Search Results (29,538)

Understanding the long-term dynamics of cropland water use efficiency (WUE) and its underlying environmental drivers is essential for ensuring food and water security, particularly for regions facing intensified climate change. Here, we investigated the spatial patterns and long-term trends of gross primary productivity (GPP), evapotranspiration (ET), and WUE in cropland ecosystems across Northeast China during the past two decades as the nation’s primary commodity grain base using the time-series Breathing Earth System Simulator (BESS) products. Subsequently, the ridge regression method was used to quantitatively disentangle the relative contributions of key climatic variables to the observed WUE trends of cropland. Our results revealed a pronounced decreasing gradient in both GPP and ET along the southeast–northwest direction. A significant increase in GPP was observed over the 20-year period (p < 0.01), with 95.94% of the cropland area showing positive trends. ET showed a slight, non-significant increase (p > 0.05), though 82.77% of pixels exhibited positive trends, particularly in the northwest. Consequently, WUE showed a widespread and significant enhancement (p < 0.01), with approximately 98% of cropland pixels exhibiting increasing trends. Attribution analysis identified air temperature as the dominant environmental variable, accounting for 92.4% of the observed WUE increase, while solar radiation and precipitation contributed modestly (3.4% and 3.2%, respectively). Our findings underscore the predominant role of thermal conditions in shaping the carbon–water coupling efficiency of agroecosystems in semi-arid to semi-humid transition zones. This study provides quantitative evidence that warming climate, rather than changes in water availability or radiation, has been the primary climatic factor driving the improved cropland WUE over the past two decades. These insights have important implications for developing adaptive water management strategies to enhance agricultural climate resilience in Northeast China and similar regions worldwide. Full article

This study aimed to examine the impact of online social support on sleep quality and the potential roles of psychological resilience and digital literacy in this relationship. A cross-sectional survey was conducted with 606 university freshmen from a college in Hengyang City, Hunan Province, China, using cluster random sampling. Data were collected using the Online Social Support Questionnaire, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI; note that higher PSQI scores indicate poorer sleep quality), Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale, and Domestic College Student Digital Literacy Assessment Scale. Statistical analysis was conducted using SPSS 27.0, with mediation effects tested via the PROCESS macro. The analytical results demonstrated that online social support showed a significant negative predictive effect on the sleep quality of university freshmen (β = −0.11, p < 0.01); psychological resilience exhibited a suppression effect (i.e., opposing direct and indirect effects) between online social support and sleep quality; and digital literacy moderated the first half of the mediation pathway (β = 0.18, p < 0.001). Collectively, this study shows that online social support directly harms sleep quality but indirectly benefits it by enhancing psychological resilience. Digital literacy serves as a key moderator that amplifies this beneficial indirect effect. These findings provide significant theoretical and practical insights for developing campus health promotion initiatives. Full article

Background: Healthcare systems contribute significantly to environmental pollution, energy consumption, and resource depletion, making sustainability an increasingly important environmental and public health priority. Nurses, as frontline healthcare professionals, play a critical role in promoting environmentally responsible practices and advocating for sustainable healthcare within clinical settings. Objective: The study aimed to examine the associations between nurses’ sustainability consciousness, green advocacy, and work grit in hospital settings. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional correlational study was conducted among 377 nurses working in two university-affiliated hospitals in Egypt. Data were collected using validated instruments assessing sustainability consciousness, green advocacy, and work grit. Descriptive statistics were calculated to summarize participant characteristics and study variables. Associations among sustainability consciousness, green advocacy, and work grit were examined using Pearson correlation analysis. Multiple linear regression analysis was conducted to identify significant predictors of green advocacy, while noting that the study design allows for identification of associations rather than causal relationships. Results: The findings indicated generally high levels of sustainability consciousness among nurses. Significant positive associations were observed between sustainability consciousness, green advocacy, and work grit (p < 0.01). Multiple linear regression analysis identified sustainability consciousness and work grit as significant predictors of green advocacy, explaining 34.2% of its variance. Conclusions: These findings highlight the interconnected roles of sustainability awareness, advocacy behaviors, and psychological resilience in promoting environmentally sustainable healthcare practices. Strengthening nurses’ sustainability consciousness and work grit may enhance green advocacy and contribute to the development of sustainable healthcare systems, supporting global environmental and public health goals aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Full article

Open Educational Resources (OER) are widely promoted as mechanisms for expanding access to knowledge and supporting sustainability in higher education. Yet their long-term viability remains constrained by fragmented governance, unstable funding arrangements, weak faculty incentives, policy gaps, and uneven digital infrastructure. This article develops a conceptual and policy-oriented framework that reconceptualizes OER as sustainable knowledge commons embedded within higher education systems rather than merely repositories of open content. Using an integrative review and thematic synthesis of global scholarship on OER sustainability, commons governance, and higher education policy, the study identifies four interrelated governance dimensions: institutional embedding, participatory stewardship, equitable access and inclusion, and long-term resource sustainability. The analysis shows that sustainable OER ecosystems depend not only on open licensing and technological platforms but also on coherent policy design, institutional alignment, academic recognition structures, and collaborative governance arrangements. Each dimension is associated with indicative governance mechanisms and policy indicators such as institutional OER strategies, faculty incentive programs, and shared digital infrastructure. The framework also recognizes institutional diversity, emphasizing that governance models must be adapted to different policy environments, academic cultures, and stages of OER adoption across higher education systems. By conceptualizing OER as governable knowledge commons, the article clarifies how open knowledge initiatives can con-tribute to social equity, educational resilience, and sustainable transformation in higher education. Full article

Background: Tartary buckwheat (Fagopyrum tataricum) serves as an excellent model for studying plant water adaptation mechanisms due to its exceptional drought tolerance. While aquaporins (AQPs) mediate the transmembrane transport of water and solutes in plants, their fine-tuned regulatory networks underlying stress resilience in Tartary buckwheat remain largely elusive. Methods: Here, we combined bioinformatics and transcriptomics to systematically identify 30 highly conserved FtAQP genes at the genome-wide level. Results: Cross-validated by qRT-PCR, our analysis revealed their distinct expression patterns across different organs. Based on our transcriptomic data, we hypothesize that FtAQP family members potentially participate in a coordinated whole-plant water management network through differential spatiotemporal expression. Specifically, the robust transcription of FtAQP8, FtAQP12, and FtAQP28 in roots is associated with the initial water uptake process. As water undergoes long-distance transport, the synergistic upregulation of FtAQP13, FtAQP17, FtAQP20, and FtAQP29 in the stem suggests a potential role in facilitating critical lateral water flow. Furthermore, during reproductive development, FtAQP27 exhibits extreme tissue specificity in floral organs, implying its possible involvement in maintaining local osmotic homeostasis. Furthermore, the promoter regions of FtAQPs are highly enriched with cis-acting elements responsive to light, abscisic acid (ABA), and cold stress, suggesting they are intimately regulated by a coupling of endogenous phytohormones and environmental cues. Conclusions: Ultimately, this study provides valuable insights into the potential molecular basis of multidimensional water regulation in Tartary buckwheat, and identifies candidate genetic targets for improving water use efficiency in dryland agriculture through the precise manipulation of aquaporins. Collectively, while these observational findings provide valuable predictive models, future in vivo experimental validations are required to confirm their exact biological functions. Full article

This study investigates the structural misalignment between official wage benchmarks and actual market wages in the Republic of Korea to establish an independent, forestry-specific wage system essential for labor sustainability. Historically, the Republic of Korea forestry project costs have relied on construction industry benchmarks, leading to a “diverging hypothesis” where official rates fail to reflect the specialized risks and technical skills required in forest operations. To address this, a comprehensive wage survey was conducted in 2025 across 13 specialized forestry occupations. Utilizing a sampling frame of 7555 sites, 1044 units were selected via stratified sampling with square-root proportional allocation, ensuring a relative standard error (RSE) of 2.5%. The findings reveal that market wages consistently exceed construction benchmarks by 4.5% to 41.0%. The most significant disparities were observed in leadership and mechanized roles, reflecting substantial “risk–responsibility” and “skill premiums”. Furthermore, the study identifies a structural shift toward risk-transfer strategies, such as stumpage sales, in response to the Serious Accidents Punishment Act (SAPA). These results underscore the urgent need for a specialized wage framework to ensure safety and long-term resilience. Ultimately, such institutional refinement is a prerequisite for securing the high-quality human capital necessary for a sustainable circular bioeconomy. Full article

This paper presents a lightweight method for assessing the resilience of power distribution systems that integrates climate and infrastructure data through impact chains and a probabilistic approach, while minimizing data integration and implementation complexity. The method is demonstrated for heatwave hazards by combining network characteristics, failure probabilities of heat-sensitive components (e.g., medium-voltage cable joints), and location-specific climate projections to generate spatial maps of failure risk and network resilience. These maps support the identification and prioritization of critical components requiring intervention. Critical segments are then further analyzed using probabilistic resilience metrics to compare alternative adaptation strategies. Overall, this work contributes a practically applicable, low-complexity methodology for identifying the weakest portions of distribution networks, along with a more in-depth probabilistic approach for assessing their climate resilience. The com-prehensive framework is illustrated through a case study of a representative portion of the Italian electricity distribution system in the urban area of Rome. It is implemented in a test environment that reflects realistic distribution network data structures and automatically integrates climate data from established online repositories. Full article

Almond (Prunus dulcis (Mill.) D.A. Webb) is one of the most economically important nut crops worldwide, valued for its nutritional properties and adaptability to diverse agroecological environments. This review summarizes current knowledge on almond domestication, genetic diversity, production trends, and improvement strategies, with a focus on drought tolerance under climate change. Archaeobotanical and molecular evidence indicate central Asia and the eastern Mediterranean as key centers of origin, where recurrent introgression from wild Prunus species contributed to the high genetic variability of cultivated almond. Global production trends reveal increasing challenges due to prolonged drought, climate variability, and rising water and energy costs, particularly affecting major producers such as the United States. Mediterranean regions are transitioning from traditional low-density orchards to intensive systems, where cultivar and rootstock choice are crucial for sustainability. Self-fertile and late-blooming cultivars improve yield stability, while interspecific hybrid rootstocks enhance water use efficiency and tolerance to drought and poor soils. Drought stress impacts almond physiology and yield, although moderate deficit irrigation can maintain productivity and improve kernel quality. Future improvement relies on germplasm conservation, marker-assisted selection, and genomic tools to develop climate-resilient cultivars integrated with sustainable water management strategies. Full article

Against the backdrop of high uncertainty in the economic environment, corporate resilience is not only a key guarantee for enterprises to build their own competitive advantages, but also a vital cornerstone for China’s economy to achieve high-quality development. Sampling from China’s A-share listed companies ranging from 2009 to 2023, this paper employs the Difference-in-Differences (DID) model to examine the association between the Fair Competition Review System (FCRS) and corporate resilience. The empirical results reveal that the application of the FCRS can significantly improve corporate resilience. A mechanism analysis indicates that the FCRS enhances corporate resilience by alleviating credit misallocation and reducing agency costs. Further analysis suggests that the positive impact of the FCRS on corporate resilience is more remarkable in samples with low market competition intensity, high rule-of-law levels, and eastern and central regions. The findings not only provide a practicable path for the deep combination of competition policy and corporate resilience, but also offer useful implications for promoting corporate sustainable development. Full article

Hydroponic cultivation is expanding rapidly as a resource-efficient alternative to soil-based farming, but challenges related to nutrient management, abiotic or biotic stresses, and organic production still limit the system’s performance and efficiency. Biostimulants are increasingly being explored as a promising strategy to support productivity and sustainability in soilless systems. This review summarizes the current evidence on the use of plant biostimulants to support crop performance in hydroponic systems. Microbial biostimulants, such as plant growth promoting rhizobacteria, Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi, and Trichoderma spp., have been reported to promote root growth by synthesizing phytohormones, enhance nutrient uptake, and reduce the impacts of salt and heat stress, with reported improvements in biomass and nutrient use efficiency. Seaweed extracts and protein hydrolysates modulate plant hormonal balance, improve antioxidant defense, and have been associated with improvements in yield and quality. Humic and fulvic acids increase micronutrient bioavailability through chelation and stimulate root activity through auxin-like effects. In organic hydroponics, biostimulants may help address the nutrient gap by accelerating organic matter mineralization. Existing key challenges include the lack of hydroponic-specific dosage guidelines and high commercialization costs. Future efforts should further evaluate system-specific strategies, including emerging tools such as artificial intelligence-optimized strategies and the use of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats-edited microbes to support the long-term sustainability of controlled environment agriculture. Full article

The stability of Indonesia’s banking sector is closely linked to the effectiveness of capital regulations, particularly as a country that aligns its policies with Basel III standards. Ensuring that banks have adequate capital buffers is crucial for mitigating systemic risk. However, the interaction between regulatory requirements and actual banking behavior in developing countries remains poorly understood. This study aims to evaluate the impact of Indonesia’s capital requirement instruments, including the countercyclical capital buffer (CCyB), the capital conservation buffer (CCB), and the capital surcharge, on credit performance and financial stability across various bank categories. Using a quantitative approach, the analysis utilizes panel data from commercial banks, state-owned banks and regional development banks over several periods, using the panel regression method and Difference-in-Differences (DID) to assess how changes in buffer levels affect credit growth, Non-Performing Loans (NPLs), and the Capital Adequacy Ratio (CAR). The results show that capital buffers have a statistically significant effect on lending behavior: a 1% increase in buffer levels is associated with a measurable decrease in credit expansion across several bank groups, while CCBs exhibit a stronger stabilizing effect than CCyBs. Although these instruments do not eliminate financial uncertainty, they contribute to more prudent risk-taking. This study also revealed that the CCyB rate increases when the financial cycle is in an expansionary phase. Conversely, if the economy slows (as during the pandemic), the CCyB rate can be lowered back to 0% to encourage bank intermediation, thus shaping the bank’s responses to regulation. Several implications of implementing a capital buffer in Indonesia include the benefits of resilience and bank behavior during credit expansion. Overall, this study concludes that aligning regulatory frameworks with real-world banking behavior is crucial for enhancing financial stability in developing countries, such as Indonesia. Full article

Forests worldwide are increasingly affected by climate-driven stressors and large-scale disturbances that impair tree physiology, disrupt water and carbon balance, and increase mortality risk. In this context, successful natural and artificial regeneration is essential for maintaining forest continuity, carbon storage, and biodiversity. However, regeneration outcomes depend not only on site conditions but also on biotic pressures, especially browsing by cervids in temperate and boreal forests. The aim of this review was to identify and synthesize evidence on how silvicultural methods can reduce browsing damage in forest regeneration and to assess how these methods influence the underlying drivers of cervid pressure through stand structure and forage availability. We examine mechanisms operating at two spatial scales: at the microscale, regeneration type, planting density, structural heterogeneity, planting stock, and how species mixture influences browsing probability and intensity; at the macroscale, how cutting systems and the spatial and temporal arrangement of harvests shape foraging landscapes by concentrating or dispersing browse resources and edge habitats. The reviewed evidence shows that dense, structurally diverse natural regeneration can dilute browsing pressure, whereas uniform artificial regeneration may increase repeated damage, and that species composition and mixture patterns can either protect or expose palatable species. We conclude that integrating microscale regeneration design with landscape-level harvest planning can strengthen stand resilience, reduce dependence on fencing, and support climate-adaptive forest development. To the best of our knowledge, no previous review has synthesized this evidence across both micro- and macroscale silvicultural contexts. Although most of the studies included in this review originate from Europe, we believe that the knowledge presented here is relevant to the majority of boreal and temperate forests worldwide. Full article

Forest structural complexity underpins habitat quality, microclimate buffering, and resilience, yet it remains poorly characterized across the Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH) where field inventories and airborne LiDAR are difficult to scale across rugged terrain. Conservation planning and protected-area evaluation in the HKH therefore often rely on canopy height or cover proxies that do not directly represent vertical structural organization. Here we develop a repeatable, uncertainty-aware indicator of forest structural complexity from GEDI waveform LiDAR using the Waveform Structural Complexity Index (WSCI) and its prediction intervals. We first define a conservative analysis footprint (“trustable pixels”) by combining a woody-vegetation screen with minimum GEDI sampling support and canopy-stature plausibility, and by excluding the highest-uncertainty tail using a relative prediction-interval criterion. To separate complexity from canopy height, we model the HKH-wide expected WSCI–RH98 relationship and map height-normalized excess complexity (observed minus expected), identifying structural complexity hotspots and coldspots as the upper and lower tails of the excess distribution. Anomaly patterns are strongly organized along elevation and treeline-relevant belts and show coherent departures among ecoregions that persist after stratified adjustment for elevation and mean annual precipitation, indicating additional controls beyond broad environmental gradients. Protected areas exhibit systematically lower hotspot prevalence than surrounding landscapes, and within-elevation comparisons suggest this association is not explained by elevation alone, highlighting the need to interpret protected-area signals in the context of placement and land-use pressure. Overall, the anomaly atlas provides an operational indicator framework to stratify monitoring, prioritize field validation, and support the landscape-scale assessment of structural conditions beyond canopy height across one of the world’s most critical mountain forest systems. Full article

Research into the spatial reshaping of monochromatic laser beams grew significantly in the late 1990s due to improvements in the fabrication of diffractive optical elements. Nowadays, some applications, such as optical coherence tomography, necessitate the use of broadband light beams with a spectral width of hundreds of nanometers. The difficulty in reshaping such spectrally broadened beams lies in the wavelength dependence of the beam shaping process. This paper presents a numerical study of the wavelength dependence of two beam shaping techniques that allow a Gaussian beam to be transformed into a flat-top or doughnut intensity profile in the focal plane of a focusing lens. The first technique is based on the diffraction of an incident Gaussian beam passing through a simple binary diffractive optical element. The second technique can be described as an interferometric method, as it involves the coaxial superposition of two Gaussian beams emerging from a Michelson interferometer. We compared the stability of these two techniques’ ability to reshape the beam versus the spectral bandwidth of the incident Gaussian beam. We showed that the interferometric method is more resilient than the diffractive method to changes in the spectral bandwidth of the Gaussian beam. We also considered the case of a quasi-monochromatic beam delivered by a widely tunable laser and reshaped using the interferometric method, where the dispersion of beam reshaping could be mitigated by two programmable liquid lenses that enable control of the curvature of the Michelson interferometer mirrors. Full article

Background/Objectives: Physical activity is one of the most powerful lifestyle factors influencing brain health, with growing evidence supporting its role in promoting neuroplasticity, cognitive function, and resilience to age-related neurological decline. Recent studies indicate that these effects are mediated by coordinated molecular responses involving epigenetics, activity-dependent gene expression, metabolic adaptation, and inter-organ communication pathways. This narrative review synthesizes current knowledge from experimental and clinical studies on the neurogenomic and epigenetic mechanisms underlying exercise-induced brain plasticity. Methods: Literature searches were conducted in PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar to identify studies examining neurogenomic and epigenetic mechanisms underlying neuroplasticity and cognitive adaptations in response to exercise, with an emphasis on mechanistic and translational evidence. Results: Available evidence, derived predominantly from animal studies and supported by more limited, often indirect human data, indicates that physical activity induces epigenetic modifications, including changes in DNA methylation, histone modifications, and microRNA expression, which contribute to lasting changes in exercise-responsive genes involved in brain plasticity. These adaptations include the upregulation of key neuroplasticity-related mediators that support neurogenesis, synaptic plasticity, angiogenesis, and metabolic adaptation, alongside the downregulation of pathways linked to neuroinflammation, oxidative stress, and apoptotic signalling. Conclusions: Integrating neurogenomics with systems biology approaches offers promising opportunities to better understand how physical activity influences brain plasticity throughout life. These insights may support the development of personalized exercise medicine to improve cognitive health and reduce the risk of neurodegenerative disorders. Full article