Monitoring symptom progression in Parkinson’s Disease using Least Squares Support Vector Regression

Parkinson’s Disease is a neurodegenerative disease that has a decline in motor behaviour as one of its main symptoms. This decline is currently monitored using subjective measures, such as questionnaires and clinical observations. More detailed and objective tracking of this decline can improve treatment of the disease and allow for earlier...

Horizontal and Vertical Eye Movements in Gaze Tracking Tasks: A novel tool to classify neurodegeneration

Eye movements are the result of complex interactions between cortical and sub-cortical regions. Consequently, they are considered as an important bio-marker for neurological function. Attempts to construct an oculomotor model rely on classic paradigms. In this research, a cybernetic approach was used to construct and examine a novel paradigm,...

Objective Evaluation of the Retention of Manual Control Skills Using a Cybernetic Approach

Pilots’ manual flying skills have notably reduced due to the increase in flight deck automation over the last decades. This has resulted in a growing concern that today pilots lack the skills to safely and successfully prevent or recover from unexpected aircraft upset events or to take over controls after a sudden transition to manual flying....

Quantifying ageing effect on gaze dynamics: By using identification techniques with an eye-only and an eye-hand pursuit tracking task

In an effort to develop new tools for the classification of neurodegenerative diseases, the effect on the ocular motor system and specifically the visuomotor integration has been a field of interest for more than a decade. Where tracking tasks have shown the potential to quantify fine motor skills of the hand, too little is known about the...

Objective evaluation of human manual control adaptation boundaries using a cybernetic approach

Manual control tasks can be found everywhere in our daily activities, and the human ability to adapt in controlling many different vehicles such as cars and airplanes make it possible for us to travel farther, faster and higher. The human adaptation ability to changes in the controlled element dynamics is indispensable for tasks requiring high...

Changes in pilot control behaviour across Stewart platform motion systems

Flight simulators provide an effective, efficient, and safe environment for practising flight-critical manoeuvres without requiring a real aircraft. Most simulators are equipped with a Stewart-type motion system, which consists of six linear actuators in a hexapod configuration. The argument for use of motion systems in simulators is derived...