Seismic Risk Assessment of Transportation Network Systems, Journal of Earthquake Engineering

Transportation systems are spatially distributed systems whereby components of the system are exposed to different ground effects due to the same earthquake event. The ground effects that various components of the system are subjected include ground shaking, vertical displacements due to settlement, and horizontal displacements due to lateral spreading and sliding. The ground displacements occur because severe ground shaking causes liquefaction and landslides under the appropriate environmental conditions. Bridges are key components of transportation systems and are particularly susceptible to liquefaction and landslides as they are located over streams and rivers with piers situated over sandy saturated deposits; or they may be over canyons with high slopes that may result in slope instability. Thus, it is important to integrate the effect of local site conditions in the overall earthquake risk of a transportation system.Consideration of the spatial dependence of individual components is an important factor in the evaluation of the network system connectivity and traffic flow through the system. Risk assessment methods require that not only the component performance is assessed, but the overall system performance is evaluated. Most recently, Werner et al. (2000) and Basoz and Kiremidjian (1996) considered the problem of transportation network systems subjected to earthquake events. In both of these publications, the risk to the transportation system is computed from the direct damage to major components such as bridges and the connectivity between a predefined origindestination (O-D) set. Basoz and Kiremidjian (1996) also consider the time delay and use the information primarily for retrofit prioritization strategies. The current software HAZUS (1999) for regional loss estimation developed by the National Institute for Building Standards (NIBS) for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) considers only the direct loss to bridges in the highway transportation network. The connectivity and traffic delay problems resulting from damage to components of the system are not presently included in that software. Chang et al. (2000) propose a simple risk measure for transportation systems to represent the effectiveness of retrofit strategies by considering the difference in costs associated with travel times before and after retrofitting.In this article, a method for risk assessment of a transportation system is postulated that considers the direct cost of damage and costs due to time delays in the damaged system. The method is applied to the transportation network within five counties in the San Francisco Bay Area and conclusions are drawn on the basis of the application. The site hazards considered in the direct loss estimation include ground shaking, liquefaction and landslides. The effect of bridge damage from ground shaking hazard on the transportation network is studied under the assumption that traffic demand following the earthquake is either constant or variable

Seismic Risk Assessment of Transportation Network Systems, Journal of Earthquake Engineering

Transportation systems are spatially distributed systems whereby components of the system are exposed to different ground effects due to the same earthquake event. The ground effects that various components of the system are subjected include ground shaking, vertical displacements due to settlement, and horizontal displacements due to lateral spreading and sliding. The ground displacements occur because severe ground shaking causes liquefaction and landslides under the appropriate environmental conditions. Bridges are key components of transportation systems and are particularly susceptible to liquefaction and landslides as they are located over streams and rivers with piers situated over sandy saturated deposits; or they may be over canyons with high slopes that may result in slope instability. Thus, it is important to integrate the effect of local site conditions in the overall earthquake risk of a transportation system. Consideration of the spatial dependence of individual components is an important factor in the evaluation of the network system connectivity and traffic flow through the system. Risk assessment methods require that not only the component performance is assessed, but the overall system performance is evaluated. Most recently, Werner et al. (2000) and Basoz and Kiremidjian (1996) considered the problem of transportation network systems subjected to earthquake events. In both of these publications, the risk to the transportation system is computed from the direct damage to major components such as bridges and the connectivity between a predefined origindestination (O-D) set. Basoz and Kiremidjian (1996) also consider the time delay and use the information primarily for retrofit prioritization strategies. The current software HAZUS (1999) for regional loss estimation developed by the National Institute for Building Standards (NIBS) for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) considers only the direct loss to bridges in the highway transportation network. The connectivity and traffic delay problems resulting from damage to components of the system are not presently included in that software. Chang et al. (2000) propose a simple risk measure for transportation systems to represent the effectiveness of retrofit strategies by considering the difference in costs associated with travel times before and after retrofitting. In this article, a method for risk assessment of a transportation system is postulated that considers the direct cost of damage and costs due to time delays in the damaged system. The method is applied to the transportation network within five counties in the San Francisco Bay Area and conclusions are drawn on the basis of the application. The site hazards considered in the direct loss estimation include ground shaking, liquefaction and landslides. The effect of bridge damage from ground shaking hazard on the transportation network is studied under the assumption that traffic demand following the earthquake is either constant or variable.UCD-ITS-RP-08-10, Civil Engineering

The Self-Concept Life Cycle and Brand Perceptions: An Interdisciplinary Perspective

Consumer research has paid scant attention to the full spectrum of a consumer’s self-concept life cycle and its subsequent impact on brand attitude. This article presents a conceptual framework that provides the foundation for future research on how the self-concept, across its full life cycle, impacts brand attitude. The article considers the development of the self-concept from childhood to late adulthood, and integrates findings from various disciplines into a comprehensive framework. The factors in the framework affecting the self-concept are global culture, life events, as well as cognitive and desired age. The article offers six propositions to guide future research and encourage more interdisciplinary work, as well as guiding the application of a broader perspective in terms of the self-concept’s full life-span. Moreover, the article also presents methodological and managerial implications on how to use branding approaches that target specific consumer segments according to their self-concepts’ life cycle

The impact of surgical delay on resectability of colorectal cancer: An international prospective cohort study

AimThe SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has provided a unique opportunity to explore the impact of surgical delays on cancer resectability. This study aimed to compare resectability for colorectal cancer patients undergoing delayed versus non-delayed surgery.MethodsThis was an international prospective cohort study of consecutive colorectal cancer patients with a decision for curative surgery (January-April 2020). Surgical delay was defined as an operation taking place more than 4 weeks after treatment decision, in a patient who did not receive neoadjuvant therapy. A subgroup analysis explored the effects of delay in elective patients only. The impact of longer delays was explored in a sensitivity analysis. The primary outcome was complete resection, defined as curative resection with an R0 margin.ResultsOverall, 5453 patients from 304 hospitals in 47 countries were included, of whom 6.6% (358/5453) did not receive their planned operation. Of the 4304 operated patients without neoadjuvant therapy, 40.5% (1744/4304) were delayed beyond 4 weeks. Delayed patients were more likely to be older, men, more comorbid, have higher body mass index and have rectal cancer and early stage disease. Delayed patients had higher unadjusted rates of complete resection (93.7% vs. 91.9%, P = 0.032) and lower rates of emergency surgery (4.5% vs. 22.5%, P ConclusionOne in 15 colorectal cancer patients did not receive their planned operation during the first wave of COVID-19. Surgical delay did not appear to compromise resectability, raising the hypothesis that any reduction in long-term survival attributable to delays is likely to be due to micro-metastatic disease

Search for Nonresonant Pair Production of Highly Energetic Higgs Bosons Decaying to Bottom Quarks

International audienceA search for nonresonant Higgs boson (H) pair production via gluon and vector boson (V) fusion is performed in the four-bottom-quark final state, using proton-proton collision data at 13 TeV corresponding to 138  fb-1 collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC. The analysis targets Lorentz-boosted H pairs identified using a graph neural network. It constrains the strengths relative to the standard model of the H self-coupling and the quartic VVHH couplings, κ2V, excluding κ2V=0 for the first time, with a significance of 6.3 standard deviations when other H couplings are fixed to their standard model values

Preoperative nasopharyngeal swab testing and postoperative pulmonary complications in patients undergoing elective surgery during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic.

BACKGROUND: Surgical services are preparing to scale up in areas affected by COVID-19. This study aimed to evaluate the association between preoperative SARS-CoV-2 testing and postoperative pulmonary complications in patients undergoing elective cancer surgery. METHODS: This international cohort study included adult patients undergoing elective surgery for cancer in areas affected by SARS-CoV-2 up to 19 April 2020. Patients suspected of SARS-CoV-2 infection before operation were excluded. The primary outcome measure was postoperative pulmonary complications at 30 days after surgery. Preoperative testing strategies were adjusted for confounding using mixed-effects models. RESULTS: Of 8784 patients (432 hospitals, 53 countries), 2303 patients (26.2 per cent) underwent preoperative testing: 1458 (16.6 per cent) had a swab test, 521 (5.9 per cent) CT only, and 324 (3.7 per cent) swab and CT. Pulmonary complications occurred in 3.9 per cent, whereas SARS-CoV-2 infection was confirmed in 2.6 per cent. After risk adjustment, having at least one negative preoperative nasopharyngeal swab test (adjusted odds ratio 0.68, 95 per cent confidence interval 0.68 to 0.98; P = 0.040) was associated with a lower rate of pulmonary complications. Swab testing was beneficial before major surgery and in areas with a high 14-day SARS-CoV-2 case notification rate, but not before minor surgery or in low-risk areas. To prevent one pulmonary complication, the number needed to swab test before major or minor surgery was 18 and 48 respectively in high-risk areas, and 73 and 387 in low-risk areas. CONCLUSION: Preoperative nasopharyngeal swab testing was beneficial before major surgery and in high SARS-CoV-2 risk areas. There was no proven benefit of swab testing before minor surgery in low-risk areas