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Globally, COVID-19 pandemic has affected more than 214 countries across the world, creating uncertainty and affecting every institution and individual. The organisations recognise the need of agile projects that may offer several benefits including faster deployments, adaptability and best fit alignment to fulfill the customer needs. Implementing agile projects is the key to survive in the post pandemic situation, but emerging economies have limited scope for implementation. The present study determines the critical factors that restricts implementation of agile projects in emerging economies. The critical factors are identified from literature and validated by experts. The validated critical factors are further assessed to identify the cause-and-effect relationship using Fuzzy Decision-Making Trial and Laboratory (F-DEMATEL) method. The results of the study posit ‘Skepticism towards the new way of working’ is the most significant causal factor affecting other factors. This study is an attempt to help project managers to consider the significant factors for agile project implementation in post pandemic situation. The project managers may be benefitted from this study by considering these factors to manage challenges for agile project implementation in emerging economies. This study contributes to assess the influencing and the influenced challenging factors for agile project implementation.

Chest computed tomography (CT) is a valuable tool for the diagnosis and management of COVID-19. However, the manual segmentation of COVID-19 lesions from CT images is time-consuming and labor-intensive. In this paper, we propose a novel deep learning approach for COVID-19 lung CT image segmentation. Our approach is based on a U-Net architecture with a novel attention mechanism. The attention mechanism allows the model to focus on the most discriminative features in the CT images, which improves the segmentation accuracy. We evaluated our approach on a dataset of 1,000 CT images from COVID-19 patients. The results showed that our approach achieved a dice coefficient of 0.85 and a Jaccard index of 0.74. This is a significant improvement over previous methods. Our approach has the potential to be used as a clinical tool for the diagnosis and management of COVID-19.

Recombinant SARS-CoV-2 trimeric spike protein produced by mammalian cell culture is a potential candidate for a COVID-19 vaccine. However, this protein is much larger than most typical biopharmaceutical proteins and its large-scale manufacture is therefore challenging. Particularly, its purification using resin-based chromatography is difficult as the diffusive transport of this protein to and from its binding site within the pores of the stationary phase particles is slow. Therefore, very low flow rates need to be used during binding and elution, and this slows down the purification process. Also, due to its large size, the binding capacity of this protein on resin-based media is low. Membrane chromatography is an efficient and scalable technique for purifying biopharmaceuticals. The predominant mode of solute transport in a membrane is convective and hence it is considered better than resin-based chromatography for purifying large proteins. In this paper, we propose a membrane chromatography-based purification method for fast and scalable manufacture of recombinant SARS-CoV-2 trimeric spike protein. A combination of cation exchange z² laterally-fed membrane chromatography and size exclusion chromatography was found to be suitable for obtaining a homogeneous spike protein sample from mammalian cell culture supernatant. The proposed method is both fast and scalable and could be explored as a method for manufacturing vaccine grade spike protein.

Abstract With increased virtualization of high education given the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) as well as in response to the Covid-19 pandemic concern has been raised over the implication of this on the job satisfaction of academics. The aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of the support given to academics in ensuring job satisfaction of the academics working online. A quantitative methodology which was based on the collection of data using a questionnaire given to academics was adopted. The results indicated that sixty percent (60.4%) of the respondents had received some support by university management. Most support for the virtual environment was provided through workshops and training. However, the support given was not consistent with the other finding that eighty six percent (86%) of the academics had indicated that the major factor affecting their job satisfaction was connectivity and lack of cooperation of students (42.6%). It is encouraged that HEIs should strengthen their relationships and cooperation with supportive institutions for virtualisation such as ESKOM as well as the private and public community.

This Edited book ―Advance Research in Social Science and Management‖ is based on the proceedings the ―International Conference on Research Methodology (ICRM-2022)‖, Jointly Organized by Dr. Shakuntala Misra National Rehabilitation University, Lucknow, & Science Tech Institute, Lucknow (Run by: Manraj Kuwar Singh Educational Society, U.P. India), during Oct 28 -30, 2022. The aim of this conference was to bring together the young as well as experienced researchers on one platform to discuss the recent findings in the aforesaid areas of Social Science and Management. After peer reviewing process, relevant research papers were finally included in this book as chapters. The present volume is based on the contributions made by various authors on different important topic of “Advance Research in Social Science and Management” and introduces the subject along the following topics: The Impact of COVID-19 on Tourism Industry in Kerala; A Study on the Impact of Human Resources Management in Higher Education; Factors Hindering the Economic Empowerment of Sri Lankan Tamil Camp Living Refugees in Tamil Nadu, India; The Changing Pattern of Demand for E-Banking Services in India; Government Schemes towards MSMEs during Pandemic: An Analysis; A Study of Research Methodology; GST For Small Traders; Customer Satisfaction of SBI Life Insurance Products: A Study with Reference to Trivandrum City; Impact of E-Commerce on Indian Economy in the Modern Era; Corporate Social Responsibility, Environment and Firm‘s Financial Performance: A Literature Review; A survey on the knowledge of general public about Digital Currencies and Cryptocurrencies and Positive and Negative Impact of GST: A Study among Retailers in Kollam district.

This Edited book “Advance Research in Medical and Life Sciences Volume-2” is based on the proceedings of the “International Conference on Research Methodology (ICRM-2022)”, Jointly Organized by Dr. Shakuntala Misra National Rehabilitation University, Lucknow, & Science Tech Institute, Lucknow (Run by: Manraj Kuwar Singh Educational Society, U.P. India), during Oct 28 -30, 2022. The aim of this conference was to bring together the young as well as experienced researchers on one platform to discuss the recent findings in the aforesaid areas of Medical and Life Sciences. After peer reviewing process, relevant research papers were finally included in this book as chapters. The present volume is based on the contributions made by various authors on different important topic of “Advance Research in Medical and Life Sciences Volume-2” and introduces the subject along the following topics: Comparison of Clinical Tests and Electrodiagnostic Testing in the Diagnosis of Pregnancy Related Carpal Tunnel Syndrome; A descriptive study to assess the knowledge and expressed practice regarding prevention of osteoporosis among women in selected communities, Ambala, (Haryana); Aprepitant versus Olanzapine as add-on Therapy for Prophylaxis of Chemotherapy Induced Nausea and Vomiting (CINV) in Breast Cancer Patients: A Prospective Observational Study; Gender Disparity in Overall Health Measures during COVID 19 Era; Treating Urinary Incontinence among females with telerehabilitation -A systematic review; A comparative study on the efficacy of teucrium marum verum mother tincture and its 30 potency in the treatment of nasal polyps; Physical and Psychological impact of Smartphone Usage during COVID lockdown- A survey review; and Study to assess the knowledge of Education Professionals about Uses of Digital Education Technology in Higher Educational Institutions during COVID-19 Lockdown in India