With the ongoing advancement of digital technology and its application in rural areas, "digital village" has become one of the focal points in the field of geography. This study provided a definition and connotation of "digital village" based on a summary and analysis of existing literature. It reviewed the frontiers of research in China and internationally and offered a comparison from the perspective of knowledge production. The findings include: 1) In China, research predominantly focuses on normative studies aimed at addressing real-world issues in rural development and promoting policy optimization. The construction of digital village is seen as a means to facilitate high-quality rural development, with a concentration on how to leverage digital village initiatives to support rural revitalization and the rural restructuring resulting from the development of digital village. 2) The international studies are primarily empirical and tend to explain micro social phenomena. By examining specific issues such as the digital divide between urban and rural areas, these studies highlight various dimensions of digitization in the rural transformation process, particularly focusing on the formation of the urban-rural digital divide and its impact on coordinated urban-rural development. From a geographical perspective, future research could further address the following aspects: Re-thinking of the concept of digital village from the perspective of human-environment relationship, quantitative measurement of the urban-rural digital divide from a multi-spatial scale perspective, examination of digital village from the micro-actor perspective, and investigation of the positive and negative externalities of digital village construction based on a comprehensive research paradigm in geography.

Continental chemical weathering is one of the key processes shaping the Earth's surface morphology, influencing the global material cycle and regulating the global climate. Effectively tracing surface weathering processes has consistently been a focal point within geosciences. Lithium and its isotopes, distinguished by their unique chemical properties, exhibit great potential in tracing continental silicate weathering. This article systematically reviewed the literature and analyzed the fractionation behavior and patterns of lithium isotopes during chemical weathering processes in experimental simulations, weathering profiles, and at the watershed scales. Based on this analysis, the following insights are obtained: 1) The continental weathering process in surface environments is complex, exhibiting a nonlinear relationship between chemical weathering intensity and the δ⁷Li value. 2) Integrative studies of published data indicate that the relationship between the δ⁷Li values of weathered materials and lithium content in highly weathered regions exhibits two patterns (The variation in Li content is limited, yet the δ⁷Li values exhibit significant differentiation; conversely, there is a certain degree of variation in Li content when the differentiation of δ⁷Li values is limited), with the underlying causes requiring further investigation. 3) The red earth region in southern China is an ideal area for weathering research, showing potential in exploring the mechanisms and patterns of lithium isotope fractionation. This article argues that there are still issues in using lithium isotopes as a tracer for chemical weathering, such as insufficient quantitative studies of complex processes, limited multi-scale integrated research, unclear mechanisms of lithium isotopes in highly weathered products, and the lack of a global weathering estimation model. Future efforts should focus on enhancing laboratory simulations, empirical studies, and multi-scale integrated research to further explore the potential of lithium isotope mechanisms in underexplored areas and validate the effectiveness of lithium isotope tracing in chemical weathering through the combined use of multi-isotope systems.

With the rapid development of the digital economy, it is of great significance to explore the impact of digital technology innovation networks on regional economic resilience. Taking 41 cities in the Yangtze River Delta as the example, this study used the data of digital technology innovation cooperation patents and economic and social development from 2010 to 2021, and the social network analysis method and economic resilience measurement index, to describe the temporal and spatial change characteristics of digital technology innovation networks and economic resilience in cities in the Yangtze River Delta, and empirically test the influence of the structural characteristics of digital technology innovation networks on urban economic resilience. The results show that: 1) The cooperation degree of digital technology innovation in the Yangtze River Delta was constantly increasing, and it has gradually evolved into a core-periphery structure and a cohesive subgroup structure. The economic resilience of the cities in the Yangtze River Delta has been steadily increasing through the study period, but the spatial differences were gradually increasing. 2) Degree centrality and closeness centrality of digital technology innovation networks in Yangtze River Delta cities had a significant positive effect on the promotion of urban economic resilience, while betweenness centrality had a negative impact on economic resilience. Robustness test also showed that this conclusion is valid. 3) Compared with the central cities, the digital technology innovation network in peripheral cities had a greater impact on their economic resilience, and the degree of intermediary centrality was more significant, which was quite different from that in core cities. This study is useful for clarifying the relationship between digital technology innovation networks and economic resilience, and exploring the path to enhance regional economic resilience.

Space is a fundamental concept in geography and the traditions of geographical thought. With the continuous advancement of the information technology revolution, our understanding of space is also evolving, leading to the emergence of the concept of the space of flows. This concept has become a new perspective for understanding globalization, global cities, and the spatial organization of socioeconomic activities in the new era. This article reviewed and analyzed the proposition, evolution of the connotation, and expansion in the field of geography of the concept of space of flows. Through application cases at four different geographical scales—global, national, city, and individual—the article demonstrated the unique explanatory power of the space of flows in understanding real-world problems. The space of flows transcends the limitations of the space of places, emphasizing the importance of various "flows" in the spatial organization of urban systems and socioeconomic activities. It explores new epistemological and methodological innovations in understanding space, which is significantly essential for modern geography's innovative development. It also contributes to promoting the interdisciplinary integration of geographical science in the new era.

The integrated consolidation of resources within human-environment systems can effectively promote the scientific establishment of resource spatial configurations in courtyards, facilitating regional ecological and economic development. With the intensification of population aging and decline, China, as a large traditional agricultural country, is likely to see most rural living spaces returning to traditional courtyard-style structures in the future. Therefore, based on Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory and the resource metabolism theory, we explored the development scenarios of rural courtyards in China in the future. We also applied the resource metabolism analytical framework with the fundamental characteristics of the micro-geographical, economic, social, and industrial systems of courtyards, systematically analyzing the spatial configuration and flow patterns of courtyard resources. By comprehensively considering the multi-level needs of rural residents in the future, we established a conceptual model of courtyard resource spatial evolution based on an improved version of Maslow's theory, a panoramic resource flow model for courtyards under spatial compound structures, an evaluation indicator system of courtyard resource metabolism, and a future-oriented research framework for resource metabolism in rural courtyards, which systematically elucidated the scientific relationship between courtyard resource metabolism research and spatial function and regional policy. We innovatively put forward the scientific basis and research framework of resource metabolism with independent courtyards as the research object, evaluated the flow pattern of resources in the courtyard from the micro-scale, which is helpful for accurately identifying the optimal allocation path of resources in the region, so that the allocation of resources, ecological benefits, economic benefits, social benefits, and residents' emotional benefits can be maximized. It provides a scientific support for the global integration and diversified value-added of courtyard resources, provides an efficient guidance for the development decision making of rural areas, and promotes the sustainable development of rural human settlements.

New quality productive forces are key factors for the national development strategy, important powers to promote the deep integration of the digital economy and real economy, and the new dynamic energies for the development of the cultural tourism industry. New quality productive forces of the cultural tourism industry are the key forces to crack the dilemma of traditional cultural tourism development and enhance the resilience of the cultural tourism industry. There is a great need to build a research framework for digital cultural tourism based on the new round of technological revolution and industrial change. This study took connotation analysis-research progress-hot topics as the logical framework, and systematically examined and summarized the research results of digital cultural tourism from the aspects of conceptualization, development, hot topics, review, and prospect. The results show that: 1) Studies have defined the basic concept of digital cultural tourism from the perspective of digital technology, cultural tourism consumption, and cultural tourism industrialization, and digital cultural tourism has positively contributed to the high-quality development of cultural tourism and cultural tourism consumption experience. 2) The development of digital cultural tourism has gone through three phases of budding exploration, initial development, and explosive growth, and academic research and industrial practice have maintained a close connection. 3) The new generation of digital technologies has profoundly influenced the research content of digital cultural tourism, and the research results of digital cultural tourism are summarized based on subject-object-medium. 4) Digital cultural tourism research presents the development trend of combining qualitative and quantitative research methods, and mathematical and statistical methods, questionnaire survey, experiment, and case study are the main methods of digital cultural tourism research. 5) The study areas are often meso and micro scales, involving specific regions, cultural heritage sites, and tourist attractions. Finally, this study provides a prospect for the future of digital cultural tourism research from strengthening theoretical research, enriching research content, expanding research areas, and innovating research methods. The results contribute to enriching the theoretical system of digital cultural tourism research, promoting the high-quality development of digital cultural tourism, and implementing the digital China strategy.

Current literature on regional industrial evolution has paid much attention to the impact of regional external linkages but strategic coupling, as an important variable in the global production network framework, has received little discussion. In view of this deficiency, this study employed the panel data of nine cities of Pearl River Delta from 2003 to 2016 to examine the impact of strategic coupling on the entry dynamics of regional industry, and empirically demonstrate the moderating effect of technological density of local industries on this process. The results show that: 1) Regional external linkages have a significant impact on industrial entry, and the strategic coupling with strong dependency has a negative effect on the formation of new paths of industrial development. 2) Technological relatedness has a positive moderating effect on the impact of strategic coupling on regional industrial entry, the role of strategic coupling impact on regional industrial dynamics changed after the 2008 financial crisis, and the importance of the local enterprises' technological innovation is further highlighted. This study quantitatively explored the strategic coupling patterns of nine cities in the Pearl River Delta, and empirically demonstrated the impact of strategic coupling on the dynamics of industrial entry, which is meaningful for promoting the fusion of relational economic geography and evolutionary economic geography.

Based on the background of the formation of new quality productivity, this study took intelligent manufacturing, biomedicine, and green environmental protection industry in strategic emerging industries as examples, constructed new quality productive function networks by using enterprise foreign investment data up to 2023, and applied the social network analysis method to examine the spatial structure characteristics and influencing factors of urban new quality productive function networks in China. The findings are as follows: 1) Compared with previous urban network studies, the networks of new quality productive function do not show a "diamond structure", and the medium and high intensity network links are radiation-type spatial connections with Beijing at the core. 2) The results of influencing factor analysis show that provincial boundaries have a negative impact on all three kinds of networks, but the negative effect of spatial distance does not occur in the intelligent manufacturing network. Due to the construction of major regional high-speed transportation infrastructure in China, the impact of spatial distance on intercity investment in new quality productive function networks is relatively weak. However, administrative barriers and the hindrance effect of provincial boundaries still play a significant role. 3) The study distinguished the impact of socioeconomic-related variables on the spatial structure of urban networks in the cities where investments are sent and the cities where investments are received, and found that the impact of different variables in these networks are significantly different, reflecting the differences in the development of different industries, especially in the spatial choice behavior of foreign investment. This study revealed the changing characteristics of China's urban network spatial structure in the context of the formation of new quality productivity, which has academic significance for improving the scientific understanding of the general law of the evolution of spatial structure of China's urban system in the context of new development. Empirical cases enrich the research topics of new quality productivity. This study provides a research perspective for urban geography to actively respond to the major strategic needs of national development and the main battlefield of service economy.

"People" is the main agent of rural production and development. Understanding the regional types and driving mechanisms of rural hollowing in the Yellow River Basin from the perspective of population change is of great significance for promoting ecological protection and rural revitalization in the basin. Research showed that: 1) There is a significant change in the types of hollowed out rural areas in the Yellow River Basin, with the decline type having the largest growth rate, increasing from 16% in 2000-2010 to 39% in 2010-2020; The weakening type had the largest decrease, from 29% to 12%. With regard to the changes of regional types in various watersheds, the decline type in the middle reaches increased by 43 percentage points, while the weakening type in the downstream decreased by 34 percentage points. 2) The spatiotemporal differences in rural hollowing out regions are significant, and the spatial agglomeration characteristics are gradually emerging. The spatial distribution range of growth and weakening types is constantly shrinking, while the spatial distribution of decline types is expanding. The trend of aggregation of weakening and decline types is increasing towards the upper reaches of the Yellow River Basin. 3) The spatial differentiation of rural hollowing in the Yellow River Basin is influenced by various factors at different stages, but urbanization and topography play a significant role. In the upstream area, urbanization has had a greater impact. However, the factor that have had a greater impact on the middle reaches have evolved from urbanization in the period 2000-2010 to agricultural modernization in the period 2010-2020. Both topography and economic factors have exerted a stronger influence on the downstream area. 4) There are significant regional differences in the natural environment and culture and economy between the upper, middle, and lower reaches of the Yellow River Basin, as well as significant differences in the hollowing out of rural areas. It is necessary to combine local characteristics and innovate development paths for rural revitalization in different sections of the river basin, accelerate the formation of urban-rural integration and mutual promotion between industry and agriculture, and promote rural revitalization and development.

In recent years, inter-city commuting at the mega-region scale in China is becoming increasingly frequent. Compared to the commuting circles of international mega-cities, the characteristics of inter-city commuting and influencing factors in mega-regions remain to be cleared. Taking the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei mega-region as an example, this study used origin-destination (OD) analysis and spatial statistical analysis based on GIS to investigate the spatial distribution of inter-city commuting with the location data of twin city commuting of Beike Net renters. Assisted by ordinary least squares (OLS) and geographically weighted regression (GWR) models with individual commuting time as the dependent variable, this study revealed the impact mechanisms under the combined effect of spatial variables and personal social attributes. The analyses showed that: 1) The inter-city commuting of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei mega-region is evidently along some corridors, concentrated in the east, southeast, and southwest commuting corridors. At the city level, Langfang and Tianjin are the main origins, while at the county level, the main commuting corridor is from the Yanjiao high-tech zone to Beijing urban area. 2) The average inter-city commuting distance has exceeded the general metropolitan area boundary of 30-50 km. 3) The inter-city commuters account for more than 20% of the total commuting population located in the Yanjiao high-tech zone of Langfang City, Gu'an County, and Zhuozhou of Baoding City, forming a high-frequency commuting area—the Beijing commuter belt. 4) The GWR showed that spatial factors such as the difference in housing and salaries between the workplace and residential areas and the distance from the residence to the high-speed rail station have spatial heterogeneity effects on commuting time. The research found that the motivation for long-time inter-city commuting differs between cities. Some commuters in Tianjin are motivated by improving living quality and salaries, while some commuters in Langfang and Baoding are motivated by improving salaries and saving rent. The impact of individual attributes showed that the younger the age, the longer the commuting time. The results of this research provide a reference for the coordinated optimization of urban space layout and comprehensive transportation in mega-regions under the new urbanization strategy.

Changes in production factors have an important impact on the evolution of the spatial pattern of regional economic development. Based on the panel data of 290 prefecture-level cities in 1990-2020, the Mann-Kendall method was applied to classify China's municipal economic growth into two stages—1990-2012 and 2013-2020, and the Malmquist productivity index and spatial Durbin model were further used to analyze the effects of changes in production factors on China's regional economic growth at different stages. The results show that: 1) China's regional economy has always maintained its growth trend, and the regional economic growth areas have gradually shifted from the eastern coastal areas to the inland areas, and the growth pattern has changed from an obvious east-west difference to a coexistence of east-west and north-south differences. 2) There are clear differences in the spatial distribution pattern of changes in production factors. The regions with a large proportion of capital stock have gradually shifted from a contiguous distribution in the northeast and the Bohai Rim to the southeast coastal region, while sporadically distributed in core cities in the central and western regions; the pattern of incremental employment is consistently high in the southeast and low in the northwest, with high-value areas mainly distributed in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta, and Chengdu-Chongqing urban agglomerations; the level of capital deepening and factor input-output efficiency generally show a year-on-year upward trend, and the core urban agglomerations are still the ones with higher levels of capital deepening and efficiency. 3) The degree of influence of factor changes on regional economic growth varied over time and at different scales, with factor input-output efficiency and the number of people employed being the main contributors to regional economic growth in the two periods, respectively. The research findings can serve as a decision-making reference for China's economic development under the new circumstance.

The coordinated development of rural revitalization and new urbanization is related to the sustainable development of regions. By constructing the evaluation index system of rural revitalization and new urbanization, we used the coupled coordination degree model and geographic detector to quantitatively analyzed the spatial differentiation characteristics of rural revitalization and new urbanization used the coupled coordination degree model and geographic detector to levels in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River and the spatial and temporal change patterns of coupling and coordination from 2010 to 2020, and examined their driving mechanisms. The results show that: 1) The spatial distribution characteristics of rural revitalization and new urbanization levels in the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River were clearly differentiated. The spatial distribution pattern of new urbanization level basically remained stable, and provincial capitals were the main clusters of high-value areas. 2) The spatial heterogeneity of the coupling degree types was large, dominated by the improving stage, while the coupling and coordination degree was mainly on the verge of disorder, concentrated in areas such as Longdong and northern Shaanxi, and the relative development type as a whole was dominated by the new urbanization lagging type. 3) The change of coupled and coordinated development pattern of rural revitalization and new urbanization is the result of mutual constraints and joint action of various factors, with population, income, consumption, and investment being the main driving forces. Therefore, in the context of consolidating and expanding the achievements of poverty eradication and promoting high-quality development in the Yellow River Basin, it is important to study the coupled and coordinated development of rural revitalization and new urbanization to promote the construction of urbanization with counties as the carrier and to realize the comprehensive revitalization of rural areas.

Many evolutionary economic geography studies emphasize the role of local capabilities in industrial development based on the path dependence theory. With the rapid development of new-generation information technology and infrastructure such as high-speed rail, the cross-regional flow of knowledge is becoming increasingly common and has a significant impact on regional and industrial evolution. Therefore, in the era of the knowledge economy, the multi-scale knowledge interaction network is crucial to the evolution mechanism of industrial comparative advantages. This study used patent citation big data and other statistical data, such as the total output value of the 2-digit manufacturing industry of 41 cities in the Yangtze River Delta in 2011, 2016 and 2021 and the Logit model to analyze the evolution of industrial comparative advantages and its knowledge dynamics. The research found that: 1) With the increasingly close intercity knowledge flow network in the Yangtze River Delta, the industries with comparative advantages in cities are becoming increasingly diverse as a whole. 2) Under the premise of controlling for local capabilities and other related variables, the evolution of urban industrial comparative advantages is also significantly influenced by the advantageous industries of cities with strong knowledge flows. In other words, a city is more likely to develop its own industrial comparative advantage in the specialized field of another city that has a strong knowledge correlation with it. 3) There is a significant knowledge network correlation in the evolution of the industrial comparative advantage structure of cities in the Yangtze River Delta. The stronger the knowledge flows, the higher the similarity of industrial comparative advantage structure between cities. To some extent, this study deepens the understanding of the knowledge dynamics and multi-scale related variety of the evolution of industrial comparative advantages in the digital economy era and helps to provide a theoretical basis for regional innovation and industrial upgrading policies.

New urbanization is an important carrier of ecological civilization construction. How to promote the construction of water ecological civilization through new urbanization is a major practical problem facing the Huaihe River Eco-economic Belt in the process of modernization in which people and nature live together in harmony. This study empirically examined the mechanism of influence and spatial effects of urbanization on the construction of water ecological civilization using a spatial econometric model based on the urban panel data of the Huaihe River Eco-economic Belt from 2006 to 2020. The results are as follows: 1) The impact of comprehensive urbanization and population urbanization on the construction of water ecological civilization in the Huaihe River Eco-economic Belt follows a typical environmental Kuznets curve, exhibiting a "U"-shaped relationship. The urbanization restrains the construction of water ecological civilization in its early stage of development. Once the level of urbanization reaches a certain threshold, this effect will become positive. 2) The urbanization of population in each city has reached the inflection point value in 2014, while the comprehensive urbanization level has not yet reached the inflection point, therefore it is necessary to speed up the conversion of the transferred agricultural population into urban residents and effectively promote the new urbanization with people as the core. 3) The urbanization of the Huaihe River Eco-economic Belt has a significant inverted "U"-shaped spillover effect on water ecological civilization construction. Meanwhile, water ecological civilization construction in the region exhibits a negative spatial spillover effect. Therefore, the Huaihe River Eco-economic Belt should establish a sound system for the protection of water ecological civilization and strengthen the coordinated construction of urbanization and water ecological civilization in order to enhance the quality of new urbanization development and create an ecological demonstration belt that is harmonious between humans and water. This study offers a new perspective for analyzing the interplay between urbanization and water resource, and provides theoretical reference and empirical evidence for leveraging the new urbanization to promote the construction of water ecological civilization.

Enabling urban innovation and development with the digital economy is an important manifestation of the new development concept. This study examined the multidimensional influence mechanism of the digital economy on the innovation and development of Chinese cities. Based on a panel data set of 275 prefecture-level and above cities in China from 2010 to 2019, the mechanism was analyzed by using spatial econometric models and other methods for revealing the spatiotemporal evolution characteristics of the level of urban innovation (LUI). The results of the study show that: 1) During the study period, LUI in Chinese cities showed an uneven development, with a tendency to widen the development differences between regions, and a significant and stable spatial agglomeration distribution characteristic. 2) Nationwide, the development of digital infrastructure (DIF) and digital industry (DID) only helped to raise LUI within the regions, while digital technology (DT) had a stronger permeability and diffusion effect in promoting LUI. 3) The multidimensional development levels of the digital economy all showed a positive effect on the innovation levels of cities in the eastern, central, western, and northeastern regions, but only digital technology passed the test of significance in the models for all four broad regions. In terms of city type heterogeneity, digital technology also showed the strongest influence and technology diffusion effects. This study expanded the research perspective of digital economy-enabled innovation and development, and provides decision-making references for utilizing digital economy to promote urban innovation and development.

The development of the urban sub-center in Tongzhou District, Beijing involves new city planning and construction that include the relocation of the city's administrative centers. While reshaping the spatial pattern, it also bears the responsibility of high-quality development demonstration. By using the synthetic control method and the panel data from 2002 to 2020, this study examined the impact of Beijing's sub-center construction on the high-quality development of the relocation area from the five dimensions of innovation, coordination, greenness, openness, and sharing. The results show that the construction of the sub-center has improved the output efficiency of Tongzhou, promoted energy conservation and emission reduction, but reduced the level of medical service supply. The development had no significant impact on the improvement of industrial structure, the utilization of foreign investment, the increase of residents' income, and the increase of education service supply. These heterogenous results indicate that observing high-quality development from different dimensions is more comprehensive than simply evaluating the total economic output. Targeted measures should be taken to address the changing characteristics of different dimensions of high-quality development. First, infrastructure, population migration, industrial planning, and public services should be matched to improve the level of public service supply. Second, the new sub-center should quickly improve the level of modern service industry to provide support for the upgrading of its industries. Third, the sub-center should fully leverage its role as a window for opening up to the outside world, providing a benchmark of openness for other regions.

Government grain reserves are the ballast for national food security, and local government grain reserves are the first line of defense to safeguard national food security and market stability. Bordering India, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar, and the Kashmir region, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is China's strategic front for national defense, and it is of great significance to examine the scale and spatial distribution of grain reserves on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. This study proposed a demand-based method to measure the scale of grain reserves. Considering the grain storage conditions and the characteristics of grain production and consumption on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, we applied the model and revised the key parameters to calculate the scale of grain reserves on the plateau. On this basis and using the road network analysis method, we further discussed the spatial location of grain storage infrastructures. The results show that: 1) The total scale of required grain reserves on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau was about 815100 t, which was equivalent to 24.04% of the total annual grain consumption, and the ratio of grain reserves to consumption was higher than the minimum safe level recommended by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), which is 17%-18%. 2) Grain production, consumption, and reserves on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau were unbalanced. Only 27.19% of the counties could achieve a balance between grain production, consumption, and storage, and most counties had grain shortages. 3) The total grain deficit on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau was about 1.82 million t, and the grain deficit in agricultural areas, pastoral areas, and semi-agricultural and semi-pastoral areas were 1.24 million t, 331600 t, and 241400 t, respectively. 4) The grain storage infrastructure system on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau consisted of three vertical levels: two first-level nodes (Xining and Lhasa), 15 second-level nodes, and 114 third-level nodes. 5) In reality, the scale of local grain reserves on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau was 26.39% lower than the theoretical value. Therefore it is urgent to further increase the scale of local grain reserves. The results can provide policy references for the reform of the grain reserve system in Tibet and Qinghai.

The water conservation zone of the Yellow River (including the source region of the Yellow River, the Weihe River Watershed controlled by the Huaxian Station, and the Yiluo River Watershed) is the main runoff producing area. Identifying the comprehensive change characteristics and spatial differences of flow regime can provide an important scientific basis for analyzing the water cycle evolutions and their causes in the Yellow River Basin under the changing environment. Current research focused on the influence of environmental change on runoff magnitude in the Yellow River Basin, but cannot comprehensively explain the change characteristics and spatial differences of flow regimes. In this study, 31 source small watersheds in the water conservation zone of the Yellow River were taken as the research areas. The characteristics of flow regimes, including the magnitude, rate of change, frequency, duration, and timing metrics, were comprehensively considered. The Theil-Sen trend-free pre-whitening with Mann-Kendall (TFPW-MK) trend analysis and Sen's slope estimator methods were used to detect the variation of flow regime metrics in all the watersheds from 2000 to 2020. The hierarchical clustering method was used to identify the main patterns of flow regime changes and spatial distribution characteristics. The results show that: 1) At most watersheds, significant increases in all magnitude metrics, rate of change in high flow, and low flow frequency were detected, while rate of change in low flow, high flow frequency, and all duration and timing metrics showed a significant decrease. 2) The typical flow regimes found in the Huangshui River, the Tao River, downstream of the Weihe River, and the Luohe River were more sensitive to climate change, mainly showed significant increase in high flow magnitude but decrease in timing, and significant increase in low flow frequency but decrease in duration and timing metrics. 3) The variation of flow regime characteristics was divided into three patterns. The first pattern accounted for 42%, located in the Taohe River, the Huangshui River, the trunk and tributaries of the Weihe River, and the main stream of the Yi River, with significant increases in magnitude, frequency, and rate of change, and significant decreases in duration and timing. The second pattern accounted for 35%, located in the upstream and downstream of the three major watershed divisions, with metrics of low flow increased significantly except for a decrease in rate of change; while the five type metrics in high flow all decreased significantly. The third pattern accounted for 23%, located in the middle and lower reaches of the three watershed divisions, with significant increases in magnitude and frequency, and significant decreases in rate of change, duration, and timing.

Strengthening the interconnection between Beijing and Tianjin Municipalities is of great significance for promoting the coordinated development of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and enhancing the competitiveness of the whole region. In order to depict the characteristics of interconnection between Beijing and Tianjin in detail, this study proposed an analytical framework for the interaction of factors between Beijing and Tianjin based on the theory of dual-nuclei structure. According to this framework, the interaction of factors between Beijing and Tianjin can be divided into three aspects: resident population mobility, firm economic factor mobility, and government cooperation platform co-construction. The characteristics of these interactions between Beijing and Tianjin were analyzed by integrating multiple sources of data, including traditional statistical data, big data of mobile signaling, big data of enterprise contact, and field research data. The results show that Beijing and Tianjin have already had significant business cooperation that benefits both cities by combining their strengths. However, compared to Tianjin, Beijing has absolute advantage in most economic development factors, which leads to the deep dependence of Tianjin on Beijing. Tianjin needs to make efforts to enhance the spillover capacity of its advantageous fields to the whole Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. Beijing and Tianjin clearly share common understanding of the functional positioning of the two cities, but the characteristics of the interconnection between Beijing and Tianjin show that they still need to further refine their functional coordination and improve the policies and mechanisms on some important links. For example, Beijing should improve its cooperation with Tianjin while conducting its non-capital function dispersion and Tianjin has room for improvement in optimizing its allocation of factors and industrial environment, and actively responding to Beijing's functional positioning. In particular, Tianjin, as a gateway and traditional manufacturing city and a city with advantages in R&D resources, should put more emphasis on responding to Beijing's spillover of talents and transfer of manufacturing industries and scientific and technological achievements, and provide more supports to Beijing in its shipment of import/export goods and cooperation and exchanges with other countries.

China's marine economy has entered the stage of high-quality development. Total factor productivity of the marine economy, as an important indicator reflecting the structural optimization, technological progress, and management innovation of marine development, is an important characterization of high-quality development level. The improvement of total factor productivity is not only driven by traditional factors such as capital and labor. Although the system theory and an overall perspective should be adopted to constantly explore and discover new drivers of marine economic growth, most of the existing studies are based on a single or a few limited driving factors. Most of them focus on traditional factors such as nature and material, and lack analysis of the common driving mechanism and effects of natural, intellectual, social, and institutional capitals on economic growth. Therefore, in order to explore the dynamic mechanism of total factor productivity of the marine economy, this study used a Translog-stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) model based on a transcendental logarithmic production function to measure the total factor productivity of the marine economy in coastal areas from 2000 to 2020, and identified the dynamic mechanism of development by constructing an evaluation indicator system including natural, intellectual, social, institutional, and external environment factors. The results showed that: 1) The average level of capital factor endowment increased steadily with a significant growth rate, and the accumulation rate of various types of capital generally presented a slow-fast-slow growing trend. The regional factor endowment of various types of capital was quite different. 2) The average total factor productivity of the marine economy was on the rise, which is at the medium level. The growth rate was slow, the regional difference was obvious, and growth showed certain path dependence. 3) The total factor productivity of the marine economy was mainly driven by natural capital in 2000-2012 and by intellectual capital in 2013-2020. The total factor productivity of the marine economy in the northern, central, and southern marine economic zones were mainly driven by natural capital from 2000 to 2012 and by natural, social, and institutional capital respectively from 2013 to 2020. The driving force of natural capital was decreasing, and the driving forces of intellectual, social, and institutional capitals were increasing. The research results can be used as a reference in formulating differentiated marine economic development policies.

Educational attainments of talents are different, and exploring the spatiotemporal distribution of talents with different educational attainments and its driving factors is of key significance for formulating different kinds of talent policies and optimizing the high-quality economic development pattern of the urban system. Using data of the 2005, 2010 and 2015 population sample surveys of China, this study examined the differences in the spatial and temporal patterns of China's talents with college, undergraduate, and graduate degrees from 2005 to 2015 at the prefecture level, and used a spatial econometric model to explain the driving factors of these differences. The results show that: 1) The spatial distribution of China's talents with different educational attainments was highly uneven, and talents with college, undergraduate, and graduate degrees were mainly concentrated in the municipalities, provincial capitals, and independent plan cities. There was also some concentration of talents with college and undergraduate degrees in resource-based cities of the northwestern region, such as western Inner Mongolia and northern Xinjiang. The level of uneven distribution of talents increased with the increment of educational attainments and the unevenness was alleviated through time, but the degree of its alleviation decreased with the increase of educational attainment. 2) The dynamic agglomeration of talents showed the Matthew effect—the higher the proportion of talents at the beginning of the study period, the greater the increase of the proportion of talents during the period. The intensity of the Matthew effect of dynamic agglomeration of talents gradually increased with the increase of educational attainment. 3) The concentration of China's talents with college, undergraduate, and graduate degrees was mainly economic driven, and salary played the most important role in influencing the concentration of talents with different educational attainments. The reduction of regional salary gaps in China had caused a decrease in the level of uneven distribution of talents with different educational attainments. The rapid growth of service industry and improvements in social amenities such as secondary education, medical service, and transportation had also promoted the agglomeration of talents with different educational attainments. Nevertheless, environmental factors such as elevation and green leisure space did not significantly boost the agglomeration of talents in China. The role of both economic development and social amenities in promoting talent agglomeration showed a tendency to increase with increasing educational attainments.

Ecological well-being performance (EWP) is the ecological efficiency of improving human well-being. Analyzing the spatial and temporal patterns and driving effects of EWP can help reveal regional differences in ecological efficiency of human well-being enhancement in China and its causes. This study analyzed the evolution of the spatiotemporal patterns of EWP in China based on a comprehensive subjective and objective well-being perspective, and used the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (LMDI) method and Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) method to reveal the driving effects of EWP changes and the determinants of economic growth effect in China. The results show that: 1) The changes in EWP in China in 2006-2018 relied mainly on the effect of economic growth, but the overall level of EWP decreased due to the constraints of environmental well-being effect and social well-being effect. Among the determinants of the economic growth effect, technological progress played the most important role. 2) The differences between the mean values of EWP of southern and northern provinces in China had increased from 0.762 to 1.005, showing a spatial variation of high in the south and low in the north. The economic growth effect value in the south was much higher than that in the north, which was the main reason for the widening of the north-south differences in EWP in China. 3) The change in EWP in China as a whole appeared to be driven by economic growth, with only Beijing, Tianjin, and Shanghai showing a change driven by economic growth + environmental well-being improvement. There was a significant regional heterogeneity in the determinants of the economic growth effect in the southern and northern regions and in eastern, central, and western China. The results of the study can provide reference suggestions for promoting the coordinated regional development of EWP in China.

Tourism economic resilience involves high-quality development of tourism. By using the relevant data of tourism development in the Chinese mainland from 1998 to 2020 and based on the quantitative measurement of provincial tourism economic resilience, this study analyzed the temporal and spatial evolution characteristics of tourism economic resilience and revealed the mechanism of impact. The main conclusions of the study are as follows: China's tourism economy has strong resilience from 1998 to 2020, and the special events in individual years have not fundamentally changed the long-term positive trend. The temporal and spatial evolution of China's tourism economic resilience has the characteristics of instability and spatial agglomeration. The results of the spatial Markov chain model show that the probability of evolution of tourism economic resilience to high-value areas is high, and the tourism economic resilience at different levels generally presents agglomeration distribution. The mechanism of impact of regional tourism economic resilience was analyzed by using geographical detectors. The value of interactive leading factor q is generally greater than the maximum value of a single influencing factor, and this reflects that the impact on tourism economic resilience is generally from "resultant force". In general, the tourism economic resilience of the eastern region is closely related to the internal factors of the tourism industry, which indicates an endogenous driving type. The tourism economic resilience of the central and western regions is closely related to the external socioeconomic factors, which belongs to an exogenous driving type. Promoting the internal and external circulations of the economy plays an important role in improving the regional economic resilience. The research on the temporal and spatial evolution mechanism of tourism economic resilience provides a theoretical basis and decision-making reference for an objective understanding of the high-quality development of tourism and the risks and challenges faced by regional tourism.

New infrastructure has become an important support for China's economic transformation and high-quality development in the new era. In order to investigate the temporal and spatial evolution of China's new infrastructure development and its driving factors, this study first constructed a comprehensive evaluation index of the development level of new infrastructure based on the provincial panel data from 2013 to 2020. Then, it used the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) entropy method and spatial econometric model to measure the development level of new infrastructure and analyze its driving factors. The results show that: 1) The development level of China's new infrastructure has increased year by year, and there is a trend of balanced development among provinces. 2) There is great spatial heterogeneity in the development level of China's new infrastructure. The new infrastructure development level is much higher in the eastern region than the central, western, and northeastern regions. The overall temporal and spatial evolution pattern showed an east-west expansion trend, and the center of gravity continued to move to the southwest. 3) The development level of new infrastructure is affected by many factors, among which the economic development level, financial development level, innovation foundation, urbanization process, and population size are the key driving factors. By examining the evolution of the spatial pattern of China's new infrastructure development level and its influencing factors, this article may provide a decision-making reference for its optimal layout and development.

Spatial interaction of human mobility is a heated topic for scholars, but little is known about the nonlinear relationship of the influencing factors in the spatial interaction. Using Tencent migration data in 2018 and employing the gradient boosting decision tree (GBDT) model, this study analyzed the nonlinear characteristics of the distance-decay parameter. The results show that: 1) In the annual data benchmark model the distance-decay parameter presents nonlinear characteristics; the partial dependence curve presents two "platform areas" where the distance-decay parameter is close to 0, and two "attenuation areas" where the distance-decay parameter is about 2.8; and the results are still robust using road-based distance or data from other years. 2) There are significant differences between the distance-decay parameters of aviation, railway, and road transportation. The distance-decay pattern during the Spring Festival is basically consistent with the annual benchmark model. We recommend to plan metropolitan areas and urban agglomerations according to the nonlinear characteristics of intercity connection influenced by distances-decay pattern, and optimize the layout of territorial development accordingly.

The flow of urban and rural elements runs through the entire process of urban and rural development and is the core of achieving urban and rural integration. Exploring the mechanism of influence of urban-rural element flow on urban-rural integrated development can provide a scientific guidance for breaking the plight of urban-rural integrated development. Based on the technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) model, this study evaluated the development level of urban-rural integration in 292 cities across China, and used the ordinary least squares (OLS) and geographically weighted regression (GWR) models to explore the impact mechanism of urban-rural element flow on urban-rural integration. The results show that: 1) There are large spatial differences in the level of urban-rural integrated development at the city level in China. Most of the cities that have reached the level of deep urban-rural integration are economically developed. In general, the eastern region has the most balanced urban-rural integration. 2) Overall, the flow of land elements and population elements has the most significant impact on the urban-rural integrated development, and the driving effects of the two are negative. Locally, the influence of the flow of various urban-rural elements on the urban-rural integrated development has obvious regional differences. 3) The loss of land elements of the countryside causes loss of production elements and development space in these areas, and the lost talents have no effective way to return to the countryside, which limits urban-rural integrated development. Government investment promotes the agglomeration of elements and reduces the cost of element flow, urban and rural industries achieve division of labor and complement each other in functions, and the effective flow of information elements reduces allocation costs and improves allocation efficiency of other elements, which are beneficial to urban-rural integration.

Poverty reduction is one of the primary goals of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda of the United Nations. Clarifying how inclusive finance alleviates rural poverty and impacts rural development can provide new perspectives and avenues for alleviating rural poverty. Based on the sustainable livelihood analysis framework, this study explored the poverty reduction mechanism of rural inclusive finance and integrated multi-source data and methods to conduct a systematic empirical test on the poverty reduction effect, pathways, and heterogeneity of rural inclusive finance. The results indicate that rural inclusive finance plays a direct and an indirect role in reducing poverty. According to the three-dimensional poverty standard, the marginal impact of rural inclusive finance is 67.5%, and the poverty reduction effect is stable. Rural inclusive finance has a variable poverty reduction effect based on group differences, such as poverty degree, educational level, and type of poverty. There is a relatively small effect of poverty reduction on the deeply impoverished groups and the poor with low education levels, but a mitigation effect on income, employment, health, and living standards poverty. For the purpose of deepening, extending, and sustaining the reduction of rural poverty through inclusive finance, it would be necessary to scientifically identify the coupling process between rural inclusive finance and poor groups/regions and to determine and develop the differentiated supply of inclusive finance and an in-depth connection with rural education.

Accurate assessment and classification of rural development levels is an important issue in rural revitalization research, which can provide a scientific basis for the implementation of rural revitalization strategies by development type and stage. Taking Luanchuan County, Henan Province as an example, this study integrated multi-source data such as administrative village census and electronic maps to construct a multi-dimensional development potential measurement indicator system for the village scale, and carry out multi-dimensional evaluation and type identification of rural development potential. The results show that: 1) The overall situation of rural multi-dimensional development potential in Luanchuan County is poor, with only 45.89% of the villages having medium and above development potential, and the interaction between any two dimensions has a nonlinear enhancement effect on explaining the spatial differentiation of multi-dimensional development potential. 2) The spatial differentiation characteristics of rural multi-dimensional development levels are obvious. Villages with high development potential are concentrated near the county seat and where key township centers are located, while villages with low and medium-low development potential are mainly distributed in the border areas of the county and in the areas between the towns in the central part. 3) The development level of each dimension shows relatively significant spatial agglomeration characteristics, but the spatial agglomeration pattern is different for different dimensions. Villages with higher development level in geographical location and natural background are mainly concentrated in areas with good resource endowment and relatively flat terrain; and villages with higher development level in the four dimensions of geographical location, population development, economic foundation, and social welfare gather near the county seat, township centers, and tourist attractions. 4) According to the multi-dimensional development assessment results, the villages are divided into five types: priority revitalization, preliminary revitalization, maintaining the status quo, decline and relocation, and priority relocation. Based on the characteristics of different types of villages, revitalization paths and development strategies are proposed to improve the development quality of villages.