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Conferences are an integral part of academia, providing researchers with the opportunity to collaborate and disseminate their research. Traditionally these conferences have been in-person, but COVID-19 restrictions and growing recognition of systematic barriers have led many academic societies to reimagine the conference format. Social media platforms are often used to promote and broadcast in-person academic conferences, so with the development of online conferences they have naturally become hosting platforms. For example, during the peak of COVID-19 restrictions, when in-person meetings were not possible, Twitter conferences, like the first Global Animal Behaviour Conference (#AnimBehav2021), provided a much needed platform to collaborate and share science. Recently, conferences have returned to an in-person format. In addition, a change in ownership of Twitter led to widespread restructuring of the Twitter workforce and misinformation management policies that resulted in a massive exodus of academics from the platform. During these changes, we organized and held the second Global Animal Behaviour Twitter Conference (#AnimBehav2023) in January 2023. In this paper, we report (1) how engagement in the Twitter conference changed as a result of return to in-person conferences and changes in Twitter ownership, (2) how the community views online conferences in general and Twitter conferences in particular and (3) reflect on how online conferences can be organized moving forward. Given the widespread benefits of and need for online conferences, we urge academic societies and researchers to continue systematically exploring these alternative conference formats to ensure inclusivity and accessibility in academic spaces. • We evaluated the reach of the #AnimBehav2023 Twitter Conference. • We assessed engagement after in-person conferences returned and Twitter changed. • Presenting at a Twitter conference has greater reach than in-person conferences. • Global participation remained high despite alternative options and Twitter changes. • Despite continued enthusiasm, Twitter may no longer be the suitable platform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonpharmaceutical interventions (NPI) are an important tool for countering pandemics such as COVID-19. Some are cheap; others disrupt economic, educational, and social activity. The latter force governments to balance the health benefits of reduced infection and death against broader lockdown-induced societal costs. A literature has developed modeling how to optimally adjust lockdown intensity as an epidemic evolves. This paper extends that literature by augmenting the classic SIR model with additional states and flows capturing decay over time in vaccine-conferred immunity, the possibility that mutations create variants that erode immunity, and that protection against infection erodes faster than protecting against severe illness. As in past models, we find that small changes in parameter values can tip the optimal response between very different solutions, but the extensions considered here create new types of solutions. In some instances, it can be optimal to incur perpetual epidemic waves even if the uncontrolled infection prevalence would settle down to a stable intermediate level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact investing literature largely focuses on private equity investing and overlooks the investments made through debt financing that actually dominate the market. To address this research gap, this paper investigates whether impact financing is associated with financial benefits. By using COVID-19 as an exogenous shock to China's stock market, this paper applies fixed effects panel data analysis with a difference-in-differences research design to provide robust empirical outcomes. The results reveal those financial institutions that better integrated environmental impacts into their financing process experienced positive stock return changes in response to the shock. This study answers the question of how well an impact scales. The findings suggest that impact financing is an effective model, as the impacts incorporated in the debt can be scaled up compared to impact investing funds with low volumes. Impact financing has enormous potential for financial institutions to engage in the green transition since they can derive pecuniary utility while delivering environmental impacts. The revelation of financial benefits also contributes to overcoming the lack of knowledge about impact financing and helps to remove the barriers that advance industry growth. • This paper studies whether impact financing is associated with financial benefits. • Financial firms that better integrate environmental impact in financing have positive stock return changes during COVID-19. • Financial firms can derive pecuniary utility from pursuing impact financing. • The findings suggest that impact financing can be an effective model to bring impact to a substantial scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Is there a "missing device" for respiratory personal protection? Does it exist an easy-to-use device, allowing extensive use in everyday settings by the population, maximizing tolerability and low visual and physical invasiveness protecting from a wide range of threats including airborne pathogens, hence including the particle range of fine and ultrafine particles? Looking at the recent past, in the urgency of finding ready-to-use solutions for the respiratory protection of the population during the outbreak of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, devices for occupational safety have been used, such as filtering face masks. These are devices intended for workers operating during work shifts in environments characterized by potential high risk, known a priori, often directly sensible; this makes wearers motivated to tolerate discomfort for a given period to face a localized risk, and safety managers determined to supervise compliance with usage specifications. Their use by general population has implied known shortcomings, such as weak compatibility with relational work and activities, low tolerability during prolonged use, low compliance with the proper use of the device, all of this lessening actual protection. The need for a new perspective has emerged, targeting effectiveness in whole daily life, rather than punctual efficacy. Nasal filters are promising candidates to protect individuals throughout the day during the most varied activities, but they lack a systematic definition as a device and as a product; it follows that the high complexity needed to reach an effective performance envelop is generally underestimated. By reviewing available literature, the present paper draws on the experience from the pandemic and infers systematic product specifications and characterization methods for a new, effective personal respiratory protection device; these specifications are compared with the stringent constraints associated with the endonasal applications and, based on air filtration state of the art, quantifies the need for technology disruption and outlining possible new development paths. • The SARS-COV-2 pandemic indicated that an adequately performing nasal filter has the potential to play a protective role in the population's daily life. • A nasal filter poses unique technological challenges due to its miniaturisation. • To trap allergens, pathogens and harmful particulate matter entering the nose, it is necessary to filter out particles classified as fine and ultrafine. • Fibrous mesh filters are inadequate to filter fine and ultrafine particles in a nasal filter as small as a nostril, due to their low filtration capacity and high breathing resistance. • The development of effective nasal filters in the field of fine and ultrafine particles requires the adoption of new technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the mortality impacts of ozone pollution in China and the moderating effects of two possible adaptation strategies. Using an instrument variable constructed from ozone concentrations of nearby upwind cities, we find that ozone pollution significantly increases all-cause, cardiovascular, and respiratory mortality. Healthcare service provision significantly decreases the impacts of ozone pollution on all-cause and cardiovascular mortality, but does not moderate the impact on respiratory mortality. The impact of ozone on RES mortality declines after COVID-19. Healthcare service provision also reduces the distributional impact of ozone across the elderly and younger groups. Projection shows that climate change would induce mortality costs of 0.08% of China's GDP through increasing ozone pollution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After the new Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) emerged in the end of January 2020 in Germany, a large number of individuals suffered from severe symptoms and eventually needed intensive care in hospitals. Due to the rapid spread of the disease, the number of deceased individuals increased as well, which is a motivation to prevent as many new infections as possible. Therefore, the knowledge about the current evolution of the virus spread is crucial to predict its future behavior and to react with suitable interventions. In this paper, the evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany is forecasted by a network-based inference method, in which the interactions of individuals are taken into account using a contact matrix. Then the results are compared to the predictions without considering a contact matrix as well as to the logistic regression, which shows the advantage of incorporating the contact matrix. Furthermore, the basic reproduction number of the pandemic in Germany using a neural network approach is estimated and used for further predictions of the evolution of COVID-19 in Germany. In order to mathematically model the different compartments of the population in the considered regions, the classical SIR model is employed. In this work, we deploy the LASSO (Least Absolute Shrinkage and Selection Operator) for the unknown parameter estimation. Furthermore, we calculate and illustrate the MAPE (Mean Absolute Percentage Error) of the estimations to show the accuracy of the predictions. The results include model parameter estimation and model validation, as well as the outbreak forecasting using network-informed algorithms. Our findings show that the network-inference based approach outperforms the logistic regression as well as the neural network approach and the SIR model calibration without a contact network. Furthermore according to the results, the network-inference based approach is particularly suitable for short- to mid-term predictions, even when there is not much information about the new disease. Moreover, the predictions based on the estimation of the reproduction number in Germany can yield more reliable results with increasing the availability of data, but could not outperform the network-inference based algorithm. • The evolution of the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany and Bavaria state is forecasted. • The approach takes into account the interactions of individuals via a contact matrix. • The Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE) of the estimation is calculated. • The prediction results are compared with the true data, NNs and logistic regression. • The predictions outperform the results of estimations without contact matrix. • The network-based approach is suitable for short- to mid-term predictions. • The predictions are informative for decision-makers to set protective measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]