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Low illumination is a special driving condition that negatively affects drivers' vision, information acquisition (IA) ability, distance recognition and risk perception. This study evaluated drivers' car-following behaviours and characteristics using questionnaire-based research conducted among 214 drivers in Hefei. In this study, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was used to determine the factor structure of the scale, and the internal consistency of all factors was good. The results show that low illumination strongly influences drivers' following behaviour and that they tend to choose safe and conservative ways to follow leading vehicles. Street lights are beneficial, aiding drivers' IA and their grasp of surrounding or distant environments. Myopic drivers performed worse in car following when driving in a low illumination environment, regardless of the presence of street lights. Drivers with astigmatism performed worse when street lights were present. Drivers who reported more aberrant behaviours were more aggressive when driving and tended to adopt shorter following distances at night. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Alanine transaminase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) are referred to as liver transaminases. Although used routinely in clinical practice for decades, their role as predictors of mortality has not been examined until recently. We studied the predictive value of these serum transaminases in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) treated with primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI).Methods: We analyzed records of 2417 consecutive STEMI patients with no preexisting liver disease who were treated with primary PCI at the Cardiovascular Center in the First Hospital of Jilin University. The outcomes measured were all-cause mortality at the first month and at 2 years. The relationship between the baseline serum transaminase levels and primary outcome was determined.Results: We found a significant correlation between elevated liver transaminases and the Killip classification (P < 0.001 for ALT; P < 0.001 for AST), cardiac troponin I (P = 0.002 for ALT; P < 0.001 for AST), infarct-related coronary artery (P = 0.036 for ALT; P = 0.011 for AST), and pre-thrombolysis-in-myocardial-infarction (pre-TIMI) flow (P < 0.001 for ALT and AST). The serum level of ALT and AST were high along with the increasing of the grade of Killip classification. The primary infarct-related coronary artery in patients with ALT ≥95th percentage was left anterior descending artery (56%), followed by right coronary artery (36%). The OR for all-cause mortality at 2 years for participants with ALT ≥95th percentage was 5.370 (95% CI: 2.899-9.948), 7.034 (95% CI: 3.718-13.307) after adjustment for age and gender and 1.051 (95% CI: 0.302-3.652) after adjustment for all covariables. The OR for all-cause mortality at 2 years for participants with AST ≥95th percentage was 5.370 (95% CI 2.899-9.948) and 5.699 (95% CI 3.030-10.718) after adjustment for age and gender and 1.796 (95% CI: 0.588-5.481) after adjustment for all covariables. ALT (HR 1.004, 95% CI 1.001-1.006, P = 0.010) and AST (HR 0.999, 95% CI 0.998-1.000, P = 0.030) were associated with early all-cause mortality in patients with STEMI treated with PCI but not at 2 years post-procedure, unless for AST and ALT levels ≥95th percentage. Moreover, short- and long-term outcomes were significantly worse when both AST and ALT levels ≥95th percentage (P < 0.001).Conclusions: Serum transaminases ≥95th percentage were associated with a significantly increased incidence of short- and long-term all-cause mortality.Trial Registration: Registration number: ChiCTR-EPC-16008199 , 31 March 2016. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some researches on the relationship of China's regional industrial economy and the challenge to distinguish between the long-term and short-terms effects suffer because of the lack of data and adequate modelling techniques. In this paper, unit root test and Johansen co integration model are used to simulate statistical data from 1998 to 2011 in order to capture the industrial economic growth relationship among different regions in China. It is found there is a long-term stable relationship among some provinces. Based on the co integration result, a vector error correction (VEC) model is built to describe volatility relationship among them. When industrial output value of short-term fluctuations deviates from the long-term equilibrium, regional powers adjusts them from the non-equilibrium state to equilibrium. It is shown that there are interaction and similar development trend among regional economic growth in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ridge and furrow planting (RFP) is a rainwater harvesting system that improves the yield and water use efficiency (WUE) of alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) and other crops. Field experiments were performed to study the effects of RFP under non- or single-irrigated (NI and SI) alfalfa production on yield, WUE, evapotranspiration (FT), soil water, and forage growth from 2010 to 2011. Three planting treatments were used, flat bed, bare ridge, and plastic mulch ridge in the NI and SI fields that were referred to as FPNI, BRNI, and MRNI; and FPSI, BRSI, and MRSI, respectively. For the NI field, BRNI and MRNI significantly increased the total forage yield in the 2 yr combined by 14 and 53%; and WUE by 17 and 74% compared with FPNI, respectively. The MRNI significantly increased the 2-yr combined yield by 34% and WUE by 55% compared with BRNI. There were no significant differences in the ET over the 2 yr among the three treatments. For the SI field, BRSI and MRSI significantly increased the total forage yield over the 2 yr by 53 and 107%; and WUE by 54 and 120% compared with FPSI, respectively. The MRSI significantly increased the yield over the 2 yr by 34% and WUE by 44% compared with BRNI. Only the ET value from the MRSI treatment was significantly lower than that from the FPSI or BRSI. Therefore, MRSI could improve the yield and WUE in alfalfa, with MRNI another option under rain-fed conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the results of laboratory experiments showing the effects of rock fragments contained in three different purple soils of the Sichuan basin of southwest China. The experiments investigated how these rock fragments alter the soil's physical, chemical, and agronomical characteristics such as infiltration and evaporation. We found that the infiltration rate, whether horizontal or vertical, in the three soils has the following order: gray brown purple soil < reddish brown purple soil < brown purple soil. With increasing rock fragment contents the accumulated infiltration decreases, while the total time decreases first and then increases. The minimum occurs at approximately 10-20% of fragment content by weight. The infiltration rate also changes with the distance. In the 0-5 cm range, the initial infiltration rate increases with increasing rock fragment contents, while in the 5-10 cm range, the slope of infiltration curve increases with increasing rock fragment contents. With increasing distance, the slope gradually decreases and finally reaches a stable value. The presence of rock fragments reduces soil water content, the minimal value appearing when the rock fragments were on top of the soil column (soil + rock sample), decreasing with increasing rock fragments for other samples mixed with fragments. Under the constant 40°C temperature, the accumulated evaporation and evaporation rate are minimal for soils covered by rock fragments, and the accumulated evaporation decreases with increasing rock fragment for other soil samples. However, the evaporation rate increases with increasing rock fragments in the first 4 days and decreases thereafter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hyper-immunoglobulin E syndromes (HIES) including compound primary immunodeficiency and nonimmunological abnormalities are characterized by extremely high serum IgE levels, eosinophilia, eczema, susceptibility to infections, distinctive facial appearance, retention of deciduous teeth, cyst-forming pneumonias, and skeletal abnormalities. Itis reported that some cases of familial HIES are relative to autosomal dominant or recessive inheritance, but most cases are sporadic, and result from mutations in the human signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) gene. In this paper, we firstly report a young man diagnosed of Hyper-IgE syndrome with STAT3 mutation in Mainland China, and investigate the autosomal dominant trait of his family members. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The HapMap project aimed to catalog millions of common single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the human genome in four major populations, in order to facilitate association studies of complex diseases. To examine the transferability of Han Chinese in Beijing HapMap data to the Southern Han Chinese in Shanghai, we performed comparative analyses between genotypes from over 4,500 SNPs in a 21 Mb region on chromosome 1q21-q25 in 80 unrelated Shanghai Chinese and 45 HapMap Chinese data. Results: Three thousand and forty-two SNPs were analyzed after removal of SNPs that failed quality control and those not in the HapMap panel. We compared the allele frequency distributions, linkage disequilibrium patterns, haplotype frequency distributions and tagging SNP sets transferability between the HapMap population and Shanghai Chinese population. Among the four HapMap populations, Beijing Chinese showed the best correlation with Shanghai population on allele frequencies, linkage disequilibrium and haplotype frequencies. Tagging SNP sets selected from four HapMap populations at different thresholds were evaluated in the Shanghai sample. Under the threshold of r2 equal to 0.8 or 0.5, both HapMap Chinese and Japanese data showed better coverage and tagging efficiency than Caucasian and African data. Conclusion: Our study supported the applicability of HapMap Beijing Chinese SNP data to the study of complex diseases among southern Chinese population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzes the allele frequencies at seven Y-chromosome short tandem repeat loci from a population sample in China. Genomic DNA; DNA amplification; Gene diversity.

Presents a segregation analysis of esophageal cancer in a moderately high-incidence area in Shanxi, China. Identification of the best-fitting recessive model; Frequency of the disease allele; Determination of the maximum cumulative probability of esophageal cancer in male and female subjects.

The Personal and Social Performance Scale (PSP) is a 100-point single-item rating scale that assesses four important domains of patients with mental disorders. This study was designed to examine the validity and reliability of a Chinese version of the PSP. The study was conducted in a sample of 157 patients with schizophrenia (confirmed by DSM-IV-TR criteria, SCID-P interview). The internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha=0.84) and the inter-rater reliability (kappa value=0.82, ICC=0.94 for PSP total score) was good. The test-retest reliability was high (intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of 0.95). The scale showed good construct validity with statistically significant correlations with the Global Assessment of Functioning Scale (GAF) (ICC of 0.95). The PSP score had a good negative correlation with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) total score. The improvement in PSP after 8 weeks of treatment was significantly correlated with the reduction in PANSS: after 8 weeks of treatment, the responders (defined as those with a reduction in PANSS total score ≥50%) experienced a greater improvement in PSP than the non-responders. The Chinese version of the PSP is a convenient and valid instrument to assess the personal and social functions of stabilized and acute patients with schizophrenia., (Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)