• Imaging Science in Dentistry
• /
• 제51권4호
• /
• pp.351-361
• /
• 2021

Purpose: The clivus is a region in the anterior section of the occipital bone that is commonly imaged on large-volume cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT). There have been several reports of incidental clivus variations and certain pathological entities that have been attributed to the variations. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of these variations within the scope of dentistry. Materials and Methods: Medical databases (PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science) were searched using a controlled vocabulary (clival anomalies, cone-beam CT, canalis basilaris medianus, fossa navicularis magna, clival variation). The search was limited to English language, humans, and studies published in the last 25 years. The articles were exported into RefWorks^® and duplicates were removed. The remaining articles were screened and reviewed for supporting information on variations of the clivus on CBCT imaging. Results: Canalis basilaris medianus and fossa navicularis magna were the most common anomalies noted. Many of these variations were asymptomatic, with most patients unaware of the anomaly. In certain cases, associated pathologies ranged from developmental (Tornwaldt cyst), to acquired (recurrent meningitis). While no distinct pathognomonic aspects were noted, there were unique patterns of radiographic diagnosis and treatment modalities. Most patients had a normal course of follow-up. Conclusion: Interpretation of CBCT volumes is a skill every dentist must possess. When reviewing large-volume CBCT scans, the clinician should be able to distinguish pathology from normal anatomic variations within the skull base. The majority of clivus variations are asymptomatic and will remain undetected unless incidentally noted on radiographic examinations.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
• /
• 제51권2호
• /
• pp.120-124
• /
• 2024

Objective: Seasonal variations in semen quality are known to occur in temperate regions, but results regarding tropical areas remain inconclusive. The aim of this study was to determine whether monthly variations in semen parameters are present among men in a tropical region. Methods: Data were retrospectively collected from semen analyses of 3,000 men over a 10-year period, from 2012 to 2022. Analysis of variance and the independent-samples t-test were employed to observe variations in semen parameters throughout the entire period and between months, respectively. Results: The mean±standard deviation sperm concentration was significantly lower in June, at 42.5±31.4 million/mL, compared to other months. The highest sperm concentration was found in March, at 57.8±42.6 million/mL, constituting a mean difference of 15.3 million/mL between the lowest and highest concentrations. The total sperm count displayed a similar pattern of monthly variation, with a difference of 47.2 million between the highest and lowest months. No significant monthly differences were observed in other parameters, such as sperm motility, morphology, and semen volume. Conclusion: Significant monthly variations in sperm concentration and total sperm count were evident in this Sri Lankan population. March, which displayed the highest sperm counts, is in the spring in temperate regions, while the month with the lowest counts, July, is part of the summer. Fluctuations in photoperiod appear to most strongly influence these variations.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
• /
• 제28권3호
• /
• pp.173-181
• /
• 2011

Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute researchers have installed and operated magnetometers at Mt. Bohyun Observatory to measure the Earth's magnetic field variations in South Korea. We, in 2007, installed a fluxgate magnetometer (RFP-523C) to measure H, D, and Z components of the geomagnetic field. In addition, in 2009, we installed a Overhauser proton sensor to measure the absolute total magnetic field F and a three-axis magneto-impedance sensor for spectrum analysis. Currently three types of magnetometer data have been accumulated. In this paper, we provide the preliminary and the first statistical analysis using the BOH magnetometer installed at Mt. Bohyun Observatory. By superposed analysis, we find that daily variations of H, D, and Z shows similar tendency, that is, about 30 minutes before the meridian (11:28) a minimum appears and the time after about 3 hours and 30 minutes (15:28) a maximum appears. Also, a quiet interval start time (19:06) is near the sunset time, and a quiet interval end time (06:40) is near the sunrise time. From the sunset to the sunrise, the value of H has a nearly constant interval, that is, the sun affects the changes in H values. Seasonal variations show similar dependences to the sun. Local time variations show that noon region has the biggest variations and midnight region has the smallest variations. We compare the correlations between geomagnetic variations and activity indices as we expect the geomagnetic variation would contain the effects of geomagnetic activity variations. As a result, the correlation coefficient between H and Dst is the highest (r = 0.947), and other AL, AE, AU index and showed a high correlation. Therefore, the effects of geomagnetic storms and geomagnetic substorms might contribute to the geomagnetic changes significantly.

• International Journal of Fluid Machinery and Systems
• /
• 제8권2호
• /
• pp.102-112
• /
• 2015

In the Nordic grid, a trend observed the recent years is the increase in grid frequency variations, which means the frequency is outside the normal range (49.9-50.1 Hz) more often. Variations in the grid frequency leads to changes in the speed of rotation of all the turbines connected to the grid, since the speed of rotation is closely related to the grid frequency for synchronous generators. When the speed of rotation changes, this implies that the net torque acting on the rotating masses are changed, and the material of the turbine runners must withstand these changes in torque. Frequency variations thus leads to torque oscillations in the turbine, which become dynamical loads that the runner must be able to withstand. Several new Francis runners have recently experienced cracks in the runner blades due to fatigue, obviously due to the runner design not taking into account the actual loads on the runner. In this paper, the torque oscillations and dynamic loads due to the variations in grid frequency are simulated in a 1D MATLAB program, and measured grid frequency is used as input to the simulation program. The maximum increase and decrease in the grid frequency over a 440 seconds interval have been investigated, in addition to an extreme event where the frequency decreased far below the normal range within a few seconds. The dynamic loading originating from grid frequency variations is qualitatively found by a constructed variable $T_{stress}$, and for the simulations presented here the variations in $T_{stress}$ are found to be around 3 % of the mean value, which is a relatively small dynamic load. The important thing to remember is that these dynamic loads come in addition to all other dynamic loads, like rotor-stator interaction and draft tube surges, and should be included in the design process, if not found to be negligible.

• 보건행정학회지
• /
• 제9권2호
• /
• pp.118-138
• /
• 1999

This study presents the variations on drug utilization for outpatients' URI, gastritis. and hypertension by the type of hospital- tertiary hospital. general hospital. hospital. clinic. It investigated drug expenses. daily drug expenses. days of medication. the highest price of the drugs used. and the number of the different drugs used for each disease and type of hospital. This study also performed analysis to see how much the variations of variables related to drug use affect the variations of drug expenses. The dependent variable was drug expenses and the independent variables were days of medication. the average price of the drugs used. and the number of the different drugs used. Analysis of the drug utilization was performed on NFMI(National Federation of Medical Insurance) 1994 medical expense claim data. Patients with secondary diseases were excluded. In this study. 379 patients with URI, 386 patients with gastritis. 1.257 patients with hypertension were included. It was founded that there were large variation on drug utilization between the types of hospital for same diseases. Days of medication were longest in tertiary hospitals and shortest in hospitals or clinics. Clinics showed the lowest daily drug expenses in all of the diseases investigated. Daily drug expenses were highest in general hospitals or hospitals. which also tended to use drugs of higher price than other types of hospital. General hospitals and hospitals had larger variations in daily drug expenses and the highest price of drugs. It suggested that drug might be utilized overly in general hospitals and hospitals and some other factors might influence on drug utilization in these hospitals. It was found that the variations of drug expenses were affected by the variations of drug price and days of medication rather than the number of the different drugs. Then the strategy to reduce the variations of drug utilization and to improve the quality of drug utilization should focus on the drug price and days of medication. Further study is needed to assess the quality as well as the variation of drug utilization and to show the factors which affect them.

• 보건행정학회지
• /
• 제8권1호
• /
• pp.1-14
• /
• 1998

Analysis of practice variations has been one of important issues in trying to contain costs as well as to manage quality in health care. This study was conducted to provide statistical model for analysing variations in inpatient costs by type of hospitals. Four K-DRGs including Cesarean section, appendectomy, cataract extraction, and pediatric pneumonia with CC class 0 were selected, and means and dispersions of inpatient procedure and operation costs were simultaneously compared between type of hospitals. The results indicated that joint modelling of means and dispersions by gamma distribution was a very useful analytic tool for identifying factors which might have relationship with variations in inpatient costs. This model can be expanded to test the significance of several independent variables in analysing cost variations. In surgical conditions, means and unit variations of procedure and operation costs showed consistent pattern which was tertiarty hospital, general hospital, and hospital in descending order. Different findings were identified in pediatric pneumonia, from which mean and unit variation of procedure and operation cost was the highest in general hospital. The practical implication of this difference could not be drawn from this study. It will be done by further sophisticated researches. In order to develop health policy for cost containment and quality management in Korea, it is essential to find out manageable factors affecting variations in practice patterns which include characteristics of population, providers, regions, and so on. The statistical model presented in this study will give health services researchers useful insights for future investigations in analysing cost variations.

• 한국물환경학회지
• /
• 제29권1호
• /
• pp.97-106
• /
• 2013

The temporal and spatial variations of water quality in a stratified reservoir are fully dependent on the characteristics of inflow loading from its watershed and the transport regimes of pollutants after entering the reservoir. Because of the meteorological and hydrological conditions in Korea, the pollutants loading to reservoirs are mostly occur during rainfall events. Therefore it is important to understand the characteristics of pollutants loading from upstream rivers and their spatial propagation through the stratified reservoir during the rainfall events. The objectives of this study were to characterize the water quality variations in upstream rivers of Imha Reservoir during a rainfall event, and the transport and spatial variations of pollutants in the reservoir through extensive field monitoring and laboratory analysis. The results showed that the event mean concentration (EMC) of SS, BOD, $COD_{Mn}$, T-N, T-P, $PO_4-P$ are 8.6 ~ 362.1, 2.5 ~ 5.1, 1.5 ~ 5.1, 1.1 ~ 1.9, 8.3 ~ 57.1, 5.6 ~ 25.7 times greater than the mean concentrations of these parameters during non-rainfall period. The turbidity and SS data showed good linear correlations, but the relationships between flow and SS showed large variations because of hysteresis effect during rising and falling periods of the flood. The ratio of POC to TOC were 12.6 ~ 14.7% during the non-rainfall periods, but increased up to 28.2 ~ 41.7% during the flood event. The turbid flood flow formed underflow and interflow after entering the reservoir, and delivered a great amount of non-point pollutants such as labile and refractory organic matters and nutrients to the metalimnion layer of reservoir, which is just above the thermocline. Spatially, the lateral variations of most water quality parameters were marginal but the vertical variations were significant.

• 충청수학회지
• /
• 제2권1호
• /
• pp.55-64
• /
• 1989

In this paper, we study some properties of generalized function spaces of ${\kappa}$-, ${\phi}$-and ${\kappa}{\phi}$-bounded variations and general bounded variations.

• 대한전기학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• 대한전기학회 1988년도 추계학술대회 논문집 학회본부
• /
• pp.418-421
• /
• 1988

A disturbance and parameter variations cause a steady and/or transient error in the conventional de servo motor drive system. In this paper robust control system for dc servo motor drive taking disturbance and parameter variations into account is proposed. The proposed control system compensates rapidly the state error caused by disturbance and parameter variations. Simulation results show that the proposed method is robust for the steady and transient response in the presence of both disturance and parameter variations.

• International Journal of Aeronautical and Space Sciences
• /
• 제2권2호
• /
• pp.73-81
• /
• 2001

This paper describes the procedure to develop a robust estimator design method for a target tracker that accounts for both structured real parameter uncertainties and unknown inputs. Two robust design approaches are combined: the Mini-p-Norm. design method to consider real parameter uncertainties and the $H_{\infty}$ design technique for unknown disturbances and unknown inputs. Constant estimator gains are computed that guarantee the robust performance of the estimator in the presence of parameter variations in the target model and unknown inputs to the target. The new estimator has two design parameters. One design parameter allows the trade off between small estimator error variance and low sensitivity to unknown parameter variations. Another design parameter allows the trade off between the robustness to real parameter variations and the robustness to unknown inputs. This robust estimator design method was applied to the longitudinal motion tracking problem of a T-38 aircraft.