Charting a sustainable tomorrow: Advancing urban low-carbon economies through comprehensive evaluation and promotion.

With the world population growth, energy consumption and the rapid development of industrial economy, a large amount of carbon emissions has brought destruction and threats to the earth's environment on which human beings depend. The development of low-carbon economy has become the consensus of governments all over the world and has been vigorously advocated & promoted. This paper focuses on the top five global GDP nations in 2022: The United States, China, Japan, Germany, and Britain. A comprehensive evaluation index system of urban low-carbon economic development level is constructed from four dimensions: economic development level, environmental quality, energy consumption emission intensity and social development speed by using literature review and field interview. The evaluation measures are determined using the TOPSIS evaluation method with entropy weight and the grey relational model, providing a comprehensive assessment of the low-carbon economy's development level in these five countries." Judging from the comprehensive evaluation score, the overall development of low-carbon economy in American cities is in good condition and has reached the development standard of low-carbon economy; Germany and Japan rank second and third, and they are low-carbon economies. Britain ranks fourth in comprehensive evaluation, although it belongs to a low-carbon economy country, but there is still a certain gap with Germany and Japan; There is still a big gap between China and the other four countries. Based on the measurement and evaluation outcomes, it presents recommendations and strategies to foster the growth of low-carbon economies, offering valuable insights for the advancement of such economies across different nations. The research results guide countries all over the world to reduce carbon emissions in the process of economic development, protect the earth environment on which human beings depend, and make a better tomorrow for sustainable development.

Investigating capital flight in South Asian countries: The dual influence of terrorism and corruption.

This specific research initiative aims to intricately examine the intricate dynamics connecting terrorism, corruption, and capital flight within the context of South Asian economies, encompassing countries including Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. The principal objectives of this study entail a comprehensive investigation into the synergistic impacts of terrorism and corruption on the prevalence of capital flight. To realize these objectives, the study employs longitudinal data from 1990 to 2019, adopting the portfolio choice framework as its theoretical underpinning. In terms of methodology, the empirical inquiry uses the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimation technique. The empirical findings derived from this analysis distinctly establish a statistically noteworthy and positive correlation between terrorism, corruption, and the occurrence of capital flight across multiple South Asian nations. In light of these discerning outcomes, it is strongly recommended that the governments of South Asian countries prioritize and actively pursue the fortification of their institutional governance mechanisms. This strategic approach is deemed crucial in efficaciously counteracting the escalation of capital flight. Specifically, a targeted focus on augmenting institutional governance practices, fostering transparency, fortifying anti-corruption measures, and intensifying counterterrorism efforts could collectively contribute to reducing capital flight tendencies. By undertaking these recommendations, South Asian governments can foster an environment of enhanced economic stability, attractiveness for investment, and sustainable growth, thereby deterring the adverse impact of capital flight while concurrently combatting the underlying challenges posed by terrorism and corruption.

Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Success of Traditional Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs): An Investigation of the Footprints of Economic Crisis Attributable to COVID-19.

The COVID-19 pandemic created a significant economic decline and altered market behavior, forcing buyers and dealers online. The traditional local market merchants are not fully equipped with e-commerce business techniques and strategies, which is a barrier to their e-commerce behavior and success. The study aims to help small-medium firms adapt to an uncertain economic environment instead of reducing or shutting down business-like in Pakistan. From health to education, economy to domestic and social protection, various researches have been done since 2020. The researcher used primary data sources and did a Quantitative study after collecting the 240 samples size of data from the successful e-commerce players of Pakistan. The results confirm that customer satisfaction is essential for entrepreneurs to succeed, as customers were not satisfied with online shopping during COVID-19. Customer knowledge management (CKM) and job satisfaction (JS) are studied as potential and realized capacity variables. CKM act as a strategic asset to collect and assimilate the external customer knowledge. In contrast, satisfied employees act as a valuable asset that dynamically responds to changing customer needs and business environment by efficiently utilizing their knowledge and skills and reaching business success which is mirrored in customer satisfaction. Conclusive results enable practitioners to perceive the business success during economic crises in the organization's absorptive capacity.

Efficacy of Dry Heat Treatment against Clostridioides difficile Spores and Mycobacterium tuberculosis on Filtering Facepiece Respirators.

The COVID-19 pandemic has required novel solutions, including heat disinfection of personal protective equipment (PPE) for potential reuse to ensure availability for healthcare and other frontline workers. Understanding the efficacy of such methods on pathogens other than SARS-CoV-2 that may be present on PPE in healthcare settings is key to worker safety, as some pathogenic bacteria are more heat resistant than SARS-CoV-2. We assessed the efficacy of dry heat treatment against Clostridioides difficile spores and Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M. tb) on filtering facepiece respirator (FFR) coupons in two inoculums. Soil load (mimicking respiratory secretions) and deionized water was used for C. difficile, whereas, soil load and PBS and Tween mixture was used for M. tb. Dry heat treatment at 85 °C for 240 min resulted in a reduction equivalent to 6.0-log10 CFU and 7.3-log10 CFU in C. difficile spores inoculated in soil load and deionized water, respectively. Conversely, treatment at 75 °C for 240 min led to 4.6-log10 CFU reductions in both soil load and deionized water. C. difficile inactivation was higher by >1.5-log10 CFU in deionized water as compared to soil load (p < 0.0001), indicating the latter has a protective effect on bacterial spore inactivation at 85 °C. For M. tb, heat treatment at 75 °C for 90 min and 85 °C for 30 min led to 8-log10 reduction with or without soil load. Heat treatment near the estimated maximal operating temperatures of FFR materials (which would readily eliminate SARS-CoV-2) did not achieve complete inactivation of C. difficile spores but was successful against M. tb. The clinical relevance of surviving C. difficile spores when subjected to heat treatment remains unclear. Given this, any disinfection method of PPE for potential reuse must ensure the discarding of any PPE, potentially contaminated with C. difficile spores, to ensure the safety of healthcare workers.

Does technology innovation matter for environmental pollution? Testing the pollution halo/haven hypothesis for Asian countries.

China's GDP grew 9% annually during the end of the twentieth century. This economic growth degrades China's ecology, making it the world's greatest polluter. This position forced China to invest in developing nations and to take advantage of low-cost labor and increased pollution quotas from the World Trade Organization (WTO) to meet sustainable development objectives without environmental harm. The significance of this study is, first, this study examines the influence of Chinese outward foreign direct investment, gross domestic product, trade openness, technological innovation, and energy consumption on carbon emissions in Asian countries (Turkey, Pakistan, the Philippines, Singapore, India, Indonesia, and Cambodia). Secondly, the panel autoregressive distributed lag cointegration (ARDL) technique was used on data from 2000 to 2020 to investigate the pollution halo/haven hypothesis and environmental Kuznets curve hypothesis for south Asian nations. This analysis demonstrated that Chinese outbound foreign direct investment increases carbon emissions and confirms the pollution halo concept. Except for India and Pakistan, these nations show a U-shaped link between Chinese foreign direct investment and carbon emissions. So, policy implications recommended by the results of this study are foreign direct investment inflows with modern and ecofriendly technological transfer and enhancement in labor, and conservational management practices will benefit emerging countries to attain their sustainable development goals.

Effects of the green supply chain management practices on firm performance and sustainable development.

The idea of sustainable development and green supply chain management is considered at the underlying stage in the research and academic fields, particularly in the rising economies of Asia. This research investigates the persuasive force of the firm's green supply chain management practices with the mediating part of the competitiveness and investment recovery. Data was collected from the 12 ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 leather industries based in Pakistan. We distributed the 350 questionnaires at 12 leather industries, and the questionnaire was also transferred on Google Forms, and 50 questionnaire mail to different individuals who work in leather industries of other cities of Pakistan; out of 350 questionnaires, 183 were filled, and the remaining questionnaires were incomplete, and out of 50 emails, we get the response of 33 emails, and evaluated the model of this study by using the partial least square structural equation modeling PLS-SEM. We interact with the employees of leather industries and try to understand how they are following the green practices in their firms. This research uses resource dependence theory as the theoretical base. This study elaborates how the organization's behavior is affected by the external resources of the corporation. The actual outcomes uncover that green supply chain management activities positively impacting the firm's performance, where competitiveness and investment recovery play a mediating role among intra-organizational green practices.

Fresh insight through the VAR approach to investigate the effects of fiscal policy on environmental pollution in Pakistan.

This study explores the impact of fiscal policy on environmental pollution, employing the vector autoregressive (VAR) model on annual data from 1976 to 2018 in Pakistan. We estimate the effect of total expenditure, total revenue, education expenditures, health expenditures, and other dynamic determinants such as gross domestic product (GDP), private investment, market rate, and crude oil price on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in particular. Further, this study creates impulse response functions to check the fiscal shocks, coordinating with five scenarios of public expenditures, segregated into government revenue, and education and health expenditures. The outcomes indicate that government spending in the public sectors (education and health) had a diminishing effect on CO2 emissions, whereas government revenue that was collected from taxes improved economic growth but at a cost of environmental pollution. In Pakistan, a fiscal policy scenario has been implemented that increases government expenditures to alleviate the effects of CO2 emissions. Therefore, policymakers should provide the right direction for the feasible distribution of resources in every public sector through a powerful structure, which will ultimately reduce the overall level of environmental deficit.

Comparison of the BBL mycobacteria growth indicator tube, the BACTEC 12B, and solid media for the isolation of Mycobacterium bovis.

We compared different methods for their ability to isolate Mycobacterium bovis from tissue samples from animals with lesions resembling bovine tuberculosis. In the first trial, M. bovis was isolated from 86 of 200 tissue samples that were cultured using 2 liquid media, BACTEC 12B and BBL mycobacteria growth indicator tube (MGIT), and a solid medium, Middlebrook 7H11 supplemented with pyruvate (7H11P). M. bovis was isolated from 2 samples with MGIT but not BACTEC 12B. M. bovis was isolated from 9 samples with BACTEC but not MGIT; these 9 samples came from the North Canterbury/Marlborough region of New Zealand. The proportion of tissues from which M. bovis was isolated with BACTEC 12B or MGIT and the mean time for isolation was different for samples from the North Canterbury/Marlborough region but not the rest of New Zealand. In the second trial, M. bovis was isolated from 401 of 1,033 tissues that were cultured using MGIT, Middlebrook 7H9 broth, or solid 7H11P. The proportion of isolates of M. bovis and the mean time for their isolation with MGIT was different for the North Canterbury/Marlborough and the rest of New Zealand. The reason for this difference was not determined but may be related to the genotypes present in this region. Genotyping using variable number tandem repeats (VNTRs) of 197 isolates of M. bovis revealed that the 44 isolates from North Canterbury/Marlborough were represented by 2 closely related VNTR types that were not found in 153 isolates from the remainder of New Zealand.

Immunogenicity of DNA modified by singlet oxygen: implications in systemic lupus erythematosus and cancer.

Activation, proliferation and programmed cell death of immune cells are dependent on controlled production of ROS (reactive oxygen species). However, under chronic inflammatory conditions, large amounts of ROS generated are a major cause of many human degenerative diseases. ROS are known to cause DNA damage, leading to strand breaks, base damage and conformational changes. (1)O(2) (singlet oxygen), being one of the most potent ROS, is known to selectively react with the deoxyguanosine moiety in DNA. The effect of (1)O(2), generated by UV irradiation of Methylene Blue, on plasmid DNA was studied by UV spectroscopy and electrophoresis. The antibodies raised against the modified DNA in experimental animals induced a high titre. IgG was purified on a Protein A-Sepharose matrix, and oxidative lesions in DNA of SLE (systemic lupus erythematosus) and cancer patients were probed using anti-((1)O(2)-plasmid DNA) [anti-((1)O(2)-modified plasmid DNA)]. The DNA isolated from the sera of SLE and cancer patients was found to inhibit anti-(1)O(2)-plasmid DNA IgG activity, reiterating the results obtained with serum samples. These binding results indicate the presence of oxidative lesions in the SLE and cancer patients' genome caused by excessive production of ROS. The results confirm the damaging effect ROS has on DNA. The excessive production of reactive oxygen intermediates may be one of the factors responsible for the induction of autoimmune response seen in SLE and cancer.

Plasmid DNA acquires immunogenicity on exposure to singlet oxygen.

In the present study, the effect of singlet oxygen (1O2) (generated by ultraviolet (UV) irradiation of methylene blue) on plasmid DNA has been analyzed by UV spectroscopy, fluorescence spectroscopy, and S1 nuclease digestibility. Both native and 1O2-modified plasmid DNA were treated with a number of restriction enzymes to map out the sites damaged by 1O2. It was also observed that, on exposure to 1O2, native plasmid DNA that is non-immunogenic acquired the ability to elicit an immune response in experimental animals. However, the induced antibodies exhibited appreciable cross reactivity with various polynucleotides and nucleic acids. The data indicate that the antibodies, though cross-reactive, preferentially bind 1O2-modified epitopes on plasmid DNA. Gel retardation assay further substantiated the enhanced recognition of 1O2-modified plasmid DNA over the native form. The antibodies developed were then subjected to competition ELISA with sera from various diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis, and cancer. These results suggest that upon exposure of DNA to 1O2, neo-epitopes are generated, which may be one of the factors for the induction of circulating autoantibodies in the three diseases.