Beware of the Double-Edged Sword of Populism

Populism in Western democracies is on the rise.What was once conf ined to outliers and extreme political parties is now tearing away into the whole political system.Inflammatory speeches and critics of so-called'fake news'made by

Double-edged sword-Challenges and opportunities

In this Shi Jiazhuang Royal King Apparel Group fashion show and franchise recruitment event, Liu Lianhong, president of the association of clothing industry trade of Hebei province made his presence and delivered a key speech involving the status quo of Hebei garment industry, opportunities and challenges it faces, practical solutions and expectation as well, which impressed all the present a lot. After the event l had a face to face interview with him:

Brillouin scattering spectrum for liquid detection and applications in oceanography

The Brillouin scattering spectrum has been used to investigate the properties of a liquid medium.Here,we propose an improved method based on the double-edge technique to obtain the Brillouin spectrum of a liquid.We calculated the transmission ratios and deduced the Brillouin shift and linewidth to construct the Brillouin spectrum by extracting the Brillouin edge signal through filtered double-edge data.We built a detection system to test the performance of this method and measured the Brillouin spectrum for distilled water at different temperatures and compared it with the theoretical prediction.The observed difference between the experimental and theoretical values for Brillouin shift and linewidth is less than 4.3 MHz and 3.2 MHz,respectively.Moreover,based on the double-edge technique,the accuracy of the extracted temperatures and salinity is approximately 0.1°C and 0.5‰,respectively,indicating significant potential for application in water detection and oceanography.

Double-edged effects caused by magnesium ions and alkaline environment regulate bioactivities of magnesium-incorporated silicocarnotite in vitro

Magnesium(Mg)is an important element for its enhanced osteogenic and angiogenic properties in vitro and in vivo,however,the inherent alkalinity is the adverse factor that needs further attention.In order to study the role of alkalinity in regulating osteogenesis and angiogenesis in vitro,magnesium-silicocarnotite[Mg-Ca5(PO4)2SiO4,Mg-CPS]was designed and fabricated.In this study,Mg-CPS showed better osteogenic and angiogenic properties than CPS within 10wt.%magnesium oxide(MgO),since the adversity of alkaline condition was covered by the benefits of improved Mg ion concentrations through activating Smad2/3-Runx2 signaling pathway in MC3T3-E1 cells and PI3K-AKT signaling pathway in human umbilical vein endothelial cells in vitro.Besides,provided that MgO was incorporated with 15wt.%in CPS,the bioactivities had declined due to the environment consisting of higher-concentrated Mg ions,stronger alkalinity and lower Ca/P/Si ions caused.According to the results,it indicated that bioactivities of Mg-CPS in vitro were regulated by the double-edged effects,which were the consequence of Mg ions and alkaline environment combined.Therefore,if MgO is properly incorporated in CPS,the improved bioactivities could cover alkaline adversity,making Mg-CPS bioceramics promising in orthopedic clinical application for its enhancement of osteogenesis and angiogenesis in vitro.

Oxidative Stress and Role of Natural Plant Derived Antioxidants in Animal Reproduction

The experimental knowledge on the role of oxidative stress,and beneficial and detrimental effects of plant derived antioxidants in male and female animal reproduction are reviewed in this article.Free radical-induced oxidative stress in animal reproduction causes great loss to livestock industry.Antioxidant therapy has been implicated to be effective in preventing diseases resulted from oxidative stress.Considering the advantages of lower side effects of natural antioxidants than those of synthetic antioxidants,plants or their extracts have been extensively utilized in animals.Although many advances have been gained on application of plant derived antioxidants in alleviating oxidative stress,debatable issues still exist.Because many opposite effects were observed even using plant extracts containing similar bioactive substances in the same animal species.Therefore,plant derived antioxidants,like free radicals,are ＂double-edged swords＂ in animal reproduction,representing that they may exhibit beneficial or detrimental effects in animal reproduction,including spermatogenesis,semen functions,estrous cycles,ovulation,ovary functions,endometrium,embryo development,and pregnancy.Besides dose-dependent manner as an explanation of plant extracts＇ dual function,future studies are needed to investigate the mechanism of double-edged actions of plant derived antioxidants in different animal reproduction systems.

Anti-Interference Low-Power Double-Edge Triggered Flip-Flop Based on C-Elements

When the input signal has been interfered and glitches occur,the power consumption of Double-Edge Triggered Flip-Flops(DETFFs)will significantly increase.To effectively reduce the power consumption,this paper presents an anti-interference low-power DETFF based on C-elements.The improved C-element is used in this DETFF,which effectively blocks the glitches in the input signal,prevents redundant transitions inside the DETFF,and reduces the charge and discharge frequencies of the transistor.The C-element has also added pull-up and pull-down paths,reducing its latency.Compared with other existing DETFFs,the DETFF proposed in this paper only flips once on the clock edge,which greatly reduces the redundant transitions caused by glitches and effectively reduces power consumption.This paper uses HSPICE to simulate the proposed DETFF and other 10 DETFFs.The findings show that compared with the other 10 types of DETFFs,the proposed DETFF has achieved large performance indexes in the total power consumption,total power consumption with glitches,delays,and power delay product.A detailed analysis of variance indicates that the proposed DETFF features less sensitivity to process,voltage,temperature,and Negative Bias Temperature Instability(NBTI)-induced aging variations.

DOUBLE-EDGED LIMIT OF TOTAL FERTILITY RATES

In this paper we present the accurate estimation of total fertility rates, prove the theorem of upper and lower bounds of double-edged limit and provide the formulas of upper and lower bounds of total fertility rates. Based on these estimations and statistical data, we calculate the upper and lower bounds of the double-edged limit for 46 countries including China. Furthermore, we describe the positive growth rate, negative growth rate and zero growth rate of population development. These results are of great importance for us to control population not only in theory but also in practice.

A Double-Edged Sword

The global financial crisis has not slowed the country’s urbanization pace china will see a new urbanization upswing in the future, according to the Blue Book of Cities in China released by the Urban Development and Environment Research Center under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) on June 15.

Two Sides of American Exceptionalism

This paper concentrates on American exceptionalism.It is divided into five parts.Firstly,a brief introduction about the paper is given.Secondly,the definition of American exceptionalism and a general overview of it are given.Thirdly,the good side of American exceptionalism that makes the United States superior to other countries is clarified.Fourthly,the bad side of American exceptionalism is discussed.Finally,a concise conclusion of American exceptionalism is made.