Browsing by Subject "COVID-19 pandemic"

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Embargo
Experimental assessment of impact of different ventilation modes on cognitive and academic performance: a study based on classrooms in Türkiye
(Elsevier Ltd, 2024-06-01) Afacan, Yasemin
In closed spaces, such as classrooms, poor ventilation, indoor exposure to CO2, and non-optimal humidity and temperature conditions are global concerns associated with health and performance. This study experimentally assesses the effects of different ventilation modes on the air quality parameters and cognitive and academic performances of 120 s-grade primary school children in two buildings with different characteristics during heating and non-heating seasons. Based on a retrospective analysis of 455 primary schools in Turkiye during 2017-2018, the study was conducted in six classrooms of the two representative school buildings. Indoor air quality monitoring and performance (of the students) assessment was carried out from December 9, 2019, to September 28, 2020. The non-heating season measurements were conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to our findings, the traditionally constructed school without energy efficiency regulations exhibited the worse scenario. The success percentages of arithmetic attention in both traditional and natural ventilation modes were significantly lower in the nonheating season than in the heating season, which indicates the impact of using a facemask inside a classroom during cognitive tasks. This study demonstrated that the heating season is more critical than the non-heating season in terms of ventilation of closed spaces.
Open Access
Global air quality and COVID-19 pandemic: do we breathe cleaner air?
(Taiwan Association for Aerosol Research,Taiwan Qijiao Yanjiu Xuehui, 2021-02-08) Torkmahalleh, M. A.; Akhmetvaliyeva, Z.; Omran, A. D.; Omran, F. D.; Kazemitabar, M.; Naseri, M.; Motahareh, N.; Hamed, S.; Malekipirbazari, Milad; Adotey, E. K.; Soudabeh, G.; Neda, E.; Sabanov, S.; Alastuey, A.; Andrade, M. F.; Buonanno, G.; Carbone, S.; Cárdenas-Fuentes, D. E.; Cassee, F. R; Dai, Q.; Henríquez, A.; Hopke, P. K.; Keronen, P.; Khwaja, H. A.; Kim, J.; Kulmala, M.; Kumar, P.; Kushta, J.; Kuula, J.; Massagué, J.; Mitchell, T.; Mooibroek, D.; Morawska, L.; Niemi, J. V.; Ngagine, S. H.; Norman, M.; Oyama, B.; Oyola, P.; Öztürk, F.; Petäjä, T.; Querol, X.; Rashidi, Y.; Reyes, F.; Ross-Jones, M.; Salthammer, T.; Savvides, C.; Stabile, L.; Sjöberg, K.; Söderlund, K.; Raman, R. S.; Timonen, H.; Umezawa, M.; Viana, M.; Xie, S.
The global spread of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has challenged most countries worldwide. It was quickly recognized that reduced activities (lockdowns) during the Coronavirus Disease of 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic produced major changes in air quality. Our objective was to assess the impacts of COVID-19 lockdowns on groundlevel PM2.5, NO2, and O3 concentrations on a global scale. We obtained data from 34 countries, 141 cities, and 458 air monitoring stations on 5 continents (few data from Africa). On a global average basis, a 34.0% reduction in NO2 concentration and a 15.0% reduction in PM2.5 were estimated during the strict lockdown period (until April 30, 2020). Global average O3 concentration increased by 86.0% during this same period. Individual country and continent-wise comparisons have been made between lockdown and business-as-usual periods. Universally, NO2 was the pollutant most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. These effects were likely because its emissions were from sources that were typically restricted (i.e., surface traffic and non-essential industries) by the lockdowns and its short lifetime in the atmosphere. Our results indicate that lockdown measures and resulting reduced emissions reduced exposure to most harmful pollutants and could provide global-scale health benefits. However, the increased O3 may have substantially reduced those benefits and more detailed health assessments are required to accurately quantify the health gains. At the same, these restrictions were obtained at substantial economic costs and with other health issues (depression, suicide, spousal abuse, drug overdoses, etc.). Thus, any similar reductions in air pollution would need to be obtained without these extensive economic and other consequences produced by the imposed activity reductions.
Open Access
Practices of knowledge exchange in the context of the COVID-19 Pandemic
(Springer, 2023-11-20) Peschke, Lutz; Gyftopoulos, S.; Kapusuzoğlu, A.; Folkvord, F.; Gümüş Ağca, Yasemin; Kaldoudi, E.; Drosatos, G.; Ceylan, N. B.; Pecchia, L.; Güneş Peschke, S.
This paper contributes to a better understanding of a system of pandemic knowledge exchanges. Therefore, three different case studies conducted in Germany, Greece, and Turkiye and executed in multiple countries were analyzed in the context of Mode 3 knowledge production and the Quintuple Helix system. While the Quintuple Helix system describes the knowledge exchange processes between the systems of science, economy, politics, public, and natural environment of societies for sustainable innovation processes, Mode 3 emphasizes the importance of a creative environment for research and innovation. The COVID-19 pandemic revealed that the need for knowledge exchange with the media-based public increased dramatically. In both models, Mode 3 and the Quintuple Helix but also in the Design Thinking approach, the creative environment incorporates the knowledge of the media-based public. Nonetheless, the reality of the public is constructed as media reality. Therefore, a mix of evidence-based and opinion-based knowledge is produced and transferred during knowledge exchange in the context of innovation processes including public engagement. It could be understood that the mediating entities media and general practitioners have a similar double function in the context of knowledge exchange with the public during the pandemic times. The results reveal the big need for knowledge communication and exchange platforms which on the one hand strengthen citizen participation by transforming opinion-based into evidence-based content. On the other hand, reach the status of a global standard medium for the pandemic knowledge exchange accepted by all stakeholders of the Quintuple Helix. This generates a shared-knowledge environment with a gain for all systems of the Quintuple Helix during the sustainable innovation processes. © 2023, The Author(s).