Disposal and resource utilization of waste masks: a review

Waste masks pose a serious threat to the environment, including marine plastic pollution and soil pollution risks caused by landfills since the outbreak of COVID-19. Currently, numerous effective methods regarding disposal and resource utilization of waste masks have been reported, containing physical, thermochemical, and solvent-based technologies. As for physical technologies, the mechanical properties of the mask-based materials could be enhanced and the conductivity or antibacterial activity was endowed by adding natural fibers or inorganic nanoparticles. Regarding thermochemical technologies, catalytic pyrolysis could yield considerable hydrogen, which is an eco-friendly resource, and would mitigate the energy crisis. Noticeably, the solvent-based technology, as a more convenient and efficient method, was also considered in this paper. In this way, soaking the mask directly in a specific chemical reagent changes the original structure of polypropylene and obtains multi-functional materials. The solvent-based technology is promising in the future with the researches of sustainable and universally applicable reagents. This review could provide guidance for utilizing resources of waste masks and address the issues of plastic pollution.

Identifying spatiotemporal trends of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in wastewater: From the perspective of upstream and downstream wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) (preprint)

Recently, many efforts have been made to address the rapid spread of newly identified COVID-19 virus variants . Wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) is considered as a potential early warning tool for identifying the rapid spread of this virus. This study investigated the occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 in eight wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) and their sewerage systems which serve most of the population in Taoyuan City, Taiwan. Across the entire study period, the wastewater viral concentrations were correlated with the number of COVID-19 cases in each WWTP (Spearman' r = 0.23 - 0.76). In addition, it is confirmed that several treatment technologies could effectively eliminate the virus RNA from WWTPs influent (> 90 %). On the other hand, further results revealed that an inverse distance weighted (IDW) interpolation and hot spot model combined with geographic information system (GIS) method could be applied to analyze the spatiotemporal variations of SARS-CoV-2 in wastewater from sewer system. In addition, socio-economic factors namely population density, land-use, and tax-income were successfully identified as the potentials drivers which substantially affect the onset of COVID-19 outbreak in Taiwan. Finally, the data obtained from this study can provide a powerful tool in public health decision-making not only in response to the current epidemic situation but also other epidemic issues in the future.

Agronomic performance of camelina genotypes selected for seed yield and quality characteristics in eastern China

Camelina [ Camelina sativa (L.) Crantz] has gained extensive attention in Europe and North America as a potential dietary oil and biofuel feedstock. It is a relatively new crop in Asia (e.g., China, Korea). There is great potential for the cropping of camelina in eastern China on marginal lands where the climatic conditions (e.g., cooler temperature) may be suitable for cultivating this crop. However, little has been done to evaluate its agronomic performance in eastern China. To address this, a three-year (2019–2021) field study was conducted to evaluate the effect of fall and spring seeding dates on seed yield and quality of sixteen spring camelina genotypes across the three different growing environments in eastern China and to select potentially high-yielding genotypes for fall or spring seeding with the suitable seeding dates for each growing environment. The study showed that fall seeding camelina between late Oct. and the third week of Nov. in eastern China, including Anyang, Qingdao, and Yangzhou, produced a sustainable and satisfactory seed and oil yield (mean across genotypes, locations, and years: 2372 and 921 kg ha−1, respectively). While spring seeding between mid- and the end of April at Qingdao showed a lower productive performance (mean seed and oil yield across genotypes: 1081 and 373 kg ha−1, respectively), it still provides an alternative option for the production of high-quality edible oil compared to other oilseed crops such as soybean [ Glycine max (L.) Merr.]. Although the strong genotype × environment interactions showed, among the tested camelina genotypes, fall seeding camelina accessions of CamK9, CamC2, and CamC4 at the suitable seeding dates showed a consistently greater mean seed yield (range: 1648–3170 kg ha−1) and oil yield (747–1368 kg ha−1) in all test locations compared to other genotypes. At the suitable fall seeding dates, mean seed oil content and yield across the tested genotypes and locations were 43.5% (range: 39.0–48.9%) and 856 kg ha−1 (range: 161–1489 ha−1), respectively, with the highest mean oil content of 45.9% determined at Yangzhou (range: 43.6–48.9%) and the highest mean seed yield of 2539 kg ha−1 at Qingdao (range: 1365–3501 kg ha−1). The camelina genotypes indicated would be good candidates for large-scale cropping in eastern China and other parts of the world with similar climatic conditions. • Sixteen spring camelina genotypes selected for fall and spring seeding were evaluated. • Three camelina genotypes best adapted to fall seeding in eastern China compared to other genotypes. • Suitable seeding date for fall seeding camelina in eastern China: late Oct.–third week of Nov. • Two camelina genotypes were suitable for spring seeding in mid-April at Qingdao. • Camelina has the potential for large-scale on marginal lands of eastern China. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Industrial Crops & Products is the property of Elsevier B.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Reflections on development of rapid and living evidence-based Chinese medicine guidelines for Coronavirus disease 2019

As evidence is rapidly accumulated and updated during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, rapid and living guidelines are needed to guide the clinical practice of Chinese medicine (CM), for which the WHO handbook of rapid guideline development should be referred to, and the characteristics of CM should be addressed. When constructing the body of evidence, we need to systematically search the studies related to COVID-19 (direct) and indirect diseases, and to collect the experience evidence from ancient documents and expert consensus, thereby maximumly presenting the advantages of CM. When the recommendations are developed, the co-existing direct and indirect evidence, as well as the co-existing research and experience evidence should be fully considered and synthesized by taking priority on whichever higher level evidence it is. The development of the rapid and living CM guidelines meets the ever-changing clinical needs during COVID-19 pandemic, and can provide CM evidence supports for decision making during public health emergencies.

The relationship between adolescent risk perception and emotions during the COVID-19: a short-term longitudinal study

This study explores the relationship between adolescents’ perceptions of epidemic risk and their emotions through three follow-up surveys during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic on February 11th (T1), 18th (T2), and 25th (T3), 2020. Three hundred and four adolescents in different academic stages (junior high middle school, senior high middle school, and university) participated in the online survey, and cross-lag analysis was used to examine the causal relationship between epidemic risk perceptions and positive and negative emotions. The results found that the individual’s positive emotions were significantly higher than the negative emotions in T1, T2 and T3. Cross-lag analysis found that for positive emotions, T2 positive emotions could negatively predict T3 epidemic risk perceptions, and T2 epidemic risk perceptions could negatively predict the individual’s T3 positive emotions. For negative emotions, risk perceptions at T1 could positively predict negative emotions at T2, and at the same time, negative emotions at T1 could also positively predict epidemic risk perceptions at T2. This indicates that during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a causal relationship between the perceptions of epidemic risk and the emotions of adolescents, and this relationship had high stability among groups of different genders and academic stages.

Exploring the Effect of College Students’ Civic Engagement on Transferable Capabilities during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Civic engagement refers to the ways that citizens participate in the life of a community to help shape its future or improve conditions for others. While it might have been shaped by the COVID-19 pandemic recovery, this study explored how college students perceive civic engagement on selected campuses that were partially locked down. We sampled 1036 student volunteers from six universities in Taiwan by using a self-designed module of civic engagement and transferable capabilities. The Student’s t-test, ANOVA, regression, factor analysis, and structural equation modeling (SEM) were used to interpret the differences and relationships among these variables. This study provides a more detailed example of the current status of civic engagement and its relationship to transferable capabilities in a higher education setting. The related programs and institutions should take responsibility for enhancing students’ civic engagement and transferable capabilities during the pandemic. How to ameliorate the situation? The findings suggest that it is necessary to consider a student’s academic major, learning experiences in the department, and time spent on related activities during the pandemic recovery. The findings might prove useful to various campuses for enhancing ongoing practices for sustainable development.

Epidemiological characteristics of imported cases of COVID-19 from association of southeast Asian nations countries to China

Objective: To understand the epidemiological characteristics of imported coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases from Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries in China from January 1, 2020 to February 28, 2021, and provide evidence for the improvement of China's strategy of COVID-19 control towards travelers from ASEAN countries.

Adaptive Group Testing on Networks with Community Structure (preprint)

Since the inception of the group testing problem in World War II, one of the prevailing assumptions in the probabilistic variant of the problem has been that individuals in the population are infected by a disease independently. However, this assumption rarely holds in practice, as diseases typically spread through interactions between individuals and therefore cause infections to be correlated. Inspired by characteristics of COVID-19 and similar diseases, we consider an infection model over networks which generalizes the traditional i.i.d. model from probabilistic group testing. Under this infection model, we ask whether knowledge of the network structure can be leveraged to perform group testing more efficiently, focusing specifically on community-structured graphs drawn from the stochastic block model. We prove that when the network and infection parameters are conducive to "strong community structure," our proposed adaptive, graph-aware algorithm outperforms the baseline binary splitting algorithm, and is even order-optimal in certain parameter regimes. We support our results with numerical simulations.

Mitigating the Impact of COVID-19 on Emergency Stroke Care in Western China (preprint)

Background: The COVID-19 epidemic is still continuing. Little is known about the effects on stroke care. This study aims to investigate the impact of COVID-19 epidemic on urgent stroke treatment in a tertiary stroke center in western China, and to provide reference points for stroke treatment strategies during public health emergencies. Methods: The retrospective, population-based study was conducted in West China Hospital of Sichuan University, the largest hospital in the southwest of China in COVID-19 period (Dec 1, 2019 to Mar 11, 2020) and baseline non-COVID-19 period (Dec 1, 2018 to Mar 11, 2019). The COVID-19 period was further divided into pre- and peak-epidemic stages defined using government data. Medical practice was strictly based on hospital contingency plans and national expert consensus. We compared emergency visits and efficiency of stroke treatment for the baseline and COVID-19 periods. A subgroup analysis was then conducted between pre-and peak-epidemic stages. Findings: Compared with the baseline data, we found no differences in time to deliver acute interventions, intravenous thrombolysis rate (IVT), and neurological improvements in the whole COVID-19 period. There were significant reductions in visits (38·9%, p<0·0001), admission within six hours from onset (13·2%, p=0·001), mild stroke admissions (15·3%, p=0·006) and increases in rates of mechanical thrombectomy (24·4%, p<0·0001) and excellent outcome (18·1%, p<0·01). We observed significantly higher rate of IVT (17·1%, p=0·04) and shorter time to computed tomography scan (22%, p=0·01), during the peak-epidemic stages in subgroup analysis. Interpretation: The hospital’s capacity to deliver high quality stroke emergency care was hardly be affected as a result of comprehensive measures being implemented.The results provide some key messages for the practice of stroke emergency care during a crisis. Funding Statement: National Key R&D Program of China (2018YFC1311400 and 2018YFC1311401).Declaration of Interests: Authors declare no competing interests.Ethics Approval Statement: The study and analysis plan was approved by the ethical review board in West China Hospital of Sichuan University (2019/319). Written informed consent was waived.