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With the advancement in pavement technology, non-destructive testing is getting fame. Intelligent Compaction Measure Value (ICMV) provided from the intelligent compactor has been explored to indicate the pavement stiffness and the compaction quality of asphalt pavement. This study aims to analyze the advanced ICMV and traditional non-nuclear gauge (NNG) density measurements to investigate the relative correlations in compaction measuring/monitoring indicators. This research applies Sakai Compaction Control Value (CCV) to predict the non-nuclear gauge density in means of different machine learning models. For analysis, data were collected from US-52 highway in the United Sates with three passes. Relative percentage change is calculated to measure the overall and individual grid change in density and CCV values with increase of passes. Four different type of models are finally developed include the first three simple ones (pass 1, pass 2, and pass 3 models) to predict the in-place density for different rolling pattern followed by different contractors, and the fourth model (all pass data model) which is developed by joining the data of all passes along with the categorical variable pass count. All model results are reasonably good and significant. Results show that with the inclusion of pass count, model prediction accuracy increases. The pass count is the categorical variable which can affect the model prediction power and provide good results. The possibility of substituting the current practice of quality control testing, NNG, with ICMV was proved throughout this study.

Background and purpose Pneumonia is an important risk factor for mortality and morbidity after stroke. The Prestroke Independence, Sex, Age, National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (ISAN) score was shown to be a useful tool for predicting stroke-associated pneumonia based on UK multicenter cohort study. We aimed to externally validate the score using data from the China National Stroke Registry (CNSR). Methods Eligible patients with acute ischemic stroke (AIS) and intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) in the CNSR from 2007 to 2008 were included. The area under the receiver operating characteristic (AUC) curve was used to evaluate discrimination. The Hosmer–Lemeshow goodness of fit test and Pearson correlation coefficient were performed to assess calibration of the model. Results A total of 19,333 patients (AIS = 14400; ICH = 4933) were included and the overall pneumonia rate was 12.7%. The AUC was .76 (95% confidence interval [CI]: .75-.78) for the subgroup of AIS and .70 (95% CI: .68-.72) for the subgroup of ICH. The Hosmer-Lemeshow test showed the ISAN score with the good calibration for AIS and ICH (P = .177 and .405, respectively). The plot of observed versus predicted pneumonia rates suggested higher correlation for patients with AIS than with ICH (Pearson correlation coefficient = .99 and .83, respectively). Conclusions The ISAN score was a useful tool for predicting in-hospital pneumonia after acute stroke, especially for patients with AIS. Further validations need to be done in different populations.

Potassium (K) fertilizer plays an important role in increasing crop yield, quality, and nitrogen use efficiency. However, little is known about its environmental impacts, such as its effects on emissions of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N

Background Chronic alcohol consumption initially leads to asymptomatic left ventricular dysfunction, but can result in myocardial impairment and heart failure if ongoing. This study sought to characterize myocardial tissues and oxidative metabolism in asymptomatic subjects with chronic alcohol consumption by quantitative cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) and 11C-acetate positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT). Methods Thirty-four male subjects (48.8 ± 9.1 years) with alcohol consumption > 28 g/day for > 10 years and 35 age-matched healthy male subjects (49.5 ± 9.7 years) underwent CMR and 11C-acetate PET/CT. Native and post T1 values and extracellular volume (ECV) from CMR and Kmono and K1 from PET imaging were measured. Quantitative measurements by CMR and PET imaging were compared between subjects with moderate to heavy alcohol consumption and healthy controls, and their correlations were also analyzed. Results Compared to healthy controls, subjects with alcohol consumption showed significantly shorter native T1 (1133 ± 65 ms vs. 1186 ± 31 ms, p p = 0.008) values, greater ECV (28.2 ± 2.2% vs. 26.9 ± 1.3%, p = 0.003), marginally lower Kmono (57.6 ± 12.1 min− 1 × 10− 3 vs. 63.0 ± 11.7 min− 1 × 10− 3, p = 0.055), and similar K1 (0.82 ± 0.13 min− 1 vs. 0.83 ± 0.15 min− 1, p = 0.548) after adjusting for confounding factors. There were no significant differences in CMR measurements and K1 between subjects with heavy and moderate alcohol consumption (all p > 0.05). In contrast, subjects with heavy alcohol consumption showed significantly lower Kmono values compared to those with moderate alcohol consumption (52.9 ± 12.1 min− 1 × 10− 3 vs. 63.7 ± 9.2 min− 1 × 10− 3, p = 0.012). Strong and moderate correlations were found between K1 and ECV in healthy controls (r = 0.689, p = 0.013) and subjects with moderate alcohol consumption (r = 0.518, p = 0.048), respectively. Conclusion Asymptomatic men with heavy alcohol consumption have detectable structural and metabolic changes in myocardium on CMR and 11C-acetate PET/CT. Compared with quantitative CMR, 11C-acetate PET/CT imaging may be more sensitive for detecting differences in myocardial damage among subjects with moderate to heavy alcohol consumption.

The increasing complex tasks and growing size of data have necessitated the application of distributed transaction processing (DTP), which decouples tasks and data among multiple nodes for jointly processing. However, compared with the revolutionary development of computation power, the network capability falls relatively behind, leaving communication as a more distinct bottleneck. This paper focuses on the recent emerging RDMA technology, which can greatly improve communication performance but cannot be well exploited in many cases due to improper interactive design between the requester and responder. Our research finds that the typical implementation of confirming per work request (CPWR) triggers considerable CPU involvement, which further degrades the overall performance of RDMA communication. Targeting at this, we propose HiPower, which leverages a batched confirmation scheme with lower CPU utilization, to improve high-frequency communication efficiency. Our experiments show that, compared with CPWR, HiPower can improve the communication efficiency by up to 75% and reduce CPU cost by up to 79%, which speeds up the overall FCT (Flow Completion Time) by up to 14% on real workflow (Resnet-152).

Potassium (K) fertilizer plays an important role in increasing crop yield, quality, and nitrogen use efficiency. However, little is known about its environmental impacts, such as its effects on emissions of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N2O). A nitrogen-15 (15N) tracer laboratory experiment was therefore performed in an acidic agricultural soil in the suburbs of Wuhan, central China, to determine the effects of K fertilizer on N2O emissions and nitrification/denitrification product ratios under N fertilization. During 15-d incubation periods with a fixed initial N concentration (80 mg kg−1), K application increased average N2O emission rates significantly (1.6–10.8-fold) compared to the control treatment. N2O emissions derived from nitrification and denitrification both increased in K-treated soil, and denitrification contributed more to the increase; its contribution ratio rose from 32% without K fertilizer to 53% with 300 mg kg−1 of K applied. The increase in N2O emissions under K fertilization is probably due to an increase in the activity of denitrifying microorganisms and acid-resistant nitrifying microorganisms caused by higher K+ concentrations and lower soil pH. Combined treatment with potassium chloride (KCl) and N fertilizer produced lower N2O emissions than combined treatment with potassium sulfate (K2SO4) and N fertilizer during 15-d incubation periods. Our results imply that there are significant interaction effects between N fertilizers and K fertilizers on N2O emissions. In particular, combining N fertilizers with fertilizers that reduce soil acidity or contain Cl or K ions may significantly affect agricultural N2O emissions.

Recent studies have shown that, soil particle interaction forces strongly affect soil water movement. Classically, humus could increase the attractive forces through the complex interactions between humus and clay particles, but in the meanwhile humus could increase soil electric field and thus increase electrostatic repulsive forces due to surface charges of humus. On the other hand, electrolyte concentrations could affect soil particle interactions through the influence on soil electric field and osmotic pressure. Therefore, the effect of humus and electrolyte concentration would be coupled in soil water movement. In this study, the coupling effects were explored with a purple soil under different humus contents and MgCl2 concentrations. The results showed that: (i) the total repulsive energies among soil particles would increase with increasing humus content, and soil aggregate stability as well as the soil water transportation and infiltration would correspondingly decrease; (ii) a critical MgCl2 concentration was observed, and at the critical concentration the total repulsive energy was the lowest, while both the soil aggregate stability and soil water movement were the highest; (iii) humus content did not significantly change the critical concentrations. The analysis of water movement changing with soil particle interaction energy showed that, both of them decreased linearly with increasing total repulsive energies between soil particles, and different humus contents obeyed the same linear relationship for water movement. We concluded that, (i) the total repulsive energies between soil particles control soil water movement through their effect on soil aggregate stability; (ii) humus affected soil water movement mainly through its effect on the total repulsive energy between soil particles; (iii) the total repulsive energy was mainly from the electrostatic repulsive force among soil particles as MgCl2 concentration was lower than the critical concentration, while it was mainly from the osmotic pressure when the MgCl2 concentration was higher than the critical concentration.

Aging can significantly affect the performance of asphalt mixtures causing increase in stiffness, reduction in relaxation capability and increase in brittleness. These changes can be quantified through viscoelastic properties and cracking behaviour of asphalt mixtures. In this study, six mixtures are evaluated using different laboratory conditioning protocols (loose mixture conditioned at various temperatures and durations to represent different aging levels) to evaluate how the viscoelastic, fatigue, and fracture properties of the mixtures will change over time. Comparison of viscoelastic characterization between different aging levels and mixtures is conducted by using complex modulus testing. Semi Circular Bending (SCB) and Disk Shaped Compact Tension (DCT) tests are used to evaluate the fracture behaviour of the mixtures. The Simplified Viscoelastic Continuum Damage (S-VECD) testing is used to estimate the ability of the mixtures to resist fatigue cracking. The results indicate that the viscoelastic, fatigue and fracture properties of the mixtures change significantly with aging. The two long term conditioning protocols induce statistically similar changes in linear viscoelastic properties and fatigue properties but produce differences in fracture indices. In this study, two virgin mixtures generally have better fracture and fatigue performance than the four mixtures with RAP. Two mixtures which have the largest difference between the high and low performance grade temperatures show the largest change in fracture and fatigue properties with aging.

Patients with stroke are at particularly increased risk of developing deep vein thrombosis (DVT) during hospitalization. In this study, we aimed to compare the potential risk of in-hospital DVT by stroke subtypes. This study is based on a prospective cohort (in-hospital medical complication after acute stroke [iMCAS] registry) enrolling patients with acute ischemic stroke (AIS), intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), and subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH). In-hospital DVT was diagnosed by clinical manifestations and verified by compression Doppler ultrasound. A logistic regression analysis was performed to assess the association between stroke subtypes and occurrence of DVT. A total number of 1,771 patients were enrolled in the iMCAS. The mean age was 57.1 ± 12.9 years, and 27.5% were female patients. The median length of stay was 14 days (interquartile range [IQR], 11-16). The median National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale score on admission for patients with AIS, ICH, and SAH was 4 (IQR: 2-8), 4 (IQR:1-10), and 0 (IQR:0-0), respectively. In-hospital DVT after AIS, ICH, and SAH was 1.9%, 5.7%, and 7.9%, respectively. The median time from stroke onset to DVT formation after AIS, ICH, and SAH was 10.5 days (IQR: 3.8-14.5), 7.5 days (IQR:4.0-9.5), and 7.0 days (IQR:5.0-12.5), respectively. After adjusting for potential confounders, patients with ICH (odds ratio = 7.350; 95% confidence interval = 2.411-22.13; P .001) and SAH (odds ratio = 11.92; 95% confidence interval = 5.192-27.38; P .001) had significantly higher risk of in-hospital DVT than those patients with AIS. In conclusion, patients with hemorrhagic stroke (ICH and SAH) have significantly higher risk of in-hospital DVT than patients with AIS. Further studies on pathophysiologic mechanisms are warranted.

Background There is limited nationwide evidence about the standard short- and long-term management of stroke types and prognosis in China. Methods A nationwide registry recruited 14,244 imaging-confirmed incident strokes from 132 hospitals across 31 provinces of China during 2007-8, recording presenting characteristics, diagnostic procedures, and in-hospital treatment. After hospital discharge, patients were followed up for 12 months. Conventional statistical methods were used to examine the patterns of management and prognosis. Findings Overall, 68.7%, 26.9%, and 4.4% were ischaemic stroke (IS), intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH) , and subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH) respectively. Only 20% were managed in a dedicated stroke unit. Among IS admitted

Novel methodologies for the selective synthesis of pyrrolo[1,2-a]azepines or 4,6-dicarbonyl indoles starting from pyrrole derivatives and alkynones are described. When reactions were carried out with 1,2,4-trisubstituted N-propargyl pyrroles using a ZnI2 catalyst, pyrrolo[1,2-a]azepines were obtained. Whereas 4,6-dicarbonyl indoles were produced selectively with 1,2-disubstituted pyrroles in the presence of silica gel. The reaction outcomes depend on the substituent pattern of the substrates and the nature of the catalysts chosen. Control reactions suggested that the formation of a conjugated enamine intermediate was crucial for both the processes. With easily accessible starting materials, inexpensive catalysts and an easy-to-handle procedure, this reaction has the potential to become a general protocol for the synthesis of pyrrolo[1,2-a]azepines or indoles.

Proportion of intracranial and extracranial atherosclerotic stenosis. Showed the proportion of intracranial and extracranial atherosclerotic stenosis (n = 2864). Table S2. Association between time duration of smoking and ECAS and ICAS in subgroup of patients with never and current smoking. Showed the association between time duration of smoking and ECAS and ICAS in subgroup of patients with never and current smoking (n = 2617). Table S3. Association between extent of smoking and ECAS and ICAS in subgroup of patients with never and current smoking. Showed the Association between extent of smoking and ECAS and ICAS in subgroup of patients with never and current smoking (n = 2617). (DOCX 46 kb)

It is well known that, electrolyte concentration can influence soil water movement through its influence on the osmotic potential of water; on the other hand, electrolytes also can influence soil water movement through its influence on the matric potential of soil water, because soil electric field is closely related to the electrolyte concentration. Therefore, the two effects arising from electrolytes on soil water movement are coupled, and the object of this study is to explore this coupling effect by adopting a 2:1 type electrolyte with different concentrations. In this study, water movement in a purple soil was evaluated through a one-dimensional vertical infiltration experiment through determining water infiltration rate and advance speed of the wetting front. The results revealed that (1) the critical electrolyte concentration of CaCl2 in soil water infiltration and migration is 10−2 mol L-1; (2) 10−2 mol L-1 CaCl2 is also the critical concentration for the relative total water potential, which is the sum of the matric potential and the osmotic potential; (3) detailed analysis of the effects of the matric potential and osmotic potential on soil water movement indicated that soil water infiltration is dominated by the matric potential when the CaCl2 concentration is lower than the critical concentration, while it is dominated by the osmotic potential when the CaCl2 concentration is higher than the critical concentration. It can be speculated that the matric potential based on an electric field dominates soil water infiltration when the soil moisture content is high, while osmotic potential dominates soil water infiltration when soil moisture content is low and that the concentration of 0.01 mol L-1 CaCl2 is the critical point at which water infiltration changes from matric potential control to osmotic potential control.

Background: During the past decade, an increasing number of prospective studies have focused on the association between vitamin D and cardiovascular disease (CVD). However, the evidence on the relation between serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] and the risk of overt CVD is inconclusive.Objective: We performed a dose-response meta-analysis to summarize and prospectively quantify the RR of low serum 25(OH)D concentration and total CVD (events and mortality).Design: We identified relevant studies by searching PubMed and EMBASE up to December 2015 and by hand-searching reference lists. Prospective studies based on the general population and reported RRs and 95% CIs were included. A random-effects model was used to calculate the pooled RRs. Nonlinear association was assessed by using restricted cubic spline analyses.Results: A total of 34 publications with 180,667 participants were eligible for the meta-analysis. We included 32 publications (27 independent studies) for total CVD events and 17 publications (17 independent studies) for CVD mortality. We observed an inverse association between serum 25(OH)D and total CVD events and CVD mortality, and the pooled RRs per 10-ng/mL increment were 0.90 (95% CI: 0.86, 0.94) for total CVD events and 0.88 (95% CI: 0.80, 0.96) for CVD mortality. A nonlinear association was detected for total CVD events (P-nonlinear < 0.001) and CVD mortality (P-nonlinear = 0.022).Conclusion: Serum 25(OH)D concentration was inversely associated with total CVD events and CVD mortality from the observed studies.

Background: To develop a risk model (ICH Progression Score) to predict in-hospital deterioration after ICH using routinely collected variables at presentation. Methods: The ICH Progression Score was developed based on the China National Stroke Registry, in which eligible patients were randomly divided into derivation (60%) and validation (40%) cohorts. Variables routinely collected at presentation were used for predicting in-hospital deterioration after ICH. For testing the added value of hematoma volume measure, we separately developed two models with (ICH Progression Score-A) and without (ICH Progression Score-B) hematoma volume included. In-hospital deterioration after ICH was defined as the episode in which a patient experienced a persistent increase in NIHSS score of 4 or more or death during hospitalization. Multivariable logistic regression was performed to identify independent predictors. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) and Hosmer-Lemeshow goodness-of-fit test was used to assess model discrimination and calibration, respectively. Results: In-hospital deterioration was 13.2% and 11.6% in the derivation (n=2870) and validation (n=1921) cohorts, respectively. A 23-point ICH Progression Score-A was developed based on a set of predictors and showed good discrimination in the derivation (AUROC=0.82; 95%CI=0.80-0.84) and validation (AUROC=0.79; 95%CI=0.76-0.82) cohorts. The ICH Progression Score-A was well calibrated (Hosmer-Lemeshow test) in the derivation (P=0.62) and validation (P=0.36) cohorts. Similarly, a 25-point ICH Progression Score-B was established. The ICH Progression Score-A and -B were not significantly different in discrimination for in-hospital deterioration after ICH. Conclusion: the ICH Progression Score are valid clinical grading scales for predicting in-hospital deterioration after ICH at presentation.

Recently, elevated levels of homocysteine and early neurological deterioration due to acute ischemic stroke have been reported to be strongly correlated. However, the role of homocysteine-lowering therapy (HLT) in the prognosis of acute ischemic stroke patients has remained unclear. This study evaluated the effects of HLT during hospitalization on the early outcomes of the 792 ischemic stroke patients with H-type hypertension from the China National Stroke Registry. The subjects were divided into HLT and non-HLT groups. Demographic and laboratory information were collected, while the functional outcome at discharge and at 90 days follow-up were assessed by National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale and modified Rankin Scale (mRS) in both groups. We found that in the univariate analysis, the proportions of patients with good functional outcomes (mRS = 0-2) were 31.68 versus 29.36 % (OR 0.90, 95 % CI 0.66-1.22, p = 0.45) at discharge and 27.02 versus 28.30 % (OR 1.06, 95 % CI 0.77-1.45, p = 0.72) at 90 days follow-up for the HLT and non-HLT groups, respectively. After multivariate analysis, there was still no significant difference in the outcomes at discharge (OR 0.85, 95 % CI 0.53-1.36, p = 0.49) or at 90 days follow-up (OR 0.98, 95 % CI 0.60-1.60, p = 0.93) for the two groups. The findings of this study indicated that patients with HLT or not during hospitalization had no significant difference in early prognosis. We concluded that HLT during hospitalization did not improve the early functional outcomes of ischemic stroke patients who also had H-type hypertension.

Background and purpose The quality of after-hour emergency care of patients with acute ischemic stroke is debatable. We therefore, sought to analyze the performance measures, quality of care and clinical outcomes in these patients admitted during off-hours. Methods Our study included 4493 patients from a selected cohort of patients admitted to the hospitals with ischemic stroke in the China National Stroke Registry (CNSR) from September 2007 to August 2008. On-hour presentation was defined as arrival at the emergency department from the scene between 8AM and 5PM from Monday through Friday. Off-hours included the remainder of the on-hours and statutory holidays. The association between off-hour presentation and outcome was analyzed using multivariate logistic-regression models. Results Off-hour presentation was identified in 2672 (59.5%) patients with ischemic stroke. Comparison of patients admitted during off-hours with those admitted during on-hours revealed an unadjusted odds ratio of in-hospital mortality of 1.38 (95% confidence interval, 1.04-1.85), which declined to 1.34 (95% confidence interval, 0.93-1.93) after adjusting for patient characteristics (especially, pre-hospital delay). No difference in 30-day mortality, total death or dependence at three, six and 12 months between two groups was observed. No association between off-hour admission and quality of care was found. Conclusions In the CNSR database, compared with on-hour patients, off-hour patients with acute ischemic stroke admitted to the emergency departments from scene manifested a higher incidence of in-hospital mortality. However, the difference in incidence and quality of care between the groups disappeared after adjusting for pre-hospital delay and other variables.

Background Stroke Prognostication using Age and NIH (National Institutes of Health) Stroke Scale (SPAN)-100 is a simple and easy-to-use tool for assessing the outcomes of ischemic stroke after thrombolysis. To explore its application, we evaluated SPAN-100's prognostic value in predicting 3- and 12-month outcomes in general ischemic stroke patients. Methods We applied the SPAN-100 to ischemic stroke patients from the China National Stroke Registry. Poor outcome was defined as a modified Rankin Scale of 2-6. Discrimination of SPAN-100 was assessed by the area under the receiver–operator curves (AUC) and 95% confidence intervals (CI). We also performed an exploratory post hoc analysis of the performance of the SPAN index score using 80 as the cutoff point. Results Among 11,894 ischemic stroke patients, 479 (4.0%) patients were SPAN-100 positive. The AUC of SPAN-100 for poor outcome was .54 (95% CI, .54-.54) at 3 months and .54 (95% CI, .54-.55) at 12 months, respectively. In the exploratory analysis, when 80 was used as the cutoff point of SPAN index score, the AUC for poor outcome was .66 (95% CI, .66-.67) at 3 months and .68 (95% CI, .67-.68) at 12 months, respectively. Conclusions SPAN-100 suffered from low prediction power for 3- and 12-month outcomes of ischemic stroke in Chinese population. A cutoff point of 80 may improve the performance, but none of them had an AUC above the threshold of .8 required for use in individuals.

Incentive mechanisms in P2P systems have become a hot research field since more and more free-riders are coming out in P2P systems. Many strategies have been proposed and applied, and models are built to analyze these strategies. In this paper, we propose a novel incentive mechanism based on relative probability in a model more like a real implemented system, and compare it to reciprocative strategy, an absolute probability based mechanism. Experiments show that in this model, relative probability based mechanisms are as efficient as other ones, and are more robust to non-cooperators' cheating.