Otar Akanyeti, Federico Villagra Povina, David Langford, Arshad Sher, Luke Ian Lunn, Katie Love, Luis Mur, Phil Jones, Sarah Jones, Helen Tench

The project focuses on developing a smart, instrumented gait monitoring system for subjects with chronic hemiparetic stroke. Our goal is to create a mobile app that runs on a standard smartwatch and a mobile phone to automatically and objectively quantify gait impairments in stroke patients, monitor their recovery in response to exercise rehabilitation, and investigate how improvements in gait impact their quality of life.

The project is funded by the Welsh Stroke Implementation Group under the Stroke Research, Education and Innovation Fund program.

Federico Villagra Povina, Otar Akanyeti, David Langford, Reyer Zwiggelaar, Azam Hamidinekoo, Derek K. Jones, Maryam Afzali Deligani, Jonathan Hewitt, Benjamin Jelley, Phil Jones, Sarah Jones, Helen Tench

The main goal of the project is to investigate stroke related microstructural changes in the White Matter of brain and evaluate how these changes associate with gait impairments and sensorimotor integration during activities of daily living such as walking. This multidisciplinary research project draws from the fields of Computer Science, Neuroscience and Biomechanics, and it involves collaborative working across Wales between two academic institutions (Aberystwyth University and Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre, CUBRIC) and three health boards (Cardiff and Vale University Health Board, Aneurin Bevan University Health Board and Hywel Dda University Health Board).

The project is funded by the Welsh Stroke Implementation Group under the Stroke Research, Education and Innovation Fund program.

Otar Akanyeti

We are part of one of the largest EU research consortiums to develop a mechanistic and actionable definition of how the brain generates action using a set of elementary interactions and translate this knowledge into novel technological solutions to control robotic mobility. The consortium exploits the complementary competencies of its members across academic, research, private and NGO enterprises while creating synergy through research, innovation, staff exchange and transfer of knowledge.

The project is funded by the European Commission under the Horizon 2020 Marie Curie Research and Innovation Staff Exchange program.

Otar Akanyeti, Federico Villagra Povina, Reyer Zwiggelaar, Dr Esin Öztürk Işık, Dr Hale Sayıbaşılı, Dr Can Yücesoy, Alp Dinçer

The interdisciplinary project aims for delivering wearable technology to improve the lives of stroke patients in Turkey. Recently developed by Aberystwyth University (in collaboration with NHS Wales), the wearable tech provides high resolution movement data to quantify walking disability and evaluate the efficacy of stroke treatment. By providing objective measurements, it will promote consistency of service across Turkey and empower patients to be more independent. Collecting data over long periods in more natural settings will reveal new insights into stroke prevalence and outcomes. It will be easier to identify patients with the greatest health needs and offer personalized rehabilitation programs.

The project is funded by the Centre for International Development Research at Aberystwyth University.

Otar Akanyeti, Federico Villagra Povina, David Langford, Chris Price, Rachel Rahman, Dan Monaghan, Nathan Williams, Megan Taylor Bunker

The goal is to create a virtual exercise practitioner (VEP) to deliver clinically validated, homebased training programs that are safe and stroke specific. The VEP is a mobile app solution powered by artificial intelligence which will enable patients to self-assess and monitor their physical function, offer personalized training and provide real-time feedback to enhance self-motivation. In the future, it will also have the option to feedback patient status to researchers and the NHS. The VEP will help stroke patients cope with isolation and reduce sedentary behaviour. By promoting activity, it will improve the physical, cognitive and mental well-being of patients, aid recovery and in the long-term prevent further health complications (e.g. falls, recurrent stroke, diabetes, depression). A working prototype will be delivered by a multidisciplinary research team from the Aberystwyth University with expertise in Artificial Intelligence, Software Engineering, Stroke Rehabilitation, Clinical Exercise Science and Psychology.

The project is under review by the Welsh Government under Sér Cymru Covid-19 program

Otar Akanyeti, Qiang Shen

This interdisciplinary project aims for discovering new bio-inspired computing strategies for multi-agent systems by integrating principles from particle swarm optimization, stochastic models for animal movement, and classical conditioning theory. We study the organization of fish shoals during collective learning and design a computational framework to model environmental and social interactions underlying this organization.

The project is funded by the Welsh Government under the Sér Cymru Cofund II Research Fellowship program