The incorporation of an agglomeration bonus payment to encourage spatial coordination in auction mechanisms to allocate payments for ecosystem services (PES) contracts has been explored as a promising innovation that could enhance the effectiveness of PES schemes. Empirical evidence on the performance of this particular design feature is scant, and almost exclusively derived from laboratory experiments using student subjects. This study reports results from a framed field experimental auction allocating PES contracts with and without agglomeration bonus payments using actual forest land owners in rural China as subjects. We find tentative evidence that, in a PES auction that provides agglomeration bonuses, subjects tend to bid less in anticipation of receiving bonus payments when their neighbours are also successful in the auction. In addition, we have mixed findings as to whether the agglomeration bonus is able to induce a bidding pattern in favour of contiguous conservation. The two sets of results convey some encouraging signals of the theoretically postulated cost-effectiveness and conservation efficacy of the agglomeration bonus. Further research from the actual field is warranted in light of the policy significance of this innovative incentive mechanism.

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A molecular linkage map for the maize hybrid of cross between Ye478 and Dan340 was constructed by using 150 co-dominant SSR markers. The total map length was 1 478.7 cM with an average interval of 10.0 cM. Composite interval mapping was used to identify the plant height (PH) and ear position (EH) QTL at 5 environments based on the phenotypic data of 397 F2:3 families. Then 21 PH and 25 EH relevant QTL were identified. The mean contribution of 12.2% and 14.9% QTL for plant height was identified at the interval of umc2025 - umc1035 on chromosome 1 and umc1822 - bnlg1118 on chromosome 5, respectively. Meanwhile, the mean contribution of 10.2% and 22.8% to ear position were identified at the interval of phi029 - umc1102 on chromosome 3 and phi109188 - bnlg1118 on chromosome 5. The main QTL for PH and EH were both found at the regions of Bin5.05 - 5.07 on chromosome 5. The additive and partial dominant effects were the main genetic basis for plant height and ear position in maize. The effect of population size and environments on QTL mapping were analyzed.

A two-dimensional (2D) magnetic field sensor consisting of four silicon magnetic sensitive transistors (SMSTs) with similar characteristics is presented in this paper. By use of micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) and integrated packaging technology, this sensor fabricated by using the silicon wafer with a <100> orientation and high resistivity, was packaged on printed circuit boards (PCBs). In order to detect the magnetic fields in the x and y axes directions, two of the four SMSTs with opposite magnetic sensitive directions were located along the x and −x axes directions, symmetrically, and the others were located along the y and −y axes directions. The experimental results show that when the VCE = 10.0 V and IB = 6.0 mA, the magnetic sensitivities of the sensor in the x and y axes directions are 366.0 mV/T and 365.0 mV/T, respectively. It is possible to measure the 2D magnetic field and improve the magnetic sensitivity, significantly.

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