Phylogenetic Characteristics of Canine Parvovirus Type 2c Variant Endemic in Shanghai, China

Canine parvovirus type 2 (CPV-2) has spread and mutated globally over the past 40 years. In the present study, 206 samples from dogs suspected of CPV-2 infection were collected from five veterinary clinics in Shanghai city, China. The average positive rate for CPV-2 was detected to be 40.78% using the PCR method. Using an F81 cell (feline kidney cell) culture, the isolates of three CPV-2c strains were obtained. The near full-length genome sequences of the isolates were determined and submitted to GenBank: CPV-SH2001 (MW650830), CPV-SH2002 (MW811188), and CPV-SH2003 (MW811189). By comparing the amino acid sequences of 12 CPV strains with those of 48 related strains retrieved from GenBank, all of the CPV strains from Shanghai were typed as belonging to a relatively new CPV-2c variant spreading in Asia, with typical amino acid residues (5Gly, 267Tyr, 324Ile, and 370Arg) in the VP2 protein. The divergence time of this new CPV-2c clade was estimated by the phylogenetic tree using the maximum likelihood and RelTime with Dated Tips (RTDT) approaches. Our results indicate that the 426 and 324 VP2 amino acid residues are under strong selection pressure with a posterior probability of 0.966 and 0.943, respectively. Therefore, this study provides insight into the phylogenetic characteristics of the current CPV-2c variant in Shanghai city, China.

A Multi-Criteria Evaluation of the Urban Ecological Environment in Shanghai Based on Remote Sensing

The urban ecological environment is related to human health and is one of the most concerned issues nowadays. Hence, it is essential to detect and then evaluate the urban ecological environment. However, the conventional manual detection methods have many limitations, such as the high cost of labor, time, and capital. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the urban ecological environment more conveniently and reasonably, thus this paper proposed an ecological environment evaluation method based on remote sensing and a projection pursuit model. Firstly, a series of criteria for the urban ecological environment in Shanghai City are obtained through remote sensing technology. Then, the ecological environment is comprehensively evaluated using the projection pursuit model. Lastly, the ecological environment changes of Shanghai City are analyzed. The results show that the average remote sensing ecological index of Shanghai in 2020 increased obviously compared with that in 2016. In addition, Jinshan District, Songjiang District, and Qingpu District have higher ecological environment quality, while Hongkou District, Jingan District, and Huangpu District have lower ecological environment quality. In addition, the ecological environment of all districts has a significant positive spatial autocorrelation. These findings suggest that the ecological environment of Shanghai has improved overall in the past five years. In addition, Hongkou District, Jingan District, and Huangpu District should put more effort into improving the ecological environment in future, and the improvement of ecological environment should consider the impact of surrounding districts. Moreover, the proposed weight setting method is more reasonable, and the proposed evaluation method is convenient and practical.

Drift in policy implementation: Incentives thwarted in a recycling programme

An incentives-based residential recycling programme was designed and implemented for improving residential waste sorting in Shanghai city, but showed very limited success in its performance. To identify why, this study systematically analysed each step of implementation using key informant interviews and site observations. Results show that policy intentions were retained in the policy devolution processes from Municipality to District, and then to Street (ward) levels, but the incentives concepts were effectively nullified in the further devolution to community-level governance. The local implementers focused on formal key performance indicators (KPIs) in order to satisfy inspections. However, the KPIs, which had been devised to allow ease of measurement, were found to unintentionally cause divergence from the policy intention of incentivisation of residents. Furthermore, high scores for these KPIs masked the implementation failure. This identification of the effective derailing of a policy via conscientious implementation is worth highlighting for avoidance in other programmes, in recycling or elsewhere.

Investigating the development and interaction of bus-metro based on Lotka–Volterra models: Evidence from seven central cities in China

Bus and metro are the two most important public transport modes in many metropolises in China, and they both have experienced rapid growth and meanwhile coexisted for decades. However, little is known on how the metro and bus interacted with each other during their rapid growths. This study was proposed to investigate the growth and interaction of bus-metro from the macro perspective. The passenger volume data for metro and bus were collected from seven central cities to represent the development of the two public transport modes, and the Logistic model and Lotka–Volterra model were employed to model the growth as well as the interaction of bus-metro, respectively. The modeling results show that the development of bus conforms to the Logistic model (i.e. S-shaped curve), while the bus-metro interaction conforms to the Lotka–Volterra model with interaction modes of competition (Shanghai city from 2000–2009, Shanghai city from 2009–2018, Guangzhou city from 2009–2017, Nanjing city from 2008–2018), and mutualism (Guangzhou city from 2000–2009). The further analysis indicates that urban characteristics and policies determine the interaction, and the parameters of the Lotka–Volterra model could be used to judge the bus-metro interaction type.

The Potential Impacts of Electric Vehicles on Urban Air Quality in Shanghai City

The Shanghai government has outlined plans for the new vehicles used for the public transportation, rental, sanitation, postal, and intra-city freight to be completely powered by electricity by 2020. This paper analyzed the characteristics of vehicle emissions in Shanghai in the past five years. The potential reduction in road traffic related emissions due to the promotion and application of electric vehicle in Shanghai was evaluated. The potential reduction was quantified by vehicular emissions. The vehicular emissions inventories are calculated by the COPERT IV model under the different scenarios, of which the results indicate that promoting electric vehicles is the efficient measure to control all road traffic related emissions and improve urban air quality. The results also provided basis and support for making policies to promote and manage electric vehicles.

Evaluating long-term potential evapotranspiration and soil moisture dynamics at Shanghai City China

As the finical hub of China, the Shanghai metropolitan area is one of the most important regions on earth, which requires significant efforts in water, energy and resources management and supply. Ongoing dynamic changes in climate have posed large uncertainties in our ability to better quantify, estimate and predict future hydrological and ecological responses, including soil moisture dynamics and potential evapotranspirative demands. Given these significant implications, in this study, we focused on better understanding long-term dynamic trends in soil moisture and potential evapotranspiration at Shanghai with the Hargreaves equation and 1-Dimensional flow transport with Richard’s equation. We further tested how perturbations in temperature and precipitation patterns influence soil moisture and potential evapotranspiration responses. Our results suggested significant correlation between temperature and potential evapotranspiration as well as precipitation inputs and soil moisture. We believe these results can provide useful insights to help us better understand the hydrological responses at Shanghai to climate change.