In diesem Beitrag wird eine Einführung in eine bisher wenig erforschte Krankheitsform namens "Misophonie" gegeben. Betroffene erleben negative physiologische und emotionale Reaktionen bei der Rezeption bestimmter Formen von Schall. Bislang wurde diese Krankheit noch nicht in den ICD-11 Katalog aufgenommen. Das hochrangige medizinische Zetrum Amsterdam UMC hat 2020 allerdings diverse Kritierien für das Krankheistbild festgestellt. Im Beitrag wird nach einer kurzen Definition der Misophonie ein Katalog an triggernden Geräuschen sowie Diagnosekriterien dargelegt. Eine mögliche Behandlungform wird aufgezeit und ein Interview mit einer betroffenen Person präsentiert. Ziel ist es mit diesen Beitrag auf diese noch relativ unbekannte Störung aufmerksam zu machen und zu sensibilisieren.

In times of digitalisation, visual assistance systems in assembly are increasingly important. The design of these assembly systems needs to be highly complex to meet the requirements. Due to the increasing number of variants in production processes, as well as shorter innovation and product life cycles, assistance systems should improve quality and reduce complexity of assembly processes. However, many large kitchen manufacturers still assemble kitchen cabinets manually, due to the high variety of components, such as rails and fittings. This paper focuses on the analysis and evaluation of virtual assistance systems to improve quality and usability in individualised kitchen cabinet assembly processes at a large German manufacturer. A solution is identified and detailed.

ABSTRACT

Biomimicry is a new science that examines natural models, takes inspiration from them, and imitates designs or processes to solve problems and create innovations. Thus, it creates a field of work that aims to produce products that are functional, sustainable, do not harm the environment, and are economical and durable, taking nature and its cycle as an example. Biology and design work go hand in hand with biomimicry applications to develop products using living organisms such as algae, bacteria, and fungi. Algae are photosynthetic organisms in almost all ecosystems, including various aquatic environments and land. Algae are classified as macroalgae or microalgae according to their size and morphological characteristics. Microalgae are microscopic, primarily unicellular, or simple multicellular, and prokaryotic or eukaryotic. Many microalgae can adapt to extreme conditions such as a wide range of temperatures, salinities, pH values, and light intensities. Microalgae convert carbon dioxide into valuable biologically active compounds through solar energy. Thus, they constitute one-third of the total biomass worldwide and contribute 50% of atmospheric oxygen. Secondary metabolites may consist of 50-70% protein and more than 10- 30% lipids and vitamins, in varying amounts depending on the species. Microalgae form a central basis for achieving sustainability. They accomplish this by reproducing rapidly, producing important products, and accumulating lipids and carbohydrates as storage materials to produce biofuels.

The functional properties of microalgae have directed the attention of researchers, engineers, and architects from different disciplines to investigate the use of microalgae for sustainability. Designers have begun to use microalgae, influenced by their life processes, functions and physiological structures in nature, to serve as a sustainable solution. These include creating oxygen-rich areas, producing, and developing transparent roof and exterior coating systems that can be used to help regenerate urban environments, biodegradable pigments for textile prints, lighting, biofilms and fillers. The focus of this study is to underline how microalgal systems can be used in industrial and technological applications by modelling microalgal systems through biomimicry applications and bioengineering. Thus, we aim to reveal how a versatile contribution can be made to sustainability using microalgae in biomimicry designs.

Tourism recommendation systems have the potential to alleviate choice overload for travelers. Social robots offer a promising avenue for delivering recommendations in tourist information settings, presenting an engaging and intuitive interface. This research explores tourists’ perceptions of the effectiveness and satisfaction of tourism recommendations provided by social robots as well as their preferences for human-like versus robotic interactions. An experiment was conducted at a tourist information office involving 60 participants exposed to either a human-like or robotic version of the social robot recommender system. Feedback was collected via survey, revealing that the participants responded positively to the social robot across various evaluation criteria. These findings suggest that tourists are receptive to social robots in real-world tourism contexts and would consider using them in the future.