• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.7
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• pp.3105-3112
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• 2014

Purpose: To examine breast cancer (BC) incidence trends in relation to mammographic screening and risk factor prevalence in South Australia (SA). Materials and Methods: Trends in annual BC incidence rates were calculated using direct standardisation and compared with projected incidence derived from Poisson regression analysis of pre-screening rates. Annual percentage change and change time points were estimated using Joinpoint software. Biennial mammography screening participation rates were calculated using data from BreastScreen SA. Trends in overweight/obesity, alcohol use and hormone replacement therapy (HRT) use were examined using 1991-2009 Health Omnibus Survey data. Trends in total fertility were examined using data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Results: BC incidence increased around the time BreastScreen commenced and then stabilised in the mid-1990s. However rates have remained higher than projected, even though the proportion and age distribution of first time screening attendees stabilised around 1998. A decrease in BC incidence was observed among women aged 50-59yrs from the late-1990's but not among older women. Obesity and alcohol use have increased steadily in all age groups, while HRT use declined sharply from the late-1990s. Conclusions: BC incidence has remained higher than projected since mammography screening began. The sustained elevation is likely to be due to lead time effects, though over-diagnosis cannot be excluded. Declining HRT use has also impacted incidence trends. Implications: Studies using individual level data, which can account for changes in risk factor prevalence and lead time effects, are required to evaluate 'over-diagnosis' due to screening.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.1007-1015
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• 2013

A stochastic probability model based on the non-homogeneous Poisson process is represented that can correctly analyze the time-dependent linear and nonlinear behaviors of total damage over the occurrence process of loads. Introducing several types of damage intensity functions, the probability of failure and the total damage with respect to mean time to failure has been investigated in detail. Taking particularly the limit state to be the random variables followed with a distribution function, the uncertainty of that would be taken into consideration in this paper. In addition, the stochastic probability model has been straightforwardly applied to the rubble-mound breakwaters with the definition of damage level about the erosion of armor units. The probability of failure and the nonlinear total damage with respect to mean time to failure has been analyzed with the damage intensity functions for armor units estimated by fitting the expected total damage to the experimental datum. Based on the present results from the stochastic probability model, the preventive management for the armor units of the rubble-mound breakwaters would be suggested to make a decision on the repairing time and the minimum amounts repaired quantitatively.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.347-355
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• 2014

Thermal problems that are directly related to the lifetime of an electronic device are becoming increasingly important owing to the miniaturization of electronic devices. To solve thermal problems, it is essential to study thermal stability through thermal diffusion and insulation. A honeycomb sandwich plate has anisotropic thermal conductivity. To analyze the thermal deformation and temperature distribution of a system that employs a honeycomb sandwich plate, the thermal and elastic properties need to be determined. In this study, the thermal and elastic properties of a honeycomb sandwich plate, such as thermal conductivity, coefficient of thermal expansion, elastic modulus, Poisson's ratio, and shear modulus, are predicted. The properties of a honeycomb sandwich plate vary according to the hexagon size, thickness, and material properties.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.2783-2787
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• 2013

To assess the risk of cancer incidence after medical radiation exposure for coronary artery disease (CAD), a retrospective cohort study was conducted based on Taiwan's National Health Insurance Research Database (NHIRD). Patients with CAD were identified according to the International Classification of Diseases code, 9th Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM), and their records of medical radiation procedures were collected from 1997 to 2010. A total of 18,697 subjects with radiation exposure from cardiac imaging or therapeutic procedures for CAD were enrolled, and 19,109 subjects receiving cardiac diagnostic procedures without radiation were adopted as the control group. The distributions of age and gender were similar between the two populations. Cancer risks were evaluated by age-adjusted incidence rate ratio (aIRR) and association with cumulative exposure were further evaluated with relative risks by Poisson regression analysis. A total of 954 and 885 subjects with various types of cancers in both cohorts after following up for over 10 years were found, with incidences of 409.8 and 388.0 per 100,000 person-years, respectively. The risk of breast cancer (aIRR=1.85, 95% confidence interval: 1.14-3.00) was significantly elevated in the exposed female subjects, but no significant cancer risk was found in the exposed males. In addition, cancer risks of the breast and lung were increased with the exposure level. The study suggests that radiation exposure from cardiac imaging or therapeutic procedures for CAD may be associated with the increased risk of breast and lung cancers in CAD patients.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.14
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• pp.5901-5908
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• 2014

Background: Data from BreastScreen Australia Screening and Assessment Services (SAS) for 2002-2010 were analysed to determine whether some SAS characteristics were more conducive that others to high screening performance, as indicated by high priority performance indicators and standards. Materials And Methods: Indicators investigated related to: numbers of benign open biopsies, screen-detected invasive cancers, and interval cancers, and wait times between screening and assessment. Multivariate Poisson regression was undertaken using as candidate predictors of performance, SAS size (screening volume), urban or rural location, year of screening, accreditation status, and percentages of clients from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, rural and remote areas, and socio-economically disadvantaged areas. Results: Performance standards for benign biopsies and invasive cancer detection were uniformly met irrespective of SAS location and size. The interval cancer standard was also met, except in 2003 when the 95% confidence interval of the rate still incorporated the national standard. Performance indicators improved over time for: benign open biopsy for second or subsequent screening rounds; rates of invasive breast cancer detection for second or subsequent screening rounds; and rates of small cancer detection. No differences were found over time in interval cancer rates. Interval cancer rates did not differ between non-metropolitan and metropolitan SAS, although state-wide SAS had lower rates. The standard for wait time between screening and assessment (being assessed ${\leq}28$ days) was mostly unmet and this applied in particular to SAS with high percentages of culturally and linguistically diverse women in their screening populations. Conclusions: Gains in performance were observed, and all performance standards were met irrespective of SAS characteristics, except wait times to assessment. Additional descriptive data should be collected on SAS characteristics, and their associations with favourable screening performance, as these may be important when deciding on SAS design

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.16 no.7
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• pp.1463-1469
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• 2012

This paper has presented the influence of scaling theory on short channel effects of double gate(DG) MOSFET in subthreshold region. In the case of conventional MOSFET, to preserve constantly output characteristics,current and switching frequency have been analyzed based on scaling theory. To analyze the results of application of scaling theory for short channel effects of DGMOSFET, the changes of threshold voltage, drain induced barrier height and subthreshold swing have been observed according to scaling factor. The analytical potential distribution of Poisson equation already verified has been used. As a result, it has been observed that threshold voltage among short channel effects is grealty changed according to scaling factor. The best scaling theory for DGMOSFET has been explained as using modified scaling theory, applying weighting factor reflected the influence of two gates when scaling theory has been applied for channel length.

• Journal of computational fluids engineering
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.38-47
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• 2005

Substructuring methods are often used in finite element structural analyses. In this study a multi-level substructuring(MLSS) algorithm is developed and proposed as a possible candidate for finite element fluid solvers. The present algorithm consists of four stages such as a gathering, a condensing, a solving and a scattering stage. At each level, a predetermined number of elements are gathered and condensed to form an element of higher level. At the highest level, each sub-domain consists of only one super-element. Thus, the inversion process of a stiffness matrix associated with internal degrees of freedom of each sub-domain has been replaced by a sequential static condensation of gathered element matrices. The global algebraic system arising from the assembly of each sub-domain matrices is solved using a well-known iterative solver such as the conjugare gradient(CG) or the conjugate gradient squared(CGS) method. A time comparison with CG has been performed on a 2-D Poisson problem. With one domain the computing time by MLSS is comparable with that by CG up to about 260,000 d.o.f. For 263,169 d.o.f using 8 x 8 sub-domains, the time by MLSS is reduced to a value less than $30\%$ of that by CG. The lid-driven cavity problem has been solved for Re = 3200 using the element interpolation degree(Deg.) up to cubic. in this case, preconditioning techniques usually accompanied by iterative solvers are not needed. Finite element formulation for the incompressible flow has been stabilized by a modified residual procedure proposed by Ilinca et al.[9].

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.34 no.3
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• pp.821-831
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• 2014

Stochastic rainfall generators or stochastic simulation have been widely employed to generate synthetic rainfall sequences which can be used in hydrologic models as inputs. The calibration of Poisson cluster stochastic rainfall generator (e.g. Modified Bartlett-Lewis Rectangular Pulse, MBLRP) is seriously affected by local minima that is usually estimated from the local optimization algorithm. In this regard, global optimization techniques such as particle swarm optimization and shuffled complex evolution algorithm have been proposed to better estimate the parameters. Although the global search algorithm is designed to avoid the local minima, reliable parameter estimation of MBLRP model is not always feasible especially in a limited parameter space. In addition, uncertainty associated with parameters in the MBLRP rainfall generator has not been properly addressed yet. In this sense, this study aims to develop and test a Bayesian model based parameter estimation method for the MBLRP rainfall generator that allow us to derive the posterior distribution of the model parameters. It was found that the HBM based MBLRP model showed better performance in terms of reproducing rainfall statistic and underlying distribution of hourly rainfall series.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.10
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• pp.10-20
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• 2003

In this study, the effective properties were numerically calculated for laminated plain weave textile composites with arbitrary s tacking orientation angles. A single-field macroelement with modified sub-domain integration was used in the analysis to reduce computer resource requirement while efficiently accounting for the internal microstructure. A sample calculation procedure based on the Monte Carlo method was employed to consider the random shift between the layers. Results showed that a significant deviation occurred when the orientation angles were near 0 deg for extensional modulus and Poisson's ratio and 45 deg for the shear modulus. It was also found that the average properties calculated by the 2-layer numerical specimen had large differences compared to the CLT results, which indicated that a caution must be needed when designig of thin plain weave composite structures.

• Clinical and Experimental Pediatrics
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• v.60 no.11
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• pp.353-358
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• 2017

Purpose: To develop and evaluate a simple screening tool to assess hearing loss in newborns. A derived score was compared with the standard clinical practice tool. Methods: This cohort study was designed to screen the hearing of newborns using transiently evoked otoacoustic emission and auditory brain stem response, and to determine the risk factors associated with hearing loss of newborns in 3 tertiary hospitals in Northern Thailand. Data were prospectively collected from November 1, 2010 to May 31, 2012. To develop the risk score, clinical-risk indicators were measured by Poisson risk regression. The regression coefficients were transformed into item scores dividing each regression-coefficient with the smallest coefficient in the model, rounding the number to its nearest integer, and adding up to a total score. Results: Five clinical risk factors (Craniofacial anomaly, Ototoxicity, Birth weight, family history [Relative] of congenital sensorineural hearing loss, and Apgar score) were included in our COBRA score. The screening tool detected, by area under the receiver operating characteristic curve, more than 80% of existing hearing loss. The positive-likelihood ratio of hearing loss in patients with scores of 4, 6, and 8 were 25.21 (95% confidence interval [CI], 14.69-43.26), 58.52 (95% CI, 36.26-94.44), and 51.56 (95% CI, 33.74-78.82), respectively. This result was similar to the standard tool (The Joint Committee on Infant Hearing) of 26.72 (95% CI, 20.59-34.66). Conclusion: A simple screening tool of five predictors provides good prediction indices for newborn hearing loss, which may motivate parents to bring children for further appropriate testing and investigations.