Prefabrication decisions of the construction supply chain under government subsidies.

Prefabrication has been generating increasing interest as a cleaner production strategy to promote sustainable development. Alongside this trend, various subsidies have been set to improve prefabrication levels. This paper evaluates the prefabrication levels of buildings through the assembly rate. A series of models are established to investigate the optimal assembly rate under various government subsidies. The optimal assembly rate and subsidy revenue-sharing coefficient are analyzed in both decentralized and centralized scenarios. By comparing the optimal decisions in these two scenarios, a transfer payment contract is proposed that enables the overall coordination of the prefabricated construction supply chain (PCSC). The results show that the optimal assembly rate in the centralized scenario is higher than that in the decentralized one. When the revenue-sharing coefficient is 100%, the subsidy revenue-sharing contract can coordinate the PCSC system and realize the Pareto improvement. When certain conditions are satisfied in the transfer payment contract, business profits can achieve Pareto optimality. This research provides a reference for construction enterprises making decisions to promote the development of PCSC.

Evolutionary Games of Low-Carbon Behaviors of Construction Stakeholders under Carbon Taxes.

The development of low-carbon buildings (LCBs) in China has not reached its expected status, although the Chinese government has formulated many relevant regulations. The real estate developers and consumers are essential participants in the development of LCBs. This paper explores whether the government's implementation of the carbon tax will change their choices of LCBs. Evolutionary game models between developers and consumers are established under static and dynamic carbon taxes. Their evolutionarily stable strategies (ESS) are deduced in different situations. According to the real scenarios in China, numerical simulations are further conducted to show that carbon tax influences the low-carbon behaviors of stakeholders in the construction industry. Under a static carbon tax, the two players cannot reach an equilibrium state, while the game system is stable under a dynamic tax. The probability of the developers constructing LCBs is positively related to the carbon tax, while its degree is gradually weakened as the tax rate increases. Therefore, an appropriate tax should be set to promote the development of LCBs effectively. Finally, policy implications are put forwarded to guide the participants' low-carbon behaviors and reduce the carbon emissions in the Chinese construction industry.

Carbon mitigation by the construction industry in China: a perspective of efficiency and costs.

Evaluating carbon emission performance of the construction industry is a significant prerequisite for developing regional carbon mitigation plans. Taking environmental and technical heterogeneities into account, this paper employed a meta-frontier method to measure the carbon emission efficiency, carbon mitigation potential, and costs of the construction sector in different regions of China from 2005 to 2016. The empirical results show that substantial disparities in carbon emission efficiency exist in the construction industry. The total carbon mitigation potential of this sector was 206.76 million tons, with the Lower Yellow river area accounting for the largest proportion at 27%. Meanwhile, the carbon mitigation costs of this sector increased from 584.94 to 1273.30 yuan/ton during 2005-2016. The highest mitigation costs occur in the Lower Yangtze River area and the South Coastal area, indicating it was more costly in these areas to conduct additional carbon emissions mitigation. The results could facilitate the policy formulation on regional-oriented carbon emissions mitigation of the construction industry in China.

Discovery of Potent and Selective Leads against Toxoplasma gondii Dihydrofolate Reductase via Structure-Based Design.

Current treatment of toxoplasmosis targets the parasite's folate metabolism through inhibition of dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR). The most widely used DHFR antagonist, pyrimethamine, was introduced over 60 years ago and is associated with toxicity that can be largely attributed to a similar affinity for parasite and human DHFR. Computational analysis of biochemical differences between Toxoplasma gondii and human DHFR enabled the design of inhibitors with both improved potency and selectivity. The approach described herein yielded TRC-19, a promising lead with an IC50 of 9 nM and 89-fold selectivity in favor of Toxoplasma gondii DHFR, as well as crystallographic data to substantiate in silico methodology. Overall, 50% of synthesized in silico designs met hit threshold criteria of IC50 < 10 µM and >2-fold selectivity favoring Toxoplasma gondii, further demonstrating the efficiency of our structure-based drug design approach.