Elephant Culture Matter for China’s Asian Elephants Conservation

Traditional anthropogenic impacts such as hunting, using as war-elephant, trading of ivory, paying tribute to the imperial court and so on, were once thought to be directly responsible for the rapid decline of Asian elephants in China. But in Yunnan Province, China, a unique human factor such as the traditional elephant culture of local ethnic minorities, is an important factor in the conservation of Asian elephants. In these areas, we investigated by means of village interviews, field surveys and data collection, the results show that the elephant culture of ethnic minorities has a great impact on people's thoughts and behaviors, these traditional culture and belief (that mean taking elephant as the God, holding elephant as a belief, worshipping elephant and praise it) urges people to actively protect elephants and avoid more human-elephant conflicts. To enhance the public awareness of Asian elephant conservation, the Chinese Government or international environmental organizations should give higher attention and support to these elephant cultures.

Political connection heterogeneity and corporate innovation

This paper examines whether political connection heterogeneity plays a role in corporate innovation in a sample of all listed firms in China from 2008 to 2016. Our results show that connections with central government officials promote innovation, while connections with local government officials inhibit innovation. The nonconformity between the influence of federalism and that of the local authorities is associated with the personnel promotion and tenure requirements that induce differential innovation-promotion strategies. We use the Heckman two-stage estimation to address selection bias, and we adopt a setting as a quasi-natural experiment, leveraging the decrease in local GDP growth rates to abate endogeneity. Our results endure these econometric treatments and a series of robustness checks. In mechanism tests, we document evidence that the central government promotes corporate innovation by improving innovation efficiency, while the local government inhibits innovation by reducing both innovation inputs and efficiency. We also find that the effect is even larger on high-tech firms and that it can be mitigated by marketization

Could long-term dialysis vintage and abnormal calcium, phosphorus and iPTH control accelerate aging among the maintenance hemodialysis population?

AbstractObjective Aging is a complex process of physiological dysregulation of the body system and is common in hemodialysis patients. However, limited studies have investigated the links between dialysis vintage, calcium, phosphorus, and iPTH control and aging. The purpose of the current study was to examine these associations.Methods During 2020, a cross-sectional study was conducted in 3025 hemodialysis patients from 27 centers in Anhui Province, China. Biological age was calculated by a formula using chronological age and clinical indicators. The absence of the target range for serum phosphorus (0.87–1.45 mmol/L), corrected calcium (2.1–2.5 mmol/L) and iPTH (130–585 pg/mL) were identified as abnormal calcium, phosphorus, and iPTH control.Results A total of 1131 hemodialysis patients were included, 59.2% of whom were males (669/1131). The mean (standard deviation) of actual age and biological age were 56.07 (12.79) years and 66.94 (25.88), respectively. The median of dialysis vintage was 4.3 years. After adjusting for the confounders, linear regression models showed patients with abnormal calcium, phosphorus, and iPTH control and on hemodialysis for less than 4.3 years (B = 0.211, p = .002) or on hemodialysis for 4.3 years or more (B = 0.302, p < .001), patients with normal calcium, phosphorus, and iPTH control and on hemodialysis for 4.3 years or more (B = 0.087, p = .013) had a higher biological age.Conclusion Our findings support the hypothesis that long-term hemodialysis and abnormal calcium, phosphorus, and iPTH control may accelerate aging in the hemodialysis population. Further studies are warrant to verify the significance of maintaining normal calcium-phosphorus metabolism in aging