Revisited Globalization’s Impact on Total Environment: Evidence Based on Overall Environmental Performance Index

This study aims to examine the impact of globalization on environmental performance by employing panel data for 148 countries from 2001 to 2018, via the indicator of Environmental Performance Index to capture the overall environmental quality and KOF index to measure the multi dimensions of globalization. The empirical results suggest that globalization is critical to environmental performance, which is reliable while we conduct several robustness tests. Furthermore, if globalization increases, it would be beneficial for the environmental performance; moreover, among specific dimensions of globalization, economic globalization, social globalization and political globalization would bring about better environmental performance. Besides, the improvement of globalization, social globalization and political globalization would bring about better environmental performance, while that of economic globalization cannot change the overall environmental performance. Our study offers more insight into the relationship between globalization and environmental performance.

Emergent classicality in general multipartite states and channels

In a quantum measurement process, classical information about the measured system spreads throughout the environment. Meanwhile, quantum information about the system becomes inaccessible to local observers. Here we prove a result about quantum channels indicating that an aspect of this phenomenon is completely general. We show that for any evolution of the system and environment, for everywhere in the environment excluding an O(1)-sized region we call the "quantum Markov blanket," any locally accessible information about the system must be approximately classical, i.e. obtainable from some fixed measurement. The result strengthens the earlier result of Brandão et al. (Nat. comm. 6:7908) in which the excluded region was allowed to grow with total environment size. It may also be seen as a new consequence of the principles of no-cloning or monogamy of entanglement. Our proof offers a constructive optimization procedure for determining the "quantum Markov blanket" region, as well as the effective measurement induced by the evolution. Alternatively, under channel-state duality, our result characterizes the marginals of multipartite states.

ВЕРОЯТНОСТНЫЕ ПОДХОДЫ К ОЦЕНКЕ ЗАГРЯЗНЕННОСТИ ПОВЕРХНОСТНЫХ ВОД

Предложен способ вероятностной оценки качества природных сред с линейным алгоритмом интерполяции общей вероятности, предназначенный для учета числа объектов в разных группах. Структурированность и пошаговый алгоритм расчета, удобство представления и интерпретации результатов позволяют внедрять его в автоматизированные системы и использовать в программных комплексах интегральной оценки загрязненности окружающей среды. Апробация способавероятностных оценок качества вод на примере озера Архиерейское (Республика Татарстан) показала гибкость применения аналитического инструмента, позволяющего определять тенденции и корректировать прогностические оценки состояния водного объекта. Библиографические ссылки 1. РД 52.24.643‒2002. Методические указания. Метод комплексной оценки степени загрязненности поверхностных вод по гидрохимическим показателям.2. Трифонов А.П., Захаров А.В., Проняев Е.В. Вероятностные модели и методы статистического анализа стохастических сигналов // Ведущие научно-педагогические коллективы. Воронеж: Воронежский гос. ун-т, 2003. С. 142‒160.3. Acuña-Alonso С., Álvarez Х., Lorenzo O., Cancela Á., ValeroЕ., Sánchez Á. Assessment of water quality in eutrophized water bodies through the application of indexes and toxicity//The science of the total environment. 2020. V. 1, №728. 138775. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138775.4. Jiang Q., He J., Ye G., Christakos G. Heavy metal contamination assessment of surface sediments of the East Zhejiang coastal area during 2012-2015 // Ecotoxicology and environmental safety. 2018. V. 15, №163. P. 444‒455. doi: 10.1016/j.ecoenv.2018.07.107.5. Nelson E. Quantum fluctuations, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985. 160 p.

The Impact of COVID-19 Lockdowns on Air Quality—A Global Review

The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has emerged as a serious public health threat and has had a tremendous impact on all spheres of the environment. The air quality across the world improved because of COVID-19 lockdowns. Since the outbreak of COVID-19, large numbers of studies have been carried out on the impact of lockdowns on air quality around the world, but no studies have been carried out on the systematic review on the impact of lockdowns on air quality. This study aims to systematically assess the bibliographic review on the impact of lockdowns on air quality around the globe. A total of 237 studies were identified after rigorous review, and 144 studies met the criteria for the review. The literature was surveyed from Scopus, Google Scholar, PubMed, Web of Science, and the Google search engine. The results reveal that (i) most of the studies were carried out on Asia (about 65%), followed by Europe (18%), North America (6%), South America (5%), and Africa (3%); (ii) in the case of countries, the highest number of studies was performed on India (29%), followed by China (23%), the U.S. (5%), the UK (4%), and Italy; (iii) more than 60% of the studies included NO2 for study, followed by PM2.5 (about 50%), PM10, SO2, and CO; (iv) most of the studies were published by Science of the Total Environment (29%), followed by Aerosol and Air Quality Research (23%), Air Quality, Atmosphere & Health (9%), and Environmental Pollution (5%); (v) the studies reveal that there were significant improvements in air quality during lockdowns in comparison with previous time periods. Thus, this diversified study conducted on the impact of lockdowns on air quality will surely assist in identifying any gaps, as it outlines the insights of the current scientific research.