Panagiotis Katrakazas

Associations Between Hearing Performance and Physiological Measures - An Overview and Outlook.

The current paper summarises the research investigating associations between physiological data and hearing performance. An overview of state-of-the-art research and literature is given as well as promising directions for associations between physiological data and data regarding hearing loss and hearing performance. The physiological parameters included in this paper are: electrodermal activity, heart rate variability, blood pressure, blood oxygenation and respiratory rate. Furthermore, the environmental and behavioural measurements of physical activity and body mass index, alcohol consumption and smoking have been included. So far, only electrodermal activity and heart rate variability are physiological signals simultaneously associated with hearing loss or hearing performance. Initial findings suggest blood pressure and respiratory rate to be the most promising physiological measures that relate to hearing loss and hearing performance.

HEAR?INFO: A Modern Mobile-Web Platform Addressed to Hard-of-Hearing Elderly Individuals

In the concept of the hearing loss awareness, a modern mobile-web platform is hereby presented, aiming to offer constant online access to individuals who are hard of hearing, while presenting them regularly updated information concerning their condition. This information is presented via a specific modified interface, taking into account the special needs of the specific community. After a thorough research in GUI, the software requirements substitute or supplement the lack of integrated sound systems, with visual modifications, caption text and even specially chosen colours. Different applications, including auditory tests and exercises are considered, aiming to the self-awareness and broadening of an individual’s fund of knowledge.

ACESO: Analysis of Cervical Cancer: An Evidence-Based Treatments Optimization

Deciding for Cervical Cancer (CxCa) treatment is not a simple task. There are several competing factors that arise from the perspective of survival, treatment, toxicity, quality of patient’s life, as well as the geographic location of the patient, which indicates access to specific healthcare resources. All of these factors play a significant role in the ultimate decision to pursue surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy. Our aim is to develop an integrated platform incorporating a big data analytics (BDA) platform, enabling the collection and analysis of heterogeneous data related to the effectiveness of existing interventions and to the discovery of more effective techniques.

Computational Analysis of BRCA1 Mutations in Pediatric Patients with Malignancies and Their Mothers

Breast and ovarian cancers are the most prevalent type of malignancies amongst women. Similar incidence appear in childhood malignancies, where the basic ontogenetic mechanisms still remain to be elucidated. Such approaches, of relating mothers cancer mutations with the prevalence of childhood cancer in their offspring could prove useful in the prognosis, early detection and therapy of childhood malignancies. The aim of the present study was to use computational and bioinformatics tools to investigate the incidence of mutations in mothers with children suffering from neoplasms. Genes were examined for mutations and in particular, those were BRCA1, RAS family genes, TP53 and FLT3. Mutations were initially detected using PCR and multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) methodologies. Gene expression was detected using quantitative Reverse Transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) methodologies and results have been confirmed with the sequencing method. Following experimental analysis, bioinformatics analyses have been performed. In the case of positive identification of mutations, molecular modelling was used in order to study the effects of the mutations on the BRCA protein and subsequent effects on binding to BARD1, a signaling molecule down-stream of BRCA1, which participates in DNA repair pathways. Concluding, it appeared that the presence of a mutation in the aforementioned genes is not adequate for the disease to progress, yet it can be considered as a serious factor for disease progression. Thus, it appears that this phenomenon is of extreme interest and it should be further investigated in a larger patient cohort.

The Thermodynamic Cost of Intelligence

The concept of Information, is probably one of the most difficult physical (or maybe not) quantities to be comprehended. This is true not only due to the definition and physical meaning of Information, but also due to the difficulty in quantifying Information. It has been an intense field of study, especially in the 20th century, due to the revolution of information technology, where the notion of bit dominated the information discipline. Further on, after the bit the next term introduced in information theory was the qubit, the quantum bit. The present work tries to answer the question on the thermodynamic cost of intelligence. It attempts to build a connection between information and thermodynamics in terms of energy consumption and work production and in particular from a macroscopic point of view. From an initial observation we have reached the outcome that when introducing the concept of information into the thermodynamic equilibrium, it appears that it violates the law of energy conservation. Yet, we pose a hypothesis that Information per se carried energy and thus the conservation of energy is true.

Design and Development of a Low-Budget Infrasonic Detector

Infrasonic waves, or simply infrasound, are sound waves with frequencies lower than 20Hz, which are not audible to humans. Although there are many sources of infrasound in the environment, either natural or man-made, whose related research is ongoing for many years, a strong concern has emerged over the last decade about whether infrasound poses a threat to our health. The main cause of this concern is the frequent complaints of residents, living in areas where wind turbines are installed and operate. Residents claim that the operation of the turbines and specifically the infrasound generated by them, has a negative effect on their health. These facts justify the development of a low-cost device, able of detecting and suitably amplifying infrasonic waves so that the processing and study of infrasound waves can be measurable. Until now the equipment designed specifically for this purpose has been quite expensive and hardly available. Therefore, we propose a simple, functional and low cost device to address the infrasound detection thresholds.

Chronic Disease Management via Mobile Apps: The Diabetes Case

Given the great potential of mHealth applications as far as chronic diseases management is concerned, we investigated the level of intervention provided by mobile applications for the case of diabetes. Online stores (Google Play Store, App Store, Windows Phone Store) and mHealth-related databases were used as our investigation field and applications were reviewed upon several criteria. Our results indicate that there is still enough room for improvement in order to approach a holistic managemenent point-of-view from an mHealth perspective.

Σkynet: A Novel Biologically Inspired Near Extinction Reconstruction Model

The present work aims to develop a fundamentally novel computational model for reconstructing complex software systems, following some massive internal failure or external infrastructure damage. The present model mimics the biological process of information transmission in terms of transcription and subsequent translation, introducing novel terms such as pre-code and computational RNA.

Complex Dynamics in Tumor Gene Regulatory Networks: Oncogenesis Dynamics Driven by “Genes Gone Crazy”

Human neoplasms are considered to be diseases whose pathogenesis is attributed to genomic aberrations. Yet, it has been previously reported that genomic stability is probably not the sole “player” in tumor ontogenesis. Several genes have been identified that are considerd to be the “oncogenic drivers”. In that sense the present work manifests a hypothesis that tumor ontogenesis could be driven by genes or network of genes that get out of control or else “genes gone crazy”.

Otosclerosis and Tympanosclerosis Modeling Using the Finite Element Method

A Finite Element Model (FEM) of middle ear was used to simulate the pathology of otosclerosis (OS) and tympanosclerosis (TS). Several aspects regarding the two diseases were examined, the results of which are hereby presented, connecting OS and TS with significant hearing loss, depending on the position of the OS and TS plaque accordingly.