Search Results (3,970)

This paper examines the essential role of urban green spaces in fostering healthy living from a landscape architecture perspective. Health goes beyond the mere absence of disease to include physical, mental, and social wellbeing, all of which are greatly enhanced by accessible green spaces. By synthesising existing literature, this paper shows that urban green spaces have strong positive associations with health outcomes, especially in urban settings where environmental stressors are pronounced. The paper stresses the importance of designing attractive and accessible green spaces that encourage physical activity, mental wellbeing, and social interaction, addressing public health issues such as obesity and mental health disorders. In addition to physical and mental health benefits, the paper explores the potential of local food production through edible green infrastructure, such as community gardens, which can significantly improve diet and nutrition. Additionally, the study discusses disparities in the access to quality green spaces, particularly between the Global North and South, and advocates for equitable design strategies that serve diverse populations. Integrating evidence-based approaches into landscape architecture, the paper argues for the establishment of urban green spaces as essential elements of public health infrastructure. Finally, the paper calls for future research and policy efforts to maximise the health benefits of urban green spaces and improve the quality of life in urban environments. Full article

Impatiens L. plants have a variety of flower colors, abundant flowers, and unique flower types, which have high ornamental and medicinal value. This paper utilized CiteSpace (version 6.2.R4) and VOSviewer (version 1.6.20) software to analyze documents related to Impatiens L. research from 1987 to 2023, sourced from the Web of Science database (WOS) and the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI). Bibliometric analyses were conducted to explore the literature potential of Impatiens L. research, revealing publication volume, discipline distribution, major research institutions and researchers, research hotspots, and research trends. The results indicated a consistent increase in articles published on Impatiens L., with the United States, China, and India as the primary research countries. The research direction predominantly focused on plant science, ecology, and horticulture, with universities and research institutes being the main contributors. The Chinese Academy of Sciences and Florida State University were identified as having the most published articles and a strong influence. Research on Impatiens L. primarily focused on investigating new species, phenotypic plasticity, biodiversity, and systematic classification. Future efforts should emphasize the investigation and protection of Impatiens L. resources, conduct in-depth research on the plant’s active components, innovate breeding technology, and explore the biological characteristics and ecological role of Impatiens L. through interdisciplinary collaboration. Full article

This study examines the impact of changes in temperature and seasonal climate across a 4-year period (2019–2022) and the impact of the existing design on pedestrian activity in the ChiKaHo underground public space in Sapporo, Japan. Using statistical and regression analyses, the study identified boundary temperature ranges for each analyzed point in this space and presented an assumption of the design- and function-related factors influencing the period of use of the ChiKaHo. Each observation point exhibited a unique temperature range of change in pedestrian behavior, from −2 °C (points J1 and J3 near the main transportation station gate and in the corridor, respectively) to +6.8–13.2 °C for points J2 and J4, near open spaces. This research revealed the temperature ranges affecting pedestrian use of underground spaces and that a varying climate has different influences on a particular location. In the future, this can be used as a basis for local design improvements and seasonal adaptation policies to provide a sustainable public underground space in ChiKaHo. Full article

In the context of sustainable urban development, elucidating urban heat island (UHI) dynamics in arid regions is crucial. By thoroughly examining the characteristics of UHI variations and potential driving factors, cities can implement effective strategies to reduce their impacts on the environment and public health. However, the driving factors of a UHI in arid regions remain unclear. This study analyzed seasonal and diurnal variations in a surface UHI (SUHI) and the potential driving factors using Pearson’s correlation analysis and an Optimal Parameters-Based Geographic Detector (OPGD) model in 22 cities in Xinjiang, northwest China. The findings reveal that the average annual surface urban heat island intensity (SUHII) values in Xinjiang’s cities were 1.37 ± 0.86 °C, with the SUHII being most pronounced in summer (2.44 °C), followed by winter (2.15 °C), spring (0.47 °C), and autumn (0.40 °C). Moreover, the annual mean SUHII was stronger at nighttime (1.90 °C) compared to during the daytime (0.84 °C), with variations observed across seasons. The seasonal disparity of SUHII in Xinjiang was more significant during the daytime (3.91 °C) compared to nighttime (0.39 °C), with daytime and nighttime SUHIIs decreasing from summer to winter. The study also highlights that the city size, elevation, vegetation cover, urban form, and socio-economic factors (GDP and population density) emerged as key drivers, with the GDP exerting the strongest influence on SUHIIs in cities across Xinjiang. To mitigate the UHI effects, measures like urban environment enhancement by improving surface conditions, blue–green space development, landscape optimization, and economic strategy adjustments are recommended. Full article

Urban botanical gardens collect, preserve, research, and utilize important regional plant resources and serve as ecologically friendly cores of development and renewal for urban organisms. Meanwhile, they offer garden landscape displays and public science education. Furthermore, biodiversity conservation has become important globally. Here, the connotation of urban botanical gardens is interpreted, the functional evolution of urban botanical gardens is examined, and the challenges of sustainably developing urban botanical gardens in the context of biodiversity conservation are analysed. Taking the Shanghai Botanical Garden as an example, the abilities of urban botanical gardens in high-density downtown areas to coexist with urban spaces and thrive along with cities—thus enhancing their five core functions of ex situ conservation, scientific research, popular science education, garden horticulture, and public service—are discussed. These discussions provide references for the sustainable development of urban botanical gardens in similarly high-density city centres. Full article

In the context of historical districts becoming a key to the urban transformation and high-quality development of Chinese cities, this paper investigates the regeneration of historic environments in China, emphasizing the creation of public value through urban morphology. By analyzing five distinct case studies—Chengdu KuanZhai Alley, Shanghai TianZiFang Alley, Guangzhou EnNing Road, Taiyuan ZhongLou Street, and Beijing NanLuoGu Alley—this study explores the relationship between urban form and public value creation from 2000 to 2020. The research posits that the spatial attribute of “public nature” is central to the regeneration process, highlighting the importance of understanding how urban spaces can foster community engagement and social interaction. An evaluation system is constructed to assess the regeneration of historic areas based on spatial “publicness” and people’s perceptions, addressing the need for a more nuanced approach to urban planning. The findings reveal that effective urban regeneration not only preserves historical significance but also enhances the quality of public spaces, thereby contributing to social equity and cultural integrity. This study aims to provide valuable insights for urban planners and policymakers, advocating for a public value-oriented approach to the renewal of historic districts that balances economic development with the preservation of cultural heritage. The integration of public value concepts into heritage management is crucial for creating vibrant urban environments that resonate with community needs and aspirations. Full article

As an accessible and low-risk mode of transportation and recreational activity, walking both produces and is produced by socio-spatial urban features. The health benefits of walking transcend physical fitness, remaining integral to mental health and to fostering social connectedness in urban communities. Understanding what drives walking behaviour, therefore, warrants attention from a public health perspective. This qualitative case study focuses on the social interactions of inhabitants during neighbourhood walks and how built environment features influence walking patterns and experience. Using diaries, maps, and semi-structured interviews with 45 inhabitants of a mid-sized Canadian city, this research investigates the influence of permanent and temporary physical features on the perceived quality of inhabitants’ walks. The findings show the public visibility of urban modifications influences walking behaviour and improves social interactions, leading to a heightened sense of belonging and community. Inhabitant-led modifications in the urban space were mostly neighbourhood-bound and voyeuristic, whereas administrative interventions were more successful for collectivization. Both types of interventions are argued to foster social connectedness through different mechanisms, with positive impacts on inhabitants’ health and wellbeing. The findings underscore the relevance of community-led and administratively planned interventions in built environments in positioning public health policies associated with social cohesion and connectedness. Full article

True crime podcasts invite their listeners to crowdsource investigations online, solving cases that have fallen through the cracks of the criminal justice system. Through a cultural criminologist lens, this digital ethnography examines The Vanished podcast as a case study of how true crime listeners engage with solving cases in digital community spaces. Previous studies have dismissed true crime fans as pseudo police acting as digital vigilantes. Podcasting communities provide an important public service, working as participatory journalists to investigate the story and report the truth. Rather than depending on law enforcement permission to organize, online crime-investigation communities leverage the Internet’s function as an organizing agent for mobilization beyond the parameters of conventional social structures and formal government agencies. Findings reveal a six-step process of case collaboration between podcast producers, active listeners, and family and friends of missing persons. Other communities can apply this unique system to successfully investigate crime, suggesting implications for individuals within marginalized groups less likely to find justice through the formal legal system. Full article

With rapid global sustainable growth and urbanization, green spaces—central to urban green infrastructure—provide essential ecosystem services that significantly enhance residents’ quality of life and well-being. This importance has grown even more evident during the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, the research on satisfaction with urban green spaces has become an essential topic for scholars in recent years. A systematic review could be helpful as research trends and effective optimization strategies are still unclear. To fill this gap, this study conducted a bibliometric analysis of 313 high-quality papers published on the Web of Science since 2001. The findings revealed: (1) Key journals and significant developments associated with this field of research, especially from China and the United States, emerging as the major contributors. (2) Keyword clustering analysis identified key themes, including public engagement, historic preservation, environmental justice, walkability, green space accessibility, and restorative environments. These findings emphasize the importance of data-driven and innovative planning strategies for enhancing residents’ well-being, tourism, and urban sustainability. (3) Research on satisfaction with urban green spaces has shifted from a singular to a more diversified focus, contributing to the optimization of urban green spaces through four main aspects: residents’ needs, ecological functions, management strategies, and research approaches. The conclusions offer strategies for researching the optimization of urban green spaces and provide valuable insights for residents, scholars, urban planners, and designers. Full article

The imbalance in the “production–living–ecology” function (PLEF) has become a major issue for global cities due to the rapid advancement of urbanization and industrialization worldwide. The realization of PLEF coupling and coordination is crucial for a region’s sustainable development. Existing research has defined the concept of PLEF from the perspective of land function and measured its coupling coordination level using relevant models. However, there is still room for improvement in the indicator system, research methods, and other aspects. This work builds a PLEF coupling coordination evaluation-index system based on the perspective of human habitat using multi-source data in order to examine the spatial differences in PLEF coupling coordination level and the influencing factors in the Yellow River Basin (YRB). Using the modified coupling coordination model, the Moran index, spatial Markov chain model, and geographically weighted random forest model were introduced to analyze its spatial and temporal differentiation and influencing factors. The results found that (a) the level of PLEF coupling coordination in the YRB from 2010 to 2022 has been improving, and the number of severely imbalanced cities has been reduced from 23 to 15, but the level of downstream cities’ coupling coordination is significantly higher than that of upstream cities. The probability of cities maintaining their own level is greater than 50%, and there is basically no cross-level transfer. (b) The Moran index of the PLEF coupling coordination level has risen from 0.137 to 0.229, which shows a significant positive clustering phenomenon and is continually strengthening. The intercity polarization effect is being continually enhanced as seen in the LISA clustering diagram. (c) There is significant heterogeneity between the influencing factors in time and space. In terms of importance level, the series is per capita disposable income (0.416) > nighttime lighting index (0.370) > local general public budget expenditure (0.332) > number of beds per 1000 people (0.191) > NO₂ content in the air (0.110). This study systematically investigates the dynamic evolution of the coupled coordination level of PLEF in the YRB and its influencing mechanism, which is of great practical use. Full article

Conventional methods for tumor diagnosis suffer from two inherent limitations: they are time-consuming and subjective. Computer-aided diagnosis (CAD) is an important approach for addressing these limitations. Pathology whole-slide images (WSIs) are high-resolution tissue images that have made significant contributions to cancer diagnosis and prognosis assessment. Due to the complexity of WSIs and the availability of only slide-level labels, multiple instance learning (MIL) has become the primary framework for WSI classification. However, most MIL methods fail to capture the interdependence among image patches within a WSI, which is crucial for accurate classification prediction. Moreover, due to the weak supervision of slide-level labels, overfitting may occur during the training process. To address these issues, this paper proposes a dual-attention-based multiple instance learning framework (DAMIL). DAMIL leverages the spatial relationships and channel information between WSI patches for classification prediction, without detailed pixel-level tumor annotations. The output of the model preserves the semantic variations in the latent space, enhances semantic disturbance invariance, and provides reliable class identification for the final slide-level representation. We validate the effectiveness of DAMIL on the most commonly used public dataset, Camelyon16. The results demonstrate that DAMIL outperforms the state-of-the-art methods in terms of classification accuracy (ACC), area under the curve (AUC), and F1-Score. Our model also allows for the examination of its interpretability by visualizing the dual-attention weights. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to use a dual-attention mechanism, considering both spatial and channel information, for whole-slide image classification. Full article

The natural conditions in the loess gully area are harsh, and the construction of rural public spaces often lacks scientific guidance. It is essential to develop an optimization method for public spaces that is oriented toward the needs of villagers. For this study, the numerous river valley plain villages in Northern Shaanxi were selected as typical examples, with a focus on Liangqu Village as a case study. First, a public space perception evaluation system was established using the semantic differential method, which comprised four criterion-layer factors and nineteen indicator-layer factors. Perception evaluations were conducted for two types of public spaces: nodes and lanes. The results indicate that “facility completeness”, “accessibility”, and “activity diversity” were the most significant factors affecting villagers’ perceptions of node spaces. In contrast, “safety”, “landscape richness”, and “facility completeness” were the most critical factors influencing villagers’ perceptions of road spaces. Based on the evaluation results, the optimization needs of public spaces were categorized into four levels, and factors that urgently require improvement such as “facility completeness” and “safety” were identified. This study analyzed villagers’ perceptions and needs related to public spaces, providing scientific guidance for establishing a bottom-up design method for optimizing public spaces. Full article

In response to escalating concerns about the indoor transmission of respiratory diseases, this study introduces a sophisticated software tool engineered to accurately determine contact rates among individuals in enclosed spaces—essential for public health surveillance and disease transmission mitigation. The tool applies YOLOv8, a cutting-edge deep learning model that enables precise individual detection and real-time tracking from video streams. An innovative feature of this system is its dynamic circular buffer zones, coupled with an advanced 2D projective transformation to accurately overlay video data coordinates onto a digital layout of the physical environment. By analyzing the overlap of these buffer zones and incorporating detailed heatmap visualizations, the software provides an in-depth quantification of contact instances and spatial contact patterns, marking an advancement over traditional contact tracing and contact counting methods. These enhancements not only improve the accuracy and speed of data analysis but also furnish public health officials with a comprehensive framework to develop more effective non-pharmaceutical infection control strategies. This research signifies a crucial evolution in epidemiological tools, transitioning from manual, simulation, and survey-based tracking methods to automated, real time, and precision-driven technologies that integrate advanced visual analytics to better understand and manage disease transmission in indoor settings. Full article

Urban growth is vast in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) due to economic development, and there is a need to consider liveability and sustainable ecosystems for future urban expansion. Promising strategies for sustainability focus on minimizing a building’s effects on the environment and improving residents’ quality of life, which is important in the desert and when confronting the issues of water and climate change. Sustainable practices that impact the livelihood of people in the UAE include factors such as walkable areas, open space, policing, healthcare, education, housing, and ensuring friendly transport that enhance the overall quality of life of residents in the region. Recognizing and appreciating the UAE’s cultural values is crucial when incorporating these aspects, allowing references to the nation’s character when creating communal areas. The primary research included quantitative surveys of three identified communities, composed of fifty participants each, where the findings indicate partial to full compliance, with 85.7% of the liveability indices being about public transport and green space. Through this analysis, liveability and sustainability principles need to be trialed and incorporated into future urban development to embrace the ecology as well as the inhabitants. To realize these targets, the proposed study adopted a four-part approach. Initially, an analysis of related studies concerning the UAE or the Gulf area was carried out to obtain important liveability and quality-of-life factors. A total of 6 dimensions and 51 indicators were extracted from the literature to inform the next stage. Subsequently, the authors identified and evaluated the design of three chosen communities in various cities in the UAE concerning liveability and sustainability indices. Consequently, a conceptual redesign of a typical community was made, illustrating the improved quality of life and sustainability. Lastly, a survey with respective facets from an urban planning architect and environmental scientist cum environmental economist was conducted to evaluate the practicality of the proposed design. This research gives a comprehensive picture of how liveability and sustainable ecosystem concepts need to be implemented in the UAE urban context and offers a direction to develop lively, context-specific, culturally attached, and sustainable urban environments for the present day and for the future. Full article

This case study in the municipality of Acharnes, Greece, examines a local initiative that transforms schoolyards into community gardens, involving teachers, pupils, parents, grandparents, and neighbors. The research explores participants’ perceptions of these transformations, with a focus on interactions with non-human beings such as pollinators. Data were collected using a questionnaire completed by 85 participants, including parents and guardians of pupils and school staff. Data analysis was conducted using statistical software to evaluate the research sample. Initially, descriptive statistics, including frequency distributions, were used to summarize the demographic and baseline variables of the sample. Next, Kendall’s tau correlation was applied to assess statistically significant relationships, such as those between age and proximity to green spaces, as well as gender, education, and green space preferences. The results of the survey reveal the “embrace” of these new urban green areas by both the school and the local community. This study, as part of an effort to address broader challenges in urban contexts, highlights the need for further in-depth exploration and examination of these dynamics to provide valuable insights into the design and management of school gardens. The aim is to enhance community engagement and urban biodiversity, with a central focus on social and environmental resilience. Full article