{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,9]],"date-time":"2026-05-09T08:18:04Z","timestamp":1778314684163,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":39,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"8","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]],"date-time":"2025-08-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1754006400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100012456","name":"National Social Science Planning Fund","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["20BRK019"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["20BRK019"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100012456","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Systems"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Improving the green innovation quality (GIQ) of center cities is crucial to achieve sustainable urban agglomeration development. Utilizing data on green patent citations and economic indicators across cities in the Yangtze River Delta urban agglomeration (YRD) from 2003 to 2022, this research examines the influence of center cities\u2019 GIQ on the economic performance of peripheral municipalities. The results show the following: (1) Center cities\u2019 GIQ exerts a significant suppressive effect on peripheral cities\u2019 economic growth overall. Heterogeneity analysis uncovers a distance-dependent duality. GIQ stimulates growth in proximate cities (within 300 km) but suppresses it beyond this threshold. This spatial siphoning effect is notably amplified in national-level center cities. (2) Mechanisms suggest that GIQ accelerates the outflow of skilled labor in peripheral cities through factor agglomeration and industry transfer mechanisms. Concurrently, it impedes the gradient diffusion of urban services, collectively hindering peripheral development. (3) Increased government green attention (GGA) and industry\u2013university\u2013research cooperation (IURC) in centers can mitigate these negative impacts. This paper contributes to the theoretical discourse on center cities\u2019 spatial externalities within agglomerations and offers empirical support and policy insights for the exertion of spillover effects of high-quality green innovation from center cities and the sustainable development of urban agglomeration.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/systems13080642","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,5]],"date-time":"2025-08-05T08:46:55Z","timestamp":1754383615000},"page":"642","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":7,"title":["Green Innovation Quality in Center Cities and Economic Growth in Peripheral Cities: Evidence from the Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"13","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0007-6945-6478","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Sijie","family":"Duan","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Economics, Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, Wuhan 430073, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Hao","family":"Chen","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Economics, Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, Wuhan 430073, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-8715-4613","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jie","family":"Han","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Public Administration and Policy, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"137","DOI":"10.1016\/j.chieco.2015.03.012","article-title":"Patent statistics: A good indicator for innovation in China? 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