Efficacy of Doppler ultrasound [correction of utrasound] for screening symptoms of decompression sickness during simulated extravehicular activities

Doppler ultrasound is frequently used for monitoring circulating microbubbles during decompression to assess the symptoms of Decompression Sickness (DCS). This analysis was carried out to evaluate its effectiveness for screening symptoms of DCS during simulated extravehicular activities (EVA). The information from various hypobaric chamber studies carried out at the NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX was used in this analysis (n = 516). The circulating microbubbles were detected in the precordial area in 42% (218/516), and symptoms were reported in 16% (81/516) of these exposures. The accuracy of Doppler-detectable bubbles (Spencer grades) on all symptoms of DCS was examined by calculating measures of sensitivity and specificity. The efficacy of Doppler as a screening device was examined by calculating their positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV). The results of these analyses indicated that the sensitivity of Doppler decreased, and the PPV increased with higher Spencer grades. However, the likelihood of detecting true negative cases (NPV) was consistently higher with all bubble grades. Due to the high false-positive rate and low prior probabilities of the risk of DCS, Doppler was found to be more useful to identify those who did not develop DCS, than to detect positive cases of DCS in the simulated EVA exposures.     

水下航行体减阻技术综述

空/水跨介质飞行器经空中飞抵目标水域后高速入水，对目标实施快速打击，具有隐蔽性好、突防能力强等特点。但在水下航行中，固/液界面阻力及绕流流场变化等问题严重影响了航行速度与稳定性。减小航行体表面阻力干扰、流场优化是保障水下高速稳定航行的关键。旨在探讨适用于水下高速航行体的表面减阻与流场优化方法，对表面微结构减阻、超疏水表面减阻、超空泡减阻和微气泡减阻４种最具代表性的固/液界面减阻技术进行论述，分析各种减阻技术的机理与应用可行性，探讨适用于水下高速航行体的减阻技术发展方向。