Various structural discontinuities, which form a discrete fracture network, play a significant role in the failure conditions and stability of the rock masses around underground excavations. Several continuum numerical methods have been used to study the stability of underground excavations in jointed rock masses but only few of them can take into account the influence of the pre-existing natur...

Several molecular epidemiological studies have been conducted to examine the association between low-density lipoprotein receptor-related proteins (LRP5) Ala1330Val polymorphism and fracture; however, the conclusions remained controversial. We therefore performed an extensive meta-analysis on 10 published studies with 184479 subjects. Electronic databases, including PubMed, Excerpta Medica Data...

BACKGROUND Interleukin-6 (IL6) -174C/G polymorphism was suggested to be associated with fracture risk. However, the results were inconsistent. Thus, we did a meta-analysis. METHODS Reported studies were searched from online electronic databases of Pubmed, EMBASE, Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI). The odds ratios (ORs) and corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calcu...

A combined finite/ discrete element method is presented for modelling of composite specimens subjected to dynamic/impact loadings. The main task is set on developing an algorithm for simulation of potential bonding and debonding/delamination phenomena during impact or general dynamic loading conditions. In addition, full fracture analysis can also be performed. The proposed approach adopts a ge...

The cause of crack initiation turbine blade had initially cracked by a fatigue mechanism over a period of time and then fractured by the overload at the last moment. Experimental procedure consists of macroscopic inspection, material verification, microscopic examination, and metallographic analysis and finally FE. And for these procedures, some specimens were prepared from a fractured blade. Us...