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Over the past decade, the number of studies that investigate aerosol–cloud interactions has increased considerably. Although tremendous progress has been made to improve the understanding of basic physical mechanisms of aerosol–cloud interactions and reduce their uncertainties in climate forcing, there is still poor understanding of 1) some of the mechanisms that interact with each other over multiple spatial and temporal scales, 2) the feedbacks between microphysical and dynamical processes and between local-scale processes and large-scale circulations, and 3) the significance of cloud–aerosol interactions on weather systems as well as regional and global climate. This review focuses on recent theoretical studies and important mechanisms on aerosol–cloud interactions and discusses the significances of aerosol impacts on radiative forcing and precipitation extremes associated with different cloud systems. The authors summarize the main obstacles preventing the science from making a leap—for example, the lack of concurrent profile measurements of cloud dynamics, microphysics, and aerosols over a wide region on the observation side and the large variability of cloud microphysics parameterizations resulting in a large spread of modeling results on the modeling side. Therefore, large efforts are needed to escalate understanding. Future directions should focus on obtaining concurrent measurements of aerosol properties and cloud microphysical and dynamic properties over a range of temporal and spatial scales collected over typical climate regimes and closure studies, as well as improving understanding and parameterizations of cloud microphysics such as ice nucleation, mixed-phase properties, and hydrometeor size and fall speed.

It is essential to understand the factors driving the recent decline of dust activity in East Asia for future dust projections. Using a physically-based dust emission model, here we show that the weakening of surface wind and the increasing of vegetation cover and soil moisture have all contributed to the decline in dust activity during 2001 to 2017. The relative contributions of these three factors to the dust emission reduction during 2010–2017 relative to 2001 are 46%, 30%, and 24%, respectively. Much (78%) of the dust emission reduction is from barren lands, and a small fraction (4.6%) of the reduction is attributed to grassland vegetation increase that is partly ascribed to the ecological restoration. This suggests that the ecological restoration plays a minor role in the decline of dust activity. Rather, the decline is mainly driven by climatic factors, with the weakening of surface wind playing the dominant role. Changes in climatic factors mainly drive the decline of East Asian dust activity in the past two decades. The weakening of surface winds plays a dominant role, and the increasing of vegetation cover and soil moisture also has key contribution

Saline-alkali soils pose an increasingly serious global threat to plant growth and productivity. Much progress has been made in elucidating how plants adapt to salt stress by modulating ion homeostasis. Understanding the molecular mechanisms that affect salt tolerance and devising strategies to develop/breed salt-resilient crops have been the primary goals of plant salt stress signaling research over the past few decades. In this review, we reflect on recent major advances in our understanding of the cellular and physiological mechanisms underlying plant responses to salt stress, especially those involving temporally and spatially defined changes in signal perception, decoding, and transduction in specific organelles or cells.

As the forefront of China’s reform and opening up in the new era, free trade zones (FTZs) are not only a testing ground for promoting the domestic rule of law but also a pilot zone for aligning with the international rule of law. Over the past decade, China’s FTZs have formed a new pattern in which eastern FTZs collaborate with western ones and opening up is implemented across the board in the areas along borders, rivers, and coastal regions. However, they have also given rise to the issue of coordination of multiple interests such as reform and the rule of law, development and risks. XI Jinping Thought on the Rule of Law emphasizes advancing the domestic rule of law and foreign related rule of law in a coordinated manner. During FTZ construction, efforts should be made to fully explore the compatibility of the foreign-related rule of law with the domestic rule of law and the international rule of law. This entails optimizing the development pattern through coordination between the central and local governments, achieving steady opening up by aligning with international standards, and consolidating institutional innovation through multilateral cooperation. The ultimate goal is to establish FTZs as new heights of opening up characterized by a higher level of openness, a better business environment, and a stronger radiation effect.

The dust cycle is an important component of the Earth system and has been implemented in climate models and Earth system models (ESMs). An assessment of the dust cycle in these models is vital to address their strengths and weaknesses in simulating dust aerosol and its interactions with the Earth system and enhance the future model developments. This study presents a comprehensive evaluation of the global dust cycle in 15 models participating in the fifth phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5). The various models are compared with each other and with an aerosol reanalysis as well as station observations. The results show that the global dust emission in these models varies by a factor of 4–5 for the same size range. The models generally agree with each other and observations in reproducing the “dust belt”, which extends from North Africa, the Middle East, Central and South Asia to East Asia, although they differ greatly in the spatial extent of this dust belt. The models also differ in other dust source regions such as North America and Australia. We suggest that the coupling of dust emission with dynamic vegetation can enlarge the range of simulated dust emission. For the removal process, all the models estimate that wet deposition is smaller than dry deposition and wet deposition accounts for 12 %–39 % of total deposition. The models also estimate that most (77 %–91 %) dust particles are deposited onto continents and 9 %–23 % of dust particles are deposited into oceans. Compared to the observations, most models reproduce the dust deposition and dust concentrations within a factor of 10 at most stations, but larger biases by more than a factor of 10 are also noted at specific regions and for certain models. These results highlight the need for further improvements of the dust cycle especially on dust emission in climate models.

Amino acid metabolism plays a pivotal role in tumor microenvironment, influencing various aspects of cancer progression. The metabolic reprogramming of amino acids in tumor cells is intricately linked to protein synthesis, nucleotide synthesis, modulation of signaling pathways, regulation of tumor cell metabolism, maintenance of oxidative stress homeostasis, and epigenetic modifications. Furthermore, the dysregulation of amino acid metabolism also impacts tumor microenvironment and tumor immunity. Amino acids can act as signaling molecules that modulate immune cell function and immune tolerance within the tumor microenvironment, reshaping the anti-tumor immune response and promoting immune evasion by cancer cells. Moreover, amino acid metabolism can influence the behavior of stromal cells, such as cancer-associated fibroblasts, regulate ECM remodeling and promote angiogenesis, thereby facilitating tumor growth and metastasis. Understanding the intricate interplay between amino acid metabolism and the tumor microenvironment is of crucial significance. Expanding our knowledge of the multifaceted roles of amino acid metabolism in tumor microenvironment holds significant promise for the development of more effective cancer therapies aimed at disrupting the metabolic dependencies of cancer cells and modulating the tumor microenvironment to enhance anti-tumor immune responses and inhibit tumor progression.

The report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China put forward a scientific and systematic theory of the Chinese path to modernization, in which the modernization of the rule of law is both an integral part and a strong guarantee. Building a modern socialist country in all respects under the rule of law requires attention to the settlement of civil and commercial disputes. The separation of civil society and the political state, along with their mutual influence, has led to the development of diverse dispute-resolution mechanisms. Globalization has further accelerated their development and transformation. In face of the adjustments to the dispute resolution system amid the unprecedented changes of the century, China should complete the top-level design of the diversified settlement of civil and commercial disputes by deploying legislative and judicial resources to enhance the leading role of litigation in resolving these disputes. At the same time, China should continue to prioritize alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, improve the credibility of arbitration, and leverage the aggregating power of mediation, so as to serve the construction of the Chinese path to modernization.

Background Pomelo is one of the three major species of citrus. The fruit accumulates a variety of abundant secondary metabolites that affect the flavor. UDP-glycosyltransferases (UGTs) are involved in the glycosylation of secondary metabolites. Results In the present study, we performed a genome-wide analysis of pomelo UGT family, a total of 145 UGTs was identified based on the conserved plant secondary product glycosyltransferase (PSPG) motif. These UGT genes were clustered into 16 major groups through phylogenetic analysis of these genes with other plant UGTs (A-P). Pomelo UGTs were distributed unevenly among the chromosomes. At least 10 intron insertion events were observed in these UGT genome sequences, and I-5 was identified to be the highest conserved one. The expression profile analysis of pomelo UGT genes in different fruit tissues during development and ripening was carried out by RNA-seq. Conclusions We identified 145 UGTs in pomelo fruit through transcriptome data and citrus genome database. Our research provides available information on UGTs studies in pomelo, and provides an important research foundation for screening and identification of functional UGT genes.

Biomass burning (BB) aerosols exert a strong surface cooling effect over the southeast Atlantic (SEA) via aerosol‐radiation and aerosol‐cloud interactions. The reduction of the sea surface temperature (SST) can trigger the SST‐low cloud feedback. Whether this feedback can amplify the surface cooling effect is examined. The modeling results from the Community Earth System Model version 2 (CESM2) demonstrate that counterintuitively the cloud radiative effect (CRE) caused by the BB aerosols is weaker if SST‐low cloud feedback is considered compared to fixed‐SST simulation (−2.99 W m−2 vs. −4.79 W m−2). This is caused by (a) stronger sea breeze due to larger sea‐land temperature contrast causing less smoke transport over SEA and (b) less moisture supply from surface due to colder SST. Changes in SST also lead to counterclockwise rotation of ocean circulation anomalies. Consequently, the excess heat transport from the equator reverses the direction of SST‐cloud feedback in this region. Plain Language Summary Biomass burning aerosols can modulate the cloud macro‐ and microphysical properties over the Southeast Atlantic and induce a strong cooling effect at the surface. As a result, sea surface temperature will decrease, which can further promote cloudiness in this region (a positive SST‐low cloud feedback). Our study demonstrates that the cooling effect caused by biomass burning aerosols is actually smaller when the SST‐low cloud feedback is considered, because of stronger sea breeze that reduces the transport of biomass burning aerosols and weaker surface moisture supply. In addition, the ocean current changes can determine the direction of this SST‐low cloud feedback. Key Points Sea surface temperature‐low cloud feedback reduces the magnitude of the cloud radiative effect (CRE) caused by the BB aerosols over Southeast Atlantic Weaker CRE is due to stronger sea breeze and less moisture supply from the ocean The excess heat transport associated with counterclockwise rotation of ocean circulation anomalies stops the amplification of CRE

Based on the PM2.5 concentration data of 253 prefecture-level cities, it empirically investigated the effect of urban density on PM2.5 concentration in China using spatial econometric regression method. The results show that there is a spatial spillover effect of PM2.5 concentration in China. The coefficient of urban density is significantly negative, and the increase in urban density will reduce haze pollution. In order to reduce haze pollution in Chinese cities, it is necessary to continue to implement regional joint prevention and control measures. The eastern region should focus on building small blocks and high-density networks to reduce haze pollution. The central region should focus on urban greening, increase green coverage, and reduce the heat island effect. While improving the level of greening in the western region, we should increase urban density, reduce urban sprawl, and build compact cities.