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SignificanceEstimates of nutrient allocation in different plant tissues and the relationships between the nutrient contents and photosynthetic capacity are critical to predicting ecosystem carbon sequestration under global change. Here, we provide an assessment of large-scale patterns of community-level nitrogen and phosphorus concentrations in different plant tissues and then examine how nutrient allocations are coupled with plant productivity. The results show that nutrient concentrations in leaves are less responsive to abiotic environments than those in woody stems and roots (stable leaf nutrient concentration hypothesis); the relationships between vegetation primary productivity and leaf nutrient contents are stronger when less nutrients are allocated to the woody tissues (productivity–nutrient allocation hypothesis) and are stronger in deciduous than in evergreen vegetation (productivity–leaf lifespan hypothesis).

AbstractGold, silver, platinum and palladium typically crystallize with the face-centred cubic structure. Here we report the high-yield solution synthesis of gold nanoribbons in the 4H hexagonal polytype, a previously unreported metastable phase of gold. These gold nanoribbons undergo a phase transition from the original 4H hexagonal to face-centred cubic structure on ligand exchange under ambient conditions. Using monochromated electron energy-loss spectroscopy, the strong infrared plasmon absorption of single 4H gold nanoribbons is observed. Furthermore, the 4H hexagonal phases of silver, palladium and platinum can be readily stabilized through direct epitaxial growth of these metals on the 4H gold nanoribbon surface. Our findings may open up new strategies for the crystal phase-controlled synthesis of advanced noble metal nanomaterials.

We researched China's climate and sustainable development goal with relevant and susceptible instruments capable of inducing and mitigating carbon emissions. Amidst the contributor to the global carbon emissions, China is caught in between mitigating its carbon emission and aiming towards placing its national contribution of emissions to the acceptable levels of 1.5 °C and below 2 °C. Following the intricacies surrounding China's sustainable development as it contains its economic and environmental performance, we adopt China's data of 1980 and 2018 with different scientific approaches (nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL), dynamic ordinary least square test, and bootstrap Granger causality) with different instruments (such as economic growth, financial development, renewable energy, and innovation policies) to research China's sustainable development. For clear exposition and insight into our findings with policies attached, we draw a conclusion from the outcomes of the mentioned approaches. From NARDL and dynamic ordinary least squares (DOLS), we find that economic growth through economic activities is statistically significant in determining the trend (increase) of carbon emissions in China in both periods (short run and long run). However, other selected instruments (financial, renewable, and innovation policies) tend towards controlling and moderating the carbon emissions in China. Thus, China has good prospects to mitigate its carbon emissions if considered tailoring its policies towards favorable instruments. From bootstrap Granger causality, we find similar inferential results that support previous findings thereby confirming the positive implication of the selected instruments to China's sustainable development. Hence, the nexus that is established among the selected instruments clearly show the importance of technological innovation and renewable energy in mitigating carbon emissions.

Livestock manure waste (LMW) has turned into an important source of greenhouse gas emissions. Livestock manure waste recycling (LMWR) has great significance for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the LMW management process. For a long time, the government has mainly adopted environmental regulation to accelerate LMWR, but the recycling degree is still low. The objective of this study was to assess the impact of environmental regulation on LMWR. Empirical evidence was obtained through methods of in-depth measures and questionnaire investigation from 465 households engaged in breeding pigs in Hebei, Henan, and Hubei, China. The double hurdle model was employed to empirically assess the impact of environmental regulation on household LMWR behavior, and the moderating effects of guiding regulation were further verified. The results were that (1) 62.30% of the households in the sample were willing to implement LMWR behavior, but the recycling degree was only 42.50% of the LMW emission amount. (2) Environmental regulation was found to positively impact household LMWR behavior, while the effects were mainly contributed by imperative and guiding regulation. (3) Guiding regulation was shown to positively moderate the influences of imperative and incentive regulation on household LMWR behavior. (4) The impact of environmental regulation on different scales of household LMWR behavior was found to be heterogeneous. Finally, some recommendations, such as improving subsidy standards, classifying to promote LMWR technology, as well as increasing the matched proportions of planting and breeding, were proposed.

As a new type of agricultural management organization alliance, the effect of the benefit linkage generated by agricultural industrialization consortium on collaboration performance is closely related to the sustainable development of the agricultural economy. Based on survey data on consortia in Shanghai, this paper analyzes the effects of benefit linkage and uses multiple linear regression modeling to comprehensively explore the impact of benefit linkage effects on collaboration performance from both subjective and objective aspects, as well as the differences in impact on the collaboration performance of consortia with different organizational structures. The results show that the benefit linkage effect has a positive impact on collaboration performance, and there are differences in the impact of the benefit linkage effect on collaboration performance under different types of organizational structures, among which the resource allocation effect, capitalization effect and correlation effect of the benefit linkage of non-joint stock consortia have a positive impact on collaboration performance; the resource allocation effect of joint-stock consortia has no significant impact on collaboration performance, the capitalization effect on collaboration performance is significantly lower than that of non-joint stock consortia, and the correlation effect on collaboration performance is significantly higher than that of non-joint-stock consortia. Therefore, under a certain benefit linkage, according to the establishment purpose and collaboration goal, a consortium with different types of organizational structures should be established to give full play to the impact of the benefit linkage effect on collaboration performance and promote the sustainable development of agricultural industrialization.

This study aims to explore the application of fractional order chaotic system (FOCS), based on the T-S fuzzy model, in the design of secure communication (SC) and this SC system’s role in the construction of efficiency evaluation system for dispatching operation of energy saving and power generation under a low carbon economy (LCE). First, the definition of fractional order differential equations and the stability theory of FOCS are discussed. T-S fuzzy control is introduced to analyse the stability of FOCS. Then, based on the adaptive synchronisation theory, the combined FOCS is designed for SC, and the performance of the system constructed here is analysed in a MATLAB environment. Next, an evaluation index system of the dispatching operation effect of energy saving and power generation under LCE is constructed. The confidential communication system constructed here is used to transmit the index data. The particle swarm optimisation (PSO) algorithm is then used to optimise the back propagation neural network (BPNN) model. The BPNN algorithm based on PSO (PSO-BPNN) is obtained, and the evaluation model is constructed. After training this model, it is applied to the evaluation of the dispatching operation effect for energy saving and power generation in 10 provinces in China. The simulation results show that the FOCS based on the T-S fuzzy model can acquire the criterion of system stability. Furthermore, the constructed SC system can effectively undertake the secure transmission of square and sine waves. The performance of the PSO-BPNN model seems to be better than other algorithms. After analysing the data on energy saving and power generation from 10 provinces in China using this model, the comprehensive evaluation value of province 5 is found to be the highest and good (0.802), while that of province 4 is the lowest and general (0.600). Summarising, the FOCS based on T-S fuzzy model constructed here is applied to the design of SC. This can improve the confidentiality of data transmission and reduce the transmission error. Moreover, the BPNN evaluation model based on PSO can effectively achieve the evaluation of the dispatching operation effect of energy saving and power generation under LCE.

AbstractWith the development of a low-carbon economy, the concept of low-carbon tourism is also increasingly popular. The implementation of low-carbon tourism responds to society's collective call for energy conservation and emission reduction. This is also the inevitable choice for sustainable development of tourism. This paper begins by explaining the concepts of low-carbon economy and low-carbon tourism; summarizes the content of low-carbon tourist attractions; describes the current plight of construction of low-carbon tourist attractions in China; and proposes some countermeasures for the construction of standard low-carbon tourist attractions.