Books published by Springer Nature Singapore

This book describes how the COVID-19 pandemic has affected the way of work, the division of household labor, and family formation in Japan. One of the characteristics of Japanese employment practices is a stable employer¿employment relationship and seniority-based wage system. In return, long working hours, especially for men who are called ¿salarymen¿ (salaried workers, or ¿company men¿), are required. The pandemic has led to an expansion of telework and has reduced their working hours, which has made them return to their homes to work. In contrast, non-regular employees, who are mostly women, has become more unstable in employment and their incomes fell. This tendency has become even stronger under the pandemic.Compared with conditions in Western countries, in Japan wives have a greater responsibility for domestic chores. In the pandemic, as children's classes shifted to online and childcare support facilities were temporarily closed, the burden of housework and child-rearing increased for wives. However, husbands who worked from home shared a part of the housework, and popular home delivery services helped to reduce the burdens on wives. Japan is one of the developed countries with low fertility rates. Under the pandemic, many Japanese postponed starting a family, which further shrank the country¿s birthrate. There was a remarkably significant tendency to postpone having children among economically disadvantaged and socially isolated families.This book provides a portrait of Japan¿s experience regarding the notable impacts of the pandemic on work and family life.

This monograph provides a detailed and systematic introduction to the application of deep learning technology in the intelligent monitoring of crop diseases and pests. Taking 24 types of crop pests, wheat aphids, and wheat diseases with complex backgrounds as examples, a large-scale crop pest and disease dataset was constructed to provide necessary data support for the deep learning module. Various schemes for identifying and detecting large-scale crop diseases and pests based on deep convolutional neural network technology have also been proposed. This book can be used as a reference for teachers and students majoring in agriculture, computer science, artificial intelligence, intelligent science and technology, and other related fields in higher education institutions. It can also be used as a reference book for researchers in fields such as image processing technology, intelligent manufacturing, and high-tech applications.

This book proposes new technologies and discusses future solutions for ICT design infrastructures, as reflected in high-quality papers presented at the 7th International Conference on ICT for Sustainable Development (ICT4SD 2022), held in Goa, India, on 29-30 July 2022. The book covers the topics such as big data and data mining, data fusion, IoT programming toolkits and frameworks, green communication systems and network, use of ICT in smart cities, sensor networks and embedded system, network and information security, wireless and optical networks, security, trust, and privacy, routing and control protocols, cognitive radio and networks, and natural language processing. Bringing together experts from different countries, the book explores a range of central issues from an international perspective.

This book presents the latest cutting-edge research on phase separation. It discusses the benefits and risks of phase separation for living cells from the perspectives of physics, chemistry, biology, and medicine.Phase separation is a physico-chemical process that induces a single solution of solvent and intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) to separate into two phases, one phase containing only solvent and the other containing IDPs in the solvent. A key molecule in phase separation is the intrinsically disordered region (IDR) proteins (IDPs), mostly comprised of RNA-binding proteins (RBPs). One of the major roles of phase separation is to generate condensates, membrane-less organelles including stress granule, Cajal body, and nucleolus.Biological actions of phase separation in various aspects of science have received increasing attention in recent years. The book consists of four parts; Part I on physics and chemistry includes topics on structural biology of RBP FUS/TLS and chaperone for phase separation, computational approach of phase separation, and chemistry of G-quadruplex of DNA and RNA. Part II on molecular biology presents molecular mechanism of IDR sequence phase separation and potential cellular function of these labile fibers, formation of membrane-less organelles, and roles of noncoding RNAs in phase separation. Part III on biology covers topics from nuclear pore complex, developmental biology regarding force-dependent remodeling, and neurobiology and higher order brain functions. Finally, Part IV on medicine presents condensates and cancer therapy, pathogenesis of neurodegenerative diseases based on IDPs, and responses of microglia to amyloid. The last chapter highlights the latest topic on how the SARS-Cov-2 virus takes advantage of phase separation for its infections.This book brings together the studies of phase separation in each area in a single volume. The comprehensive approach provides new insights to the research andwill benefit the readers by responding to the emerging needs for understanding phase separation.

This edited book is an in-depth compilation of recent tools and techniques, concepts and strategies used globally in plant molecular farming (PMF) for the cost-effective bulk production of recombinant proteins, secondary metabolites, and other biomolecules. The book presents an overview of success stories of PMF applications from developing countries to address poverty, achieve zero hunger, good health and well-being, thus achieving the UN SDGs 1, 2, and 3.The book deep dives into recent extraction and downstream processing methodologies, its co-existence with conventional agriculture, global governance and finally opportunities, challenges, and future perspectives in plant molecular farming. It focuses on plastid/chloroplast transformation (transplastomics) and its application in plant molecular farming. The books highlight recent advances in genome editing, synthetic biology, glycosylation and glyco-engineering for improved plant molecular farming by marker-free andtissue-specific systems via cisgenic and transgenic crops. In depth discussions on biosafety issues and bio-containment strategies have also been included.The book has 15 chapters authored by globally leading experts on the subject, presenting opportunities & challenges for bio-industrial researchers and entrepreneurs. It is useful to researchers, industrialists, entrepreneurs, policy planners, academician, and students across the disciplines.

This book is a collection of studies on state-of-art techniques developed for producing value-added N-containing chemicals and N-doped carbon materials from renewable sources via sustainable technologies. Aiming to improve conversion effectiveness and develop innovative techniques for new value-added N-containing products, topics in the text address recent advances, assess and highlight promising methods or technological strategies, and outline direct conversion routes for conversion of renewable resources to N-containing chemicals and materials. World-renowned authorities, experts, and professionals have contributed individual chapters in selected areas to cover the overall topic comprehensively. In addition to researchers and professionals in the field, educators teaching university courses on biomass transformation, biomass energy, energy materials, heterocyclic chemistry, resource materials and sustainable development and green chemistry will find the text informative with new international perspectives.

This contributed volume is focused on SDG 3, 6, 7 ,9, 11, 15, and it covers extensive knowledge on damage and loss contexts of climate change in a developing country. Indiäs vast landscape with its diversity of eco-geo-physiography, socio-cultural, and developmental settings, coupled with climate change and anthropogenic factors, makes it one of the most disaster-prone countries of the world and, thus, representing almost all the disasters and extreme events associated with climate change, variability, and weather phenomenon.Besides common hazards,such as heavy rainfall, floods, drought, cyclone and heat wave, secondary and composite disasters like forest fires and disease epidemics are also covered with case studies and examples. Cross-cutting aspects like infrastructure resilience, gender and social equity concerns, legal and assessment tools, and futuristic vision have been covered well in the book. Disaster risk reduction, preparedness, and resilienceas central themes of adaptation to climate change are presented through policy discussions, tools, and strategic analysis of past and recent lessons.This book is of common interest to a wider range of readers across policyplanning, academia, research, and professional practitioners having interest in adaptation, resilience building and sustainability in developing countries of the world. Though it is primarily a reference book, it can also serve as a textbook for university courses and professional trainings in climate change adaptation, disaster management, sustainability and strategic management studies.

This book examines the childhood education policy development in China. It involves investigating the holistic landscape of China's childhood development from a policy perspective. It also offers a specific lens to examine the migrant childhood education policy in China, the left-behind childhood education policy in China, the ethnic childhood education policy development in China, the special childhood education policy in China, and the boarding schools' childhood education policy in China. The intended readers are scholars and researchers who are interested and work in research on China's childhood education reform/pre-K-12 in China. The administrators and stakeholders in Chinese education system and graduate students are majoring and minoring in the field of educational policy.

The book is motivated by the pivotal issue: what is the performance limit of active control and energy harvesting? It aims to develop systematic design methodologies with a "e;visualization technique"e; where the performance limit can be readily determined solely based on visual inspections.Modern technological systems have evolved toward high speed, heavy load, lightweight, flexible operation and extreme conditions, as demonstrated in aerospace, marine, transportation and manufacturing industries. The associated vibration and noise issues have become such problematic that they may significantly confine the performance of the systems, to say the discomfort at least.Through the geometric representation of the performance specifications, fundamental issues such as (1) the existence of feasible controllers; (2) the optimality of controllers; (3) the performance limit of controllers; (4) compromisability among the performance specifications; (5) the synthesis of controllers; and (6) the influence of constraints on optimal solutions can all be resolved within the proposed framework. The state of the art is thus refined with a new approach complementary to those optimization-based routines, where extra effort would have to be exercised to disclose the compromisability of performance specifications.The proposed book will result in a new design methodology-performance limit-oriented active control. It was initiated by the author with the project "e;Active Control for Performance Limit"e; (ACPL). A series of fundamental results are obtained and will be disseminated in this book. The results are verified through extensive numerical demonstrations and are expected to provide useful guidance for practical engineering in the vibration and noise industry and research.

In an era of globalization, internationalization of higher education (IHE) has been constructed as an almost inevitable trend and has become a common pursuit of many nations in their higher education (HE) policies. This book focuses on two nations, China and Australia, in terms of this trend. The broadest aim of this book was to find out the interactive relationships between global and national pressures in policy development by comparing the international HE policies in China and Australia. The three categories, overarching meta-policies at the macrolevel (nation), institution focused policies at the mesolevel (universities), and people focused policies at the microlevel (individuals) are documented and analyzed. Similarities and differences are identified. Similarities include promoting and deepening IHE as one important agenda in national policies at the macrolevel in the two nations, promoting transnational cooperation in the provision of HE at the mesolevel, as well as increasing international student numbers and encouraging an outflow of student learning and exchanges at the microlevel. Differences include China's soft power initiatives and Australia's appeal for the sustainability of international HE as a national priority in the area of IHE at the macrolevel; the focus on "e;World Class Universities"e; construction in China and strengthening the overall HE system in Australia; and different issues in relation to people mobility and brain circulation-specifically, encouraging more outflow of students and attracting more inflow of talents and international students in China, and over-reliance on international students financially in Australia. It is suggested that different responses to the global trends reflect the specificities of each nation and the ways path-dependent factors mediate global pressures. This comparison will facilitate a better understanding of how globalization has affected and been responded to in IHE policies and enable a better understanding of their path-dependent mediation through a focus on two specific sets of national policies.

This book includes the synthesis, analysis and characterization of nanomaterials that are an important ingredient in nanotechnologies. Nanomaterials contain nanoparticles, smaller than 100 nanometers in at least one dimension. Nanomaterials are coming into use in health care, electronics, cosmetics and other areas. Their physical and chemical properties differ from those of bulk materials. This needs to cover health risks to workers and potential risks to environment. This is currently done on a case-by-case basis, but risk assessment methods need to be kept up to date as the use of nanomaterials expands, especially as they find their way into consumer products. This book covers the basics to advanced applications of nanomaterials and provides a useful resource for researchers and professionals in the field.

This book discusses a detailed overview of diabetic retinopathy, symptoms, causes, and screening methodologies. Using a deep convolution neural network and visualizations techniques, this work develops a prognosis system used to automatically detect the diabetic retinopathy disease from captured retina images and help improve the prediction rate of diagnosis. This book gives the readers an understanding of the diabetic retinopathy disease and recognition process that helps to improve the clinical analysis efficiency. It caters to general ophthalmologists and optometrists, diabetologists, and internists who encounter diabetic patients and most prevalent retinal diseases daily.

This book collates various aspects of stress tolerance in crop plants. It primarily focuses on the heat and temperature related stress, starting from the severity of the problem on quantity and quality of yield under the threat of global climate change. The content also explores other mechanistic dimensions such as physiochemical and molecular mechanism underlying thermotolerance, signaling mechanism under heat stress, role of heat shock proteins in modulating thermotolerance, omics approach for development of climate smart-crop. Chapters discuss different approaches used in the past to develop heat stress tolerant crop plants, list of developed thermotolerant agriculturally important crop plants, redox homeostasis under heat stress, nutrient uptake and use efficiency in plants under heat stress and much more. The book is a useful compilation for researchers working in the area of abiotic stress tolerance in crop plants, as well as for students of plant physiology and agricultural sciences.

This book traces archaeological exploration and discoveries as early as 2012 and reveals Liangzhu culture by reviewing seven years of archaeological findings at the Liangzhu historical site, developments in archaeology history, the psychological journeys of archaeologists, as well as the collision of schools of thought. It also contains in-depth interviews with archaeological experts and other specialists, building a bridge between popular interest and academic interest, and showcases Liangzhu civilization and archaeology for professionals and the general public alike.

This book proposes the use of green infrastructure to balance biodiversity conservation and disaster management. Paddy fields are one example of such infrastructure and are the focus of this book. In Japan, abandoned, once-cultivated land is increasing in the paddy fields due to the aging of society and recent depopulation. The author proposes to consolidate such lands and create wetlands because the paddy fields hold water during heavy rains, which prevents floods and protects cities. This is essential, considering that extreme weather conditions have increased the risk of flood damage in Japan. Not only do such wetlands hold water during the flood season, they also provide habitats for aquatic life and places for children to learn about the natural environment. In addition, fish farming in the wetlands will provide food for many people. The increase in water disasters associated with global warming is occurring not only in Japan but globally. The proposal presented in this book will help government officials around the world, especially those involved in urban and rural planning, to consider disaster management-an idea that will be welcomed by both engineers and biologists.

This book introduces the issues of the contemporary state of Bihar, India, in terms of its performance on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) indicators and the initiatives taken by the central and state governments towards realizing human development. Doing so, it draws upon the mistakes committed in the past and moves ahead towards a better future with the idea of sustainable human development. The book also presents a comprehensive evaluation of the background and indicators of the human development index, and it analyses the impact of COVID-19 on India in general and on Bihar in particular.India is a nation of unbalanced states in terms of development. In spite of all the development initiatives, India still contains states that have not conformed to the breakthrough claimed by the nation, and the state of Bihar falls under this category. Bihar has emerged as the worst performer in human development, based on the ranking of the Human Development Index 2020. Nevertheless, Bihar has the potential for overall development to achieve its glorious past once again, by various pro-poor policies implemented by the government of Bihar in the last two decades, which is critically analysed in detail.

This book invites readers to challenge, corroborate, and add to the discourse on more inclusive pedagogical practice. Presenting theoretically and empirically informed research, it highlights potential considerations regarding the intersections of diversity, literacy, and learner difficulties. These three areas provide a stage where opposing paradigms often pose challenges for educators and create unnecessary barriers to providing the best education for all learners. These barriers might reveal how students are positioned through a deficit lens rather than one that recognizes individual differences and how these learner differences sometimes result in labels or put students at increased risk of encountering difficulties. The contributing authors' goals are to start and sustain a conversation that examines these perspectives and to offer counter-narratives to the deficit lens by recognizing that individual difference does not need to be a barrier to educational access. By examining opportunities for more inclusive educational success, this book encourages discourse among key stakeholders; further, it goes beyond problematizing to offer new avenues for optimal learning and inclusive pedagogy across multiple contexts.

This book provides a single source of reference for educators interested in understanding how industry-based ideas have been adapted into different educational contexts, and supports their utilisation in practice. The link between industry-based ideas and their application in education has enabled educators to develop engaging, collaborative, and creative learning environments, as well as better preparing their students for an increasingly complex and dynamic global environment. This book includes contributions from educators, researchers, and practitioners, who have integrated industry-based ideas into their teaching, and explores how these concepts and practices support the creation of effective learning environments. Through these diverse, international contributions, this book enables wider engagement with, and critical analysis of, the application of industry practices, processes and techniques in the development of collaborative and creative learning environments.

This book focuses on influence of slag-steel chemical reaction on control of inclusions in Al deoxidized special steel. Readers learn about the control of inclusions in Al deoxidized special steel refined with high basicity high alumina slag. This refining slag system was developed by the authors and used to target low melting point inclusions. This book is useful for university teachers, graduate students, researchers and engineers who are engaged in the field on control of non-metallic inclusions in steel, particularly those who are exploring innovative and optimal technologies for more efficient control of inclusions and improved qualities of steels.

This book provides an in-depth analysis of India's pulses sector in terms of production, prices, markets, and trade. Pulses play a pivotal role in a developing country like India for all categories of people due to its rich protein content (double that of wheat and three times more than that of rice).  Despite being an important crop from the point of view of food, nutrition, and environmental security, the focus of food security policies in developing countries has been more on wheat and rice production. This book analyses factors influencing the supply of pulses with a greater emphasis on government interventions such as minimum support price (MSP) and National Food Security Mission (NFSM), the effectiveness of MSP and factors influencing farmers' access to MSP, the import dependency implications through a detailed import pricing behavior of major importers of major pulses. It investigates production, market dynamics, and trade implications related to two major pulses, chickpea and pigeonpea, produced by all pulse-producing States in India. Analysis of farmer's awareness of MSP and factors influencing access to MSP are undertaken through a comprehensive household survey from the States of Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Madhya Pradesh. Finally, the book analyses import implications and import pricing behaviour for all major pulses imported by India.  The book would be very useful for researchers working on the issues of agricultural production and food security, for agriculture and agri-business students, as well as for policy makers to understand the inherent dynamics in the pulses sector.

This book adopts the methods of field investigation and case study, systematically summarizes the development course of Nanjiang County in Sichuan Province since China's reform and opening-up, and comprehensively sorts out its main experiences of promoting green development and rural governance. These experiences not only have great enlightening and demonstration significance to the 80 counties that belong to the Qinba mountain area, but also have important reference value to promote rural revitalization and realize effective governance in the vast mountainous areas and counties throughout the country. Therefore, this book is not only suitable for ordinary readers interested in China's reform and opening up, but also suitable for professional researchers interested in China's green development and rural governance.