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PurposeThe operation mode of enterprises will affect its resource commitment in the host country, involving different costs and time, as well as risks. Yet, the current state of knowledge about how the institutional environment affects the operation mode change of international construction enterprises is equivocal. This study aims to explore the impact of a host country's institutional environment on the operation mode change of international construction enterprises.Design/methodology/approachFirst, this study proposes a model on the impact of the institutional environment on the operation mode change of international construction enterprises. Second, this study used the Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) published by the World Bank and a questionnaire survey to collect data. Finally, the study employs a multiple regression methodology to test the hypothesis and discusses the results.FindingsResults highlight that the important impact of the institutional environment on the operation mode change of international construction enterprises. The results showed that enterprises are more willing to increase resource commitments under the condition of stable institutional environment. In addition, enterprises' market-specific experience and general international experience, as moderating variables, weaken the impact of the institutional environment on the operation mode change. However, general international experience has no significant moderating effect.Practical implicationsThe findings of this study provide practical implications for the investment risk assessment of international construction enterprises. Enterprises need to consider the change in institutional quality and institutional instability of the host country, as well as their own international experience when changing operation mode.Originality/valueThis study extends internationalization theory to the international construction field and provided theoretical guidance for the mechanism of operation mode change of international construction enterprises.

In this paper, a novel g-C3N4/ZnO composite microspheres (CZCM) with enhanced photocatalytic activity under visible light exposure were successfully prepared by a self-assembly method followed by calcination in the air. A hierarchical structure in which ZnO microspheres were closely covered with g-C3N4 nanosheets was constructed. The microstructure and photocatalytic activities of the CZCM were characterized. The photocatalytic property of CZCM was evaluated by degrading solution Methyl Orange (MO) and Tetracycline (TC). The effects of varied contents of g-C3N4 on the photocatalytic capability of CZCM were systematically investigated and the results show that the optimized CZ-15% sample exhibit much higher photocatalytic degradation efficiency than that of bare g-C3N4 or ZnO under identical conditions. The analysis of Photoluminescence (PL) and photocurrent (PC) independently conformed that the photo-induced electron-hole (e−-h+) pairs in the CZCM were effectively generated and responsible for the observed photocatalysis. The enhanced adsorption of visible-light and the effective charge separation on the surface of CZCM enabled significant improvement of photocatalytic performance. According to the experimental results and relative energy band levels of the two semiconductors, a possible photocatalysis mechanism for the reaction process is proposed.

Under the condition of using the same frequency resources, the communication capacity of high-throughput satellites is tens or even hundreds of times higher than that of traditional satellites. Compared with traditional satellites, high-throughput satellites have a large capacity, high speed, and anti-interference characteristics. However, the high-throughput satellite communication link using Ku/Ka-band is vulnerable to weather factors such as rain attenuation, so the system should have a control mechanism to achieve fade countermeasures. The existing methods include transmission power adjustment, mod cod adaptive adjustment, carrier symbol rate adjustment, etc. In this paper, various technical means are comprehensively used to compare and analyze the effect of combined control and propose a multi-domain united link adaptation technique to optimize link availability and resource utilization.

Background: This study aimed to summarize the experience in treatment of Mycoplasma pneumoniae pneumonia (MPP) with worsening lung shadow despite treatment with appropriate antimicrobials and corticosteroid in children. Methods: All patients satisfied refractory MP pneumonia (RMPP) diagnostic criteria were enrolled. The clinical manifestations, laboratory findings, imaging features, treatments, and outcomes were retrospectively reviewed. Results: Six patients with an average age of 7.83±3.13 years old were included in this study. All the patients were non-responsive to macrolide (ML) and glucocorticoids treatment shown by aggravated clinical symptoms and chest radiographies. The average total duration of fever was 19.5±8.34 days and the average time before levofloxacin (LVX) therapy was 10±2.97 days. After LVX treatment, the time of fever was from 1 to 3 days in five cases and 11 days in one case. The MP-DNA copies in the sputum decreased slowly after ML treatment in six patients, while they decreased quickly after LVX treatment in 5 children. A2063G mutation of domain V of 23SrRNA gene was found in five cases. Five patients recovered completely 16–32 days after treatment. One patient developed acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) with abnormal brain magnetic resonance imaging and occurred serious sequelae. Conclusion: The sputum MP-DNA copies and clinical symptoms have a positive correlation with therapeutic efficacy. LVX may be beneficial in treatment of ML-unresponsive and corticosteroid-resistant RMPP in children. RMPP can be gradually cured by effective treatment of LVX, while which can damage the nervous system and lead to severe complications once MP invades brain tissues.

Dynamic urbanization processes have caused great changes on China's urban spatial pattern and hierarchical structure in the past few decades. In this study, we propose new metrics for measuring the pattern of urban land by considering both, spatial distribution and hierarchical structure of the urban system. The metrics are deduced from Christaller's Central Place Theory and allow evaluating the spatial pattern of urban land based on three indicators: azimuth heterogeneity, distance heterogeneity and quantity heterogeneity of subordinate urban patches around the corresponding higher-rank urban patch. For monitoring the evolution of the spatial hierarchical urban system, we apply these metrics on China's urban lands for the time period of 1990 until 2015 based on provincial administrative units. The results show that (1) at the national level, we find hierarchical spatial urban systems similar to the ideal pattern suggested by the Central Places Theory in the eastern and central regions; (2) the hierarchical urban systems develop between 1990 until 2015 in most areas in the opposite direction of the ideal pattern suggested by the Central Place Theory; however, this tendency is more evident in the eastern and central regions than in western inland regions. Besides, we find underdeveloped urban systems, i.e. patterns that have some missing high levels in the hierarchical gradation and over developed urban systems, i.e. patterns that have some missing low levels in the hierarchical gradation. We discuss alternative urban systems for explaining the inapplicability of the Central Places Theory in some examples.

With the rapid development and continuous rise of domestic software, all walks of life are also trying their best to promote the cross integration of information technology in different fields, using domestic basic software and hardware facilities to promote industrial reform and promote the transformation of industrial economy to information economy. As the core technology of contract file processing is still used, it is more and more difficult to reuse and reconstruct in the enterprise information intelligence. In order to realize the localization construction of contract management projects which are the key construction projects of large energy enterprises, a large number of technologies that rely on foreign open source or have copyright are excluded. In this paper, a large-scale contract management system based on the localization platform is proposed. The process of data interaction from the bottom architecture design to the application end is described in detail. Then, the localization file operation module is integrated to make it have the function of contract processing, and finally users can get satisfactory online contract processing operation. The practical application results show that the design scheme is feasible, which significantly improves the development effect and application stability of the system, and also provides strong reference and support for the construction of other similar systems in the future.

With the gradual deepening and expansion of the scale of enterprise information construction, it is increasingly required that the system can break business barriers and data barriers, so that it can realize a new software design idea of data sharing, technology sharing and collaboration. Based on the experience of large-scale integration projects, this paper first analyzes the maturity of enterprise business, discusses how to do a good planning and design in the conceptual stage of project start-up, and promotes the whole process management of the project. Next, it enables demanders and developers to communicate effectively under a unified business architecture, and with the help of big data technology, allows designers to sort out the focus of the public and ideal deliverables based on data analysis of various indicators accumulated by previous systems. Finally, the project team can achieve the output of deliverables quickly and accurately. This method has great development potential for software R & D, and it can be widely used in major enterprises. It also brings effective solutions for later enterprises in the face of complex integrated projects.

The purpose of this study was to determine if there is an association between maternal herpes simplex virus (HSV) infection and pre-eclampsia/eclampsia or gestational hypertension. The US Nationwide Inpatient Sample database was searched for women aged 15–44 years who delivered in a hospital between 2005 and 2014. The patients were categorized into those with and without HSV and pre-eclampsia/eclampsia and gestational hypertension were compared between the groups. The analytic sample size (n=8 264 076) was equivalent to a population-based sample size of 40 653 030 patients. After adjusting for significant variables including age, race, income, insurance status, diabetes mellitus (DM), gestational DM, obesity, and multiple gestations, multivariate regression analysis indicated that HSV was associated with a higher OR for gestational hypertension (adjusted OR 1.038; 95% CI 1.004 to 1.072). However, HSV was not associated with pre-eclampsia/eclampsia (OR 1.001; 95% CI 0.968 to 1.035) in univariate regression analysis. The results of the current study suggest that HSV infection is associated with gestational hypertension but not pre-eclampsia. Given the prevalence of HSV infection and its potential association with hypertensive disorders of pregnancy, further study of HSV and hypertension in pregnancy is warranted.

The prospect of introducing natural biological secrets to improve the crack resistance of gray cast iron is presented. We demonstrated that the mechanism of resisting crack owned by plant leaf can be referred to fabricate an alternating structure of hard and soft with low cost, high strength, and an exceptional ability to resist crack growth. Laser alloying was introduced to fabricate the hard phase which associated with the original matrix constituted the alternating structure. A homogeneous microstructure and a uniform distribution of chemical composites were achieved in hard phase. Nanoindentation test showed the resistance to plastic deformation of hard phase was improved. Crack propagation tests verified the crack resistance was enhanced by the alternating structure which could change and prolong crack path, and the effectiveness of resisting crack propagation was proportional to the size of hard phase.

This study was aimed to investigate antitumor activity of paederosidic acid (PA) in human non-small cell lung cancer cells and explore the related mechanisms. The anti-proliferative effects of PA on A549 cells were evaluated by MTT method and the IC50 values were calculated. Furthermore, the PA-induced apoptosis in A549 cells was determined by fluorescence microscope via staining with DAPI and by flow cytometer via staining with FITC conjugated Annexin V/PI. The expression of apoptosis-related or signaling proteins was investigated by Western blotting. Our results demonstrated that PA showed significant anti-tumor activity on lung cancer in vitro; the mechanisms were involved in inducing mitochondria-mediated apoptosis via up-regulation of caspase-3, caspase-8, caspase-9, Bid, Bax, down-regulation of Bcl-2 and stimulating the release of Cyto-C from mitochondria. In addition, JNK phosphorylation levels significantly increased concomitantly with decrease in Akt phosphorylation after treatment with PA in A549 cells. However, JNK siRNA-transfected cells diminished PA-induced caspase-3, 8 and 9, Bid and Bax activaton while enhanced the Bcl-2 activation. Collectively, these results indicated that PA-induced JNK activation played an important functional role in apoptosis.

Urbanization in China has been experiencing a remarkable dynamism in the past 40 years. The most evident implication of urbanization is the physical growth of cities. We analyze urban land growth r...

In inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD), high mobility group box 1 (HMGB1), as an endogenous inflammatory molecule, can promote inflammatory cytokines secretion by acting on TLR2/4 resulting in tissue damage. The underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Here we report a novel role of HMGB1 in controlling the maintenance and function of intestine-resident group-3 innate lymphoid cells (ILC3s) that are important innate effector cells implicated in mucosal homeostasis and IBD pathogenesis. We showed that mice treated with anti-HMGB1 Ab, or genetically deficient for TLR2–/– or TLR4–/– mice, displayed reduced intestinal inflammation. In these mice, the numbers of colonic ILC3s were significantly reduced, and the levels of IL-17 and IL-22 that can be secreted by ILC3s were also decreased in the colon tissues. Furthermore, HMGB1 promoted DCs via TLR2/4 signaling to produce IL-23, activating ILC3s to produce IL-17 and IL-22. Our data thus indicated that the HMGB1-TLR2/4-DCs-IL-23 cascade pathway enhances the functions of ILC3s to produce IL-17 and IL-22, and this signal way might play a vital role in the development of IBD.

Urbanization in China has expanded at an unprecedented speed since the declaration of “Reform and Open Policy” and presented many challenges. Unbalanced regional development, appearance of super megacities and concomitant problems, and conflicts between urbanization and cultivated land protection are three critical problems that Chinese urbanization has to face. To develop new plans for foreseeable future urbanization in China, it is critical to understand the evolving history of cities across China. This study maps urban expansion of 60 typical Chinese cities based on large amount of remote sensing data and the labor-intensive image interpretation method, in order to understand the history of urban expansion from the 1970s to 2013. Results showed that area of cities expanded 5.23 times compared to their area in the 1970s. Urban expansion in China accelerated three times (1988–1996, 1999–2006, and 2009–2011) and decelerated three times (1997–1998, 2007–2008, and 2012–2013) over the 40 years. The urban area of South China expanded most significantly 9.42 times, while the urban area in Northeast China expanded only 2.37 times. The disparity among different administrative ranks of cities was even greater than (3.81 times) the differences among different regions. Super megacities have been continuously expanding at a fast rate (8.60-fold), and have not shown obvious signs of slowing down. The proportion of cultivated land among the land sources for urban expansion decreased to a small extent in the 1990s, but cultivated land continues to be the major land source for urban expansion. Effective future urbanization needs controlling the expansion scale of large cities and reasonably developing medium and small cities, as well as balancing regional development.

The urban expansion process in China from the 1970s to 2013 was retrieved based on remote sensing and GIS technology. With the latest zoning method used as reference, annual expansion area per city, urban expansion type, and fractal dimension index were employed to analyze the Chinese urban expansion characteristics and its spatial difference from the aspects of urban expansion process, influence of urban expansion on land use, and urban spatial morphological evolutions. Results indicate that 1) under the powerful guidance of policies, urban expansion in China went through six different stages, and cities in the eastern region entered the rapid expansion period the earliest, followed by cities in the central, northeastern and western regions; 2) cultivated lands and rural settlements and industrial traffic lands were the important land sources for urban expansion in China; the influence of urban expansion on land use in the eastern region was the strongest, followed by the central, northeastern and western regions; 3) urban spatial morphology tended to be complex and was directly related to the adopted spatial expansion mode. Infilling expansion became the main urban expansion mode in the western region first, then in the central and northeastern regions, and finally in the eastern region. This study establishes the foundation for an in-depth recognition of urban expansion in China and optimization of future urban planning.

If urban sprawl is to be avoided in China in the next ten years, it is not only crucial to understand the overall history, current status, and future trends of urban expansion there, but also these differences, and this is presently lacking. In this study, remotely sensed images with approximately 30 m spatial resolution were used to quantitatively assess the spatial and temporal patterns of urban expansion of 60 Chinese cities (1973–2013). Urban-expansion-process curves of the cities studied were drawn using annual expansion area as an indicator. Curve similarity analysis generated four basic process modes of urban expansion in China. These included cities that: 1) peaked around 2004 and then decelerated; 2) peaked around 2010 and then decelerated; 3) showed sustained acceleration, and 4) showed continued deceleration. Four basic process modes represented cities under different levels of development stage. Geographic location was found to be the most related characteristic to urban expansion process. Regional development policies at the national level in each region also showed highly temporal consistency with fluctuation characteristics of urban expansion process. Urban characteristic such as population size and administrative level were not found to be significantly related to urban expansion-process modes. Understanding the basic process-mode categories well is extremely important for future regional-balance planning and development of macroeconomic policies.

State-led efforts of food localization have been conducted across mainland China under the umbrella of Vegetable Basket Project since the end of the 1980s, with the purpose of addressing urban food security. Food localization as a counter movement to globalization has been extensively studied for its debatable role in promoting the sustainability of food systems in developed economies. Previous studies failed to recognize food localization initiatives driven by the state and its significant impact on suburban farmland use. To fill this gap, this study discusses the key features of state-led food localization with the case of Nanjing, China through examining governmental policy documents, local food production plans and the remote sensing data of greenhouse expansion. Furthermore, the impacts of a state-led food localization strategy on the transition of suburban farmland use, particularly on the expansion of greenhouses, have been investigated by employing the binary logistic regression model. We argue that state-led food localization has substantially promoted the expansion of greenhouse farming for the purpose of stabilizing a sufficient local food supply, particularly vegetables. It has also provided support through means such as subsidy, agriculture extension service and technology training to smallholders, including local and migrant farmers.

The excessive planning and construction of new cities and towns as well the massive expansion of planned settlement areas in China reveals a surprising phenomenon: extensive newly constructed areas that are characterized by severe under capacity. This phenomenon is described as “ghost city” and usually appears at the intra-urban scale. However, current data and methods are inappropriate to detect this phenomenon at this intra-urban scale for entire China. Besides, most studies neglect the usual immigration period of newly built areas. In this study, we suggest a new term, the “ghost neighborhood”, which refers to a new residential neighborhood that still runs at severe under capacity after a typical immigration period of five to six years. Based on this conceptual baseline, we identify “ghost neighborhoods” across China by developing a methodology to gradually exclude the “non-ghost areas” by predominantly relying on night-light emissions. The process is based on LJ1-01 night-light data, TanDEM-X data and Global Urban Footprint data, which feature evident advantages in spatial resolutions while being available for entire China. The main results are as follows: 1) we identify 1048 “ghost neighborhoods” across the urban landscapes of China with a total coverage area of 353.64 km2; they are estimated to have the capacity to house 13.6 million people; 2) the identified “ghost neighborhoods” are particularly frequent and large in the dynamically urbanizing regions, such as the Pearl River Delta, the Yangtze River Delta and the entire Shandong province.

Background Previously, we have demonstrated that IL-33 administration protecting TNBS-induced experimental colitis is associated with facilitation of Th2/Tregs responses in mice. However, whether IL-33 regulates autophagy to ameliorate experimental colitis is unclear. Results IL-33 administration (2 μg/day, intraperitoneal injection), while facilitating Th2/Tregs responses, also enhances the autophagy in mice with TNBS-induced colitis as well as macrophages. In the meantime, we observed that inhibition of the autophagy with 3-methyladenine (3-MA) (24 mg/kg, intraperitoneal injection) in mice exacerbates TNBS-induced experimental colitis. On the contrary, administration of rapamycin (2 mg/kg,intragastric administration), an autophagy-enhancer, alleviates the colitis in mice. In vivo, Immunofluorescence analysis revealed that TNBS combined with IL-33 enhanced the autophagy of macrophages in the inflammatory gut tissue. In vitro, treatment with IL-33 promoted the autophagy of macrophages generated from bone marrow cells in dose-dependant manner. Furthermore, the effect of autophagy-enhancement by IL-33 is TLR4 signaling pathway dependant. Our notion was further confirmed by IL-33-deficient bone marrow-derived macrophages cells. Conclusions IL-33 regulates the autophagy is a new immunoregulatory property on TNBS-induced experimental colitis in mice.

The dynamic urbanization process of China has stimulated a massive growth of urban settlements in the past few decades. With the development of remote sensing technology and the release of the long-time Landsat archive, spatial characteristics of urban settlement are gradually analyzed on a large scale, and various patterns are developed for describing and analyzing it. However, the urban settlement patterns were mainly quantified by the landscape metrics in existing studies, the underlying features shaping urban settlement pattern were always neglected. In this study, we establish a systematic and comprehensive &lsquo, urban development index system&rsquo, for describing China&rsquo, s urban settlement pattern and its evolutions during the end of the 1980s through to 2010 by using a series of statistical methods. Results show that (1) urban settlement pattern in 2010 is quantified comparatively simpler and more completely than in the end of the 1980s, (2) urban settlements in western and eastern regions present integrated pattern and homogeneous attributes, while urban settlements in central and northeastern regions present relatively complex pattern and various attributes, (3) urban settlements with the most variable pattern are accompanied by the most dynamic population and economic capacity, followed by landscape dispersion. Topographic complexity of urban settlements generally remained unchanged or with slight fluctuations, therefore, it has limited influence on settlement pattern evolution.

As the 'economic engines' of China, coastal cities have developed and expanded considerably since the 1970s. In this study, information on the urban expansion process of Chinese coastal cities from the 1970s to 2013 was retrieved. Through the analysis of stage characteristics, spatial expansion modes, influences on land use, centroid shifts, and spatial morphological evolutions, the spatial differences of coastal urban expansion were revealed. Results indicate that 1) the expansion stages of southern coastal cities are more complex than those of northern coastal cities, and the expansion ranges and speeds of the former are far higher than those of the latter; 2) the spatial expansion of southern coastal cities mostly adopt a single mode, whereas northern coastal cities mostly adopt a mixed mode; 3) significant spatial differences in the occupations of different land sources exist between the south and the north along the coastline; 4) the centroid of coastal cities tends to migrate toward the coastline, and the centroid shift distances of southern coastal cities are clearly higher than those of northern coastal cities; and 5) the spatial morphology of southern coastal cities tends to be compact, whereas that of northern coastal cities tends to be loose. Policies have a powerful significance in terms of guiding urban expansion and its spatial differences in coastal cities. Urban expansion in coastal cities will encounter new opportunities and challenges under the guidance of new types of urbanization strategies.