Understanding COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy in Canada.

While Canada has had relatively high vaccination rates against COVID-19, specifically during earlier waves of the pandemic, vaccine hesitancy has continued to serve as a significant barrier to adequate protection against the virus and, more recently, booster vaccine uptake. This paper explores the processes underlying Canadians' perceptions of COVID-19 vaccines and their decisions to take or refuse them, as well as how public policy and health messaging about vaccination has influenced vaccination attitudes and behaviors. Our focus group interviews with 18 vaccinated and unvaccinated adult Canadians conducted during October 2021 reveal that, in some respects, COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy conforms to prior knowledge about some of the factors that affect vaccine attitudes (e.

Institutional trust is a distinct construct related to vaccine hesitancy and refusal.

Background: Vaccine hesitancy is driven by a heterogeneous and changing set of psychological, social and historical phenomena, requiring multidisciplinary approaches to its study and intervention. Past research has brought to light instances of both interpersonal and institutional trust playing an important role in vaccine uptake. However, no comprehensive study to date has specifically assessed the relative importance of these two categories of trust as they relate to vaccine behaviors and attitudes.

Sulfate, Bisulfate, and Hydrogen Co-adsorption on Pt(111) and Au(111) in an Electrochemical Environment.

The co-adsorption of sulfate, bisulfate and hydrogen on Pt(111) and Au(111) electrodes was studied based on periodic density functional calculations with the aqueous electrolyte represented by both explicit and implicit solvent models. The influence of the electrochemical control parameters such as the electrode potential and pH was taken into account in a grand-canonical approach. Thus, phase diagrams of the stable coadsorption phases as a function of the electrochemical potential and Pourbaix diagrams have been derived which well reproduce experimental findings.

Interactions of ions across carbon nanotubes.

The interactions between a pair of Li ions across a semiconducting (8,0)CNT and a conducting (5,5)CNT has been investigated by density functional theory. The direct Coulomb interaction between the ions is almost completely screened. The band structure of the CNTs is not affected by the Li ions, but the Fermi level is raised to accommodate the extra electrons.

Oxygen Reduction on Ag(100) in Alkaline Solutions--A Theoretical Study.

Silver is much more reactive to oxygen than gold; nevertheless, in alkaline solutions, the rates of oxygen reduction on both metals are similar. To explain this phenomenon, the first, rate-determining step of oxygen reduction on Ag(100) is determined by a combination of DFT, molecular dynamics, and electrocatalysis theory. In vacuum, oxygen is adsorbed on Ag(100), but in the electrochemical environment, the adsorption energy is offset by the loss of hydration energy as the molecule approaches the surface.

On the Energetics of Ions in Carbon and Gold Nanotubes.

We investigate the insertion of halide and alkali atoms into narrow single-walled carbon nanotubes with diameters <9 Å by density functional theory; both chiral and non-chiral tubes are considered. The atoms are stored in the form of ions; the concomitant charge transfer affects the band structure and makes originally semiconducting tubes conducting. The electrostatic interaction between a charge and the walls of the tube is explicitly calculated.

Volcano plots in hydrogen electrocatalysis - uses and abuses.

Sabatier's principle suggests, that for hydrogen evolution a plot of the rate constant versus the hydrogen adsorption energy should result in a volcano, and several such plots have been presented in the literature. A thorough examination of the data shows, that there is no volcano once the oxide-covered metals are left out. We examine the factors that govern the reaction rate in the light of our own theory and conclude, that Sabatier's principle is only one of several factors that determine the rate.