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Palatal defects are rehabilitated by fabricating maxillofacial prostheses called obturators. The treatment incorporates taking deviously unpredictable impressions to facsimile the palatal defects into plaster casts for obturator fabrication in the dental laboratory. The casts are then digitally stored using expensive hardware to prevent physical damage or data loss and, when required, future obturators are digitally designed, and 3D printed. Our objective was to construct and validate an economic in-house smartphone-integrated stereophotogrammetry (SPINS) 3D scanner and to evaluate its accuracy in designing prosthetics using open source/free (OS/F) digital pipeline. Palatal defect models were scanned using SPINS and its accuracy was compared against the standard laser scanner for virtual area and volumetric parameters. SPINS derived 3D models were then used to design obturators by using (OS/F) software. The resultant obturators were virtually compared against standard medical software designs. There were no significant differences in any of the virtual parameters when evaluating the accuracy of both SPINS, as well as OS/F derived obturators. However, limitations in the design process resulted in minimal dissimilarities. With further improvements, SPINS based prosthetic rehabilitation could create a viable, low cost method for rural and developing health services to embrace maxillofacial record keeping and digitised prosthetic rehabilitation.

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Marine ecosystem around the world especially in coastal areas are facing threats of extinction from climate change, water pollution, and human activities, and therefore are in an urgent need for a round-the-clock monitoring. A novel Malaysian Integrated Ocean Observation System (MIOOS) buoy has been developed, which integrates an audio and visual surveillance into the traditional ocean data acquisition system (ODAS) buoy with the objective of providing a complete and cost effective coastal monitoring solution for marine parks. The buoy was equipped with sensors to sample oceanographic and meteorological data, and also a hydrophone and two cameras including one omni-directional camera to capture audio and visual data of the surrounding. The buoy embedded system has been designed using a low-power MSP430G2533 from Texas Instrument as the primary microcontroller. The system was powered by an 80Ah Lithium Ion battery, which was rechargeable using two units of 20 Watts solar panels. Data were transmitted to a ground station using XTend 900 MHz wireless module, which were subsequently stored and shared over the internet through a broadband modem. The buoy also has been made configurable using a Short Message Service (SMS) through a GSM modem connected to the ground station. Field testing has been conducted at a coastal area and the oceanographic and meteorological data as well as images have been collected. Data plotted have satisfactorily exposed some trends which are useful in oceanographic and meteorological studies.

No abstract