Assessing Impacts of Climate Change and Sea-Level Rise on Seawater Intrusion in a Coastal Aquifer

The objectives of this study were to assess the climate change impacts on sea-level rise (SLR) and freshwater recharge rates and to investigate these SLR and freshwater recharge rates on seawater intrusion in coastal groundwater systems through the Saturated-Unsaturated Transport (SUTRA) model. The Gunsan tide gauge station data were used to project SLR based on polynomial regressions. Freshwater recharge rates were assumed as 10% of the projected annual precipitation under climate change. The Byeonsan2 groundwater monitoring well for seawater intrusion was selected for the study. A total of 15 scenarios, including the baseline period (2005–2015), were made based on SLR projections and estimated freshwater recharge rates. The changes in salinity relative to the baseline at the monitoring well for each scenario were investigated through the SUTRA model. From the scenario of 0.57 m SLR with a freshwater recharge rate of 0.0058 kg s−1, the largest salinity increase (40.3%) was simulated. We concluded that this study may provide a better understanding of the climate change impacts on seawater intrusion by considering both SLR and freshwater recharge rates

STAMPS: development and verification of swallowing kinematic analysis software

Abstract Background Swallowing impairment is a common complication in various geriatric and neurodegenerative diseases. Swallowing kinematic analysis is essential to quantitatively evaluate the swallowing motion of the oropharyngeal structures. This study aims to develop a novel swallowing kinematic analysis software, called spatio-temporal analyzer for motion and physiologic study (STAMPS), and verify its validity and reliability. Methods STAMPS was developed in MATLAB, which is one of the most popular platforms for biomedical analysis. This software was constructed to acquire, process, and analyze the data of swallowing motion. The target of swallowing structures includes bony structures (hyoid bone, mandible, maxilla, and cervical vertebral bodies), cartilages (epiglottis and arytenoid), soft tissues (larynx and upper esophageal sphincter), and food bolus. Numerous functions are available for the spatiotemporal parameters of the swallowing structures. Testing for validity and reliability was performed in 10 dysphagia patients with diverse etiologies and using the instrumental swallowing model which was designed to mimic the motion of the hyoid bone and the epiglottis. Results The intra- and inter-rater reliability tests showed excellent agreement for displacement and moderate to excellent agreement for velocity. The Pearson correlation coefficients between the measured and instrumental reference values were nearly 1.00 (P < 0.001) for displacement and velocity. The Bland–Altman plots showed good agreement between the measurements and the reference values. Conclusions STAMPS provides precise and reliable kinematic measurements and multiple practical functionalities for spatiotemporal analysis. The software is expected to be useful for researchers who are interested in the swallowing motion analysis

MOESM3 of STAMPS: development and verification of swallowing kinematic analysis software

Additional file 3: Figure S3. The Bland-Altman plot for the linear (A) and angular (B) velocities. The graph shows the relation between the mean of the two values (reference and STAMPS value, the x-axis) and the difference between the two (the y-axis)