Administrative divisions are an important part of the national system of governance, and the related adjustments have become an important tool for optimizing the administrative management system, improving the effectiveness of national governance, and promoting regional spatial reorganization. Among these adjustments, county-to-district conversion, as an important part of China's county-level administrative division adjustment from 1997, has become a hot topic that has attracted much attention in the study of administrative division. Based on existing studies, this article analyzed the change of county (city) abolition and establishment of districts from the aspects of progress, occurrence logic, assessment method, and multiple impacts in a comprehensive manner. We found that the number of counties (cities) converted to districts in China experienced a fluctuating increase and then a rapid decrease, followed by a rapid increase and then a gradual decrease, with an overall M-shaped temporal pattern, and 2000-2002 and 2014-2016 were the two peak periods of conversion. National policies provided the necessary conditions for county-to-district conversion, local demands promoted the implementation of the conversion, and the final adjustment was often the result of the game between multiple actors. The research methods became more diversified, but the relevant basic theories and methodological studies are relatively weak, and there is still a big gap between the status quo and the requirements of governance modernization. The conclusions of the existing studies on the economic and social benefits of county-to-district conversion are inconsistent, while that on the impact of ecological benefits is relatively uniform, that is, the quality of the regional ecological environment has been improved by the county-to-district conversion. In summary, this article argued that in the future there is an urgent need to strengthen the theoretical and methodological research on the setting up of administrative districts, reveal in depth the positive and negative effects of county-to-district conversion on the development of cities and regions, strengthen the analysis of the driving mechanism of county-to-district conversion, and examine the triggering conditions of county-to-district conversion, in order to provide references for the scientific improvement of decision making of local governments as well as the optimization and adjustment of the national policies on county-to-district conversion.

To support the safe and effective growth of regions, resilient city networks should be built in metropolitan areas. Current research is focused on understanding how disaster risk propagates in city networks and assessing network resilience. This study developed a multiplex city network model composed of facility and function based on the fundamental concept of the city network, and investigated the functional, physical, and geographic relationships across networks. Second, we examined the resilience of the multiplex city network in terms of both the structure and function and the network as a whole and local areas. Third, we illustrated how disaster risks spread in the multiplex city network from three perspectives—propagation path, propagation process, and propagation impact, which establish a logical relationship between disaster impact and network resilience. Lastly, we proposed a three-step framework for assessing the resilience of multiplex city networks: modeling the multiplex city network, simulating risk propagation of the network, and using indicastors to measure the network's resilience. The feasibility and validity of the framework were verified by the case study of resilience assessment of the "road-people's flow" multiplex city network in the Wuhan metropolitan area under the impact of flooding. The case results demonstrate that as disaster risks spread through the network, certain cities' structural and functional status will alter, drawing attention to these changes as a means of enhancing network resilience. For instance, some cities and network paths will have much less connectedness and as a result, these cities should improve their own preparedness during the latent phase of disasters and recovery capacity during the mitigation phase. Certain cities and paths have an absorptive capability during the risk outbreak period that helps keep the city network operating as intended. This research offered a fresh look at the theory and methodology of city network resilience assessment that considers disaster risk transmission. It concentrated on the real requirements for the development of regional network security. By examining and altering the interactions between cities, the suggested framework can contribute to making city networks more resilient.

As China's economic and trade cooperation with Southeast Asia and other regions becomes increasingly close, accelerating the construction of the new western land-sea corridor and enhancing the quality and efficiency of logistics development is of great significance for promoting economic development and high-level opening-up in the inland areas of western China. This study focused on 30 urban units within the core coverage area of the new western land-sea corridor. Based on long-term statistical data, it employed the back propagation (BP) neural network model to predict the railway and highway freight volumes of each city after the completion of the main corridor. An improved gravity model was used to simulate the freight connections between cities under future corridor capacity conditions. Additionally, social network analysis was applied to compare the railway and highway logistics network structures before and after the completion of the corridor. The results indicate that: 1) The construction of the new western land-sea corridor helps reduce the railway and highway distances between cities in the core coverage area, increasing the total freight volume of each city. 2) Upon completion of the corridor, logistics connections between seaports and landports, such as Fangchenggang and Kunming facing Southeast Asia, and cities such as Chongqing and various provincial capitals, will be significantly strengthened. This will also promote the flow of goods to prefecture-level cities, leading to a hierarchical and integrated development pattern in the logistics network. 3) In terms of the distance reduction effect, changes in freight volume, and shifts in logistics network structure, the construction of the corridor has a stronger impact on the railway logistics network compared to the highway network. By comparing the changes in land logistics network patterns before and after the construction of the corridor, this study provides scientific insights for optimizing corridor layout, upgrading logistics networks, and promoting high-quality regional economic development.

Exploring the impact of urban morphology on the thermal environment is crucial for implementing sustainable urban planning and improving thermal conditions of cities. However, current research on the multiscale analysis of the heterogeneity in urban morphology's thermal environmental effects at the community scale is still insufficient, and the process of effectively integrating research findings into urban planning and management practices also faces numerous challenges. This study focused on the Nankai District, a typical high-density urban area in Tianjin Municipality, and used the building vector data and Landsat 8 remote sensing imagery to quantify urban morphology and land surface temperatures during the summer at the community scale. It integrated the multiscale geographically weighted regression and K-means clustering methods to investigate the spatial heterogeneity of urban morphology's impact on land surface temperatures and to perform cluster zoning. The results revealed that: 1) The summer land surface temperatures in Nankai District exhibited a high in the north and low in the south distribution with significant spatial autocorrelation, forming high-high and low-low aggregation patterns. 2) The multiscale geographically weighted regression model significantly outperformed ordinary least squares and geographically weighted regression models in fitting and explaining the relationship between urban morphology and land surface temperatures. 3) The impact of urban morphology factors on summer land surface temperatures showed multiscale spatial heterogeneity, with influences ranking from highest to lowest as follows: building density > normalized difference vegetation index > floor area ratio > building volume density, where building density and building volume density contributed to higher temperatures, whereas the normalized difference vegetation index and floor area ratio had a notable cooling effect. 4) Clustering based on the spatial heterogeneity of urban morphology indicators affecting summer land surface temperatures allowed the study area to be divided into three distinct regions, which enabled the formulation of differentiated planning strategies. The findings of this study provide a basis for optimizing community thermal environments. Moreover, effectively integrating multiscale geographically weighted regression and K-means clustering methods offers new perspectives and methodological frameworks for urban thermal environment research and related fields.

The world is currently experiencing unprecedented changes, with frequent geopolitical conflicts, major public health incidents, extreme natural hazards and disasters, and other emergencies. The risks of the global grain supply chain are becoming increasingly prominent, and enhancing the resilience of the global grain supply chain has become a fundamental way to ensure the security and stability of the global grain supply chain. This study measured the resilience of international grain supply chains by identifying multidimensional supply chain network resilience measurement indicators based on the perspective of complex network. The characteristics of change of resilience and node anti-interference ability were analyzed. The results show that: 1) The global supply chains of rice and corn have a higher level of resilience, followed by the global supply chain of wheat, and the global supply chain of soybean has the lowest level of resilience. 2) The global supply chain networks of the four types of grain products are all resilient networks with fast recovery capacity and adaptability and their resilience levels have all improved. However, there are differences in their improvement levels, with soybeans, rice, wheat, and corn in descending order. 3) In the global supply chain network of the four types of grain products, China's anti-interference level is higher than the world average, but lower than the United States, and the anti-interference level of wheat and corn needs to be improved. The results of this study have important practical and theoretical significance for clarifying the resilience level and characteristics of change of the global grain supply chain, which may help enhance China's position and anti-interference ability in the global grain supply chain network.

With the in-depth development of a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation, intelligent manufacturing equipment has become an important force to promote the high-quality development of industry, and the study of its production and supply relationship is of great significance to optimize the distribution of new quality productivity.Based on the data of core enterprises and suppliers in China's intelligent manufacturing equipment industry from 2010 to 2023, this study explored the spatial change characteristics of production-supply relationships of China's intelligent manufacturing equipment industry from three dimensions: production and supply linkage, production and supply network, and production and supply cluster by Pareto analysis and k-kernel analysis. The results are as follows: 1) The number and intensity of enterprise connections were increasing, and 700-1800 km was the general distance of production and supply connection of intelligent manufacturing equipment enterprises. The pattern of intercity production and supply links evolved from the shape of dual core radiation, triangle, to bow and arrow in China, and there were similarities and differences in the dominant flow of intercity production and supply links. The strong production and supply links between enterprises gradually shifted from intracity to intercity, and the number of export-oriented cities increased rapidly. 2) For more than a decade, the structure of the intercity production and supply network of China's intelligent manufacturing equipment industry has become increasingly compact and complex. After 2015, the city hierarchy of the intercity production and supply network has moved from a "pyramid" to a flat structure. 3) The number of production and supply clusters of China's intelligent manufacturing equipment industry has increased from 21 to 29. The production and supply cluster of the Yangtze River Delta has always maintained a leading position, the production and supply clusters of the Pearl River Delta, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, and Shandong Peninsula have developed steadily, and the status of the production and supply clusters in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and the Chengdu-Chongqing region have significantly improved. The pattern of association of node cities within the clusters can be divided into five types: Single center, one core and multiple subordinates, two cores and multiple subordinates, multi-center, and low-level equilibrium, and the node association patterns within the clusters have showed spatiotemporal heterogeneity from 2010 to 2023.

Green finance is also called environmental finance or sustainability finance. As an important kind of financial development, green finance focuses on the win-win situation between the environment and economic growth by supporting the environmental protection industry. On the other hand, the green low-carbon transformation development can form diversified green capital needs, which will induce financial institutions to adjust products and services structure, innovate green finance service models and application scenarios with ecological concepts, and this will promote the development of green finance. Therefore, the concept and practice of green financial development and green low-carbon transformation are highly consistent, and there is an inherent logic of coordination and mutual promotion. However, there is limited literature on the coupling and coordination relationship between green financial development and green low-carbon transformation, and the research on influencing factors needs more in-depth discussions. To reveal the status of coupling and coordination between green financial development and green low-carbon transformation, this study used the entropy method to measure the level of green financial development and green low-carbon transformation, and introduced the coupling and coordination degree model, geodetector, and ArcGIS technology to explore the spatial and temporal variation characteristics and influencing factors of coupling and coordination between green financial development and green low-carbon transformation based on the data of Hunan Province from 2013 to 2021. The results show that the coupling and coordination degree between green financial development and green low-carbon transformation in Hunan Province was on the rise year by year, and continued to improve over time. The status was transiting to a coordinated stage step by step. The coupling and coordination degree in various regions showed a relatively consistent trend with the entire province. The coupling and coordination degree exhibited spatial agglomeration characteristics and presented a green development pattern radiating from Changsha City to the surrounding areas. The spatial differentiation of the coupling and coordination degree was obvious, greater in the eastern region than the western region, and in the northern region than the southern region. However, the growth speed in the western and southern regions was higher than that in the eastern and northern regions. The geodetector test results show that the coupling and coordination degree was influenced by factors of economic development, financial development scale, green R&D investment, digital infrastructure, and regional openness. Among them, the explanatory power of green R&D investment and financial development scale was greater than other factors, and both of them were the driving factors for the coupling and coordination between green financial development and green low-carbon transformation. The research may enable governments to clearly understand the integrated pattern of green financial development and green low-carbon transformation, so as to provide a decision-making reference for the integrated development of green financial development and green low-carbon transformation, and a reliable theoretical basis for cultivating new quality productivity according to local conditions to promote high-quality development.

In view of the fact that there is no systematic summary of recent studies on the history of geography in China except in some selected fields, based on a literature review and the change of thoughts in research on the history of science, this study examined the major progress of recent research on the history of geography and related works in China, and discussed the issues that deserve further attention in the future. The literature review found that: 1) The history of geography is an independent academic field in Chinese geography, characterized by fruitful research results, wide field coverage, and stable research groups. 2) The system of the field has been tentatively constructed, forming a research system that covers disciplinary history, intellectual history, social history, and research on compiling history, which largely corresponds to the research field of the history of science. 3) There are many thoughts in the study of the history of geography, which largely aligns with the main trends of contemporary history of science. However, due to insufficient reference to the new trends in the history of science such as the social history of knowledge, contextualism, conceptual history, and reading history, there are only few research achievements under the recent trends of geographical thoughts. 4) The spatial scope, subfields, and subjects of the research objects are different, mainly reflected in the focus on the study of the history of Chinese geography, and studies on the history of cartography and modern historical geography in China, famous geographical research institutions, societies, and scholars in contemporary China have made fruitful achievements. In contrast, the corresponding research on other spatial scopes, sub-areas, and subjects is weaker. 5) Specialized research on the history of Chinese geography has focused on the ancient period, with a gradual emergence of the modern period, and modern and contemporary research is mainly a review of progress and a synthesis of the literature. The main issues worthy of attention in future research include: 1) Focusing on weak areas of research, and presenting a more comprehensive development trajectory of Chinese geography, especially the disciplinary history in the last hundred years. 2) Strengthening the reference to the trends of the social history of knowledge, contextualism, conceptual history, and reading history, and paying more attention to research on the history of geography under modern and contemporary geographical thoughts. 3) Paying attention to the interpretation of the social value of the history of modern and contemporary Chinese geography and expanding the societal cognition of geography. 4) Emphasizing dialogue with international research and enhancing the international discourse of research on the history of Chinese geography.

The economic space of urban-rural interface is an important topic that has long been concerned by geography, sociology, urban and rural planning, and other disciplines. This study adopted a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods: we read the classic literature to examine the research lineage; and we downloaded the Chinese and English publications from China National Knowledge Infrastructure and the Web of Science databases and quantitatively analyzed the data by using the CiteSpace 6.26 software, which was used as supporting evidence for the division of the research phases. This study examined the three stages of international research related to the economic space of the urban-rural interface: the emergence of early exploration in Europe and the United States, the development of attention to less developed regions, and the emergence of the post-industrial era. Then it examined the three stages of Chinese research: the reference of foreign theories at the beginning of urbanization, the concern of real problems during the acceleration of urbanization, and the exploration of multiple values in the middle and late stages of urbanization. It also concluded that the economic space of the urban-rural interface presents three characteristics: inclusive mixing of economic types, dynamic fragmentation of morphological evolution, and dualistic coexistence of economic dynamics. There are two paths in the evolution of economic space in the urban-rural interface: one is led by top-down forces, showing the path of peri-urban agriculture-centralized large-scale industry-high-tech industry; the other is driven by bottom-up forces, showing the path of peri-urban agriculture-township industry in the early stage, and then different branches with regional differences in the later stage. Urbanization is the fundamental driving force for the economic space evolution of the urban-rural interface; technological factors are the core factors for this evolution; and the government, the market, and the society all play a key role in the change. Based on the above review, we proposed four directions for future research on the economic space of the urban-rural interface in terms of scale and regional differences, post-industrial characteristics, cross-border network characteristics, and governance guidance.

Festival tourism strengthens the modern construction of ethnic festivals. This article started from the perspective of modernity, examined the translation thinking of actor network theory, and used field research data and spatial analysis to clarify the culture reconstruction processes, characteristics, and logic of Daughter's Festival. The results show that: 1) The cultural reconstruction modes of Daughter's Festival driven by tourism have typical modernity practice characteristics, and they can be divided into three different types: "local" based on their original place, and "remote" and "mobile" based on the city. The culture reconstruction processes and characteristics of different modes present typical heterogeneity. 2) The three types of modernity practices in ethnic festivals have undergone a series of processes such as interest granting, alliance absorption, and action mobilization of modern actant, presenting a cultural reconstruction in terms of material, institutional, and spiritual dimensions. 3) Three different modes of festival respectively show different modernity practice characteristics, including the continuation of life by "eliminating" out of norms, the traditions' return of "following" subjectivity, and individuality presentation of "tending" romanticism. 4) Under the dynamics of modernity, including spatiotemporal separation, disembedding, and knowledge reflection, the physical space, festival rules, festival functions, and meanings of ethnic festivals have been updated and reshaped, and there are differences in the cultural reconstruction logic between rural and urban areas. This research can provide theoretical and empirical references for understanding the relationship between modernity and cultural reconstruction, modernity and locality, and solving problems such as the traditional culture inheritance in the context of modernity.

In the context of China's rapid urbanization, the migration of ethnic minority population is becoming increasingly more active, and has become an important component of China's migration groups, which has attracted widespread attention. This article reviewed the existing studies from the perspective of geography, which is conducive to enhancing interdisciplinary dialogue and expanding the research direction of ethnic minority population migration in China. Based on the reality of ethnic minority migration in China, this study incorporated the relevant migration theories on the basis of Chinese ethnicity theories, and established a macro-micro analytical framework. The study found that the migration of ethnic minority population has entered an active period, and the overall pattern of migration was from rural to urban areas, mainly within the provinces and across provinces from west to east; China's ethnic minority migration was also affected by factors that are common for the overall migration of the country, including ethnic minority languages, specific cultural practices, and co-ethnic network connections. Other factors related to ethnic culture also played an important role, but existing studies are weak in examining the mechanism of cultural factors; Ethnic minority migration in China not only promotes urbanization but also facilitates a wide range of interaction, communication, and integration among all ethnic groups, and its impact on urban-rural integration and the protection and revitalization of ethnic villages in ethnic minority areas requires the joint attention of different disciplines. Looking forward to future research, the study can be expanded in terms of the dispersal pattern and characteristics of change of ethnic minority migrants in urban scale hierarchies, the examination of the role of cultural factors in whether and how to migrate, and the effects of migration on the development of urban-rural transformation in ethnic minority areas and on ethnic minority individuals, respectively.

Based on the agricultural product e-commerce data of Taobao and Jingdong from 2012 to 2022, this study analyzed the development trend and spatial distribution pattern of China's agricultural product e-commerce industry by using kernel density analysis, average nearest neighbor index, and standard deviation ellipse. It also explored the driving factors and formation mechanisms by using multiscale geographically weighted regression in combination with the macro economic data of prefectural-level cities. The results of the study show that: 1) The spatial distribution pattern of agricultural product e-commerce industry is highly consistent with China's human and natural geographic factors, and shows the characteristics of regional agglomeration. 2) The spatial direction of industrial development shows a pattern of northeast-south (slightly eastward), forming a multicore circular structure with gradient diffusion from the center to the periphery, and the change and layout of the industry show a dependency on the established development path, presenting an unbalanced spatial distribution. 3) There is an obvious spatial heterogeneity in the driving effects of various factors for the agricultural product e-commerce industry, and there is a general tendency for the driving role of industrial structure factors, economic and social development factors, market potential factors, and government support factors to gradually decrease from east to west, and the driving role of infrastructure factors shows a tendency of gradual decrease from south to north. Based on the above conclusions, this article put forward the following policy recommendations: 1) Each region should primarily focus on exploring the market and stabilize the relationship between production and marketing for the development of agricultural product e-commerce. 2) The positive role of policy guidance should be further utilized to provide more positive externality inputs for the development of e-commerce in the western region. 3) Infrastructure development of agricultural products logistics should be further strengthened. 4) In the development of the industry, different regions need to take into account their own actual situation and implement targeted measures to avoid wasting resources.

Functional polycentricity is a reflection of the essential attributes of urban agglomerations, and an important way to build a new urbanization pattern of division of labor and cooperation with improved functions.Based on Tencent's population movement data from 19 urban agglomerations of China, this study analyzed the spatiotemporal change characteristics of population flow networks at the national and regional scales and functional polycentricity in urban agglomerations, and further explored the influencing factors of functional polycentricity. The results show that: 1) The regional functional polycentricity index of urban agglomerations of China as a whole is larger than the national functional polycentricity index and evolves toward stronger polycentricity, and there is a large gap between the national and regional functional polycentricity indices of the three types of urban agglomerations. 2) The regional functional polycentricity index of most urban agglomerations is larger than the national functional polycentricity index, which is in line with the general pattern that the larger the scale, the smaller the polycentricity index. The functional polycentricity type of each urban agglomeration is stable, but the direction of change differs. There is no obvious relationship between the functional polycentricity type of urban agglomerations and the type of urban agglomerations' development, and the type of urban agglomerations' functional polycentricity shows complexity. 3) The increase in GDP per capita reduces the national functional polycentricity index and shows a "U"-shaped correlation with the regional functional polycentricity index. The increase in the ratio of the total value of the secondary and tertiary industries promotes the increase of the national functional polycentricity index, and the increase in the size of the resident population and the decrease in the proportion of Internet users promotes the increase of the regional functional polycentricity index. The results of this study can provide relevant references for the development strategy of the spatial structure of urban agglomerations.

In the context of global warming, there is a higher probability of occurrence of the summertime compound hot extremes when daytime and nighttime heat sustains, which lead to the reduction of continuous precipitation and increase of precipitation with short duration and high intensity, resulting in changes of diurnal precipitation pattern at summertime in the Northern Hemisphere land area. Compared with the well-understood summer precipitation on the annual scale, current knowledge about combined daytime and nighttime precipitation remains too scarce for the Loess Plateau of China. Based on the daily precipitation and maximum temperature dataset from 1970 to 2020 released by the National Meteorological Information Center and using the empirical orthogonal function (EOF) and Mann-Kendall trend analysis method, we investigated the spatiotemporal variations of rainfall amount, days, and intensity for four types of diurnal precipitation process on the Loess Plateau in summertime (from June to August), including sunny days and rainy nighttime, hot daytime and rainy nighttime, rainfall days for diurnal composite precipitation, as well as rainy daytime and rainless nighttime. The results are as follows: 1) From 2000 to 2020, the Loess Plateau witnessed a significant increase of precipitation amount in summertime and nighttime, which had not changed the spatial pattern characterized by a decreasing gradient of precipitation from southeast to northwest. 2) Consistent with the fluctuating precipitation amount and decreased precipitation days, there was a significant increasing trend for the precipitation intensity in sunny days and rainy nighttime, rainfall days for diurnal composite precipitation, rainy daytime and rainless nighttime from 2000 to 2020, while for hot daytime and rainy nighttime the precipitation intensity maintained stable fluctuations after the 1990s. 3) Areas in the central arid zone of Ningxia, eastern part of the Hetao Plain, northern Shanxi Province, and from the Fen-Wei Plain to the Yiluo River Plain were sensitive to the variations of sunny days and rainy nighttime. However, the Earth-Rock Mountain and high-altitude regions of the southwestern Loess Plateau are sensitive to hot daytime and rainy nighttime changes. Meanwhile, we observed a high sensitivity for the variations of rainfall days for diurnal composite precipitation, as well as rainy daytime and rainless nighttime in the valley and plain areas of the southeastern part of the Loess Plateau. The findings highlight that the increased intensity of daytime precipitation and diurnal composite precipitation is changing the patterns of diurnal extreme precipitation on the Loess Plateau, inspiring to enhance the research regarding the variations and mechanism of diurnal extreme precipitation in summertime.

Nature-based solutions (NbS) represent an efficient approach to utilizing natural resources while simultaneously protecting ecosystems, addressing the social, economic, and environmental challenges we face today. Recognized internationally as a cutting-edge method for ecosystem management, NbS can be effectively applied to the restructuring of rural spaces. This approach not only mitigates the ecological and environmental crises hindering rural development, but also unlocks the potential for rural growth, fostering comprehensive revitalization of rural areas. This study outlined the conceptual evolution of NbS, and explored the conceptual connotation of rural spatial restructuring based on NbS from the perspectives of various stakeholders, including local governments, village committees, rural business entities, and rural residents. The analysis was structured around four dimensions: ecological space, physical space, economic space, and social space. The research systematically examined the progress in restructuring the ecological space, physical space, economic space, and social space of rural areas through NbS, focusing on ecological conservation and landscape optimization, the optimization of production and living spaces, land consolidation and agricultural transformation, the commodification of natural landscapes, and balancing the needs and expectations of different stakeholders. The study concluded by suggesting future research directions, emphasizing the localization of NbS concepts, the establishment of multi-sectoral collaborative mechanisms, optimization strategies for resource and capital allocation, phased assessments of socioeconomic impacts, and the application of quantitative methods to measure socioeconomic benefits.

Mobile phone signaling data have been widely used in spatiotemporal behavior research, but their potential application in urban planning is limited due to the lack of information on activity purposes. To address this issue, this study proposed a method to infer the purposes of non-work activities from mobile phone signaling data. The method integrates multisource data, and employs a multinomial logit model to explore the relationship between activity purposes and individual attributes, temporal characteristics, and spatial properties of activities. The key innovation lies in the introduction of a location visit frequency variable that reflects long-term behavioral patterns. Empirical results show that incorporating visit frequency significantly improves the model's goodness of fit from 0.265 to 0.442, and increases the overall prediction accuracy from 58.0% to 69.2%. While maintaining interpretability, this method substantially enhances the accuracy of non-work activity identification, providing new insights into residents' spatiotemporal behavior patterns. The findings offer valuable data support and decision-making references for public facility planning, traffic demand forecasting, and business spatial layout optimization.

Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (hereinafter referred to as Inner Mongolia) is an important ecological barrier in northern China. Under the joint drive of natural and human factors, the dynamic process of vegetation change in Inner Mongolia has significantly varied since the twenty-first century. However, there is still a lack of systematic quantitative research on the location, degree, and occurrence of abrupt changes in vegetation, and the contribution of different driving factors. This study selected six remote sensing vegetation indices and used the Theil-Sen trend, Mann-Kendall test, and Breaks for Additive Season and Trend methods to monitor the spatiotemporal patterns of vegetation greening and browning in Inner Mongolia from 2000 to 2022. The contributions of natural and human factors were quantitatively analyzed using the improved Residual Trends method and Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling. The results show that: 1) From 2000 to 2022, 29.62%-36.96% of the areas in Inner Mongolia experienced vegetation greening, while only 0.36%-0.51% of the areas experienced browning. Positive abrupt changes mainly occurred in grasslands (35.9%) in the central and western regions and forested areas in the eastern region (25.7%), while 42.7% of the negative abrupt changes occurred in the western grassland areas such as Chifeng City and western Hulunbuir City. 2) Climate change dominated 88.8% of vegetation greening and 62.8% of vegetation browning in the study area, with 5.8% of greening and 14.8% of browning being dominated by land use. Both factors had positive effects on vegetation greening areas and negative impacts on browning areas. 3) For greening areas and browning areas, direct impact of temperature, soil moisture, population density, and land use intensity had dominant effects on most areas. The direct and indirect effects of various factors exhibited significant spatial heterogeneity in distribution. This study can provide a scientific guidance for the development of ecological restoration in Inner Mongolia.

As a rail transit infrastructure linking cities in a certain region, intercity railways play an important role in promoting regional integrated social and economic development. In the formulation of intercity railway construction plans, after determining the scale and layout of the line network, it is also necessary to preliminarily divide the construction phases of each line. Due to the different roles and positions of intercity railways in an urban agglomeration, scientifically planning their construction sequence is conducive to forming a reasonable spatial and temporal layout, as well as achieving the best socioeconomic benefits. Based on the forecasted long-term distribution of population and economy, this study formulated the spatial interactive accessibility of intercity railways, constructed a value model for intercity railway connections, and proposed a "round by round comparison-dynamic progressive" evaluation method for the construction sequence of intercity railways. Taking the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area urban agglomeration as a case study, we evaluated and ranked the intercity railway lines in the medium and long-term development plans. The study identified some key routes with high value and some ordinary routes with small value increment, which generally conforms to the recent construction project arrangement of the Greater Bay Area urban agglomeration, but there are also some differences. The proposed connection value model can provide a reference basis for the formulation and implementation of planning schemes.

Under the background of globalization, informatization, industrialization, and urbanization, the hierarchical structure of China's urban system and its flow networks are intertwined and interact with each other. Based on the improved gravitational field model and the spatial econometric model, this study analyzed the economic efficiency of the Wuhan metropolitan area under the interaction of urban hierarchy and population flow (hierarchy-flow). The study found that the economic performance of cities and towns in the Wuhan metropolitan area showed a significant center-periphery pattern, and the Wuhan-Ezhou-Huangshi-Huanggang axis of economic efficiency is initially formed. The total economic volume of cities and towns grew super-linearly with the increase of urban population scale, but the gap between them tended to narrow. Population flows across scales promoted the growth of urban economic efficiency, and there was heterogeneity in the effects of different dimensions of urban hierarchies on urban economic efficiency. The influence of scale hierarchy on urban economic efficiency was negative, while increased population flows to large cities reduced scale diseconomies. Functional hierarchies contributed to the economic efficiency of cities and towns, and they further promoted agglomeration economies through cross-scale population flow. The administrative hierarchy promoted efficient economic growth in cities and towns, and growth in the scale of urban mobility at high administrative tiers promoted hierarchical diffusion. The interaction of hierarchy-flow expands the research perspectives of urban economic growth, deepens the understanding of the mechanism of high-efficiency growth of cities with different hierarchies, and lays the foundation for the coordinated and high-efficiency development of urban economy in metropolitan areas.

The burgeoning digital economy is a key driver in shaping urban and regional landscapes. The digital transformation of value chains is crucial for promoting high-quality growth in the digital creative sector. Based on the spatiotemporal production and service data of China's online gaming industry from 2010 to 2022, this study analyzed the spatial characteristics of China's online gaming industry network from the perspective of the digital creative value chain, and revealed its influencing factors using the valued Exponential Random Graph Models (ERGMs). The research findings provide several significant insights. First, the Chinese online gaming industry network features a hierarchical pyramid structure and a distinctive spatial configuration of "strong triangle" and "weak diamond". This is characterized by strong core connections and the integration of small to medium-sized cities. The network also displays path dependency and hierarchical attraction traits across cities. Second, there are distinct differences in the spatial layouts of industrial networks at different stages of the value chain. The production-operation network adopts a triangle + diamond configuration, while the operation-publishing network shifts to a radial structure centered around the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. Last, the network can be influenced by factors such as administrative hierarchy, the growing new economy, institutional and social proximity, and contagion effects. It is important to recognize that these factors can vary across different developmental phases and segments of the value chain. This study contributes to the academic discussion by providing a strong theoretical framework and empirical evidence for analyzing urban networks in the digital era. It also offers strategic insights for the optimized allocation of the digital creative industry, promoting synergistic interactions, and facilitating the evolution and enhancement of value chains.

Under the background of rapid urbanization and living heritage tourism development, traditional ethnic minority villages, as a unique geographical unit that nurtures ethnic regional cultures, have become increasingly hollowed out, showing multi-dimensional spatial change with both common and individual characteristics. Based on this phenomenon, this study took Pingtan Village of the Xiangxi Dong ethnic community in Hunan Province as an example, and applied the framework of quantitative assessment of hollowing out status quo-analysis of spatial variation of hollowing out-exploration of hollowing out formation mechanism by using index construction, qualitative research, and the institutional analysis and development (IAD) framework, to explore the status quo, spatial variation characteristics, and formation mechanism of hollowing out in Pingtan Village. The study found that: 1) From the quantitative results, the external appearance of traditional buildings in the village is still well preserved, but population hollowing out and building hollowing out are significant, and the degree of hollowing out of the new village, commercial streets, and traditional village shows the characteristics of microscopic geographic differentiation. 2) In terms of the specific features of hollowing out, residents' non-farming employment and conservative mobility have increased, the architectural space shows fragmentation of the spatial texture at the macro level and low-energy development of residential buildings at the micro level, and the cultural space faces the challenges of the loss of local representation and inheritance. 3) With regard to the hollowing formation mechanism, the hollowing out of Pingtan Village is a complex process of alienation of the village territorial spatial system driven by the macro social environment and the micro confined space, as well as by the combination of exogenous and endogenous subjects. The study aimed to explore the general patterns of the characteristics and formation mechanism of the hollowing out of traditional ethnic minority villages, to provide a scientific basis for the effective implementation of urban-rural integration and rural revitalization in the same types of micro territorial space, and to promote the survival of traditional ethnic minority villages in a living state.

Accurately quantifying the complex relationships between urban rail transit and residential property prices along its lines can help optimize land resource utilization and enhance residents' well-being. Taking Lanzhou City as a case, this study employed multi-source heterogeneous data to develop a methodology that integrates an Optuna-optimized XGBoost model with the interpretability techniques of SHAP-PDP. This approach aims to investigate the mechanisms through which subway characteristics influence housing prices and quantitatively analyze the interactive effects between subway characteristics and other key influencing factors. The results reveal that: 1) The XGBoost model outperforms decision trees, random forests, gradient boosting decision trees, and CatBoost, achieving an explanatory power of 77.29%, making its predictions more reliable. 2) Property management fees, betweenness centrality, vegetation coverage, density of transportation facilities, and density of financial institutions are the top five contributors to housing prices, collectively accounting for 46.07% of relative importance. Among subway-related characteristics, network centrality of subway stations exerts a significantly greater impact on housing prices than proximity to the nearest station. 3) The effects of distance to subway station, betweenness centrality, and closeness centrality on housing prices exhibit nonlinear characteristics with distinct threshold effects, indicating that the influence intensity fluctuates significantly with changing conditions. 4) Apart from property management fees, subway characteristics interact intricately with vegetation coverage, density of functional facilities, and building age, yielding positive interactive effects only within specific ranges. Therefore, maintaining various feature elements within optimal ranges is an effective approach to capturing land value premiums. The findings provide a theoretical reference for scientifically assessing the impact of rail transit on urban development, helping to avoid decision-making blind spots caused by information asymmetry. Additionally, they offer policy insights for achieving stable housing price regulation and enhancing the efficiency of urban spatial governance.

Human trafficking has existed since ancient times and persists to this day, causing serious damage to family and social harmony and stability. Based on open-source data on the Internet, this study employed statistical analysis and spatial visualization methods to analyze the spatiotemporal characteristics of child trafficking in Henan Province from 1970 to 2018. Furthermore, it exploreed the regional types and formation mechanisms of these crimes. The results are as follows: 1) From 1970 to 2018, the annual variation of child trafficking in Henan Province showed an inverted-"V" shape, high in the middle and low at both ends. It was closely related to fertility policies, anti-trafficking enforcement efforts, and shifts in societal attitudes. In terms of monthly variation, a clear seasonal differentiation was observed, with spring and summer being the peak seasons, largely influenced by climate, agricultural activities, and holidays. 2) The spatial distribution of child trafficking in Henan Province showed significant regional disparities. Hotspot areas include Huaxian County, Yuanyang County, and Lankao County in the northeast, and Erqi District in the central region, while most counties in the northwest, west, and south are low-incidence areas. 3) The regional types of child trafficking in Henan Province were mainly dominated by trafficking in boys, trafficking in girls, and trafficking out boys. Through the study period, the number of boy-inflow-dominant areas has decreased, while the number of boy-outflow-dominant areas has shown an upward trend, and the number of girl-inflow-dominant areas has shown a slight increase. 4) Due to the influence of the family planning policy, regions in Henan Province with severe son preference, poor economic development, and lower educational levels tend to traffic in boys due to restricted fertility, inability to conceive, or the loss of a son, driven by the purposes of "continuing the family line" and "providing old-age support", thereby forming the boy-inflow-dominant type. In contrast, regions with less pronounced son preference often desire "having both a son and a daughter", or some economically disadvantaged men seek to enter marriage by purchasing wives. When faced with fertility restrictions, inability to conceive, or marital mismatches, these regions tend to traffic in girls for the purposes of caregiving in old age and childbearing, forming the girl-inflow-dominant type. The formation of the trafficking out boys is facilitated by a robust buyer's market, sufficient criminal motivation, inadequate regulatory enforcement, market-driven criminal choices, and convenient transportation conditions.

In the process of suburbanization, the consumption life of residents in large residential areas has developed new characteristics in the context of urban socio-spatial reconstruction. Based on the theoretical perspective of spatial behavior, this study constructed a multidimensional analytical framework of "social group-consumption place-consumption behavior" to deeply analyze the internal relationship between social, behavioral, and spatial factors in the consumption behavior of residents in large residential areas. The study adopted the method of questionnaire survey, and analyzed the spatial and temporal characteristics and influencing factors of the consumption behaviors of the residents in the Wangjing area of Beijing through the binary logistic regression model. The following results were obtained: 1) The consumption behavior of Wangjing area residents showed the characteristics of high proportion of food and education, cultural, and entertainment spending, and at the same time showed four varied types of consumption demand, namely, personal basic consumption type, self-development consumption type, family development consumption type, and leisure and health consumption type. 2) In the Wangjing area, the loss of the centrality of the municipal shopping malls is persisting. Residents' social consumption demand and spatial cognitive evaluation of places jointly promoted the formation of differentiated consumption behavior choices of neighborhood-level, commercial-level, and city-level consumption places. 3) The consumption behavior of residents in large residential areas presented the pattern of "localization" in time and "near-residence" in space. The service functions of job-housing, urban and virtual consumption spaces exhibited characteristics of balance, differentiation, and convenience. 4) The length of work-related commute, length of residence, and age of the residents had a stronger explanatory power for the behavior of job-housing consumption spaces, and the influencing factors related to monthly income and type of occupation had a stronger influence on the behavior of urban consumption spaces.

New quality productive forces act as a bridge for balanced economic development between urban and rural areas. This study analyzed the change of China's new quality productive forces using the panel data from prefecture-level cities spanning from 2011 to 2021. Through the application of mediation effect models and spatial econometric models, the study examined the influence of new quality productive forces on the urban-rural income gap, the mechanisms at play, and the spatial spillover effects. The results indicate that: 1) Since 2011, the overall level of new quality productive forces in Chinese prefecture-level cities had shown a steady upward trend, with significant spatial clustering characteristics. The various components of the new quality productive forces exhibited a "point and area clustering" spatial pattern. 2) The development of new quality productive forces had a significant positive impact on reducing the urban-rural income gap. This conclusion remained valid after robustness and endogeneity tests. 3) The results of the mediation effect analysis confirm that improvements in new quality productive forces in Chinese cities not only contribute to narrowing the urban-rural income gap overall but also affect the gap through mechanisms such as enhancing labor productivity and resource allocation efficiency. 4) The results of the spatial econometric analysis indicate that the development of new quality productive forces in China had a positive spillover effect on the urban-rural income gap. While it reduced the gap within a region, it also positively influenced the narrowing of the gap in neighboring regions. The enhancement of new quality productive forces is crucial for optimizing regional layouts. Moving forward, it is essential to integrate urban-rural coordinated development goals with the cultivation of these productive forces, emphasizing their positive impact on promoting urban-rural coordinated development.