Reimagining the notion of Hong Kong as an education hub: National imperative for higher education policy

This article examines the evolving concept of Hong Kong as an education hub, with a focus on the influence of the Greater Bay Area (GBA) strategy on higher education development. It begins by reviewing the impacts of the policy of developing Hong Kong into an education hub on the city’s educational landscape and global competitiveness. Subsequently, the article investigates the GBA’s role as a subnational higher education region, highlighting the heightened strategic cooperation between Hong Kong and the Chinese Mainland in the higher education arena. The cases of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Guangzhou are examined as examples of cross-border education in the GBA, shedding light on their role in fostering research collaboration and knowledge exchange. The article reimagines the notion of an education hub, underscoring Hong Kong’s transition from a gateway to a radiator, and discusses the implications of this shift for the city’s global and national positioning. Through this analysis, the article examines the dynamics and future prospects of education hub in Hong Kong, particularly within the context of emphasising integration with the Chinese Mainland

Ecological Response of Phytoplankton to the Oil Spills in the Oceans

Oil spills in oceans have substantial influence on marine ecosystems. This study investigates 21 oil spills in the world. Analyzing Chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiomerer (MODIS) data after Penglai oil spills on 4 June 2011, found a bloom with peak value of Chl-a (13.66 mg m−3) spread over an area of 800 km2 during 18–25 June 2011, and a pronounced increase in the monthly Chl-a concentration (6.40 mg m−3) on June 2012 in the Bohai Sea. Out of the 21 oil spills, 14 blooms were observed, while 11 blooms associated with oil spills in the time interval of 3–10 months. In total, about 75% blooms occurred during June–August. Among all 14 blooms, 72% appeared when temperature was warm (20–30 °C), 7% appeared when temperature was low (10–20 °C), and the remaining 21% occurred when temperature was lower than 10 °C. This research concludes that the odds of a phytoplankton bloom after an oil spillage are higher at the time of higher temperature (\u3e20 °C). The short-term impact of the oil spills on ecosystem could mainly depend on the quantity and composition of oil, while the long-term impact of the oil spills on ecosystem could be related to biodegradation of microorganisms

Analysis of depression status and influencing factors in middle-aged and elderly patients with chronic diseases

ObjectivesTo explore prevalence of depression and its influencing factors in middle-aged and elderly patients with chronic diseases.MethodData were extracted from the 2018 China Health and Retirement Tracking Survey (CHARLS) for 6,704 middle-aged and elderly patients ≥45 years with chronic diseases. The influencing variables were selected based on LASSO-logistic regression model, and a nomogram was further drawn to visualize regression results.ResultsComorbidity between chronic diseases and depression symptoms were detected in 3058 individuals (45.6%). Female, rural, lower education, poor, insomnia, multiple chronic disease, and functional impairment were associated with a higher proportion of depression. Meanwhile, family interaction, intergenerational financial support, social activity intensity, and satisfaction with life can protect against depression.ConclusionDepressive symptoms are common in Chinese older adults with chronic diseases. They need regular assessment and intervention, especially those with multiple diseases, female, rural, alone, impaired, poor sleep, or poor economy. These high-risk elders also need family, medical, and social support and care

Common and segregated neural substrates for automatic conceptual and affective priming as revealed by event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging

The brain activity associated with automatic semantic priming has been extensively studied. Thus far there has been no prior study that directly contrasts the neural mechanisms of semantic and affective priming. The present study employed event-related fMRI to examine the common and distinct neural bases underlying conceptual and affective priming with a lexical decision task. A special type of emotional word. a dual-meaning word containing both conceptual meaning and affective meaning, was adopted as target. Short stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) (50 ms) was used to emphasize automatic processing. Fifteen participants were scanned in the present study. We found that the left middle/superior temporal gyrus was the brain region involved in both automatic conceptual and affective priming effects, suggesting general lexical-semantic processing that share in the two types of priming. The left inferior frontal gyrus and right superior temporal gyrus were found to be the conceptual-specific areas in automatic priming effect, consistent with the role of these areas in more extensive within-category semantic processes. The results also revealed that the left fusiform gyrus and left insula were the affective-specific regions in automatic priming effect, demonstrating the involvement of the left fusiform gyrus in automatic affective priming effect, and clarifying the role of the insula in emotional processing rather than conceptual processing. Despite comparable behavioral effects of automatic conceptual priming and affective priming, the present study revealed a neural dissociation of the two types of priming, as well as the shared neural bases

Modality- and task-specific brain regions involved in Chinese lexical processing

fMRI was used to examine lexical processing in native adult Chinese speakers. A 2 task (semantics and phonology) x 2 modality (visual and auditory) within-subject design was adopted. The semantic task involved a meaning association judgment and the phonological task involved a rhyming judgment to two sequentially presented words. The overall effect across tasks and modalities was used to identify seven ROIs, including the left fusiform gyrus (FG), the left superior temporal gyrus (STG), the left ventral inferior frontal gyrus (VIFG), the left middle temporal gyrus (MTG), the left dorsal inferior frontal gyrus (DIFG), the left inferior parietal lobule (IPL), and the left middle frontal gyrus (MFG). ROI analyses revealed two modality-specific areas, FG for visual and STG for auditory, and three task-specific areas, IPL and DIFG for phonology and VIFG for semantics. Greater DIFG activation was associated with conflicting tonal information between words for the auditory rhyming task, suggesting this region's role in strategic phonological processing, and greater VIFG activation was correlated with lower association between words for both the auditory and the visual meaning task, suggesting this region's role in retrieval and selection of semantic representations. The modality- and task-specific effects in Chinese revealed by this study are similar to those found in alphabetical languages. Unlike English, we found that MFG was both modality- and task-specific, suggesting that MFG may be responsible for the visuospatial analysis of Chinese characters and orthography-to-phonology integration at a syllabic level

Pathogenic Connexin-31 Forms Constitutively Active Hemichannels to Promote Necrotic Cell Death

Mutations in Connexin-31 (Cx31) are associated with multiple human diseases including erythrokeratodermia variabilis (EKV). The molecular action of Cx31 pathogenic mutants remains largely elusive. We report here that expression of EKV pathogenic mutant Cx31R42P induces cell death with necrotic characteristics. Inhibition of hemichannel activity by a connexin hemichannel inhibitor or high extracellular calcium suppresses Cx31R42P-induced cell death. Expression of Cx31R42P induces ER stress resulting in reactive oxygen species (ROS) production, in turn, to regulate gating of Cx31R42P hemichannels and Cx31R42P induced cell death. Moreover, Cx31R42P hemichannels play an important role in mediating ATP release from the cell. In contrast, no hemichannel activity was detected with cells expressing wildtype Cx31. Together, the results suggest that Cx31R42P forms constitutively active hemichannels to promote necrotic cell death. The Cx31R42P active hemichannels are likely resulted by an ER stress mediated ROS overproduction. The study identifies a mechanism of EKV pathogenesis induced by a Cx31 mutant and provides a new avenue for potential treatment strategy of the disease

Subtelomeric assembly of a multi-gene pathway for antimicrobial defense compounds in cereals

Non-random gene organization in eukaryotes plays a significant role in genome evolution. Here, we investigate the origin of a biosynthetic gene cluster for production of defence compounds in oat—the avenacin cluster. We elucidate the structure and organisation of this 12-gene cluster, characterise the last two missing pathway steps, and reconstitute the entire pathway in tobacco by transient expression. We show that the cluster has formed de novo since the divergence of oats in a subtelomeric region of the genome that lacks homology with other grasses, and that gene order is approximately colinear with the biosynthetic pathway. We speculate that the positioning of the late pathway genes furthest away from the telomere may mitigate against a ‘self-poisoning’ scenario in which toxic intermediates accumulate as a result of telomeric gene deletions. Our investigations reveal a striking example of adaptive evolution underpinned by remarkable genome plasticity

Spatio-temporal dynamics of suspended sediment concentration during the 2004 Sumatra tsunami

313-322Spatio-temporal dynamics of suspended sediment concentration (SSC) in Indian Ocean during the 2004 Sumatra tsunami was analyzed using satellite data. Surface SSC in epicenter area increased notably right after the tsunami week (about 200% higher than that in the same period in earlier 4 years); the surface SSC in a deep water area about 1600 km from the epicenter area did not increase after the tsunami. Increase of SSC in the epicenter area may be mainly caused by the transportation of SSC by the tsunami backwash. Range of spatial clustering in SSC significantly decreased during the tsunami week. It may be related to the tsunami waves that diluted the spatial clustering level in SSC. A new spatio-temporal correlation model shows that the fluctuation in the spatio-temporal correlation surface of SSC appeared remarkably intense round the tsunami. Present study reveals that the tsunami considerably disturbed the spatio-temporal dynamics in SSC