Study on Kaishochi changes before and after the war-damage-recovery land readjustment programs of Nagoya City, Japanese Castle Town

In this paper, focusing on open temple-type kaishochi (open areas ensconced in the design of urban blocks) located in the district of Nagoya City in Japan’s Aichi Prefecture, we will review the effects of the war-damage-recovery land readjustment programs, through which the city has experienced a number of major transformation. Specifically, we will elucidate the actual state of such kaishochi before and after the project by examining residual trends of temple-type structures by using maps produced before and after the project implementation. Targeting 66 Edo-period kaishochi blocks in the Nagoya Castle district, we first analyzed the differences between the land usage decrease rate for the whole district and that for the targeted kaishochis. Next, we analyzed transformations of usage and form using the maps produced before and after the project implementation. As a result of our analysis, the following three points were clarified. First, even though the number of temple-type kaishochis is decreasing, there has been little change in the area they occupy. Second, there has been little change in kaishochi usage before and after the project implementation. Third, looking at the kaishochi forms, we can find changes from Flagpole type (large inner area with narrow outside access), no-contact type (large inner area with no public access to outside roads), and integrated type (large access to outside road)

An improved heuristic algorithm for the maximum benefit Chinese postman problem

The maximum benefit Chinese postman problem (MBCPP) is a practical generalization of the Chinese postman problem. A distinctive feature of MBCPP is that the postman can traverse each edge arbitrary times and obtains a benefit for each traversal of an edge, which depends on the number of times that the edge has been traversed. (Pearn and Wang, Omega 31 (2003) 269–273) discussed MBCPP under the assumption that the benefits of each edge is a non-increasing function of the number of traversals. They showed that MBCPP under this assumption is NP-hard, and proposed a heuristic algorithm which applies the minimum spanning tree and the minimal-cost T-join algorithms. (Corberán, Plana, Rodríguez-Chía and Sanchis, Math. Program. 141 (2013) 21–48) presented an integer programming formulation and a branch-and-cut algorithm for MBCPP without the assumption on the benefits. This is based on the idea of integrating the benefits of each edge into two benefits, each representing that the edge is traversed an odd or even number of times. In this paper, by applying the idea of Corberán et al., we improve the heuristic algorithm of Pearn and Wang. Our algorithm applies to the general case with no assumption on the benefits, and can perform better even if the benefits are non-increasing. We then analyze the efficiency of our heuristic algorithm in theory and in practice, and prove that it finds the optimal solution when the benefits satisfy a certain property

The Longitudinal Study of Liver Cysts in Patients With Autosomal Dominant Polycystic Kidney Disease and Polycystic Liver Disease

Although polycystic liver disease (PCLD) is one of the extrarenal complications in patients with autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD), longitudinal changes and the association with total liver volume (TLV) have not been clearly elucidated yet. Methods: Patients with ADPKD were chosen who underwent computed tomography or magnetic resonance imaging twice or more during August 2003 through December 2015. TLV, each cyst volume, and the proportion of parenchyma were measured. The natural history of liver cysts and the association between TLV and liver cysts were evaluated. To compare with liver cysts in ADPKD patients with PCLD, simple liver cysts in patients without ADPKD were also evaluated. Results: TLV at baseline and its growth rate in all the patients with ADPKD, whose serum creatinine, estimated glomerular filtration rate, and total kidney volume were 1.45 mg/dl (0.76–2.32 mg/dl), 38.5 ml/min per 1.73 m2 (18.7–57.9 ml/min per 1.73 m2), and 1394 ml (773–2861 ml), were 1431 ml (1062–1749 ml) and −0.95%/yr (−3.16 to 4.94%/yr), respectively, in the observation period (median, 1063 days). Neither TLV nor its growth rate was significantly different between ADPKD patients with PCLD and those without PCLD. The growth rate of 79 liver cysts was 39.5%/yr (17.5–80.8%/yr) in PCLD patients with ADPKD. It was significantly larger than that of 60 simple liver cysts in the non-ADPKD group, 11.0%/yr (−2.2 to 33.1%/yr). Moreover, the proportion of parenchyma reduced, whereas that of total cyst volume increased significantly (P = 0.001). Discussion: The reduction of parenchyma was accompanied by the growth of liver cysts during time course in PCLD patients with ADPKD