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During 2010 to 2020, Northeast Pacific (NEP) sea surface temperature (SST) experienced the warmest decade ever recorded, manifested in several extreme marine heatwaves, referred to as "warm blob" events, which severely affect marine ecosystems and extreme weather along the west coast of North America. While year-to-year internal climate variability has been suggested as a cause of individual events, the causes of the continuous dramatic NEP SST warming remain elusive. Here, we show that other than the greenhouse gas (GHG) forcing, rapid aerosol abatement in China over the period likely plays an important role. Anomalous tropospheric warming induced by declining aerosols in China generated atmospheric teleconnections from East Asia to the NEP, featuring an intensified and southward-shifted Aleutian Low. The associated atmospheric circulation anomaly weakens the climatological westerlies in the NEP and warms the SST there by suppressing the evaporative cooling. The aerosol-induced mean warming of the NEP SST, along with internal climate variability and the GHG-induced warming, made the warm blob events more frequent and intense during 2010 to 2020. As anthropogenic aerosol emissions continue to decrease, there is likely to be an increase in NEP warm blob events, disproportionately large beyond the direct radiative effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context • Researchers have associated insomnia with many disorders, making insomnia a serious public health issue in China. Sleep quality in older adults isn’t well characterized in China. Objective • The study intended to explore the sleep quality and subjective duration of sleep in a community-dwelling older population in China and identify potential risk factors for poor sleep. Design • The research team performed a cross-sectional survey using the convenience sampling method. Setting • The study took place in a community in Wuhu, Anhui, China in 2015. Participants • Participants were 1075 members of the community from Wuhu city. Outcome Measures • The research team collected self-reported information on sleep quality. Results • The overall prevalence of self-reported insomnia among older adults were 40.8%. The prevalence of insomnia in females, 259 (59.00%), was significantly higher than in males, 180 (41.00%), with P=.00. For income status, the prevalence of insomnia was significantly higher for participants with less than 10 000 RMB per year income for a family, 191 participants (43.51%), than for participants with higher family incomes, with P=.00. For marital status, the prevalence of insomnia was significantly higher for the widowed participants, 121 participants (24.56%), with P=.01. Conclusions • Sleep quality for females, low-income families, and widowed people were significantly worse than for people in other categories among older adults in China. Older adults in China need proper interventions for the factors causing poor sleep hygiene. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To promote high-quality economic development, China continues to strengthen its network infrastructure, but it is unclear how this affects the regional ecosystem. To clarify the impact direction, based on the weekly data of river pollution in China from 2004 to 2018, this paper regards the Broadband China (BC) strategy as a quasi-natural experiment and uses a difference-in-difference (DID) model for empirical analysis. The study found that network infrastructure construction significantly exacerbates river pollution. After a series of robustness tests, such as the placebo test and propensity score matching DID (PSM-DID), this research conclusion still holds. The impact of network infrastructure construction on river pollution is more visible in economically developed regions as well as cities with a higher level of digital economy development. The mechanism analysis confirms that during the sample period, network infrastructure construction led to secondary industry agglomeration but did not have a significant impact on innovation ability or environmental regulation, thus leading to the continuous intensification of river pollution. This paper not only provides empirical evidence for the study of the environmental effects of network infrastructure construction but also provides suggestions on how to better weigh the relationship between economic development and the environment in the digital economy [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drying kinetics, color, and texture changes in different drying temperatures of jujubes were investigated in this study. With the increase of temperature, the drying time reached a minimum (140 min) at 80℃. At the temperature of 40℃, the retention of the original color was the greatest (ΔE = 1.66); similar results were also reflected by the measured pulp browning (4.186 ± 0.350 Abs/g) and 5-HMF (0.517 ± 0.044 mg/g). After drying, the fruit hardness decreased to 55.91%–86.59% of the initial (2,543.2 ± 181.4 g). SEM showed that the HAD temperature exceeded 60℃ and the pulp tissue sharp dramatically, causing the fruit to harden. Affected by drying temperature and polygalacturonase, WSP increased in drying, whereas CSP and NSP showed the opposite trend, and they were significantly correlated with the texture of fruits. The results expanded our understanding of the jujube drying process and provided guidance for controlling the quality of jujube during HAD processing. Practical applications The drying method of jujube fruit in China is special, which is a combination of air drying and hot air drying. However, discoloration, shrinkage, and other quality deterioration occurred during the drying process, significantly affecting the quality of jujube fruit. In this study, semi-air-dried jujubes were used to investigate the color and texture during hot air drying. These results will provide valuable information to the pilot or industrial scale processors and also served as an operational guide for the jujube fruit drying process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]