Identification of , a gene whose constitutive overexpression increases glycinebetaine content in maize and soybean.

Efforts to increase glycinebetaine (GB) levels in plants have been pursued as an approach to improving plant performance under stress conditions. To date, the impact of engineered levels of GB has been limited by metabolic constraints that restrict the achieved increases. We report the identification of a novel gene, that is differentially expressed in high and low GB accumulating maize genotypes.

The Effects of Vehicle Redesign on the Risk of Driver Death.

Objectives: This study updates a 2006 report that estimated the historical effects of vehicle design changes on driver fatality rates in the United States, separate from the effects of environmental and driver behavior changes during the same period. In addition to extending the period covered by 8 years, this study estimated the effect of design changes by model year and vehicle type.

Methods: Driver death rates for consecutive model years of vehicle models without design changes were used to estimate the vehicle aging effect and the death rates that would have been expected if the entire fleet had remained unchanged from the 1985 calendar year.

Development of a frontal small overlap crashworthiness evaluation test.

Objectives: Small overlap frontal crashes are those in which crash forces are applied outboard of the vehicle's longitudinal frame rails. In-depth analyses of crashes indicate that such crashes account for a significant proportion of frontal crashes with seriously injured occupants. The objective of this research was to evaluate possible barrier crash tests that could be used to evaluate the crashworthiness of vehicles across a spectrum of small overlap crash types.

IIHS side crash test ratings and occupant death risk in real-world crashes.

Objective: To evaluate how well the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) side crash test ratings predict real-world occupant death risk in side-impact crashes.

Methods: The IIHS has been evaluating passenger vehicle side crashworthiness since 2003. In the IIHS side crash test, a vehicle is impacted perpendicularly on the driver's side by a moving deformable barrier simulating a typical sport utility vehicle (SUV) or pickup.

Cell phone use while driving and attributable crash risk.

Objectives: Prior research has estimated that crash risk is 4 times higher when talking on a cell phone versus not talking. The objectives of this study were to estimate the extent to which drivers talk on cell phones while driving and to compute the implied annual number of crashes that could have been avoided if driver cell phone use were restricted.

Methods: A national survey of approximately 1200 U.

Preventing minor neck injuries in rear crashes--forty years of progress.

Objective: This article offers a historical review of vehicle design measures that have been implemented to reduce the risk of neck injuries to the occupants of rear struck vehicles.

Methods: The literature on regulations, consumer information programs, and efforts by vehicle manufacturers to address whiplash injuries is summarized along with studies evaluating the efficacy of the resulting vehicle design changes.

Results: Vehicle designs and, in particular, the designs of seats and head restraints have changed considerably over the last 40 years.

Making the most of the worst-case scenario: should belt-positioning booster seats be used in lap-belt-only seating positions?

Objective: Examine real-world crash injury data to determine whether children seated with lap belts only are better protected with or without belt-positioning booster seats.

Methods: Crash injury rates among booster-age children were examined for three restraint categories: lap belt only, belt-positioning booster seat with lap belt, and booster seat with lap/shoulder belt. Data were drawn from the National Automotive Sampling System-Crashworthiness Data System (NASS-CDS) and the Partners for Child Passenger Safety (PCPS) crash surveillance system for years 1997-2006 and 1998-2006, respectively.

Caution: a comment on Alena Erke's red light for red-light cameras? A meta-analysis of the effects of red-light cameras on crashes.

In Red Light for Red-Light Cameras?, Alena Erke concludes that "...

Metabolite analyses of grain from maize hybrids grown in the United States under drought and watered conditions during the 2002 field season.

Understanding natural variation in the composition of conventional crop germplasms is critical in establishing a baseline for comparison of biotechnology-derived crops. This is particularly relevant to such traits as tolerance to drought stress. Thus, there is both a need to understand the contribution of stress conditions to natural variation in plant nutritional components and to determine whether levels of small molecule metabolites such as osmoprotectants and stress metabolites are also affected.

Trends over time in the risk of driver death: what if vehicle designs had not improved?

Objectives: Passenger vehicle driver death rates per million vehicle registrations declined steadily during calendar years 1985-2004. The present study sought to separate the effect of vehicle design changes from this trend.

Methods: Restricting the trend to a fixed set of model years removed the vehicle design effects, but there were still effects due to vehicle aging.

Comparison of EuroSID-2 and SID-IIs in Vehicle Side Impact Tests with the IIHS Barrier.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) has recently developed and evaluated a new side impact barrier to represent the front profile of pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles for a new consumer information program. In the development of this program, two dummies were considered for assessing driver injury risk in side-struck vehicles: EuroSID-2 (50th percentile male dummy) and SID-IIs (5th percentile female dummy). The purpose of this study was to compare injury responses and kinematics for these two dummies in side impact crash tests.

Effects of head restraint and seat redesign on neck injury risk in rear-end crashes.

Automobile insurance claims were examined to determine the rates of neck injuries in rear-end crashes for vehicles with and without redesigned head restraints, redesigned seats, or both. Results indicate that the improved geometric fit of head restraints observed in many newer vehicle models are reducing the risk of whiplash injury substantially among female drivers (about 37% in the Ford Taurus and Mercury Sable), but have very little effect among male drivers. New seat designs, such as active head restraints that move upward and closer to drivers' heads during a rear impact, give added benefit, producing about a 43% reduction in whiplash injury claims (55% reduction among female drivers).

Rollover risk of cars and light trucks after accounting for driver and environmental factors.

Characteristics of the driver, roadway environment, and vehicle were associated with the likelihood of rollover occurrence in more than 14000 single-vehicle fatal and 78000 single-vehicle injury crashes during 1995-98. Rollovers were more likely in crashes involving young drivers or occurring on rural curves. After accounting for the effects of driver age and gender, roadway alignment and surface condition, and whether or not the crash occurred in a rural area, light trucks were still twice as likely as cars to experience rollovers.