The effect of carbon dioxide emission and the consumption of electrical energy, fossil fuel energy, and renewable energy, on economic performance: evidence from Pakistan.

Energy affects the economic growth and development of a country. Renewable energy has become an important part of the world's energy consumption. The use of fossil fuel energy contributes to global warming and carbon dioxide emissions, and has a detrimental effect on the environment. The long-run and short-run causality relationships between electric power consumption, renewable electricity output, renewable energy consumption, fossil fuel energy consumption, energy use, carbon dioxide emissions, and gross domestic product per capita for Pakistan over the period of 1990-2017 were investigated in this paper using the autoregressive distributed lag bounds testing approach to cointegration. The augmented Dickey-Fuller unit root test and the Phillips-Perron unit root test were used to check the stationarity of the variables, while the Johansen cointegration test was applied to check the robustness of the long-run relationships. The Granger causality test under the vector error correction model extracted during the short-run estimation showed a unidirectional relationship among all variables except for the relationship between gross domestic product per capita and carbon dioxide emission, which was bidirectional (feedback hypothesis). The evidence showed that in the long run, carbon dioxide emissions, electric power consumption, and renewable electricity output had a positive and significant relationship with the gross domestic product per capita, while the relationship of renewable energy consumption, energy use, and fossil fuel energy consumption with the gross domestic product per capita had a negative effect. Overall, the long-run effects of the variables were found to have a stronger effect on the gross domestic product per capita than the short-run dynamics, which indicated that the findings were heterogeneous. The evidence suggests that the government of Pakistan should take steps to enhance the use of renewable energy resources to resolve the energy crisis in the country and introduce new policies to reduce carbon dioxide emissions.

A new type occluder applied in atrial spetal defect of mini-pigs / 中国比较医学杂志

Objective To evaluate the efficacy, safety and compatibility of a new type of atrial septal defect ( ASD) occluder in atrial spetal defect mini-pigs model.Methods Five Tibet mini-pigs were selected as the ASD models which were established by the combination of atrial septal puncture and balloon dilation.Then the new type occluder was implanted for the therapy of ASD.Transthoracic echocardiography with color Doppler was used in all animals during closure and in follow up examinations.The animals were killed at 3 months after occlusion for electron microscopical observation and microscopic examination.Result The ASD models had been created in five piglets successfully without complication, all of whom were implanted successfully with the new device without shunts.Postmortem and microscopic examination of the 5 specimens 3 months after placement showed complete.Conclusion Transcatheter ASD occlusion with new type ASD occluder is safe,feasible and effective.This occlusion can repair the atrial septal defect successfully.

The underlying biological mechanisms of biocompatibility differences between bare and TiN-coated NiTi alloys.

TiN coating has been demonstrated to improve the biocompatibility of bare NiTi alloys; however, essential biocompatibility differences between NiTi alloys before and after TiN coating are not known so far. In this study, to explore the underlying biological mechanisms of biocompatibility differences between them, the changes of bare and TiN-coated NiTi alloys in surface chemical composition, morphology, hydrophilicity, Ni ions release, cytotoxicity, apoptosis, and gene expression profiles were compared using energy-dispersive spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, contact angle, surface energy, Ni ions release analysis, the methylthiazoltetrazolium (MTT) method, flow cytometry and microarray methods, respectively. Pathways binding to networks and real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) were employed to analyze and validate the microarray data, respectively. It was found that, compared with the bare NiTi alloys, TiN coating significantly decreased Ni ions content on the surfaces of the NiTi alloys and reduced the release of Ni ions from the alloys, attenuated the inhibition of Ni ions to the expression of genes associated with anti-inflammatory, and also suppressed the promotion of Ni ions to the expression of apoptosis-related genes. Moreover, TiN coating distinctly improved the hydrophilicity and uniformity of the surfaces of the NiTi alloys, and contributed to the expression of genes participating in cell adhesion and other physiological activities. These results indicate that the TiN-coated NiTi alloys will help overcome the shortcomings of NiTi alloys used in clinical application currently, and can be expected to be a replacement of biomaterials for a medical device field.

Epidermal growth factor-like domain 7 expression in arteriosclerosis obliterans and abdominal aortic aneurysm / 中华普通外科杂志

Objective To investigate the expression characteristics of epidermal growth factor-like domain 7 ( egfl 7 ) in arteriosclerosis obliterans ( ASO) tissues and abdominal aortic aneurysm ( AAA ) tissues, and it's role in atherosclerosis (AS).Methods In this study, 8 normal artery, 11 lower extremity ASO and 34 AAA samples were collected.Immunohistochemistry and in situ hybridization were performed in artery sections to investigate the expression characteristics of egfl 7 at protein and mRNA levels.The relative quantitative detection of egfl 7 mRNA was detected by qRT-PCR.The effect of egfl 7 was examined by RNA interference.Results In ASO and AAA samples, the expression of egfl 7 protein was mainly in the tunica media; The expression site of egfl 7 mRNA was the same as that of egfl 7 protein.Compared with normal artery samples, the expression of egfl 7 mRNA was significantly upregulated in the early stage of ASO samples and AAA samples (325 ± 120 vs.100 ± 36, P ＜ 0.01, 216 ± 133 vs.100 ± 36, P ＜ 0.05 ).Compared with the control group, the proliferative ability of smooth muscle cells was significantly down regulated after egfl 7 interference (0.85 ± 0.05 vs.1.34 ± 0.04, P ＜ 0.01).Conclusions egfl 7 might be a gene that regulates the pathogenic process of atherosclerosis through promoting vascular smooth muscle cell proliferation.

A 5-year follow-up study of suicide attempts / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

Objective　This was a follow-up study of suicidal patients to assess the influence over time of different risk factors.Method　A cohort of 73 patients admitted to a psychiatric department after a suicide attempt was followed-up for 5 years.Results　In total,61.6% reattemped,15.1% of which had committed suicide during the follow-up.The rist factors for suicide included history of family psychiatric or suicide,and a poor social support,et al.Conclusion　The results suggest a high repetition rate of suicide attempters in the psychotic patients who had previous suicidal behaviour and them positive family history.The preventive strategy to suicide in patients,such as set up good social network and should pay mroe attention to psyciologic rehabilitation period after discharge.