No abstract

We recommend that more well-controlled studies have to be conducted in the future to address the short- and long-term effects of physical exercise on alleviating depression. Efforts should be focused on unveiling the differential effects of mindful and non-mindful exercises on depression and the underlying mechanisms of their therapeutic action.

This paper aims to review the current practice in cost engineering, identify the scientific research challengesand suggest future direction of this area research. It has been developed based on both the outputs from the academic forum of cost engineering at Cranfield University in the UK and the state of art on cost engineering research. The promising future research subjects in Cost Engineering have been identified and discussed in detail such as understanding the factors impacting design rework; cost estimation using CAPP information; estimating the uncertainties through life cycle; and developing uncertainty modelling methods.

Acupressure seems to be effective in providing immediate relief of pretreatment anxiety among adults, and has a medium effect size. However, conflicting results were found for the improvements on physiological indicators. More rigorous reporting, including allocation concealment procedure, is needed to strengthen the results.

Purpose The concrete industry faces challenges to create concrete mix designs that reduce negative environmental impacts but also maintain high performance. This has led to 'greener' cementitious materials being developed which can decrease the use of traditional Portland cement (PC). This study intended to carry out a 'cradle-to-gate' life cycle assessment (LCA) on concrete mix designs containing different cementitious blends. Methods The aim of this study was to obtain the overall environmental impact, with a particular focus on carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions of three concrete mix designs: CEM I (100 % PC content), CEM II/B-V (65 % PC content, 35 % Fly Ash (FA) content) and CEM III/B (30 % PC content, 70 % ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBS) content). Evaluations of the three concrete mixes were performed using 'SimaPro 8' LCA software. A comparative cradle-to-gate LCA of these mixes has not currently been explored and could present a new insight into improving the environmental impact of concrete with the use of secondary materials. Recommendations from this work would help the industry make key decisions about concrete mix designs.Results and discussion Results show that Mix 2 (CEM II/B-V) and Mix 3 (CEM III/B) could potentially be taken forwards to improve their environmental impacts of concrete production. With respect to optimum mix design, it is strongly recommended that GGBS is selected as the addition of choice for reducing CO 2 emissions. FA does still considerably improve sustainability when compared to PC, but this work proved that inclusion of GGBS environmentally optimises the mix design even further. Advantages of using GGBS include lower CO 2 emissions, a substantial reduction of environmental impacts and an increased scope for sustainability due to the higher PC replacement levels that are permitted for GGBS. Due to mix designs enabling a higher contribution of GGBS additions, it would also indicate an increased positive effect regarding waste scenarios. Conclusions and recommendations The main contribution of this work demonstrated that concrete can be produced without loss of performance whilst significantly reducing the negative environmental impacts incurred in its production. The results obtained from this work would help to define the available options for optimising concrete mix design. The only material variations in each mix were the different cementitious blends. So, by determining the best option, a platform to make recommendations can be established based upon cementitious materials.