Real estate development analysis in China

Real estate development and investment in China has become a strategy rather than an investment opportunity for most of the international investors. However, given the relatively short period of time in the development of the real estate market in China, there are still a lot of deficiencies in the market. One of these is the difficulty in establishing values for real estate assets. The other is the complication of the development procedures which affects property investment analysis. Attempts to examine the problems in carrying out development analysis in this market by analysing a joint venture development in Beijing.published_or_final_versio

Property Management in China: Opportunities and Problems

The development of the real estate market in China has been well-documented, but one of the most interesting, yet chaotic issues in this market has not been fully covered. It is the problems and opportunities arising from the needs for the management of existing properties. Supply of prime office buildings in the major cities in China has been unprecedented owing to the strong demand from local and overseas companies. To preserve the investment value of the building, there is a great need for good management. However, those who have worked in a socialist country will understand that service industry is always the weakest point of the economy. It is, nevertheless, exactly for this reason that there is a great opportunity for established property management companies to expand their service not only in property management but also in the training of the new generation of local property managers in this potential market.published_or_final_versio

Privatising management services in subsidised housing in Hong Kong

Privatisation of services from the public sector is topical currently mainly because of the potential savings and efficiency to be gained. In the aspect of property management, the Hong Kong Housing Authority owns more than 600,000 units of public housing flats and the requirement for good and efficient property management services is enormous. The current policy of privatising these services to the private management agents has proved to be a correct direction in terms of retaining the growth of the public sector, and also improving the level of services to the tenants. While the privatisation scheme might bring in more opportunities for growth of the property management companies in the private sector, it is more important for the government to forge a proper transitional arrangement to switch to full private management in order not to endanger the already low morale in the public sector.published_or_final_versio

Remote sensing of glacier change in the Central Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and the relationship with changing climate

2016-2017 > Academic research: refereed > Publication in refereed journal201804_a bcmaVersion of RecordPublishe

The dynamics of the Shanghai land market - An intra city analysis

In an open market, the land price of a particular site represents a set of attributes that a user is willing to pay for the use of that site. It has long been established that one of the most important attributes is the distance of this site from the city center. Based on a mono-centric assumption of urban development, land economists since Alonso have almost all agreed that there is a diminishing effect on land price the greater the distance from the city center. Although there have been various modifications of this locational perspective, it remains the core concept of land market dynamics. The question arises, therefore, as to whether a semi-open but extremely active land market with a heavy government presence will also follow this urban structure principle. In this paper, we apply a double-log regression model to examine land price changes in Shanghai from 1992 to 2006. Our results, based on an examination of more than seven thousand transactions, show that land price changes in Shanghai follow these dynamics and that a major transportation node plays an important role. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd.postprin

Effect of a current blocking barrier on a 2–6 μm p-GaAs/AlGaAs heterojunction infrared detector

We report the performance of a 30 period p-GaAs/AlxGa1 − xAs heterojunction photovoltaic infrared detector, with graded barriers, operating in the 2–6 μm wavelength range. Implementation of a current blocking barrier increases the specific detectivity (D*) under dark conditions by two orders of magnitude to ∼1.9 × 1011 Jones at 2.7 μm, at 77 K. Furthermore, at zero bias, the resistance-area product (R 0 A) attains a value of ∼7.2 × 108 Ω cm2, a five orders enhancement due to the current blocking barrier, with the responsivity reduced by only a factor of ∼1.5

Estimation of Spectroscopic Uncertainty and Correlation in Terahertz Time Domain Spectroscopy

We present a method of calculating the measurement variance-covariance matrix of a spectroscopic sample’s complex refractive index from time-domain statistics in order to estimate uncertainty of a measurement. We compare this method to a numerical analysis and previously derived methodology, and show that our time-based estimate is both accurate and adaptable to complex extraction models

Multilayer Extraction of Complex Refractive Index in Broadband Transmission Terahertz Time-Domain Spectroscopy

In terahertz spectroscopy, multi-layered samples often need to be measured, for instance in a liquid flow cell, and this complicates the extraction of material parameters. We present a spectroscopic parameter extraction algorithm for multilayer samples that can also be used to extract the thickness of an unknown sample laye

A critical role of the transient receptor potential melastatin 2 channel in a positive feedback mechanism for reactive oxygen species‐induced delayed cell death

Transient receptor potential melastatin 2 (TRPM2) channel activation by reactive oxygen species (ROS) plays a critical role in delayed neuronal cell death, responsible for postischemia brain damage via altering intracellular Zn2+ homeostasis, but a mechanistic understanding is still lacking. Here, we showed that H2O2 induced neuroblastoma SH‐SY5Y cell death with a significant delay, dependently of the TRPM2 channel and increased [Zn2+]i, and therefore used this cell model to investigate the mechanisms underlying ROS‐induced TRPM2‐mediated delayed cell death. H2O2 increased concentration‐dependently the [Zn2+]i and caused lysosomal dysfunction and Zn2+ loss and, furthermore, mitochondrial Zn2+ accumulation, fragmentation, and ROS generation. Such effects were suppressed by preventing poly(adenosine diphosphate ribose, ADPR) polymerase‐1‐dependent TRPM2 channel activation with PJ34 and 3,3′,5,5′‐tetra‐tert‐butyldiphenoquinone, inhibiting the TRPM2 channel with 2‐aminoethoxydiphenyl borate (2‐APB) and N‐(p‐amylcinnamoyl)anthranilic acid, or chelating Zn2+ with N,N,N,N‐tetrakis(2‐pyridylmethyl)‐ethylenediamine (TPEN). Bafilomycin‐induced lysosomal dysfunction also resulted in mitochondrial Zn2+ accumulation, fragmentation, and ROS generation that were inhibited by PJ34 or 2‐APB, suggesting that these mitochondrial events are TRPM2 dependent and sequela of lysosomal dysfunction. Mitochondrial TRPM2 expression was detected and exposure to ADPR‐induced Zn2+ uptake in isolated mitochondria, which was prevented by TPEN. H2O2‐induced delayed cell death was inhibited by apocynin and diphenyleneiodonium, nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate hydrogen (NADPH) oxidase (NOX) inhibitors, GKT137831, an NOX1/4‐specific inhibitor, or Gö6983, a protein kinase C (PKC) inhibitor. Moreover, inhibition of PKC/NOX prevented H2O2‐induced ROS generation, lysosomal dysfunction and Zn2+ release, and mitochondrial Zn2+ accumulation, fragmentation and ROS generation. Collectively, these results support a critical role for the TRPM2 channel in coupling PKC/NOX‐mediated ROS generation, lysosomal Zn2+ release, and mitochondrial Zn2+ accumulation, and ROS generation to form a vicious positive feedback signaling mechanism for ROS‐induced delayed cell death

Performance improvements of a split-off band infra-red detector using a graded barrier

Uncooled split-off band infrared detectors have been demonstrated with an operational device response in the 3–5 μm range. We have shown that it is possible to enhance this device response through reducing the recapture rate by replacing one of the commonly used flat barriers in the device with a graded barrier, which was grown using a “digital alloying” approach. Responsivity of approximately 80 μA/W (D* = 1.4 × 108 Jones) were observed at 78 K under a 1 V applied bias, with a peak response at 2.8 μm. This is an improvement by a factor of ∼25 times compared to an equivalent device with a flat barrier. This enhancement is due to improved carrier transport resulting from the superlattice structure, and a low recapture rate enabled by a reduced distance to the image force potential peak in the graded barrier. The device performance can be further improved by growing a structure with repeats of the single emitter layer reported here