Showing papers by "Coventry University published in 2020"

The prevalence of stress, anxiety and depression within front-line healthcare workers caring for COVID-19 patients: a systematic review and meta-regression.

Abstract: Stress, anxiety, and depression are some of the most important research and practice challenges for psychologists, psychiatrists, and behavioral scientists. Due to the importance of issue and the lack of general statistics on these disorders among the Hospital staff treating the COVID-19 patients, this study aims to systematically review and determine the prevalence of stress, anxiety and depression within front-line healthcare workers caring for COVID-19 patients. In this research work, the systematic review, meta-analysis and meta-regression approaches are used to approximate the prevalence of stress, anxiety and depression within front-line healthcare workers caring for COVID-19 patients. The keywords of prevalence, anxiety, stress, depression, psychopathy, mental illness, mental disorder, doctor, physician, nurse, hospital staff, 2019-nCoV, COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2 and Coronaviruses were used for searching the SID, MagIran, IranMedex, IranDoc, ScienceDirect, Embase, Scopus, PubMed, Web of Science (ISI) and Google Scholar databases. The search process was conducted in December 2019 to June 2020. In order to amalgamate and analyze the reported results within the collected studies, the random effects model is used. The heterogeneity of the studies is assessed using the I2 index. Lastly, the data analysis is performed within the Comprehensive Meta-Analysis software. Of the 29 studies with a total sample size of 22,380, 21 papers have reported the prevalence of depression, 23 have reported the prevalence of anxiety, and 9 studies have reported the prevalence of stress. The prevalence of depression is 24.3% (18% CI 18.2–31.6%), the prevalence of anxiety is 25.8% (95% CI 20.5–31.9%), and the prevalence of stress is 45% (95% CI 24.3–67.5%) among the hospitals’ Hospital staff caring for the COVID-19 patients. According to the results of meta-regression analysis, with increasing the sample size, the prevalence of depression and anxiety decreased, and this was statistically significant (P < 0.05), however, the prevalence of stress increased with increasing the sample size, yet this was not statistically significant (P = 0.829). The results of this study clearly demonstrate that the prevalence of stress, anxiety and depression within front-line healthcare workers caring for COVID-19 patients is high. Therefore, the health policy-makers should take measures to control and prevent mental disorders in the Hospital staff.

Clinical effects of curcumin in enhancing cancer therapy: A systematic review.

Abstract: Curcumin is herbal compound that has been shown to have anti-cancer effects in pre-clinical and clinical studies. The anti-cancer effects of curcumin include inhibiting the carcinogenesis, inhibiting angiogenesis, and inhibiting tumour growth. This study aims to determine the Clinical effects of curcumin in different types of cancers using systematic review approach. A systematic review methodology is adopted for undertaking detailed analysis of the effects of curcumin in cancer therapy. The results presented in this paper is an outcome of extracting the findings of the studies selected from the articles published in international databases including SID, MagIran, IranMedex, IranDoc, Google Scholar, ScienceDirect, Scopus, PubMed and Web of Science (ISI). These databases were thoroughly searched, and the relevant publications were selected based on the plausible keywords, in accordance with the study aims, as follows: prevalence, curcumin, clinical features, cancer. The results are derived based on several clinical studies on curcumin consumption with chemotherapy drugs, highlighting that curcumin increases the effectiveness of chemotherapy and radiotherapy which results in improving patient’s survival time, and increasing the expression of anti-metastatic proteins along with reducing their side effects. The comprehensive systematic review presented in this paper confirms that curcumin reduces the side effects of chemotherapy or radiotherapy, resulting in improving patients’ quality of life. A number of studies reported that, curcumin has increased patient survival time and decreased tumor markers’ level.

Research priorities for the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond: A call to action for psychological science.

Abstract: The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) that has caused the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic represents the greatest international biopsychosocial emergency the world has faced for a century, and psychological science has an integral role to offer in helping societies recover. The aim of this paper is to set out the shorter- and longer-term priorities for research in psychological science that will (a) frame the breadth and scope of potential contributions from across the discipline; (b) enable researchers to focus their resources on gaps in knowledge; and (c) help funders and policymakers make informed decisions about future research priorities in order to best meet the needs of societies as they emerge from the acute phase of the pandemic. The research priorities were informed by an expert panel convened by the British Psychological Society that reflects the breadth of the discipline; a wider advisory panel with international input; and a survey of 539 psychological scientists conducted early in May 2020. The most pressing need is to research the negative biopsychosocial impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic to facilitate immediate and longer-term recovery, not only in relation to mental health, but also in relation to behaviour change and adherence, work, education, children and families, physical health and the brain, and social cohesion and connectedness. We call on psychological scientists to work collaboratively with other scientists and stakeholders, establish consortia, and develop innovative research methods while maintaining high-quality, open, and rigorous research standards.

Structure of the global plastic waste trade network and the impact of China’s import Ban

Abstract: Millions of tonnes (teragrams) of plastic waste are traded around the world every year, which plays an important role in partially substituting virgin plastics as a source of raw materials in plastic product manufacturing. In this paper, global plastic waste trade networks (GPWTNs) from 1988 to 2017 are established using the UN-Comtrade database. The spatiotemporal evolution of the GPWTNs is analyzed. Attention is given to the country ranks, inter- and intra-continental trade flows, and geo-visual communities in the GPWTNs. We also evaluate the direct and indirect impacts of China’s plastic waste import ban on the GPWTNs. The results show that the GPWTNs have small-world and scale-free properties and a core-periphery structure. The geography of the plastic waste trade is structured by Asia as the dominant importer and North America and Europe as the largest sources of plastic waste. China is the unrivaled colossus in the global plastic waste trade. After China’s import ban, the plastic waste trade flows have been largely redirected to Southeast Asian countries. Compared with import countries, export countries are more important for the robustness of GPWTNs. Clearly, developed countries will not announce bans on plastic waste exports; these countries have strong motivation to continue to shift plastic waste to poorer countries. However, the import bans from developing countries will compel developed countries to build new disposal facilities and deal with their plastic waste domestically.

An AHP-based multi-criteria model for sustainable supply chain development in the renewable energy sector

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to provide a multi-criteria decision making framework based on the Triple Bottom Line principles and Analytic Hierarchy Process methodology for sustainable supply chain development in the renewable energy sector. The proposed framework encompasses the whole energy production supply chain, from raw materials’ suppliers to disposal. In particular, the photovoltaic energy sector has been used as case study and represents the focus of this work. The framework is based on the three Triple Bottom Line dimensions such as social, economic and environmental. Furthermore, literature review and expert opinions are used to identify and assess the sub-criteria for each dimension, followed by pair-wise comparison. Finally, the proposed framework is used to evaluate the seven European countries that conjointly represent the 86.8% of the total photovoltaic installed capacity in Europe, using both logical and quantitative information. Results are in agreement with the photovoltaic development in the period 2000-2017 in these countries. The proposed framework provides the decision makers with a powerful tool for making sustainable investment decisions in the photovoltaic energy sector.

An ecological future for weed science to sustain crop production and the environment. A review

Abstract: Sustainable strategies for managing weeds are critical to meeting agriculture’s potential to feed the world’s population while conserving the ecosystems and biodiversity on which we depend. The dominant paradigm of weed management in developed countries is currently founded on the two principal tools of herbicides and tillage to remove weeds. However, evidence of negative environmental impacts from both tools is growing, and herbicide resistance is increasingly prevalent. These challenges emerge from a lack of attention to how weeds interact with and are regulated by the agroecosystem as a whole. Novel technological tools proposed for weed control, such as new herbicides, gene editing, and seed destructors, do not address these systemic challenges and thus are unlikely to provide truly sustainable solutions. Combining multiple tools and techniques in an Integrated Weed Management strategy is a step forward, but many integrated strategies still remain overly reliant on too few tools. In contrast, advances in weed ecology are revealing a wealth of options to manage weeds at the agroecosystem level that, rather than aiming to eradicate weeds, act to regulate populations to limit their negative impacts while conserving diversity. Here, we review the current state of knowledge in weed ecology and identify how this can be translated into practical weed management. The major points are the following: (1) the diversity and type of crops, management actions and limiting resources can be manipulated to limit weed competitiveness while promoting weed diversity; (2) in contrast to technological tools, ecological approaches to weed management tend to be synergistic with other agroecosystem functions; and (3) there are many existing practices compatible with this approach that could be integrated into current systems, alongside new options to explore. Overall, this review demonstrates that integrating systems-level ecological thinking into agronomic decision-making offers the best route to achieving sustainable weed management.

Removal of captopril pharmaceutical from synthetic pharmaceutical-industry wastewaters: Use of activated carbon derived from Butia catarinensis

Abstract: A high surface area activated carbon was produced from the seed of Butia catarinensis (Bc), which was utilized for removing captopril from synthetic pharmaceutical industry wastewaters. The activated carbon was made by mixing ZnCl2 and Bc at a proportion of 1:1 and pyrolyzed at 600° (ABc-600). The material was characterized by the Boehm titration, hydrophilic/ hydrophobic ratio, elemental analysis, TGA, FTIR, and N2 isotherm (surface area (SBET), total pore volume (TPV), and pore size distribution (PSD)). The characterization data showed that the adsorbent displayed a hydrophilic surface due to the presence of several polar groups. The carbon material presented a TPV of 0.392 cm3 g−1, and SBET of 1267 m2 g−1. The equilibrium and kinetics data were suitably fitted to Liu isotherm and Avrami-fractional-order. The employment of the ABc-600 in the treatment of synthetic pharmaceutical industry wastewater exhibited high effectiveness in their removals (up to 99.0 %).

The prevalence of sleep disturbances among physicians and nurses facing the COVID-19 patients: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Abstract: In all epidemics, healthcare staff are at the centre of risks and damages caused by pathogens. Today, nurses and physicians are faced with unprecedented work pressures in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, resulting in several psychological disorders such as stress, anxiety and sleep disturbances. The aim of this study is to investigate the prevalence of sleep disturbances in hospital nurses and physicians facing the COVID-19 patients. A systematic review and metanalysis was conducted in accordance with the PRISMA criteria. The PubMed, Scopus, Science direct, Web of science, CINHAL, Medline, and Google Scholar databases were searched with no lower time-limt and until 24 June 2020. The heterogeneity of the studies was measured using I2 test and the publication bias was assessed by the Egger’s test at the significance level of 0.05. The I2 test was used to evaluate the heterogeneity of the selected studies, based on the results of I2 test, the prevalence of sleep disturbances in nurses and physicians is I2: 97.4% and I2: 97.3% respectively. After following the systematic review processes, 7 cross-sectional studies were selected for meta-analysis. Six studies with the sample size of 3745 nurses were examined in and the prevalence of sleep disturbances was approximated to be 34.8% (95% CI: 24.8-46.4%). The prevalence of sleep disturbances in physicians was also measured in 5 studies with the sample size of 2123 physicians. According to the results, the prevalence of sleep disturbances in physicians caring for the COVID-19 patients was reported to be 41.6% (95% CI: 27.7-57%). Healthcare workers, as the front line of the fight against COVID-19, are more vulnerable to the harmful effects of this disease than other groups in society. Increasing workplace stress increases sleep disturbances in the medical staff, especially nurses and physicians. In other words, increased stress due to the exposure to COVID-19 increases the prevalence of sleep disturbances in nurses and physicians. Therefore, it is important for health policymakers to provide solutions and interventions to reduce the workplace stress and pressures on medical staff.

Is camouflaging autistic traits associated with suicidal thoughts and behaviours? Expanding the interpersonal psychological theory of suicide in an undergraduate student sample

Abstract: The current study explored whether people who camouflage autistic traits are more likely to experience thwarted belongingness and suicidality, as predicted by the Interpersonal Psychological Theory of Suicide (IPTS). 160 undergraduate students (86.9% female, 18–23 years) completed a cross-sectional online survey from 8th February to 30th May 2019 including self-report measures of thwarted belongingness and perceived burdensomeness, autistic traits, depression, anxiety, camouflaging autistic traits, and lifetime suicidality. Results suggest that camouflaging autistic traits is associated with increased risk of experiencing thwarted belongingness and lifetime suicidality. It is important for suicide theories such as the IPTS to include variables relevant to the broader autism phenotype, to increase applicability of models to both autistic and non-autistic people.

An Intelligent Non-Invasive Real-Time Human Activity Recognition System for Next-Generation Healthcare.

Abstract: Human motion detection is getting considerable attention in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) driven healthcare systems. Human motion can be used to provide remote healthcare solutions for vulnerable people by identifying particular movements such as falls, gait and breathing disorders. This can allow people to live more independent lifestyles and still have the safety of being monitored if more direct care is needed. At present wearable devices can provide real-time monitoring by deploying equipment on a person’s body. However, putting devices on a person’s body all the time makes it uncomfortable and the elderly tend to forget to wear them, in addition to the insecurity of being tracked all the time. This paper demonstrates how human motions can be detected in a quasi-real-time scenario using a non-invasive method. Patterns in the wireless signals present particular human body motions as each movement induces a unique change in the wireless medium. These changes can be used to identify particular body motions. This work produces a dataset that contains patterns of radio wave signals obtained using software-defined radios (SDRs) to establish if a subject is standing up or sitting down as a test case. The dataset was used to create a machine learning model, which was used in a developed application to provide a quasi-real-time classification of standing or sitting state. The machine-learning model was able to achieve 96.70% accuracy using the Random Forest algorithm using 10 fold cross-validation. A benchmark dataset of wearable devices was compared to the proposed dataset and results showed the proposed dataset to have similar accuracy of nearly 90%. The machine-learning models developed in this paper are tested for two activities but the developed system is designed and applicable for detecting and differentiating x number of activities.

Edge Intelligence-Assisted Smoke Detection in Foggy Surveillance Environments

Abstract: Smoke detection in foggy surveillance environments is a challenging task and plays a key role in disaster management for industrial systems. The current smoke detection methods are applicable to only normal surveillance videos, providing unsatisfactory results for video streams captured from foggy environments, due to challenges related to clutter and unclear contents. In this paper, an energy-friendly edge intelligence-assisted smoke detection method is proposed using deep convolutional neural networks for foggy surveillance environments. Our method uses a light-weight architecture, considering all necessary requirements regarding accuracy, running time, and deployment feasibility for smoke detection in an industrial setting, compared to other complex and computationally expensive architectures including AlexNet, GoogleNet, and visual geometry group (VGG). Experiments are conducted on available benchmark smoke detection datasets, and the obtained results show better performance of the proposed method over state-of-the-art for early smoke detection in foggy surveillance.

Noninvasive In Vivo Assessment of Cardiac Metabolism in the Healthy and Diabetic Human Heart Using Hyperpolarized 13C MRI.

Abstract: Rationale: The recent development of hyperpolarized 13C magnetic resonance spectroscopy has made it possible to measure cellular metabolism in vivo, in real time. Objective: By comparing participan...

Implications of advanced wastewater treatment: Electrocoagulation and electroflocculation of effluent discharged from a wastewater treatment plant

Abstract: In this research, wastewater treatment was inspected on a pilot-scale wastewater treatment plant by electrochemical techniques, electrocoagulation (EC), electroflotation (EF) and electrophoretic deposition (EPD). The wastewater samples have been characterised by applying different parameters to determine optimum working conditions of the electrocoagulation reactor. Two electrodes have been tested separately with an outflow coming from primary and secondary sedimentation tank. The outflows from these tanks are introduced in EC reactor then EC reactor efficacy is determined for the removal of chemical oxygen demand (COD), suspended solids, micropollutants and amount of coagulants in agglomerates at different current densities. The amounts of suspended solids (SS) in influent and effluent streams were determined by the membrane filtration technique. The operational applied current values range from 1–4 A in the case of COD removal by Fe and Al. While for SS aggregation the applied current ranges from 0.5–3 A and inflow rate was tested from 250 to 500 L/h. The pH of outflows increased by increasing applied current and both of these parameters were found a positive increase in the amount of SS aggregations after EC treatment. Furthermore, the COD removal efficiency was found to be 56–57 % and 12–18 % in case Fe and Al electrode respectively after EC treatment. The results showed that applied current is the most effective parameter, whereas the aluminium electrodes have produced more amounts of flocs and bubbles in comparison to iron electrodes at similar amount of current density.

Cuffless Single-Site Photoplethysmography for Blood Pressure Monitoring

Abstract: One in three adults worldwide has hypertension, which is associated with significant morbidity and mortality. Consequently, there is a global demand for continuous and non-invasive blood pressure (BP) measurements that are convenient, easy to use, and more accurate than the currently available methods for detecting hypertension. This could easily be achieved through the integration of single-site photoplethysmography (PPG) readings into wearable devices, although improved reliability and an understanding of BP estimation accuracy are essential. This review paper focuses on understanding the features of PPG associated with BP and examines the development of this technology over the 2010–2019 period in terms of validation, sample size, diversity of subjects, and datasets used. Challenges and opportunities to move single-site PPG forward are also discussed.

A flipped classroom model in higher education: a review of the evidence across disciplines

Abstract: The recent movement to integrate the flipped classroom model into higher education has resulted in significant changes that affected both teaching and learning practices in different ways. After almost a decade of research on the flipped classroom model, different emergent outcomes have been reported in a domain specific context. To gain a comprehensive understanding of the flipped classroom implementation in a university context, a review of the literature on the use of flipped classroom in a university context was conducted. This study was guided by interpreting the previous research findings according to the domain of utilization, opportunities, challenges, and extensions to the conventional flipped classroom model. This study found that the utilization of flipped classroom in various disciplines is mainly advocated to promote students’ engagement, metacognition, attitude, performance, understanding, and achievement, as well as other learning outcomes. The key challenges of this method, shared across all disciplines, were devoted to the length of the video/digital materials and time required for instructors to prepare the learning materials and for students to master it. Recommendations for policy makers and other crucial insights for the future studies were highlighted.

The effect of variable operating parameters for hydrocarbon fuel formation from CO2 by molten salts electrolysis

Abstract: The emission of CO2 has been increasing day by day by growing world population, which resulted in the atmospheric and environmental destruction. Conventionally different strategies, including nuclear power and geothermal energy have been adopted to convert atmospheric CO2 to hydrocarbon fuels. However, these methods are very complicated due to large amount of radioactive waste from the reprocessing plant. The present study investigated the effect of various parameters like temperature (200–500 °C), applied voltage (1.5–3.0 V), and feed gas (CO2/H2O) composition of 1, 9.2, and 15.6 in hydrocarbon fuel formation in molten carbonate (Li2CO3–Na2CO3–K2CO3; 43.5:31.5:25 mol%) and hydroxide (LiOH–NaOH; 27:73 and KOH–NaOH; 50:50 mol%) salts. The GC results reported that CH4 was the predominant hydrocarbon product with a lower CO2/H2O ratio (9.2) at 275 °C under 3 V in molten hydroxide (LiOH–NaOH). The results also showed that by increasing electrolysis temperature from 425 to 500 °C, the number of carbon atoms in hydrocarbon species rose to 7 (C7H16) with a production rate of 1.5 μmol/h cm2 at CO2/H2O ratio of 9.2. Moreover, the electrolysis to produce hydrocarbons in molten carbonates was more feasible at 1.5 V than 2 V due to the prospective carbon formation. While in molten hydroxide, the CH4 production rate (0.80–20.40 μmol/h cm2) increased by increasing the applied voltage from 2.0–3.0 V despite the reduced current efficiencies (2.30 to 0.05%). The maximum current efficiency (99.5%) was achieved for H2 as a by-product in molten hydroxide (LiOH–NaOH; 27:73 mol%) at 275 °C, under 2 V and CO2/H2O ratio of 1. Resultantly, the practice of molten salts could be a promising and encouraging technology for further fundamental investigation for hydrocarbon fuel formation due to its fast-electrolytic conversion rate and no utilization of catalyst.

Formulation of zeolite supported nano-metallic catalyst and applications in textile effluent treatment

Abstract: Textile industry is one of the major industries worldwide and produces a huge amount of coloured effluents. The presence of coloured compounds (dyes) in water change its aesthetic value and cause serious health and environmental consequences. However, the present investigation was carried out to minimize and reduce the colour compounds discharged by the textile industries through a nano-scaled catalyst. This study is mainly focused on the explanation of nanoparticles aggregation by deposition on natural zeolite, and utilization of this natural zeolite as supported material to nano zerovalent iron (NZ-nZVI) in the form of liquid slurry with sodium percarbonate acting as an oxidant in a Fenton like system for the removal of synthetic CI acid orange 52 (AO52) azo dye, in textile effluent. The nano-scaled zerovalent irons were synthesized by borohydride method in ethanolic medium. UV–vis spectrophotometry, FTIR, EDX, SEM, and XRD (powdered) analysis were used for the investigations of surface morphology, composition, and properties of natural zeolite supported nZVI and study the dye removal mechanism. The XRD spectrum revealed that clinoptilolite is the major component of natural zeolite used, while EDX found that the iron content of NZ-nZVI was about 9.5 %. The introduction of natural zeolite as supporting material in the formation of iron nanoparticle resulted in the partial reduction of aggregation of zerovalent iron nanoparticles. The findings revealed that the 94.86 % removal of CI acid orange 52 dye was obtained after 180 min treatment at 15 mg/L initial dye concentration. The highest rapid dye removal of about 60 % was achieved within the first 10 min of treatment at the same dye concentration. Furthermore, the actual dyeing effluent including green, magenta, and the blended colour was successfully decolourized by natural zeolite-supported nZVI/SPC Fenton process. It is concluded that the acceleration of corrosion of NZ-nZVI, breaking of azo bond, and consumption of Fe2+ were the possible mechanisms behind the removal of AO52 dye. It is also recommended that NZ-nZVI/SPC Fenton process could be a viable option for effluent and groundwater remediation.