Trends of motorcyclist accidents in Kelantan between 1998-2003

Motor vehicle crashes (MVCs) contribute large proportion of death and disability globally and motorcyclists are the most vulnerable group. In Malaysia, motorcycles are one of the most important forms of personal transportation. More than 50% of the registered vehicles in this country are motorcycles. Casualties among motorcyclist form a large portion of traffic injury problems in Malaysia and are ranked among the highest in comparison to other countries. The objective of the stu& was to determine the trend of motorcycle crashes in Kelantan, between 1998 and 2003. This was a retrospective record review of MVCs data in Kelantan. Data gathered were input into SPSS version 11 and Microsoft Excel and analyzed using decomposition method to explore the seasonality and simple linear regression to explore the trend. The study revealed that majority of road trafic injuries involved motorcycle users (58.5% to 63.1 %). The proportion of fatality was between 8.6% and 10.7% and majority involved 11-30 years (60.0% - 69.7%). About 90% of the fatal motorcycle injuries were male. The peak hour for fatality was between 4.00 to 8.00 afternoons. No seasonal pattern of motorcycle accidents but, there was signrficant linear increasing trend (p<0.001) with an average of 9 cases increasing every year. Based on the results above, we conclude that the trend of motorcycle accidents was increasing in year 1998 - 2003, but no seasonal pattern. Most of the fatal motorcycle crashes involved young men riders and occurred at afternoon. We recommend that public education and enforcement on accident prevention should be given a priority

CRISPR/Cas9-mediated editing of 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate oxidase1 enhances Petunia flower longevity

© 2019 The Authors. Plant Biotechnology Journal published by Society for Experimental Biology and The Association of Applied Biologists and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.The genes that encode the ethylene biosynthesis enzyme 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate oxidase (ACO) are thought to be involved in flower senescence. Hence, we investigated whether the transcript levels of PhACO genes (PhACO1, PhACO3 and PhACO4) in Petunia cv. Mirage Rose are associated with ethylene production at different flowering stages. High transcript levels were detected in the late flowering stage and linked to high ethylene levels. PhACO1 was subsequently edited using the CRISPR/Cas9 system, and its role in ethylene production was investigated. PhACO1-edited T0 mutant lines, regardless of mutant type (homozygous or monoallelic), exhibited significantly reduced ethylene production and enhanced flower longevity compared with wild-type. Flower longevity and the reduction in ethylene production were observed to be stronger in homozygous plants than in their monoallelic counterparts. Additionally, the transmission of the edited gene to the T1 (lines 6 and 36) generation was also confirmed, with the results for flower longevity and ethylene production proving to be identical to those of the T0 mutant lines. Overall, this study increases the understanding of the role of PhACO1 in petunia flower longevity and also points to the CRISPR/Cas9 system being a powerful tool in the improvement of floricultural quality11sciescopu