The risk of venous thromboembolism and blood hyperlactatemia is associated with increased mortality among critically ill patients with Covid-19.

INTRODUCTION: Coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) following venous thromboembolism (VTE) and blood hyperlactatemia are associated with higher mortality. However, reliable biomarkers for this association remain to be elucidated. This study investigated the associations of VTE risk and blood hyperlactatemia with mortality among critically ill Covid-19 patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU). METHODS: In this single-centre retrospective study, we included 171 patients aged ≥18 years with confirmed Covid-19 admitted to the ICU at a tertiary healthcare clinic in the Eastern region of Saudi Arabia between 1 March 2020 and 31 January 2021. Patients were divided into two groups: survivor and non-survivor. The survivors have been identified as the patients discharged from the ICU alive. The VTE risk was defined using a Padua prediction score (PPS) >4. The blood lactate concentration (BLC) cut-off value >2 mmol/L was used to determine the blood hyperlactatemia. RESULTS: Multi-factor Cox analysis showed that PPS >4 and BLC >2 mmol/L were more likely to be significantly associated with higher odds of ICU mortality in critically ill Covid-19 patients (hazard ratio [HR] = 2.80, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.00-8.08, p = 0.050; HR = 3.87, 95% CI = 1.12-13.45, p = 0.033, respectively). The Area under the Curve for VTE and blood hyperlactatemia were 0.62 and 0.85, respectively. CONCLUSION: VTE risk and blood hyperlactatemia have been associated with a higher mortality risk in critically ill Covid-19 patients who are hospitalized in the ICU in Saudi Arabia. According to our findings, these people needed more effective VTE prevention strategies based on a personalized assessment of their risk of bleeding. Moreover, persons without diabetes and other groups with a high risk of dying from COVID-19 may be recognized by measuring glucose as having elevated glucose and lactate jointly.

A meta-ethnography investigating relational influences on mental health and cancer-related health care interventions for racially minoritised people in the UK.

OBJECTIVE: Despite calls to increase the 'cultural competence' of health care providers, racially minoritised people continue to experience a range of problems when it comes to health care, including discrimination. While relevant qualitative meta-syntheses have suggested better ways forward for health care for racialised minorities, many have lacked conceptual depth, and none have specifically investigated the relational dimensions involved in care. We set out to investigate the social and cultural influences on health care interventions, focusing on psychological approaches and/or cancer care to inform the trial of a new psychological therapy for those living with or beyond cancer. METHOD: A meta-ethnography approach was used to examine the relevant qualitative studies, following Noblit and Hare, and guided by patient involvement throughout. Papers were analysed between September 2018 and February 2023, with some interruptions caused by the Covid pandemic. The following databases were searched: Ovid MEDLINE, EBSCO CINAHL, Ovid Embase, EBSCO PsycINFO, Proquest Sociology Collection (including Applied Social Sciences Index & Abstracts (ASSIA), Sociological Abstracts and Sociology Database), EBSCO SocINDEX, Ovid AMED, and Web of Science. The systematic review protocol was registered with the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO) (ID: CRD42018107695), and reporting follows the eMERGe Reporting Guidance for meta-ethnographies (France et al. 2019). RESULTS: Twenty-nine journal papers were included in the final review. Themes (third-order constructs) developed in the paper include the centrality of the patient-practitioner relationship; how participants give meaning to their illness in connection to others; how families (rather than individuals) may make health decisions; how links with a higher power and spiritual/religious others can play a role in coping; and the ways in which a hierarchy of help-seeking develops, frequently with the first port of call being the resources of oneself. Participants in studies had a need to avoid being 'othered' in their care, valuing practitioners that connected with them, and who were able to recognise them as whole and complex (sometimes described in relational languages like 'love'). Complex family-based health decision-making and/or the importance of relations with non-human interactants (e.g. God, spiritual beings) were frequently uncovered, not to mention the profoundly emergent nature of stigma, whereby families could be relatively safe havens for containing and dealing with health challenges. A conceptual framework of 'animated via (frequently hidden) affective relationality' emerged in the final synthesis, bringing all themes together, and drawing attention to the emergent nature of the salient issues facing minoritised patients in health care interactions. CONCLUSION: Our analysis is important because it sheds light on the hitherto buried relational forces animating and producing the specific issues facing racially minoritised patients, which study participants thought were largely overlooked, but to which professionals can readily relate (given the universal nature of human relations). Thus, training around the affective relationality of consultations could be a fruitful avenue to explore to improve care of diverse patients.

Molecular Understanding of ACE-2 and HLA-Conferred Differential Susceptibility to COVID-19: Host-Directed Insights Opening New Windows in COVID-19 Therapeutics.

The genetic variants of HLAs (human leukocyte antigens) play a crucial role in the virus-host interaction and pathology of COVID-19. The genetic variants of HLAs not only influence T cell immune responses but also B cell immune responses by presenting a variety of peptide fragments of invading pathogens. Peptide cocktail vaccines produced by using various conserved HLA-A2 epitopes provoke substantial specific CD8+ T cell responses in experimental animals. The HLA profiles vary among individuals and trigger different T cell-mediated immune responses in COVID-19 infections. Those with HLA-C*01 and HLA-B*44 are highly susceptible to the disease. However, HLA-A*02:01, HLA-DR*03:01, and HLA-Cw*15:02 alleles show resistance to SARS infection. Understanding the genetic association of HLA with COVID-19 susceptibility and severity is important because it can help in studying the transmission of COVID-19 and its physiopathogenesis. The HLA-C*01 and B*44 allele pathways can be studied to gain insight into disease transmission and physiopathogenesis. Therefore, integrating HLA testing is suggested in the ongoing pandemic, which will help in the rapid identification of highly susceptible populations worldwide and possibly acclimate vaccine development. Therefore, understanding the correlation between HLA and SARS-CoV-2 is critical in opening new insights into COVID-19 therapeutics, based on previous studies conducted.

An Updated and Focused Review on Heterocyclic Inhibitors for SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 3CLpro.

BACKGROUND: SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 are extremely infective and frequently cause severe respiratory issues (acute respiratory syndrome). These emerging viruses represent huge challenges to worldwide health. Reliable and systematic examination of SARS-CoV and COVID-19 will assist in identifying infectious persons accurately. Based on the biological, chemical, and genetic link of SARS CoV-2 towards SARS-CoV, the recurrence of different anti-SARS-CoV natural drug molecules may be beneficial in the advancement of anti COVID-19 herbal drug molecules. Here, we reviewed published literature on SAR, and molecular docking study of previously synthesized derivatives, which targeted SARS-CoV along with future prospects on SARS-CoV-2 have been reviewed. This study would assist researchers in developing newer/novel potential molecules that would target SAR-CoV-2. OBJECTIVES: The review highlights the inhibition potential of heterocyclic inhibitors for SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2. The structure-activity relationship of potential compounds has been discussed. EVIDENCE ACQUISITION: We carried out a thorough literature assessment employing electronic databases for scientific articles highlighting potential heterocyclic inhibitors for SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2, published from 2010 to 2021. We recovered 415 articles, but only 220 were involved and conversed in this manuscript. The article apprehended appropriate research considering three areas: 1) SAR activity, 2) Molecular docking, and 3) Biological activity and future prospects on SARS-CoV-2. METHODS: The potential compounds with good inhibition are discussed, and their inhibition is expressed in terms of IC50. RESULTS: Heterocyclic scaffolds reflected an extensive range of therapeutic activity and may act as an initiating idea for designing and discovering potential inhibitors for SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 treatment. CONCLUSION: The points highlighted here may prove to be a vital tool for medicinal chemists working/investigating more potent and efficacious scaffolds in treating SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2.

Investigation of the interactions of HSA and SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease against eugenol for novel COVID-19 drug discovery: spectroscopic and insilico study.

Coronavirus family consist of a member known as SARS-CoV-2, spread drastically in 2019 (Covid-19), affecting millions of people worldwide. Till date there is no clear-clinical therapy or drug, targeted to cure this serious disease. Researches are going on to prevent this corona virus. Here, we tried to explore a novel SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease as a potential inhibitor. Finally, eugenol was docked with this protease to find prime SARS-inhibitors. In silico studies revealed that eugenol binds to the active site of SARS-CoV-2 papain-like protease with appropriate binding. Moreover, the MD simulation for 100 ns and MMPBSA calculation reveals that eugenol possess potential phytotherapeutic properties against COVID-19. The interaction of eugenol with human serum albumin has been examined by using fluorescence, UV-vis spectroscopy, circular dichroism as well as computational techniques such as molecular docking, molecular dynamic simulation and MMPBSA calculation. Overall investigation shows eugenol having good affinity for HSA Ka 6.80 × 106 M-1.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.

Death Be Not Proud: A Commentary on Muslim Acceptance of Death in the Intensive Care Unit.

Technologies used in medicine have meant that treatments can keep people biologically alive but often fail to provide meaningful recovery and quality of life. Many of those from the Islamic faith have relied on these technologies for recovery on religious grounds, even when it may be against clinical advice. This commentary seeks to challenge this notion among many Muslims and suggests there is a psycho-spiritual motivation within the Islamic tradition in not pursuing intensive care treatment that is deemed futile by clinicians. A wish to embrace death in these situations should be expressed to loved ones, and the dying person's loved ones should be encouraged to embrace death, in order to minimise harm from disagreements between clinical staff and family.

Effect of increased screen time on eyes during COVID-19 pandemic.

Purpose: The objective of the study was to assess the effect of increased screen time on ocular health during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) crisis. Materials and Method: An online pretested, self-reported questionnaire with relevant details was generated through Google form and sent to participants. Chi-square or Fisher's exact test was used to investigate the associations between the qualitative variables. The associated risk factors of number and frequency of ocular health problems were analysed by univariate and multivariate logistic regression. Result: A total of 435 responses were considered where 48.5% (N = 211) were female participants and 51.5% (N = 224) were male. Average age of the participants was 35 years. 89% of the participants reported an increase in the screen time during the during the lockdown period. Younger age group reported to have greater screen time than the older participants (p = 0.001) and hence experienced more symptoms of digital eye strain (DES) (p = 0.003). The most common symptoms associated with digital eye strain in our study were eyestrain 52.8% (N = 230) and headache 31.3% (N = 136). In total, 81.37% (354/435) of participants had experienced at least one symptom related to digital screen usage. Conclusion: DES is non-vision-threatening but discomfort caused due to it can have implications on overall physical, mental, and social well-being. The study highlights the increase in digital screen time during the pandemic and the resultant eye strain. There is need of spreading awareness regarding the adverse effects of digital device use and the preventive measures to safeguard our ocular health.

Environment and Health: Need to Rebuild and Maintain Balance

Adaptation is one of the most important virtues for the survival of any organism, including humans. During the past few decades, the issue of climate change has been considered one of the most significant problems faced by humanity and has been debated extensively. The surge of pandemic COVID-19 affected virtually every aspect of our life, including the world economy, education, development, etc. to an apparent standstill. It took the life of our near and dear and left several with irreversible damage. COVID-19 reminds us of lessons about responding to climate change and behavioral responses to global challenges. The re-emergence and increasing burden of human Monkeypox cases are also getting global attention. Every disease has its remedy;we just have to decode it. If we want to reverse the degradation of our environment, we must take some difficult actions and modify our habits and behaviors. The required personal changes are at times difficult and sometimes manageable and straightforward. Through proper environmental health engineering, we must concentrate on a different level of prevention. When the environments where we live, work, and play are safe and free of risks that might harm people's health, we are said to be living in good environmental health.

The Rv3874-Rv3875 chimeric protein shows a promiscuous serodiagnostic potential for tuberculosis.

Tuberculosis (TB) stays a major cause of death globally after COVID-19 and HIV. An early diagnosis to control TB effectively, needs a fast reliable diagnostic method with high sensitivity. Serodiagnosis involving polyclonal antibodies detection against an antigen of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) in serum samples can be instrumental. In our study, Rv3874 and Rv3875 antigens were cloned, expressed, and purified individually and as a chimeric construct in Escherichia coli BL21. Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA) based findings revealed that the Rv3874-Rv3875 chimeric construct was two-fold more sensitive (59.7%) than the individual sensitivities of Rv3874 (28.4%) and Rv3875 (24.9%) for 201 serum TB positive samples. Furthermore, the fusion construct was a little more sensitive (60.4%) for male subjects than that for females (58.8%). Lastly, our preliminary findings, molecular insights of secondary structure, and statistical and in silico analysis of each construct also advocate that CEP can be considered a better immunodiagnostic tool in addition to previously reported EC skin test.

Does money buy health? evaluation of stock market performance and economic growth in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The novel coronavirus pandemic of 2019 (COVID-19) has significantly harmed numerous social and economic activities worldwide, drawing researchers and governments' attention to the problem and tackling it via persistent healthcare measures. The study's primary purpose is to examine the effects of total coronavirus cases, total fatalities, total recovered cases, unemployment, and trade openness on stock prices and economic growth in the world's top 39 affected nations. An analysis of the coronavirus outbreaks found that wealthier countries had a well-established healthcare infrastructure, but they were disproportionately affected by the virus. Conversely, the less wealthy nations had inadequate healthcare infrastructures, but they were not as affected as the wealthier countries. Is it possible to buy health with money? That was the question at the heart of the study's money-and-health curve. The robust least square regression results indicate that an increase in coronavirus cases influences economic growth and stock market performance due to massive healthcare funding distributed globally, sustaining economic and financial activities for a shorter period. However, a continuous increase in coronavirus fatalities depresses the stock market, resulting in financial depression worldwide. Additionally, a rise in overall coronavirus recovered cases has a negative effect on the country's economic development and stock market performance because of greater uncertainty in economic and financial activities. Case fatality ratios influence economic growth, whereas case recovery ratios decrease economic and financial performance due to greater healthcare concerns across countries. Finally, trade openness is critical in sustaining the country's economic development and stock market performance in the wake of the COVID-19 epidemic.

The psychological mechanism linking life satisfaction and turnover intention among healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BACKGROUND: COVID-19 challenged and brought turmoil to the healthcare workers' mental and psychological well-being. Specifically, they are feeling tremendous pressure and many of them worry about their work conditions and even intent to leave them. In this situation, it is of utmost for them to satisfied their lives during the challenging situation. OBJECTIVE: This paper explores the relationship of life satisfaction with healthcare workers' turnover intention during the COVID-19 pandemic. It was hypothesized that this relationship would be mediated by trust climate, and this mediation association would be stronger when workers experience job embeddedness in the workplace. METHODS: Survey data were collected from the 520 healthcare workers. A moderated mediation examination was employed to test the hypotheses. RESULTS: Results revealed that life satisfaction is positively related to a trusting climate that, in turn, is negatively related to workers' turnover intention. Moreover, the association between life satisfaction and turnover intention was moderated by job embeddedness. CONCLUSIONS: Focusing on improving healthcare workers' job embeddedness and increasing their trust climate might enhance life satisfaction and reduce turnover intention. The implications of the findings are also discussed for research and practice.

Global User-Level Perception of COVID-19 Contact Tracing Applications: Data-Driven Approach Using Natural Language Processing.

BACKGROUND: Contact tracing has been globally adopted in the fight to control the infection rate of COVID-19. To this aim, several mobile apps have been developed. However, there are ever-growing concerns over the working mechanism and performance of these applications. The literature already provides some interesting exploratory studies on the community's response to the applications by analyzing information from different sources, such as news and users' reviews of the applications. However, to the best of our knowledge, there is no existing solution that automatically analyzes users' reviews and extracts the evoked sentiments. We believe such solutions combined with a user-friendly interface can be used as a rapid surveillance tool to monitor how effective an application is and to make immediate changes without going through an intense participatory design method. OBJECTIVE: In this paper, we aim to analyze the efficacy of AI and NLP techniques for automatically extracting and classifying the polarity of users' sentiments by proposing a sentiment analysis framework to automatically analyze users' reviews on COVID-19 contact tracing mobile apps. We also aim to provide a large-scale annotated benchmark data set to facilitate future research in the domain. As a proof of concept, we also developed a web application based on the proposed solutions, which is expected to help the community quickly analyze the potential of an application in the domain. METHODS: We propose a pipeline starting from manual annotation via a crowd-sourcing study and concluding with the development and training of artificial intelligence (AI) models for automatic sentiment analysis of users' reviews. In detail, we collected and annotated a large-scale data set of user reviews on COVID-19 contact tracing applications. We used both classical and deep learning methods for classification experiments. RESULTS: We used 8 different methods on 3 different tasks, achieving up to an average F1 score of 94.8%, indicating the feasibility of the proposed solution. The crowd-sourcing activity resulted in a large-scale benchmark data set composed of 34,534 manually annotated reviews. CONCLUSIONS: The existing literature mostly relies on the manual or exploratory analysis of users' reviews on applications, which is tedious and time-consuming. In existing studies, generally, data from fewer applications are analyzed. In this work, we showed that AI and natural language processing techniques provide good results for analyzing and classifying users' sentiments' polarity and that automatic sentiment analysis can help to analyze users' responses more accurately and quickly. We also provided a large-scale benchmark data set. We believe the presented analysis, data set, and proposed solutions combined with a user-friendly interface can be used as a rapid surveillance tool to analyze and monitor mobile apps deployed in emergency situations leading to rapid changes in the applications without going through an intense participatory design method.

Attitude, perceptions and willingness to receive COVID-19 vaccine and its associated factors among general population of Uttar Pradesh, Northern India.

Background: Several vaccines have been developed and tested against COVID-19 around the globe. Vaccine hesitancy and misinformation poses major challenges to the achievement of coverage and population immunity. Understanding key determinants that influence the preferences and demands of a COVID-19 vaccine by the community may help to develop strategies for improving coverage. Objectives: To assess willingness to receive coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccine and identify the factors associated with it among the general population of Uttar Pradesh, North India. Material and methods: A web-based cross sectional study was conducted in the month of May 2021 among the unvaccinated general adult population of Uttar Pradesh, Northern India adopting an exponential, non-discriminative snowball sampling technique. A bilingual, self-administered anonymous semi-structured questionnaire in google form was designed and sent to the study participants through social media platform, WhatsApp. Data collected were extracted into excel sheets and was analyzed using SPSS software, version 21.0. Bivariate analysis was performed to identify the key determinants for vaccine acceptance among the participants. Result: Out of 254 participants completing the questionnaire, 219 (86.2%) showed willingness to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, whereas 10 (4.0%) admitted hesitancy and 25 (9.8%) were not sure. Younger age-group (18-44 years), female gender, absence of any co-morbidity, lower education level, current employment status, positive history of confirmed COVID-19 infection in the person and positive history of confirmed COVID-19 infection in any family member/friend were the factors found to be significantly associated with the willingness to receive a COVID-19 vaccine. Conclusion: During the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic in India, high acceptance for COVID-19 vaccination was found among the general population of Uttar Pradesh, whereas concerns about vaccine safety may hinder the actual vaccine uptake.

Embedded Coded Relay System for Molecular Communications

With the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) has urged scientists and industrialists to explore modern information and communication technology (ICT) as a means to reduce or even eliminate it. The World Health Organization recently reported that the virus may infect the organism through any organ in the living body, such as the respiratory, the immunity, the nervous, the digestive, or the cardiovascular system. Targeting the abovementioned goal, we envision an implanted nanosystem embedded in the intra living-body network. The main function of the nanosystem is either to perform diagnosis and mitigation of infectious diseases or to implement a targeted drug delivery system (i.e., delivery of the therapeutic drug to the diseased tissue or targeted cell). The communication among the nanomachines is accomplished via communication-based molecular diffusion. The control/interconnection of the nanosystem is accomplished through the utilization of Internet of bio-nano things (IoBNT). The proposed nanosystem is designed to employ a coded relay nanomachine disciplined by the decode and forward (DF) principle to ensure reliable drug delivery to the targeted cell. Notably, both the sensitivity of the drug dose and the phenomenon of drug molecules loss before delivery to the target cell site in long-distance due to the molecules diffusion process are taken into account. In this paper, a coded relay NM with conventional coding techniques such as RS and Turbo codes is selected to achieve minimum bit error rate (BER) performance and high signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), while the detection process is based on maximum likelihood (ML) probability and minimum error probability (MEP). The performance analysis of the proposed scheme is evaluated in terms of channel capacity and bit error rate by varying system parameters such as relay position, number of released molecules, relay and receiver size. Analysis results are validated through simulation and demonstrate that the proposed scheme can significantly improve delivery performance of the desirable drugs in the molecular communication system.

Ramatroban for chemoprophylaxis and treatment of COVID-19: David takes on Goliath.

INTRODUCTION: In COVID-19 pneumonia, there is a massive increase in fatty acid levels and lipid mediators with a predominance of cyclooxygenase metabolites, notably TxB2 ≫ PGE2 > PGD2 in the lungs, and 11-dehydro-TxB2, a TxA2 metabolite, in the systemic circulation. While TxA2 stimulates thromboxane prostanoid (TP) receptors, 11-dehydro-TxB2 is a full agonist of DP2 (formerly known as the CRTh2) receptors for PGD2. Anecdotal experience of using ramatroban, a dual receptor antagonist of the TxA2/TP and PGD2/DP2 receptors, demonstrated rapid symptomatic relief from acute respiratory distress and hypoxemia while avoiding hospitalization. AREAS COVERED: Evidence supporting the role of TxA2/TP receptors and PGD2/DP2 receptors in causing rapidly progressive lung injury associated with hypoxemia, a maladaptive immune response and thromboinflammation is discussed. An innovative perspective on the dual antagonism of TxA2/TP and PGD2/DP2 receptor signaling as a therapeutic approach in COVID-19 is presented. This paper examines ramatroban an anti-platelet, immunomodulator, and antifibrotic agent for acute and long-haul COVID-19. EXPERT OPINION: Ramatroban, a dual blocker of TP and DP2 receptors, has demonstrated efficacy in animal models of respiratory dysfunction, atherosclerosis, thrombosis, and sepsis, as well as preliminary evidence for rapid relief from dyspnea and hypoxemia in COVID-19 pneumonia. Ramatroban merits investigation as a promising antithrombotic and immunomodulatory agent for chemoprophylaxis and treatment.

Recent progress in the development of potential drugs against SARS-CoV-2.

SARS-CoV-2, a newly emerged and highly pathogenic coronavirus, is identified as the causal agent of Coronavirus Disease (2019) (COVID-19) in the late December 2019, in China. The virus has rapidly spread nationwide and spilled over to the other countries around the globe, resulting in more than 120 million infections and 2.6 million deaths until the time of this review. Unfortunately, there are still no specific drugs available against this disease, and it is very necessary to call upon more scientists to work together to stop a further spread. Hence, the recent progress in the development of drugs may help scientific community quickly understand current research status and further develop new effective drugs. Herein, we summarize the cellular entry and replication process of this virus and discuss the recent development of potential viral based drugs that target bio-macromolecules in different stages of the viral life cycle, especially S protein, 3CLPro, PLPro, RdRp and helicase.

Graphene-based nanomaterials as antimicrobial surface coatings: A parallel approach to restrain the expansion of COVID-19.

The recently emerged severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has become a significant and topmost global health challenge of today. SARS-CoV-2 can propagate through several direct or indirect means resulting in its exponential spread in short times. Consequently, finding new research based real-world and feasible solutions to interrupt the spread of pathogenic microorganisms is indispensable. It has been established that this virus can survive on a variety of available surfaces ranging from a few hours to a few days, which has increased the risk of COVID-19 spread to large populations. Currently, available surface disinfectant chemicals provide only a temporary solution and are not recommended to be used in the long run due to their toxicity and irritation. Apart from the urgent development of vaccine and antiviral drugs, there is also a need to design and develop surface disinfectant antiviral coatings for long-term applications even for new variants. The unique physicochemical properties of graphene-based nanomaterials (GBNs) have been widely investigated for antimicrobial applications. However, the research work for their use in antimicrobial surface coatings is minimal. This perspective enlightens the scope of using GBNs as antimicrobial/antiviral surface coatings to reduce the spread of transmittable microorganisms, precisely, SARS-CoV-2. This study attempts to demonstrate the synergistic effect of GBNs and metallic nanoparticles (MNPs), for their potential antiviral applications in the development of surface disinfectant coatings. Some proposed mechanisms for the antiviral activity of the graphene family against SARS-CoV-2 has also been explained. It is anticipated that this study will potentially lead to new insights and future trends to develop a framework for further investigation on this research area of pivotal importance to minimize the transmission of current and any future viral outbreaks.

Does market concentration affect wholesale electricity prices? An analysis of the Indian electricity sector in the COVID-19 pandemic context

This study explores whether the market concentration affects the wholesale prices of electricity generation among Indian companies by drawing 15-min frequency data related to electricity production, wholesale prices, and electricity demand in August 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. The ARDL model estimates show a positive relationship between market concentration and wholesale energy prices. The study recommends the adoption of policies to reduce market concentration and enhance clean energy development.