Search

Background: The population of Roman Britain are renowned for having elevated nitrogen (δ15) stable isotope values, which have been interpreted as evidence for the increased consumption of marine products. However, such results are now understood to also reflect episodes of stress and disease, suggesting that new interpretations are warranted. Aim: To test a novel approach which combines hazard mortality analysis and stable isotope data to determine whether there is a relationship between age-at-death, elevated δ15N values and mortality risk. Subjects and methods: This study used published osteological and dietary stable isotope data for nitrogen (δ15N) and carbon (δ13C) of 659 1st–5th century AD individuals aged >12 years old excavated from Roman cemeteries in Britain. The relationship between diet and mortality risk was assessed using the Gompertz hazard model, and differences in median reported isotope values between the sexes was determined using a Mann Whitney test. Results: It was discovered that higher δ15N levels are associated with elevated risks of mortality, whereas the opposite pattern was observed for δ13C, and males had higher median δ13C and δ15N values. Conclusion: This study successfully demonstrated that stable isotope data can be integrated into hazard models, allowing one to connect diet and mortality in past populations. It supports the findings of other isotope studies which have established that individuals with childhood stress/trauma will have different isotope patterns.

Abstract: The Systemic Theoretical Process Analysis (STPA) model is used for hazard analysis and accident prevention, based on systemic thinking and the identification of causal scenarios, created by Professor Nancy Leveson of the Institute of Technology of Massachusetts (MIT). The purpose of this article is to perform a bibliometric and patent analysis of the STPA model. Since bibliometry is an important tool in the analysis of scientific production, this method is used as a descriptive statistic, for the purposes of this study, the concepts of Goffman's Epidemic Theory were highlighted, under a mainly qualitative analysis, for a study of decline and ascent scientific method. For the bibliometric analysis, the main page of Professor Nancy Leveson was used in MIT's Web site, besides the Web of Science, Mendeley, ResearchGate, Village of Engineering and Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO). Aiming to cover the patents analysis it was used the Derwent, IHS and Orbit research bases. Defining as search term “Analysis of the Theoretical Process of Systems” and “STPA”, searched in the title, abstract and keywords. A total of 171 publications (1990 to 2017) were found, with 89 specific references of the STPA model (2002 to 2017), addressing several subjects such as: definitions, steps, complements to the model, areas of application and use of the model with another risk analysis tool. At the end of this article are highlighted the main works of the STPA model, tools of support and analysis, serving as base and favoring future works.

Purpose: Conditional survival (CS) and failure hazard estimations can provide important dynamic prognostic information for clinical decision‐making and surveillance counseling. The current study aimed to investigate the CS and dynamic failure hazard in non‐metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) treated with intensity‐modulated radiotherapy (IMRT). Methods: Conditional overall survival (COS) and progression‐free survival (CPFS) estimates adjusted for age and gender against each AJCC 8th stage were calculated. Multivariable Cox regression (MCR) models were fitted in the entire population at baseline and subsequently separate MCR models were fitted in patients who have maintained event‐free time of 1 to 10 years to generate respective hazard ratio (HR). Annual hazard rates of death and progression over 10 years for each stage were also estimated. Results: A total of 1993 patients were eligible for analysis. The estimated 5‐year OS and PFS for entire cohort were 79.0% and 70.7% at initial diagnosis. After 5 years of event‐free follow‐up, additional 5‐year COS and CPFS increased to 85.9% and 85.5%, respectively. Stage I/II maintained dramatically favorable CS and low hazard (< 5%) of death and progression over time. Relative to stage I/II, stage III manifested non‐significantly higher failure hazard for the first 3 years of survivorship and approached to similar level of stage I/II afterwards. Stage IVA presented most impressive improvement in terms of both COS (∆=9.8%) and CPFS (∆ = 16.8%) whereas still drastically inferior to that of stage I‐III across all conditional time points. After 4 years of follow‐up, progression hazard of stage IVA became relatively steady of approximate 6%. Conclusions: Survival prospect of non‐metastatic NPC improves over years with distinct dynamic patterns across stages, providing important implications for personalized decision‐making in terms of both clinical management and surveillance counseling. Stage‐dependent and hazard‐adapted clinical management and surveillance are warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In natural language processing (NLP) of Chinese hazard text collected in the process of hazard identification, Chinese word segmentation (CWS) is the first step to extracting meaningful information from such semi-structured Chinese texts. This paper proposes a new neighbor entropy-based segmentation (NES) model for CWS. The model considers the segmentation benefits of neighbor entropies, adopting the concept of "neighbor" in optimization research. It is defined by the benefit ratio of text segmentation, including benefits and losses of combining the segmentation unit with more information than other popular statistical models. In the experiments performed, together with the maximum-based segmentation algorithm, the NES model achieves a 99.3% precision, 98.7% recall, and 99.0% f-measure for text segmentation; these performances are higher than those of existing tools based on other seven popular statistical models. Results show that the NES model is a valid CWS, especially for text segmentation requirements necessitating longer-sized characters. The text corpus used comes from the Beijing Municipal Administration of Work Safety, which was recorded in the fourth quarter of 2018. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seismic hazard in terms of peak ground acceleration (PGA) and spectral acceleration (SA) for the seismically active Indo-Gangetic Basin (IGB) has been computed using both a fault model and spatially smoothed-grid seismicity model. Seismicity parameters, viz. minimum magnitude, the maximum regional magnitude M max , mean seismic activity rate λ , the slope of the frequency–magnitude Gutenberg–Richter relationship, and the β-value ( b l n (10) ), have been estimated spatially. The layered seismogenic source framework based on hypocentral depth distribution, i.e. 0–25, 25–70, and 70–180 km, for the smoothed-grid seismicity model has also been employed. The lowest λ 4 and λ 5 values for the IGB are 0.05 to 0.02 and 0.015 to 0.005, respectively, in the southern part of the IGB for hypocentral depth variation of 0–25 km. The IGB has a significant variation of seismicity in the entire stretch with noteworthy clustering in the northern side, which gradually decreases towards the south, and the spatial variability of the b-value and M max are 0.65–1.15 and 5.0–8.4 M w , respectively. A ground-motion prediction equation has been selected and weighted by carrying out the efficacy test considering the past earthquakes. The disaggregation process is used for determining the spatial contribution of different magnitudes and distances for the whole IGB. Sensitivity analysis is used for examining the effect of various parameters. The PGA for the IGB varies from 0.06 to 0.54 g for 2% and 0.03 to 0.32 g for a 10% probability of exceedance in 50 years at bedrock condition. The developed average uniform hazard spectra in this study match well with the spectra derived from recorded ground motion. Based on the disaggregation process, dominant magnitude and distance are in the range of 4.7 to 6.0 M w and 15 to 75 km, respectively, in the case of PGA and change to 5.5–7.2 M w and 45 to 150 km in the case of 0.5 s and 5.8–7.5 M w and 70 to 250 km in the case of 2.0 s. Sensitivity analysis suggested that increase in maximum magnitude and distance has an impact on hazard level over a longer period. This is the first time a detailed hazard analysis has been presented for the IGB. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sounding rockets are particularly important for studies in the scientific community and one of the main attractions is their relatively moderated cost compared to more complex manned missions. Besides, missions with sounding rockets can have varying high ranges according to their needs. Safety aspects are essential for this type of mission to be successfully accomplished. This work aims to analyze systemic factors that influence safety in Brazilian suborbital launch campaigns. A safety analysis methodology for suborbital launch operations is proposed and carried out for the Alcântara Space Center (CEA) and its iterations with other involved organizations. The study of systems safety techniques applied to Launch Operations at CEA is a truly relevant task because it deals with the preservation of human life, properties, knowledge, and the environment. The Systems-Theoretic Process Analysis (STPA) analysis was used as accident causes analysis, based on systems theory, not on reliability theory. The performed analysis was based on historical data from past launches and eventually accidents that occurred. The resulting analysis by the application of STPA to the evaluation phases of the concept, requirements, architecture, and design of a hypothetical two-stage sounding rocket provided valuable information related to the safety aspects of the mission. The results of this analysis show the effectiveness of analyzing the systemic factors that influence safety in suborbital vehicle launch operations, seeking for existing hazards, and creating safety recommendations or restrictions to minimize the probability of the occurrence of hazard events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modern seismic hazard analysis utilizes various ground motion prediction equations (GMPEs) to estimate intensity measures (IMs) such as spectral acceleration (Sa), Arias intensity (Ia), significant duration (D5‐95), and cumulative absolute velocity (CAV) as scalar parameters. The use of these GMPEs leads to independent estimations of IMs for the same earthquake scenario. Since the IMs belonging to the same earthquake scenario are naturally correlated, the GMPEs used for characterization of seismic hazard are expected to incorporate such correlation structure. Particularly, Sa corresponding to different periods of a single‐degree‐of‐freedom oscillator is estimated by GMPEs that do not explicitly account for internal correlations between the Sa at various periods for the same ground motion. The current approach to incorporate such a correlation for Sa spectrum is through a post‐processing technique developed by Baker and Jayaram; their method relates the spectral accelerations of different periods using functional forms describing linear correlations. However, the proposed correlation functions can be further improved and extended to more accurately estimate the spectrum of near‐fault high‐magnitude ground motions using high order dependencies among the spectral accelerations. This study proposes a generalized ground motion prediction model (GGMPM) using a hybrid recurrent neural network (RNN) framework that can be used to estimate a 29 × 1 correlated vector (denoted as IM) of RotD50 Sa at 26 periods and geometric means of Ia, D5‐95, and CAV using a set of seismic source and site parameters as inputs. This is an improvement to the current body of knowledge because the high order dependencies between the individual components of IM are incorporated. A RNN framework is developed that estimates the median vector of IM. The discrepancy between the IM estimated using the RNN framework and the IM computed from recorded motions is further minimized using the covariance matrix adaptation evolution strategy (CMA‐ES), which is a non‐convex optimization method. The residuals of the RNN framework are used to construct the inter‐event and the intra‐event covariance matrices to account for the inter‐event and intra‐event variabilities of the ground motions. Hence, given the source and site parameters, the RNN‐framework returns a median prediction of the IM, which is then combined with estimated inter‐event and intra‐event covariance matrices to obtain the probabilistic estimation of IM. Furthermore, this GGMPM framework is compared against various currently used GMPEs, and the results of these comparisons demonstrate that the proposed GGMPM leads to improved predictions while maintaining the internal dependencies of the IM components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Food Safety & Quality is the property of Journal of Food Safety & Quality Editorial Department and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Advanced Engineering Science / Gongcheng Kexue Yu Jishu is the property of Advanced Engineering Science Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study analyzes and compares foodborne disease outbreaks reported in the Republic of Korea (KR) and the United States (US) during 2011-2017. The foodborne outbreaks data in the KR and the US were collected from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety and from the Surveillance for Foodborne Disease Outbreaks United States, respectively. The average number of outbreaks and illness population were higher in the US than in the KR, but the KR's illness ratio considering population size was 2.4 times higher than that of the US. When the sites of outbreaks compared, the number of illness was the highest at schools in the KR whereas outbreaks at restaurants were more frequent in the US. In the KR, bacterial infections were the primary cause of outbreaks while bacterial and viral infections accounted for the largest share of outbreaks in the US. Specifically, pathogenic E. coli presented a significant risk in the KR whereas Salmonella was the most prevalent in the US. These results indicate that the main microbiological targets for detection and control in the KR should differ from the US, which should be considered for developing food safety related policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In our study, a food safety management system was developed for a chaga mushroom biotechnology product manufacturer, with the purpose of meeting the quality demands of customers and enhancing the manufacturer's reputation. The study focused on identifying the potentially significant hazards present at each stage of the production process for chaga mushroom capsule products, and on ensuring that the biotechnology company in question has fully implemented ISO22000:2018 and the HACCP methodology. The results indicate that, in the 1 year following the implementation of ISO 22000:2018, there was a statistically significant drop (P < 0.05) in the coliforms level of the tested biotechnology product samples that started in the ninth month following implementation. The rapid screening of mycotoxin, heavy metal, and pesticide residue levels also increased monitoring intensity and strengthened the periodic rotation plan, enabling control over potential problems relating to raw materials and ensuring product quality. This finding reveals the importance and necessity of rapid screening for small‐ and medium‐sized food industry enterprises. Furthermore, 1 year after the system's implementation, the defect rate for chaga products was also observed to have declined, and the number of process flow anomalies requiring correction was also found to have decreased significantly (P < 0.05), indicating that safety and quality levels were improving and stabilizing. If implemented over a longer period of time, the food safety management system's benefits would stand out even more, and significant improvements would be observed for more monitored items. Practical Application: Few studies have touched on food safety management systems (FSMSs) developed for capsule health food products. The enterprise examined in this study had actively worked to improve its quality system and meet its customers' needs through the implementation of the FSMSs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Food Safety & Quality is the property of Journal of Food Safety & Quality Editorial Department and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Real-time systems must avoid hazardous situations. To achieve this, their functionality should be investigated under time constraints. A model based on Hierarchical Communicating Real-time State Machine (H-CRSM) and analysis methodology is proposed in this paper with the objective of obtaining any hazardous events that may occur in the input ANSI-C program. The system outputs a scenario list of the different hazards. A path in the code showing the cause of the undesirable event is associated with each hazardous scenario. The strength of the proposed methodology is that the process of hazardous situation detection does not require the running of the ANSI-C program many times with distinct values for the inputs. It also focuses on analyzing the software level of the life cycle. It is not like most of the verification and analysis tools that check system levels. The system level may be bug-free, but the software level may not be. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Safety-critical systems, such as the railway signal system, are subject to potentially high costs from failures, including loss of life and property damage. The use of new technology, including communication-based train control (CBTC) systems with software and computers, has changed the types of accidents that occur. Software-related issues and dysfunctional interactions between system components controlled by the software are increasingly the cause of incidents. Developing a "safe" safety-critical system requires accurate and complete safety requirements, which are the foundation of system development. Traditional hazard analysis techniques are insufficient for identifying the causes of accidents in modern railway signaling systems. Systems-Theoretic Process Analysis (STPA) is a powerful new hazard analysis method designed to address these limitations. Building upon this foundation, a hierarchical approach to safety requirement development has been further developed. This approach combines STPA analysis with a hierarchical modeling approach to establish traceability links from safety requirements to specific architectures, refine and allocate system-level safety requirements to relevant subsystems, and abstract safety requirements at higher hierarchical levels to enable easy changes to lower-level implementations. This paper employs the aforementioned methodology within the context of the CBTC system, thereby enhancing risk management and hazard analysis, enabling early insights, and facilitating the generation of safety requirements of CBTC System., Competing Interests: The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Zuxi Chen reports financial support was provided by Fujian Province Department of Science and Technology. Xiaoyong Wang reports financial support was provided by Shanghai Province Department of Science and Technology. Meng Mei reports financial support was provided by 10.13039/501100002855Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China. If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (© 2024 The Author(s).)

Indentifying pollutants that pose a potential hazard indoors is an important first step to reducing risks. We reviewed key published studies reporting measurements of chemical pollutants in residences. Summary results were compiled and used to calculate representative mid-range and upper-bound concentrations relevant to chronic exposures for over 300 pollutants and peak concentrations relevant to acute exposures for a few episodic activity-associated pollutants. For the over 100 pollutants with available criterions, the measured concentrations are compared to available chronic and acute health-hazard standards and guidelines. Fifteen pollutants are identified as potential chronic or acute health hazards for many homes. A subset of pollutants are identified as priority chemical pollutants and suggestions are made for effectively reducing indoor concentrations.

The likelihood of incident occurring in oil and gas industries is high due to the inherent risks associated to high temperature, high pressure, hydrocarbon, and etc. One of the prominent incidents that have taken place is the Texas refinery explosion. The purpose of this review was to investigate the causes of the BP Texas refinery incident. There are three sources of references for the reviewed articles: Web of Science, Scopus, and Science Direct. The search results were filtered according to six selection criteria, and after reading the abstracts and full texts, ten articles were included in this review. These studies and reports were reviewed to understand modeling and simulation of the incident process and to identify the root causes of the incident. The review highlights the main factors that led to the incident including: lack of management of change (MOC), maintenance, preliminary hazard analysis, lack of effective safety barriers, and human errors in some sectors. It is recommended that lessons learned from the incident be shared to relevant parties to improve the process safety and further studies on safety barriers and their failure instead of simulation of the incident dynamics.

This paper illustrates how an emulator (or meta-model) of a tsunami code can be a useful tool to evaluate or qualify tsunami hazard levels associated with both specific and unknown tsunamigenic seismic sources. The meta-models are statistical tools permitting to drastically reduce the computational time necessary for tsunami simulations. As a consequence they can be used to explore the tsunamigenic potential of a seismic zone, by taking into account an extended set of tsunami scenarios. We illustrate these concepts by studying the tsunamis generated by the Azores-Gibraltar Plate Boundary (AGPB) and potentially impacting the French Atlantic Coast. We first analyze the impact of two realistic scenarios corresponding to potential sources of the 1755-Lisbon tsunami (when uncertainty on seismic parameters is considered). We then show how meta-models could permit to qualify the tsunamis generated by this seismic area. All the results are finally discussed in light of tsunami hazard issued by the TSUMAPS-NEAM research project available online (http://ai2lab.org/tsumapsneam/interactive-hazard-curve-tool/). From this methodological study, it appears that tsunami hazard issued by TSUMAPS-NEAM research project is envelop, even when compared to all the likely and unlikely tsunami scenarios generated in the AGPB area.

Based on the historical data of meteorological disasters in East China during 2004–2015, the overall characteristics, interannual variations and the hazards of meteorological disasters in different provinces of East China were analyzed. The results indicated that flood disaster (including landslide and mud-rock flow) induced by rainstorms had caused the largest affected area and total failure area of crops, and also caused the largest number of affected people and collapsed houses. Strong convection weather (including gale, hail, thunder and lightning) disaster resulted in the largest number of deaths and typhoon disaster caused the greatest direct economic losses. There were significant decreasing trends in the affected area and the total failure area of crops, and the number of affected people and deaths during 2004–2015, while the direct economic loss caused by meteorological disasters showed no significant trend in East China. The hazards of meteorological disasters had obvious regional differences. In the northern part of East China, the hazards of drought and strong convection weather disasters were higher, but in the southern part, there were higher hazards of flood disaster. In the eastern coastal areas of East China, the hazards of typhoon disaster were higher. Hazard analysis of meteorological disasters has important significances for disaster prevention and mitigation, risk management and crisis response.

Uncertainty is the inseparable part of the engineering analysis. These uncertainties have different Distributions. Sobol decomposition method is one of the most well-known methods of sensitivity analysis. Sobol decomposition as a robust sensitivity analysis method can only be used for uniform distribution. In the present paper, we generalize Sobol sensitivity method for all continuous and discrete distributions. Hence it can be used for wide Varity models in engineering and science of different distributions. The capability of the generalized method for precise numerical values presentation, the results of the sensitivity analysis of the Tehran seismic hazard is given. Due to the variability of materials and earthquakes, Structural and geosciences are full of uncertainties. Calculating the role of the uncertainty of each parameter in the overall uncertainty can be to optimize the efforts and costs necessary for outputs precision, so, it is possible to provide a precise values of sensitivities. The results are satisfactory.

The paper analyzes the conditions of safe use of industrial gas systems and factors influencing gas hazards. Typical gas installation and its basic features have been characterized. The results of gas threat analysis in an industrial enterprise using FTA error tree method and ETA event tree method are presented. Compares selected methods of identifying hazards gas industry with respect to the scope of their use. The paper presents an analysis of two exemplary hazards: an industrial gas catastrophe (FTA) and an explosive gas explosion (ETA). In both cases, technical risks and human errors (human factor) were taken into account. The cause-effect relationships of hazards and their causes are presented in the form of diagrams in the drawings.

In order to shed light on the seismic response of complex industrial plants, advanced finite element models should take into account both multicomponents and relevant coupling effects. These models are usually computationally expensive and rely on significant computational resources. Moreover, the relationships between seismic action, system response and relevant damage levels are often characterized by a high level of nonlinearity, which requires a solid background of experimental data. Vulnerability and reliability analyses both depend on the adoption of a significant number of seismic waveforms that are generally not available when seismic risk evaluation is strictly site-specific. In addition, detection of most vulnerable components, i.e., pipe bends and welding points, is an important step to prevent leakage events. In order to handle these issues, a methodology based on a stochastic seismic ground motion model, hybrid simulation and acoustic emission is presented in this paper. The seismic model is able to generate synthetic ground motions coherent with site-specific analysis. In greater detail, the system is composed of a steel slender tank, i.e., the numerical substructure, and a piping network connected through a bolted flange joint, i.e., the physical substructure. Moreover, to monitor the seismic performance of the pipeline and harness the use of sensor technology, acoustic emission sensors are placed through the pipeline. Thus, real-time acoustic emission signals of the system under study are acquired using acoustic emission sensors. Moreover, in addition to seismic events, also a severe monotonic loading is exerted on the physical substructure. As a result, deformation levels of each critical component were investigated; and the processing of acoustic emission signals provided a more in-depth view of the damage of the analysed components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although seismic activity in Brazil is low to moderate, some earthquakes with damage potential occurred in the past. Engineering structures located along the coast and those installed in deep waters need to comply with safety requirements. In addition, there is a need to address the public interest regarding the effects of seismically-induced landslides. Therefore, a probabilistic seismic hazard assessment was carried out for the offshore south/southeast regions of Brazil, in order to estimate potential levels of ground motion. A historical and recent instrumental seismicity catalog for this region has been compiled. A stochastic attenuation relation with different seismic source models and recurrence parameters was used in a hazard analysis with the CRISIS 2012 software. To capture the epistemic and aleatoric uncertainties in the hazard calculations, a logic tree approach was adopted, considering different seismic zone models, seismic activity parameters, and scaling factors in the Ground Motion Prediction Equation. It was verified that the Peak Ground Accelerations are mostly less than 2.0% g in the continental portion of the region (for 10% exceedance probability in 50 years). At a particular point of interest located offshore in the continental slope of the study area, the seismic hazard is also low, with the maximum acceleration for the probability of exceedance of 10% and 2% in 50 years reaching mean values of 3.2% and 19.1% g, respectively, for very hard rock conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reliable hazard analysis is crucial in the flood risk management of river basins. For the floodplains of large, developed rivers, flood hazard analysis often needs to account for the complex hydrology of multiple tributaries and the potential failure of dikes. Estimating this hazard using deterministic methods ignores two major aspects of large-scale risk analysis: the spatial–temporal variability of extreme events caused by tributaries, and the uncertainty of dike breach development. Innovative stochastic methods are here developed to account for these uncertainties and are applied to the Po River in Italy. The effects of using these stochastic methods are compared against deterministic equivalents, and the methods are combined to demonstrate applications for an overall stochastic hazard analysis. The results show these uncertainties can impact extreme event water levels by more than 2 m at certain channel locations, and also affect inundation and breaching patterns. The combined hazard analysis allows for probability distributions of flood hazard and dike failure to be developed, which can be used to assess future flood risk management measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Landslides are the second most frequent tsunami source worldwide. However, their complex and diverse nature of origin combined with their infrequent event records make prognostic modelling challenging. In this paper, we present a probabilistic framework for analysing uncertainties emerging from the landslide source process. This probabilistic framework employs event trees and is used to conduct tsunami uncertainty analysis as well as probabilistic tsunami hazard analysis (PTHA). An example study is presented for the Lyngen fjord in Norway. This application uses a mix of empirical landslide data combined with expert judgement to come up with probability maps for tsunami inundation. Based on this study, it is concluded that the present landslide tsunami hazard analysis is largely driven by epistemic uncertainties. These epistemic uncertainties can be incorporated in the probabilistic framework. Conducting a literature analysis, we further show examples of how landslide and tsunami data can be used to better constrain landslide uncertainties, combined with statistical and numerical analysis methods. We discuss how these methods, combined with the probabilistic framework, can be used to improve landslide tsunami hazard analysis in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Food Research & Development is the property of Food Research & Development Editorial Department and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The likelihood of incident occurring in oil and gas industries is high due to the inherent risks associated to high temperature, high pressure, hydrocarbon, and etc. One of the prominent incidents that have taken place is the Texas refinery explosion. The purpose of this review was to investigate the causes of the BP Texas refinery incident. There are three sources of references for the reviewed articles: Web of Science, Scopus, and Science Direct. The search results were filtered according to six selection criteria, and after reading the abstracts and full texts, ten articles were included in this review. These studies and reports were reviewed to understand modeling and simulation of the incident process and to identify the root causes of the incident. The review highlights the main factors that led to the incident including: lack of management of change (MOC), maintenance, preliminary hazard analysis, lack of effective safety barriers, and human errors in some sectors. It is recommended that lessons learned from the incident be shared to relevant parties to improve the process safety and further studies on safety barriers and their failure instead of simulation of the incident dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to make a system safer, it is necessary to determine which hazard should be removed by considering the interactions of all hazards in the process. In this study, the influence of the hazards related to iron works in a construction firm is examined by Bayesian network approach. If only the most important hazard is identified and removed from the work environment, it may be erroneous to comment on the levels of the remaining hazards. A Bayesian network is proposed to remove this problem. If there is more time and budget than planned for a process, these capacities will have to be reduced in other processes. Linear programming is proposed to remove this problem. A strong decision support system has been established by combining a Bayesian network and linear programming. A construction firm application has been demonstrated using the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aftershocks are commonly removed from observed earthquake catalogs in probabilistic seismic hazard analyses, using declustering techniques. We use stationary and temporal Epistemic‐Type Aftershock Sequence (ETAS) models to generate aftershocks from background seismicity and preceding aftershocks. We assume that the mainshocks equal the background seismicity, to divide the synthetic earthquake catalogs into mainshock (declustered) and complete (nondeclustered) versions. Only mainshocks follow a Poissonian distribution. We then evaluate how accurately we can forecast the recurrence of the largest events based on the simulated catalogs. A single b value is derived from the simulated catalogs and used in the magnitude‐frequency forecast. When the b value of the mainshocks is considerably smaller than the b value of the aftershocks, the information derived from the mainshock catalog leads to accurate predictions of the occurrence of the largest events. Conversely, when the mainshock and aftershocks have comparable b values, only the complete catalog produces representative estimates for the occurrence statistics of the largest events. We also show that using Poisson statistics leads to representative assessment of long‐term recurrences, even if aftershocks have a non‐Poissonian distribution. Finally, we analyze a recent case of induced seismicity, Oklahoma, USA, where the complete catalog displays a kink in the magnitude‐frequency distribution. Declustering removes this kink, leading to better b value estimations for the largest magnitude events. We conclude that temporal declustering for seismic hazard assessment is only recommended in catalogs with a large number of earthquakes and in catalogs where the b values of the mainshocks are significantly different from the b values of the complete catalog. Key Points: Probabilistic seismic hazard analysis relies on accurate forecasts of the magnitude‐frequency distribution of the largest eventsMainshocks and aftershocks may have different b valuesTemporal declustering is appropriate only if mainshocks and aftershocks have considerably different b values [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Planning and executing healthcare for the patient or resident living with obesity can be a challenging task that has implications to the occupational health professional. Methods: Leading global experts in the areas of occupational health, ergonomics, bariatrics, technology, and patient care were identified and invited to participate in a round table discussion. Questions posed to experts were based on literature that addressed patient handling and mobility, architectural design recommendations, clinical care of the person with obesity, and ergonomic guidelines. Findings: Experts agreed that special considerations must be in place to care for the person who is obese. These special considerations should address not only clinical care of the patient, but ways to protect workers from occupational injury associated with clinical care. Experts suggested that, in some situations, a bariatric training suit may be helpful in better understanding space and design challenges, as well as a better understanding of the physical limitations associated with a larger body habitus (although simulated). Further, experts agreed that insensitivities often stem from failure to have proper space, technology and design accommodations in place. Conclusions/Application to Practice: The occupational health professional is a key resource to teams charged with planning and executing healthcare for the patient or resident living with obesity. Interprofessional understanding and communication can lead to a more comprehensive approach to space, design and technology that not only addresses the patient, but the worker providing direct care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital health interventions (DHIs) enable improvements in health strategy and address health system challenges. The World Health Organization provides a formal classification for DHIs. However, safety claims, about such interventions, vary in quality and are often vague as to how they are communicated between technical, clinical experts and stakeholders. By combining the classifications with a method of safety analysis and justification, we postulate confidence in the safety of digital technology. Confidence is resulting from the application of the framework to the DHI, using defined health system challenges. The framework and derived safety justifications can be applied to any DHI. It can serve as guideline for health strategy, regulatory and standards based compliance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What impact does engagement in crime have on terrorist group survival? In theory criminal activity may decrease group survival by damaging group legitimacy or prompting government crackdowns. Conversely, crime might boost group survival by facilitating access to revenues or by further taxing state policing capacity. Moreover, different types of crime might have different effects. We investigate the impact of crime on terrorist group survival using cross-sectional data on 578 terrorist groups observed between 1970 and 2007. We find that engagement in crime reduces a group's chance of demise by around 50% and extends its lifespan by around 7 years on average. Terrorist groups involved in narcotics are less likely to end by police or military force, but are also less likely to win political concessions. We find that groups involved in extortion live the longest and are also less likely to end by force or by splintering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) are gaining importance in the automotive sector because of the potential of electric vehicles (EVs) to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution. However, there are serious hazards resulting from failing battery cells leading to exothermic chemical reactions inside the cell, called thermal runaway (TR). Literature of quantifying the failing behavior of modern automotive high capacity cells is rare and focusing on single hazard categories such as heat generation. Thus, the aim of this study is to quantify several hazard relevant parameters of a failing currently used battery cell extracted from a modern mass-produced EV: the temperature response of the cell, the maximum reached cell surface temperature, the amount of produced vent gas, the gas venting rate, the composition of the produced gases including electrolyte vapor and the size and composition of the produced particles at TR. For this purpose, overtemperature experiments with fresh 41 Ah automotive lithium NMC/LMO--graphite pouch cells at different state-of-charge (SOC) 100%, 30% and 0% are performed. The results are valuable for firefighters, battery pack designers, cell recyclers, cell transportation and all who deal with batteries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PWCs are sporty recreational boats that can hold a pilot and up to 2 additional passengers. These vessels have powerful engines driving an internal impeller that forces water through a steerable jet nozzle. This pressurized water provides thrust used for both propulsion and steering. Three-person PWCs can have 200 hp engines, and can speed across the water at 60-70 mph. PWCs are popular throughout the country and around the world. But, since the 1970's, there has been a history of serious injuries and fatalities involving PWC operators, passengers, and bystanders. Many such incidents have been of two principal types – a.) steering-related collisions, and b.) body cavity water intrusion injuries to passengers who fell off the back of an accelerating PWC, and suffered body orifice damages caused by exposure to the pressurized water jet. PWC manufacturers tried to address both these types of hazards via precautionary instructions and warnings alone, but casualty rates remained high. Recently, engineering changes were introduced that have enhanced PWC steering, and have resulted in improved craft safety. However, no engineering changes have addressed the pressurized water intrusion type injuries. Total reliance on warnings, and deficient aspects of those warnings, continue to negatively impact PWC safety. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban gas pipelines network as one of the most vital lifelines plays an important role in the level of vulnerability and earthquake damage. Iran is located on the Alpide earthquake belt, which is one of the highly earthquake-prone zones of the world. The first earthquake effect, which can damage pipelines, is the transient ground deformation caused by wave propagation. The second one is the permanent ground deformation, which refers to liquefaction, landslide, and ground failure. With the failure of the gas pipelines, a fire may also occur, and consequently, the indirect damage caused by the earthquake may even further increase. This paper investigates the seismic risk of the Asaluyeh city urban gas distribution network by regarding the all geo-seismic hazard using HAZUS methodology. The post-earthquake ignition is evaluated using fault tree method, and the consequences of the design earthquake are assessed using PHAST package. Finally, the network physical damage risk, human risk, and direct economic risk are all evaluated. The results show that three possible failures may happen in the Asaluyeh gas distribution network. While the probability of an ignition occurrence is 35% for leakage and 32% for breaking, the post-earthquake ignition can affect around 30 people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A once‐per‐century geoelectric hazard map is created for the U.S. high‐voltage power grid. A statistical extrapolation from 31 years of magnetic field measurements is made by identifying 84 geomagnetic storms with the Kp and Dst indices. Data from 24 geomagnetic observatories, 1,079 magnetotelluric survey sites, and 17,258 transmission lines are utilized to perform a geoelectric hazard analysis with the most comprehensive data publicly available. With these data, we estimate once‐per‐century geoelectric fields at the magnetotelluric survey sites and calculate the theoretical voltages within transmission lines in the U.S. power grid. Once‐per‐century geoelectric field strengths span more than 3 orders of magnitude from a minimum of 0.02 V/km at a site in Idaho to a maximum of 27.2 V/km at a site in Maine, with nearly 30% of the surveyed land area exceeding 1 V/km. We show the influence that geoelectric field polarization has on geoelectric hazards when viewed on a power transmission network. The calculated transmission line voltages can approach 1,000 V in some transmission lines. Four regions in the United States with particularly notable geoelectric hazards are identified and discussed: the East Coast, Pacific Northwest, Upper Midwest, and the Denver metropolitan area. Key Points: Conductivity structure of Earth imparts more than 3 orders of magnitude difference in geoelectric hazards for the United StatesEstimated geoelectric fields for a once‐per‐century geomagnetic storm are predicted to exceed 1 V/km at 30% of the surveyed land areaThe geoelectric field amplitude and polarization couple into the power grid to produce almost 1,000 V in some transmission lines [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to compare the difference of the methodologies between ISO 22000:2005 and ISO 22000:2018. Compared to the methodology of food safety management system ISO 22000:2005, the methodology of ISO 22000:2018 has not been seen yet. The methodology established in this study was based on the differences of ISO 22000:2018 and ISO 22000:2005 and the abundant experiences of author toward the counseling of verification. The high-level structural management of ISO 22000:2018 can be integrated with other management systems. The risk which was assessed through the severity and possibilities could be converted into an opportunity according to the new method of risk evaluation of ISO 22000:2018 based on the CODEX HACCP. Relatedly, through the implementation of the HACCP system, the key regulatory terms relevant for adherence to ISO 22000:2018 have been added and revised. In particular, the new regulations state that the members of food safety management committees must either possess the expertise required to determine hazards or seek the assistance of outside experts when necessary. This regulation must be effectively implemented in the FSMS of small- and medium-sized enterprises throughout the world. In addition, the key terms and definitions of ISO 22000:2018 such as critical control points, prerequisite programs, and operation prerequisite programs are more clearly defined and consistent with the standard operating procedures of effective food safety management systems. ISO 22000:2018 also pays greater attention to the two "plan, do, check, action" (PDCA) cycles including food safety management system and food safety level. These two PDCA cycles emphasize the need for independent operation but should also be implemented such that they have close synergy and harmony with each other. This methodology was used for the verification of ISO 22000:2018 of seven factories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The maximum daily rainfall, maximum wind speed, and storm surge frequency during the typhoon period were obtained based on the main landing paths of typhoons in Fujian Province, China. Methods such as the Pearson III probability distribution function, information diffusion theory, and entropy weight theory were used to analyze the hazard of the disaster-causing factors of typhoons with different landing paths. The results show that the hazard of typhoon disasters in Fujian Province gradually decreases from the eastern coastal area to the western inland area, but the hazards notably differ between different landing paths. The dominant factor affecting the hazards of typhoon disasters in Fujian Province is the typhoon rainstorm. The hazard analysis of typhoon disasters based on different landing paths can provide more specific and reliable information for the comprehensive risk assessment of typhoon disasters. Furthermore, it can provide a more scientific decision basis for the customization of disaster reduction plans in the study area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]