Corporate social responsibility and environmental sustainability: achieving firms sustainable performance supported by plant capability

In the contemporary industrial setting, corporations face direct and indirect pressures from multiple intrinsic and extrinsic environmental constituents, including competitive entities and resource limitations, hindering their continuity and sustainability. Against this backdrop, Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is an industrial dynamic that enables firms to address the pressures imposed by these environmental constituents. Therefore, this study examines the impact of CSR on firm’s sustainable performance conditioned at different plant sizes. In doing so, the data was collected using a survey instrument comprising close-ended items with five-point likert scales on each item for measuring managerial perceptions from manufacturing industries. Through non-probabilistic sampling, a sample of 399 responses from middle to top-level management was collected. Smart PLS was utilized to analyze the data for validating the hypothesized relationships between the latent constructs. To enhance the reliability of the tests used for the analysis, bootstrapping was used to iterate the sample size and refine significance levels. Overall findings indicate that environmental sustainable development is essential to explain the relationship between ‘CSR for consumer’ and ‘Firm sustainable performance’. The relationship between ‘CSR to employees’ and ‘Firm sustainable performance’ is significant both with and without the explanatory role of sustainable environmental performance. The link between CSR to community and firm sustainable performance is not being explained by environmental sustainable development. These results offer valuable policy recommendations

An Efficient Alarm Notification Algorithm for Earthquake Early Warning System

Alarm Notification is a service that addresses devices and users with messages to be processed immediately or at a specific time. In this paper, we propose an efficient alarm notification algorithm for earthquake early warning system in Taiwan. Due to the lack of multicast support in the general IP network, we try to deliver notification messages to multiple receivers in time base on location information、network throughput with peering ISPs and priority with IoT devices. With the proposed algorithm, we can not only reduce the burst message traffic for network but also send the messages in time

Effects of ecological innovation, governance structure, and social development on the adoption of sustainable reporting in the global tourism industry

This study analyzes the effects of institutional factors on adopting sustainability reporting in the worldwide tourism industry. Initially, it compiled the data on the organizational environment, including environment, social and governance performance, and sector-level macroeconomic control variables such as economic growth, exports, and tourism receipts from 2001 to 2019. For empirical estimations, it applies multiple panel estimators; pooled ordinary least square (OLS), fixed effect, and random effects model, while dynamic Generalized Method of Moments is applied to address endogeneity issues in panel data. The results report that environmental, social, and governance indicators are essential for sustainable tourism. Mainly, ecological and social circumstances are more prominent than others. Further, ecological innovation is considered essential for sustainability in this sector. This research suggests an innovative theoretical approach that exposes the importance of sustainability reporting in the tourism industry. It also provides the guideline to the regulators that they should expand their focus on the regulations of sustainability reporting on the tourism industry

DNA Binding and Degradation by the HNH Protein ColE7

The bacterial toxin ColE7 bears an HNH motif which has been identified in hundreds of prokaryotic and eukaryotic endonucleases, involved in DNA homing, restriction, repair, or chromosome degradation. The crystal structure of the nuclease domain of ColE7 in complex with a duplex DNA has been determined at 2.5 Å resolution. The HNH motif is bound at the minor groove primarily to DNA phosphate groups at and beyond the 3′ side of the scissile phosphate, with little interaction with ribose groups and bases. This result provides a structural basis for sugar- and sequence-independent DNA recognition and the inhibition mechanism by inhibitor Im7, which blocks the substrate binding site but not the active site. Structural comparison shows that two families of endonucleases bind and bend DNA in a similar way to that of the HNH ColE7, indicating that endonucleases containing a “ββα-metal” fold of active site possess a universal mode for protein-DNA interactions

Abnormal glucose tolerance and insulin resistance in polycystic ovary syndrome amongst the Taiwanese population- not correlated with insulin receptor substrate-1 Gly972Arg/Ala513Pro polymorphism

BACKGROUND: Insulin resistance and glucose dysmetabolism in polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) are related with the polymorphisms in the genes encoding the insulin receptor substrate (IRS) proteins, especially Gly972Arg/Ala513Pro polymorphism being reported to be associated with type-2 diabetes and PCOS. We intended to assess the prevalence of abnormal glucose tolerance (AGT) and insulin resistance in Taiwanese PCOS women. We also tried to assess whether the particular identity of Gly972Arg/Ala513Pro polymorphic alleles of the IRS-1 gene mutation can be used as an appropriate diagnostic indicator for PCOS. METHODS: We designed a prospective clinical study. Forty-seven Taiwanese Hoklo and Hakka women, diagnosed with PCOS were enrolled in this study as were forty-five healthy Hoklo and Hakka women as the control group. Insulin resistance was evaluated with fasting insulin, fasting glucose/insulin ratio, and homeostasis model assessment index for insulin resistance (HOMA(IR)). The genomic DNA of the subjects was amplified by PCR and digested by restriction fragmented length polymorphism (RFLP) with Bst N1 used for codon 972 and Dra III for codon 513. RESULTS: AGT was found in 46.8% of these PCOS patients and was significantly related to high insulin resistance rather than the low insulin resistance. Those patients with either insulin resistance or AGT comprised the majority of PCOS affected patients (AGT + fasting insulin ≥17: 83%, AGT + glucose/insulin ratio ≥6.5: 85.1%, AGT + HOMA(IR )≥ 2: 87.2%, and AGT + HOMA(IR )≥ 3.8: 72.3%). None of the tested samples revealed any polymorphism due to the absence of any Dra III recognition site or any Bst N1 recognition site in the amplified PCR fragment digested by restriction fragmented length polymorphism. CONCLUSION: There is significantly high prevalence of AGT and insulin resistance in PCOS women, but Gly972Arg and Ala513Pro polymorphic alleles of IRS-1 are rare and are not associated with the elevated risk of PCOS amongst Taiwanese subjects. This is quite different from the similar study in phylogenetically diverged Caucasian subjects

Turbidity Currents, Submarine Landslides and the 2006 Pingtung Earthquake off SW Taiwan

Submarine landslides or slumps may generate turbidity currents consisting of mixture of sediment and water. Large and fast-moving turbidity currents can incise and erode continental margins and cause damage to artificial structures such as telecommunication cables on the seafloor. In this study, we report that eleven submarine cables across the Kaoping canyon and Manila trench were broken in sequence from 1500 to 4000 m deep, as a consequence of submarine landslides and turbidity currents associated with the 2006 Pingtung earthquakes offshore SW Taiwan. We have established a full-scale scenario and calculation of the turbidity currents along the Kaoping canyon channel from the middle continental slope to the adjacent deep ocean. Our results show that turbidity current velocities vary downstream ranging from 20 to 3.7 and 5.7 m/s, which demonstrates a positive relationship between turbidity current velocity and bathymetric slope. The violent cable failures happened in this case evidenced the destructive power of the turbidity current to seafloor or underwater facilities that should not be underestimated

Autoantibodies against type I IFNs in patients with critical influenza pneumonia

In an international cohort of 279 patients with hypoxemic influenza pneumonia, we identified 13 patients (4.6%) with autoantibodies neutralizing IFN-alpha and/or -omega, which were previously reported to underlie 15% cases of life-threatening COVID-19 pneumonia and one third of severe adverse reactions to live-attenuated yellow fever vaccine. Autoantibodies neutralizing type I interferons (IFNs) can underlie critical COVID-19 pneumonia and yellow fever vaccine disease. We report here on 13 patients harboring autoantibodies neutralizing IFN-alpha 2 alone (five patients) or with IFN-omega (eight patients) from a cohort of 279 patients (4.7%) aged 6-73 yr with critical influenza pneumonia. Nine and four patients had antibodies neutralizing high and low concentrations, respectively, of IFN-alpha 2, and six and two patients had antibodies neutralizing high and low concentrations, respectively, of IFN-omega. The patients' autoantibodies increased influenza A virus replication in both A549 cells and reconstituted human airway epithelia. The prevalence of these antibodies was significantly higher than that in the general population for patients 70 yr of age (3.1 vs. 4.4%, P = 0.68). The risk of critical influenza was highest in patients with antibodies neutralizing high concentrations of both IFN-alpha 2 and IFN-omega (OR = 11.7, P = 1.3 x 10(-5)), especially those <70 yr old (OR = 139.9, P = 3.1 x 10(-10)). We also identified 10 patients in additional influenza patient cohorts. Autoantibodies neutralizing type I IFNs account for similar to 5% of cases of life-threatening influenza pneumonia in patients <70 yr old