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Proximity is a crucial factor influencing innovation collaboration and performance. Most existing studies have primarily focused on the organizational level and been static in nature. Therefore, a further study on how proximity affects innovation performance is needed. This paper aims to fill this gap by highlighting the organizational, cognitive and geographical proximity in China’s open regional innovation system.

This paper analyzes the data from 2010 to 2015 through path analysis.

The results reveal that geographical proximity has a direct positive effect on regional innovation performance in China’s regional innovation system. It also shows that organizational proximity exerts a negative impact on absorptive capacity, and through it adversely affects regional innovation performance. In contrast, cognitive proximity is found to have a positive effect on absorptive capacity, enhancing regional innovation performance.

Based on these findings, this paper contributes to a better understanding of the role of proximity in innovation collaboration and performance. By highlighting the importance of different proximity types, it provides insights for policymakers and practitioners seeking to foster regional innovation.

Because the mechanism of how knowledge sharing affects organizational innovation is still unclear, the study focuses on the relationship between knowledge sharing and organizational innovation performance, with a focus on mediating role of absorptive capacity and individual creativity.

On the basis of the knowledge base view and organizational learning theory, the study propose a model to verify the impact of inbound and outbound knowledge sharing on organizational innovation performance based on previous research. It also analyzed how these effects were mediated by individual creativity and absorptive capacity. The study collected 166 samples to verify the theoretical model.

Results corroborate that inbound knowledge sharing cannot directly promote organizational innovation performance, and absorptive capacity has a full mediation effect between inbound knowledge sharing and organizational innovation performance. Knowledge outbound sharing, individual creativity and absorptive capacity can improve innovation performance. In addition, absorptive capacity and individual creativity have direct and significant impacts on organizational innovation performance. Moreover, absorptive capacity plays a partial mediate role between individual creativity and innovation performance. Finally, this study discusses the policy implications of the study and describes possible future research directions.

The paper creatively divides knowledge sharing into inbound knowledge sharing and outbound knowledge sharing and verifies that knowledge sharing does not directly affect organizational innovation performance. The mediating role of absorptive capacity and individual creativity was analysis.

With the development of regional economy, innovation network plays an increasingly prominent role in reducing regional innovation cost and enabling information, knowledge and capital flow and diffusion. Building an efficient innovation network has become a feasible way to improve regional innovation capabilities and performance. Thus, under the background of Chinese special triple helix structure, the specific mechanism of innovation network characteristics on regional innovation performance is still an issue that needs to be studied urgently.

This study conducts a multi-level regression analysis regional innovation panel data of China from the past four years to explore how the three dimensions of innovation network characteristics (i.e. network density, openness and strength) affect regional innovation performance.

The results show that there is an inverted-U relationship exists between network density and regional innovation performance. The network openness and regional innovation performance show a significantly positive relationship and a U-shaped relationship exists between network strength and regional innovation performance.

First, this study examines the relationship between network density, openness, strength and innovation ability in the network variable structure. However, this study does not analyze how absorptive capacity impacts the network structure and innovation performance of regional innovators. Second, innovation network intensity largely varies according to different types of enterprises or industries. Therefore, future studies can attempt to analyze the relationship between innovation network and innovation performance on the basis of the industry or the enterprise itself. Fourth, this study does not consider the change in the influence of innovation network structure on innovation ability.

The results of this study provide insights for the formulation of the regional innovation policy. First, enterprises must maintain good contact with research institutes, universities and technology intermediaries and promote resource, information and money flow between networks through formal and informal interactions. Enterprises can currently only interact with a limited number of innovative subjects due to their limited resources. Therefore, we should continue implementing the open policy of foreign capital utilization and absorb the technology, knowledge, management, ideas, talent and other resource advantages in the world. The investment environment in the central and western regions should be improved as soon as possible to guide foreign direct investments to the middle and the west part of China, thereby promoting the coordinated development of regional innovation ability and economy.

In 2015, the Chinese Government proposed “public entrepreneurship and innovation,” including technological, institutional, management and mode innovations. This study suggests that innovation subjects in the region should establish an interactive and dynamic innovation network among innovators.

The innovation of this study lies in the analysis of the characteristics of innovation network that significantly affect regional innovation performance, the exploration of different stages of innovation network construction path and provide theoretical guidance for the construction of innovation network.

The impact of environmental regulations on ecological innovation is a contested issue in current research. However, there is no uniform consensus on existing conclusions. It is commonly accepted among scholars that external environment and organizational characteristics are key factors affecting ecological innovation. However, these are often analyzed in isolation, without consideration of the interaction between leadership and external environment. So this study aims to explore the impact of environmental regulation on ecological innovation by combining internal and external factors.

Based on institutional theory and leadership theory, this paper takes environmental regulation as the independent variable, environmental leadership as the intermediary variable and intellectual property protection level as the regulating variable to explore the impact mechanism of environmental regulation on ecological innovation.

The findings indicate an inverted U-shaped relationship between environmental regulation and ecological innovation. Additionally, there is a positive correlation between environmental leadership and intellectual property protection level with ecological innovation. Furthermore, environmental leadership partially mediates the relationship between environmental regulation and ecological innovation. However, the level of intellectual property protection does not have a significant moderating effect on the relationship between environmental leadership and ecological innovation.

This paper proposes suggestions for regional ecological innovation based on the current policy and research situation to promote its development.

It has been ten years since the policy was implemented, but the effect of the policy needs to be tested empirically. This paper aims to explore the mechanism of policy influence on regional innovation ability by measuring the effectiveness of policy by innovation ability indicators. Further, it reflects the problems in the process of the transformation and development of resource-based cities in recent years and points out the direction for the development of the cities in the future. In addition, this paper discusses the differences between regions and cities in China and seeks the path to narrow the gap.

This paper mainly uses the difference-in-difference method for the research. This study divided China’s resource-based cities and non-resource-based cities into experimental groups and control groups, and explored the effect of the transformation and development of resource-based cities and the changes of their innovation ability under the influence of the National Sustainable Development Plan for Resource-based Cities (NSDPRC). More carefully, this paper uses the fixed effects regression model, propensity score matching method, bootstrap method and other methods to improve the empirical results.

This paper finds that NSDPRC significantly improves the innovation ability of resource-based cities, although there is some lag in this effect. Research on the influence mechanism of policies shows that NSDPRC improves the marketization degree of resource-based cities and reduces the proportion of the secondary industry in such cities. Finally, the results of the heterogeneity analysis confirm that policies are more popular in western China and that resource-based cities in growth, maturity and decline are more vulnerable to policy influence. The development of policy effectiveness also requires the size of a city, and maintaining a healthy and reasonable scale is necessary for urban development.

First, the existing research on the development of resource-based cities is mainly from the perspective of economy and environment, but rarely from the perspective of innovation ability, and the index to measure urban development is relatively single. This paper will compensate for this deficiency. Second, different from the European and American countries that have basically completed the industrial transformation, the research on Chinese cities will provide a reference for the transformation of developing countries. Finally, from the perspective of resource endowment theory and innovation theory, this paper discusses the influence of SDPNRBC mechanism on the innovation ability improvement of resource-based cities, and further improves and enriches the theory.

In an attempt to tackle the incidence of poverty and social exclusion in the Ghanaian society, a number of social protection programmes including the school feeding programme is introduced. The programme is designed to cater for the extreme poor and as well encourage enrolment and attendance in the country. The purpose of this paper is to assess the intention or objective for which the programme is initiated and the realities on the ground. It looks at whether the current beneficiaries are the extreme poor described in the policy document.

The study explored the incidence of poverty in Ghana using the Ghana Living Standard Survey (GLSS6) and the Ghana School Feeding Annual Operation Plan (GSFAOP) with the help of the school feeding policy document to draw on actual beneficiaries and potential beneficiaries. The differences between percentages of poverty (2012/2013) and feeding schools was computed using GLSS6 and GSFAOP. The study also conducted a number of open-ended interviews with some stakeholders to validate the nature of recruitment of beneficiary schools.

The study concluded that there is a mismatch of potential beneficiaries and current beneficiaries using the referred data sources. It was found out that majority of beneficiary schools are located within areas of lesser incidence of poverty. This could be attributed to political interference in view of testimonies from respondents and the computerisation of GLSS6 and GSFAOP. The study therefore proposed that the allocation of feeding schools should be done to reflect the percentage of poverty situation in each region. This could be achieved when the district education office takes control. It will help minimise the level of politicisation and as well improve efficiency.

The study therefore highlighted the relevance of the school feeding programme and the inverse relationship it has with political interference. It again demonstrates the need to restructure the operations of the programme to meet the objective for which it was established.

Synthesizing from the institutional theory and social network theory, this study investigates factors influencing green innovation performance in new ventures.

The findings show that the dimensions of internal social network; heterogeneous network and tie strength have significant positive effects on proactive environmental strategy based on a sample of 300 new ventures in China.

The results further support the mediating role of proactive environmental strategy on internal organizational networks and green innovation performance of new ventures. The study further investigated the moderating role of the regulatory quality as a dimension of institutional environment in China. The results show that the regulatory quality positively moderates the relationship between proactive environmental strategy and green innovation performance. Policy and managerial implications are further discussed.

Over the past 20 years, green innovation has increasingly attracted the attention of policymakers and scholars. However, most studies have focused on mature ventures, and little attention has been given to how newly established ventures attain green innovation performance.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of product substitutability on sales performance of integrated and decentralised supply chains. The authors model supply chain performance effects by applying a Cournot equation to a combination of different industry configurations. The study aims to extend existing equilibria models in different supply chains by including the effects of product substitutability on supply chain performance. By extending existing equilibria models, the authors explore the relationship between the degree of product substitutability, chain structure and chain performance when some actors of the supply chain behave as Stackelberg leaders in a duopoly.

The paper models a supply chain performance by applying a Cournot equation to different supply chain structures in a duopoly.

The findings indicate that, for each specific-supply chain structures in different market configurations, when product substitutability reaches a certain threshold decentralised supply chains outperform integrated chains, in disagreement with common belief in current existing literature.

The study is limited to the application of differential equations in a competitive market configured as a duopoly. Future studies might extend the same model to a competitive market characterised by more than two actors. The findings imply that current tendency of lean implementations through integrated supply chains does not always favour supply chain performance.

The paper includes implications for the development of a stronger differentiation strategy based on consumer value when markets are characterised by high-product substitutability.

These findings highlight the importance of differentiation and consumer-value generation in markets that follow Nash equilibria as opposed to the current focus on price competition.

The brake pipe system was an essential braking component of the railway freight trains, but the existing E-type sealing rings had problems such as insufficient low-temperature resistance, poor heat stability and short service life. To address these issues, low-phenyl silicone rubber was prepared and tested, and the finite element analysis and experimental studies on the sealing performance of its sealing rings were carried out.

The low-temperature resistance and thermal stability of the prepared low-phenyl silicone rubber were studied using low-temperature tensile testing, differential scanning calorimetry, dynamic thermomechanical analysis and thermogravimetric analysis. The sealing performance of the low-phenyl silicone rubber sealing ring was studied by using finite element analysis software abaqus and experiments.

The prepared low-phenyl silicone rubber sealing ring possessed excellent low-temperature resistance and thermal stability. According to the finite element analysis results, the finish of the flange sealing surface and groove outer edge should be ensured, and extrusion damage should be avoided. The sealing rings were more susceptible to damage in high compression ratio and/or low-temperature environments. When the sealing effect was ensured, a small compression ratio should be selected, and rubbers with hardness and elasticity less affected by temperature should be selected. The prepared low-phenyl silicone rubber sealing ring had zero leakage at both room temperature (RT) and −50 °C.

The innovation of this study is that it provides valuable data and experience for the future development of the sealing rings used in the brake pipe flange joints of the railway freight cars in China.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the tribological properties, antiwear mechanism and anticorrosion properties of two novel halogen-free borate ionic liquids (ILs) in 500 N base oil.

Different qualities of borate ILs were added to 500 N, and their tribological properties were tested on a four-ball machine. The tribological properties of the additives were evaluated by measuring the wear scar diameter (WSD) and average coefficient of friction. The antiwear and antifriction mechanism of ILs was analyzed by energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS).

The corrosion degrees of the two borate ILs 1-butyl-3-octyl-imidazole bis(mandelato)-borate ([OBIM][BMB]) and 1-butyl-3-(3-methoxypropyl)-imidazole bis(mandelato)-borate ([MPBIM][BMB]) are 1b and 1a, respectively, suggesting that they both possess significant corrosion resistance and can effectively protect the steel surface. When the concentration of [OBIM][BMB] and [MPBIM][BMB] is 2.5 Wt.%, the friction coefficient of 500 N is reduced by 37.3% and 26.2%, respectively. According to the analysis of the thermo gravimetric analyzer curves, [OBIM][BMB] and [MPBIM][BMB] decomposed at 369.7°C and 374.3°C, respectively, indicate that two additives both can be applied in higher temperature condition. The results of XPS and scanning electron microscope (SEM) reveal that [OBIM][BMB] and [MPBIM][BMB] both can react with the steel surface, thereby forming chemical films composed of iron oxide, B₂O₃ and organic N-containing compounds.

Two new environmentally friendly borate ILs were synthesized and their tribological properties in 500 N base oil were investigated for the first time.