According to the United Nations, by 2050, about 68% of the world’s population will live in urban areas. This population increase requires environmental resilience and planning ability to reduce the negative environmental impacts associated with growth. In this scenario, life cycle analysis, whose standards were introduced by ISO 14000 series, is an essential tool. From this perspective, smart cities whose concern about environmental sustainability is paramount corroborating SDG 11. This study aims to provide a holistic view of environmental technologies developed by Brazilian inventors, focused on life cycle analysis, which promotes innovation by helping cities build greener, more efficient, resilient, and sustainable environments. The methodology of this article was an exploratory study and investigated the scenario of patents in the life cycle. 209 patent processes with Brazilian inventors were found in the Espacenet database. Analyzing each of the results individually revealed processes related to air quality, solid waste, and environmental sanitation. The review of patent processes allowed mapping of the technological advances linked to life cycle analysis, finding that the system is still little explored and can present competitive advantages for cities.

This study delves into the evolving landscape of smart city development in Kazakhstan, a domain gaining increasing relevance in the context of urban modernization and digital transformation. The research is anchored in the quest to understand how specific technological factors influence the formation of smart cities within the region. To this end, the study adopts a Spatial Autoregressive Model (SAR) as its core analytical tool, leveraging data on server density, cloud service usage, and electronic invoicing practices across various Kazakhstani cities. The crux of the research revolves around assessing the impact of these selected technological variables on the smart city development process. The SAR model’s application facilitates a nuanced understanding of the spatial dynamics at play, offering insights into how these factors vary in influence across different urban areas. A key finding of this investigation is the significant positive correlation between the adoption of electronic invoicing and smart city development, a result that stands in contrast to the relatively insignificant impact of server density and cloud service usage. The conclusion drawn from these findings underscores the pivotal role of digital administrative processes, particularly electronic invoicing, in driving the smart city agenda in Kazakhstan. This insight not only contributes to the academic discourse on smart cities but also holds practical implications for policymakers and urban planners. It suggests a strategic shift towards prioritizing digital administrative innovations over mere infrastructural or technological upgrades. The study’s outcomes are poised to guide future smart city initiatives in Kazakhstan and offer a reference point for similar emerging economies embarking on their smart city journeys.

Under the background of the continuous development of science and technology, the era of big data has come in an all-round way, and big data technology has also been widely used in the education industry. The course of financial management in applied colleges and universities is a highly applied course, which focuses on the substance of the course. Teachers need to create a good learning environment for students with the help of information technology, and constantly cultivate students' professional skills and professionalism. In order to improve the quality of financial management courses in colleges and universities, this paper mainly analyzes the management courses in application-oriented colleges and universities, expounds the factors affecting the practical teaching quality of management courses in colleges and universities, and analyzes the teaching methods of management courses in application-oriented colleges and universities. Finally, it is concluded that only when teachers constantly improve their teaching level, can students' learning level be improved by combining theory with practice.

Targeted Poverty Alleviation refers to the targeted funding work completed in the process of higher education development. However, at present, in the process of implementing the requirements of Targeted Poverty Alleviation in China's universities, some students' families are difficult to complete identification, and there are also some problems in the information management of the funders, which has seriously affected the funding for students with financial difficulties in their families during the period of higher education in China. With the rapid development and progress of Big data technology, through the establishment of a sound information technology system, we must help students actively change the funding model in the future and greatly improve the funding, which is of great significance to the development of university funding supervision and management.