Life cycle environmental impact assessment for battery-powered electric vehicles at the global and regional levels.

As an important part of electric vehicles, lithium-ion battery packs will have a certain environmental impact in the use stage. To analyze the comprehensive environmental impact, 11 lithium-ion battery packs composed of different materials were selected as the research object. By introducing the life cycle assessment method and entropy weight method to quantify environmental load, a multilevel index evaluation system was established based on environmental battery characteristics. The results show that the Li-S battery is the cleanest battery in the use stage. In addition, in terms of power structure, when battery packs are used in China, the carbon footprint, ecological footprint, acidification potential, eutrophication potential, human toxicity cancer and human toxicity noncancer are much higher than those in the other four regions. Although the current power structure in China is not conducive to the sustainable development of electric vehicles, the optimization of the power structure is expected to make electric vehicles achieve clean driving in China.

Telecoupling China's City-Level Water Withdrawal with Distant Consumption.

Trade causes the geospatial separation of production and consumption, which drives telecoupling between resource utilization and distant consumption. While benefiting the economy, trade can also exacerbate resource use inequality among regions. Here, we propose telecoupled water withdrawal (TWW) to examine the impact of distant consumption on local water resources, defined as local water withdrawal driven remotely by consumption in other regions. We characterize the TWW in China in 2015 at the city level (350 cities) using a nested multiregional input-output model. We find that approximately 20% of TWW is linked to foreign consumption, more than a quarter of which is driven by the United States. Moreover, cities with high TWW are concentrated on the Southeast coast and in Northwest China. Cities in Xinjiang province (Northwest China) account for 12% of the national TWW but only 0.7% of China's GDP. Our findings shed light on the telecoupling of pressure on local water resources in China cities and distant consumption at the global scale, calling for joint efforts by the contributors and beneficiaries of TWW to ensure the synergistic sustainability of water resources and trade.

Can the new energy vehicles (NEVs) and power battery industry help China to meet the carbon neutrality goal before 2060?

China is working to boost the manufacture, market share, sales, and use of NEVs to replace fuel vehicles in transportation sector to get carbon reduction target by 2060. In this research, using Simapro life cycle assessment software and Eco-invent database, the market share, carbon footprint, and life cycle analysis of fuel vehicles, NEVs, and batteries were calculated from the last five years to next 25 years, with a focus on the sustainable development. Results indicate globally, China had 293.98 m vehicles and 45.22% worldwide highest market share, followed by Germany with 224.97 m and 42.22% shares. Annually China's NEVs production rate is 50%, and sales account for 35%, while the carbon footprint will account for 5.2 E+07 to 4.89 E+07 kgCO2e by 2021-2035. The power battery production 219.7 GWh reaches 150%-163.4%, whereas carbon footprint values in production and use stage of 1 kWh of LFP 44.0 kgCO2eq, NCM-146.8 kgCO2eq, and NCA-370 kgCO2eq. The single carbon footprint of LFP is smallest at about 5.52 E+09, while NCM is highest at 1.84 E+10. Thus, using NEVs, and LFP batteries will reduce carbon emissions by 56.33%-103.14% and 56.33% or 0.64 Gt to 0.006 Gt by 2060. LCA analysis of NEVs and batteries at manufacturing and using stages quantified the environmental impact ranked from highest to lowest as ADP > AP > GWP > EP > POCP > ODP. ADP(e) and ADP(f) at manufacturing stage account for 14.7%, while other components account for 83.3% during the use stage. Conclusive findings are higher sales and use of NEVs, LFP, and reduction in coal-fired power generation from 70.92% to 50%, and increase in renewable energy sources in electricity generation expectedly will reduce carbon footprint by 31% and environmental impact on acid rain, ozone depletion, and photochemical smog. Finally, to achieve carbon neutrality in China, the NEVs industry must be supported by incentive policies, financial aid, technological improvements, and research and development. This would improve NEV's supply, demand, and environmental impact.

Imbalance in the city-level crop water footprint aggravated regional inequality in China.

Crop production is the main consumer of water resources. The heterogeneous water resource endowments and imbalanced crop water use exacerbate regional resource consumption inequality. In this study, we quantified the crop water footprint (CWF) of 356 cities in China from 2000 to 2020, measured the inequality between the city CWF and water resources, and identified different strategies to alleviate regional CWF inequality. We found that the average CWF from 2000 to 2020 varied widely across cities, ranging from 0.03 × 108 m3 to 806.78 × 108 m3, and the inequality between city CWF and local water resource endowment was increasing. China had a strong dependence on green water in crop production, and its proportion increased from 52.48 % to 67.17 %. The Gini coefficient of the green water footprint increased from 0.545 to 0.621, and the degree of inequality increased significantly. In addition, the blue water and gray water continuously showed great inequality, especially the blue water, the Gini coefficient of which was 0.724 in 2020. The results show significant disparities in CWF among cities, which have highly exacerbated regional inequality in China. Improving the utilization rate of green water is an important measure to balance the allocation between serving the natural ecosystem and meeting the basic human needs. This study revealed for the first time the inequality of city-level CWF and highlights the severe situation of inequality among regions in China. Balancing the inequality between CWF and water resource endowment at city-level is conducive to fundamentally solving the problem of unreasonable water resource allocation.

The Chinese plug-in electric vehicles industry in post-COVID-19 era towards 2035: Where is the path to revival?

The sudden Coronavirus Disease reported at the end of 2019 (COVID-19) has brought huge pressure to Chinese Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEVs) industry which is bearing heavy burden under the decreasing fiscal subsidy. If the epidemic continues to rage as the worst case, analysis based on System Dynamics Model (SDM) indicates that the whole PEVs industry in China may shrink by half compared with its originally expected level in 2035. To emerge from the recession, feasible industrial policies include (1) accelerating the construction of charging infrastructures, (2) mitigating the downtrend of financial assistance and (3) providing more traffic privilege for drivers. Extending the deadline of fiscal subsidy by only 2 years, which has been adopted by the Chinese central government, is demonstrated to achieve remarkable effect for the revival of PEVs market. By contrast, the time when providing best charging service or most traffic privilege to get the PEVs industry back to normal needs to be advanced by 10 years or earlier. For industrial policy makers, actively implementing the other two promoting measures on the basis of existing monetary support may be a more efficient strategy for Chinese PEVs market to revive from the shadow in post-COVID-19 era.

The ecological boundary gap is gradually tightening in China's megacities: Taking Beijing as a case.

Planetary boundaries define the safe operating space of human beings relative to the Earth's system, which is of great significance in helping human beings predict environmental safety limits. However, ecological boundaries have not been presented or downscaled to regional levels. Moreover, a method has not been developed to quantitatively measure the gap between the value of the services provided by the ecosystem and the size of the urban population and economy that the ecosystem can carry. Herein, we propose the concept and calculation model of the "ecological boundary" to quantitatively assess the ecosystem security gap size transgressed by humans. Ecological boundaries are defined as the maximum population and economic scale that a certain area can support under a certain ecologically productive area. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the ecological boundary in megacities, and Beijing is considered as a specific case. The results show that the consumption of natural resources has transgressed its ecological boundary in Beijing. The direct consequence is that the ecological well-being per capita continues to decrease. Fortunately, with decreases in the ecological footprint and land use/land cover change dynamic degree, the ecological boundary gap is gradually tightening. Moreover, the role of ecological boundaries as early warning signals of undesirable urban ecological environmental changes is discussed, the significance of the monetization of ecological boundaries is described, the factors underlying the ecological boundary gap in the process of accelerating urbanization in China are analyzed, and policy recommendations for resolving the threat to ecological security boundaries by megacities are presented. The primary purpose of our study is provide policymakers with information on the gap between the current well-being of humankind and critical capacity thresholds, which can help determine whether human activities have fallen into an unsustainable state that may result in undesirable eco-environmental changes that could have detrimental or even disastrous consequences for the population of a region.

The inharmonious mechanism of CO2, NOx, SO2, and PM2.5 electric vehicle emission reductions in Northern China.

Beijing benefits from the promotion of electric vehicles (EVs) in the improvement of road tailpipe emissions; these emissions are caused by internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs) and reduce the surrounding environmental quality. When analyzing the electricity grid, upstream emissions of EVs in Beijing can be tracked back to Shanxi and Inner Mongolia. This study investigates the inharmonious mechanism of emission reduction to promote EVs in Beijing and Northern China based on 6 scenarios and 42 real EVs. Because there is a neighbor effect, Beijing only accounts for 34%, 34%, 41%, and 35% of the total CO2, NOx, SO2 and PM2.5 emissions, respectively. Although the local CO2, NOx, and PM2.5 emissions can be easily reduced (as long as the conversion of "coal to gas" plan is realized), it is difficult to achieve emission reductions of NOx and SO2 without increasing the clean electricity generation mix in Shanxi and Inner Mongolia at the total emission level. However, there is still a large reduction potential of EVs themselves due to an increasingly clean electricity mix in Beijing, Shanxi and Inner Mongolia. Beijing local CO2, NOx, SO2 and PM2.5 emissions can be reduced by 86.92%, 98.79%, 99.98% and 99.94%, respectively, and a total reduction of 78.43% of CO2, 93.83% of NOx, 97.85% of SO2 and 99.26% of PM2.5 emissions is possible. Compared with the corresponding ICEV, an EV of 18 kWh/100 km starts to reduce Beijing local CO2, NOx and PM2.5 emissions in scenario 1, 3 and 1, respectively, while the SO2 emissions cannot be reduced. However, the total CO2, NOx, SO2 and PM2.5 emissions can be reduced in scenario 2, 5, 5, and 1, respectively. A sensitivity analysis shows that the promotion of EVs can reduce Beijing local CO2, NOx, SO2 and PM2.5 emissions by 125.568-238.960 g/km, 0.059-0.113 g/km, -0.00003 - - 0.00007 g/km and 0.034-0.065 g/km, respectively. In addition, the total CO2, NOx, SO2 and PM2.5 reduction in emissions can be 132.883-253.757 g/km, 0.189-0.361 g/km, 0.299-0.569 g/km and 0.053-0.101 g/km, respectively.

Risk Factors of Nosocomial Infection for Infants in Neonatal Intensive Care Units: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to identify the nosocomial infection (NI) risk factors in neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICU). MATERIAL AND METHODS Databases (PubMed, Embase, Cochrane, VANFUN, CNKI, and VTTMS) were searched using index words to find relevant studies published before November 2018. Meta-analyses of relative risk (RR) were performed for the identification of risk factors. RESULTS Data from 22 cohort studies (2270 infants with and 21 605 infants without NI) were included in the meta-analysis. Infant weight of <2500 g (RR: 3.44, 95% CI: 2.31-5.11), gestational age of <37 weeks (RR: 3.85, 95% CI: 1.87-7.92), mechanical ventilation use (RR: 3.16, 95% CI: 2.21-4.50), venipuncture (RR: 3.01, 95% CI: 1.20-7.57), the incidence of asphyxia (RR: 1.68, 95% CI: 1.04-2.71), and feeding intolerance (RR: 2.12, 95% CI: 1.60-2.81) were identified as the risk factors for the incidence of NI. There was no significant publication bias. CONCLUSIONS This study shows that <2500 g infant body weight, gestational age of <37 weeks, mechanical ventilation utility, venipuncture, asphyxia incidence, and feeding intolerance are the risk factors for NI nosocomial infection in infants in NICU. Appropriate preventive measures and targeted interventions are needed.

Superior "green" electrode materials for secondary batteries: through the footprint family indicators to analyze their environmental friendliness.

As secondary batteries are becoming the popular production of industry, especial for lithium ion batteries (LIBs), the degree of environmental friendliness will gather increasing attention to their products of the whole life cycle. The research combines the life cycle assessment (LCA) and footprint family definition to establish a framework to calculate the footprint family of secondary battery materials. Through the method, we calculated the values of carbon footprint, water footprint, and ecological footprint about this eight kinds of secondary cathode battery materials with Ni-MH, Li1.2Ni0.2Mn0.6O2/C, LiNi1/3Co1/3Mn1/3O2/C, LiNi0.8Co0.2O2/C, LiFePO4/C, LiFe0.98Mn0.02PO4/C, FeF3(H2O)3/C, and NaFePO4/C. When comparing and analyzing their values in each footprint, it can summarize the evaluation method for some secondary batteries by footprint indicators and construct the evaluation system. Through the comprehensive evaluation of footprint family system, the NaFePO4/C battery gets the best performance of three main footprints when combining 1 kg of cathode materials, while Ni-MH is opposite. Hence, among these eight batteries environmental impacts evaluation, the NaFePO4/C battery is regarded as the superior "green" battery, albeit the current application is restricted because of the synthesis limitation on large scale and energy density of storage. In LIBs comparison, the FeF3(H2O)3 material shows its characteristics of environmental friendliness, which is expected to be a greener battery material of LIB. In conventional LIBs, the iron-containing cathode materials show lower environmental burden than ternary cathode materials. We can reduce environmental impacts through developing new advanced materials and reducing the content of high sensitivity element in raw materials.

Tumor-associated macrophages induce invasion and poor prognosis in human gastric cancer in a cyclooxygenase-2/MMP9-dependent manner.

Cyclooxygenase-2 (COX2) and tumor-associated macrophages (TAMs) are associated with invasion, angiogenesis, and poor prognosis in many human cancers. However, the role of TAMs in human gastric cancer (GC) remains elusive. In the present study, we first measured COX2 expression and TAM infiltration in human GC tissues using double immunohistochemical staining. Then, we indirectly cocultured M2-polarized macrophages derived from human THP-1 cells with GC cells as an in vitro model. Transwell assays, siRNA transfection, treatment with a COX2 inhibitor and Western blotting were used to investigate the relationship among TAMs, invasion and COX2 expression as well as the underlying molecular mechanism. Double IHC staining showed that TAMs were aggregated near GC tumor nests and had high COX2 expression; moreover, the number of TAMs that infiltrated the tumor nest was correlated with the depth of invasion, COX2 expression and poor prognosis in human GC. In an in vitro assay, after treatment with phorbol myristate acetate (PMA), the THP-1 cells differentiated into M2 macrophages and induced COX2/MMP9-dependent invasiveness in GC cells. Pretreatment of GC cells with COX2 siRNA or a COX2 inhibitor (Celecoxib) can negate these promoting effects. The results of this study and those of our previous studies indicate that coculture with M2-polarized macrophages can induce the COX2-dependent release of matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP9), which subsequently increases the invasiveness of GC cells. Our data may provide a basis for targeting TAMs or for polarizing TAMs through immune regulation to halt GC progression, which could soon become a nonsurgical treatment for human gastric cancer.

Use of autologous platelet rich fibrin-based bioactive membrane in pressure ulcer healing in rats.

OBJECTIVE: To verify the feasibility of treating pressure ulcers (PUs) with autologous platelet-rich fibrin-based (PRF) bioactive membrane, both in vitro and in vivo. METHOD: An animal model using adult male Sprague-Dawley rats was used. Pressure was periodically exerted on the skin to induce localised ischaemia by using an external magnet and transplanted metal disc. After a PU developed, the rats were divided into two groups: a treatment group and a control group. Rats in the treatment group were then treated with PRF bioactive membrane every three days. RESULTS: A total of 20 rats were used in this study. At days three and seven, the PU area in the PRF bioactive membrane-treated group was significantly smaller than that in the control group, and after 14 days of treatment, the PUs in the PRF bioactive membrane treatment group had healed. Haemotoxylin and eosin staining, immunohistochemistry and Western blot results indicated that PRF bioactive membrane induced wound healing by increasing the thickness of the regenerated epidermis and by upregulating vascular endothelial growth factor expression. Further, we found that different concentrations of rat autologous PRF soluble factors extraction components could significantly promote rat aortic endothelial cell proliferation, wound healing and migration ability in vitro. CONCLUSION: Overall, results indicate that PRF bioactive membrane promotes PU healing in rats. Thus, it may represent a natural and effective wound-healing tool for use in the treatment of clinical skin PUs in humans in the future.

New Application of Waste Citrus Maxima Peel-Derived Carbon as an Oxygen Electrode Material for Lithium Oxygen Batteries.

Recently, lithium oxygen battery has become a promising candidate to satisfy the current large-energy-storage devices demand because of its amazing theoretical energy density. However, it still faces problems such as poor reversibility and short cycle life. Here, citrus maxima peel (CMP) was used as a precursor to prepare activated and Fe-loading carbon (CMPACs and CMPACs-Fe, respectively) via pyrolysis in nitrogen atmosphere at 900 °C, in which KOH was added as an activator. Electrochemical measurements show that CMPAC-based Li-O2 battery possesses high specific capacity of 7800 mA h/g, steady cycling performance of 466 cycles with a corresponding Coulombic efficiency of 92.5%, good rate capability, and reversibility. Besides, CMPACs-Fe-based O2 electrode delivers even lower overpotential in both charge and discharge processes. We conclude that these excellent electrochemical performances of CMPACs and CMPACs-Fe-based O2 electrode benefit from their cellular porous structure, plenty of active sites, and large specific surface area (900 and 768 m2/g), which suggest that these biomass-derived porous carbons might become promising candidates to achieve efficient lithium oxygen battery.

Hot Compress with Chinese Herbal Salt Packets Reducing PICC Catheter Complications: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

OBJECTIVE: To explore the preventive effect of applying hot compress with Chinese herbal salt packets (CHSP) to puncture vessels under aseptic conditions during peripherally inserted central catheter (PICC) on postoperative phlebitis. METHODS: A total of 720 hospitalized patients undergoing first PICC were assigned to treatment and control groups (360 cases each group) according to a random number table. The control group received conventional catheterization and nursing care. The treatment group was first given hot compress with CHSP (which consisted of honeysuckle 30 g, Semen brassicae 30 g, Salvia miltiorrhiza 30 g, Angelica dahurica 30 g, Semen raphani 30 g, Evodia rutaecarpa 30 g, and coarse salt 20 g) on the punctured vessel under aseptic conditions for 5-10 min before conventional catheterization. The main efficacy indices were the vessel diameters before and during catheterization and the success rate of a single catheter, and the secondary efficacy indiex was the incidence of superficial phlebitis within 1 week after catheterization. RESULTS: The vessel diameter during catheterization of the treatment group was remarkably increased compared with the control group [(7.96±0.42) mm vs. (4.39±0.54) mm, P<0.01]. The success rate of the single catheter of the treatment group was significantly higher than that of the control group [94.00% (329/350) vs. 73.72% (244/329), P<0.01]. The incidence of superficial phlebitis within 1 week after catheterization in the treatment group was lower than that in the control group (P=0.007). There was no adverse event with CHSP. CONCLUSION: Hot compress with CHSP during PICC is applicable as it can effectively improve the success rate of a single catheter and reduce the incidence of superficial phlebitis after catheterization (Trial registration No. ChiCTR-ONC-17010498).

Rethinking environmental stress from the perspective of an integrated environmental footprint: Application in the Beijing industry sector.

Individual footprint indicators are limited in that they usually only address one specific environmental aspect. For this reason, assessments involving multiple footprint indicators are preferred. However, the interpretation of a profile of footprint indicators can be difficult as the relative importance of the different footprint results is not readily discerned by decision-makers. In this study, a time series (1997-2012) of carbon, water and land footprints was calculated for industry sectors in the Beijing region using input-output analysis. An integrated environmental footprint (IEF) was subsequently developed using normalization and entropy weighting. The results show that steep increases in environmental footprint have accompanied Beijing's rapid economic development. In 2012, the Primary Industry had the largest IEF (8.32); however, the Secondary Industry had the greatest increase over the study period, from 0.19 to 6.37. For the Primary Industry, the greatest contribution to the IEF came from the land footprint. For the Secondary and Tertiary Industries, the water footprint was most important. Using the IEF, industry sectors with low resource utilization efficiency and high greenhouse gas emissions intensity can be identified. As such, the IEF can help to inform about industry sectors which should be given priority for modernization as well as the particular footprints that require priority attention in each sector. The IEF can also be helpful in identifying industry sectors that could be encouraged to expand within the Beijing region as they are especially efficient in terms of value adding relative to IEF. Other industries, over time, may be better located in other regions that do not face the same environmental pressures as Beijing.

Coexisting Behaviors of Asymmetric Attractors in Hyperbolic-Type Memristor based Hopfield Neural Network.

A new hyperbolic-type memristor emulator is presented and its frequency-dependent pinched hysteresis loops are analyzed by numerical simulations and confirmed by hardware experiments. Based on the emulator, a novel hyperbolic-type memristor based 3-neuron Hopfield neural network (HNN) is proposed, which is achieved through substituting one coupling-connection weight with a memristive synaptic weight. It is numerically shown that the memristive HNN has a dynamical transition from chaotic, to periodic, and further to stable point behaviors with the variations of the memristor inner parameter, implying the stabilization effect of the hyperbolic-type memristor on the chaotic HNN. Of particular interest, it should be highly stressed that for different memristor inner parameters, different coexisting behaviors of asymmetric attractors are emerged under different initial conditions, leading to the existence of multistable oscillation states in the memristive HNN. Furthermore, by using commercial discrete components, a nonlinear circuit is designed and PSPICE circuit simulations and hardware experiments are performed. The results simulated and captured from the realization circuit are consistent with numerical simulations, which well verify the facticity of coexisting asymmetric attractors' behaviors.

Preparation of MnO2-Modified Graphite Sorbents from Spent Li-Ion Batteries for the Treatment of Water Contaminated by Lead, Cadmium, and Silver.

Herein, a novel adsorbent was prepared via grafting MnO2 particles on graphite recovered from spent lithium-ion batteries to treat water contaminated by lead, cadmium, and silver. This is the first study reporting the recovery of spent LIB anode material and its application to heavy-metal-contaminated wastewater treatment. Characterizations using scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray analysis, and Fourier transform infrared showed that the adsorbent surface was coated with MnO2 ultrafine particles that served as the sorption mechanism to remove heavy-metal ions. In comparison to the raw artificial graphite (AG) powder, the MnO2-modified AG (MnO2-AG) exhibited a markedly improved removal capacity toward Pb(II), Cd(II), and Ag(I), whose removal rates reached as high as 99.9, 79.7, and 99.8%, respectively. The removal of the heavy metals by MnO2-AG was mainly through the ion exchange of hydroxyl groups. This study provides the possibility of synthesis of an efficient adsorbent by reusing the "waste", such as spent Li-ion batteries. It is an economic and environmentally friendly approach for both heavy-metal-contaminated water treatment and waste recycling.

Quantifying the environmental impact of a Li-rich high-capacity cathode material in electric vehicles via life cycle assessment.

A promising Li-rich high-capacity cathode material (xLi2MnO3·(1-x)LiMn0.5Ni0.5O2) has received much attention with regard to improving the performance of lithium-ion batteries in electric vehicles. This study presents an environmental impact evaluation of a lithium-ion battery with Li-rich materials used in an electric vehicle throughout the life cycle of the battery. A comparison between this cathode material and a Li-ion cathode material containing cobalt was compiled in this study. The battery use stage was found to play a large role in the total environmental impact and high greenhouse gas emissions. During battery production, cathode material manufacturing has the highest environmental impact due to its complex processing and variety of raw materials. Compared to the cathode with cobalt, the Li-rich material generates fewer impacts in terms of human health and ecosystem quality. Through the life cycle assessment (LCA) results and sensitivity analysis, we found that the electricity mix and energy efficiency significantly influence the environmental impacts of both battery production and battery use. This paper also provides a detailed life cycle inventory, including firsthand data on lithium-ion batteries with Li-rich cathode materials.

[Maintenance effects of acupoint catgut embedding at early time on gastrointestinal function in patients with craniocerebral injury].

OBJECTIVE: To explore the maintenance effects of acupoint catgut embedding at early time on gastrointestinal function in patients with craniocerebral injury. METHODS: Sixty craniocerebral injury patients with 5 to 12 points of Glasgow coma scale (GCS), according to treatment order, were alternately divided into an observation group and a control group, 30 cases in each one. Patients in the control group were treated with regular treatment and nursing care. Based on this, patients in the observation group, according to different pathogenesis and symptoms presented within 24 h into hospitalization, were additionally treated with acupoint catgut embedding. The recovery time of borborygmus, time of first anal aerofluxus, time of first defecation, abdominal pressure at different time points, the occurrence rate of complications (upper gastrointestinal hemorrhage, diarrhea, vomiting), time of enteral nutrition tolerance rate reaching 30 kcal/kg x d were observed and recorded. RESULTS: The recovery time of borborygmus, time of first anal aerofluxus, time of first defecation and time of enteral nutrition tolerance rate reaching 30 kcal/kg x d in the observation group were all earlier to those in the control group (all P<0.01). At 48 h, 4 d and 7 d into hospitalization, the abdominal pressures in the observation group were all lower than those in the control group [(11.10 +/- 1.47) mmHg vs. (13.50 +/- 1.43) mmHg, (8.40 +/- 1.25) mmHg vs. (11.90 +/- 1.56) mmHg, (6.73 +/- 0.74) mmHg vs. (10.80 +/- 1.30) mmHg, all P<0.01]. There were 8 cases with complications of gastrointestinal hemorrhage, diarrhea and vomiting in the observation group with the occurrence rate o 27% (8/30), which was lower than those in the control group (70.0% (21/30), P<0.01. CONCLUSION: The acupoint catgut embedding at early time in craniocerebral injury patients could improve the recovery of gastrointestinal function, reduce intolerance of enteral nutrition and occurrence rate of various complications.

Environmental impact assessment and end-of-life treatment policy analysis for Li-ion batteries and Ni-MH batteries.

Based on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Eco-indicator 99 method, a LCA model was applied to conduct environmental impact and end-of-life treatment policy analysis for secondary batteries. This model evaluated the cycle, recycle and waste treatment stages of secondary batteries. Nickel-Metal Hydride (Ni-MH) batteries and Lithium ion (Li-ion) batteries were chosen as the typical secondary batteries in this study. Through this research, the following results were found: (1) A basic number of cycles should be defined. A minimum cycle number of 200 would result in an obvious decline of environmental loads for both battery types. Batteries with high energy density and long life expectancy have small environmental loads. Products and technology that help increase energy density and life expectancy should be encouraged. (2) Secondary batteries should be sorted out from municipal garbage. Meanwhile, different types of discarded batteries should be treated separately under policies and regulations. (3) The incineration rate has obvious impact on the Eco-indicator points of Nickel-Metal Hydride (Ni-MH) batteries. The influence of recycle rate on Lithium ion (Li-ion) batteries is more obvious. These findings indicate that recycling is the most promising direction for reducing secondary batteries' environmental loads. The model proposed here can be used to evaluate environmental loads of other secondary batteries and it can be useful for proposing policies and countermeasures to reduce the environmental impact of secondary batteries.

A risk explicit interval linear programming model for uncertainty-based environmental economic optimization in the Lake Fuxian watershed, China.

The conflict of water environment protection and economic development has brought severe water pollution and restricted the sustainable development in the watershed. A risk explicit interval linear programming (REILP) method was used to solve integrated watershed environmental-economic optimization problem. Interval linear programming (ILP) and REILP models for uncertainty-based environmental economic optimization at the watershed scale were developed for the management of Lake Fuxian watershed, China. Scenario analysis was introduced into model solution process to ensure the practicality and operability of optimization schemes. Decision makers' preferences for risk levels can be expressed through inputting different discrete aspiration level values into the REILP model in three periods under two scenarios. Through balancing the optimal system returns and corresponding system risks, decision makers can develop an efficient industrial restructuring scheme based directly on the window of "low risk and high return efficiency" in the trade-off curve. The representative schemes at the turning points of two scenarios were interpreted and compared to identify a preferable planning alternative, which has the relatively low risks and nearly maximum benefits. This study provides new insights and proposes a tool, which was REILP, for decision makers to develop an effectively environmental economic optimization scheme in integrated watershed management.