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Breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP), an ATP-binding cassette (ABC) half transporter encoded by the Abcg2 gene, is reported to influence the pharmacokinetics of substrate drugs during clinical therapy. The aim of this study was to clarify the mechanisms that regulate the transcription of the chicken Abcg2 gene through cloning and characterization of its promoter region. Results showed that the Abcg2 gene is transcribed by a TATA-less promoter with several putative Sp1 sites upstream from two putative CpG islands. A luciferase reporter assay conducted both in chicken leghorn male hepatoma (LMH) cells and chicken primary hepatocytes mapped a basal promoter to nucleotides −110 to +30, which is responsible for the constitutive expression of Abcg2. The 5′-region upstream of the basal promoter was characterized by both positive and negative regulatory domains. Further, using the cell-based reporter gene assay combined with RT-PCR and drug accumulation analysis, we found that four xenobiotics, daidzein, clotrimazole, ivermectin, and lipopolysaccharide (LPS), influence the expression and function of BCRP through significant regulation of the Abcg2 gene promoter. Interaction sites with the Abcg2 gene promoter of these four selected regulators were clarified by progressive deletions and mutation assays. This study shed some light on the regulatory mechanisms involved in chicken Abcg2 gene expression and the results may have far-reaching significance regarding the usage and development of veterinary drugs.

Breast cancer resistance protein (BCRP), an ATP-binding cassette (ABC) half transporter encoded by the Abcg2 gene, is reported to influence the pharmacokinetics of substrate drugs during clinical therapy. The aim of this study was to clarify the mechanisms that regulate the transcription of the chicken Abcg2 gene through cloning and characterization of its promoter region. Results showed that the Abcg2 gene is transcribed by a TATA-less promoter with several putative Sp1 sites upstream from two putative CpG islands. A luciferase reporter assay conducted both in chicken leghorn male hepatoma (LMH) cells and chicken primary hepatocytes mapped a basal promoter to nucleotides −110 to +30, which is responsible for the constitutive expression of Abcg2. The 5′-region upstream of the basal promoter was characterized by both positive and negative regulatory domains. Further, using the cell-based reporter gene assay combined with RT-PCR and drug accumulation analysis, we found that four xenobiotics, daidzein, clotrimazole, ivermectin, and lipopolysaccharide (LPS), influence the expression and function of BCRP through significant regulation of the Abcg2 gene promoter. Interaction sites with the Abcg2 gene promoter of these four selected regulators were clarified by progressive deletions and mutation assays. This study shed some light on the regulatory mechanisms involved in chicken Abcg2 gene expression and the results may have far-reaching significance regarding the usage and development of veterinary drugs.

Global expectation for sustainability has prompted the transition of practices in wastewater treatment plants toward not only waste management but also energy and nutrient recovery. It has been shown that low-temperature hydrotherm (HT) treatment can enhance downstream biogas production via anaerobic digestion (AD). Yet, because the application of combined HT and AD is still at an early stage, a systematic understanding of the dynamic speciation evolution of important elements is still lacking. This study investigates energy and nutrient recovery from sewage sludge and swine manure via combined HT-AD treatment. Bench-scale investigation was conducted to evaluate biogas production and understand the dynamic evolution of organic carbon (C) and phosphorus (P) speciation. C and P speciations were characterized using complementary chemical and spectroscopic techniques, including

Phosphorus (P) in animal manures is an important P pool for P recycling and reclamation. In recent years, thermochemical techniques have gained much interests for effective waste treatment and P recycling. This study comparatively characterized the transformation of P during two representative thermochemical treatments (pyrolysis and hydrothermal carbonization, HTC) of four animal manures (swine, chicken, beef, and dairy manures) by combining nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, X-ray absorption spectroscopy, and sequential extraction. For both pyrolysis and HTC treatments, degradation of organic phosphate and crystallization of Ca phosphate minerals were observed and were highly dependent on treatment temperature. Extensive crystallization of Ca phosphate minerals occurred at temperatures above 450 °C during pyrolysis, compared to the lower temperature (175 and 225 °C) requirements during HTC. As a result, P was immobilized in the hydrochars and high temperature pyrochars, and was extracted primarily by HCl. Because Ca is the dominating P-complexing cation in all four manures, all manures showed similar P speciation and transformation behaviors during the treatments. Results from this work provided deeper insights into the thermochemical processes occurred during the pyrolysis and HTC treatments of biological wastes, as well as guidance for P reclamation and recycling from these wastes.

Shortage in phosphorus (P) resources and P wastewater pollution is considered as a serious problem worldwide. The application of modified biochar for P recovery from wastewater and reuse of recovered P as agricultural fertilizer is a preferred process. This work aims to develop a calcium and magnesium loaded biochar (Ca–Mg/biochar) application for P recovery from biogas fermentation liquid. The physico-chemical characterization, adsorption efficiency, adsorption selectivity, and postsorption availability of Ca-Mg/biochar were investigated. The synthesized Ca–Mg/biochar was rich in organic functional groups and in CaO and MgO nanoparticles. With the increase in synthesis temperature, the yield decreased, C content increased, H content decreased, N content remained the same basically, and BET surface area increased. The P adsorption of Ca–Mg/biochar could be accelerated by nano-CaO and nano-MgO particles and reached equilibrium after 360 min. The process was endothermic, spontaneous, and showed an increase in the disorder of the solid–liquid interface. Moreover, it could be fitted by the Freundlich model. The maximum P adsorption amounts were 294.22, 315.33, and 326.63 mg/g. The P adsorption selectivity of Ca–Mg/biochar could not be significantly influenced by the typical pH level of biogas fermentation liquid. The nano-CaO and nano-MgO particles of Ca–Mg/biochar could reduce the negative interaction effects of coexisting ions. The P releasing amounts of postsorption Ca–Mg/biochar were in the order of Ca–Mg/B600 > Ca–Mg/B450 > Ca–Mg/B300. Results revealed that postsorption Ca–Mg/biochar can continually release P and is more suitable for an acid environment.

Phosphorus (P) is an essential nutrient for all organisms, thus playing unique and critical roles at the food-energy-water nexus. Most P utilized by human activities eventually converges into various solid biowastes, such as crop biomass, animal manures, and sewage sludges. Therefore, integration of efficient P recovery practices into solid biowaste management will not only significantly reduce the dependence on limited geological P resources but also reduce P runoff and related water contamination issues associated with traditional waste management strategies. This study reviews the applications of (hydro)thermal techniques for the treatment of solid biowastes, which can greatly facilitate P recovery in addition to waste volume reduction, decontamination, and energy recovery. Research showed that P speciation (including molecular moiety, complexation state, and mineralogy) can experience significant changes during (hydro)thermal treatments, and are impacted by treatment techniques and conditions. Changes in P speciation and overall properties of the products can alter the mobility and bioavailability of P, and subsequent P reclamation and recycling efficiency of the treatment products. This review summarizes recent progresses in this direction, identifies the challenges and knowledge gaps, and provides a foundation for future research efforts targeting at sustainable management of nutrient-rich biowastes.

With the rapid economic growth and expansion of urban area in the past over thirty years in China, the land value increased rapidly in the process of land use conversion, which has aroused great social conflicts. Model of land value increment allocation is established based on the concept of land development right and applied in a case study about Guangzhou. It is concluded that according with the new approach of land value increment distribution based on LDR, special consideration for the function of social security of farmland, providing an new approach for the reform of land property right system and land compensation system reform. Keywords: Land value increment; Benefit allocation; Land development right; Farmland conversion

With the development of database technology as well as the widespread application of Database management system, our capabilities of both generating and collecting data have been increasing rapidly. In addition, popular use of the World Wide Web as a global information system has flooded us with a tremendous amount of data and information. This explosive growth in stored or transient data has generated an urgent need for new techniques and automated tools that can intelligently assist us in transforming the vast amounts of data into useful information and knowledge. The Data Mining technology brought forward. Data mining, also popularly referred to knowledge discovery from data (KDD), is the automated or convenient extraction of patterns representing knowledge implicitly stored or captured in large databases, data warehouses, the Web, other massive information repositories, or data streams. Data mining is a multidisciplinary field, drawing work from areas including database technology, machine learning, statistics, pattern recognition, information retrieval, neural networks, knowledge-based systems, artificial intelligence, high-performance computing, and data visualization. Database and Information Technology in the Decision Tree of is very important for the military. The Data Mining had been applied and studied in these years, and it has been applied in many domains successfully, such as business, finance and medical treatment. However, little is applied in communication construction scheme.

The recycling of lost phosphorus (P) is important in sustainable development. In line with this objective, biochar adsorption is a promising method of P recovery. Therefore, our study investigates the efficiency and selectivity of magnesium modified corn biochar (Mg/biochar) in relation to P adsorption. It also examines the available P derived from postsorption Mg/biochar. Mg/biochar is rich in magnesium nanoparticles and organic functional groups, and it can adsorb 90% of the equilibrium amount of P within 30 min. The Mg/biochar P adsorption process is mainly controlled by chemical action. The maximum P adsorption amount of Mg/biochar is 239 mg/g. The Langmuir-Freundlich model fits the P adsorption isotherm best. Thermodynamics calculation shows ∆H > 0, ∆G < 0, ∆S > 0, and it demonstrates the P adsorption process is an endothermic, spontaneous, and increasingly disordered. The optimal pH is 9. The amounts of P adsorbed by Mg/B300, Mg/B450, and Mg/B600 from swine wastewater are lower than that adsorbed from synthetic P wastewater by 6.6%, 4.8%, and 4.2%, respectively. Mg/biochar is more resistant to pH and to the influence of coexisting ions than biochar. Finally, postsorption Mg/biochar can release P persistently. The P release equilibrium concentrations are ordered as follows: Mg/B600 > Mg/B450 > Mg/B300. The postsorption Mg/B300, Mg/B450, and Mg/B600 can release 3.3%, 3.9%, and 4.4% of the total adsorbed P, respectively, per interval time.

Struvite crystallization is an efficient method for phosphorus recovery from animal manure wastewater. However, large amount of organic coexisting impurities, contained in animal manure wastewater, might influence struvite crystallization. In this study, the effect of typical organic matter contained in animal manure wastewater, such as butyric acid, fulvic acid, tetracycline, on phosphorus recovery was examined. The following conclusions were drawn: (1) with an increase in butyric acid concentration in animal manure wastewater, phosphorus recovery efficiency did not change significantly; (2) with an increase in fulvic acid concentration in animal manure wastewater, phosphorus recovery efficiency decreased obviously; (3) with an increase in tetracycline concentration in animal manure wastewater, phosphorus recovery efficiency decreased slightly.

The problem of phosphorus discharge is related to environmental protection and food security. Struvite crystallization is a useful technology for phosphate recovery from wastewater. In the research, struvite crystallization process with CO2 degasification continuous U-shape reactor (CUSR) was application for phosphate recovery from animal manure wastewater. The result indicated PO4 3--P recovery ratio could achieve 47-53% without magnesium addition when CUSR hydraulic retention time controlled at 60 min. With extra magnesium addition, PO4 3--P recovery ratio could significant achieve 80-86% at magnesium addition amount 57.5 mg/dm3. PHREEQC modeling predictions trend of struvite crystallization was close to CUSR experimental results. The modeling calculation can provide a theoretical guide for operational parameters design. For seeding technology, high phosphate recovery efficiency was obtained and preformed struvite was the most effective seeding material. Surface characterization analysis demonstrated the dominant composition of chemical solids was struvite. Water extraction analysis indicated chemical solids recovery from animal manure wastewater could release PO4 3--P slowly and be available as slow-release fertilizer.

The problem of nutrient pollution from piggy wastewater has been considered as a serious problem. Enhancing struvite crystallization process is an efficient technology for ammonium recovery. In our study, the optimal reaction conditions of pH, Mg2+: NH4+: PO43- molar ratio, mixing reaction time, and different kinds of chemicals combinations for ammonium recovery were examined. The conclusions were drawn as following. The optimal pH for ammonium recovery was 9.0. The optimal Mg2+: NH4+: PO43- molar ratio for ammonium recovery was 1.3:1:1. The optimal mixing reaction time for ammonium recovery was 10 min. The chemicals combination of MgCl2 + Na2HPO4 was the most efficient for ammonium recovery. Scanning electron microscopy analysis indicated the unshaped struvite crystal was coarse and its size was irregular.

Winter is the most scenery depression during annual plant landscape. It could be improved depending on exploring suitable winter landscape construction methods, by using the rational allocation of winter ornamental plants. This paper discussed the ornamental characteristics of winter garden plants and winter garden plant landscape construction methods as well as configuration arts, proposed allocation patterns from different viewing angles, provided a reference for urban winter garden landscape.

Ammonium nitrogen pollution is a key factor related to water eutrophication. In our works, biochar adsorption for ammonium nitrogen removal from wastewater has been investigated. Transmission Electron Microscope with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, and Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy was performed to characterize the prepared biochar. The optimal solution pH, and coexisting ions effect for ammonium nitrogen removal from wastewater was examined. Surface characterization demonstrated the obtained biochar was coarse, unshaped, irregular, and contained a great deal of carbon. With an increase in solution pH, biochar adsorption amount of ammonium nitrogen was decrease. With an increase in coexisting ions concentration, biochar adsorption amount of ammonium nitrogen was decrease.

Biochar is environmental friendly materials that can be used for environmental protection. In the research, the application of biochar for phosphate adsorption and recovery from wastewater was examined. The material surface characterization analysis, include Transmission Electron Microscope with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy, was performed to characterize the prepared biochar. The application analysis, include optimal solution pH and interfering ions effect, was performed for phosphate adsorption and recovery from wastewater. The research conclusions were drawn as follow: (1) material surface characterization demonstrated the prepared biochar was coarse, unshaped, irregular, and contained a great deal of carbon; (2) application analysis indicated biochar adsorption amount for phosphate was decrease with an increase in solution pH, and biochar adsorption amount for phosphate was also decrease with an increase in interfering ions concentration.

Since phosphorus, a non-renewable and non-substitutable resource, has become the principal contributor and limiting factor to water eutrophication, achieving phosphorus removal and recovery from wastewater is pretty essential. Even though struvite crystallization process has been widely used for phosphate (P) recovery in wastewater treatment, its application is hampered by difficulties controlling small particle size and crystal growth. This study was conducted to control the settleability of struvite by calculating and predicting the struvite-settling percentage (Ps), which is always affected by the initial concentration of P (CP), solution pH (pH), reaction time (t), reaction temperature (T), agitation rate (Ar) and inlet flow velocity (vf) of the fluidized bed reactor. The results showed that the settleability of struvite could be enhanced by increasing T and decreasing pH, Ar, or vf and would perform worse with overlong t or excessive CP. The dynamic variation process of the solution supersaturated index (SI) combined with the phase equilibrium theory and Ostwald ripening mechanism explained the above results sufficiently. The logistic model was chosen to predict the Ps under multi-factors, but the accuracy needs to be improved.

This study conducted the quantitative analysis on the structure change of land use in Xinchang County using Lorenz curve and Gini coefficient. The results revealed the characteristics and evolution of the county's land use structure change and suggested that the county increase the distribution rate of woodland and other ecological applications for a carbon source reduced, energy saving and ecology-conducive environment.

In order to explore the energy land space, protect the environment, optimize the allocation of land resources, land use planning should be established based on land suitability evaluation. This paper aimed to propose the GIS spatial overlay method for the village-scale land suitability assessment and apply on Gulou Village of Taizhou City. Based on the research results, the paper pointed out the bio-energy land expansion area and proposed the coordination of environmental protection, ecological maintenance and economic construction to optimize the land resource planning and environmental protection for Gulou Village.

The aggravating urban thermal environment has considerable adverse effects on urban physical environment, energy consumption, and public health. Due to the complexity of factors contributing to the urban thermal environment, traditional statistical methods are insufficient for acquiring data and analyzing the impacts of human activities on the thermal environment, especially for identifying dominant factors. Based on thermal remote sensing imageries and Geographic Information System analysis, we assessed spatial pattern of urban thermal environment in Shanghai in 2008, and analyzed the factors contributing to the generation of urban heat island (UHI) using principal component analysis (PCA). We found that Shanghai had obvious UHI with uneven spatial pattern in 2008. Further, we identified three most important components leading to the variances of Shanghai’s UHI: the gradient from man-made to natural land cover, landscape configuration, and anthropogenic heat release. A linear model has thus been successfully constructed, implying that PCA is helpful in identifying major contributors to UHI. The findings are of significance for policy implication to urban thermal environment mitigation.

Assessment of the forest land use change and proposed land suitability for tea for the area along Laos - China Border were the main purpose of this research paper. An integrated GIS-based analysis system (IGAS), supporting assessment of forest land-use and land suitability for the study area where along Laos-China border was developed. Multi criteria analysis and system dynamics techniques were used to assess forest land use and land suitability and to forecast potential land-use for tea. The total study area is estimated at 10 325.07 km2 according to the field data collection and data analysis. The area of current forest cover decreased rapidly from 6337.33 km2 (61.38%) in 1992 to 5106.28 km2 (49.46%) in 2002 in the study area. The current forest was mainly transferred to potential forest and permanent agriculture especially to rubber plantation areas even in the National Conservation Biodiversity Conservation Areas. The main causes of forest land use change are poverty. In order to address the problems, land suitability classification for tea was developed based on the multi-criteria. And finally two options of land suitability classification for tea for the study areas were developed.

Based on the remote sensing (RS) and geographic information system (GIS) analysis of the Landsat multispectral scanner (MSS) and thematic mapper (TM) satellite images of 1983, 1993, and 2005, the present research examined the effectiveness of the urban construction boundaries (UCBs) in containing urban growth within the 6th Ring Road of Beijing Municipality. Three indicators on boundary control were proposed, through which the effectiveness of boundary containment, land inventory sufficiency and illegal adjacent development to the UCBs were explored. The results suggested that, first, the UCBs were limited in effectiveness in containing urban growth; second, the area encompassed by the UCBs might not be designed large enough to accommodate new development. The frustration of the urban growth control through the UCBs mainly resulted from the lack of a transparent system for urban land use planning and control to provide sufficient information, the limitation of the traditional land use prediction method to consider contingencies, and the absence of a mechanism to monitor and adjust the UCBs to respond just in time to urban change.

Forest cover and land use change directly impact biological diversity worldwide, contribute to climate change and affect the ability of biological systems to support human needs by altering ecosystem services. Given the forest land use characteristics and ecosystem types in Luang Namtha Province, Lao PDR, the forest cover and land cover category of Luang Namtha Province were divided into six classes, i.e., current forest (CF), potential forest (PF), other wooded areas (OW), permanent agricultural land (PA), other non-forest areas (NF) and water (W). In first instance, earlier geographic information data (GIS data) of forest cover and land use during 1992 and 2002 was obtained from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF), Lao PDR. Two steps of forest land use change assessment were conducted by the MAF, i.e., plot sampling on satellite image maps (SIMs) to detect the changes of forest cover and land use during 1992 and 2002 for the entire Luang Namtha Province and field verification in order to identify causes of the changes. Secondly, dynamic information of the forest land cover changes during this ten-year period was calculated by means of map algebra in ArcGIS 9.2. Thirdly, based on the theory of ecosystem service functions and the service function values of different global ecosystems, the value of the six forest cover and land use categories in the province was obtained. Finally, ecological environmental effects, produced by the regional land cover changes over the study period, were calculated.

The acquisition of precise soil data representative of the entire survey area, is a critical issue for many treatments such as irrigation or fertilization in precision agriculture. The aim of this study was to investigate the spatial variability of soil bulk electrical conductivity (ECb) in a coastal saline field and design an optimized spatial sampling scheme of ECb based on a sampling design algorithm, the variance quad-tree (VQT) method. Soil ECb data were collected from the field at 20 m interval in a regular grid scheme. The smooth contour map of the whole field was obtained by ordinary kriging interpolation, VQT algorithm was then used to split the smooth contour map into strata of different number desired, the sampling locations can be selected within each stratum in subsequent sampling. The result indicated that the probability of choosing representative sampling sites was increased significantly by using VQT method with the sampling number being greatly reduced compared to grid sampling design while retaining the same prediction accuracy. The advantage of the VQT method is that this scheme samples sparsely in fields where the spatial variability is relatively uniform and more intensive where the variability is large. Thus the sampling efficiency can be improved, hence facilitate an assessment methodology that can be applied in a rapid, practical and cost-effective manner.

Sustainable farmland consolidation covers ecology, economy and society, which means, its only goal is to protect eco-environment, in accordance with public benefits and economic laws. China is still a developing country, facing capital-lacking, an important but difficult problem, while sustainable farmland consolidation will need more money than common farmland consolidation. To solve the problem, this paper put forward and designed a new financing mode for farmland consolidation: BOT (Build-Operate-Transfer), which can effectively solve the financing problem and investment reclamation by the way of concession, and make sustainable farmland consolidation be realized in China.

In recent years, the application of ecosystem service value in land use change research is a hot topic in many famous international journals. However, policy makers are seldom taking into account the achievements of the related studies in practice. This paper summarized the three main bottlenecks in applying ecosystem service value in land management practices, i. e., the difficulty in measuring the service values, the complexity of driving factors, and the bias of evaluation criteria. Some solutions on the bottlenecks were provided, and the future research directions in China were prospected. It was suggested that in the studies of land use change based on ecosystem service value, it would be more appropriate to adopt comparative analysis method in small scale case studies, especially focusing on the natural ecological resources and the excessive loss of their values.

Agricultural land consolidation is a strong disturbance to farmland ecosystem. In traditional agricultural land consolidation, the main technical and economic indices for the design of ditches include the convenience for production and transportation, the allocation of water resources, and the improvement of water utilization, but short of ecological consideration, which has already affected the spread of agricultural species, caused the degradation of bio-habitat, and given obvious negative effects on the bio-competition mechanism, buffering and compensation capacity, and insect pests-resistance of farmland ecosystem. This paper summarized the functions of ecological ditches, and introduced the recent progress on the formations and construction designs of ecological ditches, tests of ecological engineering methods, and technologies and methods of choosing correct ecological materials. It was suggested that the future research should focus on the different functional requirements and specifications for different roads and ditches, and the characteristics and habitats of all the organisms and animals should be considered by the designers and constructors. Moreover, a comprehensive design which meets the ecological demands for the ditches' formations, structures, and regulatory sizes should be taken into account to solve the most of the problems listed above.

By using RS and GIS techniques, the spatiotemporal changes of wetlands in Hangzhou Bay Industrial Belt, one of the most developed zones in Zhejiang Province, from 1990 to 2005 were studied. There was a frequent conversion between the wetlands and other land use types and between the wetlands themselves, mainly manifested in the conversion between wetland and farmland, and from wetland to construction land and from tidal flat to aquiculture area. The comparative advantage of other land use types and the policy of cultivated land's requisition-compensation balance decided the inherent mechanisms of these spatiotemporal changes. Driven by the aquaculture's comparative advantage to traditional agriculture, large areas of inland farmland and of the tidal flat along the coast of Hangzhou Bay were reclaimed into aquiculture area, and the rapid expansion of construction land, limited land resources, and the implement of cultivated land's requisition-compensation balance policy induced the wetlands being occupied.

Based on remote sensing image Landsat/TM6, and supported by GIS, this article studied the Spatial and temporal characteristics of thermal field in Hangzhou since 1991 to 2005. Contrastive analysis was conducted between two phases of remote sensing images on the characteristic of thermal Spatial and temporal change, as well as the thermal change difference of different fractal section. It is indicated:  The overall surface brightness temperature showed a rising tendency, the scope of “Heat Island” increased; the change of urban thermal from 1991 to 2005 showed that only the area of low temperature region reduced, the decrement is 7.401×107 m2; while the area of intermediate temperature region, inferior high temperature region and high temperature region all increased, the increase respectively is 9.125×106m2, 2.479×108m2 and 4.010×107m2; ‚As respect of the spatial expansion direction, in the 15 years from 1991 to 2005, the change of Hangzhou urban thermal field showed the characteristic of “outside expanding”, “dispersing”, “associating” and “inside digesting”. ƒFractal dimension manifested well the section change difference of brightness temperature in different urban expansion direction. The research also indicated, the change of landscape pattern in Hangzhou had the uniformity with the change of heat environment ecological effect. And the landscape pattern of urban underlying surface was the primary factor of the characteristic of urban thermal distribution.

The purpose of this paper is to present some empirical findings on the spatial distribution of real estate taxes impacts on housing price in China. The fixed effect regression model was used to estimate this effect with data of the 31 provinces and metropolis in 1998-2006. The fording showed that: (1) real estate taxes had both direct and indirect impact on housing price. The direct effect was real estate taxes capitalization, and the indirect effects were referred as the capitalization of public services deriving from the real estate taxes revenues. (2) Real estate taxes had a negative effect on housing price in China. If the collected real estate taxes increased at 1 percentage, housing price would increase at 0.038 percentage, but if local public expenditure increased at 1 percentage, housing price would increase at 0.398 percentages. (3) The real estate taxes burden effect on housing price in central districts of China was much more obvious than Western China, and this effect in Eastern China was not obvious. The reason for the results could be explained to some extent as the spatial difference of local public expenditure.

One approach to apply precision agriculture to optimize crop production and environmental quality is identifying management zones. In this paper, the variables of soil electrical conductivity (EC) data, cotton yield data and normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) data in an about 15 ha field in a coastal saline land were selected as data resources, and their spatial variabilities were firstly analyzed and spatial distribution maps constructed with geostatistics technique. Then fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm was used to define management zones, fuzzy performance index (FPI) and normalized classification entropy (NCE) were used to determine the optimal cluster numbers. Finally one-way variance analysis was performed on 224 georeferenced soil and yield sampling points to assess how well the defined management zones reflected the soil properties and productivity level. The results reveal that the optimal number of management zones for the present study area was 3 and the defined management zones provided a better description of soil properties and yield variation. Statistical analyses indicate significant differences between the chemical properties of soil samples and crop yield in each management zone, and management zone 3 presented the highest nutrient level and potential crop productivity, whereas management zone 1 the lowest. Based on these findings, we conclude that fuzzy c-means clustering approach can be used to delineate management zones by using the given three variables in the coastal saline soils, and the defined management zones form an objective basis for targeting soil samples for nutrient analysis and development of site-specific application strategies.

In this paper, we present a Kalman filter algorithm with fuzzy theory, which shows how to search for the optimum weight coefficient values of a Kalman filter. In the traditional Kalman filter algorithm, we discover some drawbacks such as low convergence time and large mean square error (MSE). Therefore, we adopt a Kalman algorithm combined with fuzzy logic theory for improving the convergence rate and the MSE value of the conventional Kalman filter using simulated results under an additive white gaussian noise (AWGN) channel. The major goal of this paper is to show that a Kalman filter, which is based on fuzzy logic for separating the signals under an AWGN channel, has better performance than the conventional Kalman algorithm.