Institutional Problems for Chinese Environmental Accounting: Evidence from the Accounting Profession

The global environmental crisis has turned accounting scholars’ attention to environmental accounting (hereafter EA). With the gap of EA research and practice between China and the western world, it is necessary to elaborate on this gap through accounting professionals’ environmental awareness (perceptions), which has tended to become the key to adopting EA practices in accounting firms. This has led to the main research question: what are accounting professionals’ perceptions of EA? To illustrate what factors would lead accounting firms (not) adopting EA practices, institutional theory is used as the main framework to identify key issues that lead firms to resemble each other. Legitimacy and stakeholder analysis are adopted as a supplement of institutional analysis to explain how accounting firms respond to influences brought by legitimate concerns and interest groups, which has constructed this multi-framework. This thesis is conducted through 35 semi-structured interviews. Interviewees are invited from different scales of Chinese accounting firms on a top-down basis. Documentary review is used as a supplement of the interviews. Thematic analysis is employed to elaborate on how institutional drivers shape EA across different categories. This thesis has identified that clients’ demands tend to be the key for (not) adopting EA, which can be reflected through participants’ knowledge structure, education and training, practices and the adoption of practical guidelines – this leads to the branding effects of EA in the Big Four, which reflects a practical gap between the Big Four and domestic firms. More specifically, this thesis has reasserted that organizations tend to model themselves on others perceived to be successful in response to certain uncertainty; whereas the clarity of ‘successful organizations’ and ‘uncertainty’ becomes the key institutional driver for firms (not) adopting EA practices. As a supplementary framework, stakeholder and legitimacy analysis tends to reflect how EA is perceived and influenced through different interested parties. In general, this thesis has demonstrated a rather low environmental awareness amongst the Chinese accounting profession, suggesting that EA is developed to enable instead of offsetting the inequity between the Big Four and domestic firms

Current relationship status and sexual activity in past 30 days by self-reported sex and sexual orientation.

<p>Current relationship status and sexual activity in past 30 days by self-reported sex and sexual orientation.</p

Sexual function and satisfaction in past 30 days of sexually active men and women by self-reported sexual orientation.

<p>Sexual function and satisfaction in past 30 days of sexually active men and women by self-reported sexual orientation.</p

The sociodemographics of survey respondents and non-respondents compared to the current population survey.

<p>The sociodemographics of survey respondents and non-respondents compared to the current population survey.</p

Mouse RAGE Variant 4 Is a Dominant Membrane Receptor that Does Not Shed to Generate Soluble RAGE

<div><p>The receptor for advanced glycation end products (RAGE) is a multi-ligand, immunoglobulin-like receptor that has been implicated in aging-associated diseases. Recent studies have demonstrated that both human and murine <i>Ager</i> genes undergo extensive alternative splicing that generates multiple putative transcripts encoding different receptor isoforms. Except for the soluble isoform (esRAGE), the majority of putative RAGE isoforms remain unstudied. Profiling of murine <i>Ager</i> transcripts showed that variant transcript 4 (mRAGE_v4), the second most abundant transcript in lungs and multiple other tissues, encodes a receptor that lacks nine residues located within the C2 extracellular section close to the trans-membrane domain. We therefore characterized mRAGEV4 isoreceptor in comparison with the full-length mRAGE (mRAGEFL). Although differing in only nine residues, mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4 display very different cellular behaviors. While mRAGEFL undergoes constitutive, extensive shedding in the cell to generate sRAGE, mRAGEV4 hardly sheds. In addition, we found that while mRAGEFL can localize to both the plasma membrane and the endosome, mRAGEV4 is exclusively localized to the plasma membrane. These very different cellular localization patterns suggest that, in addition to their roles in sRAGE production, mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4 may play distinct, spatiotemporal roles in signaling and innate immune responses. Compared to mice, humans do not have the v4 transcript. Although hRAGE, like mRAGEFL, also localizes to the plasma membrane and the endosome, its rate of constitutive shedding is significantly lower. These observations provide valuable information regarding RAGE biology, and serve as a reference by which to create mouse models relating to human diseases.</p></div

Examination of cellular localization of mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4 in serum-starved A549 cells.

<p>A549 cells were serum-starved for 6 h prior to transfection. (A) plasma membrane localization; (B) lysosomal localization. Blue: DAPI (nucleus); red: mcherry (mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4); green: Alexa Fluor 488-conjugated plasma membrane marker cholera toxin B (A), and GFP-tagged lysosome marker LAMP-1(B). The scale bar represents 10 μm.</p

Monodisperse Copper Chalcogenide Nanocrystals: Controllable Synthesis and the Pinning of Plasmonic Resonance Absorption

Controllable synthesis of copper chalcogenide nanocrystals (NCs), including desired geometry, composition and surrounding environment, is of high significance for the modulation of their optoelectronic response and the corresponding applications. Herein, copper nitride nanoparticles have been used as “uncontaminated” copper precursors to synthesize copper chalcogenide NCs with high monodispersity through a one-pot strategy. In this protocol, the sizes and compositions of NCs can be readily controlled by varying the ratio of the precursors. For Cu_2–<i>x</i>S NCs with different diameters, the size variations are all smaller than 5.6%. Furthermore, the plasmonic properties of the copper chalcogenide NCs are investigated under a steady state by tuning the plasmonic resonance absorption band to a limiting condition (denoted “pinning” phenomena). It is observed that the pinning frequency increases (from 1.09 to 1.23 eV) with the increment of the NC size (from 5.4 ± 0.3 to 11.1 ± 0.4 nm), explained by introducing surface scattering. Meanwhile, the frequencies of ternary alloyed copper sulfide selenide NCs blue-shift from 0.90 to 1.00 eV with the increase of selenium content from 11% to 66%, which is related to the effective mass of free carriers. Additionally, the plasmonic absorption bands of Cu_2–<i>x</i>S NCs encapsulated by two single-layer graphene pin at 1525–1550 nm during the oxidation process, which is influenced by both the dielectric constant and redox potential of the surrounding environment. This study demonstrates the controllable synthesis and precise fundamental plasmonic properties of the copper chalcogenide NCs, ensuring the potential plasmonic-related techniques with high efficiency, accuracy and excellent spatial resolution

Examination of RAGE shedding using immunoprecipitation.

<p>A549 cells were transfected with FLAG-tagged hRAGE, mRAGEFL, and mRAGEV4 expression vectors. Cell culture medium was collected 16 h post-transfection and immunoprcipitated with anti-FLAG antibodies. The cell lysates (A) and immunoprecipitants (B) were resolved with SDS gel and western blotted with anti-FLAG antibodies conjugated with HRP. * marks the resolved mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4, and β-actin level in the cell lysates was used as the loading control for cell lysates.</p

Examination of constitutive RAGE shedding using cycloheximide chase and ELISA analyses.

<p>A549 cells transfected with FLAG-tagged mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4 were pre-treated with cycloheximide and then incubated in medium supplemented with cycloheximide. At each time point, cell culture medium (1 ml) was collected for ELISA analyses and cells were lysed for western blotting, using anti-FLAG-antibodies. (A) mRAGEFL; (B) mRAGEV4. For (A) and (B), the left panel is the western blot; the right panel is the densitometry semi-quantification of the western blot. C. ELISA analyses of sRAGE in cell culture medium from mRAGEFL- and mRAGEV4-transfected cells. The ELISA was performed in triplicate, and Student <i>t</i>-test was performed to compare sRAGE production between mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4 at each time point. *** <i>p</i> < 0.001.</p

Examination of cellular localizations of mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4.

<p>(A) Plasma membrane localization; (B) early endosome localization; (C) late endosome localization. Blue: DAPI (nucleus); red: mcherry (mRAGEFL and mRAGEV4); green: Alexa Fluor 488-conjugated plasma membrane marker cholera toxin B (A), and GFP tagged early endosome marker Rab11 (B) and late endosome marker Rab 9 (C). The scale bar represents 10 μm.</p