In utero sonographic diagnosis of a communicating enteric duplication cyst in a giant omphalocele

Enteric duplications are rare lesions, and relatively few cases have been diagnosed prenatally. We present, to our knowledge, the first case of an associated communicating ileal duplication cyst in a huge omphalocele diagnosed prenatally. The prenatal ultrasound findings revealed four features of the cystic lesion including peristaltic movements of the cystic wall, communication between the cyst and normal bowel lumen, intra-cystic echogenic contents, and echogenic mesenteric tissue (fat) close to the cyst. These distinct characteristics helped us to make a firm in utero diagnosis. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Three- versus two-dimensional ultrasound for nuchal translucency thickness measurements: comparison of feasibility and levels of agreement

We have determined feasibility and levels of agreement for visualizing the nuchal translucency within a time limit with three-dimensional (3D) and two-dimensional (2D) transvaginal ultrasound. A total of 213 women of median gestational age 13 weeks (range 11–14 weeks) undergoing first-trimester nuchal translucency (NT) thickness measurements with 2D transabdominal ultrasound were included in the study. Additionally all women underwent 2D and 3D transvaginal NT examination within a time limit of 90 s. These two methods were compared with each other and with our standard method (2D transabdominal ultrasound) with respect to visualization of fetal nuchal fold and to the levels of agreement. The nuchal fold was visualized by 3D and 2D transvaginal ultrasound in 85.9% (95% CI: 80.5%, 90.3%) and 25.8% (95% CI: 20.1%, 32.2%), respectively (p<0.001). There was a statistically significant underestimation of the NT by 2D transabdominal as compared with 3D transvaginal ultrasound of 0.1 mm (p<0.001), and by 3D transvaginal as compared with 2D transvaginal ultrasound of even 0.1 mm (p<0.001). 3D transvaginal ultrasound of the nuchal fold has increased feasibility to 2D transvaginal ultrasound within a short examination time and with minimal, but significant, measurement differences. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Enteric Viruses in a Large Waterborne Outbreak of Acute Gastroenteritis in Finland

In Nokia city about 450,000 l of treated sewage water was for 2 days allowed to run into the drinking water supplies of the city due to a personal error of one employee. Within the next 5 weeks about 1,000 people sought care at the municipal health centre or regional hospital because of gastroenteritis. Here we report the results of viral analyses performed by gene amplification assays from the earliest water and sewage samples as well as from close to 300 patient samples. The contaminating treated sewage was shown to harbour several enteric viruses known to cause acute gastroenteritis. Likewise, the drinking water sample was positive for noro-, astro-, rota-, entero- and adenoviruses. Noroviruses were also found in 29.8% of stool samples from affected patients, while astro-, adeno-, rota- and enteroviruses were detected in 19.7, 18.2, 7.5 and 3.7% of the specimens, respectively. An erratum to this article can be found at     

超声波/铁-炭微电解协同降解苯酚

采用超声波/铁-炭微电解联用体系,以苯酚为目标污染物,考察了苯酚溶液初始pH值、初始浓度、铁屑与活性炭投加量等因素对联用体系降解苯酚效果的影响.结果表明:考察范围内,苯酚降解率随其初始浓度和溶液初始pH值的增加而降低,随铁屑与活性炭投加量的增加而升高.当苯酚初始浓度由50mg·L-1增至270mg·L-1,溶液初始pH值由3.0增至9.0时,降解率分别由91.3%和78.4%降至34.7%和50.7%;铁屑投加量为每L苯酚溶液中40g、160g和320g,铁屑与活性炭体积比均为1:1时,降解率依次为31.8%、51.9%和72.8%.对比实验及动力学分析表明:联用体系中超声波(US)和铁-炭微电解对苯酚降解具有明显的协同作用,协同因子E=5.12,且降解过程符合假一级动力学规律,并根据降解速率常数随各影响因素的变化关系确定了宏观动力学模型.     

Real-time leak detection in oil pipelines using an Inverse Transient Analysis model

Based on Inverse Transient Analysis (ITA) method, a real-time leak detection method is proposed to capture leak location and the associated leak rate in oil pipe conveyance systems. In the proposed approach, location and flow rate of leak (if any), the fluid properties, as well as physical parameters of the system, are calculated in consecutive periods through minimizing the discrepancy between the calculated and measured flow parameters of the system. The method of characteristics is employed to numerically calculate the transient responses of the system and the genetic algorithm is utilized as the optimization engine. The proposed approach was applied to several real pipeline systems in which the required transient flow data are either directly collected from the field or fabricated with a third-party numerical software. Extensive numerical explorations were conducted to investigate the performance of the proposed method in real-time leak detection and to determine the extent to which field data errors, stemming from Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems and measurement equipment, affect the leak flow rate and location detectability of the proposed approach. The results show that the proposed approach provides promising results under a variety of transient and steady-state flow conditions even in the case with small leak flow rate of around 2% of the line rate. The results also reveal that the noises in the measurement data and the errors originated from SCADA systems do not significantly compromise the leak detectability of the proposed approach, confirming that the proposed approach can be utilized in practice.     

超声波-臭氧破解剩余污泥技术的初步研究

剩余污泥的处理与处置是我国和世界面临的重要环境课题.文章初步研究了臭氧、超声波及其组合工艺对剩余污泥的破解作用,考察了反应时间、臭氧流量、超声功率对污泥破解效果的影响.研究表明:臭氧流量为7I/min时破解效果最好,反应40min,SCOD、NH3-N、TN和TP分别比反应前提高了586%、178%、522%和1781...     

超声波与其他技术联用降解水污染物

介绍了国内外超声波与其他技术联用在降解水污染物方面的研究进展。多项研究表明,与单独采用超声波降解水污染物的技术相比,超声波与紫外光、芬顿试剂、臭氧和某些氧化剂联用能更迅速、更彻底地降解水中污染物。