EXPLORING SOCIAL COMMERCE ADOPTION IN CHINA: A USES AND GRATIFICATIONS PERSPECTIVE

As a new e-commerce paradigm, social commerce has resulted from consumers relying on the online recommendations of friends and acquaintances. To clarify Chinese consumers’ social commerce intentions, we conducted an empirical study based on a uses and gratifications approach. The results indicate that perceived gratification from entertainment was found to be the strongest predictor of Chinese consumers’ social commerce intentions. This is followed by the perceived gratification from information seeking, expressive information sharing, cool and new trends, and social interaction. However, neither gratification from escape nor passing time was found to be significant predictor. In addition, perceived gratification from information seeking has a stronger influence on consumers’ social commerce intentions in females than in males, while perceived gratification from expressive information sharing has a stronger influence on consumers’ social commerce intentions in males than in females. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed in the paper

Methods for conducting international Delphi surveys to optimise global participation in core outcome set development: a case study in gastric cancer informed by a comprehensive literature review

Copyright © 2021, The Author(s) Open Access. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.Background: Core outcome sets (COS) should be relevant to key stakeholders and widely applicable and usable. Ideally, they are developed for international use to allow optimal data synthesis from trials. Electronic Delphi surveys are commonly used to facilitate global participation; however, this has limitations. It is common for these surveys to be conducted in a single language potentially excluding those not fluent in that tongue. The aim of this study is to summarise current approaches for optimising international participation in Delphi studies and make recommendations for future practice. Methods: A comprehensive literature review of current approaches to translating Delphi surveys for COS development was undertaken. A standardised methodology adapted from international guidance derived from 12 major sets of translation guidelines in the field of outcome reporting was developed. As a case study, this was applied to a COS project for surgical trials in gastric cancer to translate a Delphi survey into 7 target languages from regions active in gastric cancer research. Results: Three hundred thirty-two abstracts were screened and four studies addressing COS development in rheumatoid and osteoarthritis, vascular malformations and polypharmacy were eligible for inclusion. There was wide variation in methodological approaches to translation, including the number of forward translations, the inclusion of back translation, the employment of cognitive debriefing and how discrepancies and disagreements were handled. Important considerations were identified during the development of the gastric cancer survey including establishing translation groups, timelines, understanding financial implications, strategies to maximise recruitment and regulatory approvals. The methodological approach to translating the Delphi surveys was easily reproducible by local collaborators and resulted in an additional 637 participants to the 315 recruited to complete the source language survey. Ninety-nine per cent of patients and 97% of healthcare professionals from non-English-speaking regions used translated surveys. Conclusion: Consideration of the issues described will improve planning by other COS developers and can be used to widen international participation from both patients and healthcare professionals.This study is funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Doctoral Research Fellowship Grant (DRF-2015-08-023). JMB is partially funded by the NIHR Bristol Biomedical Research Centre and the MRC ConDUCT-II Hub for Trials Methodology Research. PRW was funded by the MRC North West Hub for Trials Methodology Research (Grant ref: MR/K025635/01).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Rapid Method for the Determination of 5-Hydroxymethylfurfural and Levulinic Acid Using a Double-Wavelength UV Spectroscopy

This study reports on a rapid method for the determination of levulinic acid (LA) and 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) in acid hydrolyze system of glucose based on UV spectroscopy. It was found that HMF and LA have a maximum absorption at the wavelengths of 284 nm and 266 nm, respectively, in a water medium, and the absorptions of HMF and LA at 284 nm and 266 nm follow Beer's law very well. However, it was found that a major spectral interference species will arise in the quantification of HMF and LA; nonetheless, this interference can be eliminated through the absorption treatment of charcoal. Therefore, both HMF and LA can be quantified with a double-wavelength technique. The repeatability of the method had a relative standard deviation of less than 4.47% for HMF and 2.25% for LA; the limit of quantification (LOQ) was 0.017 mmol/L for HMF and 4.68 mmol/L for LA, and the recovery ranged from 88% to 116% for HMF and from 94% to 105% for LA. The present method is simple, rapid, and accurate. It is suitable to use in the research of the preparation of HMF and LA in biorefinery area

TLR9 promoter polymorphism is associated with both an increased susceptibility to gastric carcinoma and poor prognosis.

OBJECTIVE: Genetic polymorphisms of Toll-like receptors (TLRs) may influence the effects of H. pylori infection and play important roles in gastric carcinogenesis. The aim of this study was to determine whether the polymorphisms of TLR4 and TLR9 are associated with susceptibility to gastric carcinoma and its prognosis. METHODS: This study consisted of 314 patients with gastric cancer and 314 healthy controls. The polymorphisms were assessed using polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) analysis. Survival was analyzed by Kaplan-Meier survival curves. RESULTS: No variant genotypes of TLR4+896A/G, TLR4+1196C/T, or TLR9 -1237T/C were detected. For TLR9 -1486 T/C, multiple logistic regression analyses revealed that compared with the TT homozygote, patients with both the TC variant (adjusted odds ratio (OR) = 1.47, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.04-2.10) and the CC variant (adjusted OR = 1.63, 95% CI = 1.01-2.64) had higher risks of gastric cancer. Further stratification analyses revealed that an increased risk of gastric cancer associated with C carriers was evident among females (adjusted OR = 1.84, 95%CI = 1.02-3.33), in younger subjects aged less than 60 years old (adjusted OR = 1.86, 95%CI = 1.15-3.00), and subjects with H. pylori infection (adjusted OR = 1.53, 95% CI = 1.03-2.27). We also observed a significant association between C carriers and noncardia gastric cancer (adjusted OR = 1.51, 95% CI = 1.03-2.20). In addition, we demonstrated that the C carrier genotype and H. pylori infection may have a synergistic effect and conferred an OR of 2.44 for developing gastric cancer. TLR9 -1486C was also identified as an independent marker of poor survival of carcinoma. CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that TLR9 -1486C carriers are associated with an increased risk and poor prognosis of gastric carcinoma in the Chinese population

Physical localization and DNA methylation of 45S rRNA gene loci in Jatropha curcas L.

In eukaryotes, 45S rRNA genes are arranged in tandem arrays of repeat units, and not all copies are transcribed during mitosis. DNA methylation is considered to be an epigenetic marker for rDNA activation. Here, we established a clear and accurate karyogram for Jatropha curcas L. The chromosomal formula was found to be 2n=2x=22=12m+10 sm. We found that the 45S rDNA loci were located at the termini of chromosomes 7 and 9 in J. curcas. The distribution of 45S rDNA has no significant difference in J. curcas from different sources. Based on the hybridization signal patterns, there were two forms of rDNA - dispersed and condensed. The dispersed type of signals appeared during interphase and prophase, while the condensed types appeared during different stages of mitosis. DNA methylation analysis showed that when 45S rDNA stronger signals were dispersed and connected to the nucleolus, DNA methylation levels were lower at interphase and prophase. However, when the 45S rDNA loci were condensed, especially during metaphase, they showed different forms of DNA methylation

Bi-directional and temporal relationship between elevated alanine aminotransferase and hypertension in a longitudinal study of Chinese adults

Objective Despite the strong correlation between elevated alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and hypertension, their bi-directional and temporal relationship are currently unclear. Our study aimed to explore the bi-directional and temporal association between elevated ALT (ALT > 40 U/L) and hypertension. Methods Measurements of alanine aminotransferase and blood pressure were obtained twice from 2013 to 2017 in 3314 Chinese adults without cardiovascular disease at baseline. Bi-directional and cross-lagged panel analyses were performed to dissect the temporal relationship between elevated ALT and hypertension. Results Longitudinally, we found that baseline elevated ALT was strongly correlated with incident hypertension (odds ratios = 2.16, P = .001), and baseline hypertension was also significantly associated with incident elevated ALT (odds ratios = 1.64, P = .026). The cross-lagged path coefficients from baseline ALT to follow-up blood pressure were significantly greater than that from baseline blood pressure to follow-up ALT (β: 0.043 vs. 0.026, P < .05 for systolic blood pressure and β: 0.052 vs. 0.024, P < .05 for diastolic blood pressure). Conclusion Our results provide evidence for the bi-directional association of elevated ALT and hypertension among Chinese adults, and elevated ALT probably antedates the development of hypertension

Stratified analyses between TLR9 -1486 T/C polymorphisms and gastric cancer risk.

*<p>Adjusted for age, sex, and <i>H. pylori</i> infection in a logistic dominant model.</p><p>OR, odds ratio; CI, confidence interval.</p

The genotype distributions of TLR9-1486 T/C in cases and controls.

a<p>Adjusted for age, sex, and <i>H. pylori</i> infection.</p><p>OR, odds ratio; CI, confidence interval.</p