Ground reaction curves for circular excavations in non-homogeneous,axisymmetric strain-softening rock masses

Fast methods to solve the unloading problem of a cylindrical cavity or tunnel excavated in elasto-perfectly plastic, elasto-brittle or strain-softening materials under a hydrostatic stress feld can be derived based on the self-similarity of the solution. As a consequence, they only apply when the rock mass is homogeneous and so exclude many cases of practical interest. We describe a robust and fast numerical technique that solves the tunnel unloading problem and estimates the ground reaction curve for a cylindrical cavity excavated in a rock mass with properties depending on the radial coordinate, where the solution is no longer self-similar. The solution is based on a continuation-like approach(associated with the unloading and with the incremental formulation of the elasto-plastic behavior), fnite element spatial discretization and a combination of explicit sub-stepping schemes and implicit techniques to integrate the constitutive law, so as to tackle the diffculties associated with both strong strain-softening and elasto-brittle behaviors. The developed algorithm is used for two practical ground reaction curve computation applications. The frst application refers to a tunnel surrounded by an aureole of material damaged by blasting and the second to a tunnel surrounded by a ring-like zone of reinforced(rock-bolted) material.

Runoff variations in the Luanhe River Basin during 1956-2002

The decrease of runoff in the Luanhe river basin, which caused water crisis in Tian-jin for several times, was investigated using discharge data covering the period 1956-2002. The data from the differential integral curves of the annual runoff indicate that the decreasing point began in 1979 in the six sub-basins. The decrease of runoff in the Luanhe river basin resulted from the combination of climate effects and human activities, in which the latter plays an important role. This can be illustrated by noting that after 1979 the runoff generated by similar precipitation decreased under the condition that the total precipitation did not decrease in the entire basin. As a result, the annual runoff of the Luanhe river basin after 1979 decreased by about 6.46×10^8 m^3 each year. To analyze the runoff characteristics, it is inadequate to seek the runoff trends only and the identification of cyclical component of the runoff as accurate as possible is necessary. From the natural annual runoff discharge time series, we can see the annual runoff fluctuates around the long-term average. Analyzed by VRL （Variable Record Length） method, the main periods of 3, 5-6, 7, 9, 16-20 and 37-39 years were found. The last decade causing water crisis was the driest period in the history, and this condition will last several years from trend analysis and power spectrum analysis. So finding new water sources is urgent to solve water crisis in Tianjin city, and the South-North Water Transfer is a feasible option.

High accuracy in automatic detection of atrial fibrillation for Holter monitoring

Atrial fibrillation(AF) has been considered as a growing epidemiological problem in the world,with a substantial impact on morbidity and mortality.Ambulatory electrocardiography(e.g.,Holter) monitoring is commonly used for AF diagnosis and therapy and the automated detection of AF is of great significance due to the vast amount of information provided.This study presents a combined method to achieve high accuracy in AF detection.Firstly,we detected the suspected transitions between AF and sinus rhythm using the delta RR interval distribution difference curve,which were then classified by a combination analysis of P wave and RR interval.The MIT-BIH AF database was used for algorithm validation and a high sensitivity and a high specificity(98.2% and 97.5%,respectively) were achieved.Further,we developed a dataset of 24-h paroxysmal AF Holter recordings(n=45) to evaluate the performance in clinical practice,which yielded satisfactory accuracy(sensitivity=96.3%,specificity=96.8%).