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Purpose: To retrospectively compare the efficacy and safety of prostatic artery embolization (PAE) combined with transurethral resection of the prostate (TURP) and simple TURP in treating large (> 100 mL) benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). Methods: We retrospectively analyzed the clinical data of 13 and 17 patients with large BPH who underwent TURP and PAE + TURP, respectively, from January 2016 to January 2020. The changes in various indices before and after surgery were compared between the two groups. Results: In the PAE + TURP group, the operation time (OT), intraoperative blood loss (BL), postoperative bladder flushing time (PBFT), and postoperative catheter retention time (PCRT) were lower, and the speed of the excised lesion (SEL) was higher than that in the TURP group (P < 0.05). Following-up for 12 months, the prostatic volume (PV), maximum urinary flow rate (Qmax), postvoid residual volume (PVR), International Prostate Symptom Score (IPSS), quality of life (QoL) score, total prostate-specific antigen (T-PSA), and free prostate-specific antigen (F-PSA) in each group improved as compared to before the surgery (P < 0.05), and the above improved indicators, IPSS ratio, and obstructive symptoms in the PAE + TURP group were higher than those in the TURP group (P < 0.05). The incidence of postoperative complications in the PAE + TURP group was lower than that in the TURP group. We obtained the pathological picture of a prostate biopsy after PAE for the first time. Conclusion: Compared to TURP alone, PAE + TURP should be promoted, because of its greater efficacy and safety in treating large BPH and fewer post-surgical complications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Assessment of debris flow hazards is important for developing measures to mitigate the loss of life and property and to minimize environmental damage. Two modified uncertainty models, Set Pair Analysis (SPA) and modified Set Pair Analysis (mSPA), were suggested to assess the regional debris flow hazard. A case study was conducted in seven towns of the Beichuan county, Sichuan Province, China, to test and compare the application of these two models in debris flow hazard assessment. The results showed that mSPA only can fit for value-variables, but not for non value-variable assessment indexes, Furthermore, as for a given assessment index xi, mSPA only considers two cases, namely, when grade value increases with xi and when grade value decreases with x. Thus, mSPA can not be used for debris flow hazard assessment but SPA is credible for the assessment because there are no limitations when using SPA model to assess the debris flow hazard. Therefore, in this study SPA is proposed for assessing debris flow hazard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A conception of exposure degree is used in this article to account for the hiding and exposure mechanism of nonuniform sediment transport. The force arms of particles on the bed slope are assumed to be a function of the exposure degree, which is stochastically related to the size and gradation of bed materials. Based on this conception, the formula for the angle of repose of nonuniform sediment is developed. The angle of repose of nonuniform sediment is experimentally investigated in rotation drum at the rolling motion of sediment particles. The nonuniform sediment is gotten from the mixture of two kinds of uniform sediment with different weight ratios and two experimental plans that one for changing the weight ratio of two kinds of uniform sediment from 1:9 to 9:1 and the other changing the uniform sediment size and weight ratio are used. The effect of the rotation speed and the filling degree on the angle of repose is investigated, too. Finally, the formula has been tested against a wide range of laboratory data, the prediction by the newly proposed formulas is very good. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The primary network of groundwater level observation wells aims at realizing a regional groundwater management policy. It may give a regional picture of groundwater level with emphasis on the natural situation. Observation data from the primary network can be used to estimate the actual state of groundwater system. Since the cost of the installation and maintenance of a groundwater monitoring network is extremely high, the assessment of effectiveness of the network becomes very necessary. Groundwater level monitoring networks are the examples of discontinuous sampling on variables presenting spatial continuity and highly skewed frequency distributions. Anywhere in the aquifer, ordinary kriging provides estimates of the variable sampled and a standard error of the estimate. In this article, the average Kriging standard deviation was used as a criterion for the determination of network density,and the GIS-based approach was analysized. A case study of groundwater level network simulation in the Chaiwopu Basin, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China, was presented. In the case study, the initial phreatic water observation wells were 18, a comparison of the three variogram parameters of the three defferent variogram models shows that the Gaussian model is the best. Finally, a network with 55 wells was constructed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]