AI4Work Project: Human-Centric Digital Twin Approaches to Trustworthy AI and Robotics for Improved Working Conditions in Healthcare and Education Sectors.

AI and robotics aim to transform workplace landscapes in a several sectors such as manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, construction, agriculture, and education. Central to this evolution is the innovative use of Digital Twin technology, which creates real-time updated virtual replicas of physical systems and entities. This technology is especially transformative in healthcare and education, promising customized and efficient experiences for all involved.

County-level political group density, partisan polarization, and individual-level mortality among adults in the United States: A lagged multilevel study.

Objective: To investigate the associations between county-level political group density, partisan polarization, and individual-level mortality from all causes and from coronary heart disease (CHD) in the United States.

Methods: Using data from five survey waves (1998-2006) of the General Social Survey-National Death Index dataset and the County Presidential Election Return 2000 dataset, we fit weighted Cox proportional hazards models to estimate the associations between (1) political group density and (2) partisan polarization measured at the county level in 2000 (n = 313 counties) categorized into quartiles with individual-level mortality (n = 14,983 participants) from all causes and CHD, controlling for individual- and county-level factors. Maximum follow-up was from one year after the survey up until 2014.

Election-Related Post-Traumatic Stress: Evidence from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

The 2020 U.S. presidential election saw rising political tensions among ordinary voters and political elites, with fears of election violence culminating in the January 6 riot.

Geometrical Doping at the Atomic Scale in Oxide Quantum Materials.

Chemical dopants enabling a plethora of emergent physical properties have been treated as randomly and uniformly distributed in the frame of a three-dimensional doped system. However, in nanostructured architectures, the location of dopants relative to the interface or boundary can greatly influence device performance. This observation suggests that chemical dopants need to be considered as discrete defects, meaning that geometric control of chemical dopants becomes a critical aspect as the physical size of materials scales down into the nanotechnology regime.

Integrating IoT Wearable Devices in Telemonitoring Platforms for Continuous Assisted Living Services.

Assisted living services have become increasingly important in recent years as the population ages and the demand for personalized care rises. In this paper, we present the integration of wearable IoT devices in a remote monitoring platform for elderly people that enables seamless data collection, analysis, and visualization while in parallel, alarms and notification functionalities are provided in the context of a personalized monitoring and care plan. The system has been implemented using state-of-the-art technologies and methods to facilitate robust operation, increased usability and real-time communication.

MedSecurance Project: Advanced Security-for-Safety Assurance for Medical Device IoT (IoMT).

The MedSecurance project focus on identifying new challenges in cyber security with focus on hardware and software medical devices in the context of emerging healthcare architectures. In addition, the project will review best practice and identify gaps in the guidance, particularly the guidance stipulated by the medical device regulation and directives. Finally, the project will develop comprehensive methodology and tooling for the engineering of trustworthy networks of inter-operating medical devices, that shall have security-for-safety by design, with a strategy for device certification and certifiable dynamic network composition, ensuring that patient safety is safeguarded from malicious cyber actors and technology "accidents".

Enriching Remote Monitoring and Care Platforms with Personalized Recommendations to Enhance Gamification and Coaching.

Patients' remote monitoring platforms can be enhanced with intelligent recommendations and gamification functionalities to support their adherence to care plans. The current paper aims to present a methodology for creating personalized recommendations, which can be used to improve patient remote monitoring and care platforms. The current pilot system design is aimed to support patients by providing recommendations for Sleep, Physical Activity, BMI, Blood sugar, Mental Health, Heart Health, and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease aspects.

The harmful effects of partisan polarization on health.

Partisan polarization significantly drives stress and anxiety among Americans, and recent aggregate-level studies suggest polarization may be shaping their health. This individual-level study uses a new representative dataset of 2,752 US residents surveyed between December 2019 and January 2020, some US residents report more days of poor physical and mental health per month than others. Using negative binomial models, zero inflated models, and visualizations, we find evidence that polarization is linked to declines in physical health: the more distant an individual feels politically from the average voter in their state, the worse health outcomes he or she reports.

Intelligent Pervasive Monitoring Solution of COVID-19 Patients.

The COVID-19 pandemic transforms the healthcare delivery models and accelerates the implementation and the adoption of telemedicine solutions at all levels of the healthcare system. Telehealth services ensure the continuity of care and treatment of both inpatients and outpatients during this pandemic, while reducing the spread of the virus through hospitals. The aim of this paper is to present an intelligent remote monitoring system with innovative data analytics features for COVID-19 patients.

Using mHealth Technologies to Promote Public Health and Well-Being in Urban Areas with Blue-Green Solutions.

European and International cities face crucial global geopolitical, economic, environmental, and other changes. All these intensify threats to and inequalities in citizens' health. The implementation of Blue-Green Solutions in urban and rural areas have been broadly used to tackle the above challenges.

Pervasive Monitoring of Public Health and Well-Being in Urban Areas with Blue-Green Solutions.

The urban environment seems to affect the citizens' health. The implementation of Blue-Green Solutions (BGS) in urban areas have been used to promote public health and citizens well-being. The aim of this paper is to present the development of an mHealth app for monitoring patients and citizens health status in areas where BGS will be applied.

Gamification and Coaching in Remote Monitoring and Care Platforms.

Nowadays, several e-health systems are equipped with advanced features for patients monitoring and care. Among these features, gamification and operations supporting the patients' adherence to therapeutic and care plans have been found to be quite useful and valuable. Among others, the introduction of intelligent patient coaching and the provisions of recommendations are very popular.

Opposing views: associations of political polarization, political party affiliation, and social trust with COVID-19 vaccination intent and receipt.

Introduction: Political polarization has increased in the USA within recent years. Studies have shown Republicans are less likely to accept COVID-19 vaccinations than Democrats; however, little is known regarding the association between COVID-19 vaccination acceptance and political polarization.

Methods: We used data from a nationally-representative survey of 1427 participants conducted between 9 February 2021 and 17 February 2021.

Quantifying Citizens' Well-Being in Areas with Natural Based Solutions Using Mobile Computing.

Urban planners, architects and civil engineers are integrating Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) to address contemporary environmental, social, health and economic challenges. Many studies claim that NBS are poised to improve citizens' well-being in urban areas. NBS can also benefit Public Health, as they can contribute to optimising environmental parameters (such as urban heat island effects, floods, etc.

Political polarization on COVID-19 pandemic response in the United States.

Despite calls for political consensus, there is growing evidence that the public response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been politicized in the US. We examined the extent to which this polarization exists among the US public across two national studies. In a representative US sample ( = 699, March 2020) we find that liberals (compared to conservatives) perceive higher risk, place less trust in politicians to handle the pandemic, are more trusting of medical experts such as the WHO, and are more critical of the government response.

Skyrmion Qubits: A New Class of Quantum Logic Elements Based on Nanoscale Magnetization.

We introduce a new class of primitive building blocks for realizing quantum logic elements based on nanoscale magnetization textures called skyrmions. In a skyrmion qubit, information is stored in the quantum degree of helicity, and the logical states can be adjusted by electric and magnetic fields, offering a rich operation regime with high anharmonicity. By exploring a large parameter space, we propose two skyrmion qubit variants depending on their quantized state.

Is divisive politics making Americans sick? Associations of perceived partisan polarization with physical and mental health outcomes among adults in the United States.

Objectives: To investigate whether changes in perceived partisan polarization since the 2016 US presidential election and current perceptions of polarization are associated with the onset of physical and mental health conditions in adults.

Methods: We surveyed a nationally-representative sample (n = 2752) of US adults between December 2019 and January 2020. We used multivariable logistic regression to estimate associations between perceived polarization and the incidence of hypertension, high cholesterol, obesity, diabetes, and anxiety, depressive, and sleep disorders in or after 2016 and current self-rated health.

Colossal topological Hall effect at the transition between isolated and lattice-phase interfacial skyrmions.

The topological Hall effect is used extensively to study chiral spin textures in various materials. However, the factors controlling its magnitude in technologically-relevant thin films remain uncertain. Using variable-temperature magnetotransport and real-space magnetic imaging in a series of Ir/Fe/Co/Pt heterostructures, here we report that the chiral spin fluctuations at the phase boundary between isolated skyrmions and a disordered skyrmion lattice result in a power-law enhancement of the topological Hall resistivity by up to three orders of magnitude.

Skyrmion-(Anti)Vortex Coupling in a Chiral Magnet-Superconductor Heterostructure.

We report experimental coupling of chiral magnetism and superconductivity in [IrFeCoPt]/Nb heterostructures. The stray field of skyrmions with radius ≈50  nm is sufficient to nucleate antivortices in a 25 nm Nb film, with unique signatures in the magnetization, critical current, and flux dynamics, corroborated via simulations. We also detect a thermally tunable Rashba-Edelstein exchange coupling in the isolated skyrmion phase.

Microwave resonances of magnetic skyrmions in thin film multilayers.

Non-collinear magnets exhibit a rich array of dynamic properties at microwave frequencies. They can host nanometre-scale topological textures known as skyrmions, whose spin resonances are expected to be highly sensitive to their local magnetic environment. Here, we report a magnetic resonance study of an [Ir/Fe/Co/Pt] multilayer hosting Néel skyrmions at room temperature.

Current-Induced Spin Torques on Single GdFeCo Magnetic Layers.

Spintronics exploit spin-orbit coupling (SOC) to generate spin currents, spin torques, and, in the absence of inversion symmetry, Rashba and Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions. The widely used magnetic materials, based on 3d metals such as Fe and Co, possess a small SOC. To circumvent this shortcoming, the common practice has been to utilize the large SOC of nonmagnetic layers of 5d heavy metals (HMs), such as Pt, to generate spin currents and, in turn, exert spin torques on the magnetic layers.

A perpendicular field electromagnet with a 250 mm access bore.

We present a laboratory electromagnet capable of generating magnetic fields up to ±0.48 T, specifically designed as a perpendicular flux source for thin film samples in an ambient environment. The magnet features a 250 mm diameter clear access bore above the sample plane, thus offering compatibility with a wide variety of experimental apparatus.