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The purpose of this paper is to seek to drive the modernization of the entire national economy and maintain in the long-term stability of the whole society; this paper proposes an improved model based on the first-order multivariable grey model [GM (1, N) model] for predicting the housing demand and solving the housing demand problem.

This paper proposes an improved model based on the first-order multivariable grey model [GM (1, N) model] for predicting the housing demand and solving the housing demand problem. First, a novel variable SW evaluation algorithm is proposed based on the sensitivity analysis, and then the grey relational analysis (GRA) algorithm is utilized to select influencing factors of the commodity housing market. Finally, the AWGM (1, N) model is established to predict the housing demand.

This paper selects seven factors to predict the housing demand and find out the order of grey relational ranked from large to small: the completed area of the commodity housing> the per capita housing area> the one-year lending rate> the nonagricultural population > GDP > average price of the commodity housing > per capita disposable income.

The model constructed in the paper can be effectively applied to the analysis and prediction of Chinese real estate market scientifically and reasonably.

The factors of the commodity housing market in Wuhan are considered as an example to analyze the sales area of the commodity housing from 2015 to 2017 and predict its trend from 2018 to 2019. The comparison between demand for the commodity housing actual value and one for model predicted value is capability to verify the effectiveness of the authors’ proposed algorithm.

This article aims to examine the extent to which Western World “textbook” strategic marketing is being practised within Chinese manufacturing companies as well as its contribution to competitive success.

Data were collected by means of a web‐based survey. A total of 89 usable questionnaires were received from Chinese manufacturing firms employing at least 50 people. Data analysis was conducted using SPSS.

The results confirm that, on the whole, the basic strategic marketing practices which are typically advocated in the mainstream Western academic and prescriptive literature are being widely practised within Chinese manufacturing companies. The results also show the higher performing firms are clearly differentiated from their lower performing counterparts by doing more and better marketing.

Because of the relatively low response rate, one limitation is the extent to which the sample is representative of the population under scrutiny. Also, in spite of the questionnaire being back translated, some misunderstanding of the questions cannot be ruled out. Originality/value – The paper confirms that Western strategic marketing practices are clearly associated with the higher performing Chinese manufacturing companies.

The purpose of this paper is to summarize the advances in grey system theory research and various application achievements in science and engineering. At the same time, it commemorates the 40th anniversary of the birth of grey system theory and the 10th anniversary of Grey Systems–Theory and Application.

Firstly, the innovations of theoretical research in grey system theory were summarized and some of the widely recognized new results are briefly described. By searching and combing the research results of grey system theory in China national knowledge infrastructure (CNKI) database and Web of Science by Institute for Scientific Information (ISI), this paper shows the rapid development trend of grey system theory in the past 40 years, and the successful applications of grey system theory in the fields of social sciences, natural sciences and engineering technologies.

More than 227 thousands literature were found by input 10 phrases such as grey system, grey number and sequence operator etc. in CNKI database. After entering the new century, the number of grey system papers included in CNKI database is increasing rapidly. Since 2008, more than 10 thousands papers have been included per year and more than 15 thousands papers have been included per year since 2014. Grey system method and model are widely used in physics, chemistry, biology and other fields of natural science, as well as transportation, electric power, machinery and other fields of engineering technology, and a large number of valuable results have been achieved.

It can be seen that the grey system theory plays an important role in promoting China’s scientific and technological progress, innovation and development and high-level talent training from tens of thousands of literatures marked with important national science and technology projects and a large number of grey system literatures published by China’s double first-class universities and double first-class discipline construction universities.

Both innovations of theoretical research and practical application play important role in the growth of new theory. The innovations of theoretical research provide methods and tools for practical application, which is conducive to improve application efficiency and broaden application fields. A large number of practical applications needs have become the source of theoretical innovation and the solid background for the birth of theoretical innovation achievements.

In this research, the authors established a hierarchical motion planner for quadruped locomotion, which enables a parallel wheel-quadruped robot, the “BIT-NAZA” robot, to traverse rough three-dimensional (3-D) terrain.

Presented is a novel wheel-quadruped mobile robot with parallel driving mechanisms and based on the Stewart six degrees of freedom (6-DOF) platform. The task for traversing rough terrain is decomposed into two prospects: one is the configuration selection in terms of a local foothold cost map, in which the kinematic feasibility of parallel mechanism and terrain features are satisfied in heuristic search planning, and the other one is a whole-body controller to complete smooth and continuous motion transitions.

A fan-shaped foot search region focuses on footholds with a strong possibility of becoming foot placement, simplifying computation complexity. A receding horizon avoids kinematic deadlock during the search process and improves robot adaptation.

Both simulation and experimental results validated the proposed scenario available and appropriate for quadruped locomotion to traverse challenging 3-D terrains.

This paper analyzes kinematic workspace for a parallel robot with 6-DOF Stewart mechanism on both body and foot. A fan-shaped foot search region enhances computation efficiency. Receding horizon broadens the preview search to decrease the possibility of deadlock minima resulting from terrain variation.

The paper focuses on the issue of manual rebar-binding tasks in the construction industry, which are marked by high labor intensity, high costs and inefficient operations. The rebar-binding robots that are currently available are not fully mature. Most of them can only bind one or two nodes in one position, which leads to significant time wastage in movement. Based on a new type of rebar-binding robot, this paper aims to propose a new movement and binding control that reduces manpower and enhances efficiency.

The robot is combined with photoelectric sensors, travel switches and other sensors. It is supposed to move accurately and run in a limited area on the rebar mesh through logical judgment, speed control and position control. Machine vision is used by the robot to locate the rebar nodes and then adjusts the binding-gun position to ensure that multiple rebar nodes are bound sequentially.

By moving on the rebar mesh with accuracy, the robot meets the positioning accuracy requirements of the binding module, with experimental testing accuracy within 5 mm. Furthermore, its ability to bind four rebar nodes in one place results in a high efficiency and a binding effect that meets building standards.

The innovative design of the robot can adapt itself to the rebar mesh, move accurately to the target position and bind four nodes at that position, which reduces the number of movements on the mesh. Repetitive and heavy rebar-binding tasks can be efficiently completed by the robot, which saves human resources, reduces worker labor intensity and reduces construction overhead. It provides a more feasible and practical solution for using robots to bind rebar nodes.

This paper aims to propose an optimal design of the partial textures in the mixed lubrication regime of the crankpin bearing (CB) to maximize the CB's lubrication efficiency.

Based on a hybrid model between the slider-crank-mechanism dynamic and CB lubrication, the square-cylindrical textures (SCT) of partial textures designed on the CB’s mixed lubrication regime are researched. The effect of the density distributions of partial textures on CB’s lubrication efficiency is then evaluated via two indices of increasing the oil film pressure (p) and decreasing the frictional force (F_f) of the CB. The SCT’s geometrical dimensions are then optimized by the genetic algorithm to further improve the CB’s lubrication efficiency.

The results show that the SCT of partial textures optimized by the genetic algorithm has an obvious effect on enhancing CB’s lubrication efficiency. Especially, with the CB using the optimal SCT of partial textures (4 × 6), the maximum p is significantly increased by 3.7% and 8.2%, concurrently, the maximum F_f is evidently reduced by 9.5% and 21.6% in comparison with the SCT of partial textures (4 × 6) without optimization and the SCT of full textures (12 × 6) designed throughout the CB’s bearing surface, respectively.

The application of the optimal SCT of partial textures on the bearing surface not only is simple for the design-manufacturing process and maximizes CB’s lubrication efficiency but also can reduce the machining time, save cost and ensure the durability of the bearing compared to use the full textures designed throughout the CB’s bearing surface.

Electrostatic monitoring technology is a useful tool for monitoring and detecting component faults and degradation, which is necessary for engine health management. This paper aims to carry out online monitoring experiments of turbo-shaft engine to contribute to the practical application of electrostatic sensor in aero-engine.

Combined with the time and frequency domain methods of signal processing, the authors analyze the electrostatic signal from the short timescale and the long timescale.

The short timescale analysis verifies that electrostatic sensor is sensitive to the additional increased charged particles caused by abnormal conditions, which makes this technology to monitor typical failures in aero-engine gas path. The long scale analysis verifies the electrostatic sensor has the ability to monitor the degradation of the engine gas path performance, and water washing has a great impact on the electrostatic signal. The spectrum of the electrostatic signal contains not only the motion information of the charged particles but also the rotating speed information of the free turbine.

The findings in this article prove the effectiveness of electrostatic monitoring and contribute to the application of this technology to aero-engine.

The research in this paper would be the foundation to achieve the application of the technology in aero-engine.

This study aims to understand how abusive supervision influences employees’ unethical pro-organizational behavior (UPB). In particular, the mediating effect of moral disengagement and moderating role of traditionality on this relationship were examined.

This study conducted a two-wave questionnaire survey using data collected from 629 employees from different companies in China. Moderated mediation analysis was conducted to test the hypotheses.

The results show that moral disengagement mediates the relationship between abusive supervision and employees’ UPB. Employee traditionality enhances the relationship between abusive supervision and moral disengagement as well as the indirect effect of abusive supervision on employees’ UPB via moral disengagement.

First, by exploring the positive impact of abusive supervision on UPB, the authors enhance the current understanding of the role of negative leadership in the development of UPB and enrich the research on the antecedents of UPB and outcomes of abusive supervision. Second, based on social cognitive theory, this study enriches the literature on abusive supervision and employee UPB by identifying moral disengagement as a mediator. Third, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the authors are among the first to incorporate traditionality to tell a Chinese story about how traditional employees respond to the effects of abusive supervision on UPB, providing a new lens for the cultural boundary condition in the occurrence mechanism of UPB.

This study aims to evaluate the effect of grape seed extract on the thermal oxidation of soybean oil.

Four treatments were used: soybean oil (SO), butylhydroxytoluene (BHT), antioxidant at concentration of 100 mg/kg in soybean oil (BHTSO), grape seed extract at a concentration of 100 mg/kg in soybean oil (Extract), and mixture at a concentration of 50 mg/kg of grape seed extract (Mixture) and 50 mg/kg of BHT in soybean oil subjected to 180°C for 20 h. The total phenolic compounds were quantified by spectrophotometry using the Folin-Ciocalteu reagent. The antioxidant activity was evaluated by the ABTS^•+, DPPH^• and FRAP acid systems. The fatty acid composition and phytosterols were determined by gas chromatography (GC) and tocopherols were determined by high-performance liquid chromatography.

Among the treatments studied, the Extract and the Mixture presented lower losses of total phenolic compounds, DPPH^• and FRAP, while BHTSO had an opposite effect. After 10 h of heating, the Mixture and the Extract were more effective in reducing the formation decomposition products, measured by the amount of total polar compounds. The Mixture resulted in higher retention of essential fatty acids at the end of heating. The Extract and Mixture showed higher retention rates of total tocopherols and the Mixture resulted in 338.71 mg/100 g (P ≤ 0.05) of total phytosterol after 20 h of heating.

Oils undergoing the heating process suffer major changes, requiring the addition of antioxidant compounds. As a result of the questioning on the use of chemical additives, research on natural antioxidants, as substitute to the synthetic ones, is increasing. Among the natural compounds with high antioxidant potential, the grape wastes such as its seeds are highlighted. Studies using grape seed extract are scarce.

This study aims to explore the key attributes of robot chef restaurants and their influencing factors from the perspective of customers and analyzes how these key attributes affect customer perceived value.

A mixed-methods research design was used in this study. Using 473 online reviews and ratings (Study 1), the research summarized customers’ evaluations on three types of attributes (environment, service and food) and identified the key attributes along with their influencing factors. Subsequently, through field questionnaires (Study 2) involving 269 actual customers, structural equation modeling was used to analyze how the identified key attributes and their influencing factors impact customer perceived value.

This study reveals that customers in robot chef restaurants prioritize food attributes, particularly valuing food authenticity alongside food quality. In contrast to traditional restaurants, customers’ evaluations of food attributes in robot chef restaurants are significantly influenced by the competence of robot chefs. Notably, customers’ negative attitudes toward robots diminish the positive effects on both food quality and food authenticity.

To enhance customer perceived value, robot chef restaurants should concentrate on food attributes. They can achieve this by fostering a high-quality, authentic food experience through the elevation of robot chefs’ competence and by providing customer education.

This study expands research on the customer experience in robotic restaurants by proposing an integrated model determining factors that affect the perceived customer value.