Earthquake Hazard Input for Loss Estimation Study: St. Louis Highway System

The long recurrence period and high consequence earthquakes events in the New Madrid Seismic Zone have caused some federal agencies (e.g., NEHRP, FHWA) to look at the more densely populated areas where higher seismic risk is present. This paper presents the data collection, interpretation, and analysis of the geotechnical information required for an earthquake loss estimation study in St. Louis metro area. The loss estimation study was limited to the highway transportation system, where only the major highways were considered. The project information was processed using a GIS, and the subsequent loss analysis was executed using the HAZUS-MH program

Estimation of Earthquake Loss due to Bridge Damage in the St. Louis Metropolitan Area: Part I - Direct Losses

The risk associated with earthquake hazards on highway systems is dependent on the complexity of a network and its redundancy in providing traffic flow. Earthquake loss estimation studies can provide decision makers with an appreciation of the importance of having a highway network resistant to earthquakes and information to make the network resistant to these events. The direct economic loss was estimated for a major metropolitan area, St. Louis, for a series of earthquake scenarios. The primary component of the study was damage to bridges within the highway system. The study zone covers the St. Louis metropolitan area and its surrounding suburban regions. The study region includes several major alluvial river valleys with liquefaction susceptible areas. Earthquake scenarios with epicenters in St. Louis (MW 7.0), Germantown, Ill. (MW 7.0) and New Madrid, Mo. (MW 7.7) were selected to contrast high impact/low probability and low impact/higher probability events. The losses to the bridge infrastructure were estimated to range from $70 to$800 million depending on the earthquake event. The data collection, generation, and interpretation are described along with the procedures required to carry out the loss estimation using the geographic information system-based HAZUS-MH system. The output of this project was used as input for a hybrid indirect loss calculation presented in the companion paper

Book Reviews

The legal profession is to be congratulated that men of the great erudition of Dean Wigmore and the editors associated with him are devoting themselves so unselfishly to the heavy labor of presenting in fitting English form the masterpieces of continental legal literature. Though much may be said about the insufficiency of translations as a basis of scholarly work in -any subject, the fact remains that the great bulk of the legal profession, even those of a scholarly habit of mind, have not the linguistic ability necessary to use the original sources of knowledge. On the other hand the need of knowledge of European law is a most insistent one. Our continual round of precedent-grinding, on the basis of the naive political philosophy of the eighteenth century, has long since proved its inadequacy. The profession, or at least the better part of it, is beginning to look for some enlarging and enfranchising ideas, and is ready to welcome them from any source. Though much remains to be done in The detail of working out the history of our own system, we nevertheless have a solid basis of historical knowledge of the common law, thanks to the investigations of our scholars, English and American, in that field: The careful study of cases and the building up of our admirable series of casebooks have made the results of these historical investigations available to the student of our day. The next step forward must be to enlarge the basis of our scholarship by comparative study of other systems in their historical development and to get new points of view as to the meaning and tendency of legal concepts from the legal philosophies of other countries. The translation will give to the average member of the profession and to the ordinary student of law a chance to participate in or at least to keep up with the progress in the comparative and philosophic fields, and will serve the same \u27purpose in this new movement that the casebooks have served in interpreting and passing on the historical knowledge of our own system

Skeletal Muscle Fibrosis in the mdx/utrn plus /- Mouse Validates Its Suitability as a Murine Model of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy

Various therapeutic approaches have been studied for the treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), but none of these approaches have led to significant long-term effects in patients. One reason for this observed inefficacy may be the use of inappropriate animal models for the testing of therapeutic agents. The mdx mouse is the most widely used murine model of DMD, yet it does not model the fibrotic progression observed in patients. Other murine models of DMD are available that lack one or both alleles of utrophin, a functional analog of dystrophin. The aim of this study was to compare fibrosis and myofiber damage in the mdx, mdx/utrn+/- and double knockout (dko) mouse models. We used Masson\u27s trichrome stain and percentage of centrally-nucleated myofibers as indicators of fibrosis and myofiber regeneration, respectively, to assess disease progression in diaphragm and gastrocnemius muscles harvested from young and aged wild-type, mdx, mdx/utrn+/- and dko mice. Our results indicated that eight week-old gastrocnemius muscles of both mdx/utrn+/- and dko hind limb developed fibrosis whereas age-matched mdx gastrocnemius muscle did not (p = 0.002). The amount of collagen found in the mdx/utrn+/- diaphragm was significantly higher than that found in the corresponding diaphragm muscles of wild-type animals, but not of mdx animals (p = 0.0003). Aged mdx/utrn+/- mice developed fibrosis in both diaphragm and gastrocnemius muscles compared to wild-type controls (p = 0.003). Mdx diaphragm was fibrotic in aged mice as well (p = 0.0235), whereas the gastrocnemius muscle in these animals was not fibrotic. We did not measure a significant difference in collagen staining between wild-type and mdx gastrocnemius muscles. The results of this study support previous reports that the moderately-affected mdx/utrn+/- mouse is a better model of DMD, and we show here that this difference is apparent by 2 months of age

Skeletal Muscle Fibrosis in the mdx/utrn+/- Mouse Validates Its Suitability as a Murine Model of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy

Various therapeutic approaches have been studied for the treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), but none of these approaches have led to significant long-term effects in patients. One reason for this observed inefficacy may be the use of inappropriate animal models for the testing of therapeutic agents. The mdx mouse is the most widely used murine model of DMD, yet it does not model the fibrotic progression observed in patients. Other murine models of DMD are available that lack one or both alleles of utrophin, a functional analog of dystrophin. The aim of this study was to compare fibrosis and myofiber damage in the mdx, mdx/utrn+/- and double knockout (dko) mouse models.We used Masson’s trichrome stain and percentage of centrally-nucleated myofibers as indicators of fibrosis and myofiber regeneration, respectively, to assess disease progression in diaphragm and gastrocnemius muscles harvested from young and aged wild-type, mdx, mdx/utrn+/- and dko mice. Our results indicated that eight week-old gastrocnemius muscles of both mdx/utrn+/- and dko hind limb developed fibrosis whereas age-matched mdx gastrocnemius muscle did not (p = 0.002). The amount of collagen found in the mdx/utrn+/- diaphragm was significantly higher than that found in the corresponding diaphragm muscles of wild-type animals, but not of mdx animals (p = 0.0003). Aged mdx/utrn+/- mice developed fibrosis in both diaphragm and gastrocnemius muscles compared to wild-type controls (p = 0.003). Mdx diaphragm was fibrotic in aged mice as well (p = 0.0235), whereas the gastrocnemius muscle in these animals was not fibrotic. We did not measure a significant difference in collagen staining between wild-type and mdx gastrocnemius muscles. The results of this study support previous reports that the moderately-affected mdx/utrn+/- mouse is a better model of DMD, and we show here that this difference is apparent by 2 months of age