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Background To analyze mechanisms of action of glucocorticoid treatment for endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) in sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL), we aimed to evaluate the expression and activation status of the protein kinase RNA-like ER kinase (PERK)–C/EBP homologous protein (CHOP) pathway, which is the major pathway in the ERS. Methods In the present study, we established an in vitro ERS model using tunicamycin-treated hair-cell-like HEI-OC1 cells. The effect of dexamethasone on proliferation inhibition, apoptosis, and ATF4–CHOP pathway in HEI-OC1 cells was examined by CCK-8 assay, flow cytometry, western blotting, and reverse transcription PCR, respectively. Results In HEI-OC1 cells, dexamethasone was shown to significantly reduce the tunicamycin-induced expression of ATF4 and CHOP in the context of sustained viability and proliferation, a therapeutic effect that was reversible by co-treatment with a glucocorticoid antagonist. Conclusion Dexamethasone can protect hair-cell-like HEI-OC1 cells from ERS damage, which may be one of the mechanisms of action for GCs in SNHL treatment.

Purpose The construction of a modern economic system is a symbolic and strategic choice for large developing economies on the path toward high-quality economic development. The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach The overall framework aims to adhere to “One Policy and One Mainline” to build an innovation-driven, synergistic industrial system and a “with three-qualities” economic system (with efficient market mechanisms, energetic micro-agents and appropriate macroeconomic regulation). Findings The strengthening of the real economy and construction of a modern industrial system constitute the material basis for supporting this system and framework. As major decision making and theoretical innovation in empirical practice, building a modern economic system can also contribute substantially toward developing the applied economic theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Originality/value Building a modern economic system in China necessitates, without exception, the construction of various subsystems encompassing industrial, market, distribution, regional development, green development, open and economic institutional aspects.

BACKGROUND Sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL) is currently treated with a combination of drugs, predominantly with glucocorticoids (GCs). However, the mechanisms of action of GCs in SSNHL are unknown. This study aimed to analyze the role of endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) in SSNHL pathogenesis and prognosis. MATERIAL AND METHODS In this study, we evaluated the expression and activation status of the protein kinase RNA-like endoplasmic reticulum kinase (PERK)-C/EBP homologous protein (CHOP) pathway in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from patients with SSNHL and compared them with those in healthy controls. We also compared differences in expression of activating transcription factor 4 (ATF4) and CHOP before and after glucocorticoid treatment in patients with improved and unimproved SSNHL. RESULTS Treatment with GCs significantly improved hearing in 55% of patients with SSNHL. Levels of phosphorylated PERK (p-PERK) and phosphorylated eukaryotic initiation factor 2alpha were increased in PBMCs from patients with SSNHL compared with healthy controls. ATF4 and CHOP expression were also significantly elevated. After treatment, the amount of ATF4 and CHOP proteins in PBMCs in the patients whose SSNHL improved was significantly reduced compared with the levels measured before treatment in all patients with SSNHL. The expression of the ATF4 and CHOP proteins in PBMCs in the unimproved group, however, was not significantly changed relative to pretreatment levels. CONCLUSIONS ERS may play a significant role in the pathogenesis of SSNHL, and the responsiveness of the condition to GC-mediated mitigation of ERS may be one of the key factors that affect patient prognosis.

Background To analyze the clinical efficacy of intratympanic steroid perfusion (ISP) and postauricular steroid injection (PSI) for refractory severe and profound sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL). Methods SSNHL patients who failed a conventional treatment with severe to profound hearing loss [pure tone average (PTA, 0.25–8 kHz) > 60 dB] were treated with ISP or PSI plus antioxidant and neurotrophin for 10 consecutive days. Antioxidant and neurotrophin were administrated either intravenously and/or orally. All patients were assigned into the ISP group or the PSI group and followed up for more than three months. The changes in PTA, effective rate and side effects were analyzed in the two groups. Results Similar hearing improvements and effective rates were observed in the two groups. However, a slightly better efficacy was observed in the PSI group compared to the ISP group. Patients with shorter intervals from onset to treatment had significantly more hearing improvements. The route of antioxidant and neurotrophin administration had no impact on treatment effects. Conclusion Both ISP and PSI could be used as salvage treatments for refractory SSNHL. These salvage treatments should be started as soon as possible once SSNHL patients fail a conventional treatment.

Cisplatin‑induced cytotoxicity, such as nephrotoxicity, neurotoxicity and ototoxicity, restricts the clinical application of this compound. Panax notoginseng Saponins (PNS) exhibit potent free radical scavenging and antioxidant activity. PNS have been demonstrated to reduce cisplatin‑induced nephrotoxicity and neurotoxicity. The present study investigated the ability of PNS to protect the auditory HEI‑OC1 cell line against ototoxicity induced by cisplatin. PNS induced activation of the AKT/nuclear factor erythroid 2‑related factor 2 (Nrf2) signaling pathway. Following pretreatment with PNS, HEI‑OC1 cells were treated with cisplatin and cultured for 24 h. The viability of HEI‑OC1 cells was examined using a Cell Counting Kit‑8 assay. Double staining analysis was used to measure cell apoptosis. The ability of PNS to reduce reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels was assessed by flow cytometry. The levels of phosphorylated (p)‑AKT, heme oxygenase 1 (HO‑1), NAD(P)H quinone dehydrogenase 1 (NQO1), glutamate‑cysteine ligase catalytic (GCLC) and Nrf2 were measured by western blotting. HEI‑OC1 cells that were pretreated with PNS exhibited significantly increased cell viability compared with that noted in cells treated only with cisplatin. In addition, PNS suppressed the induction of apoptosis and ROS production following cisplatin treatment. The upregulation of NQO1, HO‑1 and GCLC expression in PNS‑pretreated cells was associated with p‑AKT levels and the activation of Nrf2. These findings suggested that PNS protected auditory cells against ototoxicity induced by cisplatin by activating AKT/Nrf2 signaling. PNS may serve as a potential candidate in regulating cisplatin‑induced cytotoxicity.

This paper tests the pollution haven hypothesis by examining the relationship between environmental regulation and foreign investment with consideration of the role of corporate social responsibility, which has so far been neglected. Using multinationals’ investment data from China, our results in general support the pollution haven hypothesis that less stringent environmental regulation is more attractive for multinationals to invest in China, but high social responsibility can counteract attractiveness of weak environmental regulation.

Using firm-level data from a 2009 survey conducted in Suzhou city, Jiangsu province, this article examines the impact of technological capacity and value-chain position on a firm's product competitiveness. Technological capacity and product competitiveness are self-assessed relative to other firms and products in the same industry. Position on the value chain is measured relative to a firm's position as an original-brand manufacturer or not. Our empirical results show that competitiveness rises with a firm's technological capacity and its position on the global value chain. This finding is consistent with the theoretical prediction. The article also investigates the determinants of technological capacity and value-chain position, including the firm's size, research and development (R&D) spending, location dummies, educational level of technical and managerial personnel, wages of technical and managerial personnel, and enterprise ownership. Bootstrapping, probit, and linear probability regression models ar...

To study the expression of hyaluronan synthasel-3 (HAS1-3) in nasal polyps, and discuss their clinical significance.The expression of HA, HAS1, HAS2 and HAS3 in nasal polyps group (25 cases) and inferior turbinate group (15 cases) was detected by immunohistochemistry and semi-quantitative RT-PCR.Compared with the control, the expression of HA, HAS1 and HAS3 was higher in nasal polyps (P0. 05), while there was no significant difference in HAS2 expression (P0. 05).The increase of HASI and HAS3 expression may be the main cause of the excessive deposition of HA in nasal polyps, which may play an important role in the pathogenic process of nasal polyps, and become a potential target for therapy of nasal polyps.

We examine the effect of agency cost on the relation between top executives' overconfidence and investment-cash flow sensitivity using the data from Chinese listed companies. We find that on average top executives' overconfidence leads to increased investment-cash flow sensitivity. However, this relation holds only for companies with state-owned entities as controlling shareholders. In contrast, the relation is not significant for non-state controlled firms. We construct proxy for agency cost and find that state-controlled companies have significantly greater agency cost than non-state controlled companies. Results on sub-samples sorted by agency cost again show that the positive effect of top executives' overconfidence on investment-cash flow sensitivity holds only for companies that exhibit high agency cost. Our results therefore suggest that agency cost has a significant impact on the relation between top executives' overconfidence and investment-cash flow sensitivity, and the investment distortion due to top executives' overconfidence behavior may be alleviated by reducing agency cost through elevated supervision.

This paper examines how international openness influences China’s corporate environmental performance. A unique firm-level dataset is constructed by combining two databases: the Annual Industrial Survey and the China GreenWatch Program Rating System. The empirical results obtained from a series of ordered probit models indicate that openness has a positive relation to corporate environmental performance in China. However, the two main marketopening strategies in China, exporting and attracting foreign investment, have different effects on environmental performance. The results reveal that foreign investment plays a substantial and positive role that can support the environmental spillovers in China. However, the effect of exporting is insignificant. The environmental pressure from foreign customers to improve Chinese firms’ environmental performance presents a challenge. Our study indicates that China could make environmental quality improvements through increased international openness, as is likely the case for other developing countries.

Using a panel of China's enterprises from 1999 to 2007, this paper examined how market-oriented economic transition affects the productivity of China's enterprises given the various stages of enterprises in the commercialization process and given the market segmentation among Chinese different regions. The main findings are that: (i) enterprises with higher degrees of commercialization have relatively higher productivity, whereas enterprises with higher degrees of market segmentation have relatively lower productivity; (ii) the commercialization process and market segmentation act indirectly affect productivity through enterprises' capacity to export, innovate and obtain business loans; and (iii) the indirect effects are found to be significantly different between the commercialization process and market segmentation, highlighting the effects of the market-oriented economic transition on enterprises' productivity. This paper provides reliable enterprise-level evidence regarding the sources and evolution of enterprise productivity during different stages of market-oriented economic transition in China.

The gravity equation is usually employed by researchers in the field of international trade to explain the growth of a country's imports and exports volume, especially the manufactured goods. But in China, variables in the model, such as exchange rate, tariff, transportation cost, and spatial distance etc., are not sufficient to explain the riddle of China's growth in trade volume. In fact, this growth in China's trade volume is owing to the disintegration of production in the process of economic globalization, to the multinational corporations’ (MNC) vertical outsourcing of their manufacturing processes and procedures, and to the timely readjustment of Chinese enterprises on their strategies of participating in the international intra-product specialization. In this paper we establish an equilibrium model of intra-product specialization dominated by MNCs, and do some empirical tests on the growth in trade volume in China by using the variables including technological conditions of trade, similarity of economies, policy conditions of trade, disintegration of production and level of per capita capital equipment. The empirical results support our basic judgments.

This paper constructs a monopolistic competition trade model to describe the mechanism of import-induced export which is defined as expansion of consumer product export size caused by import of massive advanced machinery. This paper introduces the product quality preference into the monopolistic competition trade model, and finds with the improvement of product quality, foreign demand for domestic manufactured consumer product will rise. Import of eligible machinery can raise the short-term profit and export volume of domestic consumer product manufacturers, and also raise total export volume of domestic consumer product industry.JEL Classification: F14, D20, O50

Based on empirical evidence from enterprises in Jiangsu Province, this paper studies key influencing factors of their innovation activities at the micro level. Results show that a “threshold effect” and a reversed U-shaped relationship exist between an enterprise’s size and intensity of its innovation input when factors such as brand, entrepreneur background, HR, industrial and regional differences are controlled. Agglomeration effect is found influencing an enterprise’s innovation activities negatively rather than positively. A non-linear relationship is also found between an enterprise’s innovation activities and export ratio, showing a “capture effect”. A behavior mode of the effects of these influencing factors on innovation activities of China’s manufacturing enterprises is established and implications are provided.

This paper examines competitive issues related to environmental policies like the European Union directives on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment and Restriction on Hazardous Substances implemented in 2006. In order to examine strategic environmental choice implications related to these directives, a vertical market model developed by Stephen F. Hamilton in analyzing competitive choice amongst domestic and foreign, downstream and upstream companies in the presence of environmental constraints was adopted. The main conclusion is that industrial and environmental policies in developing countries should be refocused so as to realize the integration of the environmental cost by internalizing the externalities.

To study clinical efficacy of surgery after the DCF induction chemotherapy in T2-3 laryngeal carcinoma and hypopharyngeal carcinoma.To analyze clinical data about 102 cases of T2-3 laryngeal carcinoma and hypopharyngeal carcinoma retrospectively, 62 cases were divided into experimental group and 40 cases in control group, the experimental group completed three cycles of the DCF induction chemotherapy, then the efficacy was evaluated, surgery were carried out in the end, the control group received operation directly. In two groups, tumor response rates, toxicities, positive surgical margin rates and survival rate differences were observed and compared.Tumor response rate was 61.3% in experimental group, the laryngeal carcinoma rate was significantly lower than that in hypopharyngeal (44.4% VS 84.6%, P0.05). Compared to its control, there were no significant differences about the positive surgical margin rate, the median survival time, 3-year and 5-year survival rate of laryngeal carcinoma(P0.05). The foci edges of 0. 3 cm and 0. 5 cm positive margin rate of hypopharyngeal carcinoma in experimental group were significantly lower than in its control (P0.05), but among the 1 cm edge' positive rate, the median survival time, 3-year and 5-year survival rate no significant differences were found (P0.05). During induction chemotherapy in the experimental group, no serious adverse reactions were found.Induction chemotherapy of DCF regimen can not only narrow T2-3 laryngeal carcinoma and hypopharyngeal carcinoma' area, but also ensure an adequate safety margin.

Using firm-level data from a 2009 survey conducted in Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province, China, this paper examines impacts of technology capacity and value-chain position on firm’s product competitiveness. Both technology capacity and product competitiveness are self-assessed relative to other firms and products in the same industry. The position of value-chain is measured relative to if a firm is an original brand manufacturer or not. Our empirical results show that competitiveness rises with firm’s technology capacity and its position in the global value chain. This finding is consistent with the theoretical prediction. The paper also investigates determinants of technology capacity and value-chain position, including firm’s size, R&D spending, location dummies, education level of technical and management personnel, wages of technical and management personnel, and enterprise ownership. Bootstrapping, Probit, and linear probability regression models are employed.

This paper analyses the mechanism of how development of producer services improves the productivity of manufacturing through mathematical model. We argue that as an advanced input of manufacturing, producer services not only improve their own efficiency, but also reduce the unit producer cost of manufacturing, thus, enhance the manufacturing's competence. The empirical analysis which is based on the panel data of regions from 1998 to 2004 and industries from 1993 to 2003 supports our conclusion. Our findings are as follows: 1 The expansion of producer services promotes the productivity of manufacturing. 2 The impact of transportations, storages, posts and telecommunications on labour intensive industry is the most distinct. 3 The productivity enhancement of capital intensive industry is affected by the development of finance to a large extent. 4 Scientific research has lagged impacts on manufacturing industry, with negative correlation to manufacturing's productivity in the same year, but positive correlation to that of next year. It affects tech-intensive industry most.