An extension of the Truscott-Brindley model [Bull. Math. Biol. 56, 981 (1994)] is derived to account for the effect of demographic fluctuations. In the presence of seasonal forcing and sufficiently shallow water conditions, the fluctuations induced by the discreteness of the zooplankton component appear sufficient to cause switching between the bloom and no-bloom cycles predicted at the mean-fi...

BACKGROUND Understanding global seasonal patterns of Kawasaki disease (KD) may provide insight into the etiology of this vasculitis that is now the most common cause of acquired heart disease in children in developed countries worldwide. METHODS Data from 1970-2012 from 25 countries distributed over the globe were analyzed for seasonality. The number of KD cases from each location was normali...

BACKGROUND Birth weight is known to fluctuate with season of birth, however, there is little information about seasonal variation in neonatal anthropometric measures. AIMS The aim of this study was to examine seasonal fluctuations in birth weight and selected anthropometric measures. STUDY DESIGN AND SUBJECTS The birth weight of singletons born after at least 37 weeks gestation was extracte...

Seasonal variation has been reported for several disorders, including those of the nervous system. This variability is usually regarded as reflecting fluctuations in vitamin D level. Although epilepsy has also been reported to exhibit some seasonal features only one previous study assessed seasonal distribution of the epileptic seizures themselves. Based on individual seizure diaries obtained f...

A significant proportion of human diseases, spanning the gamut from viral respiratory disease to arthropod-borne macroparasitic infections of the blood, exhibit distinct and stable seasonal patterns of incidence. Traditional statistical methods for the evaluation of seasonal time-series data emphasize the removal of these seasonal variations to be able to examine non-periodic, and therefore une...

In this paper, we develop an aggregation procedure using time-varying weights for constructing the common component of international economic fluctuations. The methodology for deriving time-varying weights is based on some stylised features of the data documented in the paper. The model allows for a unified treatment of cyclical and seasonal fluctuations and also accommodates the dynamic propag...