BACKGROUND Interim analyses are used in clinical trials in order to enable early decisions for medical, ethical, and economic reasons. However, it appears unfeasible to stop a trial during such an interim analysis. New patients will thus enter the trial while the interim analysis is ongoing. Moreover, depending on the event kinetics of the specific disease, the trial design, and the correspondi...

background: the interim restorative materials should have certain mechanical properties to withstand in oral cavity. the aim of this study was to evaluate the hardness and wear resistance ofinterim restorative materials. materials and methods: fifteen identical rectangular shape specimens with dimensions of 2 mm × 10 mm × 30 mm were made from 7 interim materials (tempspan, protemp 3 garant, rev...

Abstract This article presents coupled data assimilation (DA) activities at the European Centre for Medium‐Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). Coupled DA is an essential component of ECMWF Earth‐system strategy. It aims providing consistent initial conditions to atmosphere, land, and ocean forecast model. The introduces different systems observing each component. discusses challenges related obser...

A new relationship between the surface distribution of equivalent potential temperature and the potential temperature at the tropopause is proposed. Using a Gaussian approximation for the distribution of equivalent potential temperature, we argue that the tropopause potential temperature is approximately given by the mean equivalent potential temperature at the surface plus twice its standard d...

Land surface processes and their initialization are of crucial importance to address the challenge of seamless (from weather to seasonal) Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP). In particular it has been found that soil moisture influences the landatmosphere exchange processes on all relevant time scales. It is therefore expected to be of high interest for NWP applications to assimilate new satelli...