HISTORIC VOYAGE The ship New Golden Bridge II leaves Fuzhou, Fujian Province, for Taiwan on July 13, the first combined passenger-cargo vessel to embark on a direct trip between the Chinese mainland and Taiwan (LAI JIANQIANG)

Essential Acid

A two-year study of 25,000 babies has found that a lack of folic acid, essential for neural tube formation, was the main cause of birth defects in China's Shanxi Province.

Ren Aiguo, a professor at Peking University's Reproductive Health Institute, said insufficient folic acid caused serious neural tube abnormalities, the most common type of birth defect in the coal-rich region in north China.

Between 2003 and 2004, the folic acid level of Shanxi people was around one-quarter that of people in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, a city with a low level of birth defects in east China.

With a diet high in noodles and other cooked wheaten food, Shanxi people, especially those in the rural areas, consumed fewer vegetables and less meat, the main sources of folic acid, than those in south China.

Miracle Survivors

Three men who had been trapped in a flooded mine in Guizhou Province for 25 days were rescued on July 12, the rescue headquarters said.

The miners were found at 11:28 a.m. in a flooded coalmine shaft and immediately lifted to the ground, said Chen Qing, head of the rescue headquarters.

They managed to survive by drinking water on the ground. They appeared very weak but were able to talk, rescuers said. Two miners are 36 years old and the other is 35 years old.

Qinglong County's Xinqiao Coalmine was flooded on June 17 while 16 miners were working underground.

Rescuers found one body on June 25 and 12 miners are still missing.

Rampant Plagiarism

Nearly half of science-industry workers in China's research institutes, universities and hospitals think academic cheating is "common," a survey by the China Association for Science and Technology showed.

The survey, released on July 10, reported that 43 percent of the 30,078 respondents thought plagiarism is "really" or "rather" serious in China. About 45 percent of them were worried about outright fabrication.

Furthermore, 56 percent said they were sure of at least one case of plagiarism, fabrication or sending one thesis to several journals for publication among science researchers they knew.

In the survey, 30 percent of the workers attributed cheating to the current evaluation system that appraises researchers' academic performance largely by the number of theses they wrote and had published.

A total of 18 percent of respondents thought it was due to incompetent supervision.

Cleaner Air for Games

Guangzhou's environmental protection authority has vowed to ensure better air quality during the 16th Asian Games next year by spending up to 600 million yuan ($88 million) in tackling the problem of air pollution.

The plan also calls for another 1.8 billion yuan ($265 million) to be raised from the private sector, Yang Liu, Deputy Director of the Guangzhou Environmental Protection Bureau, was quoted as saying in China Daily.

The city's air quality improved a bit in the first five months of 2009, with 37 fewer days of haze and dust than in the same period last year, Yang said. Up to 32 chemical plants will be removed or ordered to stop production by the end of this year.

GOLDEN MARK Commemorative gold and silver bullion marking the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China are shown to the public on July 14 and start selling to collectors on July 23 (XINHUA)

DEADLY EXPLOSION Firefighters work to put out a fire at the Luoran Chemical Plant in Yanshi, Henan Province, on July 15. A blast occurred at the plant early in the morning that triggered a fire. At least seven people died (ZHANG XIAOLI)

READY TO DEBUT Workers install glass walls at the 2010 Shanghai World Expo's Sun Valley on July 14. The Expo Axis Project, which is to be the largest building on the expo site, will be complete by the end of this year (XINHUA)

FITNESS CAMP Overweight children e xercise with their instructors in a gym in Cangzhou, Hebei Province, which launched a weight loss camp for students on summer vacation (FU XINCHUN)