Is colonial heritage negative or not so much? Debating heritage discourses and selective interpretation of Kulangsu, China

Heritage is in essence dissonant, especially colonial heritage in postcolonial nations. Via questionnaire surveys and interviews, this study investigates Kulangsu in Xiamen, China, a colonial heritage site mainly developed in the 19th and 20th centuries, to unveil the local government’s authorised heritage discourse (AHD) of the site and how tourists perceive the colonial past of Kulangsu and construct their own heritage discourse(s). Results show that, when considering the colonial history of the site, neither the AHD promoted by the authorities nor the tourists’ lay discourses are necessarily negative. However, tension implicitly arises between the tourists’ demand for comprehensive heritage information and the authorities’ selective interpretation of the site. Although the AHD affects lay discourses to some extent, most tourists expect the authorities to present more complete and neutral information about heritage so they can reflect and forge their own conception of colonial legacies. From a critical heritage studies perspective, this tension reflects the power imbalance between the authorities and the tourists and reminds the authorities and heritage experts to rethink heritage tourism and conservation in terms of heritage interpretation. This paper, therefore, calls for additional reflection on the legitimacy of selective interpretation, which implicates a complex process of intricate reasoning that is underpinned by the power imbalance between the authorities and the tourists, ultimately resulting in an AHD

Risk assessment in project management by a graph-theory-based group decision making method with comprehensive linguistic preference information

The work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (71971145, 71771156, 72171158), the Andalusian Government under Project P20-00673, and also by the Spanish State Research Agency under Project PID2019-103880RB-I00/AEI/10.13039/501100011033.Risk assessment is a vital part in project management. It is possible that experts may provide comprehensive linguistic preference information in distinct forms with respect to different aspects of the risk assessment problem in investment management. It is a challenge to model and deal with comprehensive linguistic preference assessments in multiple forms given by experts. In this regard, this paper defines the generalised probabilistic linguistic preference relation (GPLPR) to represent different forms of linguistic preference information in a unified structure. Then, a probability cutting method is proposed to simplify the representation of a GPLPR. Afterwards, a graph-theory-based method is developed to improve the consistency degree of a GPLPR. A group decision making method with GPLPRs is then proposed to carry on the risk assessment in project management. Discussions regarding the comparative analysis and managerial insights are given.National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) 71971145 71771156 72171158Andalusian Government P20-00673Spanish Government PID2019-103880RB-I00/AEI/10.13039/50110001103

An Empirical Study on Zero Address Terms Among Chinese College Students

Chinese address terms are the basis of interpersonal communication. On the one hand, a conversation usually begins with address terms which play a important role. On the other hand, choosing different address terms represents the different tone the speaker wants to express. Therefore, accurate and appropriate use of address terms is one of the important symbols of successful communication. However, using zero address terms is still very common because we don’t know how to address appropriately in some occasions. This paper aims to study the common types of zero address terms usage among university students, and try to summarize the main reasons. This study is based on daily conversations of college students in four common campus scenes which are office building, study building, store and playground. The following findings are obtained in this study. There are five common types of zero address terms phenomenon. They are polite expression, personal pronoun, no expression, onomatopoeia and body language. There are three main reasons for using zero address terms. They are occasion, interpersonal purpose and social development.

Proton-transfer salts of diphenylphosphinic acid with substituted 2-aminopyridine:crystal structure, spectroscopic and DFT studies

Three proton-transfer salts of diphenylphosphinic acid (DPPA) with 2-amino-5-(X)-pyridine (AMPY, X = Cl, CN or CH3), namely, 2-amino-5-chloropyridinium diphenylphosphinate, C5H6ClN2+·C12H10O2P― (1, X = Cl), 2-amino-5-cyano-pyridinium diphenylphosphinate, C6H6N3+·C12H10O2P― (2, X = CN), and 2-amino-5-methylpyridinium diphenylphosphinate, C6H9N2+·C12H10O2P― (3, X = CH3), have been synthesized and characterized by FT–IR and 1H NMR spectroscopy, and X-ray crystallography. The crystal structures of compounds 1–3 were determined in the space group P1 for 1 and 2, and C2/c for 3. All three compounds contain N—H· · ·O hydrogen-bonding interactions due to proton transfer from the O P—OH group of DPPA as donor to the pyridine N atom of AMPY as acceptor. The proton transfer of compounds 1–3 was also verified by 1H NMR and FT–IR spectroscopy. The stoichiometry of all three proton-transfer salts was determined to be 1:1 and the Benesi–Hildebrand equation was applied to determine the formation constant (KCT) and the molar extinction coefficient ("CT) in each case. Theoretical density functional theory (DFT) calculations were performed to investigate the optimized geometries, the molecular electrostatic potentials (MEP) and the highest occupied molecular orbitals (HOMO) and lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals (LUMO) of all three proton-transfer salts. The results showed good agreement between the experimental data and the DFT computational analysis.</p

Observation of transition from semiconducting to metallic ground state in high-quality single crystalline FeSi

We report anomalous physical properties of single-crystalline FeSi over a wide temperature range 1.8-400 K. X-ray diffraction, specific heat, and magnetization measurements indicate that the FeSi crystals synthesized in this study are of high quality with a very low concentration of magnetic impurities ($\sim$0.01$\%$). The electrical resistivity $\rho$($T$) can be described by activated behavior with an energy gap $\Delta$ = 57 meV between 67 K and 150 K. At temperatures below 67 K, $\rho$($T$) is significantly lower than an extrapolation of the activated behavior, and the Hall coefficient and magneto-resistivity undergo a sign change in this region. At $\sim$19 K, a transition from semiconducting to metallic-like behavior is observed with deceasing temperature. Whereas the transition temperature is very robust in a magnetic field, the magnitude of the resistivity below $\sim$30 K is very sensitive to magnetic field. There is no indication of a bulk phase transition or onset of magnetic order in the vicinity of either 67 K or 19 K from specific heat and magnetic susceptibility measurements. These measurements provide evidence for a conducting surface state in FeSi at low temperatures

Risk assessment in project management by a graphtheory- based group decision making method with comprehensive linguistic preference information

Risk assessment is a vital part in project management. It is possible that experts may provide comprehensive linguistic preference information in distinct forms with respect to different aspects of the risk assessment problem in investment management. It is a challenge to model and deal with comprehensive linguistic preference assessments in multiple forms given by experts. In this regard, this paper defines the generalised probabilistic linguistic preference relation (GPLPR) to represent different forms of linguistic preference information in a unified structure. Then, a probability cutting method is proposed to simplify the representation of a GPLPR. Afterwards, a graph-theory-based method is developed to improve the consistency degree of a GPLPR. A group decision making method with GPLPRs is then proposed to carry on the risk assessment in project management. Discussions regarding the comparative analysis and managerial insights are given

Scoulerine promotes cytotoxicity and attenuates stemness in ovarian cancer by targeting PI3K/AKT/mTOR axis

In women, ovarian cancer is a common gynecological cancer associated with poor prognosis, reoccurrence and chemoresistance. Scoulerine, a benzylisoquinoline alkaloid, has been reported effective against several carcinomas. Thus, we investigated the impact of scoulerine on ovarian cancer cells (OVCAR3). Cell viability was assessed by MTT assay, migration was determined by Boyden Chamber assay, while the invasion was monitored by Boyden Chamber assay using the matrigel. The stemness properties of OVCAR3 cells were observed by tumorsphere assay. Epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT) and stemness-related protein markers were monitored by real-time PCR analysis and immunoblotting. Scoulerine inhibits the viability of OVCAR3 cells with the IC50 observed at 10 µmol L–1 after 48 h treatment. Scoulerine inhibited the colony-forming ability, migration and invasiveness of OVCAR3 cells in a dose-dependent fashion. Scoulerine treatment also drastically reduced the spheroid-forming ability of OVCAR3 cells. The mesenchymal and stemness-related markers like N-cadherin, vimentin, CD-44, Oct-4, Sox-2 and Aldh1A1 were downregulated, whereas the epithelial markers like E-cadherin and CD-24 were upregulated in scoulerine-treated cells. The upstream PI3K/Akt/mTOR-axis was downregulated in scoulerine-treated cells. We concluded that scoulerine successfully perturbs the cancerous properties of OVCAR3 cells by targeting the PI3K/Akt/mTOR axis. In vivo studies revealed a substantial decrease in tumor mass and volume after scoulerine treatment. Furthermore, scoulerine treatment was found to decrease oxidative stress factors in ovarian cancer mice model. Scoulerine is a potential anticancer agent against ovarian cancer and can be considered as a lead molecule for this malignancy, provided further investigations are performed