The present application relates to the manipulation and handling of biological materials and, in one form, provides an apparatus for micromanipulation of biological material, including a channel for accommodating biological material and allowing for passage of liquid treatment solutions. The apparatus may include a two part construction wherein two portions of the apparatus are adapted to be heat sealed with a secondary material intermediate the two portions prior to a vitrification process step. A system for vitrification of a biological specimen is also provided including a software operable means for controlling the temperature environment, a software operable means for controlling fluid dispense volume and velocity and aspiration volume and velocity for the application of liquid treatment solutions to the biological specimen, and a software operable means for controlling protocol time.

A method of controlling an end effector of a robotically-controlled surgical instrument may include receiving a first input signal indicative of a high grip level input at a master grip input mechanism that controls a slave gripping force of the end effector; receiving a second input signal indicative of a user's readiness to operate the surgical instrument to perform a first surgical procedure; and outputting a locking signal in response to receiving the first input signal and the second input signal together to lock one or more degrees of freedom of the surgical instrument during the first surgical procedure.

In some embodiments, apparatuses and methods are provided herein useful to assess monitor, improve, and/or modify health and well-being as it relates to people associated with a habitable or other built environments or spaces therein. In some embodiments, an intervention assessment system and methods include one or more sensors for measuring aspects related to the built environment, a personal user device, and a control circuit configured to receive one or more measurements form the sensor(s), identify a problem with the built environment, and identify potential interventions based on the indicators associated with the problem. By one approach, a plurality of potential interventions may be ranked based on, for example, the ability to reduce the prevalence of the problem or indicator in the built environment, feasibility, cost, and timeliness. In some approaches, the system and method also select and may implement one or more interventions.

A system and a corresponding method of correcting temperature data from a non-imaging optical sensor involve collecting temperature data generated using the optical sensor. The temperature data describes temperature changes across a surface of a material during an additive manufacturing operation in which the material is heated by a heat source. The method includes estimating a size of a hot spot corresponding to a hottest region formed on the surface by the heat source; and estimating a size of a heated region corresponding to a locus of points within the field of view that contribute to the temperature data. The method further includes correcting the temperature data based on the estimated sizes of the hot spot and the heated region.

A coil spring modeling apparatus includes a first attachment member disposed on a lower spring seat, a second attachment member disposed on an upper spring seat, an actuator unit formed of a Stewart-platform-type parallel mechanism, a spring height detection mechanism, and a controller. The spring height detection mechanism is constituted of displacement gauges such as a linear variable differential transformer. These gauges are provided on hydraulic cylinders, and detect amounts of displacement relative to the reference lengths of the hydraulic cylinders, respectively. A hydraulic pressure supply device is controlled by the controller and supplies fluid pressure according to the displacement detected by the gauges to the respective hydraulic cylinders.

The generation of a factory order to control production of nucleotide sequences by a gene manufacturing system includes receiving an expression indicating an operation on sequence operands, each representing at least one nucleotide sequence part, evaluating the expression to a sequence specification, wherein the sequence specification comprises a data structure including one or more first-level operations and one or more second-level operations, and generating the factory order based upon execution of the one or more first-level operations and the one or more second-level operations. In a recursive manner, the one or more first-level operations operate on at least one first-level sequence operand, the value of which is resolved by execution of one or more of the second-level operations. The factory order may then be provided to the gene manufacturing system to assemble the sequence parts into nucleotide sequences represented by the sequence specification.

A computer-assisted surgery system may have a robotic arm including a surgical tool and a processor communicatively connected to the robotic arm. The processor may be configured to receive, from a neural monitor, a signal indicative of a distance between the surgical tool and a portion of a patient's anatomy including nervous tissue. The processor may be further configured to generate a command for altering a degree to which the robotic arm resists movement based on the signal received from the neural monitor; and send the command to the robotic arm.

A robot includes an operation execution unit; and a control unit which controls the operation execution unit, in which the control unit assembles an operation member at an assembly position by the operation execution unit and determines a state of fastening based on a captured image including the assembly position.

A system includes a network device installed at a site, the network device including an operating condition configured to be altered by an input initiated external to the site. The system also includes at least one multi-user configurable geographical boundary capable of being established about the site to alter the operating condition in response to a location based information of a user relative to the site and the geographical boundary. A method of managing a site includes detecting a network device installed at a site, the network device having an operating condition configured to be altered by an input initiated external to the site. The method also includes enabling configuration of at least one multi-user configurable geographical boundary capable of being established about the site to alter the operating condition in response to a location based information of a user relative to the site and the geographical boundary.

A building management system (BMS) includes one or more sensors that measure a variable state or condition in the BMS and a plurality of BMS devices that operate to affect the variable state or condition measured by the one or more sensors. Each of the BMS devices stores a thermodynamic block that models the BMS device. Each of the thermodynamic blocks includes a list of connections and a list of stats. The connections define one or more inputs to the thermodynamic block and one or more outputs from the thermodynamic block. The stats define one or more relationships between the inputs and the outputs. Each of the BMS devices includes a solver configured to perform calculations using the stats and connections defined by the thermodynamic block stored within the BMS device.