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This case study explores the boatbuilding practices among boatbuilders (Tukang Timbal) in Terengganu, Malaysia, and their significance in preserving maritime heritage and craftsmanship in ASEAN. By examining the techniques, materials, and cultural influences involved in contemporary boat construction, the research aims to document and analyse the unique practices of these skilled artisans. Employing a qualitative research approach, the study combines interviews, observation, and analysis of boatbuilding processes to uncover the knowledge and skills passed down through generations of boatbuilders in Terengganu. It investigates the factors that shape their practices, including local ecological conditions, cultural traditions, and modern advancements in technology. The research emphasises the role of boatbuilders as cultural custodians, highlighting the importance of their craftsmanship in preserving Southeast Asian maritime heritage. By documenting their practices and understanding their cultural significance, the study contributes to the recognition and appreciation of this unique cultural tradition. The findings of this study provide valuable insights into contemporary boatbuilding practices in Terengganu, Malaysia. Examining the techniques and materials employed by boatbuilders, the research deepens our understanding of both the cultural and technological aspects of boat construction in ASEAN today. Ultimately, this case study sheds light on the boatbuilding practices among boatbuilders in Terengganu, Malaysia, contributing to the broader discourse on maritime heritage and craftsmanship in ASEAN. By documenting their unique techniques and materials, the study underscores the importance of preserving and promoting these traditional skills in order to sustain cultural heritage in a rapidly changing world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Harbin Institute of Technology. Social Sciences Edition / Haerbin Gongye Daxue Xuebao. Shehui Kexue Ban is the property of Harbin Institute of Technology and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of GeSec: Revista de Gestao e Secretariado is the property of Sindicato das Secretarias e Secretarios do Estado de Sao Paulo (SINSESP) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Brazilian Journal of Production Engineering / Revista Brasileira de Engenharia de Produção is the property of Brazilian Journal of Production Engineering and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Featured Application: Featured Application: The machine learning predictive model of fuel consumption proposed can help shipping companies toward an increasingly efficient and sustainable energy consumption with reduced operational and logistics costs, supporting a more competitive position in the market in compliance with environmental and safety regulatory standards. Water navigation is crucial for the movement of people and goods in many locations, including the Amazon region. It is essential for the flow of inputs and outputs, and for certain Amazon cities, boat access is the only option. Fuel consumption accounts for over 25% of a vessel's total operational costs. Shipping companies are therefore seeking procedures and technologies to reduce energy consumption. This research aimed to develop a fuel consumption prediction model for vessels operating in the Amazon region. Machine learning techniques such as Decision Tree, Random Forest, Extra Tree, Gradient Boosting, Extreme Gradient Boosting, and CatBoost can be used for this purpose. The input variables were based on the main design characteristics of the vessels, such as length and draft. Through metrics like mean, median, and coefficient of determination (R2), six different algorithms were assessed. CatBoost was identified as the model with the best performance and suitability for the data. Indeed, it achieved an R2 value higher than 91% in predicting and optimizing fuel consumption for vessels operating in the Amazon and similar regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research conducted since 2003 in and around the regional center of Tres Zapotes, Veracruz documents the importance of aquatic resources and transportation routes for subsistence and settlement over more than two millennia. Systematic archaeological survey over more than 400 km2 in the surrounding Eastern Lower Papaloapan Basin details a persistent focus of major settlements on streams and other bodies of water that would have provided an abundance of food and opportunities for water-born transport. Excavations at Tres Zapotes further indicate that exploitation of aquatic fauna was a significant component of a mixed subsistence strategy for the Olmec and Epi-Olmec inhabitants of the site, who obtained fish, turtles, and waterfowl from streams, lakes, estuaries and coastal marine environments over a range extending no less than 20 km from the center. Artifact inventories and landscape features further suggest an associated subsistence technology that included weighted nets and retention ponds in seasonally flooded areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of globalization on transportation corridors in Azerbaijan, which are strategically located to serve as hubs for crossroads between north-south and east-west trade. The main hypothesis is that globalization has had a significant impact on transportation corridors in Azerbaijan, resulting in greater connectivity and trade flows within the region. The recent triumph over Armenia has resulted in significant changes in the region, enhancing Azerbaijan's reputation. Alongside the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and the imposition of sanctions on Russia and Iran, Azerbaijan has emerged as a secure passage between these influential powers. Furthermore, the rising demands for major international trade routes have created a pressing need for Azerbaijan to enhance its capabilities to effectively meet these growing requirements. According to the World Systems Theory, semi-periphery countries play the role of bridges between core and periphery states. Globalization has led to Azerbaijan's integration into the global economic system as a semi-peripheral country. This has resulted in increased trade and investment, which in turn has led to the development of transportation infrastructure and the expansion of transportation networks.

As seafarers are involved in Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS), except for those in the fourth level of autonomy, the decision making of autonomous berthing should be carried out and be understood by human beings. This paper proposes a fuzzy logic-based human-like decision-making method for ultra-large ship berthing, which considers locations, ship particulars and the natural environment, and these factors are treated as the input variables. The IF–THEN rules are then established after the fuzzification of the input variables and are used for fuzzy inference to derive the decision of ship handling. It can be implemented in the decision-making system for safe navigation or be included in the process of autonomous berthing. The pilotage data are collected with nautical instruments and a distance measurement system during the berthing process, which are used to validate the proposed model and calculate the speed and turn errors. The overall and individual error of the decision-making model is in a reasonable and small range, which indicates that the model has good accuracy. The results of this research offer theoretical and practical insights into the development of a human-like decision-making method for autonomous navigation in port waters and maritime safety management in the shipping industry. The model can be further applied to develop a more widely applicable decision-making system for autonomous navigation in confined waters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of globalization on transportation corridors in Azerbaijan, which are strategically located to serve as hubs for crossroads between north-south and east-west trade. The main hypothesis is that globalization has had a significant impact on transportation corridors in Azerbaijan, resulting in greater connectivity and trade flows within the region. The recent triumph over Armenia has resulted in significant changes in the region, enhancing Azerbaijan's reputation. Alongside the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and the imposition of sanctions on Russia and Iran, Azerbaijan has emerged as a secure passage between these influential powers. Furthermore, the rising demands for major international trade routes have created a pressing need for Azerbaijan to enhance its capabilities to effectively meet these growing requirements. According to the World Systems Theory, semi-periphery countries play the role of bridges between core and periphery states. Globalization has led to Azerbaijan's integration into the global economic system as a semi-peripheral country. This has resulted in increased trade and investment, which in turn has led to the development of transportation infrastructure and the expansion of transportation networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to the continuous development and application of blockchain technology, more and more industries are exploring its application in project management. In the management of water transportation engineering projects, blockchain technology also has certain application potential. This article will start with the characteristics of blockchain technology, and the current situation and needs of water transportation project management, analyze the application mode of blockchain technology in water transportation project management, and explore its advantages, limitations, and practical applications. The experimental results of this article showed that when blockchain technology was applied to the management of water transportation engineering projects, its information sharing score was 93; its data storage and management score was 96.1; its smart contract score was 97.4; its fund management score was 97.1; its Internet of Things technology score was 96.5, which was far higher than the score of applying traditional technologies. It was shown that using blockchain technology for water transportation engineering project management can improve the efficiency and quality of project management, reduce costs, and extend to a wider range of water transportation lines and project fields in the future. HIGHLIGHTS With the continuous development of blockchain technology, its application in water transportation project management is also deepening.; This article starts from the characteristics of blockchain technology, the current situation and needs of water transportation project management, analyzes the application model of blockchain technology in water transportation project management, and discusses its advantages, limitations and practical applications.; The research results of this article show that using blockchain technology for water transportation project management can improve the efficiency and quality of project management and reduce costs.;

Copyright of Water Conservancy Science & Techonlogy & Economy is the property of Water Conservancy Science & Technology & Economy Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

BACKGROUND: Water‐free transportation (WFT), as a novel strategy for express delivery of live shrimp (Litopenaeus vannamei), was developed recently. However, air exposure during this transportation arouses a series of abiotic stress to the shrimp. In the present study, the influences of WFT stress on glycolysis and lipolysis metabolism and meat quality (umami flavor and drip loss) were investigated in comparison with conventional water transportation (WT). RESULTS: The results showed that type II muscle fibers with the feature of anaerobic metabolism were dominated in shrimp flesh. In addition, the increments of intracellular Ca2+ was detected in WFT and WT, which then activated the AMP‐activated protein kinase pathway and promoted the consumption of glycogen, as well as the accumulation of lactate and lipolysis, under the enzymolysis of hexokinase, pyruvate kinase, lactate dehydrogenase and adipose triglyceride lipase. Glycogen glycolyzed to latate. Meanwhile, ATP degraded along with glycolysis resulting in the generation of ATP‐related adenosine phosphates such as inosine monophosphate with umami flavor and phosphoric acid. More remarkable (P < 0.05) physiological changes (except lactate dehydrogenase and lactate) were observed in WFT compared to WT. Additionally, the fatty acid profile also slightly changed. CONCLUSION: The transport stress induced significant energy metabolism changes of shrimp flesh and therefore effected the flesh quality. The intensifications of freshness (K‐value) of shrimp flesh were detected as a result of ATP degradation, which were more pronounced after WFT. However, the drip loss of shrimp flesh was more significantly increased (P < 0.05) after WFT compared to WT. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The growing demand for petrochemicals has led to an increase in the number of ships carrying hazardous goods, making the effective regulation of ship tank-washing wastewater collection and discharge more important. To attain this objective, it is crucial to conduct quantitative analyses of the quantity of tank-washing wastewater generated and its geographical spread in the region. However, current estimation methods are plagued by issues such as unreliability and inaccuracy. This study presents a methodology for estimating the quantity of regional tank-washing wastewater, which is based on multi-source data. Using this method to estimate the quantity of tank-washing wastewater generated in the Pearl River Delta region, it was found that in the first quarter of 2018, the demand for tank washing by dangerous goods ships accounted for approximately 7.4% of the total number of berthing events in the study area. If all of these demands were fulfilled, about 15,000 tons of tank-washing wastewater would be generated. A more precise estimation of tank-washing wastewater was achieved, and the geographical dispersal of quantity was identified. Estimating the quantity of tank-washing wastewater in the area forms the foundation for developing facilities for collecting and disposing such wastewater, as well as for the design and site selection of tank-washing stations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water navigation is crucial for the movement of people and goods in many locations, including the Amazon region. It is essential for the flow of inputs and outputs, and for certain Amazon cities, boat access is the only option. Fuel consumption accounts for over 25% of a vessel’s total operational costs. Shipping companies are therefore seeking procedures and technologies to reduce energy consumption. This research aimed to develop a fuel consumption prediction model for vessels operating in the Amazon region. Machine learning techniques such as Decision Tree, Random Forest, Extra Tree, Gradient Boosting, Extreme Gradient Boosting, and CatBoost can be used for this purpose. The input variables were based on the main design characteristics of the vessels, such as length and draft. Through metrics like mean, median, and coefficient of determination (R2), six different algorithms were assessed. CatBoost was identified as the model with the best performance and suitability for the data. Indeed, it achieved an R2 value higher than 91% in predicting and optimizing fuel consumption for vessels operating in the Amazon and similar regions.

With the development of global industry and the increase of population, the shortage of freshwater resources has become a serious global challenge to the sustainable development of human society, prompting in-depth research on advanced water-harvesting technologies. However, the existing methods have many defects, such as easy pollution, insufficient water transportation speed, low water collection efficiency, complex preparation process, expensive raw materials, and so on. Here, inspired by natural organisms, such as beetles and cactus thorns, a new patterned surface combining a superamphiphobic region and a triangular fluorosurfactant (capstone FS50)-modified hydrophilic region has been designed for efficient and rapid water collection and condensation. The superamphiphobic part has an efficient water transmission capacity. On the one hand, owing to a good hydrophilic property, the FS50-modified part efficiently collects fog droplets that are further condensed into much larger water droplets. On the other hand, many large water drops condensed on the superamphiphobic region easily roll onto the hydrophilic FS50-modified surface, and form much larger droplets when combined with the original ones. The patterned surface achieves a very large water collection rate (WCR) of 20.6 mg min−1 cm−2, which is much larger than others reported in previous papers, while it is 1.5 and 1.3 times than that of single superamphiphobic and FS50-modified surfaces. Since both the patterns show superior oil repellency, it presents good resistance to organic pollution, resulting in very superior chemical stability and recyclability. Even after water collection for 60 cycles, the patterned surface can still reach a WCR value of 18 mg min−1 cm−2. The patterned surfaces also collect acid fog, alkali fog, and hot water fog when their WCR values are 20.1, 19.8, and 20.5 mg min−1 cm−2, respectively. This work has found a new patterned superoleophobic surface for efficient water collection, which achieves robust mechanical durability and chemical stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drought stress is an important factor affecting plant growth and development. It will provide a theoretical basis for cultivating new stress-resistant varieties and improving water utilization rate of plants by studying the regulation mechanism of osmotic adjustment and water transportation under drought stress, and understanding the physiological and biochemical characteristics and stress resistance mechanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As seafarers are involved in Maritime Autonomous Surface Ships (MASS), except for those in the fourth level of autonomy, the decision making of autonomous berthing should be carried out and be understood by human beings. This paper proposes a fuzzy logic-based human-like decision-making method for ultra-large ship berthing, which considers locations, ship particulars and the natural environment, and these factors are treated as the input variables. The IF–THEN rules are then established after the fuzzification of the input variables and are used for fuzzy inference to derive the decision of ship handling. It can be implemented in the decision-making system for safe navigation or be included in the process of autonomous berthing. The pilotage data are collected with nautical instruments and a distance measurement system during the berthing process, which are used to validate the proposed model and calculate the speed and turn errors. The overall and individual error of the decision-making model is in a reasonable and small range, which indicates that the model has good accuracy. The results of this research offer theoretical and practical insights into the development of a human-like decision-making method for autonomous navigation in port waters and maritime safety management in the shipping industry. The model can be further applied to develop a more widely applicable decision-making system for autonomous navigation in confined waters.

The phenomenon of changing the geometric parameters of pressure fire hoses is manifested when they transport extinguishing liquids. Although the extension of pressure fire hoses does not have a significant impact on the fire extinguishing process, the energy costs associated with such changes should be taken into account. In fact, part of the power of the fire pump is spent not on transporting liquids and forming extinguishing jets but on the «optional» lengthening of pressure fire hoses. Latex pressure fire hoses with diameters of 51 mm and 77 mm and fire pressure hoses with doublesided polymer coating of 51 mm (all of type T) were randomly selected for the experiments. The temperature was 263 K and 298 K, the fluid flow rate was constant, the pressure values at the inlet of the Protek 366 fire barrel had fixed values. No significant changes in the diameters (expansion or narrowing) of pressure fire hoses were recorded during water transportation. An elongation of 79 cm with a hose length of 1960 cm (73 cm with a hose length of 1790 cm) was recorded when transporting water in the case of using hoses with a diameter of 77 mm, a pressure at their inlet of 0.8 MPa, a temperature of 263 K, and a water flow rate of 0 l/s. The force that provided such a stretch was 2.04 kN. When extinguishing liquid was supplied by pressure fire hoses with a diameter of 77 mm in the temperature range of 263–298 K, the elongation decreased slightly with decreasing temperature. A slight unevenness of stretching of pressure fire hoses along the length was found when stretching increased closer to their middle. The results indicate the dependence of the amount of stretching on the materials from which pressure fire hoses are made, as well as their diameter. The values of dynamic forces that cause stretching of pressure fire hoses established in the study can be used in practice when taking into account the forced energy losses for fluid transportation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are promising clean power sources with high energy conversion efficiency, fast startup, and no pollutant emission. The generated water in the cathode can cause water flooding of the catalyst layer (CL), which in turn can significantly decrease the fuel cell performance. To address this significant issue of PEMFC, a new gas diffusion layer (GDL) with non-uniform distribution of PTFE is proposed for water removal from the CL. The feasibility of this new GDL design is numerically evaluated by a Lattice-Boltzmann Method (LBM)-based two-phase flow model. The porous structure of the new GDL design is numerically reconstructed, followed by LBM simulations of the water transport in GDL. Three types of different wetting conditions are considered. It is found that liquid water transported 7.87% more with a single row of wetted solids and 13.36% more with two rows of wetted solids. The results clearly demonstrate that the liquid water can be effectively removed from the GDL by proper arrangement of hydrophilic solids in the GDL. [Display omitted] • A new non-uniformly wettable GDL structure is introduced with non-uniform distribution of PTFE. • The transportation of liquid water in GDL is analyzed in terms of time domain and transport volume. • Compared the drainage efficiency and capacity of GDL under different conditions. • The new structure can improve the liquid water transport capacity by up to 13.36%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Biomass-derived, carbon converted from renewable biomass materials via the carbonization process, has been widely investigated for interfacial solar evaporators and is deemed a promising choice for solar desalination. However, salt accumulation at the evaporation interface is a great challenge. Studies show that the surface wetting and antifouling ability of carbonized-biomass, affects solar absorption, water supply, and water evaporation. In this paper, a simple two-step strategy completely different from carbonization is proposed for efficient solar evaporation and seawater desalination. In this regard, an interfacial solar evaporator is prepared based on the corn cob. The evaporator makes the best use of the raw three-dimensional interconnected fiber network structure, which extremely promotes the collection of solar energy, sufficient water supply, and vapor escape at the evaporation interface. Owing to the decrease in evaporation enthalpy and drawing energy from the environment, the evaporation rate and the photothermal conversion efficiency of proposed the evaporator reached 1.68 kg·m−2·h−1 and 99.32 % under solar irradiation intensity of 1 kW·m−2, respectively. The performance of the proposed scheme was investigated under various salinity levels and a great salt-rejecting and anti-corrosion performance was achieved. This simple strategy is a promising candidate for preparing biomass-based interfacial solar evaporators in practical applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vitis heyneana is widely distributed in Guizhou Province and has high drought resistance. The role of aquaporin proteins (AQPs) has been studied extensively in plants, and the expression of tonoplast membrane intrinsic protein (TIP) genes is vital for drought tolerance. Nonetheless, information on TIPs in V. heyneana is inadequate. In the present study, nine VhTIP genes from V. heyneana cv. 'Huaxi-9' were cloned and characterized. The open reading frames of nine genes contained 750–780 bases and encoded 249–259 amino acids. The amino acid sequence has a typical MIP family domain containing a unique SGGHINPAVT sequence. Moreover, VhTIPs expressed four patterns in the leaf of 'Huaxi-9', and the expression of VhTIP2;1 under drought conditions was the most upregulated gene. In addition, Arabidopsis transgenic plants that overexpressed VhTIP2;1 had a higher leaf water potential, leaf relative water content, and proline content, as well as a lower relative electrical conductivity and malondialdehyde content than wild-type (WT) plants under drought stress, indicating that transgenic A. thaliana has greater tolerance to drought stress than non-transgenic plants. This study provides valuable information to better explain the characterization and function of VhTIP2;1 in regulating drought resistance in Chinese wild grape plants and establishing molecular drought-resistant4 breeding systems in grapes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intelligent perception ability of the close-range navigation environment is the basis of autonomous decision-making and control of unmanned ships. In order to realize real-time perception of the close-range environment of unmanned ships, an enhanced attention mechanism YOLOv4 (EA-YOLOv4) algorithm is proposed. First of all, on the basis of YOLOv4, the convolutional block attention module (CBAM) is used to search for features in channel and space dimensions, respectively, to improve the model's feature perception of ship targets. Then, the improved-efficient intersection over union (EIoU) loss function is used to replace the complete intersection over union (CIoU) loss function of the YOLOv4 algorithm to improve the algorithm's perception of ships of different sizes. Finally, in the post-processing of algorithm prediction, soft non-maximum suppression (Soft-NMS) is used to replace the non-maximum suppression (NMS) of YOLOv4 to reduce the missed detection of overlapping ships without affecting the efficiency. The proposed method is verified on the large data set SeaShips, and the average accuracy rate of mAP0.5–0.95 reaches 72.5%, which is 10.7% higher than the original network YOLOv4, and the FPS is 38 frames/s, which effectively improves the ship detection accuracy while ensuring real-time performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a specific form of water transport that involves a simultaneous carriage of passengers and cargo, the function of a ferry to bridge one area to another is threatened by the fast growth of air transport, which is not only faster and more convenient but also often cheaper than traveling by ferry. The objective of this paper is to identify market expectations of ferry services and to identify the opportunity for ferry tourism development in Indonesia. This paper is a market survey of 103 ferry passengers in seven locations in Indonesia: Merak, Bakauheni, Bayuwangi, Bali, Batam, Labuan Bajo, and Lake Toba. Data analysis uses descriptive statistics to identify customers' top-of-mind opinions. The results show that the market prefers extended digital platforms to co-create their experience, both in ferry services and their trips, shortened route ferries to enrich their experience on multi-transportation facilities, while providing more entertainment and recreational facilities on longer routes, as well as instagrammable spots, both on the ferry or in the terminal. There are also collaboration opportunities with sports and other communities to cater to weekenders to create island-hopping events on weekends. The conclusion is that ferry operators should conduct market surveys periodically to understand their markets and their requirements to cope with the ever-changing marketplace. In addition, co-creating products with community customers and product development innovations is the solution to make ferry tourism relevant to current and future demands. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cement asphalt mortar (CAM) could be considered as the cement mortar modified by asphalt emulsion, which would alter the microstructure of cement mortar and thus exert significant influence on the mechanical properties and durability of CAM. In the current research, the effect of cationic asphalt emulsion on the compressive/flexural strength, flexibility, water adsorption, permeability and sulfate attack of CAM were investigated. The obtained results indicated that, both the compressive strength and flexural strength of CAM all decreased obviously with the increase of A/C (mass ratio of asphalt to cement), on the contrast, the incorporation of cationic asphalt emulsion would improve the flexibility of CAM. The increased A/C would suppress the water transportation, including water adsorption and penetration, into CAM, which is mainly due to the reduction in the pore connectivity and the hydrophobization on the wall of pores, thereby beneficial to improve the durability of CAM. The transportation pathway of water containing sulfate ions into CAM would be inhibited with the increase of A/C, which suppressed the formation of erosion products and in turn decreased the damage of the microstructure of CAM, that is, the incorporated cationic asphalt emulsion would enhance the sulfate attack resistance of CAM. The field emission scanning electronic microscopy (FESEM) observation showed that, with the increase of A/C, more and more asphalt film formed in the CAM, while less and less cement hydration products were generated, which is correlated well with the variation of mechanical properties, water sorptivity and sulfate attack resistance of CAM.

During the Neolithic period very few humans (3 to 5 million) lived on Planet Earth. As described in this review, there was an excess of water to support the life of these people. After the advent of agricultural practices, the number of people, as well as the production of food, increased very much and, as a consequence, large amounts of water became necessary to support this development. The availability of water is still in large excess as compared to the needs. The lack of water is the consequence of the lack of the appropriate infrastructures required to transport water to the places where it is needed. People need water in the right places at the right moment. They ask their governments to provide it, but the answers are not satisfactory. The actions needed are at the level of improving the irrigation, the distribution of water, the growth of more efficient vegetables and many similar initiatives. What is needed is a plethora of concerted actions that require national and international initiatives. The answer is an "international" action, not an "intergovernmental" one.

Solar water evaporation, which can be utilized for seawater desalination and wastewater treatment, promises freshwater security with renewable energy. Herein, a bionic solar evaporator consisting of a hydrogel solar absorber and bionic microchannels fabricated by the projection microstereolithography based 3D printing technique is proposed. Such a bioinspired solar evaporator achieves a fast water self‐transport speed and a high solar water evaporation rate of 4.12 kg·m−2·h−1 under 1 sun irradiation (1 kW·m−2), and the solar thermal efficiency can be as high as 92.1%. However, both the evaporation rate and solar thermal efficiency are greatly affected by properties of the hydrogel, geometric parameters of microchannels, and intensity of the light source. Most significantly, the bionic solar evaporator is applied for wastewater treatment including the purification of organic dyes, acid and alkali, as well as metal ions. The purification rate can be as high as 99.999%, demonstrating amazing performance for clean water production. The bioinspired water evaporator promises applications for solar energy harvesting, photothermal conversion, as well as environmental engineering, such as solar vapor generation, thermophotovoltaic cell, sewage disposal, and desalination of seawater. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The idea of bringing the icebergs scattered in Antarctica inspired the Emiratis to enter a new field and embark on a unique experience, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia had previously implemented it in the 1970s but failed to carry out it. There were opportunities for the Emirates to move an iceberg to the eastern coasts of the country, in cooperation with a specialized French company, according to a specific mechanism which is being done by using the satellite to locate the carried mountain and make electronic simulations to perform this on the ground, as it was hoped that the iceberg would be brought to the Emirate of Fujairah in the middle of the year 2020, but it was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic that swept the world. Those in charge in the United Arab Emirates hope that the project will achieve great benefits, the most important of which is obtaining a new source that feeds the country with the freshwater it needs, and transforming the Emirate of Fujairah into a tourist resort that attracts millions of tourists who wish to practice the hobby of skiing, and soften the region's atmosphere and make it suitable for agriculture and irrigation

"Diverting the Wen River to the Canal" is an important water conservancy project of the Grand Canal since the Yuan Dynasty, and its development and evolution are quite typical among water conservancy projects in the Shandong section of the Grand Canal. Based on the historical inheritance of the ancient Wen waterway, the precise understanding of the location of the Shandong ridge and the correct choice of the gate dam and the channel, Daicun Dam and Xiaowen River have become the key projects of diverting the Wen River to the Canal, ensuring the smooth navigation of water transportation for hundreds of years. In the late Qing Dynasty, the migration of the Yellow River to the North stopped the canal, and the Wenshui River no longer flowed into the canal. As a result, Xiaowen River and Daicun Dam became flood control and flood discharge projects in the lower reaches of Wen River. The decline of water transportation, the intensification of water disputes and the threat of flooding gradually weaken diverting the Wen River to the Canal. This paper, by analyzing the evolution of the water conservancy project of diverting the Wen River to the Canal, can not only reflect the evolution of the water source project in the Shandong section of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal and the relative uniqueness of the role of some water conservancy projects, but also probe into the deep correlation between the canal project and the transportation policy with shared fate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intelligent perception ability of the close-range navigation environment is the basis of autonomous decision-making and control of unmanned ships. In order to realize real-time perception of the close-range environment of unmanned ships, an enhanced attention mechanism YOLOv4 (EA-YOLOv4) algorithm is proposed. First of all, on the basis of YOLOv4, the convolutional block attention module (CBAM) is used to search for features in channel and space dimensions, respectively, to improve the model’s feature perception of ship targets. Then, the improved-efficient intersection over union (EIoU) loss function is used to replace the complete intersection over union (CIoU) loss function of the YOLOv4 algorithm to improve the algorithm’s perception of ships of different sizes. Finally, in the post-processing of algorithm prediction, soft non-maximum suppression (Soft-NMS) is used to replace the non-maximum suppression (NMS) of YOLOv4 to reduce the missed detection of overlapping ships without affecting the efficiency. The proposed method is verified on the large data set SeaShips, and the average accuracy rate of mAP0.5–0.95 reaches 72.5%, which is 10.7% higher than the original network YOLOv4, and the FPS is 38 frames/s, which effectively improves the ship detection accuracy while ensuring real-time performance.

Those various cross-sectional vessels in trees transfer water to as high as 100 meters, but the traditional fabrication methods limit the manufacturing of those vessels, resulting in the non-availability of those bionic microchannels. Herein, we fabricate those bionic microchannels with various cross-sections by employing projection micro-stereolithography (P µ SL) based 3D printing technique. The circumradius of bionic microchannels (pentagonal, square, triangle, and five-pointed star) can be as small as 100 μ m with precisely fabricated sharp corners. What’s more, those bionic microchannels demonstrate marvelous microfluidic performance with strong precursor effects enabled by their sharp corners. Most significantly, those special properties of our bionic microchannels enable them outstanding step lifting performance to transport water to tens of millimeters, though the water can only be transported to at most 20 mm for a single bionic microchannel. The mimicked transpiration based on the step lifting of water from bionic microchannels is also achieved. Those precisely fabricated, low-cost, various cross-sectional bionic microchannels promise applications as microfluidic chips, long-distance unpowered water transportation, step lifting, mimicked transpiration, and so on.

Phase D is proposed to be the most important hydrous phase at the upper part of the lower mantle, and it has been shown to coexist with bridgmanite (Brg), the most abundant mineral and main host for Al2O3 in the lower mantle. The concentration of Al in Phase D could significantly increase the thermal stability field of Phase D, therefore, partitioning of Al between Brg and Phase D is of particular importance to constrain water distribution in the deep mantle. Here, we performed high P–T experiments in MgO–Al2O3–SiO2–H2O system to investigate the partitioning of Al between Brg and Phase D up to 32 GPa and 1350 °C. Our results indicated that Al distributes strongly into Phase D relative to Brg and the partition coefficient slightly decreases with increasing temperature. Al-bearing Phase D exhibits a very high thermal stability region, but it completely decomposed around 28 GPa and 1350 °C, at which point Brg coexisted with a large amount of melt. The depth ~ 850 km (28 GPa) is thus proposed to be the second choke point for hydrous minerals. This may shed new lights on several important geophysical observations in subduction zones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have systematically investigated the high-pressure and high-temperature stability of Al-bearing dense hydrous magnesium silicate phases (DHMSs) in natural chlorite compositions containing ~ 16 wt% H2O and ~ 14 wt% Al2O3 between 14 and 25 GPa at 800–1600 °C by an MA8-type multi-anvil apparatus. A chemical mixture similar to Fe-free chlorite was also investigated for comparison. Following the pressure–temperature (P–T) path of cold subduction, the phase assemblage of phase E + phase D is stable at 14–25 GPa. Superhydrous phase B is observed between 16 and 22 GPa coexisting with phase E + phase D. Following the P–T path of hot subduction, the phase assemblage of phase E + garnet is identified at 14–18 GPa coexisting with the melt. The phase assemblage of superhydrous phase B + phase D was found at 18–25 GPa, which is expected to survive at higher P–T conditions. We have confirmed that the presence of Al could enhance the stability of DHMSs. Our results indicate that, after chlorite decomposition at the shallow region of the subduction zone, the wide stability field of Al-bearing DHMSs can increase the possibility of water transportation into the deep lower mantle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Water scarcity forms a risk to sustainable development in arid and semi-arid areas. Fog harvesting is a sustainable source for drinking water because of its passive collection, minimal energy requirement, and low maintenance cost. Creatures living in desert areas can survive well because they can extract water directly from the atmosphere usually owing to their hierarchical micro- and nanostructures. Bioinspired structures used to harvest fog have drawn immense attention in recent years. Various bioinspired surfaces for water harvesting are reviewed including plants (cactus, lotus, rice, pitaya, Cotula fallax, Eremopyrum orientale, Salsola crassa, and Gladiolus dalenii) and animals (Stenocara Beetle, spider silk, lizard, cicada wing, earthworms, caterpillars, and mussels) from the aspects of fabrication processes and water collecting efficiency. A comparison table is given with the maximum water collecting efficiency 5300 mg/(cm2 h). Water transportation and collection are also briefly discussed. Inspiration from nature is just a starting point. The ultimate goal is to increase both the efficiency and the amount of fog harvesting in order to practical usage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water has an important effect in grape growth, however, there's little information on water transport distance on grape's physiological characteristics. The growth and development, the anatomical structure of secondary xylem and phloem, the sap flow and the water transport in Meili grape were observed and studied. The study showed that, with the extension of water transport distance, the growth rate and quantity of current-year shoot leaves decreased at different growth periods. The plasticities of leaf water content (WC), free water content (FWC), leaf dry matter content and water saturation deficit (WSD) of Meili grape were very small and had no significant differences. While the plasticities of water potential (WP), bound water content (BWC), bound water/free water (RBF), leaf area (LA) and specific leaf area (SLA) increased with the water transport distance extended and showed significant differences (P < 0.05). There were significant differences in stomatal density and stomatal length, and had no significant differences in leaf thickness and stomatal width. The transverse diameter growth of grape berries showed a typical hyper-S curve and showed no significant differences. The sugar unloading rate on the 1st shoot was significantly higher than that on the 7th shoot. The fresh weight per berry showed significant differences, while there was no significant differences in dry weights. The relative conductivity of xylem vessels in the 1st, 4th and 7th current-year shoots increased gradually. Water transport distance was inversely proportional to branch maturity, growth potential and xylem width, and was directly proportional to vessel density and vessel length. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]