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The effects of government subsidies to corporate R&D on firms' innovation outputs still remain inconclusive in existing studies. Moreover, little is known how the screening system of the public R&D programs influences the effect of such programs. This study examines the effects of Innofund (one of the largest Chinese government programs supporting corporate R&D activities) on firms' innovation outputs in China. In particular, the project screening mechanism was changed due to policy amendments in 2005. This exogenous policy shock allows us to estimate how the project screening system affects the influence of public R&D subsidies. Based on a panel dataset of Chinese manufacturing firms, we find Innofund-backed firms outperform their non-Innofund-backed counterparts in innovation, measured by the number of patents, new product sales, and the volume of exports after they gained funding. The magnification effects of Innofund are larger after 2005, when the project-screening scheme became more decentralized indicating that decentralized screening functions better in public R&D investment. Finally, the effects of Innofund and the effects of the decentralized screening system that occurred in 2005 vary substantially across markets. The more economically and institutionally developed the market is, the stronger the Innofund effects and the project selection decentralization effects appear. The identification problems are handled by using the propensity score matching approach and the instrumental variable approach. ; postprint

The sweeping change in political economy associated with the spectacular growth of the private sector in China is not much studied in economics literature. This paper fills in this gap. The central subject of this paper is the political economy nature of the Chinese private sector and of the CPC. Empirically, we examine the dynamics of rent creation from the party membership and other political connections when the regime is changed from anti-capitalistic to pro-capitalistic. Endogeneity problems are addressed. We identify the causality of rents and private entrepreneurs' political connections, and explore the implications of these political elites' rents for social welfare in terms of productivity. ; postprint

The sweeping change in political economy associated with the rapid growth of the private sector in China is rarely studied empirically in the economics literature. Using four cross-sectional surveys of private firms between 1995 and 2010, we examine the dynamics of rent creation from Party membership and other political connections when the regime changed from anti-capitalistic to pro-capitalistic during the period 2002–2004. We find that entrepreneurs with political connection enjoyed significantly more rents only after the constitutional amendments. This finding sheds lights on the nature of the political economy of today's Chinese economy. Endogeneity/causality problems are addressed. ; preprint

In China, with accelerating growth of agriculture economy structure and rapid development of farming mechanization, the intensity and scale of grain planting has increased considerably. However, the drying of freshly harvested grain is a big problem needing to be resolved. In-store drying technology has good ability for large scale drying. Low energy consumption and successful application of this technology in Australia and America has attracted much attention by the Chinese government. Therefore, study of instore drying started in China from the cooperative study of 'In-store drying of paddy in China' with Australia in 1997. This paper will introduce the main projects of in-store drying in China since 1997, different periods of the technology development, key problems solved, major achievements and the drying technology distribution within China. After about 13 years development, in-store drying of paddy in China includes technology and related equipment specifically for China, such as technology and equipment for mobile ventilation, mold prevention with ozone, heaters for drying grain moisture, and computerized cooling systems. The initial moisture content of paddy allowed for in-store drying increased from 16% to 25%, the bulk allowable depth of paddy increased from 1.8 m to 6 m, and was competitive with paddy drying throughout the world. The main tasks to advance in-store drying in China in the future will be integration of two stage drying technology for paddy and development of relevant equipment, wireless control ventilation technology and development of relevant equipment, study and application of in-store drying technology in new varieties such as wheat and rapeseed. Keywords: China, In-store drying, Paddy, Moisture content

Metal halide perovskites are generating enormous excitement for use in solar cells and light-emission applications, but devices still show substantial non-radiative losses. Here, we show that by combining light and atmospheric treatments, we can increase the internal luminescence quantum efficiencies of polycrystalline perovskite films from 1% to 89%, with carrier lifetimes of 32 μs and diffusion lengths of 77 μm, comparable with perovskite single crystals. Remarkably, the surface recombination velocity of holes in the treated films is 0.4 cm/s, approaching the values for fully passivated crystalline silicon, which has the lowest values for any semiconductor to date. The enhancements translate to solar cell power-conversion efficiencies of 19.2%, with a near-instant rise to stabilized power output, consistent with suppression of ion migration. We propose a mechanism in which light creates superoxide species from oxygen that remove shallow surface states. The work reveals an industrially scalable post-treatment capable of producing state-of-the-art semiconducting films. ; S.D.S. has received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Program (Marie Curie Actions) under REA grant number PIOF-GA-2013-622630. This work made use of the Shared Experimental Facilities supported in part by the MRSEC Program of the National Science Foundation (NSF) under award number MDR – 1419807. R.B. acknowledges support from the MIT Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP). A.O. acknowledges support from the NSF under grant no. 1605406 (EP/L000202). D.G. acknowledges the China Scholarship Council for funding, file no. 201504910812. The authors acknowledge funding from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) under EP/P02484X/1 and the Programme Grant EP/M005143/1. M.S.I. and C.E. acknowledge support from the EPSRC Program grant on Energy Materials (EP/KO16288) and the Archer HPC/MCC Consortium (EP/L000202). E.M.H. gratefully acknowledges the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) Echo number 712.014.007 for funding. The work was also partially supported by Eni S.p.A. via the Eni-MIT Solar Frontiers Center. The authors thank Mengfei Wu and Marc Baldo for access to an integrating sphere, Jay Patel and Michael Johnston for EQE verifications, and Eli Yablonovitch and Luis Pazos-Outón for helpful discussion.