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The authors discuss their study of creative activity in an ant colony and how this study is put to use.

With less than 6% of total global water resources but one fifth of the global population, China is facing serious challenges for its water resources management, particularly in rural areas due to the long-standing urban-rural dualistic structure and the economic-centralized developmental policies. This paper addresses the key water crises in rural China including potable water supply, wastewater treatment and disposal, water for agricultural purposes, and environmental concerns, and then analyzes the administrative system on water resources from the perspective of characteristics of the current administrative system and regulations; finally, synthetic approaches to solve water problems in rural China are proposed with regard to institutional reform, regulation revision, economic instruments, technology innovation and capacity-building. These recommendations provide valuable insights to water managers in rural China so that they can identify the most appropriate pathways for optimizing their water resources, reducing the total wastewater discharge and improving their water-related ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzed the characteristic of the tourism destination ecosystem from perspective of entropy in Dunhuang City. Given these circumstances, an evaluation index system that considers the potential of sustainable development was formed based on dissipative structure and entropy change for the tourism destination ecosystem. The sustainable development potential evaluation model for tourism destination ecosystem was built up based on information entropy. Then, we analyzed each indicator impact for the sustainable development potential and proposed some measures for the tourism destination ecosystem. The conclusions include: (a) the requirements of Dunhuang tourism destination ecosystem on the natural ecosystem continuously grew between 2000 and 2012; (b) The sustainable development potential of the Dunhuang tourism destination ecosystem was on an oscillation upward trend during the study period, which is dependent on government attention, and pollution problems were improved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integrated analysis on socio-economic metabolism could provide a basis for understanding and optimizing regional sustainability. The paper conducted socio-economic metabolism analysis by means of the emergy accounting method coupled with data envelopment analysis and decomposition analysis techniques to assess the sustainability of Qingyang city and its eight sub-region system, as well as to identify the major driving factors of performance change during 2000-2007, to serve as the basis for future policy scenarios. The results indicate that Qingyang greatly depended on non-renewable emergy flows and feedback (purchased) emergy flows, except the two sub-regions, named Huanxian and Huachi, which highly depended on renewable emergy flow. Zhenyuan, Huanxian and Qingcheng were identified as being relatively emergy efficient, and the other five sub-regions have potential to reduce natural resource inputs and waste output to achieve the goal of efficiency. The results of decomposition analysis show that the economic growth, as well as the increased emergy yield ratio and population not accompanied by a sufficient increase of resource utilization efficiency are the main drivers of the unsustainable economic model in Qingyang and call for polices to promote the efficiency of resource utilization and to optimize natural resource use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses the importance of creativity in achieving quantum leaps of knowledge. Association of intelligence with the faculty of thought and reason; Concept of creativity; Influence of creativity on social behavior.

Police negotiators provide leadership and expertise in the de-escalation and resolution of critical incidents, including responding to individuals exhibiting suicidal behaviour. This study describes the frequency and characteristics of suicide-related negotiation incidents in Queensland, Australia as classified in the Queensland Police Service Negotiator Deployment Database, between 2012 and 2014. Incidents were analysed to understand the individuals involved and precipitating factors including mental health problems and intoxication with alcohol or drugs. Police negotiators were deployed to 156 suicide intervention incidents over a 3-year period, half of which occurred at a residence. The cohort had a median age of 32 years and were predominantly male (82%). Four out of five individuals appeared to have a mental health problem, and at least half were intoxicated due to drugs or alcohol. Findings highlight the importance of strong linkages between police, health and social services and the need for innovative and comprehensive, cross-agency programmes., Competing Interests: Megan L. Steele has declared no conflicts of interest Lisa Wittenhagen has declared no conflicts of interest Carla Meurk has declared no conflicts of interest Jane Phillips has declared no conflicts of interest Bobbie Clugston has declared no conflicts of interest Peter Heck has declared no conflicts of interest Elissa Waterson has declared no conflicts of interest Ed Heffernan has declared no conflicts of interest, (© 2023 The Australian and New Zealand Association of Psychiatry, Psychology and Law.)