This book discusses the emergence of diverse functional organizations in the visual pathway which could be spontaneously and solely initiated by the random feedforward wiring of neural circuits. It demonstrates that the structure of ON and OFF retinal ganglion cell (RGC) mosaics is projected onto V1 by retino-cortical feedforward mapping to induce higher cognitive functions. This book will be beneficial for both theoretical and experimental neuroscientists, as well as for researchers using brain-inspired neural network models.

This book explores the status of paper-based diagnostic solutions, or Microfluidics 2.0. The contributors explore: how paper-based tests can be widely distributed and utilized by semi-skilled personnel; how close to commercial applications the technology has become, and what is still required to make paper-based diagnostics the game-changer it can be. The technology is examined through the lens of the World Health Organization's ASSURED criteria for low-resource countries (Affordable, Sensitive, Specific, User-friendly, Rapid and robust, Equipment-free, and Deliverable to end-users). Its applications have to include: health technology, environmental technology, food safety, and more. This book is appropriate for researchers in these areas, as well as those interested in microfluidics, and includes chapters dedicated to principles such as theory of flow and surface treatments; components such as biomarkers and detection; and current methods of manufacturing. Discusses how paper-based diagnostics can be used in developing countries by comparing current diagnostic tests with the World Health Organization's ASSURED criteria Examines how paper-based diagnostics could be integrated with other technologies, such as printed electronics, and the Internet of Things. Outlines how semi-skilled personnel across a variety of fields can implement paper-based diagnostics

Circulating cell-free DNA is poised to transform cancer diagnosis and care; however, it carries technical challenges such as low abundance, fragmentation and sensitivity to biospecimen handling. Development of clinically useful assays hinges on understanding the unique technical aspects of working with cell-free DNA as a substrate. This book provides an in-depth summary of the technical issues impacting cell-free DNA purification from blood plasma and analysis in a cancer context, including design of PCR assays, sequencing library preparation and methylation analysis. Emerging fields such as extracellular vesicles and blood nucleases are also covered, as well as basic biology and considerations pertinent to biobanking.

This volume explores the latest engineering methods of mammalian cells that are useful for controlling the performance of engineered mammalian cells for future cell-based therapeutics and for better understanding of complex biological systems. The chapters in this book are organized into five parts. Part One described methods to engineer mammalian cells to sense biologically relevant inputs, such as cell contacts and soluble proteins. Part Two looks at techniques to engineer mammalian cells to sense artificial inputs, such as light and ultrasound. Part Three provides cutting-edge CRISPR-Cas-based methods to carry out highly multiplexed genome editing and spatiotemporally controlled genome editing. Part Four discusses ways to control and engineer biological events in mammalian cells in combination with chemical compounds and systems. Part Five explores techniques to engineer specific mammalian cells in targeted manners. Written in the highly successful Methods in Molecular Biology series format, chapters include introductions to their respective topics, lists of the necessary materials and reagents, step-by-step, readily reproducible laboratory protocols, and tips on troubleshooting and avoiding known pitfalls. Comprehensive and authoritative, Mammalian Cell Engineering: Methods and Protocols is a valuable resource that allows scientists to successfully carry out their research, thus ultimately contributing to the future advancement of this field.

This book covers the medical condition of diabetic patients, their early symptoms and methods conventionally used for diagnosing and monitoring diabetes. It describes various techniques and technologies used for diabetes detection. The content is built upon moving from regressive technology (invasive) and adapting new-age pain-free technologies (non-invasive), machine learning and artificial intelligence for diabetes monitoring and management. This book details all the popular technologies used in the health care and medical fields for diabetic patients. An entire chapter is dedicated to how the future of this field will be shaping up and the challenges remaining to be conquered. Finally, it shows artificial intelligence and predictions, which can be beneficial for the early detection, dose monitoring and surveillance for patients suffering from diabetes

This book describes how assistive technology can help handicapped, elderly and acutely sick people to manage their daily lives better and stay safe in the home. It discusses how safety is understood from an ethical, technical and social perspective, and offers examples of the problems that users, their helpers and professional carers have with assistive technology in everyday situations. The book provides insights from user-centred research and uses photographs to illustrate the main topic: how users and technology can work together to ensure safety. User-focused and combining experience with research, the book will interest users of these kinds of technology, health professionals who might introduce and/or prescribe them, engineers who develop and sell assistive technological gadgets, and architects who build safe homes - as well as researchers and students who work in these fields. It provides an overview of the existing technology, examines ways to test its effectiveness from the point of view of users, health professionals and researchers from different fields (architecture, education, engineering, facility management, medicine, nursing, occupational therapy, rehabilitative medicine, physiotherapy, social science and speech therapy), and lists useful addresses, websites and literature

This book is part of a two-part volume book that highlights the latest advances in innovative bioceramics applied in the highly interdisciplinary area referred to as "translational medicine". This volume covers the basic principles and techniques used in the manufacture of bioceramics and biocomposites for various biomedical applications including drug delivery, implantable bionics and the development of the cardiac pacemaker, and bone tissue engineering. Furthermore, self-healing materials have been attracting increasing interest in both engineering and medical applications during the past two decades. Self-healing hydrogels are particularly interesting because of their ability to repair structural damages and recover their original functions, specifically in tissue engineering.

This book showcases the state of the art in the field of sensors and microsystems, revealing the impressive potential of novel methodologies and technologies. It covers a broad range of aspects, including: bio-, physical and chemical sensors; actuators; micro- and nano-structured materials; mechanisms of interaction and signal transduction; polymers and biomaterials; sensor electronics and instrumentation; analytical microsystems, recognition systems and signal analysis; and sensor networks, as well as manufacturing technologies, environmental, food and biomedical applications. The book gathers a selection of papers presented at the 19th AISEM National Conference on Sensors and Microsystems. Held in Lecce, Italy in February 2017, the event brought together researchers, end users, technology teams and policy makers.

Wearable Systems Based Gait Monitoring and Analysis provides a thorough overview of wearable gait monitoring techniques and their use in health analysis. The text starts with an examination of the relationship between the human body's physical condition and gait, and then introduces and explains nine mainstream sensing mechanisms, including piezoresistive, resistive, capacitive, piezoelectric, inductive, optical, air pressure, EMG and IMU-based architectures. Gait sensor design considerations in terms of geometry and deployment are also introduced. Diverse processing algorithms for manipulating sensors outputs to transform raw data to understandable gait features are discussed. Furthermore, gait analysis-based health monitoring demonstrations are given at the end of this book, including both medical and occupational applications. The book will enable students of biomedical engineering, electrical engineering, signal processing, and ergonomics and practitioners to understand the medical and occupational applications of engineering-based gait analysis and falling injury prevention methods.

This book presents the state-of-the-art techniques for the modeling, simulation, testing, compilation and physical synthesis of mVLSI biochips. The authors describe a top-down modeling and synthesis methodology for the mVLSI biochips, inspired by microelectronics VLSI methodologies. They introduce a modeling framework for the components and the biochip architecture, and a high-level microfluidic protocol language. Coverage includes a topology graph-based model for the biochip architecture, and a sequencing graph to model for biochemical application, showing how the application model can be obtained from the protocol language. The techniques described facilitate programmability and automation, enabling developers in the emerging, large biochip market.

This updated fourth edition provides current information on devices and is divided into diagnostic and treatment sections. Devices are described with the theory of operation and relevant anatomical and physiological considerations. Aspects of BMET work including test equipment, standards, and information technology are also discussed. The text covers a wide variety of diagnostic and treatment devices currently used in hospitals that students will likely encounter in their career. Principles of operation and examples of use are provided. This book is unique in that it is written by an experienced biomed tech with 30 years' experience in hospitals rather than by engineers with little frontline experience. It is also unique in that it provides ancillary materials on the web and is the only guide divided into diagnostic and treatment device sections. This new edition also includes two new chapters on computers, information technology, and networking as well as health technology management. From the previous edition: "The book presents a comfortable balance between clinical applications, basic technical information, and various pictures of medical technologies one will encounter in the field. Additionally, related anatomy and physiology principles and essential technical terms are a nice complement to the technologies presented. The everyday duties and responsibilities of a biomed are captured by the various 'true-to-life' scenarios introduced throughout the book." -Joey Jones, Madisonville Community College, Kentucky, USA This book is intended for students in biomedical engineering technology and healthcare technology management (BMET/HTM) programs as well as biomedical engineering students. Field service representatives, medical device designers, and medical device sales representatives will also find it useful.

This book offers a comprehensive analysis of philosophical, social, ethical, and legal challenges arising as a consequences of current advances in neurosciences and neurotechnology. It starts by offering an overview of fundamental concepts such as mental privacy, personal autonomy, mental integrity, and responsibility, among others. In turn, it discusses the influence of possible misuses or uncontrolled uses of neurotechnology on those concepts, and, more in general, on human rights and equality. Then, it makes some original proposals to deal with the main ethical, legal, and social problems associated to the use of neurotechnology, both in medicine and in everyday life, suggesting possible policies to protect privacy, neural data, and intimacy. Crossing the borders between humanities, natural sciences, bio-medicine, and engineering, and taking into account geographical and cultural differences, this book offers a conceptual debate around policy and decision making concerning some of the key neuroethical challenges of our times. It offers a comprehensive guide to the most important issues of neurojustice and neuroprotection, together with a set of new paradigms to face some of the most urgent neuroethical problems of our times.

Biomedical Applications of Magnetic Particles discusses fundamental magnetic nanoparticle physics and chemistry and explores important biomedical applications and future challenges. The first section presents the fundamentals of the field by explaining the theory of magnetism, describing techniques to synthesize magnetic particles, detailing methods to characterize magnetic particles, and quantitatively describing the applied magnetic forces, torques, and the resultant particle motions. The second section describes the wide range of biomedical applications, including chemical sensors, cellular actuators, drug delivery, magnetic hyperthermia, magnetic resonance imaging contrast enhancement, and toxicity. Additional key features include: Covers both introduction to physics and characterization of magnetic nanoparticles and the state of the art in biomedical applications Authoritative reference for scientists and engineers for all new or old to the field Describes how the size of magnetic nanoparticles affects their magnetic properties, colloidal properties, and biological properties. Written by a team of internationally respected experts, this book provides an up-to-date authoritative reference for scientists and engineers.

This book covers innovative breakthroughs in additive manufacturing processes used for biomedical engineering. More and more, 3D printing is selected over traditional manufacturing processes, especially for complex designs, because of the many advantages such as fewer restrictions, better production cost savings, higher quality control, and accuracy. Current challenges and opportunities regarding material, design, cost savings, and efficiency are covered along with an outline of the most recent fabrication methods used for converting biomaterials into integrated structures that can fit best in anatomy while still obtaining the necessary architecture, mechanical reliability, biocompatibility, and anti-bacterial characteristics needed. Additional chapters will also focus on selected areas of applications such as bionics, affordable prostheses, implants, medical devices, rapid tooling, and drug delivery. Additive Manufacturing Processes in Biomedical Engineering: Advanced Fabrication Methods and Rapid Tooling Techniques acts as a first-hand reference for commercial manufacturing organizations which are mimicking tissue organs by using additive manufacturing techniques. By capturing the current trends of today's manufacturing practices this book becomes a one-stop resource for manufacturing professionals, engineers in related disciplines, and academic researchers.

Explains the basis of Brain Computer Interface and how it can be established using different EEG signal characteristics Covers the detail classification of different types of EEG signals with respect to their physical characteristics Explains detection and diagnosis of epileptic seizures from EEG data of a subject Reviews design and development a low cost and robust EEG acquisition system Provides mathematical analysis of EEG including MATLAB codes for students to experiment with EEG data

This book discusses the extraction, purification, modification, and processing of biobased materials and their various industrial applications, across biomedical, pharmaceutical, construction, and other industries. It includes contributions from experts on hybrid biopolymers and bio-composites, bioactive and biodegradable materials, bio-inert polymers, natural polymers and composites, and metallic natural materials. Therefore, this encyclopedia is a useful reference for scientists, academicians, research scholars, and technologists. Major challenges of biobased materials are their efficient development, cost-effective, and green & environment friendly production/applications. This encyclopedia answers these challenges to professionals and scientists for proper utilization of biobased materials. It presents the recent practices of biobased materials technology in different scientific and engineering domains. It helps the bounded industrial outcomes to reach the general readership of different domains. This encyclopedia bridges the technological gaps between the industrial and academic professionals and the novice young students/scholars. The interdisciplinarity of this encyclopedia makes it unique for a wide readership. The topic of biobased materials is currently popular in the scientific community, working in such following areas as Recycled materials, Renewable materials, Materials for efficiency, Materials for waste treatment, Materials for reduction of environmental load, Materials for easy disposal or recycle, Hazardous free materials, Materials for reducing human health impact, Materials for energy efficiency, Materials for green energy, etc. This is a relatively hot topic in materials science and has strong demands for energy, material and money savings, as well as heavy contamination problems, despite that the area of biobased materials belongs to most important fields of modern science & technology, no important encyclopedias have been published in the area of "biobased materials"

This book highlights recent advances in the field of plant-biotic interactions and explores current serious issues in the crop production industry. It is intended to attract more attention to these important, but often overlooked areas, and to stimulate new ideas for future research. Plants are constantly under attack by pathogens, pests, and parasites, which can significantly impact worldwide food production and human health. While pathogens and pests attack and interconnect with their hosts in a variety of ways, plants have developed sophisticated immune systems to fight infections. In the field of plant-biotic interactions, most of the studies to date have focused on the function and signaling pathways of plant disease resistance proteins and pattern recognition receptors, as well as pathogen effector proteins. In contrast, this book presents new and emerging research areas, and introduces students, researchers, academics, and policy advisors to the latest trends in e.g. microbial technology, environmental microbiology, agricultural science, the health sciences, biological sciences and other related disciplines.

With rise of smart medical sensors, cloud computing and the health care technologies, "connected health" is getting remarkable consideration everywhere. Recently, the Internet of Things (IoT) has brought the vision of a smarter world into reality. Cloud computing fits well in this scenario as it can provide high quality of clinical experience. Thus an IoT-cloud convergence can play a vital role in healthcare by offering better insight of heterogeneous healthcare content supporting quality care. It can also support powerful processing and storage facilities of huge data to provide automated decision making. This book aims to report quality research on recent advances towards IoT-Cloud convergence for smart healthcare, more specifically to the state-of-the-art approaches, design, development and innovative use of those convergence methods for providing insights into healthcare service demands. Students, researchers, and medical experts in the field of information technology, medicine, cloud computing, soft computing technologies, IoT and the related fields can benefit from this handbook in handling real-time challenges in healthcare. Current books are limited to focus either on soft computing algorithms or smart healthcare. Integration of smart and cloud computing models in healthcare resulting in connected health is explored in detail in this book.

This book highlights treatment strategies for bacterial biofilms in connection with a variety of human diseases. In particular, it reviews bacterial biofilm formation and its mechanism. Topics covered include biofilms in human health, the role of biofilms in mediating human diseases, and methods for testing bacterial biofilms. Further sections concentrate on biofilm-mediated diseases in different parts of the human gastrointestinal tract, while therapeutic strategies for biofilm control and natural agents that disrupt bacterial biofilms are also covered. Readers will also find the latest advances in probiotics and biofilms, as well as the use of probiotics to counteract biofilm-associated infections. Biofilms and antimicrobial resistance are discussed. Subsequent chapters address the management of inflammatory bowel disease via probiotics biofilms, as well as the role of probiotics bacteria in the treatment of human diseases associated with bacterial biofilms. The book is chiefly intended for clinicians/scientists in the fields of medical microbiology, applied microbiology, biochemistry, and biotechnology.

This book highlights recent advances in soft and stretchable biointegrated electronics. A renowned group of authors address key ideas in the materials, processes, mechanics, and devices of soft and stretchable electronics; the wearable electronics systems; and bioinspired and implantable biomedical electronics. Among the topics discussed are liquid metals, stretchable and flexible energy sources, skin-like devices, in vitro neural recording, and more. Special focus is given to recent advances in extremely soft and stretchable bio-inspired electronics with real-world clinical studies that validate the technology. Foundational theoretical and experimental aspects are also covered in relation to the design and application of these biointegrated electronics systems. This is an ideal book for researchers, engineers, and industry professionals involved in developing healthcare devices, medical tools and related instruments relevant to various clinical practices.

This book provides an insightful guide to the design, testing and optimization of micro-electrode-dot-array (MEDA) digital microfluidic biochips. The authors focus on the characteristics specific for MEDA biochips, e.g., real-time sensing and advanced microfluidic operations like lamination mixing and droplet shape morphing. Readers will be enabled to enhance the automated design and use of MEDA and to develop a set of solutions to facilitate the full exploitation of design complexities that are possible with standard CMOS fabrication techniques. The book provides the first set of design automation and test techniques for MEDA biochips. The methods described in this book have been validated using fabricated MEDA biochips in the laboratory. Readers will benefit from an in-depth look at the MEDA platform and how to combine microfluidics with software, e.g., applying biomolecular protocols to software-controlled and cyberphysical microfluidic biochips.

The Computational Biomechanics for Medicine titles provide an opportunity for specialists in computational biomechanics to present their latest methodologiesand advancements. Thisvolumecomprises twelve of the newest approaches and applications of computational biomechanics, from researchers in Australia, New Zealand, USA, France, Spain and Switzerland. Some of the interesting topics discussed are:real-time simulations; growth and remodelling of soft tissues; inverse and meshless solutions; medical image analysis; and patient-specific solid mechanics simulations. One of the greatest challenges facing the computational engineering community is to extend the success of computational mechanics to fields outside traditional engineering, in particular to biology, the biomedical sciences, and medicine. We hope the research presented within this book series will contribute to overcoming this grand challenge.

The processing of medical images in a reasonable timeframe and with high definition is very challenging. This volume helps to meet that challenge by presenting a thorough overview of medical imaging modalities, its processing, high-performance computing, and the need to embed parallelism in medical image processing techniques to achieve efficient and fast results. With contributions from researchers from prestigious laboratories and educational institutions, High-Performance Medical Image Processing provides important information on medical image processing techniques, parallel computing techniques, and embedding parallelism in different image processing techniques. A comprehensive review of parallel algorithms in medical image processing problems is a key feature of this book. The volume presents the relevant theoretical frameworks and the latest empirical research findings in the area and provides detailed descriptions about the diverse high-performance techniques. Topics discussed include parallel computing, multicore architectures and their applications in image processing, machine learning applications, conventional and advanced magnetic resonance imaging methods, hyperspectral image processing, algorithms for segmenting 2D slices for 3D viewing, and more. Case studies, such as on the detection of cancer tumors, expound on the information presented. Key features: Provides descriptions of different medical imaging modalities and their applications Discusses the basics and advanced aspects of parallel computing with different multicore architectures Expounds on the need for embedding data and task parallelism in different medical image processing techniques Presents helpful examples and case studies of the discussed methods This book will be valuable for professionals, researchers, and students working in the field of healthcare engineering, medical imaging technology, applications in machine and deep learning, and more. It is also appropriate for courses in computer engineering, biomedical engineering and electrical engineering based on artificial intelligence, parallel computing, high performance computing, and machine learning and its applications in medical imaging.

Improving the quality of life for the disabled and elderly is a pressing issue for today s European societies, as Europe, and industrialized countries worldwide, are confronted with a demographic shift. Researchers are looking toward Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) as the solution to this problem. Wireless Technologies for Ambient Assisted Living and Healthcare: Systems and Applications provides a compendium of terms, definitions, and explanations of concepts and processes within the area of AAL. It focuses on innovative wireless solutions for smart home environments, which will positively contribute to independent living and quality of life for disabled and elderly individuals, as they rely less on caretakers and more on technology. Other topics include information and communication technologies related to health, new developments in distributed applications and interoperable systems, applications and services, wireless technologies and architectures for health monitoring systems, and wireless communication and sensor networks in smart living space.