Impact of Covid-19 on people and Work from Home

This pandemic has affected family life around the world. As a result of lockdown individuals are already experiencing significant revenue and job losses. The ability to ‘Work from Home’ (WFH) can help damp down the impact of the situation, undoubtedly. Overall, the effects of WFH arrangements rely a lot on the job status of parents and presence of dependents (children & elderly), and this current situation is likely to intensify these differences. It does not necessarily mean, however, that the effect of the crisis should inevitably be gender neutral. Working women have been particularly affected. It seems to be very fascinating to work from home, while sitting on a comfortable couch, casually dressed, even sometimes in sleep suits, without stepping out in scorching heat and wasting time in traveling, but this may not be a preferred situation for everybody, especially women. The most significant impact on working women during the crisis will be trying to balance household demands, childcare needs and work demands. The group most likely to be hardest hit then would be lower income families with young children, and single mothers in particular. Generally women are in charge of planning, organizing and recalling of everything that needs to be remembered. The mental stress and load that comes with such work has risen exponentially in present circumstances. Even though many countries are relied on lockdown to control widespread of COVID-19 pandemic, the mental problems such as depression, anxiety, insomnia, suicidal thoughts and other psychological trauma are most common in case of normal individual and extensive in case of people who are psychologically ill. Females are more prone to psychological distress. The main concern is to manage and provide opportunities for regulation of stress caused due to anxiety and lack of peer contact. Another main threat is an increased risk of parents to develop mental illness, women may also suffer from domestic violence and consequently it results child maltreatment. The current scenario may be particularly challenging especially for children and adolescents with special needs or disadvantages, such as disabilities, also if someone has prior trauma experiences, undiagnosed mental health problems, background of migration and low socioeconomic status.

Failure Creteria for the Design & Stability Anlaysis of Tunnels in the Rock Mass Environment of Kp Using Numerical Modeling

The stability of a tunnel in rocks can be evaluated through different methods. Empirical design methods are commonly used supplemented and validated with numerical design methods to improve the stability. Each and every design method requires certain rock and rock mass parameters as input. Empirical design methods include Rock Mass Classification systems as integral part. Strength and/or stiffness parameters are frequently required for Numerical design analysis. Rock mass properties can either be determined directly or predicted, however, the direct determination is not always viable and these are generally predicted. Rock mass strength and deformability is realistically well predicted through the use of rock mass classification systems in conjunction with appropriate empirical failure criteria such as Hoek-Brown failure criterion and empirical expressions using rock mass classification systems respectively. However, the use of such relations requires right, precise and authentic input data. The thesis focuses on devising better ways and means for approximating the input parameters needed for engineering design of tunnels in rocks. The first part of this research focuses on fitting of failure criterion to laboratory data to get a suitable failure criterion for the local rock mass environment and optimize the strength parameters for numerical design purposes. The second part describes the empirical estimation of rock mass deformation modulus. The Hoek – Brown failure criterion 2002 version and its variants are fitted to full scale laboratory rock data of Kohat Tunnel as well as Diamir Basha Dam Diversion Tunnels using linear and multiple regression methods and Microsoft Excel optimization tool "Solver". Analysis shows that for majority cases/ rock types, the ―Globalized‖ variant of the Hoek – Brown failure criterion is best fit based on error of estimation. For the deformation modulus, previous equations (based on Rock Mass Rating, Q index and Geological Strength Index) are divided into 10 groups on the basis of input parameters and modeled using ―Sigmoidal‖ and ―Gaussian‖ functions in Microsoft Excel solver optimization tool. Eight new generalized equations are presented, among which, the sigmoidal function was the best. iii It is observed that the displacement values from the modeled deformation modulus (sigmoidal function based on GSI using the 2D Finite Element Analysis (FEA) Phase2 tool) was very close to the actual displacement monitored in the field.