Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

A Spectral Adjustment For Spatial Confounding, Yawen Guan, Garritt L. Page, Brian J. Reich, Massimo Ventrucci, Shu Yang

Department of Statistics: Faculty Publications

Adjusting for an unmeasured confounder is generally an intractable problem, but in the spatial setting it may be possible under certain conditions. In this paper, we derive necessary conditions on the coherence between the treatment variable of interest and the unmeasured confounder that ensure the causal effect of the treatment is estimable. We specify our model and assumptions in the spectral domain to allow for different degrees of confounding at different spatial resolutions. The key assumption that ensures identifiability is that confounding present at global scales dissipates at local scales. We show that this assumption in the spectral domain is …

Multi-Level Small Area Estimation Based On Calibrated Hierarchical Likelihood Approach Through Bias Correction With Applications To Covid-19 Data, Nirosha Rathnayake

Theses & Dissertations

Small area estimation (SAE) has been widely used in a variety of applications to draw estimates in geographic domains represented as a metropolitan area, district, county, or state. The direct estimation methods provide accurate estimates when the sample size of study participants within each area unit is sufficiently large, but it might not always be realistic to have large sample sizes of study participants when considering small geographical regions. Meanwhile, high dimensional socio-ecological data exist at the community level, providing an opportunity for model-based estimation by incorporating rich auxiliary information at the individual and area levels. Thus, it is critical …

Prediction Of Epidemic Transmission And Evaluation Of Prevention And Control Measures Based On Artificial Society, Bin Chen, Yang Mei, Chuan Ai, Ma Liang, Zhengqiu Zhu, Hailiang Chen, Mengna Zhu, Xu Wei

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: The COVID-19 has been controlled under the strict measures,but how to normalize it deserves in-depth study.The COVID-19 transmission model and the human contact network are established separately based on SEIR model and the artificial social scenario.With the support of the multi-agent computational experiment method,a large sample calculation experiment was performed on the Tianhe supercomputer to simulate the epidemic transmission in typical areas such as communities,schools,and workplaces in artificial cities,and to predict and evaluate the risk of epidemic spread after resumption of work and school.The results show that epidemic prevention and control must be prepared for a …

Wildlife Trade And Covid-19: Towards A Criminology Of Anthropogenic Pathogen Spillover, Piers Beirne Phd

Department of Criminology

The general remit of this paper is the role of wildlife trade in pathogen spillover. Its underlying assumption is that, so far from being the exclusive domain of the life sciences, the study of pathogen spillover will be greatly enhanced by multi-perspectival approaches, including One Health and those employed here, namely, non-speciesist green criminology and critical animal studies. The paper moves from discussions of zoonosis, anthroponosis and wildlife trade to the emergence of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China. The paper recommends the abolition of all wildlife trade and the reclamation of wildlife habitat and broaches discussion of the extension of legal …

An Overview Of The Effect Of Bioaerosol Size In Coronavirus Disease 2019 Transmission, Marcelo I. Guzman

Chemistry Faculty Publications

The fast spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) constitutes a worldwide challenge to the public health, educational and trade systems, affecting the overall well-being of human societies. The high transmission and mortality rates of this virus, and the unavailability of a vaccine or treatment, resulted in the decision of multiple governments to enact measures of social distancing. Such measures can reduce the exposure to bioaerosols, which can result in pathogen deposition in the respiratory tract of the host causing disease and an immunological response. Thus, it is important to consider the validity of the proposal for keeping a distance of …

Covid-19_Umaine News_The Grand Challenge – Remote Chemistry Labs For 1,000 Students, University Of Maine Division Of Marketing And Communications

Division of Marketing & Communications

Screenshot of UMaine News press release regarding remote learning and teaching in the University of Maine Chemistry Department for the 2021 Spring Semester.

Worst Time Being Poor? The Hunger Problem In U.S. During Covid-19 Pandemic, Yuanhang Hu

School of Professional Studies

Food insecurity is deeply rooted in American society during and before the COVID-19 pandemic. Food Insecurity usually associates with economic indicators, such as unemployment rate, income level, etc. Currently, there are two main tools to fight the war of hunger. The first one is the government food assistance programs. And the second one is food pantries from the private sectors of the community. Both tools are facing numerous challenges due to COVID-19. The purpose of this article is to provide rational reasons to persuade the government to enhance the benefits of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and use administrative …

Estimation Of Transmission Dynamics Of Covid-19 In India: The Influential Saturated Incidence Rate, - Tanvi, Rajiv Aggarwal, Ashutosh Rajput

Applications and Applied Mathematics: An International Journal (AAM)

A non-linear SEIR mathematical model for coronavirus disease in India has been proposed, by incorporating the saturated incidence rate on the occurrence of new infections. In the model, the threshold quantity known as the reproduction number is evaluated which determines the stability of disease-free equilibrium and the endemic equilibrium points. The disease-free equilibrium point becomes globally asymptotically stable when the corresponding reproduction number is less than unity, whereas, if it is greater than unity then the endemic equilibrium point comes into existence, which is locally asymptotically stable under certain restrictions on the parameters value in the model. The impact of …

Cvs Covid-19 Screening Website: Test Automation, Savya Rawat

School of Professional Studies

CVS Pharmacy is an American retail corporation, also known as, and originally named, the Consumer Value Store owned by CVS Health, it is headquartered in Woonsocket, Rhode Island. CVS Pharmacy is currently the largest pharmacy chain in the United States by number of locations over 9,600 and total prescription revenue. CVS sells prescription drugs and a wide assortment of general merchandise, including over-the-counter drugs.

Now, coming to the reason why I have selected CVS pharmacy’s website cvs.com as my case study topic is because of CVS’s response to the covid-19 pandemic’s no-cost testing strategy. Whole of the world is suffering …

Higher Education Responses To Crisis: A Case Study Of Clark University And The Pandemic Of 2020, Lisa Gillingham

School of Professional Studies

The COVID-19 pandemic has delivered an existential challenge to universities and other academic institutions at a time when they are already grappling with other weighty issues that may alter the fabric of higher education. COVID-19 has forced these institutions to consider and employ new ways of conducting its work with a sense urgency that is unprecedented in the recent history of the academy. The rate of learning around these models is rapid, and Higher Education is ripe for change.

Clark University has addressed the pandemic with a plan to protect and pivot using strategies that support the continuation of its …

Chemical Modification And In Silico Validation Of Medicinally Privileged Molecular Scaffolds As Kras And Sars-Cov-2 Protease Inhibitors, Precious M. Okwuchukwu

Theses and Dissertations

Coronavirus disease was declared a global pandemic by WHO in March 2020, cancer is the second leading cause of death by a disease. Several scientists around the world are working relentlessly to discover an effective remedy to eradicate these deadly diseases. A natural polyphenol (magnolol) has been isolated from a tree Magnolia grandiflora (family Magnoliaceae) found on UTRGV campuses. This research is focused on design of a series of chemically modified sulfonyl derivatives based on the isolated magnolol framework and other medicinally privileged molecular scaffolds framework that can effectively bind to the COVID-19 main protease, SARS- CoV-2 3CL protease …

Mcst : An App For Patron Awareness Of Covid-19 Safety Measures Instituted By Small Businesses, Jorge Torres

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Small businesses across America are having restrictions placed upon them due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Those fortunate enough to remain open now face the challenge of trying to generate enough revenue to stay afloat. Small businesses, with their lack of funds, have resorted to listing their safety precautions on their front door to inform patrons. However, viewing these rules would require patrons to leave their homes. Additionally, there is no consistent set of rules being enforced by the government which is dangerous as some patrons may feel that stricter procedures be in place. These inconsistencies and lack of information can …

Digital Transformation In Higher Education: A Framework For Maturity Assessment, Adam Marks, Maytha Al-Ali, Reem Atassi, Abedallah Zaid Abualkishik, Yacine Rezgui

All Works

© 2020 Science and Information Organization. All rights reserved. —Literature in digital transformation maturity is scarce. Digital transformation in higher education, especially after COVID-19 is seen as inevitable. This research explores digital transformation maturity and challenges within Higher Education. The significance of this study stems from the role digital transformation plays in today’s knowledge economy. This study proposes a new framework based on Deloitte’s 2019 digital transformation assessment framework with Petkovic 2014 mega and major higher education process mapping. The study triangulates the findings of multiple research instruments, including survey, interviews, case study, and direct observation. The research findings show …

Secure Answer Book And Automatic Grading, Manoj Thulasidas

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

In response to the growing need to perform assessments online, we have developed a secure answer book, as well as a tool for automatically grading it for our course on spread- sheet modeling. We applied these techniques to a cohort of about 160 students who took the course last term. In this paper, we describe the design, implementation and the techniques employed to enhance both the security of the answer book and the ease, accuracy and consistency of grading. In addition, we summarize the experience and takeaways, both from the instructor and the student perspectives. Although the answer book and …

Effect Of Lockdown On Hcho And Trace Gases Over India During March 2020, Akshansha Chauhan, Ramesh P. Singh

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

COVID-19 is one of the deadly Epidemics that has impacted people living in more than 200 countries. In order to mitigate the impact of COVID-19, India observed total lockdown in the first phase for a period of 21 days (24 March–13 May 2020), so that social distancing is maintained. However, this sudden decision severely affected the normal life of people. The air quality improved due to lockdown, some relaxation was given in different cities and within some areas in the city where the people were not affected by COVID-19. In this paper, we discuss results of detailed analysis of trace …

Modeling And Relevance Analysis Of Urban Epidemic Transmission And Work Resumption Intensity, Gan Mi, Yunyi Tian, Wenchang Zhang, Xihan Zhao

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: On the basis of multi-source big data, the model for analyzing the population migration changes and manpower gaps caused by the COVID-19 epidemic in 34 typical cities across the country is constructed , and the work resumption intensity of other cities is predicited by using the migration base constructed. The SEIR model is used to estimate the basic reproduction number in each city since the simulate results show that it can emulate the transmission trend of this epidemic accurately, and the retrospective matrix analysis of the work resumption intensity is combined with the manpower gap to summarize the anti-epidemic …

Covid-19_Umaine News_Umaine Students Get Immersive Experience In Engineering Education, University Of Maine Division Of Marketing And Communications

Division of Marketing & Communications

Screenshot of UMaine News press release regarding Asli Sezen-Barrie, associate professor of curriculum, assessment and instruction in the University of Maine College of Education and Human Development redesigning her class on Teaching Science in the Secondary School to provide more opportunities for preservice teachers at UMaine to learn about engineering concepts and meet with engineers.

Viral Data, Agnieszka Leszczynski, Matthew Zook

Geography Faculty Publications

We are experiencing a historical moment characterized by unprecedented conditions of virality: a viral pandemic, the viral diffusion of misinformation and conspiracy theories, the viral momentum of ongoing Hong Kong protests, and the viral spread of #BlackLivesMatter demonstrations and related efforts to defund policing. These co-articulations of crises, traumas, and virality both implicate and are implicated by big data practices occurring in a present that is pervasively mediated by data materialities, deeply rooted dataist ideologies that entrench processes of datafication as granting objective access to truth and attendant practices of tracking, data analytics, algorithmic prediction, and data-driven targeting of individuals …

Empowering Singapore’S Smes: Fintech P2p Lending — A Lifeline For Smes’ Survival?, Grace Lee, Alan Megargel

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The COVID-19 pandemic has sent shock waves throughout the world, pushed countries into lockdown, and wreaked havoc on the world’s people and the global economy. The damage to economies around the world caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has far exceeded that of the global financial crisis. While all businesses suffered hugely, it would be of grave consequence if the small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), an important segment of every country’s economy, are unable to withstand the shock wave and sustain themselves beyond this pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of cash flow or working capital for the viability …

Exploring The Impact Of Covid-19 On Aviation Industry: A Text Mining Approach, Gottipati Swapna, Kyong Jin Shim, Weiling Angeline Jiang, Sheng Wei Andre Justin Lee

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Our study presents a comprehensive analysis of news articles from FlightGlobal website during the first half of 2020. Our analyses reveal useful insights on themes and trends concerning the aviation industry during the COVID-19 period. We applied text mining and NLP techniques to analyse the articles for extracting the aviation themes and article sentiments (positive and negative). Our results show that there is a variation in the sentiment trends for themes aligned with the real-world developments of the pandemic. The article sentiment analysis can offer industry players a quick sense of the nature of developments in the industry. Our article …

The Use Of Penalized Regression Analysis To Identify County-Level Demographic And Socioeconomic Variables Predictive Of Increased Covid-19 Cumulative Case Rates In The State Of Georgia, Holly L. Richmond, Joana Tome, Haresh Rochani, Isaac Chun-Hai Fung, Gulzar H. Shah, Jessica S. Schwind

Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Environmental Health Sciences Faculty Publications

Systemic inequity concerning the social determinants of health has been known to affect morbidity and mortality for decades. Significant attention has focused on the individual-level demographic and co-morbid factors associated with rates and mortality of COVID-19. However, less attention has been given to the county-level social determinants of health that are the main drivers of health inequities. To identify the degree to which social determinants of health predict COVID-19 cumulative case rates at the county-level in Georgia, we performed a sequential, cross-sectional ecologic analysis using a diverse set of socioeconomic and demographic variables. Lasso regression was used to identify variables …

Fall 2020

In The Loop

Studio CDM Documents Remote Initiatives; "Tom of Your Life" Film Release; Animation Jam Goes Virtual; DePaul Experimental Film Showcase 2020; Trackmania Soundtrack; Alumni Games at Pixel Pop; Alumnus Commemorates St. Vincent de Paul; Cybersecurity Champion Alina Kuzmenkova; Walking the Walk: Youth programs at CDM express DePaul’s Vincentian values; Fair Treatment: Three initiatives address racial inequity in health care; They've Got You Covered: A School of Design instructor leads a cottage industry of makers protecting essential workers from the novel coronavirus; Meet Would-Be Hot Topic Influencer Vera Drew; Data Detectives: CDM helps Chicago track the racial proportions of its COVID-19 cases

Do "Brassy" Sounding Musical Instruments Need Increased Safe Distancing Requirements To Minimize The Spread Of Covid-19?, Thomas R. Moore, Ashley E. Cannaday

Faculty Publications

Brass wind instruments with long sections of cylindrical pipe, such as trumpets and trombones, sound “brassy” when played at a fortissimo level due to the generation of a shock front in the instrument. It has been suggested that these shock fronts may increase the spread of COVID-19 by propelling respiratory particles containing the SARS-CoV-2 virus several meters due to particle entrainment in the low pressure area behind the shocks. To determine the likelihood of this occurring, fluorescent particles, ranging in size from 10–50 lm, were dropped into the shock regions produced by a trombone, a trumpet, and a shock tube. …

Mapping Disparities In Covid-19: Determining The Demographic, Economic, Educational, Housing, Quality Of Life, And Health Factors That Relate To Disparities In Covid-19 Infections And Deaths, Kate Stanley, Naima Shifa

Annual Student Research Poster Session

Background: Throughout the pandemic, minority groups, particularly African Americans and Hispanic/Latino Americans have experienced disproportionately high infection and death rates as compared to their white and Asian counterparts. Though this phenomenon could be attributed to high rates of pre-existing conditions in black and Hispanic communities, there are other underlying factors that cause such disparity. We set out to determine whether or not various demographic, economic, educational, health, housing, and quality of life indicators were correlated with higher rates of COVID-19 infection.

Methods: We used USAFacts COVID-19 data to select the 150 United States counties with the highest infection rates. We …

Investigating The Significance Of Aerosols In Determining The Coronavirus Fatality Rate Among Three European Countries, Wenzhao Li, Rejoice Thomas, Hesham El-Askary, Thomas Piechota, Daniele Struppa, Khaled A. Abdel Ghaffar

Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research

The coronavirus pandemic has not only gripped the scientific community in the search for a vaccine or a cure but also in attempts using statistics and association analysis—to identify environmental factors that increase its potency. A study by Ogen (Sci Total Environ 726:138605, 2020a) explored the possible correlation between coronavirus fatality and high nitrogen dioxide exposure in four European countries—France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Meanwhile, another study showed the importance of nitrogen dioxide along with population density in determining the coronavirus pandemic rate in England. In this follow-up study, Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) was introduced in conjunction with other variables …

A Review Of The Preclinical And Clinical Efficacy Of Remdesivir, Hydroxychloroquine, And Lopinavir-Ritonavir Treatments Against Covid-19, Dawid Maciorowski, Samir Z. El Idrissi, Yash Gupta, Brian J. Medernach, Michael B. Burns, Daniel P. Becker Ph.D., Ravi Durvasula, Prakasha Kempaiah

Chemistry: Faculty Publications and Other Works

In December of 2019, an outbreak of a novel coronavirus flared in Wuhan, the capital city of the Hubei Province, China. The pathogen has been identified as a novel enveloped RNA beta-coronavirus named severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The virus SARS-CoV-2 is associated with a disease characterized by severe atypical pneumonia known as coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19). Typical symptoms of this disease include cough, fever, malaise, shortness of breath, gastrointestinal symptoms, anosmia, and, in severe cases, pneumonia.¹ The high-risk group of COVID-19 patients includes people over the age of 60 years as well as people with existing cardiovascular …

The Impact Of A Six‐Year Climate Anomaly On The “Spanish Flu” Pandemic And Wwi, Alexander F. More, Christopher P. Loveluck, Heather Clifford, Michael J. Handley, Andrei V. Kurbatov, Michael Mccormick, Paul A. Mayewski

Teaching, Learning & Research Documents

Research study on the links between climate change and the 1918 flu pandemic.

Simulating Phase Transitions And Control Measures For Network Epidemics Caused By Infections With Presymptomatic, Asymptomatic, And Symptomatic Stages, Benjamin Braun, Başak Taraktaş, Brian Beckage, Jane Molofsky

Mathematics Faculty Publications

We investigate phase transitions associated with three control methods for epidemics on small world networks. Motivated by the behavior of SARS-CoV-2, we construct a theoretical SIR model of a virus that exhibits presymptomatic, asymptomatic, and symptomatic stages in two possible pathways. Using agent-based simulations on small world networks, we observe phase transitions for epidemic spread related to: 1) Global social distancing with a fixed probability of adherence. 2) Individually initiated social isolation when a threshold number of contacts are infected. 3) Viral shedding rate. The primary driver of total number of infections is the viral shedding rate, with probability of …

Call To Action: Sars-Cov-2 And Cerebrovascular Disorders (Cascade), Shahram Abootalebi, Benjamin M. Aertker, Mohammad Sobhan Andalibi, Negar Asdaghi, Ozlem Aykac, M. Reza Azarpazhooh, M. Cecilia Bahit, Kristian Barlinn, Hamidon Basri, Reza Bavarsad Shahripour, Anna Bersano, Jose Biller, Afshin Borhani-Haghighi, Robert D. Brown, Bruce Cv Campbell, Salvador Cruz-Flores, Deidre Anne De Silva, Mario Di Napoli, Afshin A. Divani, Randall C. Edgell, Johanna T. Fifi, Abdoreza Ghoreishi, Teruyuki Hirano, Keun Sik Hong, Chung Y. Hsu, Josephine F. Huang, Manabu Inoue, Amanda L. Jagolino, Moira Kapral, Hoo Fan Kee, Zafer Keser, Rakesh Khatri

Epidemiology and Biostatistics Publications

Background and purpose: The novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-Cov-2), now named coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), may change the risk of stroke through an enhanced systemic inflammatory response, hypercoagulable state, and endothelial damage in the cerebrovascular system. Moreover, due to the current pandemic, some countries have prioritized health resources towards COVID-19 management, making it more challenging to appropriately care for other potentially disabling and fatal diseases such as stroke. The aim of this study is to identify and describe changes in stroke epidemiological trends before, during, and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: This is an international, multicenter, hospital-based …

Coronavirus: Pandemics, Artificial Intelligence And Personal Data: How To Manage Pandemics Using Ai And What That Means For Personal Data Protection, Warren B. Chik

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This chapter discusses the hearing of essential and urgent court matters in the Singapore courts during the COVID-19 pandemic. On 27 march 2020, the Singapore judiciary notified courst users that remote hearings were to be implemented for certain types of hearings by means of video and telephone conferencing facilities. Court users were also provided with indicative lists of matters which might be considered essential and urgent.