Wind energy technology development and diffusion: A case study of Inner Mongolia, China

This study provides an overview of the diffusion of small household wind generators and development of wind farms in Inner Mongolia, China with the emphasis on policy and institutional perspectives. It analyzes the patterns of wind technology diffusion within social, economic, and environmental contexts. It relates the diffusion of wind technology to institutional framework building, and to international investment and technology transfer. By examining the economics of windfarm development and analyzing the role of alternative policy instruments, it identifies the major constraints of wind technology development and gives relevant policy recommendations

From non-market support to cost-competitive incentives: Wind energy commercialization in China

This paper presents an overview of the development of wind energy in China. By examining the economics of windfarm development, it compares the economics of wind technology with other conventional energy technologies and analyzes the role of alternative policy instruments. Meanwhile, it identifies the major constraints of wind technology development and the defects of current non-market support from the government. It shows that the development of wind power will be directly subject to rational policy change, incentive mechanisms and institutional framework building. Particular importance is paid to market incentives to reach the objectives of commercialization and industrialization of wind power. The paper recommends some cost-competitive incentive measures and policies to drive the wind power market. It concludes that promising market incentives to speed up the development of wind energy include: (i) establish market competition mechanisms through standard power purchase agreement; (ii) adjust tax policies and government subsidies; (iii) stimulate investment incentive policies and regulations; and (iv) change governmental institutions and management modes

Establishment and application of a competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay differentiating PCV2 antibodies from mixture of PCV1/PCV2 antibodies in pig sera

BACKGROUND: Porcine cirovirus type 1 (PCV1) and type 2 (PCV2) are circulating in Chinese pig herds and the infected pigs develop antibodies to both viruses. Current commercial available ELISA kits cannot differentiate PCV2-specific antibodies from the mixtures of PCV1 and PCV2 antibodies in PCV1/2-infected or PCV2-vaccinated pigs. Therefore, the need for developing PCV2-specific ELISA methods is urgent to evaluate PCV2 antibody level in exclusion of PCV1 antibody interference after PCV2 vaccination. RESULTS: Virus-like particles (VLPs) of PCV2 based on the recombinant Cap protein were expressed in Escherichia coli. A competing ELISA was established by using the VLPs as coating antigen and a PCV2-specific monoclonal antibody as the competing antibody. The competing ELISA was compared with the results obtained by using an immunoperoxidase monolayer assay on 160 serum samples. The sensitivity and specificity of this competing ELISA were determined as 96.5 and 96.0 %, at 2 standard deviation from the mean or 91.8 and 100 % at 3 standard deviations from the mean. Next, a serological survey of 1297 vaccinated serum samples collected from commercial pig herds in Beijing, Hunan and Henan provinces in China was conducted. The results showed that 85.9 % of sera having positive PCV2 antibodies. CONCLUSIONS: The competing ELISA we developed in this study was both sensitive and specific to PCV2 and was suitable for large-scale PCV2 antibody monitoring in exclusion of PCV1 antibody interference after PCV2 vaccination

Myeloid cell-derived LL-37 promotes lung cancer growth by activating Wnt/β-catenin signaling

Rationale: Antimicrobial peptides, such as cathelicidin LL-37/hCAP-18, are important effectors of the innate immune system with direct antibacterial activity. In addition, LL-37 is involved in the regulation of tumor cell growth. However, the molecular mechanisms underlying the functions of LL-37 in promoting lung cancer are not fully understood. Methods: The expression of LL-37 in the tissues and sera of patients with non-small cell lung cancer was determined through immunohistological, immunofluorescence analysis, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The animal model of wild-type and Cramp knockout mice was employed to evaluate the tumorigenic effect of LL-37 in non-small cell lung cancer. The mechanism of LL-37 involving in the promotion of lung tumor growth was evaluated via microarray analyses, recombinant protein treatment approaches in vitro, tumor immunohistochemical assays, and intervention studies in vivo. Results: LL-37 produced by myeloid cells was frequently upregulated in primary human lung cancer tissues. Moreover, its expression level correlated with poor clinical outcome. LL-37 activated Wnt/β-catenin signaling by inducing the phosphorylation of protein kinase B and subsequent phosphorylation of glycogen synthase kinase 3β mediated by the toll-like receptor-4 expressed in lung tumor cells. LL-37 treatment of tumor cells also decreased the levels of Axin2. In contrast, it elevated those of an RNA-binding protein (tristetraprolin), which may be involved in the mechanism through which LL-37 induces activation of Wnt/β-catenin. Conclusion: LL-37 may be a critical molecular link between tumor-supportive immune cells and tumors, facilitating the progression of lung cancer

Intermolecular coupling enhanced thermopower in single- molecule diketopyrrolopyrrole junctions

Sorting out organic molecules with high thermopower is essential for understanding molecular thermoelectrics. The intermolecular coupling offers a unique chance to enhance the thermopower by tuning the bandgap structure of molecular devices, but the investigation of intermolecular coupling in bulk materials remains challenging. Herein, we investigated the thermopower of diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP) cored single-molecule junctions with different coupling strengths by varying the packing density of the self-assembled monolayers (SAM) using a customized scanning tunneling microscope break junction (STM-BJ) technique. We found that the thermopower of DPP molecules could be enhanced up to one order of magnitude with increasing packing density, suggesting that the thermopower increases with larger neighboring intermolecular interactions. The combined density functional theory (DFT) calculations revealed that the closely-packed configuration brings stronger intermolecular coupling and then reduces the highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO)-lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) gap, leading to an enhanced thermopower. Our findings offer a new strategy for developing organic thermoelectric devices with high thermopower

An Improved Multi-Swarm Migrating Birds Optimization Algorithm for Hybrid Flow Shop Scheduling

An improved multi-swarm migrating birds optimization (IMMBO) algorithm is proposed for hybrid flow shop scheduling with sequence-dependent setup times (HFS-SDST), to minimize the total maximum completion time (i.e., makespan). Permutation-based encoding is adopted to substitute the individual. The modified Nawaz-Enscore-Ham (MNEH) algorithm is employed to generate initial population which are assigned to each sub-swarm according to the makespan. For each sub-swarm, the neighborhood individuals of the leader and followers are generated respectively by performing serial and parallel neighborhood strategies. If the follower is better than the leader according to their makespan, they are exchanged to ensure the information interaction of individuals within the sub-swarm. Moreover, the discrete whale optimization strategy is embedded in IMMBO to optimize the leaders of all sub-swarms to enhance the interaction among them. Furthermore, the local search is designed for the optimal individual to further improve the local search ability of the algorithm. Meanwhile, to avoid algorithm premature convergence, the control strategy for population diversification is designed to the leader of each sub-swarm. Finally, based on adjusting the algorithm parameters experimentally, simulation experiments are conducted on four variants of IMMBO to verify the function of each part by testing an adaptation dataset of Ta. Moreover, the IMMBO is compared with three existing algorithms by testing an adaptation dataset of Ta, and the experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the IMMBO algorithm to solve the hybrid flow shop scheduling problem

Sustainable development and desertification control in Hotan region [Chinese language]

Abstract in EnglishIn order to speed up the step of shaking off poverty and building up a fortune of the 1.5 million population in Hotan region, a target of an increase of o. 33 ha farmland per capita will be realized during the "Ninth-five Plan" (1996~2000). It is estimated that a wasteland area of 6.67 X 104 ha will be reclaimed for planting cotton and fruit trees. This study focuses on the appraisal of the economic, ecological and environmental benefits of the project. The results show that it will need a big amount of investment to implement the project with a tight combination between wasteland reclamation, protection against wind, afforestation for sand -fixation, and construction of irrigation works, coordinative development of agriculture, forestry, and animal husbandry, and taking into a consideration of national, regional and local residents' benefits, while has the obvious benefits. Therefore, it is a feasible sustainable development scheme. It is suggested to do further research on the impact of the project on the environment of the lower reaches of Tarim River, and some privilege policies should be given to Hotan region by the state and autonomous region