Elevated CO2 and Warming Altered Grassland Microbial Communities in Soil Top-Layers.

As two central issues of global climate change, the continuous increase of both atmospheric CO2 concentrations and global temperature has profound effects on various terrestrial ecosystems. Microbial communities play pivotal roles in these ecosystems by responding to environmental changes through regulation of soil biogeochemical processes. However, little is known about the effect of elevated CO2 (eCO2) and global warming on soil microbial communities, especially in semiarid zones. We used a functional gene array (GeoChip 3.0) to measure the functional gene composition, structure, and metabolic potential of soil microbial communities under warming, eCO2, and eCO2 + warming conditions in a semiarid grassland. The results showed that the composition and structure of microbial communities was dramatically altered by multiple climate factors, including elevated CO2 and increased temperature. Key functional genes, those involved in carbon (C) degradation and fixation, methane metabolism, nitrogen (N) fixation, denitrification and N mineralization, were all stimulated under eCO2, while those genes involved in denitrification and ammonification were inhibited under warming alone. The interaction effects of eCO2 and warming on soil functional processes were similar to eCO2 alone, whereas some genes involved in recalcitrant C degradation showed no significant changes. In addition, canonical correspondence analysis and Mantel test results suggested that NO3-N and moisture significantly correlated with variations in microbial functional genes. Overall, this study revealed the possible feedback of soil microbial communities to multiple climate change factors by the suppression of N cycling under warming, and enhancement of C and N cycling processes under either eCO2 alone or in interaction with warming. These findings may enhance our understanding of semiarid grassland ecosystem responses to integrated factors of global climate change

Optimal control towards sustainable wastewater treatment plants based on multi-agent reinforcement learning

Wastewater treatment plants are designed to eliminate pollutants and alleviate environmental pollution. However, the construction and operation of WWTPs consume resources, emit greenhouse gases (GHGs) and produce residual sludge, thus require further optimization. WWTPs are complex to control and optimize because of high nonlinearity and variation. This study used a novel technique, multi-agent deep reinforcement learning, to simultaneously optimize dissolved oxygen and chemical dosage in a WWTP. The reward function was specially designed from life cycle perspective to achieve sustainable optimization. Five scenarios were considered: baseline, three different effluent quality and cost-oriented scenarios. The result shows that optimization based on LCA has lower environmental impacts compared to baseline scenario, as cost, energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions reduce to 0.890 CNY/m3-ww, 0.530 kWh/m3-ww, 2.491 kg CO2-eq/m3-ww respectively. The cost-oriented control strategy exhibits comparable overall performance to the LCA driven strategy since it sacrifices environmental bene ts but has lower cost as 0.873 CNY/m3-ww. It is worth mentioning that the retrofitting of WWTPs based on resources should be implemented with the consideration of impact transfer. Specifically, LCA SW scenario decreases 10 kg PO4-eq in eutrophication potential compared to the baseline within 10 days, while significantly increases other indicators. The major contributors of each indicator are identified for future study and improvement. Last, the author discussed that novel dynamic control strategies required advanced sensors or a large amount of data, so the selection of control strategies should also consider economic and ecological conditions

Microbial electrolysis contribution to anaerobic digestion of waste activated sludge, leading to accelerated methane production

Methane production rate (MPR) in waste activated sludge (WAS) digestion processes is typically limited by the initial steps of complex organic matter degradation, leading to a limited MPR due to sludge fermentation speed of solid particles. In this study, a novel microbial electrolysis AD reactor (ME-AD) was used to accelerate methane production for energy recovery from WAS. Carbon bioconversion was accelerated by ME producing H-2 at the cathode. MPR was enhanced to 91.8 gCH(4)/m(3) reactor/d in the microbial electrolysis ME-AD reactor, thus improving the rate by 3 times compared to control conditions (30.6 gCH(4)/m(3) reactor/d in AD). The methane production yield reached 116.2 mg/g VSS in the ME-AD reactor. According to balance calculation on electron transfer and methane yield, the increased methane production was mostly dependent on electron contribution through the ME system. Thus, the use of the novel ME-AD reactor allowed to significantly enhance carbon degradation and methane production from WAS. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Control of the Power Flows of a Stochastic Power System

How to determine the power supply of a power system to guarantee that the state remains during a short horizon in a critical subset of the state set? The critical subset is related to the power flows of all power lines of a power system and to transient stability. The control objective is to minimize a cost function. That function is defined as the maximal power flow over all power lines, including a multiple of its standard deviation, as a function of the power supply vector. That the controlled system has an improved performance is shown by numerical results of three academic examples including an eight-node academic network, a twelve-node ring network, and a Manhattan-grid network.Comment: A supplement with 20 pages, 5 figures, 43 tables has been added to the original manuscrip

Electron Fluxes in Biocathode Bioelectrochemical Systems Performing Dechlorination of Chlorinated Aliphatic Hydrocarbons

Bioelectrochemical systems (BESs) are regarded as a promising approach for the enhanced dechlorination of chlorinated aliphatic hydrocarbons (CAHs). However, the electron distribution and transfer considering dechlorination, methanogenesis, and other bioprocesses in these systems are little understood. This study investigated the electron fluxes in biocathode BES performing dechlorination of three typical CAHs, 1,1,2,2-tetrachloroethene (PCE), 1,1,2-trichloroethene (TCE) and 1,2-dichloroethane (1,2-DCA). Anaerobic sludge was inoculated to cathode and biocathode was acclimated by the direct acclimation and selection. The constructed biocathode at −0.26 V had significantly higher dechlorination efficiency (E24h > 99.0%) than the opened circuit (E24h of 17.2–27.5%) and abiotic cathode (E24h of 5.5–10.8%), respectively. Cyclic voltammetry analysis demonstrated the enhanced cathodic current and the positive shift of onset potential in the cathodic biofilm. Under autotrophic conditions with electrons from the cathode as sole energy source (columbic efficiencies of 80.4–90.0%) and bicarbonate as sole carbon source, CAHs dechlorination efficiencies were still maintained at 85.0 ± 2.0%, 91.4 ± 1.8%, and 84.9 ± 3.1% for PCE, TCE, and 1,2-DCA, respectively. Cis-1,2-dichloroethene was the final product for PCE and TCE, while 1,2-DCA went through a different dechlorination pathway with the non-toxic ethene as the final metabolite. Methane was the main by-product of the heterotrophic biocathode, and methane production could be enhanced to some extent by electrochemical stimulation. The various electron fluxes originating from the cathode and oxidation of organic substrates might be responsible for the enhanced CAHs dechlorination, while methane generation and bacterial growth would probably reduce the fraction of electrons provided for CAH dechlorination. The study deals with the dechlorination and competitive bioprocesses in CAH-dechlorinating biocathodes with a focus on electron fluxes

The growing inequality between firms

Globalisation, technological progress and a range of policies and institutions are driving ‘Great Divergences’ in wages and productivity, write Giuseppe Berlingieri, Patrick Blanchenay and Chiara Criscuol

Prognostic significance of peripheral CD8+CD28+ and CD8+CD28- T cells in advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients treated with chemo(radio)therapy.

peer reviewed[en] BACKGROUND: Noninvasive prognostic biomarkers are needed for advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with different histological types to identify cases with poor survival. Here, we investigated the prognostic values of peripheral CD8+CD28+ T cells and CD8+CD28- T cells in advanced NSCLC patients treated with chemo(radio)therapy and the impact of histological type on them. METHODS: Of 232 registered advanced NSCLC patients, 101 treatment-naïve individuals were eligible and included in our study. Flow cytometry was used to evaluate CD8+CD28+ T cells, CD8+CD28- T cells, CD4+ CD25hi T cells, B cells, natural killer cells, γδT cells, and natural killer T cells in patients' peripheral blood. RESULTS: The median follow-up time was 13.6 months. Fifty-nine (58.4%) patients died by the end of our study. Fifty-three of the 101 advanced NSCLC cases selected for our study were adenocarcinomas (ADs), and 48 were squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs). Multivariate analyses showed that increased levels of CD8+CD28+ T cells independently predicted favorable overall survival (OS) [hazard ratio (HR): 0.51, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.30-0.89, P = 0.021] and progression-free survival (PFS) (HR: 0.66, 95% CI 0.37-0.93, P = 0.038) in ADs, but the prediction in SCCs was not statistically significant. In contrast, high levels of CD8+CD28- T cells independently predicted unfavorable OS (HR: 1.41, 95% CI 1.17-3.06, P = 0.035) and PFS (HR: 2.01, 95% CI 1.06-3.85, P = 0.029) in SCCs, but the prediction in ADs was not statistically significant. ADs had higher levels of CD4+CD25hi T cells and CD8+CD28- T cells and lower NK cells (all P < 0.05) than SCCs. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings uncovered the prognostic values of peripheral CD8+CD28+ T cells and CD8+CD28- T cells in advanced NSCLC patients treated with chemo(radio)therapy, which could help to identify patients with poor outcomes and refine treatment strategies

Statistical Optimization of Operational Parameters for Enhanced Naphthalene Degradation by Photocatalyst

The optimization of operational parameters for enhanced naphthalene degradation by TiO2/Fe3O4-SiO2 (TFS) photocatalyst was conducted using statistical experimental design and analysis. Central composite design method of response surface methodology (RSM) was adopted to investigate the optimum value of the selected factors for achieving maximum naphthalene degradation. Experimental results showed that irradiation time, pH, and TFS photocatalyst loading had significant influence on naphthalene degradation and the maximum degradation rate of 97.39% was predicted when the operational parameters were irradiation time 97.1 min, pH 2.1, and catalyst loading 0.962 g/L, respectively. The results were further verified by repeated experiments under optimal conditions. The excellent correlation between predicted and measured values further confirmed the validity and practicability of this statistical optimum strategy

Glycosylation on Spermatozoa, a Promise for the Journey to the Oocyte

Spermatozoa experience a long and tough transit in male and female genital tracts before successful fertilization. Glycosylation helps spermatogenesis, epididymal maturation, passing through cervical mucus, avoiding killing of the female immunologic system, and shaking hands between sperm and egg. Changes in glycosylations along the transit ensure that the right things happen at the right time and place on spermatozoa. Aberrant glycosylations on spermatozoa will negatively affect their fertility. Thus, we developed a lectin array method to examine the glycocalyx of spermatozoa, which will help observe glycosylations occurring on spermatozoa in a normal or abnormal conditions, such as spermatozoa with DEF126 mutation and poor freezability. Intriguingly, binding levels of ABA (Agaricus bisporus agglutinin), a lectin marking the inner layer of the glycocalyx, were changed in these subfertile spermatozoa, which indicates that the integrity of glycocalyx is critical for sperm fertility. In this chapter, we reviewed the impacts of glycosylations on sperm fertility, the lectin array method, and its potential application for sperm function assessment