Coalition-Based Gender Lobbying: Revisiting Women's Substantive Representation in China's Authoritarian Governance

While research on women's substantive representation in legislatures has proliferated, our knowledge of gender lobbying mechanisms in authoritarian regimes remains limited. Adopting a state-society interaction approach, this article addresses how women's interests are substantively represented in China despite the absence of an electoral mandate and the omnipresence of state power. Drawing on extensive fieldwork, this article maps out the intertwining of key political agents and institutions within and outside the state that mobilize for women's grievances and demands. We find that representation of women's interests in China requires the emergence of a unified societal demand followed by a coalition of state agency allies navigating within legislative, executive, and Party-affiliated institutional bodies. The pursuit of women's interests is also politically bounded and faces strong repression if the lobbying lacks state alliances or the targeted issue is considered “politically sensitive” by the government

A quorum sensing active matter in a confined geometry

Inspired by the problem of biofilm growth, we numerically investigate clustering in a two-dimensional suspension of active (Janus) particles of finite size confined in a circular cavity. Their dynamics is regulated by a non-reciprocal mechanism that causes them to switch from active to passive above a certain threshold of the perceived near-neighbor density (quorum sensing).A variety of cluster phases -- glassy, solid (hexatic) and liquid -- is observed depending on the particle dynamics at the boundary, the quorum sensing range, and the level of nois

« La petite fille modèle du Parti » ?

Comme d’autres institutions socialistes ayant perduré lors des réformes vers l’économie de marché en Chine, la Fédération natio- nale des femmes de Chine (FNFC ou FF pour parler de ses branches locales), unique organisation de représentation des intérêts des femmes, s’est constamment réinventée en vue de faire face à de nouveaux défis existentiels. En juillet 2015, la direction centrale du Parti communiste chinois a ordonné une nouvelle vague de réformes des organisations de masse, reprochant notamment à la Fédération des femmes sa distanciation vis-à-vis des citoyens ordinaires et l’affaiblissement de la représentation des intérêts des femmes. Trois ans après le début d’une ré- forme intensive, les structures locales de la FNFC ont-elles été suffisamment transformées en vue de renouer avec leur base, au niveau des masses ? Fondé sur un travail de terrain approfondi dans trois provinces ainsi que sur une analyse néo-institutionnelle, cet article soutient qu’à court terme, bien que la réforme serve principalement à la consolidation de l’autorité du Parti, les branches locales de la Fédération des femmes l’utilisent de façon créative pour élargir leur base populaire et étendre leur représentativité. À long terme, cependant, les FF locales sont confrontées à des problèmes institutionnels qui perdurent malgré la réforme, tels que la marginalisation politique, la bureaucratisation, ainsi que la mise en œuvre inefficace des politiques, qui limitent le développement du féminisme d’État en Chine

Study on the Realization of Freshwater Ecosystem Services from the Perspective of Consumer Willingness to Pay in China

The realization of freshwater ecosystem services value plays a vital role in the survival of human beings and the sustainable development of fisheries, and this process is inseparable from the support of consumers. This paper decomposes freshwater ecosystem services in multiple dimensions. From the perspective of consumers' willingness to pay for ecosystem services, using the survey data of 821 consumers in China, the influence of various dimensions of freshwater ecosystem services on consumers' willingness is explored by the structural equation model. The results show that: (1) consumers already have a certain awareness of freshwater ecosystem services, but the proportion of consumers willing to pay extra for them is not high; (2) the individual characteristics (age, gender, education, and income ) affect consumers’ willingness to pay for freshwater ecosystem services value, but the impact degree is not high; (3) regulating, cultural, and provisional servers functions of freshwater ecosystem services significantly affect consumers’ willingness to pay, especially freshwater ecosystem services’ role on regulating carbon emissions, controlling algal biomass, enhancing local fishery culture and improving leisure and leisure entertainment services. This study is helpful to deeply understand consumers' willingness to pay for various dimensions of freshwater ecosystem services and provide more targeted and detailed guidance for realizing it

Enhancing Phenotype Recognition in Clinical Notes Using Large Language Models: PhenoBCBERT and PhenoGPT

We hypothesize that large language models (LLMs) based on the transformer architecture can enable automated detection of clinical phenotype terms, including terms not documented in the HPO. In this study, we developed two types of models: PhenoBCBERT, a BERT-based model, utilizing Bio+Clinical BERT as its pre-trained model, and PhenoGPT, a GPT-based model that can be initialized from diverse GPT models, including open-source versions such as GPT-J, Falcon, and LLaMA, as well as closed-source versions such as GPT-3 and GPT-3.5. We compared our methods with PhenoTagger, a recently developed HPO recognition tool that combines rule-based and deep learning methods. We found that our methods can extract more phenotype concepts, including novel ones not characterized by HPO. We also performed case studies on biomedical literature to illustrate how new phenotype information can be recognized and extracted. We compared current BERT-based versus GPT-based models for phenotype tagging, in multiple aspects including model architecture, memory usage, speed, accuracy, and privacy protection. We also discussed the addition of a negation step and an HPO normalization layer to the transformer models for improved HPO term tagging. In conclusion, PhenoBCBERT and PhenoGPT enable the automated discovery of phenotype terms from clinical notes and biomedical literature, facilitating automated downstream tasks to derive new biological insights on human diseases

Comprehensive Network Analysis Reveals Alternative Splicing-Related lncRNAs in Hepatocellular Carcinoma

© Copyright © 2020 Wang, Wang, Bhat, Chen, Xu, Mo, Yi and Zhou. It is increasingly appreciated that long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) associated with alternative splicing (AS) could be involved in aggressive hepatocellular carcinoma. Although many recent studies show the alteration of RNA alternative splicing by deregulated lncRNAs in cancer, the extent to which and how lncRNAs impact alternative splicing at the genome scale remains largely elusive. We analyzed RNA-seq data obtained from 369 hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) and 160 normal liver tissues, quantified 198,619 isoform transcripts, and identified a total of 1,375 significant AS events in liver cancer. In order to predict novel AS-associated lncRNAs, we performed an integration of co-expression, protein-protein interaction (PPI) and epigenetic interaction networks that links lncRNA modulators (such as splicing factors, transcript factors, and miRNAs) along with their targeted AS genes in HCC. We developed a random walk-based multi-graphic (RWMG) model algorithm that prioritizes functional lncRNAs with their associated AS targets to computationally model the heterogeneous networks in HCC. RWMG shows a good performance evaluated by the ROC curve based on cross-validation and bootstrapping strategies. As a conclusion, our robust network-based framework has derived 31 AS-related lncRNAs that not only validates known cancer-associated cases MALAT1 and HOXA11-AS, but also reveals new players such as DNM1P35 and DLX6-AS1with potential functional implications. Survival analysis further provides insights into the clinical significance of identified lncRNAs

X-ray absorption study of ceria nanorods promoting the disproportionation of hydrogen peroxide

A quasi in situ X-ray absorption study demonstrated that the disproportionation of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) promoted by ceria nanorods was associated with a reversible Ce3+/Ce4+ reaction and structural transformations in ceria. The direction of this reversible reaction was postulated to depend on the H2O2 concentration and the fraction of Ce3+ species in ceria nanorods

Multiomics analysis of a resistant European turnip ECD04 during clubroot infection reveals key hub genes underlying resistance mechanism

The clubroot disease has become a worldwide threat for crucifer crop production, due to its soil-borne nature and difficulty to eradicate completely from contaminated field. In this study we used an elite resistant European fodder turnip ECD04 and investigated its resistance mechanism using transcriptome, sRNA-seq, degradome and gene editing. A total of 1751 DEGs were identified from three time points after infection, among which 7 hub genes including XTH23 for cell wall assembly and two CPK28 genes in PTI pathways. On microRNA, we identified 17 DEMs and predicted 15 miRNA-target pairs (DEM-DEG). We validated two pairs (miR395-APS4 and miR160-ARF) by degradome sequencing. We investigated the miR395-APS4 pair by CRISPR-Cas9 mediated gene editing, the result showed that knocking-out APS4 could lead to elevated clubroot resistance in B. napus. In summary, the data acquired on transcriptional response and microRNA as well as target genes provide future direction especially gene candidates for genetic improvement of clubroot resistance on Brassica species