ◽  
Performance Targets ◽  
Carrier Energy ◽  
Zero Carbon ◽  
Energy Grid

Cities and nations worldwide are pledging to energy and carbon neutral objectives that imply a huge contribution from buildings. High-performance targets, either zero energy or zero carbon, are typically difficult to be reached by single buildings, but groups of properly-managed buildings might reach these ambitious goals. For this purpose we need tools and experiences to model, monitor, manage and optimize buildings and their neighborhood-level systems. The paper describes the activities pursued for the deployment of an advanced energy management system for a multi-carrier energy grid of an existing neighborhood in the area of Milan. The activities included: (i) development of a detailed monitoring plan, (ii) deployment of the monitoring plan, (iii) development of a virtual model of the neighborhood and simulation of the energy performance. Comparisons against early-stage energy monitoring data proved promising and the generation system showed high efficiency (EER equal to 5.84), to be further exploited.

Hardware Accelerator Integration Tradeoffs for High-Performance Computing: A Case Study of GEMM Acceleration in N-Body Methods

2021 ◽  
Vol 32 (8) ◽  
pp. 2035-2048
Author(s):  
Mochamad Asri ◽  
Dhairya Malhotra ◽  
Jiajun Wang ◽  
George Biros ◽  
Lizy K. John ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Performance Computing ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Hardware Accelerator ◽  
Performance Computing

scholarly journals Evaluation of Static Mapping for Dynamic Space-Shared Multi-task Processing on FPGAs

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Umar Ibrahim Minhas ◽  
Roger Woods ◽  
Georgios Karakonstantis
Keyword(s):  
High Performance ◽  
Design Space Exploration ◽  
Design Space ◽  
System Throughput ◽  
Design Parameters ◽  
Temporal Constraints ◽  
Shared Resources ◽  
Task Processing ◽  
High Level ◽  
Performance Computing

AbstractWhilst FPGAs have been used in cloud ecosystems, it is still extremely challenging to achieve high compute density when mapping heterogeneous multi-tasks on shared resources at runtime. This work addresses this by treating the FPGA resource as a service and employing multi-task processing at the high level, design space exploration and static off-line partitioning in order to allow more efficient mapping of heterogeneous tasks onto the FPGA. In addition, a new, comprehensive runtime functional simulator is used to evaluate the effect of various spatial and temporal constraints on both the existing and new approaches when varying system design parameters. A comprehensive suite of real high performance computing tasks was implemented on a Nallatech 385 FPGA card and show that our approach can provide on average 2.9 × and 2.3 × higher system throughput for compute and mixed intensity tasks, while 0.2 × lower for memory intensive tasks due to external memory access latency and bandwidth limitations. The work has been extended by introducing a novel scheduling scheme to enhance temporal utilization of resources when using the proposed approach. Additional results for large queues of mixed intensity tasks (compute and memory) show that the proposed partitioning and scheduling approach can provide higher than 3 × system speedup over previous schemes.

scholarly journals To separate or not to separate: what is necessary and enough for a green and sustainable extraction of bioactive compounds from Brazilian citrus waste

2020 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vânia G. Zuin ◽  
Luize Z. Ramin ◽  
Mateus L. Segatto ◽  
Aylon M. Stahl ◽  
Karine Zanotti ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
High Performance ◽  
Orange Peel ◽  
Solvent Ratio ◽  
Biomass Waste ◽  
Chemical Profiles ◽  
Orange Waste ◽  
Sustainable Materials ◽  
Citrus Waste ◽  
Sustainable Extraction

AbstractIncreasing demands to obtain chemicals via greener and more sustainable materials and processes introduces concepts that should be considered and applied from lab to larger scales. Obtaining bioactive chemicals from agro-industrial non-food biomass waste can combine benign techniques and bio-circular economy to reach this goal. After extraction, evaluating profitability and environmental impacts to decide whether separation – and to what extent – is necessary or not is indispensable. This could be integrated into an approach known as sufficiency, as an important criterion for sustainability. From this perspective, Brazil’s annual generation of 8 million tons of orange waste is relevant, since citrus waste has large amounts of high-value compounds, such as pectin, d-limonene and flavonoids. This case study aimed at developing and comparing green and sustainable analytical methods to obtain flavonoids from orange peel. Homogenizer, ultrasound and microwave-assisted extractions were employed using chemometric tools, considering time, sample/solvent ratio, temperature and ethanol concentration as variables to obtain extracts containing hesperidin, naringenin, hesperetin and nobiletin. The bioactive flavonoids were determined by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC-UV). Microwave extraction was the most efficient method for obtaining the majority of flavonoids studied, six times more for hesperidin. Moreover, orange waste from different farming models showed diverse chemical profiles showing the importance of this alternative in natural product resources.

scholarly journals Can HCI Help Increase People’s Engagement in Sustainable Development? A Case Study on Energy Literacy

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (14) ◽  
pp. 7543
Author(s):  
Carla Pestana ◽  
Luísa Barros ◽  
Sabrina Scuri ◽  
Mary Barreto
Keyword(s):  
Renewable Energy Sources ◽  
User Centered Design ◽  
Card Sorting ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Information Platform ◽  
Energy Education ◽  
Initial Results ◽  
User Centered ◽  
Education Initiatives

The adoption of energy efficiency practices and increased penetration of renewable energy sources in the power system are estimated to play a key role in the decarbonization of the energy sector, helping reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ultimately fight climate change. To foster energy transition, energy education initiatives should primarily target the citizens and be designed adopting a User-Centered Design (UCD) approach and HCI methodologies. This paper describes how UCD/HCI can inform the design of citizens’ energy education initiatives by presenting a case study—the development of an information platform targeting Madeiran citizens. The article describes the design process, from ideation to prototype and validation. Methods used in each phase (card sorting, semi-structured interviews, brainstorming sessions, think-aloud protocol and surveys) are described. Results of each phase and how they have informed the following steps are presented, together with a detailed description of the resulting information platform and initial results in terms of acceptance and interaction with the system. Our initial results support the hypothesis that adopting an HCI perspective can nurture the development of energy education initiatives targeting citizens, bringing a user-centered approach to the design of such initiatives.

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