At the end of 2019, the sudden outbreak of the pandemic brought a significant impact on the sales of agricultural products in China and all over the world. To reduce the unmarketable problem caused ...by the pandemic in the agricultural industry, operators who used to focus on offline sales changed their marketing strategy and began to build online sales channels through e-commerce platforms and adopt various online marketing strategies to improve their marketing performance. Furthermore, the performance of online marketing of agricultural products is affected by the interaction of multiple factors in the complex environment. This study aims to distinguish between the performance of different online marketing strategies by using necessary comparative analysis (NCA) and qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) method, to help operators to grasp the critical elements of the online marketing of agricultural products, and how configuration effective impact the online marketing performance. The results show that: (1) NCA’s results show that a single online marketing dimension cannot constitute the necessary conditions for producing high marketing performance of agricultural products, but e-commerce broadcasting, visual effects and government cooperation play an obvious role in improving marketing performance. (2) online marketing performance is influenced by the interaction of various strategies, and no single factor has a significant effect on it. (3) a good online marketing performance configuration path is divided into four, namely “the government cooperation—e-commerce broadcasting” domination; “the government cooperation—visual effects—e-commerce broadcasting” leading; “customer relationship—the government cooperation—visual effects—e-commerce broadcasting” leading; “platform number—visual effects—e-commerce broadcasting” leading. (4) There are four driving paths with no-good online marketing performance, and there is a causal asymmetric relationship of the driving paths with good online marketing performance. This study provides management enlightenment for agricultural operators on how to effectively improve the performance of online marketing, help operators to solve practical problems, and facilitate the development of agricultural e-commerce.
Biomedical industry is a strategic emerging industry in China, especially the outbreak of the Covid pandemic. The biomedical industry is characterized by high risk, high investment, high technology ...and long cycle, and each stage contains risks and challenges. How to optimize the policy environment and financial environment, explore the unique "policy" and "finance" model for the development of the biomedical industry, and improve the innovation performance has become an important issue. This paper analyzes the relationship among industry policy, financial institution and innovation performance in the biomedical industry from the configuration perspective, combining necessary condition analysis (NCA) and qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) research methods, using the A-share listed enterprises in Shanghai and Shenzhen in the biomedical industry from 2012 to 2020 as the research objects. It is found that (1) individual policy preference or financial institution dimension cannot constitute a necessary condition for generating high innovation performance of biomedical company, but increasing tax incentive and raising the proportion of equity-based financing method play a significant role in generating high innovation performance; (2) four "political" and "financial "synergistic grouping paths can generate high innovation performance, including tax incentives, financial institutions' professional level and institutional background synergistic drive type; government subsidy, financing method and financial institutions' professional level synergistic drive type; tax incentive and financing method synergistic drive type; tax incentive and institutional background drive type. Different synergistic grouping paths represent various ways to achieve high innovation performance of biomedical enterprise. In addition, the results show that the two "political" and "financial" groupings lead to low-to-medium innovation performance, which indicates that industry policy plays a very important role in the innovation performance and that the government's support for emerging industries through policy is a significant force for the innovation development. This paper introduces the "political" and "financial" aspects to investigate the configuration effect of industry policy and financial institutions on the innovation performance of biomedical enterprise. The findings have important theoretical and practical implications for revealing the synergistic path of high innovation performance in the Chinese biomedical industry.
Polyamides are one of the most important polymers. Long-chain aliphatic polyamides could bridge the gap between traditional polyamides and polyethylenes. Here we report an approach to preparing ...sustainable ultra-strong elastomers from biomass-derived long-chain polyamides by thiol-ene addition copolymerization with diamide diene monomers. The pendant polar hydroxyl and non-polar butyrate groups between amides allow controlled programming of supramolecular hydrogen bonding and facile tuning of crystallization of polymer chains. The presence of thioether groups on the main chain can further induce metal-ligand coordination (cuprous-thioether). Unidirectional step-cycle tensile deformation has been applied to these polyamides and significantly enhances tensile strength to over 210 MPa while maintaining elasticity. Uniaxial deformation leads to a rearrangement and alignment of crystalline microstructures, which is responsible for the mechanical enhancement. These chromophore-free polyamides are observed with strong luminescence ascribed to the effect of aggregation-induced emission (AIE), originating from the formation of amide clusters with restricted molecular motions.
With the rapid development of China's economy, entrepreneurship plays an important role in advancing social and economic development. Along with the wave of global entrepreneurship, female ...entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial activities in China have thrived. Further more, cultural orientation can shape entrepreneurs' entrepreneurial motivation, thereby creating different types of enterprises. Based on the self-construction theory, this paper is devoted to the analysis of the influence of cultural orientation, cultural integration on female returnee entrepreneurs' entrepreneurial motivation. A total of 488 Chinese female returnee entrepreneurs participated in the survey. The structural equation modeling (SEM) and multi-group analysis were used to evaluate the relationship between the model structures. It provides a new perspective on the relationship between female returnee entrepreneurs' cultural orientation, entrepreneurial motivation, and the role of cultural integration. The results show that due to the influence of globalization and diversified cultural background, the cultural orientation of Chinese female returnee entrepreneurs tends to be more feminine rather than traditional masculine, and they pay more attention to meeting the entrepreneurial motivation of opportunity, such as interests, self-value expression and market opportunities, rather than simple survival. Cultural orientation has a significant influence on the entrepreneurial motivation of Chinese female entrepreneurs, and cultural integration plays a moderating role in this influence. The last part of the paper summarizes the theoretical and practical significance.
Flexible and thin energy storage devices have attracted enormous attentions. An easy and large-scale method has been employed to fabricate flexible and interwoven N, P dual-doped carbon ...fibers/graphitic carbon nitride (huCP/g-C3N4) using filter paper as a precursor. The huCP/g-C3N4 composite as self-supporting anode for lithium ion batteries exhibits high reversible capacities of 1030 mAh g−1 after 1000 cycles at 1 A g−1 and 360 mAh g−1 after 4000 cycles at 10 A g−1 along with excellent rate performance (133 mAh g−1 at 30 A g−1). For sodium ion batteries, huCP/g-C3N4 as anode delivers high reversible capacities of 345 mAh g−1 after 380 cycles at 0.1 A g−1 and 110 mAh g−1 after 4000 cycles at 1 A g−1. This excellent electrochemical performance can be attributed to the high contents of doped N and P in huCP/g-C3N4 and graphitic carbon nitride network, which not only create more defects and active sites but also expand the layer planes and provide interconnected conductive network.
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Under the rapid development of e-commerce, offline brick-and-mortar stores have been severely impacted. However, the importance of the visual, sensory and even psychological experience in the apparel ...industry makes offline stores still irreplaceable. The impact on consumers' visual experience cannot be ignored and is a significant influencing factor in determining consumers' psychological change and purchase intention. Especially for fast fashion brands which pursue low costs, visual marketing strategies is a cost-effective marketing tool to enhance the visual experience. In this paper, by adapting SOR theory and using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) research method, 15 fast fashion apparel brands and 374 valid questionnaires are adapted in China to explore not only the influence of individual dimensions in visual marketing on consumers' purchase intention, but also the action of multi-dimensional combinations. The research finds that: (1) there are two driving paths for high consumers' purchase intention. The first path is a combination of high clarity of arrangement and low display density; the second path is a combination of low light intensity, high clarity of arrangement, high tonal harmony and high window appeal. (2) There are also two paths that drive non-high consumers' purchase intentions, and they are asymmetrically related to the paths that drive high consumers' purchase intentions. The findings of this study help to provide direction and suggestions for offline visual marketing strategies of fast fashion apparel brands to increase consumers' psychological perception and purchase intention through a range of visual presentation techniques.
Alterations to the gut microbiota have been previously suggested to be tightly linked to chronic systemic inflammation, which is a major contributing factor to complications and disease progression ...in chronic kidney disease (CKD). Nevertheless, the effect of gut dysbiosis on the pathogenesis and/or production of inflammatory factors in CKD has not been extensively studied to date. In the present study, we conducted 16S ribosomal DNA pyrosequencing using fecal microbiota samples and analyzed the production of serum inflammatory factors in 50 patients with CKD and 22 healthy control (HC) subjects. The results revealed that compared to the HC subjects, patients with CKD exhibited a significant reduction in the richness and structure of their fecal microbiota. At the phylum level, compared to the HC group, patients with CKD also presented reduced abundance of Actinobacteria but increased abundance of Verrucomicrobia. Moreover, the genera
, and
were enriched in the fecal samples of patients with CKD, while
and
were enriched in those of the HC subjects. The abundance of
in the CKD group was significantly lower than that in the HC group (3.08 vs. 0.67%); this decrease in the abundance of
, an important probiotic, in patients with CKD is a striking discovery as it has not been previously reported. Finally, we analyzed whether these changes to the fecal microbiota correlated with CKD clinical characteristics and/or the production of known inflammatory factors. Altered levels of the microbiota genera
, and
were shown to be correlated with CKD disease-severity indicators, including the estimated glomerular filtration rate. Most notably,
was significantly negatively correlated with the production of interleukin-10. The results of the present study suggest that microbiota dysbiosis may promote chronic systemic inflammation in CKD. Furthermore, they support that modifying the gut microbiota, especially
, may be a promising potential therapeutic strategy to attenuate the progression of, and/or systemic inflammation in, CKD.
In this paper, a Multi-Index Nonlinear Robust Adaptive Control (MINRAC) method was proposed for ultra-complex multi-input multi-output power systems with uncertain parameter factors and external ...disturbances. The controller designed by this method has excellent static and dynamic characteristics. Under the condition of the uncertainty of system parameters and external disturbance at the same time, the MINRAC method can ensure that the multiple indexes concerned by ultra-complex power systems can be controlled at their expected values. The simulation results showed that the control mechanism of MINRAC method was consistent in both single-machine infinite bus system and multi-machine interconnected coupling system. The output function chooses power angle, angular frequency and terminal voltage as constraints. When the system has parameter uncertainty and external interference, the uncertain parameter values are adjusted by adaptive control to force these indicators to tend to the given expected value. For three-phase short circuit, which is the most serious fault in power system, the use of multi index nonlinear robust controller can ensure that the system is stable in a wide range and has better dynamic performance.
•Thymol was successfully loaded into zein nanoparticles using a low energy method.•Sodium caseinate and chitosan hydrochloride were used as the stabilizer layers.•Stabilized zein nanoparticles had a ...desirable redispersibility in water.•Improved encapsulation efficiency was achieved with double stabilizer layers.•Encapsulated thymol showed stronger antimicrobial activity for a longer time period.
Thymol-loaded zein nanoparticles stabilized with sodium caseinate (SC) and chitosan hydrochloride (CHC) were prepared and characterized. The SC stabilized nanoparticles had well-defined size range and negatively charged surface. Due to the presence of SC, the stabilized zein nanoparticles showed a shift of isoelectric point from 6.18 to 5.05, and had a desirable redispersibility in water at neutral pH after lyophilization. Coating with CHC onto the SC stabilized zein nanoparticles resulted in increased particle size, reversal of zeta potential value from negative to positive, and improved encapsulation efficiency. Both thymol-loaded zein nanoparticles and SC stabilized zein nanoparticles had a spherical shape and smooth surface, while the surfaces of CHC-SC stabilized zein nanoparticles seemed rough and had some clumps. Encapsulated thymol was more effective in suppressing gram-positive bacterium than un-encapsulated thymol for a longer time period.
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide and is increasing in incidence. Local ablative therapy plays a leading role in HCC treatment. ...Radiofrequency (RFA) is one of the first-line therapies for early local ablation. Other local ablation techniques (e.g., microwave ablation, cryoablation, irreversible electroporation, phototherapy.) have been extensively explored in clinical trials or cell/animal studies but have not yet been established as a standard treatment or applied clinically. On the one hand, single treatment may not meet the needs. On the other hand, ablative therapy can stimulate local and systemic immune effects. The combination strategy of immunotherapy and ablation is reasonable. In this review, we briefly summarized the current status and progress of ablation and immunotherapy for HCC. The immune effects of local ablation and the strategies of combination therapy, especially synergistic strategies based on biomedical materials, were discussed. This review is hoped to provide references for future researches on ablative immunotherapy to arrive to a promising new era of HCC treatment.
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