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The purpose of this paper is to build a seven‐degrees of freedom (DOF) parallel‐serial robot system which has the advantage of mechanical novelty and simplicity compared with the existing platforms, and to share the experience of converting a popular motion base to an industrial robot for use in full‐mission tank training processes of three armored arms.

By studying the concept of the robot system, a novel parallel‐serial robot with seven DOF driven by electrical servo motors is built. And the transmission modules and Hooke joints are explored and designed in detail. Then the inverse kinematics based on coupling compensation and time‐jerk synthetic optimization methods for trajectory planning of the simulator are presented and further discussed in order to satisfy the requirements of high stability and perfect performance. In advance, the feasibility and applicability of this triune parallel‐serial robot system are verified.

A prototyped test shows that the performance of the system is of a satisfaction with real‐time tracking any trajectories given by the visual system smoothly. Finally, the characteristics of the robot system are realized and verified by experiments and an industrial application.

The triune full‐mission tank training simulator developed in this paper has been used in the military industry and it has a great potential application.

This successful usage of the novel and simple parallel robot system in the military industry expands the range of its applications in real‐life task more operators training. And the proposal methods of inverse kinematics based on coupling compensation and trajectory planning enhanced the theoretical research of the parallel robot.

The type 120 emergency valve is an essential braking component of railway freight trains, but corresponding diaphragms consisting of natural rubber (NR) and chloroprene rubber (CR) exhibit insufficient aging resistance and low-temperature resistance, respectively. In order to develop type 120 emergency valve rubber diaphragms with long-life and high-performance, low-temperatureresistant CR and NR were processed.

The physical properties of the low-temperature-resistant CR and NR were tested by low-temperature stretching, dynamic mechanical analysis, differential scanning calorimetry and thermogravimetric analysis. Single-valve and single-vehicle tests of type 120 emergency valves were carried out for emergency diaphragms consisting of NR and CR.

The low-temperature-resistant CR and NR exhibited excellent physical properties. The elasticity and low-temperature resistance of NR were superior to those of CR, whereas the mechanical properties of the two rubbers were similar in the temperature range of 0 °C–150 °C. The NR and CR emergency diaphragms met the requirements of the single-valve test. In the low-temperature single-vehicle test, only the low-temperature sensitivity test of the NR emergency diaphragm met the requirements.

The innovation of this study is that it provides valuable data and experience for future development of type 120 valve rubber diaphragms.

The impact of destination reputation on tourists’ behavior has not received sufficient attention in the tourism literature. Built upon the signaling theory and the well-documented stimulus-organism-response framework, the purpose of this paper is to propose and assess a theoretical model that captures relationships among destination reputation, place attachment, tourist satisfaction, and the search for alternative destinations.

Using the covariance-based structural equation modeling technique, this study empirically tested the conceptual model with a convenience sample of Chinese tourists who visited a popular coastal urban tourism destination in China.

Findings reveal that destination reputation positively impacts perceived place dependence, place identity, and tourist satisfaction. In addition, place dependence positively affects tourist satisfaction, but place identity has no significant impact on tourist satisfaction. As expected, tourist satisfaction negatively influences tourists’ search for alternative destinations; however, place identity positively influences tourists’ search for alternative destinations.

Few studies in the tourism literature explore the role of destination reputation in the tourist decision-making process. The present study’s unique contribution lies in its examination of destination reputation on tourists’ behavior. In addition, this study includes the search for alternative destinations as an important behavioral outcome into the proposed model. Some tourists explore alternative destinations even though they are willing to revisit and spread positive messages about the destination they already visited. Therefore, the continuous searching behavior is worthy of investigation in tourism studies.

High-rise tower structures supported by side frame structure and viscous damper in chemical industry can produce plasticity under dynamic loads, such as wind and earthquake, which will heavily influence the long-term safety operation. This paper aims to systematically study the optimization design of these structures by free vibration and dynamic shakedown analysis.

The transfer matrix method and Euler–Bernoulli beam vibration are used to study the free vibration characteristic of the simplified high-rise tower structure. Then the extended stress compensation method is used to construct the self-equilibrated stress by using the dynamic load vertexes and the lower bound dynamic shakedown analysis for the structure with viscous damper. Using the proposed method, comprehensive parametric studies and optimization are performed to examine the shakedown load of high-rise tower with various supported conditions.

The numerical results show that the supported frame stiffness, attached damper or spring parameters influence the free vibration and shakedown characters of high-rise tower very much. The dynamic shakedown load is lowered down quickly with external load frequency increasing to the fundamental natural frequency of the structure under spring supported condition, while changed little with the damping connection. The optimized location and parameter of support are obtained under dynamical excitations.

In this study, the high-rise tower structure is simplified as a cantilever beam supported by a short cantilever beam and a damper under repeated dynamic load, and linear elasticity for solid is assumed for free vibration analysis. The current analysis does not account for effects such as large deformation, stochastic external load and nonlinear vibration conditions which will inevitably be encountered and affect the load capacity.

This study provides a comprehensive method for the dynamical optimization of high-rise tower structure by combining free vibration and shakedown analysis.

The purpose of this paper is to study the optimum culture condition of flax-retting enzyme, and applying the enzyme liquors to retting. In addition to research the structure of flax stem in enzyme retting using scanning electron microscopy (SEM).

The influence of cultural parameters such as moisture level, temperature, incubation time and inoculum size were evaluated with respect to polygalacturonase and xylanase yield. The structure of flax stem was revealed by SEM.

The flax was retted by dilute enzyme liquors (polygalacturonase/25 U/ml, xylanase/1 U/ml), and 24-h retting period was obtained. The SEM studies revealed the removal of a large amount of non-cellulosic gummy material of flax stem in enzyme retting.

First, flax-retting enzyme containing higher-yield polygalacturonase, lower-yield xylanase and no cellulose was yielded by SSF. Second, the composition of enzyme could meet flax retting and no damage cellulosic fibre. Finally, only low-cost wheat bran, citrus peel powder and mineral salt were employed in substrate, which could reduce the overall cost of enzyme production and flax retting.

This study aims to examine the adequate application of rights and protections granted to employees under labor laws and regulations to foreign employees working in China.

The authors analyzed applicable laws, regulations and related literature on the employment of foreigners in China and employed quantitative and qualitative methods to scrutinize the features of labor disputes involving foreign employees, to assess claims of inconsistencies. A group of judges and labor arbitrators were also interviewed.

The inconsistencies between Chinese immigration and labor laws, and between applicable laws and court enforcement, result in a considerable gap in employment protection for foreign employees. They have grown over the last two decades, in a changing legal environment of labor protection and labor market for foreigners.

This study focused on documented foreign employees' labor litigations from 2017 to 2020 in people's courts in China's five most economically developed regions. Future studies could cover a wider geographic territory and labor disputes of undocumented foreign employees to provide an even more comprehensive picture of the challenges and potential solutions.

The inconsistency between immigration and labor law regarding employment protection for documented foreign employees requires legal clarification and regulation to ensure equal employment protection of both Chinese and foreign employees.

There are limited studies using empirical data from different regions in China to document and understand the gap between the statutory labor protections and the labor protection granted to foreign employees in law as well as in court practice.

Building the relationship between retting termination and pectin content remained in the fiber is crucial for ensuring the identity quality of retted flax. In order to measure the pectin content, pectin must be removed thoroughly from the fiber. The purpose of this paper is to find the most suitable method to extract pectin from flax phloem fiber.

Methods of extracting pectin from fruits were employed to ensure the complete removal of pectin from flax for the first time, including extraction with ethylene diamine tetraacetic acid, hydrochloric acid and ion exchange resin. Traditional ammonium oxalate-KOH method was adopted as control. Each procedure was optimized according to the yield of pectin. A characteristic chromogenic technique for determining the exact pectin amount was used, which ensured the precise measurement of pectin extracted.

Results showed that comparing with the traditional ammonium oxalate-KOH method, methods of hydrochloric acid and ion exchange resin extract >95 percent (w/w) pectin and the extract conditions are much milder.

Bulk of literatures have covered the problem of how to define the quality of retted flax. But the flax industry in China still uses sensory method to check the retting termination. Connect the fiber quality with pectin content is a brand new idea. Also, the exaction method employed from fruit pectin extract is applied in flax pectin for the first time. These methods are essential for building the relationship between the pectin content and retting termination and also significant for discovering the suitable enzyme for enzyme retting.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a cross-cultural comparison of Chinese and American hospitality customers who report critical incidents and the resulting influences that these incidents and recovery efforts had on behavior. Recognizing that hospitality-based organizations are increasingly operating internationally, the study provides insights for managing customer relationships.

The study utilizes the critical incident technique in conjunction with a structured self-administered questionnaire. The sampling approach resulted in 1,146 usable responses.

The results demonstrate statistically significant cultural differences between American and Chinese consumers in terms of reported critical incident types, recovery approaches, and post-incident private voice, public voice, and repurchase intention.

This research uses cultural value scores for China and the USA as a way to explain and discuss the findings. Hofstede's model was not tested and the provided explanations should be viewed with caution.

The results of this research can provide practitioners with guidelines in regards to service recovery tactics, as well as insights into how customers respond to critical incidents across different cultures.

This study adds to the existing literature by investigating empirically critical incident types, recovery tactics, and the consumer post-encounter behaviors of public voice (i.e. complaining), private voice (i.e. negative word-of-mouth, positive word-of-mouth), and repurchase intention in China and the USA.

Knowledge sharing is an important way to improve the knowledge system of industrial construction, and the supervision mechanism is an important way to improve the efficiency of knowledge sharing. However, some research works and practices indicate that the effects of applying the supervision mechanism are not obvious. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to propose an incentive method of knowledge sharing based on the supervision mechanism for promoting knowledge sharing among member enterprises in the industrial construction supply chain.

A basic incentive model and an optimization model of knowledge sharing in the industrial construction supply chain based on the supervision mechanism were developed via the principal–agent theory. Weighted coefficients of explicit and implicit knowledge sharing were introduced into the basic model, while the supervision reward was added into the basic model of the optimization model. The effect of these two models was compared and analyzed via numerical simulation.

The optimal incentive coefficient and effort level of knowledge sharing can be obtained by solving the two aforementioned models. The results of the comparison between the two models indicate that the introduction of a supervisory reward improved the effort level and expected earnings produced by knowledge sharing, but reduced the confirmed equal earnings of member enterprises in the industrial construction supply chain.

Mutual transformation between tacit and explicit knowledge was not considered, and supervisory costs were also not considered, in the estimation of the output of knowledge sharing.

The new models proposed by this study provide theoretical guidance for the design of knowledge sharing incentive measures in the industrial construction supply chain based on the supervision mechanism. The findings suggest that member enterprises should pay attention to the costs of knowledge sharing, in order to obtain more benefits.

This study introduced the weight coefficients of explicit and implicit knowledge sharing into a previous incentive model, proposed an incentive optimization model of knowledge sharing in the industrial construction supply chain based on a supervisory mechanism, and revealed the change rules of related variables that affect the model with the change in weight coefficients. The findings verify the effectiveness of introducing supervisory reward measures and extend the range of theoretical application.