Against the backdrop that the “Double Reduction” policy driving the structural transformation of basic education, as an important carrier of non-formal science education, science and technology museums have gradually become embedded in the after-school service systems of primary and secondary schools, becoming an integral component of the collaborative supply of educational resources. Based on a review of relevant policy documents and an analysis of typical cases, this paper systematically analyzes the science education service capabilities and operating mechanisms of science and technology museums during the implementation of the “Double Reduction” policy series from the dimensions of resource integration, content innovation, teacher support, organizational collaboration, and digital empowerment. The study indicates that science and technology museums have demonstrated strong practical responsiveness in promoting the integration of educational resources, optimizing the supply of science courses, supporting teachers’ professional development, and expanding digital education scenarios. Meanwhile, science and technology museums are also confronted with such challenges as insufficient depth of institutional embedding with blurred responsibility boundaries, fragmented coordination mechanisms with low efficiency in multi-party cooperation, and unbalanced resource and capability support alongside a weak digital foundation. Based on these findings, this paper proposes countermeasures to enhance the science education capacities of science and technology museums, including improving institutional supply to deepen their participation in the “Double Reduction” policy, reconstructing collaborative architectures to boost the governance efficacy of multi-party cooperation, and establishing a sound multi-faceted support system to consolidate the digital foundation. These measures aim to provide a theoretical basis and practical reference for expanding the science education functions of science and technology museums and ensuring the high-quality implementation of the “Double Reduction” policy.

Science popularization is an important approach to improving public scientific literacy, and science posters have become a significant means of science popularization. However, current research on science posters mainly focuses on design-level discussions and lacks systematic studies on the relationship between visual presentation and communication effects. Based on visual framing theory, this research explores how the denotative and stylistic levels of visual framing in science posters influence the effects of science popularization. The results show that at the denotative level, technology-knowledge posters are more conducive to alleviating cognitive load and enhancing the communication effectiveness of science popularization, whereas image entropy, as a measure of image content complexity, does not exert a positive effect on communication outcomes and may even increase cognitive burden. At the stylistic level, surreal and warm-toned poster designs can promote science popularization by building trust and empathy, while cartoon designs, due to oversimplification of knowledge and the loss of scientific professional objectivity, fail to improve communication effectiveness. Accordingly, this research proposes the following strategies and recommendations: (1) Poster design should consider audiences’ cognitive and emotional responses, select appropriate forms according to the complexity of scientific knowledge, and reduce image content complexity; (2) In designing science posters, surreal styles should be adopted when appropriate, and the proportion of warm tones should be moderately increased to enhance communication effectiveness.

Conventional models of emergency science popularization, characterized by linear knowledge production, homogenized information dissemination, and reliance on single physical settings, are increasingly inadequate for addressing the evolving nature of disaster risks, heterogeneous public perception, and limited scenario coverage. Systematic optimization of emergency science popularization is therefore urgently required. Drawing on socio-technical systems theory, this study employs Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modeling to analyze emergency science popularization texts, extracting a novel development paradigm driven by “technology-institution-space”. Research indicates that the technology-enabled dimension achieves real-time adaptation to evolving disaster risks through dynamic knowledge production; the institutional innovation dimension resolves the challenges of fragmented resource allocation and homogenized information dissemination via a standardised precision communication system; while the spatial integration dimension establishes a comprehensive coverage network by leveraging the convergence of‘physical-social-informational’ triadic spaces. These three dimensions collectively form a multidimensional, comprehensive, and efficient emergency science popularization paradigm. Based on these findings, this study proposes several optimization pathways, including strengthening the application of digital and intelligent technologies, improving the resource support system for emergency science popularization, and promoting comprehensive, cross-regional, and multi-scale dissemination. The study provides a theoretical framework and practical insights for addressing the imbalance between the supply and demand of emergency science popularization and for enhancing public disaster risk awareness and preparedness, thereby supporting the modernization of China’s emergency management system and governance capacity.

In response to the Communist Party of China’s call to “March Toward Modern Science, ” the All-China Association for the Dissemination of Scientific and Technical Knowledge and the All-China Federation of Trade Unions jointly convened the National Conference of Activist Workers in Science and Technology Popularization in Beijing in late October 1956. The aim was to foster closer collaboration between scientists and industrial workers while expanding the reach of science popularization. The conference, distinguished by its high-level organization, prolonged preparatory phase, and extensive participation, effectively galvanized workers’ enthusiasm for science popularization by recruiting activist employees into working groups and engaging them in the nationwide conference. During the preparatory phase, grassroots research helped formulate a guiding principle for science popularization—“integration with production, alignment with practical needs, and pursuit of broad outreach”—along with a methodology emphasizing “small-scale, diverse, easily understandable, and voluntary participation.” This landmark conference in the history of New China’s science popularization established the historical experience of mobilizing active participants to “strive for extensive reach” in science popularization, which continues to offer valuable insights for enhancing national science popularization capacity building in the new era.

The 17th century marked the golden age of modern scientific development in Europe. Amid this historical convergence, as a quadruple-integrated informal educational organization combining “meetings, publications, lectures and experiments, ” the 17th-century Royal Society exhibited distinct characteristics of its era: non-systematic activity organization, strong pragmatism, a blend of academic rigor and popular appeal, and a pronounced orientation toward elite education. Its legacy, transmitted to 19th century Western universities through a multi-dimensional chain of membership, scientific institutionalization and practical formats, exerted a profound and lasting influence on Western science popularization. Based on a review of The Royal Society of London’s early development, this paper focuses on analyzing its scientific educational explorations and core characteristics during the 17th century. It also examined experiences including the purity of the purpose of science education, the proactive pursuit of societal support, maintaining the autonomy of the organization, and the laying of the foundation for the institutionalization of science education. It provides historical insights for Chinese scientific societies to achieve the “nurturing effect” of formal science education systems via informal provision, thereby empowering Chinese independent scientific and technological innovation.

The empowerment of technological innovation through science popularization constitutes a pivotal contemporary issue in the context of the new technological revolution. To elucidate the mechanisms and pathways of this empowerment, it is imperative to clarify why science popularization is positioned as equally critical as technological innovation and how the two can achieve efficient and synergistic integration. In light of the transformative shifts facing contemporary science popularization—including digital and intelligent societal transitions, the demands for high-quality development and high-level competition, as well as the challenges arising from the expansion of its focus from “mature science and technology” to “science and technology in action” —it is evident that the concept of science popularization has undergone substantial evolution in dimensions such as content, target audiences, actors, forms, and mechanisms. Its functions have expanded beyond ideological and cultural enlightenment and the empowerment through knowledge and technology to encompass “value creation based on knowledge and technology.” To facilitate this comprehensive transformation in the conception and functionality of science popularization and thereby realize its empowerment of technological innovation, it is essential to deeply embed science popularization within the national innovation system. The key to this lies in enhancing the national “distribution power for knowledge and technology,” which entails strengthening the efficient flow of knowledge and technology between producers and users, promptly identifying and dismantling barriers to such flows, and establishing institutional mechanisms that ensure innovators' timely access to requisite innovation elements.

The rapid development of artificial intelligence in the digital age is reshaping the connotation and boundaries of science popularization, promoting the transformation of science popularization goals from traditional knowledge dissemination to ability cultivation. By reviewing the development process and current challenges of science popularization work in China, and combining the development of science popularization in the digital age with the policy orientation of the revised Law of thePeople's Republic of China on Popularization of Science and Technology, this paper explores the theoretical basis and practical needs for the transformation of science popularization towards capacity cultivation. At the theoretical level, based on the STS theory and scientific literacy theory, it is transforming into a capacity-building science popularization, to enhance the public's scientific thinking ability, technological adaptability, and ethical judgment ability. To address the challenges brought by new technologies such as artificial intelligence, a five-dimensional training path is proposed, which includes optimizing supply content, innovating communication modes, reforming evaluation systems, supporting institutional policies, and optimizing talent systems. This provides a reference for improving public rationality and modernizing science popularization governance.

The integration of culture and technology constitutes both an inevitable trend and a pressing need for technological and social development. Existing studies, however, remain predominantly practice-oriented, exhibiting a paucity of theoretical exploration and systematic inquiry, particularly concerning the role of science popularization. Employing the theory of the public sphere, this study systematically analyzes how constructing a public sphere for cultural-technological dialogue can overcome barriers to their integration across three dimensions: knowledge, values, and practice. It examines the characteristics of science popularization that align with those of the public sphere—openness, rationality, and interactivity—and elucidates the mechanisms whereby science popularization fosters integration by: establishing a public space for knowledge convergence, providing a public platform for value negotiation, and creating a public interface for practical collaboration. The study also identifies current challenges in this process and proposes corresponding countermeasures. This study reveals that science popularization serves as a natural public sphere for cultural-technological dialogue. To further facilitate the integration of culture and technology through high-quality science popularization, efforts should enhance its openness, rationality, and interactivity.

Under the strategic framework of supporting Chinese modernization with high-quality population development, science popularization services assume a critical role in advancing such development. This paper analyzes the challenges confronting China's population development, including pressures arising from population size and structural issues. It elucidates the scientific essence and priority tasks of promoting high-quality population development. Furthermore, it examines the new demands placed on science popularization services in this context, such as their integration into the population service system, their contribution to enhancing the overall quality of the population, and their role in reshaping perceptions related to marriage and childbearing. A framework for structuring science popularization services to foster high-quality population development is proposed. Accordingly, for the 15th Five-Year Plan period, it is imperative to focus on the integrated enhancement of three core dimensions of comprehensive population quality: scientific and cultural literacy, holistic health, and ideological and ethical standards. This requires to establish a science popularization system for the entire population and across the entire life cycle, innovate the content of science popularization, implementing targeted action plans, which include initiatives for a high-quality demographic foundation, a competent workforce, healthy aging, and supportive family environments, promote the integration of new and traditional science popularization methods, and strengthen the policy guarantee mechanism for science popularization, and promote the high-quality development of the population served by science popularization.

Scientific and technological innovation alongside public science education serve as the “dual engines” driving innovation-led development. As a pioneering region for high-quality development in China, Zhejiang Province has cultivated distinctive experiences in promoting the synergistic evolution of these two domains. This paper focuses on the core issue of how Zhejiang facilitates itscoordinated advancement and explores the underlying mechanisms. Employing empirical analysis combined with case studies, This paper utilize the entropy method and the coupling coordination model to quantitatively assess the coupling coordination degree across Zhejiang's 11 prefecture-level cities in 2023. Through integrating practical case studies from the province, The research identify the intrinsic mechanisms governing their synergistic evolution while revealing existing challenges: uneven resource allocation between innovation and popularization, low conversion efficiency, insufficient public engagement, and lagging evaluation mechanisms. Systematically summarizing these intrinsic mechanisms, This paper propose targeted improvement recommendations based on our findings, This includes four aspects: establishing a cross-regional resource coordination and compensation mechanism, establishing a collaborative transformation system for scientific research andsciencepopularization, cultivating a sciencepopularization ecosystem involving multiple entities, and improving dynamic evaluation and governance feedback mechanisms. offering transferable insights for other Chinese regions pursuing coordinated “dual-engine” development.