Clinical Manifestations, Imaging Features, and Pathogenic/Prognostic Risk Factors for Temporomandibular Disorders (TMD): A Case-Control Study Based on Psychogenic Factors of Patients.

Objective: To survey the clinical manifestations and imaging features of temporomandibular disorders (TMD) and analyze the risk factors for pathogenesis/prognosis through a case-control study based on psychogenic factors of patients. Methods: According to the inclusion criteria, 200 adult patients were randomly enrolled from the maxillofacial department of our hospital from January 2020 to May 2021, including 100 patients with TMD as the study group and 100 healthy patients as the control group. The study group can be assigned into four subgroups according to their clinical manifestations: (1) articular area or/and masticatory muscle pain group, (2) mandibular movement abnormality group, (3) joint murmur group, and (4) two or more symptom groups. Based on the study of psychogenic factors of patients, the clinical manifestations and imaging features of TMD were determined, and the risk factors for pathogenesis/prognosis were analyzed. Results: The distribution of psychological status in the TMD group was higher than that in the control group (P < 0.05). The distribution of anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms in the TMD group was significantly different from that in the control group (P < 0.05). Anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms were the risk factors for TMD. Compared with the control group, the incidence of abnormal MRI images in patients with temporomandibular disorders was significantly different (P < 0.05). There were significant differences in psychological status (anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms) among the three groups (P < 0.05). Anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms were the risk factors for abnormal mandibular movement and joint tremor and murmur (P < 0.05). Somatic symptoms were the risk factors for various clinical symptoms of TMD (P < 0.05). Depression was the risk factor for pain (P < 0.05). Conclusion: In patients with TMD, MRI can early identify disc abnormalities and other related imaging features, which is helpful for more comprehensive clinical evaluation and treatment of TMD patients. There exhibits no significant difference in psychological status (anxiety, depression, and somatic symptoms) of patients with different clinical symptoms, and abnormal psychological status may be one of the risk factors leading to different clinical symptoms and development of different types of TMD patients.

Environmental and economic assessment of combined biostabilization and landfill for municipal solid waste.

Biostabilization can remove considerable amounts of moisture and degradable organic materials from municipal solid waste (MSW), and can therefore be an effective form of pretreatment prior to landfill. The environmental and economic impacts of two combined processes, active stage biostabilization + sanitary landfill (AL), and active and curing stage biostabilization + sanitary landfill (ACL), were compared with sanitary landfill (SL) for MSW with high moisture content. The results indicated that land requirement, leachate generation, and CH(4) emission in the ACL process decreased by 68.6%, 89.1%, and 87.6%, respectively, and the total cost was reduced by 24.1%, compared with SL. This implies that a combined biostabilization and landfill process can be an environmentally friendly and economically feasible alternative to landfill of raw MSW with high moisture content. Sensitivity analysis revealed that treatment capacity and construction costs of biostabilization and the oxidation factor of CH(4) significantly influenced the costs and benefits of the AL and ACL process at an extremely low land price. When the land price was greater than 100 USD m(-2), it became the dominating factor in determining the cost of treatment and disposal, and the total costs of ACL were reduced to less than 40% of those of SL.

Characterization of water-extractable organic matter during the biostabilization of municipal solid waste.

For the purpose of characterizing the evolution of water-extractable organic matter (WEOM) during the biostabilization of municipal solid waste (MSW) and investigating the correlation between biostability and WEOM characteristics, this study conducted 100-day investigation on biostabilization of MSW and applied various analytical approaches to characterize WEOM. The results showed that the respirometric activity of MSW was reduced by 93% to 10.7 mg kg(-1), and the dissolved organic carbon concentration of WEOM kept steady at around 4.0 g kg(-1) after day 44, when the MSW was considered to be stabilized. Moreover, the aromaticity of WEOM significantly increased and the high-molecular weight fraction became the main part of WEOM. Being highly related to the biostability of MSW, the excitation-emission matrix spectra indicated the stability by the fluorescence regional integration technique either by the presence of specific Ex/Em maxima (with wavelength pair of approximately 288/455) or by the rapid increase of normalized excitation-emission area volumes with respect to the humic substances.