Academic literature on the topic 'Distal appendages'

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common sustained cardiac arrhythmia, affecting 1.5–2% of the general population and more than 8% of those older than 80 years. Because of the progressive ageing of our population, an exponential increase in incidence is expected over the next few decades. Patients with AF have an increased mortality and morbidity, particularly owing to fatal or disabling stroke. The risk of embolic stroke is five times higher in the presence of AF, with an average annual rate around 5%, but there is a progressive increase with age and the presence of other risk factors, such as prior stroke or transient ischaemic attack, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, congestive heart failure, female sex, and vascular disease, as predicted by the CHADS₂ and the CHA₂DS₂-VASc scores. Moreover, strokes associated with AF are more severe, with a 50% greater likelihood of becoming disabled or handicapped and more than 50% likelihood of death. Intracardiac thrombus formation due to the Virchow triad of events (endothelial or endocardial damage or dysfunction, abnormal blood stasis, and altered haemostasis, platelet function, and fibrinolysis) followed by distal embolization leads to thromboembolic events manifest as transient ischaemic attack, ischaemic stroke, and peripheral embolism in patients with AF.

The Multi-Appendage Robotic System (MARS) is a hexapedal robotic platform capable of walking and of performing manipulation tasks. Each of the six limbs of MARS incorporates a three-degree of freedom (DOF), kinematically spherical proximal joint, similar to a shoulder or hip joint, and a 1-DOF distal joint, similar to an elbow or knee joint. The generation of walking gaits for such robots with multiple limbs requires a thorough understanding of the kinematics of the limbs, including their workspace. Since the entire limb workspace cannot be used in a statically stable alternating tripedal gait

Numerically simulating the six-degrees-of-freedom response motions of a ship executing an unsteady maneuver in a two-dimensional wave environment is one of the most challenging tasks in seakeeping. Mathematical difficulties may occur for several reasons. For example, the rapid change in encounter frequencies may cause a numerical dynamics imbalance. Furthermore, in order to predict the ship’s track (ship heading) accurately, the rudder forces and two-dimensional drift forces must be predicted accurately; otherwise, erroneously predicted headings can ultimately lead to obtaining entirely differ