The Impact of COVID19 Lockdown on Imprecision Measure of TrOFNs Portfolio Analysis

Oriented fuzzy numbers (OFNs) can be used in managing an investment portfolio - they include information uncertainty and imprecision related to financial market. A portfolio analysis bases on an expected fuzzy discount factor and an imprecise present value (PV). The main purpose of the paper is to compare a portfolio analysis including stocks identified by PV assessed by trapezoidal oriented fuzzy number (TrOFNs) in times of regular stock exchange session and during unexpected events (COVID19 lockdown). All considerations are illustrated by an empirical case study. The imprecision risk of the investment portfolio is estimated by energy and entropy measures, comparison of which proves that extreme events, had a tremendous impact on both measures. The analysis also shows that the aggregated portfolio measures of energy and entropy in case of regular situation are lower than in case of a crisis and also lower than measures of individual elements of portfolio.

Three dimensional echocardiography and global longitudinal strain in the assessment of left ventricular function in children after PIMS-TS

Background and Aim: Pediatric Inflammatory Multisystem Syndrome Temporally Associated with SARS-CoV-2 (PIMS-TS) is a new dis-ease affecting children, almost alwaysinvolving cardiovascular system and with potential long-term effects still unknown. Method(s): Prospective study enclosed 80 children aged 1-17 years (mean 8.2 years) diagnosed with PIMS-TS between June 2020 and June 2021 who were controlled 6 weeks and 6 months after the disease. In patients with severe cardiac involvement during acute phase (deteriorated left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) lt;55% and significantly elevated concentration of NT-pro-BNP (gt;5000 pg/ml) or troponine (gt;500 ng/ml)) the addi-tional check-up after 3 months was scheduled. In all patients at control points three dimensional echocardiography (3D-ECHO) and average global longitudinal strain (GLS) were used to assess left ventricular function. Result(s): In all patients the means of LVEF and average GLS were within normal limits at the time of all check-up points. For the whole group LVEF after 6 weeks was 60.5% (SD: 3.1;51-69%) and GLS 21.2% (SD: 3.9;12.4-29.4%). After 6 months LVEF increased to 63% (SD: 2.4;58-69%) and GLS to 23.6% (SD: 3.2;17.3-33.3%)-both significantly (plt;0.001). In the subgroup of 54 patients with originally mild cardiac involvement LVEF after 6 weeks was 60.7% (SD: 2.6;57-69%) and GLS 21.8% (SD: 3.4;17.3-29.4%). In the subgroup of 26 patients with severe cardiac involvement LVEF after 6 weeks was 59.6% (SD: 3.1;55-67%) and was not significantly different than in subgroup with mild car-diac involvement (p = 0.175) while GLS was significantly lower (19.3%, SD: 3.8;12.4-24.8%;p = 0.009). After 3 months in this group LVEF and GLS did not increase (respectively, 59.9%, 56-67%;p = 0.794 and 20.2%, 13.7-26.9%;p = 0.149). After 6 months LVEF in this subgroup increased to 62.8% (60-68%) and GLS to 22.6% (17.7-27%)-like in patients with mild cardiac involvement (plt;0.001). Conclusion(s): 3D-ECHO and GLS are highly applicable tools for the assessment of cardiac function in children after PIMS-TS. Patients with originally severe cardiovascular involvement have lower average GLS after 6 weeks. 6 months after PIMS-TS patients present significant improvement of left ventricular function. Average GLS seems to be more sensitive test for functional assess-ment than LVEF.

Impact of Course Scheduling on Student Performance in Remote Learning

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic gave rise to a need to change course syllabi in order to completely transition to a remote learning model. In the case of subjects comprising programming tasks, taking into account the availability of tools and resources that provide opportunities for independent work without teacher supervision, it was necessary to decide whether students should be allowed to work under self-paced learning, or, similar to traditional classes, fixed-schedule learning. Experiences from MOOCs demonstrated that course scheduling is not without impact on the learning process, and may affect the level of student satisfaction with the course. This study determines how course scheduling affected the performance of students attending a database course. The students were divided into two groups, and completed the first module without teacher supervision. During the learning process, they solved programming tasks which were assessed automatically, and then took quizzes to verify what they learned. One of the groups worked with the materials and took the quizzes in accordance with a schedule, and the other group did so without any time constraints. The results demonstrate that students perform better when working under the fixed-schedule model, without any impact on their level of satisfaction with the course. The system of learning not only affected the quiz results in the module where different scheduling was used, but student performance in later parts of the course as well. The results presented in the paper should be of interest to teachers designing remote courses involving self-learning. © 2022 ACM.

Pulmonary complications due to COVID-19 – a literature review

I nt r o duc t i o n: First cases of a disease called coronavirus disease 2019 (CO-VID-19), caused by a novel virus severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) of the coronavirus family, were detected in December 2019. The disease is manifested by a variety of symptoms and can run a different course: from oligosymptomatic or asymptomatic to the development of acute respiratory failure and even death. Ai m: The aim of this paper is to provide critical analysis of the potential pulmonary complications after COVID-19 infection. Ma t e r i a l a nd me t ho ds: We have provided the systematic literature review based on which we have discussed the pathophysiology of COVID-19, its outco-mes, risk factors and pulmonary complications. R e s u l t s a n d d i s c u s s i o n: The organs that are most often affected by a SARS--CoV-2 infection are the lungs. An infection with this virus can lead to a severe respiratory tract illness, both in the acute phase and as a complication after a rela-tively mild case. There are numerous observations of patients convalescing from COVID-19 who suffer from the interstitial pulmonary disease with fibrosis. There are also reported cases of spontaneous pneumothorax after COVID-19. Co nc l us i o ns: It should be borne in mind that other late complications may appear with time.

Descriptive Geometry in the Time of COVID-19: Preliminary Assessment of Distance Education During Pandemic Social Isolation

The pandemic forced a change in the teaching of descriptive geometry, a basic subject of many engineering fields. To conduct classes during COVID-19, the following resources were used: the ELF platform, MS Teams, SketchUp, AutoCAD, email. It was decided to prepare the electronic textbook along with geometric problems to be solved, supplemented by on-line consultations with students. Despite difficulties (technological, psychological), the results obtained by students during the pandemic were very good. Although the average grade during distance learning was higher than in the case of traditional education, students reported a clear need for direct contact with the teacher. © 2020