Summary

On 11 March 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, and the disease now affects nearly every country and region. Caused by SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 continues nearly 18 months later to present significant challenges to health systems and public health in both hemispheres, as well as the economies of every country. The morbidity and mortality of the infection caused by SARS-CoV-2 has been significant, and various waves of disease outbreaks initially overwhelmed many hospitals and clinics and continue to do so in many countries. This influences everyone, and public health countermeasures have been dramatic in terms of their impact on employment, social systems, and mental health. This entry collection aims to gather diverse fields about COVID-19, including in epidemiology, public health, medicine, genetics, systems biology, informatics, data science, engineering, sociology, anthropology, nursing, environmental studies, statistics, and psychology.

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Entries
Topic Review
Vitamin C and Kidney Injury
Vitamin C is an important micronutrient and antioxidant for the human body.  In animal experiments, it can protect the kidneys from injury caused by nephrotoxic drugs.  A major feature of COVID-19 and similar viral infection is the cytokine storm, which causes a rise of multiple cytokines in the blood. Those cytokines result in the oxidative stress in cells, which leads to damage to organs and tissues, including the kidneys.  Here, we reviewed the current literature on kidney damage in COVID-19 patients and analyzed the possible etiology and mechanisms.  In addition, we summarized the potential use of vitamin C in preventing kidney damage in experimental animal models and the underlying mechanisms.  Vitamin C appears to protect and facilitate recovery of kidneys from injuries derived from excessive of oxidative stress, a feature of cytokines storm in people with COVID-19.  Finally, we would like to argue that vitamin C may be protective of the renal functions in COVID-19 patients with pre-existing kidney diseases. 
  • 997
  • 26 Jul 2021
Topic Review
Sonic Environment and Noise Mitigations
The pandemic has impacted every facet of our life, society, and environment. It has also affected both the requirement and challenges for acoustic research and applications. The present article attempts to present a summary of the impact of COVID-19 on several aspects of acoustics, from the changes in the sonic environment due to reduced human and industrial activities to natural ventilation requirements for mitigating the transmission of coronavirus while mitigating noise, and, more importantly, discusses the potential impacts and challenges for acoustics in the post-COVID-19 era. The present study specifically examines the effects of COVID-19 on the sonic environment, the acoustic treatment by considering the need for constant disinfection, the noise control on construction and neighborhood activities in response to an increased number of people working from home, and the need for having natural ventilation while mitigating noise at home and offices. 
  • 759
  • 26 Jul 2021
Topic Review
Walking Needs and COVID-19
More than 150 cities around the world have expanded emergency cycling and walking infrastructure to increase their resilience in the face of the COVID 19 pandemic. This tendency toward walking has led it to becoming the predominant daily mode of transport that also contributes to significant changes in the relationships between the hierarchy of walking needs and walking behaviour. These changes need to be addressed in order to increase the resilience of walking environments in the face of such a pandemic.
  • 508
  • 26 Jul 2021
Topic Review
Fungal Co-Infections in COVID-19 Patients
Fungal co-infections are reported in severely ill COVID-19 patients admitted to the ICU, with a higher rate of incidence for aspergillosis followed by candidemia, as observed from our literature analysis. Fungal co-infections may increase disease severity and lead to more severe outcomes. 
  • 753
  • 16 Jul 2021
Topic Review
COVID-19 and People Management
COVID-19 has brought an unexpected need for change within organizations, particularly regarding human resource management. The nature of this global crisis has meant that these processes remain under-systematized. The aim of this study, which uses an exploratory design and mixed-methods analysis, is to contribute to describing the changes in human resource management practices and processes that resulted from this pandemic and to present the outlook of human resource managers for the future. One hundred and thirty-six Portuguese companies participated in the study, with the answers provided by their human resource managers. Results show that the main changes have occurred in the processes of work and safety, training, work organization, recruitment and selection, induction and onboarding, and communication. The profiles that emerged showed an association between the level of change and size of the organization. There was an increase in the use of teleworking and layoffs, and a positive assessment of the organizations’ level of preparation and adaptation to this crisis. Human resource managers reported that the most evident changes in the future will be associated with the use of technology, teleworking, and work organization. These findings are of the upmost importance, as human resource managers are essential pillars in the adjustment of the organizations to this pandemic situation. 
  • 548
  • 10 Jan 2022
Topic Review
Thirteen Potential TMPRSS2 Inhibitors
We identified a set of 13 approved or clinically investigational drugs with positively charged guanidinobenzoyl and/or aminidinobenzoyl groups, including the experimentally verified TMPRSS2 inhibitors Camostat and Nafamostat. Molecular docking suggested that the guanidinobenzoyl or aminidinobenzoyl group in all the drugs could form putative salt bridge interactions with the side-chain carboxyl group of Asp435 located in the S1 pocket of TMPRSS2. Molecular dynamics simulations further revealed the high stability of the putative salt bridge interactions over long-time simulations. These results suggest that the proposed compounds, in addition to Camostat and Nafamostat, could be effective TMPRSS2 inhibitors for COVID-19 treatment by occupying the S1 pocket with the hallmark positively charged groups.
  • 448
  • 12 Jul 2021
Topic Review
SARS-CoV-2 Emerging Variants
Despite the slow evolutionary rate of SARS-CoV-2 relative to other RNA viruses, its massive and rapid transmission during the COVID-19 pandemic has enabled it to acquire significant genetic diversity since it first entered the human population. This led to the emergence of numerous variants, some of them recently being labeled “variants of concern” (VOC), due to their potential impact on transmission, morbidity/mortality, and the evasion of neutralization by antibodies elicited by infection, vaccination, or therapeutic application. The potential to evade neutralization is the result of diversity of the target epitopes generated by the accumulation of mutations in the spike protein. While three globally recognized VOCs (Alpha or B.1.1.7, Beta or B.1.351, and Gamma or P.1) remain sensitive to neutralization albeit at reduced levels by the sera of convalescent individuals and recipients of several anti-COVID19 vaccines, the effect of spike variability is much more evident on the neutralization capacity of monoclonal antibodies. The newly recognized VOC Delta or lineage B.1.617.2, as well as locally accepted VOCs (Epsilon or B.1.427/29-US and B1.1.7 with the E484K-UK) are indicating the necessity of close monitoring of new variants on a global level. The VOCs characteristics, their mutational patterns, and the role mutations play in immune evasion are summarized in this review. 
  • 409
  • 12 Jul 2021
Topic Review
RBD Protein Vaccine is Safer
Human genome contains 8% or more retrotransposons acquired in the past from RNA viral infections. Any mRNA or cDNA antigenic vaccines have the opportunity to enter into the vaccine recipients’ somatic as well as germline cells. The SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome)-CoV (Coronavirus)-2 S(spike)-protein mRNA/cDNA antigenic vaccines, currently being used, are only antigenic. They have to go through the human recipients’ cellular processes to produce antigens that will stimulate antibody production against SARS-CoV-2, responsible for COVID (Coronavirus Disease) -19. There are scientific evidence supporting mRNA and cDNA antigenic vaccines to cause homologous and heterologous recombination into the somatic cell DNA of the vaccine recipients. On the contrary, the SARS-CoV-2 RBD-protein (antigen) vaccine, will directly stimulate antibody production against SARS-CoV-2, and thus against COVID-19.  Hence, the SARS-CoV-2 RBD-protein vaccine is a safer, fast acting, and effective vaccine against COVID-19. It can be applied to immune compromised individuals.
  • 410
  • 14 Jul 2021
Topic Review
Extracellular Vesicles and COVID-19-Related Thrombosis
Extracellular vesicles (EVs) is a term used to describe a heterogeneous group of vesicles located in different types of tissues or biological fluids such as blood, urine, saliva, breast milk and the amniotic, cerebrospinal, synovial, seminal fluid and bronchial lavage. The role of EVs in infectious diseases has been particularly controversial over the last years. It has been shown that they can influence the recipient cell activities by transporting viral proteins, RNA, DNA and receptors from infected cells to healthy cells and thus increasing the spread of virus infection. Thus, EVs may serve as potential predictors of COVID-19 severity.  Importantly, due to their stability in the circulation, low immunogenicity, biocompatibility and biodegradation, the EVs are considered suitable for designing new therapeutic strategies or delivery systems for a vaccine against the SARS CoV-2 infection 
  • 640
  • 02 Jul 2021
Topic Review
Plant Biotechnology based COVID19-vaccines
Many pathogenic viral pandemics have caused threats to global health; the COVID-19 pandemic is the latest. Its transmission is growing exponentially all around the globe, putting constraints on the health system worldwide. A novel coronavirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), causes this pandemic. Many candidate vaccines are available at this time for COVID-19, and there is a massive international race underway to procure as many vaccines as possible for each country. However, due to heavy global demand, there are strains in global vaccine production. The use of a plant biotechnology-based expression system for vaccine production also represents one part of this international effort, which is to develop plant-based heterologous expression systems, virus-like particles (VLPs)-vaccines, antiviral drugs, and a rapid supply of antigen-antibodies for detecting kits and plant origin bioactive compounds that boost the immunity and provide tolerance to fight against the virus infection. This review will look at the plant biotechnology platform that can provide the best fight against this global pandemic.
  • 826
  • 04 Aug 2021
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