Soil is an important environmental matrix to support the life of all organisms directly or indirectly. Despite being the ultimate sink for all pollutants, it has been neglected for long, which has negatively affected the quality of the soil. Disposal of pollutants has resulted in changes in properties of soils and introduction of toxicity into it. The presence of heavy metals, pesticides, polychlorinated biphenyls and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) affects all forms of life since these chemicals have associated toxicity, mutagenicity, and carcinogenicity. PAHs are typical pollutants of soil which result in alteration in grain size, porosity and water-holding capacity of soil and affect diversity/population of microbes adversely. Significant changes in permeability, volume, plasticity, etc., are also brought about resulting in poor quality of contaminated soils. Considering the toxicity and global prevalence of PAHs, remediation of contaminated soils has become a challenge. Therefore, it is important to understand the detailed mechanism of physical, chemical or biological changes in soil. Simultaneously, it becomes pertinent to identify the environmentally sustainable treatment options for remediation of contaminated sites. Whereas physical and chemical treatment methods are either cost, chemical, or energy prohibitive, the biological treatment is emerging as an efficient and effective option which employs microorganisms for mitigation. Microorganisms are known for their enzymecatalyzed catabolic activity when degradation/mineralization of a pollutant is aimed at and can prove useful in degradation of PAHs. Therefore, the present study reviews the effects of PAHs on soil properties, different remediation techniques and the role of microorganisms in remediating contaminated sites.

This paper aims to investigate the impact of environmental policy and training aspects on hotels' sustainability practices, as well as the impact of these practices on their environmental and financial performance. Based on survey data from 312 managers operating in tourism and hospitality industry, this study applies structural equation modelling. Empirical results reveal that hotels' environmental policy and training aspects are positively related to sustainability practices. Environmental communication has almost equal degree of impact on resource and energy conservation, whereas both resource conservation and energy conservation have a significant positive impact on both environmental and financial performance. The main findings of this research highlight that hotels are increasingly considering sustainability issues in their business models and strategies. These findings provide practical managerial implications for the development of tourism and hospitality industry in emerging countries.

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In December 2019, the Chinese city of Wuhan was the center of origin of a pneumonialike disease outbreak with an unknown causative pathogen. The CDC, China, managed to track the source of infection to a novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV; SARS-CoV-2) that shares approximately 79.6% of its genome with SARS-CoV. The World Health Organization (WHO) initially declared COVID-19 as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) and later characterized it as a global pandemic on March 11, 2020. Due to the novel nature of this virus, there is an urgent need for vaccines and therapeutics to control the spread of SARS-CoV-2 and its associated disease, COVID-19. Global efforts are underway to circumvent its further spread and treat COVID-19 patients through experimental vaccine formulations and therapeutic interventions, respectively. In the absence of any effective therapeutics, we have devised h bioinformatics-based approaches to accelerate global efforts in the fight against SARS-CoV-2 and to assist researchers in the initial phase of vaccine and therapeutics development. In this study, we have performed comprehensive meta-analyses and developed an integrative resource, "CoronaVR" (http://bioinfo.imtech.res.in/manojk/ coronavr/). Predominantly, we identified potential epitope-based vaccine candidates, siRNA-based therapeutic regimens, and diagnostic primers. The resource is categorized into the main sections "Genomes," "Epitopes," "Therapeutics," and Primers." The genome section harbors different components, viz, genomes, a genome browser, phylogenetic analysis, codon usage, glycosylation sites, and structural analysis. Under the umbrella of epitopes, subdivisions , namely cross-protective epitopes, B-cell (linear/discontinuous), T-cell (CD4 + /CD8 +), CTL, and MHC binders, are presented. The therapeutics section has different subsections like siRNA, miRNAs, and sgRNAs. Further, experimentally confirmed and designed diagnostic primers are earmarked in the primers section. Our study provided a set of shortlisted B-cell and T-cell (CD4 +