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The overall goal of this study is to examine whether infant feeding practices differ between mothers and grandmothers in rural China. We randomly sampled 1383 caregivers of infants aged 18 to 30 months living in 351 villages across 174 townships in nationally designated poverty counties in rural areas. Results show that a high fraction of caregivers of 18- to 30-month-old children living in low-income areas of rural China do not regularly engage in positive infant feeding practices. Only 30% of children in our sample achieved adequate dietary diversity. Only 49% of children in our sample were fed meat in the day prior to survey administration. Few caregivers reported giving any vitamin supplements (such as calcium or iron supplements) to their children. We find that 33% of the children were cared for by grandmothers rather than mothers, and that grandmothers feed a less diversified diet to children than do mothers. Most (84%) caregivers rely solely on their own experiences, friends, and family members in shaping their feeding behaviors. Overall infant feeding practices are poor in rural China. Grandmothers engage in poorer feeding practices than do mothers. Grandmothers have improved their feeding practices compared to when their own children were young. Our results suggest shortcomings in the quality of infant feeding practices, at least in part due to an absence of reliable information sources.

This article explores the problem of cognitive delays among toddlers in rural China and the role of their caregivers in producing low levels of cognition (i.e., low IQ). According to the results of a well-tested international scale of child development, the Bayley Scales of Infant Development (BSID), cognitive delays are alarmingly common, and nearly half the toddlers in our sample score an IQ of less than 84 on the BSID test (more than one standard deviation below the mean). In analyzing the source of this, we find that poor parenting—for example, not reading to, singing with, or engaging in stimulating play with one’s children—is closely associated with these delays. Even though mothers (as opposed to grandmother caregivers), and especially more educated mothers, are more likely to follow good parenting practices, quality parenting is rare overall. We seek to find out why so many young children appear to be neglected when it comes to modern parenting practices. We empirically rule out the hypotheses that caregivers discriminate according to their child’s gender; that the number of children in a given household is associated with the quality of parenting; or that caregivers living in relative poverty parent differently than their wealthier counterparts. According to the qualitative component of our study, we also find that inadequate parenting does not stem from parental indifference. Parents and grandparents obviously love their children and want them to succeed in life. Instead, the barriers appear to be primarily a lack of time and an absence of knowledge about the importance of good parenting practices. As a result, when they grow up, these children may not possess the levels of cognition needed to thrive in China’s increasingly high-skill-based economy. Overall, our findings suggest that China may be facing a national crisis due to inadequate rural early childhood development.

Social interactions in infancy have implications for long-term outcomes. This study uses data from a sample of 1412 rural Chinese infants aged 6–12 and 24–30 months to examine the relationship between peer interactions and cognitive development. Over 75% of the infants in this sample had less than three peers and around 20% had no peers in both periods. The prevalence of cognitive delays is high within this sample and increases as infants age. Multivariate analysis reveals that peer interaction is significantly associated with cognitive development. Heterogeneous analysis suggests that peer interactions and mental development may be related to the child’s primary caregiver and the distance from the child’s household to the center of their village.

Fructans are major nonstructural carbohydrates in wheat (Triticum aestivumL.). Fructan 1-fructosyltransferase (1-FFT) is the key enzyme in fructan biosynthesis. In the present study, 96 sequence variants were detected in the 1-FFT-A1gene among 26 wheat accessions including UR208, and 15 of them result in amino acid substitutions, forming four haplotypes. Two markers M39 and M2164 were developed based on the InDel21-39 and SNP-2164 polymorphisms to distinguish the three haplotypes in the 1-FFT-A1. 1-FFT-A1was located on chromosome 4A using marker M2164 and was flanked by markers Xcwm27and 6-SFT-A1.By association analysis using a natural wheat population consisted of 154 accessions, the results showed that the two markers were significantly associated with water-soluble carbohydrate (WSC) content in the lower internode stem and total stem at the early and middle grain filling stages, 1000-grain weight (TGW) at different grain filling stages and peduncle length (PLE). Comparison of the effects of three haplotypes on agronomic traits indicated that TGW, PLE and total number of spikelets per spike (TNSS) were significantly influenced by haplotypes. HapIII showed a significant positive effect on TGW, PLE and TNSS.

Using the high-resolution Terahertz Time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) and the standard sample pellet technique, the far-infrared vibrational spectra of clenbuterol hydrochloride (CH), a β2-adrenergic agonist for decreasing fat deposition and enhancing protein accretion, were measured in temperature range of 77–295 K. Between 0.2 and 3.6 THz (6.6–120.0 cm−1), seven highly resolved spectral features, strong line-narrowing and a frequency blue-shift were observed with cooling. However, ractopamine hydrochloride, with some structural and pharmacological similarities to clenbuterol hydrochloride, showed no spectral features, indicating high sensitivity and strong specificity of THz-TDS. These results could be used for the rapid and nondestructive CH residual detection in food safety control.

A convenient and environmentally friendly reactor for the synthesis of glycosyl bromides viaultrasound irradiation was designed. Peracetylated glycosyl bromides were synthesized from free saccharides by means of a one-pot method. Benzoylated and 6-subsituted glycosyl bromides were prepared from protected saccharides. The glycosyl bromides were obtained in isolated yields of 83% to 96%.

he experimentation was to study the effect to cement concrete surface flexural strength by simulating the different natures and thickness of cement mortar, The slump was defined as 20mm and 70mm, on behalf of the low plasticity of concrete and plastic concrete, the three conditions of the surface mortar thickness 25mm, 15mm and 5mm was to simulate the different thickness of mortar extracted during concrete construction,which adopted three different mortar ratio and mortar consistency, the concrete specimens with the 150*150*550mm steel mould were made from concrete and the surface layer of mortar,the specimen surface as a curved flat was to determine the surface flexural tensile strength.The results show that: the surface flexural strength of concrete is affected by the components,natures and thickness of cement mortar, the higher the surface mortar strength is, the higher concrete surface bending strength is.

In this paper, chaos theory principle is applied in studying the concrete mixing process.Using piecewise linear mapping model describes the stirred mixture mixing and separation process.A chaotic model is established for particle movement in mixing process.In order to determine the reasonable stir parameters , the solving mixed movement method and the number of periodic windows is also given out. Suggested using chaos model determine the reasonably mixing time, proposed pre-mixed aggregate method, aggregate pre-wet method and admixture batch feeding ways to improve productivity and mixing uniformity.