Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder with dysfunction in cortices as well as white matter (WM) tracts. While the changes to WM structure have been extensively investigated in PD, the nature of the functional changes to WM remains unknown. In this study, the regional activity and functional connectivity of WM were compared between PD patients (n = 57) and matched healthy controls (n = 52), based on multimodel magnetic resonance imaging data sets. By tract‐based spatial statistical analyses of regional activity, patients showed decreased structural‐functional coupling in the left corticospinal tract compared to controls. This tract also displayed abnormally increased functional connectivity within the left post‐central gyrus and left putamen in PD patients. At the network level, the WM functional network showed small‐worldness in both controls and PD patients, yet it was abnormally increased in the latter group. Based on the features of the WM functional connectome, previously un‐evaluated individuals could be classified with fair accuracy (73%) and area under the curve of the receiver operating characteristics (75%). These neuroimaging findings provide direct evidence for WM functional changes in PD, which is crucial to understand the functional role of fiber tracts in the pathology of neural circuits.

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The deaths of accident occurring in land hazardous material transport (rail and road) is a scale standard for judging accident severity in safety programmes. The f-N curve is a common practice to express the results from past scattered accident data through curve fitting method, which only estimate the overall trend. For this reason, this paper proposed a simple methodology by combination of normal distribution and f-N curve. To verify the method, the following three sets of statistical data were selected and analysed in this study: 1932 accidents in over 95 countries (1931–2004) and 322 accidents in China (2000–2008) available in the literature, and 2046 accidents investigated in China (2013–2017). It was found that the mean value curve is almost identical or even better than the best-fitted curve, while the predicted upper and lower limits with 96% reliability (±2σ) covering nearly all the statistical data are beyond the scope of common curve fitting. The result explains the inherent relation between accumulated frequency and deaths in different transport mode, in different country and at different period. This study also provides insights on the evolution of accident severity with the development of social economy and the requirement of safety.

Objectives Patients with early Parkinson disease (PD) frequently defer initiation of levodopa treatment to minimize long-term complications. Nonergoline dopamine agonists, such as pramipexole and piribedil, are frequent first-line therapies for early PD patients, yet limited head-to-head randomized controlled trial (RCT) evidence exists for dopamine agonists in this population. We therefore conducted a systematic literature review and network meta-analysis. Methods MEDLINE, Embase, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials were systematically searched (until January 7, 2020), identifying RCTs assessing the efficacy of piribedil or pramipexole in early PD. Eligible trial data were incorporated into fixed- and random-effects Bayesian network meta-analyses. Results No RCTs were identified directly comparing piribedil with pramipexole, but 6 trials provided data for pramipexole versus placebo and 2 compared piribedil versus placebo, facilitating indirect comparisons. Across all time points assessed, no significant differences were found between pramipexole and piribedil for change in the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS) score from baseline. Piribedil and pramipexole demonstrated superiority relative to placebo for UPDRS II/III change at weeks 22 to 30. No significant differences were noted between the treatments at weeks 20 to 35 for anxiety, constipation, hypotension, nausea, and somnolence. Sensitivity analyses on adjustment for dose titration periods and baseline risk yielded the same pattern of results. Conclusions No significant differences were found for pramipexole versus piribedil in the UPDRS II/III scores from baseline in early PD, with similar safety profiles.