Building Sustainable Agrifood Systems and Resilient Rural Communities in Japan explores the challenges Japan has been facing as a post-industrialized society. Through case studies across rural Japan, this book shows how these challenges are being addressed in terms of reorganizing agriculture, food systems, and rural livelihoods. Although the contexts surrounding rural areas in Japan are different from elsewhere in the world, this volume provides possible lessons on sustainability and adap...

This book timely provides high-quality records of 32 PTB sections across different depositional settings from terrestrial to marine facies in South China, including descriptions of lithologies, high-resolution correlation of key boundaries and fossil occurrences at each section. This book also analyzes the patterns and processes of the community and ecosystem evolution over space and through time in the lead to the end-Permian mass extinction, and critically analyzes the mostly debated hyp...

Assessing Learners’ Competence in L2 Chinese is the first book intended to answer the question on whether existing standardised and classroom-based assessments can reflect learners’ competence in L2 Chinese.The Chinese language has enjoyed increasing global popularity amongst second/foreign language learners and has become one of the major modern languages for school and university curricula. However, to many teachers and researchers, it has been difficult to answer with c...

As two Asian giants and rising power, the interactions between India and China have global significance. This book analyses the multifaceted and multi-layered character of Sino-Indian relations since the beginning of the 21st century in a period marked by cooperation and competition.Positioned in a social constructivist framework that emphasizes mutual perceptions and socialization, the book draws analytical leverage from two core concepts – national identity and national interest ...

This timely book documents marvelous brachiopod fossils from the Palaeozoic-Mesozoic transition of South China. Numerous beautiful pictures and detailed descriptions (specifically the measurements of body size) of brachiopod species are presented. Systematic discussion on the evolution of brachiopod biodiversity and morphological features across the critical interval is not only extremely important for paleontologists to understand the marine ecosystem evolution from the Palaeozoic to the ...

This is the first book that focuses on practical algorithms for polynomial inequality proving and discovering. It is a summary of the work by the authors and their collaborators on automated inequality proving and discovering in recent years. Besides brief introduction to some classical results and related work in corresponding chapters, the book mainly focuses on the algorithms initiated by the authors and their collaborators, such as real root counting, real root classification, improved...

This SpringerBrief presents interference coordination techniques for future 5G cellular networks. Starting with an overview of existing interference management techniques, it focuses on practical interference coordination schemes based on beamforming and user scheduling. The proposed schemes aim to deal with the inter-cell interference in multi-cell MIMO networks, cross-tier interference in device-to-device communications underlaying cellular network, and inter-network interference in cogn...

Teaching and Learning Chinese in Higher Education deals with the current issues and challenges faced by teachers and learners of Chinese.Written by leading professionals and academics, the book is the first collection of research articles based on data collected in higher education institutions in the UK. The studies focus on concerns related to learners of Chinese as a foreign language (CFL) and aim to establish studies on teaching Chinese as a foreign language (TCFL) as ...

This innovative sourcebook builds a dynamic understanding of China's early medieval period (220–589) through an original selection and arrangement of literary, historical, religious, and critical texts. A tumultuous and formative era, these centuries saw the longest stretch of political fragmentation in China's imperial history, resulting in new ethnic configurations, the rise of powerful clans, and a pervasive divide between north and south.Deploying thematic categories, the edito...

This open access book delves into discussions central to hydraulic structures and research in the realm of hydrodynamics. Hydraulic structures stand as pivotal components within civil engineering and construction, playing a safeguarding role for structures vital to human development. Examples encompass the Hoover Dam in the USA, the Three Gorges Dam in China and the Almendra Dam in Salamanca, Spain. Monitoring the safety and ensuring the structural stability of hydraulic structures has lon...

Establish a fundamental understanding of the gemstone world with the Dictionary of Gems and Gemology. This seminal work became the single most important and authoritative reference text for professionals, students, and enthusiasts in the rapidly developing field of gemology.Shipley, the founder of the Gemological Institute of America, created this dictionary to standardize and define the technical, trade, and scientific terms used in the study of precious ...

Hong Kong possesses an impressively diverse tree flora with 390 native species. This book celebrates the incredible diversity, beauty and biology of the territory's tree species, highlighting over 100 important species that are individually illustrated in exquisitely detailed watercolour paintings by Sally Grace Bunker, an acclaimed botanical artist. The illustrations are accompanied by text that teases out a diversity of associated narratives for each species, ranging from the history of ...