Di-μ-acetato-κ3 O,O′:O′;κ3 O:O,O′-bis­[(acetato-κ2 O,O′)bis­(5-nitro-1,10-phenanthroline-κ2 N,N′)cadmium]

In the binuclear title compound, [Cd2(C2H3O2)4(C12H7N3O2)2], the CdII cations are linked by carboxyl­ate O atoms into a four-membered Cd2O2 rhombic ring with a Cd⋯ Cd separation of 3.7515 (5) Å. Each CdII atom is seven-coordinated by a bidentate 5-nitro-1,10-phenanthroline (5-NO2-phen) ligand and two bidentate acetate anions, one of which also acts as a bridge linking the two Cd atoms. The crystal packing is stabilized by π–π inter­actions between the phen rings of neighboring mol­ecules, with centroid–centroid distances of 3.491 (2) (intra­molecular) and 3.598 (2) Å (inter­molecular)

An investigation into the impact of health and health related behaviour on employment and wages in China.

This thesis examines the impact of health and health-related behaviour on labour market outcomes in China. The data source used in this analysis is the second - seventh waves (1991, 1993, 1997, 2000, 2004 and 2006) of the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS). The main analysis focuses on these related issues: the impact of health on employment; the impact of health on wages; and the impact of health-related behaviour on employment and wages. This thesis provides new evidence to the limited existing evidence which examines the effect of health on labour market outcomes for the Chinese working-age population and therefore adds to the international literature in this area. It also provides evidence to policy makers, including the 17th and the 18th National Congress of China on improving the health of the whole nation. Chapter 1 outlines the motivation and objectives of the thesis. Chapter 2 briefly reviews the labour market and the health care system in China. Chapter 3 provides detailed description of the CHNS, and an overview of health and labour market outcomes in China. Chapter 4 examines the effect of self-reported health status and obesity (as measured by Body Max Index (BMI)) on the probability of being employed. The empirical strategy involves a Random Effects (RE) probit model, a Fixed Effects (FE) logit model, and a recursive bivariate probit model which controls for the potential endogeneity of health. The results show that having better health status is found to be positively associated with employment for the Chinese working-age population. There is a statistically significant and negative relationship between having an unhealthy BMI and employment. These findings are consistent with the international literature. There is evidence of discrimination against people who have unhealthy body weight, when assuming SRHS completely capture the impact of health on productivity. The results are found to be vary within the population, the result finds that the positive relationship between better health and employment is larger for men and older working-age population than for women and the young working-age population, respectively. Furthermore, failure to account for the endogeneity of being overweight underestimates its impact on employment and this is consistent with international literature. Chapter 5 estimates the impact of self-reported health status and obesity on hourly wages for non-agricultural employees. In addition to using the RE and the FE model, the analysis uses a Two Stage Least Squares (2SLS) and a Heckman (1979) selection correction method to separately control for the potential endogeneity of health and sample selection bias. The results show that having excellent health status is positively correlated with hourly wages for the Chinese workers. However, having an unhealthy BMI does not have a statistically significant effect on wages. However, for female workers being obese is predicted to reduce hourly wages by 22.40% compared to their normal weight counterparts, which is larger than that of the international literature. Based on the 2SLS method, the null hypothesis of exogeneity of health cannot be rejected for all sample groups within the Chinese population. However, the statistically significant and positive relationship between better health and wages largely disappears after controlling for sample selection bias. Chapter 6 examines the simultaneous effect of drinking alcohol and smoking status on employment and wages. To allow for the potential endogeneity of drinking and smoking simultaneously, this chapter adopts Newey (1978)'s two-step and 2SLS methods to estimate the effect on employment and wages, respectively. For the overall population, both drinking and smoking status are found to be positively correlated with employment but not with hourly wages. The results confirm the literature that there is a positive and inverse U-shaped relationship between drinking and employment, which is also robust across different ways of measuring drinking behaviour. Smoking incidence is found to be positively correlated with employment for men but not for women. Furthermore, there is no evidence of endogeneity of drinking or smoking. Chapter 7 summarizes the key findings, explores the policy implications, and identifies limitations and issues for future research

1,1-Dimethyl­hydrazin-1-ium picrate

In the title compound, C2H9N2 +·C6H2N3O7 −, the dihedral angles between the mean planes of the three nitro groups and the benzene ring are 63.5 (3), 10.5 (2) and 10.4 (2)°. In the crystal, mol­ecules are linked by N—H⋯O hydrogen bonds into a two-dimensional network parallel to (001)

The Molecular Mechanism by which PIP2 Opens the Intracellular G-Loop Gate of a Kir3.1 Channel

Abstract Inwardly rectifying potassium (Kir) channels are characterized by a long pore comprised of continuous transmembrane and cytosolic portions. A high-resolution structure of a Kir3.1 chimera revealed the presence of the cytosolic (G-loop) gate captured in the closed or open conformations. Here, we conducted molecular-dynamics simulations of these two channel states in the presence and absence of phosphatidylinositol bisphosphate (PIP2), a phospholipid that is known to gate Kir channels. Simulations of the closed state with PIP2 revealed an intermediate state between the closed and open conformations involving direct transient interactions with PIP2, as well as a network of transitional inter- and intrasubunit interactions. Key elements in the G-loop gating transition involved a PIP2-driven movement of the N-terminus and C-linker that removed constraining intermolecular interactions and led to CD-loop stabilization of the G-loop gate in the open state. To our knowledge, this is the first dynamic molecular view of PIP2-induced channel gating that is consistent with existing experimental data

Comparison Between Single Loading–Unloading Indentation and Continuous Stiffness Indentation

Experiments are performed on fused silica, Si, and duplex stainless steel to examine whether the CSM (continuous stiffness indentation) method will provide approximately the “same” results of contact modulus and indentation hardness as those measured from the quasi-static single loading–unloading indentation. The experimental results show that the elastic modulus measured by the CSM method is compatible with that by the quasi-static loading–unloading method for hard materials, while there exists a percentage difference of ∼21.3% between the smallest value and the largest vale of the measured indentation hardnesses from the CSM method for fused silica and a percentage difference of ∼15.3% between the hardnesses measured by the CSM method and the single indentation for duplex stainless steel. The large percentage difference suggests that the indentation hardness measured by the CSM method may not be compatible with that measured by the quasi-static loading–unloading method for hard materials. The finite element results reveal the percentage difference between the indentation hardness at the wave peak and that at the wave valley for the CSM method increases with the increase of the ratio of elastic modulus to yield stress

Self‐Healable and Recyclable Tactile Force Sensors with Post‐Tunable Sensitivity

It is challenging to post‐tune the sensitivity of a tactile force sensor. Herein, a facile method is reported to tailor the sensing properties of conductive polymer composites by utilizing the liquid‐like property of dynamic polymer matrix at low strain rates. The idea is demonstrated using dynamic polymer composites (CB/dPDMS) made via evaporation‐induced gelation of the suspending toluene solution of carbon black (CB) and acid‐catalyzed dynamic polydimethylsiloxane (dPDMS). The dPDMS matrices allow CB to redistribute to change the sensitivity of materials at the liquid‐like state, but exhibit typical solid‐like behavior and thus can be used as strain sensors at normal strain rates. It is shown that the gauge factor of the polymer composites can be easily post‐tuned from 1.4 to 51.5. In addition, the dynamic polymer matrices also endow the composites with interesting self‐healing ability and recyclability. Therefore, it is envisioned that this method can be useful in the design of various novel tactile sensing materials for many applications

Predicting Protein Interactions by Brownian Dynamics Simulations

We present a newly adapted Brownian-Dynamics (BD)-based protein docking method for predicting native protein complexes. The approach includes global BD conformational sampling, compact complex selection, and local energy minimization. In order to reduce the computational costs for energy evaluations, a shell-based grid force field was developed to represent the receptor protein and solvation effects. The performance of this BD protein docking approach has been evaluated on a test set of 24 crystal protein complexes. Reproduction of experimental structures in the test set indicates the adequate conformational sampling and accurate scoring of this BD protein docking approach. Furthermore, we have developed an approach to account for the flexibility of proteins, which has been successfully applied to reproduce the experimental complex structure from the structure of two unbounded proteins. These results indicate that this adapted BD protein docking approach can be useful for the prediction of protein-protein interactions