Evacuation Hazards in Crowded Subway Stations

Underground subway system is the key transportation means in dense urban areas such as Hong Kong. Subway stations are crowded with passengers on the platforms and they are observed to squeeze into the train carriages during rush hours. Putting in platform screen doors made the situation even worse. As reported in the local news, subway management claims that after following the change in maximum capacity from six passengers per meter square to four passengers per meter square, the capacity is only 70% full at rush hours. However, the capacity can be over 90% of full loading under the new calculation. Subway stations become more crowded with an average weekday patronage of nearly 5.3 million passengers.  Subway stations are mostly located in the basement or ground levels connecting the shopping mall, commercial or residential building in downtown areas. The occupancy density of passengers can be much higher than expected during festivals with fireworks show and during large-scale movements such as Occupy Central. Therefore, evacuation time in emergency situation will be prolonged. To have a better understanding of the safety issue in subway stations, evacuation time in emergency situations will be studied in this paper.  Two subway stations, Station A and Station B are selected in this paper to study the evacuation hazard of crowded stations when a fire occurs. Station A is an interchange station between two railway lines, being one of the most crowded stations with high occupancy density. Station B is the first station in the local rail network to feature a special design - “Lift-only Entrancesâ€. This is a deep underground station which lies under 70 m of ground level, the passengers have to be evacuated by lift. The occupancy density in Station B is relatively much lower than Station A under normal conditions at the moment, though the station can be very crowded if there are train delays due to signal failure or other reasons.  In this paper, the evacuation effectiveness of Station A and Station B are estimated in terms of evacuation time in different scenarios by using Hydraulic Model Calculation. Moreover, the special evacuation feature of “Lift-only Entrances†in Station B and the fire safety management strategies for emergency evacuation will be discussed.  Three scenarios will be studied in each station:  Scenario A: Assume that the passengers are evenly distributed in different exits in emergency situation. All the possible factors such as passenger behaviors and conditions are eliminated.  Scenario B: Passengers have a higher tendency to evacuate at the larger exit, this is one of the passenger behaviors in emergency situation. Therefore, the passenger distribution which depends on the exit width will be studied.  Scenario C: Assume that some of the exit routes are blocked.  The most important factor for the above study is the passenger behaviors. As in scenario B, passenger behaviors would affect the evacuation time. Therefore, fire safety management is identified to be a key part in keeping efficient evacuation. For example, a good fire action plan on crowd control is needed

Measurements of normal inner ear on computed tomography in children with congenital sensorineural hearing loss

The objective of this study is to use standardized measurements of the inner ear to see whether there are subtle bony malformations in children with congenital sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) whose temporal bone computed tomography (CT) are grossly normal. The study includes 45 ears with congenital SNHL and grossly normal temporal bone CT scans and 45 ears with normal inner ear structures and normal hearing. Standardized measurements of the inner ear structures were made on axial temporal bone CT scans. Student's t test was performed to compare the measurements of the two groups. There were significant differences in the measurements of the bony island width of the superior semicircular canal, bony island width of the lateral semicircular canal and maximal height of cochlea between two groups (P < 0.05). In conclusion, standardized measurements of bony labyrinth of inner ear on temporal bone CT can identify subtle abnormalities of inner ear in patients with congenital SNHL having grossly normal radiological images

Translation and Validation of the Chinese ICD-11 International Trauma Questionnaire (ITQ) for the Assessment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD (CPTSD)

Background: Two stress-related disorders have been proposed for inclusion in the revised ICD-11: Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD (CPTSD). The International Trauma Questionnaire (ITQ) is a bespoke measure of PTSD and CPTSD and has been widely used in English-speaking countries. Objective: The primary aim of this study was to develop a Chinese version of the ITQ and assess its content, construct, and concurrent validity. Methods: Six mental health practitioners and experts rated the Chinese translated and back-translated items to assess content validity. A sample of 423 Chinese young adults completed the ITQ, the WHO Adverse Childhood Experiences International Questionnaire, and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. Among them, 31 participants also completed the English and Chinese versions of the ITQ administered in random order at retest. Four alternative confirmatory factor analysis models were tested using data from participants who reported at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE; N = 314). Results: The Chinese ITQ received excellent ratings on relevance and appropriateness. Test–retest reliability and semantic equivalence across English and Chinese versions were acceptable. The correlated first-order six-factor model and a second-order two-factor (PTSD and DSO) both provided an acceptable model fit. The six ITQ symptoms clusters were all significantly correlated with anxiety, depression, and the number of ACEs. Conclusions: The Chinese ITQ generates scores with acceptable psychometric properties and provides evidence for including PTSD and CPTSD as separate diagnoses in ICD-11

Design and Development of an RFID-based HIS - A Case Study

The Healthcare industry involves critical activities where small mistakes could cause huge loss of life and incur massive financial losses. Improving operational efficiency and enhancing data correctness of patients are the prime targets of using hospital information system (HIS). Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology, with a unique ability to perform automatic data collection without any human intervention, has gained great interest in the healthcare industry. In this research, an RFID‐enabled HIS is proposed for improving operations in a hospital. This research presents the fundamentals of RFID, the benefits and its challenges, and also demonstrates three improved signature applications. It aims at providing the healthcare industry with a comprehensive understanding of RFID and its suitability for healthcare applications. The proposed system is considered to be suitably operational, practical, and affordable for healthcare organizations not only in China and Hong Kong, but also in other countries

A Real Time Quality Monitoring System for the Lighting Industry: A Practical and Rapid Approach Using Computer Vision and Image Processing (CVIP) Tools

In China, the manufacturing of lighting products is very labour intensive. The approach used to check quality and control production relies on operators who test using various types of fixtures. In order to increase the competitiveness of the manufacturer and the efficiency of production, the authors propose an integrated system. This system has two major elements: a computer vision system (CVS) and a real‐time monitoring system (RTMS). This model focuses not only on the rapid and practical application of modern technology to a traditional industry, but also represents a process innovation in the lighting industry. This paper describes the design and development of the prototyped lighting inspection system based on a practical and fast approach using computer vision and imaging processing (CVIP) tools. LabVIEW with IMAQ Vision Builder is the chosen tool for building the CVS. Experimental results show that this system produces a lower error rate than humans produce in the quality checking process. The whole integrated manufacturing strategy, aimed at achieving a better performance, is most suitable for a China and other labour intensive environments such as India.

Thermodynamic processes on a semiconductor surface during in-situ multi-beam laser interference patterning

Laser interference has been widely used to produce one-dimensional gratings and more recently has shown great potential for two-dimensional patterning. In this study, the authors examine by simulation, its application to in-situ patterning during materials growth. To understand the potential, it is important to study the surface processes resulting from the laser-matter interaction which have a key influence on the resulting growth mechanisms. In this work, the intensity distribution and the laser-semiconductor interaction resulting from four-beam interference patterns are analysed by numerical simulations. In particular, the authors derive the time and spatially dependent thermal distribution along with the thermal-induced desorption and surface diffusion. The results provide a crucial understanding of the light-induced thermal profile and show that the surface temperature and the surface adatom kinetics can be controlled by multi-beam pulsed laser interference patterning due to photothermal reactions. The approach has potential as an in-situ technique for the fast and precise nanostructuring of semiconductor material surfaces

Sex-specific cardiac remodeling in early and advanced stages of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy

Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) is the most frequent genetic cardiac disease with a prevalence of 1:500 to 1:200. While most patients show obstructive HCM and a relatively stable clinical phenotype (stage II), a small group of patients progresses to end-stage HCM (stage IV) within a relatively brie