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Amomum villosum Lour. (A. villosum), a comestible medicinal plant, has been traditionally used in China to treat diarrhea, stomach fullness, and abdominal distension. Polysaccharide, the main chemical component of A. villosum, has been shown to possess potential antioxidant and glycosidase inhibitory activities; however, whether it has anticolitis activity is unknown. The aim of this research was to evaluate the anticolitis effects of A. villosum polysaccharide (AVLP) in BALB/c mice. The results showed that AVLP administration significantly reversed body weight loss, colon shortening and colon weight gain and decreased the levels of proinflammatory cytokines and chemokines in colitis mice (p < 0.05). AVLP administration also maintained intestinal barrier function by the upregulation of ZO-1 protein expression (p < 0.05). In addition, high-throughput sequencing analysis showed that AVLP possessed a great regulatory effect on the growth of Adlercreutzia, Clostridium, Streptococcus, Parabacteroides, Helicobacter, Odoribacter, and Alistipes (p < 0.05, LDA score > 2). The correlation analysis revealed that the protective effects against colitis of AVLP were highly correlated with intestinal bacterium regulation. These results suggest that AVLP intake could serve as a prospective nutritional strategy for inflammatory bowel diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Seven different tree-ring parameters (tree-ring width, earlywood width, latewood width, maximum density, minimum density, mean earlywood density, and mean latewood density) were obtained from Qinghai spruce ( Picea crassifolia) at one chronology site in the Hexi Corridor, China. The chronologies were analyzed individually and then compared with each other. Growth-climate response analyses showed that the tree-ring width and maximum latewood density (MXD) are mainly influenced by warm season temperature variability. Based on the relationships derived from the climate response analysis, the MXD chronology was used to reconstruct the May-August maximum temperature for the period 1775-2008 A.D., and it explained the 38.1% of the total temperature variance. It shows cooling in the late 1700s to early 1800s and warming in the twentieth century. Spatial climate correlation analyses with gridded land surface data revealed that our warm season temperature reconstruction contains a strong large-scale temperature signal for north China. Comparison with regional and Northern Hemisphere reconstructions revealed similar low-frequency change to longer-term variability. Several cold years coincide with major volcanic eruptions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PURPOSE: The aim of this investigation was to determine and analyze the distribution of the medical institutions of stomatology and dental manpower in Liaoning province. METHODS: The data of institutions and manpower was collected by mass examination using tables filled by every institution arid personally. Epidata 3.02 database was used to input the data and statistical analysis was performed using the SPSS 12.0 software package. RESULTS: The results showed that there were 2155 dental institutions and 5617 dentists in Liaoning province. Among all the institutes, 71.0% was private clinics. About 80.5% of institutions and 87.8% of dentists were in the urban area, which was significantly higher than the percent of dentists working in the rural area. The ratio between dentists and the general population was about 13.02/10 million. There were fewer dental auxiliary in dental institutions, the ratio between dentists, nurses and dental technician was 6:2:1. The title and degree of the dentists in the rural area were lower than those in urban area, but the dentists in the rural area provided service for a large population. CONCLUSION: The results suggest that the distribution of oral health resource in Liaoning province should he rationally readjusted, and continuing education and training should be strengthened in order to improve the efficiency of oral health service and social health justice. Supported by Key Medical Professional Construction Project of Liaoning Province (Grant No.200809). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PURPOSE: To investigate the current status and the distribution of tooth loss in middle-aged people and elders in Northeast China, and provide scientific basis for the establishment of oral health care policies. METHODS: An equal-sized stratified multi-stage random sampling design was applied according to the third national oral health investigation of epidemiology, tooth loss was examined among 4752 people aged 35-44 and 65-74 in northeast China. The data were analyzed with SPSS13.0 statistical software for independent-sample t test and Chi-square test. RESULTS: Of all the subjects, 3135 people had tooth loss, the rate of tooth loss was 66.80%, mean tooth loss was 4.95; 392 persons were half edentulous, the rate of edentulous jaw was 8.35%, 223 persons were edentulous, the rate edentulous jaw was 4.75%. Statistical analysis showed tooth loss rate in females was significantly higher than that in males (P<0.05). There was significantly difference of tooth loss between city and rural area (P<0.05). There was significant difference in file amount and rate of tooth loss between Jilin Province and Liaoning Province, and Jilin Province and Heilongjiang Province as well (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The tooth loss rate is very high in middle-aged people and elders in Northeast China. Measures should be taken to prevent dental caries and periodontal disease in these population so that to promote the status of middle-aged people and elders on oral health and to improve their quality of life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PURPOSE: To assess the oral health status of the 65-74 years old people in the northeast of China, analyze the distribution of caries and periodontal diseases in this group of people, and provide scientific basis for establishing oral health care policies. METHODS: The representative samples were selected by multi-stage, stratified and random sampling from the three provinces of northeast of China. The diagnostic standard of dental caries and periodontal diseases were based on WHO criteria. SPSS 12.0 software package was used to analyze the data. RESULTS: Among 2364 people aged 65-74 years, the prevalence of dental caries was 67.5% and DFT was 2.68, and the data in urban was higher than in rural. The prevalence rate of periodontal disorders, such as health, gingival bleeding, dental calculus, periodontal pockets, loss of attachment was respectively 15.4%,72.0%,86.6%,58.0% and 60.1% ,The prevalence rate of Heilongjiang and Liaoning province was lower than that of Jilin Province. CONCLUSIONS: Dental caries and periodontal diseases were the common diseases in northeast of China, systematic community based oral health promotion should be strengthened and preventive-oriented oral health care systems are needed in the northeast of China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PURPOSE: To study the prevalence of dental caries in primary dentition of 5-year-old children in Northeast of China, and assess the risk factors for dental caries. METHODS: The representative samples were selected by multi-stage, stratified and random sampling from the three provinces of Northeast of China. Dental caries of 2353 children at five-year age were recorded according to WHO criteria. The questionnaire were finished by 1191 parents of the children and analyzed with χ²test and logistic regression using SPSS 12.0 software package. RESULTS: The prevalence of dental caries in 5-year-old children was 75.82% and dmft was 4.63. The lowest caries prevalence was noted in Heilongjiang province. The important predictors of dental caries were the educational level of parents (P<0.001) and eating sweet food before sleep (P=0.006). CONCLUSIONS: To reduce the dental caries in primary dentition, oral health education for the parents should be emphasized and sugar-intake before sleeping should be controlled. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We have reconstructed the spring (March–June) temperature from 1701 to 2008 for the Changling Mountains, the southern edge of the Gobi Desert, using mean earlywood density data of Pinus tabulaeformis. The reconstruction explains 41.7% of the actual temperature variance during the common period 1959–2008. The temperature reconstruction is representative of temperature conditions over a large area of Central and East Asia, especially in the Gobi Desert. Significant spectral peaks are identified at 2.0–2.8 and 26.9years. Our temperature reconstruction successfully captured most recent warming and agreed in general with other temperature reconstructions from nearby regions, eastern China and Northern Hemisphere on a decadal timescale. Our reconstructed temperature is significantly correlated with sea surface temperature in the western tropical and northern Pacific Ocean. Preliminary analysis of links between large-scale climatic variation and the temperature reconstruction shows that there is a relationship between extremes in spring temperature and the Asian summer monsoon circulations. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: September–March mean temperature has been reconstructed to A.D. 1680 for the Kaiduhe River watershed on the southern slope of the Tien Shan Mountains, China, using the Picea schrenkiana tree-ring width. The reconstruction explains the variance of 47% in the observed mean temperature from 1953 to 2011. Power spectral and wavelet analyses demonstrated the existence of significant 50-year and 2- to 7-year cycles of variability. The results of the spatial correlations suggest that our reconstruction contains climatic signals for Central Asia. Warm periods occurred during 1696–1708, 1730–1748, 1784–1804, 1832–1855, 1892–1903, 1924–1928, 1937–1943, and 1987–2006; while the periods of 1685–1695, 1709–1729, 1749–1783, 1805–1831, 1856–1891, 1904–1923, 1929–1936, and 1944–1986 were relatively cold. The significant correlation coefficient between the reconstruction and the temperature reconstruction for the Urumqi River source reveals that the temperature variations in the annual cold period for the southern and the northern slope of the central Tien Shan Mountains are roughly synchronous over the last nearly 300 years. A comparison between the reconstruction and three winter North Atlantic Oscillation indexes revealed similar long-term trends. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: July–June precipitation has been reconstructed back to A.D. 1464 for the Baluntai region on the southern slope of the central Tien Shan Mountains, China, using the Picea schrenkiana tree-ring width. The reconstruction explains the variance of 51% in the observed precipitation from 1959 to 2005. By employing a 21-year moving average to the reconstruction, nine periods with above average reconstructed precipitation comprised ∼1474–1503, 1550–1577, 1588–1619, 1658–1713, 1790–1812, 1833–1867, 1890–1907, 1923–1944, and 1988–1995∼; eight periods with below average reconstruction consisted of 1504–1549, 1578–1587, 1620–1657, 1714–1789, 1813–1832, 1868–1889, 1908–1922 and 1945–1987. The wet/dry periods of the reconstructed precipitation correspond well with other reconstructions. Some droughts in the historical documents are also precisely captured in the reconstruction. Precipitation variations for the southern slope of the central Tien Shan Mountains are roughly synchronous with that of the northern slope in the recent ∼300 year. Power spectral and wavelet analysis demonstrated the existence of significant ∼100-y, ∼60-y, ∼50-y, ∼16-y, ∼10-y and ∼2-y cycles of variability. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Drought is a recurring phenomenon in north-central China. Long-term information about the history of drought is still limited because the instrumental records for many areas in north-central China go back only a few decades at best. This paper presents an earlywood width (EWW) chronology of Chinese pine (Pinus tabulaeformis) in the Shimen Mountains, Tianshui, eastern Gansu, north-central China. The climate-response analysis shows that April–July precipitation is the main factor limiting the earlywood growth of Chinese pines in the Shimen Mountains, Tianshui. Based on the EWW chronology, an April–July precipitation reconstruction for the period A.D. 1629–2008 was developed for Tianshui. The climate/tree-growth model accounts for 41.6% of the observed precipitation variance during the period 1953–2008. Spatial analysis shows that the precipitation reconstruction contains a strong common drought signal for north-central China. Reconstructed drought events are compared to a precipitation reconstruction of Huashan and historical archives for north-central China. The results reveal common climatic extremes over much of north-central China. Moreover, some dry periods coincided with solar minima or volcanic eruptions over the past several hundred years. Multi-taper spectral analysis reveals the existence of significant 3.8-year (90%), 3.1-year (95%), 2.7-year (99%), 2.4-year (99%) and 2.0-year (99%) periods of variability. The linkages to the Asian-Pacific Oscillation Index suggest regional precipitation variations may be linked to the East Asian summer monsoon circulations. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Picea schrenkiana is the dominant tree species in Ili River Basin located in the western Tianshan Mountains of Xinjiang. We investigated the growth decline characteristics of P. schrenkiana at different altitudes (1800, 2300 and 2800 m) based on tree-ring index (TRI) and percentage growth change (GC), aiming to understand the growth response of P. schrenkiana to drought events at different altitudes and the impacts of altitude on tree growth decline in this region. The results showed that P. schrenkiana experienced multiple decline events at low-altitude (1800 m). TRI and GC identified inconsistent occurrence time of the decline events. The variations of TRI indicated that P. schrenkiana at low-altitude experienced two large-scale declines during 1927-1933 and 2017-2014, respectively. The variations of GC identified four decline events, including 1891-1893, 1924-1926, 1973-1975, and 2004-2009. The radial growth of P. schrenkiana across altitudes from low to high was significantly affected by the Palmer drought severity index (PDSI) of the previous growing season. The impact of current PDSI on P. schrenkiana during the growing season initially enhanced but later decreased with increasing altitude. In the extreme drought year 1917, the magnitude of growth decline increased with altitude. At low-altitude (1800 m), the TRI was 0.65, which was 35% lower than the normal level. At mid-altitude (2300 m) and high-altitude (2800 m), it was 0.56 and 0.54, respectively, being 40% lower than the average level. The drought event in 1917 had a 2-year legacy effect on the growth of P. schrenkiana at all the altitudes, with the TRI in 1920 recovered to exceeding 0.9, being close to the normal level. The impact of altitude on drought-induced forest decline was significant. Tree growth in low-altitude areas was more vulnerable to drought events due to the relatively poorer water and temperature conditions at low-altitude, which could lead to multiple large-scale decline events. In mid- and high-altitude areas, where hydrothermal conditions were more favorable, trees could experience even more severe decline during extreme droughts.

Based on the standard method of dendrochronology, we examined the tree-ring width index of two dominant tree species in the Altay Mountains, China, including Picea obovata and Larix sibirica . We analyzed the basal area increments (BAI) of those two species and the relationships between their radial growth and the climatic factors, which were compared in similar habitats. The results showed that the BAI of P. obovata was greater than L. sibirica , but the radial growth rate of L. sibirica was greater. In recent 60 years, the radial growth of P. obovata negatively correlated with high temperature in the fast growing stage of previous year, while the high temperature in June of current year promoted the radial growth of L. sibirica. There was a significantly negative correlation between radial growth of L. sibirica with temperature in January of current year. The sensitivity of tree growth to climate showed an obvious increase after an abrupt climate change under the background of recent warming and wetting trend in mid-1980s. Results of the moving correlation analysis showed that the response of the radial growth of P. obovata and L. sibirica to temperature and precipitation were enhanced under the background of climate change in the study area.

Background: To explore the relationship between enteroviruses and hospitalized children with hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) complicated with nervous system disease. 234 hospitalized HFMD patients treated in Shengjing Hospital, Liaoning Province were analyzed retrospectively. Based on the presence and severity of nervous system disease, the patients were grouped as follows: general patients, severely ill patients, critically ill patients and fatal patients. Based on the detected pathogen, the patients were grouped as follows: Enterovirus 71 (EV71) infection, coxsackie A16 (CA16) infection and other enterovirus (OE) infection., Results: Of the 423 hospitalized patients, most were admitted in July 2010(129/423, 30.5%). Enteroviruses were detected in 177(41.8%). 272/423 patients were male (64.3%), and fatal patients had the greatest proportion of male patients (p < 0.05). EV71 infection was found in 89/423 patients (21%). CA16 infection was detected in 8/423 patients (16.1%). Compared to group CA16, patients in group EV71 were hospitalized earlier, and the duration of hospitalization was longer (p < 0.05). Of the 92 patients with nervous system damage, 65 were infected with EV71 and 19 were infected with CA16. Among these CA16 infected patients, 2 had brainstem encephalitis and 1 had AFP. There were more patients with nervous system dysfunction in group EV71 than in groups CA16 or OE (p < 0.05). The 5 fatalities all occurred in group EV71 patients (p < 0.05). Infection with EV71 was most likely to cause neurogenic pulmonary edema (p < 0.05). Patients in group EV71 had a higher rate of suffering from coma and limb movement disorder than patients in groups CA16 or OE (p < 0.05)., Conclusion: The disease progresses faster in EV71-infected HFMD patients. These patients are more likely to suffer nervous system damage, neurogenic pulmonary edema, severe sequelae or death. CA16 and other enteroviruses can also cause HFMD with severe nervous system complications.

Purpose: To investigate the oral health status and its influential factors among pre-school children in Liaoning province, and to provide first hand data for prevention of caries., Methods: According to the Third National Oral Health Investigation criteria, the oral status of 792 children aged 5 years old in 6 regions of Liaoning province were examined. SPSS 13.0 software package was used for statistical analysis., Results: The prevalence of dental caries and caries means of 792 subjects were 73.86% and 4.38 respectively. The prevalence of dental caries and caries means in rural area was significantly higher than that in city area, (X(2)=16.07,P<0.01). There was no significant difference of caries prevalence between male and female X(2)=0.46,P>0.05). The prevalence of dental caries and caries means of 5-year old children in Liaoning province were lower than that of ten years ago., Conclusion: Oral health status in Liaoning province should be paid more attention, and more effective measures should be taken to the incidence of dental caries.

Purpose: The aim of this investigation was to analyse the dental caries prevalence, patterns and trends of all age groups in Liaoning province., Methods: The representative samples were selected by multi-stage, stratified and random sampling, which included subjects aged 5,12,35-44 and 65-74 years. Clinical examination was based on WHO methodology(4th Ed). Student's t test and Chi-square test were applied for statistical evaluation of the mean caries experience(DMFT/dmft) and the prevalence proportion rates of dental caries (PP) between 1995 and 2005 using SPSS 12.0 software package., Results: At age 5,12,35-44, the PP was 73.86%,30.05% and 63.89% respectively,which was lower than in 1995, the number being 89.49%, 59.19% and 70.26%. However, at 65-74 years, the PP was 67.40% in 2005, and there was no significant difference compared with 1995. For the two national survey, the PP and DMFT were higher in urban than in rural area. But the dmft in 5-year-old in urban was lower than in rural in 2005., Conclusions: The trend of dental caries in children and adults was declined in 2005, but it was still higher. It is essential to strengthen oral health education and promotion and continuously implement preventive oral care technique in Liaoning province.

Objective: To clarify the occurrence and distribution of the fusion of deciduous teeth in Shenyang., Methods: By using cross-sectional study, 4286 children were examined, who aged from 2 to 6 years in 37 kindergartens., Results: Of 4286 children investigated, fusion of the deciduous teeth were detected in 65 children (1.52 percent) without sex predilection. The fused teeth typically occurred unilaterally (68.75 percent), and mainly located in the anterior region, more frequently in the mandibular (91.25 percent) than that in the maxillary arch. 12 cases were bilaterally symmetrical (18.46 percent). Two rare cases were found with fused teeth, one occurred in central incisor, lateral incisor and canine, the other occurred between two molars with two incisors fused in the same side. Fused teeth in two cases had caries., Conclusion: The occurrence of the fused teeth may cause some complications. Pediatric dentists should pay attention to the fused teeth occurred in preschool children.