In December 2019, an outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 was identified in Wuhan, China. The World Health Organization (WHO) declared this outbreak a significant threat to international health. COVID-19 is highly infectious and can lead to fatal comorbidities especially acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Thus, fully understanding the characteristics of COVID-19-related ARDS is conducive to early identification and precise treatment. We aimed to describe the characteristics of COVID-19-related ARDS and to elucidate the differences from ARDS caused by other factors. COVID-19 mainly affected the respiratory system with minor damage to other organs. Injury to the alveolar epithelial cells was the main cause of COVID-19-related ARDS, and endothelial cells were less damaged with therefore less exudation. The clinical manifestations were relatively mild in some COVID-19 patients, which was inconsistent with the severity of laboratory and imaging findings. The onset time of COVID-19-related ARDS was 8-12 days, which was inconsistent with ARDS Berlin criteria, which defined a 1-week onset limit. Some of these patients might have a relatively normal lung compliance. The severity was redefined into three stages according to its specificity: mild, mild-moderate, and moderate-severe. HFNO can be safe in COVID-19-related ARDS patients, even in some moderate-severe patients. The more likely cause of death is severe respiratory failure. Thus, the timing of invasive mechanical ventilation is very important. The effects of corticosteroids in COVID-19-related ARDS patients were uncertain. We hope to help improve the prognosis of severe cases and reduce the mortality.

, we identified 5 patients who had PET/CT findings suspicious for COVID-19, but no symptom of infection. Results: the first three patients performed SARS-CoV-2 test in a COVID-dedicated centre, while the fourth and fifth in our Institution, in agreement with a new internal procedure. The SARS-CoV-2 test yielded positive results in all five patients. Conclusions: in this COVID-19 emergency, our task as nuclear medicine physicians is to be able to identify imaging findings suggestive of the disease and to manage patients without overload the hospital system.

AimsAn ongoing outbreak of 2019 novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) diseases (COVID-19) has been spreading in multiple countries. One of the reasons for the rapid spread is that the virus can be transmitted from infected individuals without symptoms. Revealing the pathological features of early phase COVID-19 pneumonia is important to the understanding of its pathogenesis. The aim of this study was to explore pulmonary pathology of early phase COVID-19 pneumonia in a patient with a benign lung lesion. Methods and resultsWe analyzed the pathological changes of lung tissue from a 55-year-old female patient with early phase SARS-CoV-2 infection. In this case, right lower lobectomy was performed for a benign pulmonary nodule. Detailed clinical, laboratory and radiological data were also described. This case was confirmed to have preoperative SARS-CoV-2 infection by real-time RT-PCR and RNA in situ hybridization on surgically removed lung tissues. Histologically, COVID-19 pneumonia was characterized by exudative inflammation. The closer to the visceral pleura, the more severe the exudation of monocytes and lymphocytes. Perivascular inflammatory infiltration, intraalveolar multinucleated giant cells, pneumocyte hyperplasia and intracytoplasmic viral-like inclusion bodies were seen. However, fibrinous exudate and hyaline membrane formation, which were typical pulmonary features of SARS pneumonia, were not evident in this case. Immunohistochemical staining results showed that an abnormal accumulation of CD4+ helper T lymphocytes and CD163+ M2 macrophages in the lung tissue. Accepted ArticleThis article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved ConclusionThe results highlighted the pulmonary pathological changes of early phase SARS-CoV-2 infection and suggested a role of immune dysfunction in the pathogenesis of COVID-19 pneumonia.

Objective An outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a public health emergency of international concern and poses a big challenge to medical staff and general public. The aim is to investigate psychological impact of COVID-19 epidemic on medical staff in different working posts in China, and to explore the correlation between psychological disorder and the exposure to COVID-19. Methods A multicenter WeChat-based online survey was conducted among medical staff in China between 26 February and 3 March 2020. Medical staff deployed to Hubei province from other provinces and medical staffs in different posts outside Hubei were selected to represent diverse exposure intensities to the threat of COVID-19. Anxiety, depression, sleep quality, stress and resilience were evaluated using scales including GAD-7, PHQ-9, PSQI, PSS-14, and CD-RISC-10. Latent class analysis was performed to identify potential staff requiring psychological support. Results A total of 274 respondents were included, who serving at 4 posts as follows, staff backing Hubei province, isolation wards outside Hubei, fever clinic and infectious disease department, and other departments outside Hubei. The total scores of anxiety, depression, sleep quality and stress were statistically different among groups, meanwhile an increasing tendency of anxiety, depression and sleep quality scores with increasing risk of exposure to COVID-19 was found (p < 0.05). Subsequent post-hoc analysis indicated that the staff backing Hubei had higher scores of anxiety, depression, sleep quality and perceived stress (adjusted p < 0.05). The combined prevalence of anxiety, depression and insomnia of staff backing Hubei reached as high as 38%. Four-class latent class analysis showed 3 categories of population (69.4%) may need psychological support. Conclusions High prevalence of anxiety, depression and insomnia exist in medical staff related to COVID-19. The higher the probability and intensity of exposure to COVID-19 patients, the greater the risk that medical staff will suffer from mental disorders, suggesting continuous and proper psychiatric intervention are needed.

This work investigates the vulnerability of Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) i-vector based speaker verification (SV) systems to adversarial attacks, and the transferability of adversarial samples crafted from GMM i-vector based systems to x-vector based systems. In detail, we formulate the GMM i-vector based system as a scoring function, and leverage the fast gradient sign method (FGSM) to generate adversarial samples through this function. These adversarial samples are used to attack both GMM i-vector and x-vector based systems. We measure the vulnerability of the systems by the degradation of equal error rate and false acceptance rate. Experimental results show that GMM i-vector based systems are seriously vulnerable to adversarial attacks, and the generated adversarial samples are proved to be transferable and pose threats to neural network speaker embedding based systems (e.g. x-vector systems).

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The clustering-triggered emission mechanism guides the rational design of nonaromatic polyurethanes with intrinsic emissions including room-temperature phosphorescence.

The pandemic of novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is posing a threat to all populations, especially those with underlying diseases like cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, or kidney diseases (1,2). Patients with kidney failure who require hemodialysis (HD) or peritoneal dialysis (PD) to sustain their lives often have accompanying damaged immune systems and multiple coexisting disorders; hence, there is a need for special care for these patients under the COVID-19 outbreak. Our recent study demonstrated a high prevalence and poor prognosis of COVID-19 in patients on HD (3), but its effect on patients on PD is still unknown. In this multicentered study, all 818 patients on maintenance PD from four large medical institutions in Wuhan, China, from January 1, 2020 to April 12, 2020 were included. To minimize contact with potential infectious environments of patients on PD, routine visits to PD centers were stopped and substituted by regular online follow-up by health care workers, and medicines and dialysates were provided through a home delivery service by volunteers. Medical staff members were trained to triage patients so that they attended the outpatient PD department or the fever clinic, or they stayed at home, depending on different conditions. Initial nucleic acid testing (3) and antibody testing (4) against severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) were performed in symptomatic patients on PD, and screening of the entire Wuhan population at the end of May 2020 identified no new patients among the PD population. Diagnosis of COVID-19 and disease severity were determined according to the COVID-19 guidelines of the National Health Commission of China (seventh edition). The sensitivity and specificity of the antibody assay were 87.3% and 100%, respectively. Clinical outcomes were monitored up to when the patient died or the date of April 22, 2020. Spent dialysates of infected patients were collected in designated containers, then disinfected with twice the volume of2.0 g/L hypochlorite solution for 2 hours, and drained into the sluice of the ward. Of 818 patients on PD, eight patients were diagnosed with COVID-19 during the studied period; the incidence rate of symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection was 2.44 per 1000 person-months. As shown in Table 1, the median age of patients with COVID-19 was similar to that of patients without COVID-19 on PD. Although no significant differences were detected, the median total Kt/V urea , ultrafiltration, and residual urine production H.