The first case of 2019-nCoV pneumonia infection occurred in Wuhan, Hubei Province, South China Seafood Market in December 2019. As a group with a high probability of infection, health workers are faced with a certain degree of psychological challenges in the process of facing the epidemic. This study attempts to evaluate the impact of 2019-nCoV outbreak on the psychological state of Chinese health workers and to explore the influencing factors. During the period from 31 January 2020 to 4 February 2020, the ‘Questionnaire Star’ electronic questionnaire system was used to collect data. The 2019-nCoV impact questionnaire and The Impact of Event Scale (IES) were used to check the psychological status of health workers in China. A total of 442 valid data were collected in this study. Seventy-four (16.7%) male and 368 (83.3%) female individuals participated in this study. The average score of high arousal dimension was 5.15 (s.d. = 4.71), and the median score was 4.0 (IQR 2.0, 7.0). The average score of IES was 15.26 (s.d. = 11.23), and the median score was 13.5 (IQR 7.0, 21.0). Multiple regression analysis showed that there were critical statistical differences in high arousal scores among different gender groups (male 3.0 vs. female 5.0, P = 0.075). Whether being quarantined had significant statistical differences of IES scores (being quarantined 16.0 vs. not being quarantined 13.0, P = 0.021). The overall impact of the 2019-nCoV outbreak on health workers is at a mild level. Chinese health workers have good psychological coping ability in the face of public health emergencies.

This study developed a high-strength molded fiber material (HMFM) using pulp fibers, which could be a good substitute for plastic and solid wood materials. The surface composition, microstructure and thermal properties of HMFM were investigated by XPS, SEM and DSC, respectively. The SEM observations showed that the obvious adhesive substances and agglomeration appeared among fibers, and the inter-fiber contact area and binding tightness increased after the light-delignification. The XPS examination showed that the oxygen-rich composition on the outer surface of HMFM were reduced, and the outer surface coverage of lignin increased from 70.05% to 90.15% after the light-delignification. The DSC observation showed that the thermal stability of HMFM decreased, the temperature for the maximum rate of mass loss decreased from 370 °C to 345.6 °C, and the enthalpy value required for decomposition was reduced from 110.8 J/g to 68.0 J/g after the light-delignification. The mechanical and hydrophobic properties of HMFM were obviously improved after the light-delignification. When the content of lignin decreased from 24.9% to 11.45%, the density of HMFM increased by 6.0%, the tensile strength increased by 22.0%, the bending strength increased by 23.9%, and the water contact angle increased from 64.3°–72.7° to 80.8°–84.3°.

No abstract

The behavior of pressed poplar chemi-thermomechanical pulping (CTMP) without additive the focus of our study. Four CTMPs with decreasing lignin contents were prepared by the sodium chlorite/acetic acid method and the holocellulose, α-cellulose, pentosan and Klason lignin contents of the delignified CTMPs were determined. The surface composition, aggregation structure and microstructure of the delignified fibers were characterized by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscope (SEM), and the mechanical properties of the fiber material were investigated by means of tensile and bending tests. As shown by XPS, the lignin content of the Pr-CTMP surface layer firstly increased and then decreased as the lignin content of CTMP decreased. With the delignification time increased from 0 to 240 min, the crystallinity index (CrI) of CTMP increased from 60.1% to 65.7%. TheCrIof all CTMPs at different delignification degrees showed significant elevated values after hot-pressing. The fiber cell wall became thinner and the cells were flattened and thus elevated the contact area among fibers and, as a consequence, the density of material gradually increased at higher delignification degrees. The tensile strength increased by ca. 10%, when the lignin content decreased from 24.9% to 13.1%, and by ca. 53%, when the lignin content decreased from 13.1% to nearly zero. The bending strength increased with increasing delignification. When the removal rate of lignin increased from 47% to 54%, the bending strength increased from 101 to 122 MPa.

No abstract