Employee engagement and trust relationships during COVID-19 pandemic: the expanded role of internal communication

Internal communication turns into the most valuable aspect of strengthening the relationship between the organization and employees since it causes employees to become involved in maintaining the organization's sustainability during the crisis, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. By interviewing 10 Human Resource Officers, this study examines how to engage with the employees and enhance trust relationships through expanding the role of internal communication when COVID-19 was in the air. This study reveals that, as a department with a huge responsibility to build a relationship with employees during the pandemic, Human Resource Officers use various methods to communicate with the employees, including face-to-face and mediated communication. Internal communication built in this pandemic encourages trust and engagement with the employees. Human Resource Officers expand their internal communication role to strengthen employee engagement and build trust relationships, particularly in mediated communication. This study advances knowledge of the significance of human resource officers' roles in selecting internal communication strategies to foster employee engagement and trust during times of crisis

Quantum discord evolution of three-qubit states under noisy channels

We investigated the dissipative dynamics of quantum discord for correlated qubits under Markovian environments. The basic idea in the present scheme is that quantum discord is more general, and possibly more robust and fundamental, than entanglement. We provide three initially correlated qubits in pure Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) or W state and analyse the time evolution of the quantum discord under various dissipative channels such as: Pauli channels $\sigma_{x}$, $\sigma_{y}$, and $\sigma_{z}$, as well as depolarising channels. Surprisingly, we find that under the action of Pauli channel $\sigma_{x}$, the quantum discord of GHZ state is not affected by decoherence. For the remaining dissipative channels, the W state is more robust than the GHZ state against decoherence. Moreover, we compare the dynamics of entanglement with that of the quantum discord under the conditions in which disentanglement occurs and show that quantum discord is more robust than entanglement except for phase flip coupling of the three qubits system to the environment.Comment: 17 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in EPJ

Robust estimation of bacterial cell count from optical density

Optical density (OD) is widely used to estimate the density of cells in liquid culture, but cannot be compared between instruments without a standardized calibration protocol and is challenging to relate to actual cell count. We address this with an interlaboratory study comparing three simple, low-cost, and highly accessible OD calibration protocols across 244 laboratories, applied to eight strains of constitutive GFP-expressing E. coli. Based on our results, we recommend calibrating OD to estimated cell count using serial dilution of silica microspheres, which produces highly precise calibration (95.5% of residuals <1.2-fold), is easily assessed for quality control, also assesses instrument effective linear range, and can be combined with fluorescence calibration to obtain units of Molecules of Equivalent Fluorescein (MEFL) per cell, allowing direct comparison and data fusion with flow cytometry measurements: in our study, fluorescence per cell measurements showed only a 1.07-fold mean difference between plate reader and flow cytometry data

Gold nanomesh induced surface plasmon for photocurrent enhancement in a polymer solar cell

In this study, a gold (Au) nanomesh layer was manufactured on an ITO-coated glass substrate at room temperature. The Au nanomesh was used to induce surface plasmon resonance (SPR) to enhance the photocurrent of a polymer solar cell. The Au nanomesh was manufactured by lift-off on closely packed PS nanospheres (diameter similar to 50nm; density similar to 10(10)/cm(2)). The PS nanospheres were fabricated by modified block copolymer nano-patterning on ITO. A transmittance-reflection-absorbance spectrum was used to explore the induced surface plasmon. An extinction peak was observed at similar to 580 nm indicate the possibility of Au nanomesh induced surface plasmon resonance. The short-circuit current density of the polymer solar cell was enhanced from 7.02 to 14.2 mA/cm(2) by the addition of Au nanomesh. Consequently, the power conversion efficiency enhanced from 1.9% to 3.2%. By the normalized input photon-to-current conversion efficiency (IPCE) measurement, enhanced photocurrent conversion efficiency at approximately 580 nm was observed that coincided with the extinction spectrum, indicating that the surface plasmon enhanced the photocurrent. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Employee engagement and trust relationships during COVID-19 pandemic: the expanded role of internal communication

Internal communication turns into the most valuable aspect of strengthening the relationship between the organization and employees since it causes employees to become involved in maintaining the organization's sustainability during the crisis, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic. By interviewing 10 Human Resource Officers, this study examines how to engage with the employees and enhance trust relationships through expanding the role of internal communication when COVID-19 was in the air. This study reveals that, as a department with a huge responsibility to build a relationship with employees during the pandemic, Human Resource Officers use various methods to communicate with the employees, including face-to-face and mediated communication. Internal communication built in this pandemic encourages trust and engagement with the employees. Human Resource Officers expand their internal communication role to strengthen employee engagement and build trust relationships, particularly in mediated communication. This study advances knowledge of the significance of human resource officers' roles in selecting internal communication strategies to foster employee engagement and trust during times of crisis

The comparative role of key environmental factors in determining savanna productivity and carbon fluxes: a review, with special reference to northern Australia

Terrestrial ecosystems are highly responsive to their local environments and, as such, the rate of carbon uptake both in shorter and longer timescales and different spatial scales depends on local environmental drivers. For savannas, the key environmental drivers controlling vegetation productivity are water and nutrient availability, vapour pressure deficit (VPD), solar radiation and fire. Changes in these environmental factors can modify the carbon balance of these ecosystems. Therefore, understanding the environmental drivers responsible for the patterns (temporal and spatial) and processes (photosynthesis and respiration) has become a central goal in terrestrial carbon cycle studies. Here we have reviewed the various environmental controls on the spatial and temporal patterns on savanna carbon fluxes in northern Australia. Such studies are critical in predicting the impacts of future climate change on savanna productivity and carbon storage