This paper analyzes the problem of corruption as a phenomenon, a negative and illegal social phenomenon, which is contrary to the rules of normal functioning of the society. It implies to very ...serious consequences which can produce a real threat and the possibility of adopting corruption as a negative model of life and activity, that is, the functioning of the society, personified in several corrupt individuals and groups. The state continuously applies anti-corruption mechanisms. However, a phenomenon that is difficult to eradicate is the multitude of individual cases of offering, giving, or soliciting bribes in certain everyday life circumstances. We are worried about the researches indicating that a large number of the state institutions are exposed to corruption, including the officials employed in these institutions using corrupt actions during the performance of their regular work. The basic question that arises is whether a certain number of citizens who do not accept corruption over time become “antisocial” in relation to the individuals representing a part of the society which accepts it as an adopted model, or a way of living and normal functioning being contrary to law and the commitment of the state in the fight against corruption. The aim of the research is how to prevent the adoption of the corruption model as a “value”, by reporting it to the competent authorities in Republic of Serbia, including the fight against corruption through the socalled “Romanian model”, proved to be very effective in fighting corruption.
Levees are linear structures that are continuously reconstructed throughout the years and whose construction and behavior depends on local soil conditions, as well as requirements regarding ...impermeability and mechanical resistance. This results in various levee cross sections, even within the same levee. In situations of extreme water events, when timely actions are required, this variability poses a problem for decision-making based on observed behavior, which is highly dependent on the specific section parameters. Creating models for each problematic section becomes impractical, and because of that, in this study, 91 different cross sections from 16 levees are considered to identify the key levee parameters with the largest effects on three observed mechanisms: deformations, exit hydraulic gradients, and factors of safety. The implemented factor screening methodology is based on the sequential bifurcation method (SB) and numerical analyses. The SB method successively investigates groups of factors and uses their cumulative effects to identify the important groups and to discard the unimportant based on a previously selected parameter Δ, until the groups are reduced to single factors that may be deemed important. It is found that approximately 30% of all the factors used to describe the most complex sections are considered important by at least one of the investigated mechanisms.
By analyzing the way of business companies management in Republic of Serbia and the European Union, the author, in this paper, informatively indicates both the similarities and differences in the way ...of their management, with an emphasis put on the positive as well as negative aspects of such a management including the possibilities of its abuse and the abuse of a control of the work. Taking into account the fact that each company is doing business of a common interest, it is very important to analytically define the assumptions for the most adequate ways of their management with the emphasis put on the prevention of possible abuses of the common interest because of which the business companies have been founded. All crushing data and statistics including the economic experts` warnings, the cautions of the Fiscal council referring to a negative influence of the business companies over the public finances, the lack of control of the spent resources as well as transferring the responsibility of the business companies managers to the founder(s) for bad and irresponsible running business represent the problems being faced with nowadays. A single level management system that is typically characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon legal system or the bicameral management level that is dominant in the continental legal system, or the third solution that can be accepted as a mixed system, are subject to analysis in this paper in order to find the best solutions in the way of managing companies in the sense that all previous efforts of the experts have not yielded results in finding the best - the ideal solution in this field.
To identify the unknown values of the parameters of Burger's constitutive law, commonly used for the evaluation of the creep behavior of the soft soils, this paper demonstrates a procedure relying on ...the data obtained from multiple sensors, where each sensor is used to its best advantage. The geophysical, geotechnical, and unmanned aerial vehicle data are used for the development of a numerical model whose results feed into the custom-architecture neural network, which then provides information about on the complex relationships between the creep characteristics and soil displacements. By utilizing InSAR and GPS monitoring data, particle swarm algorithm identifies the most probable set of Burger's creep parameters, eventually providing a reliable estimation of the long-term behavior of soft soils. The validation of methodology is conducted for the Oostmolendijk embankment in the Netherlands, constructed on the soft clay and peat layers. The validation results show that the application of the proposed methodology, which relies on multisensor data, can overcome the high cost and long duration issues of laboratory tests for the determination of the creep parameters and can provide reliable estimates of the long-term behavior of geotechnical structures constructed on soft soils.
In this paper a modification of the reliability-based robust geotechnical design (RGD) method is proposed. The intention of the proposed modifications is to simplify the method, make it less ...computationally expensive, and harmonise of the results with Eurocode 7. The complexity of the RGD method mainly stems from the calculation of the design’s robustness measure, which is the feasibility robustness index (ββ). Due to this fact, the replacing of the existing robustness measure with a generalised reliability index (β) is considered. It was demonstrated that β fits into the robustness concept, and is traditionally used as a construction reliability measure, making it intuitive and “user friendly”. It is proposed to conduct a sensitivity analysis using Soboli indices, with the aim of freezing the variables whose contribution to the system response variance is negligible, which will further simplify the method. By changing the robustness measure, the number of the required reliability analyses is significantly decreased. Further reduction is achieved by conducting analyses only for the designs chosen in the scope of the genetic algorithm. The original RGD method is used as an extension of traditional reliability-based design. By applying the proposed modifications, the RGD method can be used as an alternative to the classic and reliability-based design method.
When constructing flood protection structures such as river levees, oftentimes due to various factors engineers must design composite structures, i.e., reinforced earthen structures which comply with ...all the stability criteria. The most common way of reinforcing such structures is the usage of geosynthetics, or mostly geogrids when talking about stability. Since geosynthetics are man-made materials produced in a controlled environment and go through quality control measures, their characteristics contain a negligible amount of uncertainty compared to natural soils. However, geosynthetic handling, their installation in the levee, and their long-term degradation can all have significant effects of variable magnitude on geosynthetic characteristics. These effects and their variability can be considered as random variables, which can then be used in probabilistic analyses together with soil properties. To investigate the effects of the geogrid’s resistance variability on slope stability compared to soil properties variability, probabilistic analyses are conducted on a river levee in northern Croatia. It is found that the geogrid’s variability generally has very little effect on the total uncertainty compared to the friction angle’s variability, but out of the three geogrid layers used the top grid has the most influence.
Levees are embankments designed for passive flood protection. In order to reduce the potential of climate-induced flooding risks, it is necessary to reconstruct or upgrade the existing levees. Flood ...risk management aims to reduce the probability of floods and their potential adverse effects on the population, economy, and environment. This paper presents the novel application of reliability analysis for risk ranking in the Otok Virje-Brezje levee reconstruction project in the Republic of Croatia. To identify, verify and analyse key risks, a group of 35 experts, who were directly involved in the levee reconstruction project or have extensive experience in similar projects, was selected. An Analytic network process (ANP) was used for group multi criteria decision-making. Quantitative and qualitative approaches to risk analysis were combined. Different experts from the various organisations may have diverse interests and goals. The geometric mean method was chosen to reach group consensus. The resources that will be allocated to the risk responses are proportional to the risk exposures. To analyse the reliability of the group consensus-reaching method a determination of the risk ranking probability matrix is proposed by using the Monte Carlo simulation method. Different decision-making approaches are proposed for cases in which consensus is not reached with satisfactory reliability.
Introduction. Unlike traumatic rupture of the spleen, which is the most common consequence of blunt abdominal trauma and is well documented in the literature, and unlike the atraumatic rupture of the ...spleen, which is less common but al-so well described, spontaneous rupture of the spleen in a patient with malaria is a rare complication, with a potentially fatal outcome. Case report. A soldier aged 46 years, was hospitalized, with the clinical picture of abdominal colic and diarrhea, previously treated for a primary attack of acute malaria. During hospitalization, deterioration of health condition occurred, with the development of a clinical picture of an acute abdomen due to spontaneous rupture of the spleen which was successfully resolved by splenectomy. Conclusion. Splenectomy is the method of choice for patients with unstable clinical presentation due to atraumatic rupture of the spleen.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, ODKLJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The most recent major earthquake series struck near Petrinja (December 29th 2020 M 6.2), and triggered extensive ground failures in the wider area of Petrinja, Sisak and Glina. Coseismic ground ...failures including subsidence dolines, liquefaction and landslides have been documented over a large area by various experts and teams. These data are stored in the newly created inventory, which is openly presented in this paper. This inventory is administered and updated by the Croatian Geological Survey, and will be available online via a Web Map Service (WMS) (www.hgi-cgs.hr). The aim of the inventory is to not only provide data for the development of susceptibility maps and more detailed exploration for possible remediation measures, but also to define the priorities for immediate action. The earthquake triggered the rapid development of dropout dolines which endanger the local populations of the villages of Mečenčani and Borojevići. This is still an ongoing process in the vicinity of the houses and therefore in-situ exploration started immediately. Liquefaction related to alluvial sediments of the Sava, Kupa and Glina rivers occurred almost exclusively in loose and pure sands, and was accompanied by sand boils, subsidence and lateral spreading. Liquefaction also presents a greater hazard because settlement of houses and river embankments occurred. Lateral spreading caused failures of river flood embankments and natural river banks. According to the data known to date, the majority of the coseismic landslides were reactivated with minor displacements. Despite that, it has been recognised that houses at the edge, or in landslide colluvium suffered greater damage than other houses located outside the landslide impact zone.
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