Rural settlements, a type of rural locality where residents live and engage in production, always face significant changes and transitions when meeting the demands of rural development. By applying ...an integrated framework, we developed a new way to quantify the rural settlement transition (RST) through analysis of the interaction between population movements and land use changes and identification of the coupling relationship between the RST and rural development. This study revealed the dynamic process of the RST by calculating the per capita rural settlement area (PCRA) based on samples collected from 1996 to 2016 in Shandong Province. Our findings show that the rural population first decreased and then reached a relatively stable state, whereas the area of rural settlements experienced a rapid decline after a short increase in Shandong. However, the spatial patterns of rural population and rural settlements are similar to each other. In terms of the spatiotemporal characteristics of the RST, the PCRA shifted from growth to reduction in different periods and showed a spatially increasing tendency from downtown areas to suburban areas and then to exurban areas. The coupling relationship between the RST and rural development changed from extensive to intensive development during the process of urbanization. The coordinated interaction between the rural population movement and land use changes contributed to the sustainable RST as well as to rural development. Based on these findings, this paper also offers a critical discussion of the Chinese rural development policy, arguing that the land consolidation and integrated urban-rural land use planning derived from the RST should be taken into account by Chinese policy-makers and planners as viable strategies for achieving sustainable rural development targets.
•Population movement and land use change have jointly promoted the rural settlement transition (RST).•RST can be measured from the perspective of human-landscape interaction.•The per capita rural settlement area (PCRA) index shifted from growth to reduction.•The coupling relationship between the RST and rural development changed from extensive to intensive pattern during the urbanization process.•Land consolidation and integrated urban-rural land use planning are viable strategies for achieving rural sustainability.
•A conceptual model of rural land use transition is proposed.•Mutability and periodicity are two characteristics of rural land use transition.•Regional response strategies of rural land consolidation ...contribute to sustainable land use.
The changes in cultivated land and rural residential land and their interrelation are the most direct manifestation of land use transition in rural areas, which is an important basis to carry out rural land consolidation scientifically. This study constructs a conceptual model of rural land use transition and analyses the process characteristics and coupling relationship of land use transition between cultivated land and rural residential land in China in four periods from 1996 to 2016. Then, it puts forward response strategies for regional rural land consolidation. As the results show, an inverse trend between cultivated land and rural residential land, together with a certain degree of volatility demonstrated an inadequate transition in rural land use system. The types of cultivated land and rural residential land transition changed from single dominant to multiple equilibrium, but the main type of rural land use system in different stages was synchronous R negative linking. The spatial pattern of cultivated land and rural residential land transition is obviously unbalanced. The transition of rural land use system in the southeastern part of Hu Huanyong Line is active, where no transition model and process transition model play a dominant role. This area can be considered as priority for rural land consolidation in the future. Rural land consolidation should conform to the rules of land use transition, establish a multi-objective oriented regional differentiation strategy system, and promote the coordinated evolution of rural land use system.
A dilute Mg-0.68Al-0.32Ca-0.50Mn (AXM070305, wt%) magnesium (Mg) alloy with high strength and excellent ductility was developed by extrusion and subsequent T6 heat treatment. The alloy exhibits a ...yield strength (YS) of 248 MPa, ultimate tensile strength (UTS) of 288 MPa and elongation to failure (EL) of 21.0%, after T6 peak-aged treatment. The high strength is mainly attributed to the presence of high number density of nanosized β-Mn precipitates, a large number of mono-layered Guinier-Preston (G.P.) zones and planar Al2Ca phase. The excellent ductility is mainly due to the fully recrystallized fine grains with weak basal texture. The peak microhardness of this alloy was reached 67.9 HV after aging at 200 °C for 16 h, due to the precipitation of mono-layered G.P. zone, nanosized particle β-Mn phase and planar Al2Ca phase.
•The Al2Ca phase was firstly found to change from particle to planar after T6 treatment.•The present alloy shows the best performance among dilute Mg-Al-Ca-Mn alloys.•The high performance of the AXM070305 was investigated.•G.P. zone and planar Al2Ca phase can promote strength while maintaining ductility.
Detecting and estimating the degree of genetic differentiation among populations of highly mobile marine fish having pelagic larval stages is challenging because their effective population sizes can ...be large, and thus, little genetic drift and differentiation is expected in neutral genomic sites. However, genomic sites subject to directional selection stemming from variation in local environmental conditions can still show substantial genetic differentiation, yet these signatures can be hard to detect with lowâthroughput approaches. Using a pooled RADâseq approach, we investigated genomewide patterns of genetic variability and differentiation within and among 20 populations of Atlantic herring in the Baltic Sea (and adjacent Atlantic sites), where previous lowâthroughput studies and/or studies based on few populations have found limited evidence for genetic differentiation. Stringent quality control was applied in the filtering of 1Â 791Â 254 SNPs, resulting in a final data set of 68Â 182 polymorphic loci. Clear differentiation was identified between Atlantic and Baltic populations in many genomic sites, while differentiation within the Baltic Sea area was weaker and geographically less structured. However, outlier analyses â whether including all populations or only those within the Baltic Sea â uncovered hundreds of directionally selected loci in which variability was associated with either salinity, temperature or both. Hence, our results support the view that although the degree of genetic differentiation among Baltic Sea herring populations is low, there are many genomic regions showing elevated divergence, apparently as a response to temperatureâ and salinityârelated natural selection. As such, the results add to the increasing evidence of local adaptation in highly mobile marine organisms, and those in the young Baltic Sea in particular.
•The effect of Li thickness on the optical properties of WO3 films was investigated.•All-solid-state ECD with optimal Li thickness was prepared by evaporation method.•The ECD showed large optical ...modulation 64.9% at 680 nm and 52.5% at 550 nm.•High CE 106.6 cm2/C and superior cycle stability up to 4000 cycles were obtained.
Lithium (Li) electrolyte plays an important role in the electrochromic devices (ECDs), however, there are few studies on the matching between Li content and electrochromic layer in all-solid-state ECDs. In this work, lithiation WO3 films with different Li thickness were prepared by evaporation method to investigate the effect of Li thickness on the optical properties of WO3 films. Meanwhile, the Li storage capacity of WO3 in liquid electrolyte was calculated. The results showed that the optimal thickness of Li for 450 nm WO3 film prepared by evaporation was 42 nm. All-solid-state ECD glass/ITO/NiO/ZrO2/Li/WO3/ITO with optimal Li thickness exhibited large optical transmittance modulation (64.9% at 680 nm and 52.5% at 550 nm), high coloration efficiency (CE, 106.6 cm2/C at 550 nm) and superior cycle stability (98% retention of the maximum optical modulation after 4000 cycles). This work provides a new idea for the design and preparation of all-solid state ECDs.
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Factors that lead to metabolic dysregulation are associated with increased risk of early-onset colorectal cancer (CRC diagnosed under age 50). However, the association between metabolic syndrome ...(MetS) and early-onset CRC remains unexamined.
We conducted a nested case-control study among participants aged 18-64 in the IBM MarketScan Commercial Database (2006-2015). Incident CRC was identified using pathologist-coded International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM) codes, and controls were frequency matched. MetS was defined as presence of ≥3 conditions among obesity, hypertension, hyperlipidaemia and hyperglycaemia/type 2 diabetes, based on ICD-9-CM and use of medications. Multivariable logistic regressions were used to estimate ORs and 95% CIs.
MetS was associated with increased risk of early-onset CRC (n=4673; multivariable adjusted OR 1.25; 95% CI 1.09 to 1.43), similar to CRC diagnosed at age 50-64 (n=14 928; OR 1.21; 95% CI 1.15 to 1.27). Compared with individuals without a metabolic comorbid condition, those with 1, 2 or ≥3 conditions had a 9% (1.09; 95% CI 1.00 to 1.17), 12% (1.12; 95% CI 1.01 to 1.24) and 31% (1.31; 95% CI 1.13 to 1.51) higher risk of early-onset CRC (p
<0.001). No associations were observed for one or two metabolic comorbid conditions and CRC diagnosed at age 50-64. These positive associations were driven by proximal (OR per condition 1.14; 95% CI 1.06 to 1.23) and distal colon cancer (OR 1.09; 95% CI 1.00 to 1.18), but not rectal cancer (OR 1.03; 95% CI 0.97 to 1.09).
Metabolic dysregulation was associated with increased risk of early-onset CRC, driven by proximal and distal colon cancer, thus at least in part contribute to the rising incidence of early-onset CRC.
The electrical resistivity and thermal conductivity of some Mg-Al, Mg-Zn and Mg-Mn binary magnesium alloys were measured in the temperature range of 2-300K. The electrical resistivity increased with ...the increasing alloying content in each binary alloy system, while the thermal conductivity exhibited an opposite trend. The low-temperature thermal conductivity was understood using Kappa =(A/T + BT 2)-1 + CT 2, which is found to be applicable in various binary and/or multi-component alloy systems. The parameters A, B and C were determined through numerical fitting of the experimental data. Significant differences were found in the effect of three solute atoms on the thermal conductivity of Mg. The reasons for large differences in the thermal conductivity of the three binary magnesium alloy systems are discussed. Variations in the atomic volume and the valence are believed to play an important role on the thermal conductivity of magnesium alloys.
Advanced platforms have recently become available for automatic and systematic quantification of plant growth and development. These new techniques can efficiently produce multiple measurements of ...phenotypes over time, and introduce time as an extra dimension to quantitative trait locus (QTL) studies. Functional mapping utilizes a class of statistical models for identifying QTLs associated with the growth characteristics of interest. A major benefit of functional mapping is that it integrates information over multiple timepoints, and therefore could increase the statistical power for QTL detection. We review the current development of computationally efficient functional mapping methods which provide invaluable tools for analyzing large-scale timecourse data that are readily available in our post-genome era.
High-throughput imaging techniques are capable of measuring time-series of plant phenotypes, which may potentially facilitate the QTL analysis of developmental and growth related traits.
A major benefit of functional mapping is that it integrates information over multiple timepoints, and therefore could increase the statistical power for QTL detection.
To handle high-dimensional genotyping and phenotyping data, computational efficiency is the focus of the novel statistical methods for dynamic QTL analysis.
The present study aimed to determine if metformin exerts anti-inflammatory and mucus-protective effects
via
the gut microbiota. Metformin has extensive benefits including anti-inflammatory effects. ...Previous studies showed that metformin changed the gut microbiota composition and increases the number of goblet cells. Intestinal dysbiosis and goblet cell depletion are important features of ulcerative colitis (UC). The underlying mechanism and whether metformin can improve the mucus barrier in UC remain unclear. Metformin (400 mg/kg/day) was administered to mice with dextran sulfate sodium (DSS)-induced UC for 2 wk to investigate the effects of metformin on the intestinal mucus barrier. The gut microbiota was depleted, using antibiotics, to explore its role in the mucus-protecting effects of metformin.
Akkermansia muciniphila (A. muciniphila)
, which was enriched in metformin-treated mice, was administered to mice to investigate the effects of the bacteria on UC and the mucus barrier. Metformin attenuated DSS-induced UC in mice, as evidenced by the alleviation of diarrhea, hematochezia, and the decrease in body weight. The expression of mucin2, a prominent mucus barrier protein, was increased in the metformin-treated group compared to the DSS-treated group. Furthermore, fecal 16S rRNA analysis showed that metformin treatment changed the gut microbiota composition by increasing the relative abundance of
Lactobacillus
and
Akkermansia
species while decreasing
Erysipelatoclostridium
at the genus level. Antibiotic treatment partly abolished the anti-inflammatory and mucus-protecting effects of metformin. Administration of
A. muciniphila
alleviated the colonic inflammation and mucus barrier disruption. Metformin alleviated DSS-induced UC in mice and protected against cell damage
via
affecting the gut microbiota, thereby providing a new mechanism for the therapeutic effect of metformin in patients with UC. This study also provides evidence that
A. muciniphila
as a probiotic has potential benefits for UC.
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