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North Korea has repeatedly defied the international community with regards to its nuclear weapons programme. Many look to China for leverage to change North Korea's behaviour. This study reviews the development of the China–North Korean relationship and conducts a statistical analysis on the impact of China's influence on North Korea. Our analysis finds China's leverage on North Korea to be nuanced. We maintain that North Korea has been wary of China's influence. Complete isolation or pressure from China under certain conditions will render North Korea more resistant to China's influence. We also suggest that the key to the North Korean issue is still in the hands of the United States and the entire international community through the use of an engagement strategy.

Although the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's (DPRK) nuclear program has been a challenge to international security for three decades, the world still knows little about its nuclear intentions. A recently available dataset of Korean Central News Agency's English publications (1997–2018) provides a complete coverage of DPRK's nuclear activities in the time span. Our study employs the Louvain method of community detection in large networks to detect patterns and trends in North Korea's nuclear rhetoric. We have two findings: Pyongyang's primary objective is deterrence, although it also utilizes nuclear development to boost regime legitimacy. This secondary intention of legitimization is more prominent under Kim Jong-un than under Kim Jong-il, but still not as salient as deterrence. Our results suggest a policy approach of engagement and deterrence.

The pervasive consumption of smuggled foreign media in North Korea means that societal changes may bring political economic changes. To analyze how drastic political and economic changes may relate to and resulted from changing media systems and cultures, we conducted a 3-country comparison between present-day North Korea, China from the late 1970s to present day, and East Germany before the reunification with West Germany. We compared government control of media ownership and content; the flow and consumption of foreign media among citizens; the sizes of the media economy and the black market in which legal and illegal media, respectively, circulates; and the adoption of nonlocal cultures in relation to citizens' political views. Reflecting on the experiences of China and East Germany, we believe that the North Korean case is more similar to the East German case rather than to the Chinese case because the government cannot effectively control foreign media consumption and its influence on the citizens, so the country may eventually allow for some foreign media in the country.

PurposeThis article aims to unfold digital servitization by exploring the key resources and resource orchestration (i.e. resource configuration and interaction).Design/methodology/approachThis article conducted an explorative two-stage research strategy of Chinese servitized manufacturers using a preliminary case study and fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA) design. The data collection was conducted between 2016 and 2021.FindingsThis article identifies five key resources – radical, complex technological resources, complementary, specific market resources and digital resources – and their configurations – leveraging market opportunities, leveraging innovation integration and leveraging resource advantages – to facilitate servitization in the digital age. The findings underscore the interaction between technological and market resources as well as the role of digital resources in promoting the servitization journey.Originality/valueThis article contributes to the understanding of servitization in the digital context by examining the key resources and their interactions involved. It builds upon the configurational logic of servitization, expanding the existing framework in the digital context and highlighting the significance of technological and market resource orchestration and interaction in servitization research. Moreover, the paper contributes through its exploratory two-stage approach, going beyond a conceptual understanding of servitization by focusing on both the factors that enable servitization (WHAT) and the configurations that lead to servitization (HOW). Additionally, the article investigates the attributes of resources as lower-level components, addressing the need to explore the micro-level practice of resource realignment. By providing clarity on the configurations of servitization, the paper offers practical guidelines for practitioners on how to effectively utilize resources and benefit from digital servitization.

Abstract

Aims
Ethanol ingestion affects cognition and emotion, which have been attributed to the dysfunction of specific brain structures. Studies of alcoholic patients and animal models consistently identify reduced hippocampal mass as a key ethanol-induced brain adaptation. This study evaluated how neuroadaptation in the hippocampus (Hip) produced by ethanol contributed to related behavioral deficits in male and female rats.


Methods
Effects of acute, short-term and long-term ethanol exposure on the anxiety-like behavior and recognition memory on adult male and female Sprague–Dawley rats were assessed using elevated plus maze test and novel object recognition test, respectively. In addition, in order to investigate the direct effect of ethanol on hippocampal neurons, primary culture of hippocampal neurons was exposed to ethanol (10, 30 and 90 mM; 1, 24 and 48 h), and viability (CCK-8) and morphology (immunocytochemistry) were analyzed at structural levels. Western blot assays were used to assess protein levels of NT3-TrkC-ERK.


Results
Acute and short-term ethanol exposure exerted anxiolytic effects, whereas long-term ethanol exposure induced anxiogenic responses in both sexes. Short-term ethanol exposure impaired spatial memory only in female rats, whereas long-term ethanol exposure impaired spatial and recognition memory in both sexes. These behavioral impairments and ethanol-induced loss of hippocampal neurons and decreased cell viability were accompanied by downregulated NT3-TrkC-ERK pathway.


Conclusion
These results indicate that NT3-TrkC-ERK signaling in the Hip may play an important role in ethanol-induced structural and behavioral impairments.