Roberto Munoz

Development of Software that Supports the Improvement of the Empathy in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Autism is a developmental disorder characterized by a decrease in social interaction, communication, creativity, imagination and organization of daily living activities of those who have this condition. Empathy is a skill related to understanding the feelings of other people, which is an important element of social relationships. Currently in Chile there are no software applications that support the development of empathy in autistic children by taking advantage of the characteristics of multi-touch devices. For this reason, this study presents the development of such software. Due to the specific characteristics and needs of the target user, the User Centered Design methodology was used to guide the design process. This article presents the stages of the design process and describes the developed application. We also discuss the lessons learned during the process.

Defining and Validating Virtual Worlds Usability Heuristics

Virtual Worlds (VWs) are computer simulated environments, in two- or three-dimensions (3D), where hundreds of people can interact with each other in real time. Current heuristic evaluation can potentially identify issues related to the usability of VWs, but it may miss domain specific problems. For this reason, the development and use of appropriate heuristics is highly significant. This paper describes the development and validation process of a novel set of usability heuristics for VWs applications and an associated checklist. An experimental evaluation showed that the new heuristic set can potentially identify usability problems that are more closely related to the VW context and that would not be found using the traditional Nielsens heuristics.

Defining Virtual Worlds Usability Heuristics

Virtual Worlds (VWs) are computer-simulated virtual environments accessed by multiple users through their avatars. VWs constitute a growing space for collaborative play, learning and work. Usability evaluation for VWs brings new challenges. There is a need for new evaluation methods or at least an extensive use of traditional evaluations in novel ways. The paper describes the development process of a new set of usability heuristics for VWs applications, including their early validation through two case studies. A usability checklist to use when applying VWs heuristics is also proposed.

Stellar Population Properties of Ultracompact Dwarfs in M87: A Mass–Metallicity Correlation Connecting Low-metallicity Globular Clusters and Compact Ellipticals

We derive stellar population parameters for a representative sample of ultracompact dwarfs (UCDs) and a large sample of massive globular clusters (GCs) with stellar masses

Assessing the Target’ Size and Drag Distance in Mobile Applications for Users with Autism

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Dark Matter in Ultra-diffuse Galaxies in the Virgo Cluster from Their Globular Cluster Populations

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A proposal for Internet of Smart Home Things based on BCI system to aid patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

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Relations between Touch Target Size and Drag Distance in Mobile Applications for Users with Autism Spectrum Disorders

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Using Black Hole Algorithm to Improve EEG-Based Emotion Recognition

in the central galaxy M87 of the Virgo galaxy cluster, based on model fitting to the Lick-index measurements from both the literature and new observations. After necessary spectral stacking of the relatively faint objects in our initial sample of 40 UCDs and 118 GCs, we obtain 30 sets of Lick-index measurements for UCDs and 80 for GCs. The M87 UCDs have ages