Resting cell formation in the marine diatom Thalassiosira pseudonana.

Resting cells represent a survival strategy employed by diatoms to endure prolonged periods of unfavourable conditions. In the oceans, many diatoms sink at the end of their blooming season and therefore need to endure cold and dark conditions in the deeper layers of the water column. How they survive these conditions is largely unknown. We conducted an integrative analysis encompassing methods from histology, physiology, biochemistry, and genetics to reveal the biological mechanism of resting-cell formation in the model diatom Thalassiosira pseudonana. Resting-cell formation was triggered by a decrease in light and temperature with subsequent catabolism of storage compounds. Resting cells were characterised by an acidic and viscous cytoplasm and altered morphology of the chloroplast ultrastructure. The formation of resting cells in T. pseudonana is an energy demanding process required for a biophysical alteration of the cytosol and chloroplasts to endure the unfavourable conditions of the deeper ocean as photosynthetic organisms. However, most resting cells (> 90%) germinate upon return to favorable growth conditions.

The relationship between personalities and self-report positive driving behavior in a Chinese sample.

Driving behaviors play an important role in accident involvement. Concretely speaking, aberrant driving behaviors would cause more accidents, and oppositely positive driving behaviors would promote to build safety traffic environment. The main goals of this study were to explore the positive driving behavior and its relationship with personality in a Chinese sample. A total of 421 licensed drivers (286 male and 135 female) from Beijing, China completed the Positive Driver Behavior Scale (PDBS), the Driver Behavior Questionnaire (DBQ), the Dula Dangerous Driving Index (DDDI) and the Big Five Inventory (BFI) on a voluntary and anonymous basis. The results showed that the Chinese version of the PDBS has both reliability and validity and that the PDBS was significantly correlated with the BFI. Specifically, the PDBS was negatively correlated with neuroticism (r = -0.38) and positively correlated with extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness to experience (the correlation coefficient ranged from 0.36 to 0.55). In contrast with previous research, age was negatively correlated with the PDBS (r = -0.38) in our sample, which may have resulted from less driving experience or a lack of available cognitive resources.