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This paper reports results from an analysis of the relationship between the structure of the city-to-city network of global airline passenger flows and the interstate world system. While many scholars suggest that the broader parameters of the world system structure the urban hierarchy embedded within or articulated to it, others argue that the urban hierarchy is decoupling from the world system. The analyses show that there has been some modest convergence in the distribution of power in the world city system. Moreover, they suggest that the mechanism for this convergence is the upward mobility of cities located in the semi-periphery and the east Asian region. The paper closes by considering the implication of these findings for a larger understanding of the relationship between globalisation, the structure of the world city system and its articulation with the world system.

Background and objectives: Serum alkaline phosphatase has been associated with increased mortality in hemodialysis patients but its associations with mortality in chronic kidney disease (CKD) stages III and IV are unknown.Design, settings, participants & measurements: In 1094 participants in the African-American Study of Kidney Disease and Hypertension (AASK) database, the associations of serum alkaline phosphatase with mortality and cardiovascular events were examined in Cox models.Results: The mean (؎SD) age was 54 ؎ 11 yr, and 61% were men. The median alkaline phosphatase was 80 IU/L, and interquartile range was 66 to 97 IU/L. The mean follow-up was 4.6 yr. There were 105 (9.6%) all-cause deaths and 149 (13.6%) cardiovascular events. Each doubling of serum alkaline phosphatase was significantly associated with increased hazard [hazard ratio (HR) 1.60, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.08 ؊2.36] of all-cause mortality adjusted for demographics, drug and blood pressure groups, and comorbidity. With further adjustment for liver function tests as well as serum calcium and phosphorus, each doubling of serum alkaline phosphatase remained significantly associated with increased mortality (HR 1.55, 95% CI 1.03 to 2.33). Serum alkaline phosphatase was not significantly associated with increased risk of cardiovascular events.Conclusions: Independent of liver function tests and serum calcium and phosphorus, higher levels of serum alkaline phosphatase are associated with increased mortality in the CKD population. Further studies are warranted to identify the potential mechanisms for this association.

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This paper reports our research on China's world cities. Formal network analysis of air passenger linkages for recent years among China's most populous cities and among many of the world's largest cities allows us to identify the country's leading world city from among the leading Mainland candidates, Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. We theorize our findings about China's world cities in relation to both global forces (and China's increasing entanglement with them) and the policies and actions of the national state. We examine the national and global urban network through a longitudinal, two-level analysis of airline passenger travel for four time points between about 1990 and 2005. We show that Beijing was China's leading world city at the beginning of the time period, a status it lost nationally in as early as 1995, and then globally 10 years later. On the other hand Shanghai became China's leading world city, and it acquired this status first nationally in 2000, and then globally in 2005. The changing status of the Chinese capital corresponds to the country's increasing involvement with the capitalist world economy. Shanghai's ascendance as the leading world city in China may indicate that global forces have come to play an increasingly important role relative to that of the developmental state.