Platform Behavior under Market Shocks: A Simulation Framework and Reinforcement-Learning Based Study

We study the behavior of an economic platform (e.g., Amazon, Uber Eats, Instacart) under shocks, such as COVID-19 lockdowns, and the effect of different regulation considerations. To this end, we develop a multi-agent simulation environment of a platform economy in a multi-period setting where shocks may occur and disrupt the economy. Buyers and sellers are heterogeneous and modeled as economically-motivated agents, choosing whether or not to pay fees to access the platform. We use deep reinforcement learning to model the fee-setting and matching behavior of the platform, and consider two major types of regulation frameworks: (1) taxation policies and (2) platform fee restrictions. We offer a number of simulated experiments that cover different market settings and shed light on regulatory tradeoffs. Our results show that while many interventions are ineffective with a sophisticated platform actor, we identify a particular kind of regulation - fixing fees to the optimal, no-shock fees while still allowing a platform to choose how to match buyers and sellers - as holding promise for promoting the efficiency and resilience of the economic system. © 2023 ACM.

Engineered self-healing single-cavity microcapsules for pulsatile release of drug delivery

A wide range of polymer-based drug delivery systems have been reported for the treatment of various diseases. However, the dosing regimen of many drugs, such as stimulator of interferon genes agonists, programmed cell death protein-1 antibodies, and coronavirus disease 2019 vaccines, consists of repeated intratumoral or intramuscular injections. These repeated administrations may lead to poor adherence, thus resulting in compromised therapeutic outcomes and increased financial burden. Here, we devel-oped a multidose drug delivery platform by engineering polylactic-co-glycolic acid (PLGA) with different molecular weights into self-healing single-cavity microcapsules (SSM). This approach showed a flexible collocation strategy to achieve customized pulsatile drug release and was fully degradable with good safety. Notably, this single-injection delivery system contains only PLGA, holding great promise for clinical translation.(c) 2022 Chinese Society of Particuology and Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

Lipid coating technology: A potential solution to address the problem of sticky containers and vanishing drugs

Pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines require the use of material containers for protection, storage, and transportation. Glass and plastic materials are widely used for packaging, and a longstanding challenge in the field is the nonspecific adsorption of pharmaceutical drugs to container walls – the so-called "sticky containers, vanishing drugs” problem – that effectively reduces the active drug concentration and can cause drug denaturation. This challenge has been frequently discussed in the case of the anticancer drug, paclitaxel, and the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has brought renewed attention to this material science challenge in light of the need to scale up COVID-19 vaccine production and to secure sufficient quantities of packaging containers. To reduce nonspecific adsorption on inner container walls, various strategies based on siliconization and thin polymer films have been explored, while it would be advantageous to develop mass-manufacturable, natural material solutions, especially ones involving pharmaceutical grade excipients. Inspired by how lipid nanoparticles have revolutionized the vaccine field, in this perspective, we discuss the prospects for developing lipid bilayer coatings to prevent nonspecific adsorption of pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines and how recent advances in lipid bilayer coating fabrication technologies are poised to accelerate progress in the field. We critically discuss recent examples of how lipid bilayer coatings can prevent nonspecific sticking of proteins and vaccines to relevant material surfaces and examine future translational prospects. © 2021 The Authors. VIEW published by Shanghai Fuji Technology Consulting Co., Ltd, authorized by Professional Community of Experimental Medicine, National Association of Health Industry and Enterprise Management (PCEM) and John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd.

An Exploration of Learning Satisfaction and Problems on Synchronous Online Teaching Mode in an English Comprehensive Reading Course During the COVID-19 Epidemic Period

In order to explore the learning satisfaction and problems of the synchronous online teaching mode in an English comprehensive reading course during the COVID-19 epidemic period, this study constructed a synchronous online teaching mode based on the theory of community of inquiry and practiced it for one semester. The participants were 60 second-year English education majors, and the research methods were surveys and interviews. The study found that most students were satisfied with the synchronous online teaching mode adopted in this course;the synchronous online teaching mode helped improve learning outcomes;there were problems of distraction and lack of sustained attention in the synchronous online teaching mode. Based on the findings, suggestions were put forward to improve the learning satisfaction of online teaching, in order to provide references for enhancing the quality of foreign language online teaching and blended teaching in the post-epidemic era. © 2023 FLTRP, Walter de Gruyter, Cultural and Education Section British Embassy.

Effective recruitment strategies utilized in the midst of a COVID-19 pandemic to examine dietary practices and colorectal cancer screening practices of Blacks in New York City

African Americans have the highest colorectal cancer incidence and mortality rates of all racial groups in the U.S. Factors that may be contributing to these high rates, however, remain poorly understood. Specifically, this study assessed the relationship between dietary habits and colorectal cancer screening behavior and intent among individuals who identify as Black, with their ethnicity as African-American, Caribbean, and African. There are many factors that influence dietary habits, and a salient factor is culture. Many studies have experienced challenges recruiting in communities of color for various reasons. The purpose of this presentation is to describe recruitment methods utilized for this study in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, and to discuss challenges, strategies that were implemented and lessons learned that can inform and improve future recruitment efforts. Effective recruitment strategies included partnership, consistent engagement, and meeting people in places where they frequent and felt comfortable. Utilizing faith-based locations, barbershops, hair salons, and pivotal community locations allowed individuals to trust the researchers, and also eliminated the need to retain study subjects over a period of time, due to on-site data collection. Though our findings are limited to Black families in predominantly minority neighborhoods, we have identified Cicely successful strategies for this specific high-risk population and potentially similar others.

Engineered self-healing single-cavity microcapsules for pulsatile release of drug delivery

A wide range of polymer-based drug delivery systems have been reported for the treatment of various diseases. However, the dosing regimen of many drugs, such as stimulator of interferon genes agonists, programmed cell death protein-1 antibodies, and coronavirus disease 2019 vaccines, consists of repeated intratumoral or intramuscular injections. These repeated administrations may lead to poor adherence, thus resulting in compromised therapeutic outcomes and increased financial burden. Here, we developed a multidose drug delivery platform by engineering polylactic-co-glycolic acid (PLGA) with different molecular weights into self-healing single-cavity microcapsules (SSM). This approach showed a flexible collocation strategy to achieve customized pulsatile drug release and was fully degradable with good safety. Notably, this single-injection delivery system contains only PLGA, holding great promise for clinical translation. © 2022 Chinese Society of Particuology and Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Double Hydrogen-bonding Reinforced High-Performance Supramolecular Hydrogel Thermocell for Self-powered Sensing Remote-Controlled by Light

Non-contact human-machine interaction is the future trend for wearable technologies. This demand is recently highlighted by the pandemic of coronavirus disease (COVID-19). Herein, an anti-fatigue and highly conductive hydrogel thermocell with photo-thermal conversion ability for non-contact self-powering applications is designed. Double hydrogen-bonding enhanced supramolecular hydrogel is obtained with N-acryloyl glycinamide (NAGA) and diacrylate capped Pluronic F68 (F68-DA) via one-step photo-initiated polymerization. The supramolecular hydrogel can accommodate saturated electrolytes to fulfill the triple function of ionic crosslinking, heat-to-electricity conversion, and light response of thermocell. Eminently, the thermocell stands out by virtue of its high seebeck coefficient (-2.17 mV K−1) and extraordinary toughness (Fatigue threshold ≈ 3120 J m−2). The self-powering ability under the control of light heating is explored, and a model of a non-contact "light-remoted” sensor with self-powered and sensing integrated performance remote-controlled by light is constructed. It is believed that this study will pave the way for the non-contact energy supply of wearable devices. © 2023 Wiley-VCH GmbH.

Polymer-based microneedle composites for enhanced non-transdermal drug delivery

The applications of microneedles (MNs) are becoming popular with the promise of efficient and advanced drug delivery. MNs were developed to overcome the limitations of conventional drug delivery systems and bypass biological barriers. While most MN applications in the past decades focused on transdermal biomedical appli-cations, recent advancements in engineering and technology have enabled MNs to be used in a wide range of non-transdermal applications. Compared with the other types of MNs, polymer-based MN composites have attracted more attention for non-transdermal drug delivery because they exhibit excellent biological properties, including being nontoxic, biocompatible, and biodegradable, making them ideal biomaterials for drug delivery applications that overcome the metabolic constraints of drug delivery for macromolecular payloads across a variety of tissues and organs other than the skin. This review provides an overview of recent advancements in polymer-based MN composite carriers that aim to overcome the delivery challenges for non-transdermal drug delivery, specifically in the vascular, ocular, gastrointestinal tract, buccal transmucosal, periodontal, cardio-vascular, and vaginal tissue. Furthermore, this review will discuss future perspectives and challenges for poly-meric MN composites in non-transdermal drug delivery that must be resolved.

STEM Program for Female Students during COVID-19 Pandemic

Despite helping to solve problems in society and the environment and enabling financial independence, a disproportionately low number of women enter engineering careers. Contributing factors may include a lack of female role models and activities that would increase the interest and confidence in STEM pathways during the developing years. Our university has initiated activities to provide exposure to role models and STEM activities to young females. This year Ron Burton Training Village (RBTV) started a new STEM program for female students grades 6-11 which would span over 6 years. The students would attend a different experience every weekend and conclude the yearly experience with a capstone project. Our university partnered with RBTV for one weekend workshop experience. The program was intended to be an in-person event but due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this program was conducted synchronously through Zoom virtual meetings. Our university is well known for “hands-on” learning, and we decided to keep the experience hands-on even if it had to be virtual. Students participated in STEM-related hands-on projects, connecting them to real life applications and boosting students' interests in different STEM disciplines. The program represents part of our university's ongoing efforts to interest young women in STEM. The core of the half-day workshop was three 45-minute STEM modules: Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. The students rotated between the different workshops. The three modules are presented in this paper. Civil Engineering project was Soil Testing, Electrical Engineering project was Food Battery, and Computer Science project was Smart Picker. 38 female students participated in this new STEM program. A survey was conducted at the end of the event to evaluate the content of the program. Students were excited about our program, learning, and experiencing different fields of engineering. We received very positive feedback from the students. The students really enjoyed the hands-on experience. Students reflected that they would like to participate in more STEM related activities in the future. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2022.

A practical analysis of blended training efficacy on organizational outcomes

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the literature of blended learning by practically implementing best practices in employee training. Design/methodology/approach: In response to the Covid-19 pandemic, an organization had modified its training procedures over the course of three years to improve employee and organizational outcomes. Employee candidates who were onboarded into sales positions during the years 2019–2021 were given the opportunity to learn the content in an online format and subsequently evaluated prior to their in-person training and final evaluation to provide them with a self-paced blended learning experience. Both evaluation scores, along with the length it took to complete the trainings, were used to determine the trainings effectiveness and efficiency respectively. Findings: The findings for the study showed that the organization was successfully able to improve upon the efficiency of the training by reducing training length and the effectiveness by improving employee outcomes. Research limitations/implications: The study’s design was limited to the probation process, which resulted in issues drawing conclusions for employee outcomes that were relevant to their long-term organizational success. This emphasizes the importance of comprehensive investigations for future practical studies. Practical implications: The findings allow for the improvement of blended learning models within real-world organizational contexts that provide organizations with the opportunity to improve employee outcomes while reducing time costs. Originality/value: This study provides data from applied blended learning procedures that were validated using empirical findings, which contributes to the practicality of blended learning in workplace training. © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited.

An intelligent recognition framework of access control system with anti-spoofing function

Under the background that Covid-19 is spreading across the world, the lifestyle of people has to confront a series of changes and challenges. This also presents new problems and requirements to automation facilities. For example, nowadays masks have almost become necessities for people in public places. However, most access control systems (ACS) cannot recognize people wearing masks and authenticate their identities to deal with increasingly serious epidemic pressure. Consequently, many public entries have turned to an attendant mode that brings low efficiency, infection potential, and high possibility of negligence. In this paper, a new security classification framework based on face recognition is proposed. This framework uses mask detection algorithm and face authentication algorithm with anti-spoofing function. In order to evaluate the performance of the framework, this paper employs the Chinese Academy of Science Institute of Automation-Face Anti-spoofing Datasets (CASIA-FASD) and Reply-Attack datasets as benchmarks. Performance evaluation indicates that the Half Total Error Rate (HTER) is 9.7%, the Equal Error Rate (EER) is 5.5%. The average process time of a single frame is 0.12 seconds. The results demonstrate that this framework has a high anti-spoofing capability and can be employed on the embedded system to complete the mask detection and face authentication task in real-time.

Introduction to Engineering Virtual Labs - Challenges and Improvements

Labs are a vital component to learning;hands-on labs reinforce the theory that the students learned in lecture. Whether you are conducting experiments, evaluating results, or comparing data, access to the labs on campus is vital to learning. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, accessing the labs on campus has been a challenge. In Fall 2020 first-year students were invited back to campus. Introduction to Engineering is one of the first-year courses having lab components. How to conduct the lab experiment to meet the course requirements and provide a good experience for the first-year students are challenges for instructors. To provide necessary hands-on experience and at the same time to reduce the overall risk of COVID-19 exposure, the first-year students Mechanical engineering labs were carefully classified to virtual and in person labs. This paper describes the design, implementation, and challenges of the virtual/in person labs. Student's feedback was collected to reflect their overall lab experience in this special time. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2021

A community-based liver cancer education initiative led to healthier dietary and alcohol use behaviors among racial/ethnic minority community members

Background: There is an increasing body of literature that suggests a relationship between modifiable dietary behaviors and alcohol use and liver cancer. We designed and implemented a culturally tailored community-based education program to promote liver cancer prevention. Methods: Through NCI funded U54 TUFCCC/HC Cancer Partnership Community Outreach Core program, using CBPR approach, we engaged community-based organizations and community stakeholders serving underserved African, Asian, and Hispanic American communities in the Philadelphia metropolitan area and New York City. The community-based education incorporated in-person and virtual hybrid education workshops to address COVID-19 pandemic barriers. We conducted preeducation surveys and follow-up assessments at 6 months post-education. Participants' dietary behaviors, alcohol use, and sociodemographic characteristics were examined at both time points. Results: 526 participants were recruited including 92 African Americans, 247 Asian Americans, and 187 Hispanic Americans, with an average age of 59. We found that at 6-month follow-up assessment, participants had average decreased intake of red meat (3.148/6 vs. 2.685/6, p < 0.001), and average increased intake of vegetables (4.484/6 vs. 5.044/6, p < 0.001) and fruits (4.327/6 vs. 4.877/6, p < 0.001), compared to their intake at pre-education assessment. Additionally, average change in beer (-0.252) and spirit (-0.905) consumption substantively decreased from pre-intervention to 6-month follow-up assessment. Conclusion: This community-based education showed significant effects in improving healthy dietary behaviors and reducing alcohol intake among community members through CBPR community engagement from the two metropolitan areas. Future efforts are needed to sustain the positive changes in modifiable lifestyle behaviors and liver cancer prevention in these medically underserved communities.

Augmented Multicenter Graph Convolutional Network for COVID-19 Diagnosis

Chest computed tomography (CT) scans of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) disease usually come from multiple datasets gathered from different medical centers, and these images are sampled using different acquisition protocols. While integrating multicenter datasets increases sample size, it suffers from inter-center heterogeneity. To address this issue, we propose an augmented multicenter graph convolutional network (AM-GCN) to diagnose COVID-19 with steps as follows. First, we use a 3-D convolutional neural network to extract features from the initial CT scans, where a ghost module and a multitask framework are integrated to improve the network's performance. Second, we exploit the extracted features to construct a multicenter graph, which considers the intercenter heterogeneity and the disease status of training samples. Third, we propose an augmentation mechanism to augment training samples which forms an augmented multicenter graph. Finally, the diagnosis results are obtained by inputting the augmented multi-center graph into GCN. Based on 2223 COVID-19 subjects and 2221 normal controls from seven medical centers, our method has achieved a mean accuracy of 97.76%. The code for our model is made publicly.(1)

Effect of COVID-19 on delivery plans and postnatal depression scores of pregnant women.

INTRODUCTION: Owing to the coronavirus disease 2019 outbreak Hong Kong hospitals have suspended visiting periods and made mask wearing mandatory. In obstetrics, companionship during childbirth has been suspended and prenatal exercises, antenatal talks, hospital tours, and postnatal classes have been cancelled. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of these restrictive measures on delivery plans and risks of postpartum depression. METHODS: We compared pregnancy data and the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale (EPDS) scores of women who delivered between the pre-alert period (1 Jan 2019 to 4 Jan 2020) and post-alert period (5 Jan 2020 to 30 Apr 2020) in a tertiary university public hospital in Hong Kong. Screening for postpartum depression was performed routinely using the EPDS questionnaire 1 day and within 1 week after delivery. RESULTS: There was a 13.1% reduction in the number of deliveries between 1 January and 30 April from 1144 in 2019 to 994 in 2020. The EPDS scores were available for 4357 out of 4531 deliveries (96.2%). A significantly higher proportion of women had EPDS scores of ≥10 1 day after delivery in the post-alert group than the pre-alert group (14.4% vs 11.9%; P<0.05). More women used pethidine (6.2% vs 4.6%) and fewer used a birthing ball (8.5% vs 12.4%) for pain relief during labour in the post-alert group. CONCLUSIONS: Pregnant women reported more depressive symptoms in the postpartum period following the alert announcement regarding coronavirus infection in Hong Kong. This was coupled with a drop in the delivery rate at our public hospital. Suspension of childbirth companionship might have altered the methods of intrapartum pain relief and the overall pregnancy experience.

[The analysis of clinical characteristics of 34 novel coronavirus pneumonia cases in Ningxia Hui autonomous region].

Objective: To analyze the clinical characteristics of 34 COVID-19 cases and to provide the basis for the prevention and control of the epidemic disease. Methods: Thirty-four COVID-19 patients diagnosed with RT-PCR in the isolation ward of the Fourth People's Hospital of Ningxia Hui autonomous region (infectious diseases hospital) from the January 22 to February 4, 2020 were selected as the research subjects. The clinical data were collected. Excel was used to describe the relationship between clinical classification and age distribution, contact history and date of onset. SPSS 25.0 statistical software was used for analysis. The general information, clinical symptoms, blood test, virus nucleic acid test results, epidemiology, CT imaging, treatment and prognosis were analyzed. Results: There were 5 mild cases (5/34), 24 ordinary cases (24/34), 5 severe cases (5/34). The elderly was more common in severe patients. The main clinical symptoms were fever (27/34)and dry cough(26/34). The peripheral blood showed normal or decreased leukocyte count (33/34), decreased lymphocyte count (12/34). The increase of C-reactive protein (CRP) and D-dimer was related to the severity of the disease. Some patients had mild liver and kidney damage. Six patients were diagnosed through 3 or more times of nucleic acid tests. Sixteen cases had Wuhan related history,13 cases were close contacts, 5 cases had no confirmed route. The clustered infections were found in 6 families. In typical cases, CT showed single or multiple patchy ground glass shadow with thickening of interlobular septum. In severe cases, diffuse lesions of both lungs were found, with ground glass shadow, consolidation shadow and strip shadow coexisting. Thirty-four patients were treated with interferon-α and Lopinavir/Ritonavir with good prognosis. Conclusions: The clinical characteristics of COVID-19 were similar to that of general viral pneumonia but with strong infectivity. Close contact and family aggregation caused disease outbreaks. COVID-19 could not be excluded if two nucleic acid tests were negative and high-resolution CT was helpful for differential diagnosis. Early detection, early isolation, early diagnosis and early treatment are important for good prognosis. The effectiveness of antiviral drugs needs to be further verified.