Biogas-to-biomethane upgrading: A comparative review and assessment in a life cycle perspective

The study reviews and compares the most utilised techniques to obtain high quality biomethane by upgrading biogas from anaerobic digestion of the organic fraction of municipal solid waste. Environmental and economic aspects of membrane separation, water scrubbing, chemical absorption with amine solvent, and pressure swing adsorption have been quantified in a life cycle perspective. An attributional environmental Life Cycle Assessment has been implemented with the support of a Material Flow Analysis and in combination with a complementary environmental Life Cycle Costing. The analyses are based on data largely obtained from Italian existing plants but they can be generalised to the whole European Union, as demonstrated by a companion sensitivity analysis. The comparative assessment of the results indicates all the examined options as fully sustainable, also identifying the “win-win” situations. In particular, the membrane separation technique appears to have the best performances, even though in some cases with limited differences. With reference to base case scenarios, this technique shows better results for the respiratory inorganics potential (up to 34%, i.e. up to 328 kgPM2.5eq/y), global warming potential (up to 7%, i.e. up to 344 tCO2eq/y), and non-renewable energy potential (up to 12%, i.e. up to 6400 GJprimary/y) as well as for life cycle costs (up to 3.4%, i.e. about 60 k€/y). The performances of the examined techniques appear anyway dependent on site-specific conditions (such as the injection pressure in the gas grid or the existence/amount of local economic incentives) and commercial strategies for the market of interest

Assessment of liver stiffness in patients with HCV and mixed cryoglobulinemia undergoing rituximab treatment.

INTRODUCTION: Mixed cryoglobulinemia (MC) is a HCV-related lymphoproliferative disorder generally associated with advanced liver disease. Liver stiffness has been significantly correlated with histopathological stage of fibrosis. Moreover, it was influenced by necroinflammatory activity. Rituximab (RTX) is a chimeric anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody inducing transient B lymphocytes depletion that was shown to be useful and safe in the majority of HCV MC patients, leading also to improvement of cirrhotic syndrome. Aim of this study was to evaluate the modifications of liver stiffness following RTX treatment in HCV-related MC patients. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Fourteen consecutive patients (10 F, 4 M; mean age 60.43 ± 43) with HCV-related chronic hepatitis (n = 10) or cirrhosis (n = 4) and MC, eligible for RTX treatment, were prospectively enrolled. Intravenous injection of 1 g of RTX was performed at day 0 and at day 15. Assessment of stiffness was carried out by Fibroscan(®) (Echosens, Paris-France) at baseline, 15 days after the first infusion, and at month 1, 3 and 6 after therapy. RESULTS: MC symptoms significantly improved during the study, especially during the first 3 months. Liver stiffness observed 3 months after treatment was significantly reduced when compared with pre-treatment values (p = 0.01). This difference disappeared after 6 months of follow-up. Cytofluorimetric analysis showed a decrease of CD19+ peripheral blood cells, with the nadir at month 3 after therapy and B cell compartment reconstitution after 6 months. CONCLUSION: This study, for the first time showed that RTX-treatment in HCV-related MC induces a reduction of liver stiffness that is strictly associated with the B-cell depletion

Diffusive Spreading of Chainlike Molecules on Surfaces

We study the diffusion and submonolayer spreading of chainlike molecules on surfaces. Using the fluctuating bond model we extract the collective and tracer diffusion coefficients D_c and D_t with a variety of methods. We show that D_c(theta) has unusual behavior as a function of the coverage theta. It first increases but after a maximum goes to zero as theta go to one. We show that the increase is due to entropic repulsion that leads to steep density profiles for spreading droplets seen in experiments. We also develop an analytic model for D_c(theta) which agrees well with the simulations.Comment: 3 pages, RevTeX, 4 postscript figures, to appear in Phys. Rev. Letters (1996

Element-Specific Magnetic Properties of Co2MnSi Thin Films

Co2MnSi thin films were grown on Al2O3 (a plane) and GaAs (001) substrates and on thin silicon nitride windows using pulsed laser deposition. Angle-dependent magneto-optic Kerr effect measurements reveal both a uniaxial and a fourfold magnetocrystalline anisotropy for films grown on GaAs (001). X-ray magnetic circular dichroism spectra were measured at the L2,3 edges of the thin films as a function of aluminum cap layer thickness, and transmission mode L2,3 x-ray absorption through a 1000-Å Co2MnSi film grown on a silicon nitride membrane were measured, indicating that deviations from metalliclike spectra are likely due oxidation or contamination. Element-specific moments for Co and Mn were calculated from the X-ray magnetic circular dichroism data of a nonoxidized film

Access to administrative documents and to public sector information in Italy

Law No. 241 of 1990 on administrative procedure (Italian APA) established general rules on the right of access to administrative documents for the first time in the Italian legal system, which partly reproduced rules defined in sectorial legislations. From such very restrictive regime of access to administrative documents\u2014lately accompanied by a rather demagogical obligation imposed on public administrations to disclose a set of information in the context of the so-called open data policies\u2014Italy has recently moved forth to public access to data and documents held by public administrations

Discovery of a directly imaged disk in scattered light around the Sco-Cen member Wray 15-788

As part of our on-going survey we have carried out high-contrast imaging with VLT/SPHERE/IRDIS to obtain polarized and total intensity images of the young ($11^{+16}_{-7}$Myr old) K3IV star Wray 15-788 within the Lower Centaurus Crux subgroup of Sco-Cen. For the total intensity images, we remove the stellar halo by an approach based on reference star differential imaging in combination with principal component analysis. Both total intensity and polarimetric data resolve a disk around Wray 15-788. Modeling of the stellar spectral energy distribution suggests that this is a protoplanetary disk at a transition stage. We detect a bright, outer ring at a projected separation of $\sim$370mas ($\approx$56au), hints for inner substructures at $\sim$170mas ($\approx$28au) and a gap in between. Only within a position angle range of $60^\circ<\varphi<240^\circ$, we are confident at 5$\sigma$ level to detect actual scattered light flux from the outer ring of the disk; the remaining part is indistinguishable from background noise. For the detected part of the outer ring we determine a disk inclination of $i$=21$^\circ\pm$6$^\circ$ and a position angle of $\varphi$=76$^\circ\pm$16$^\circ$. Furthermore, we find that Wray 15-788 is part of a binary system with the A2V star HD 98363 at a separation of $\sim$50'' ($\approx$6900au). The detection of only half of the outer ring might be due to shadowing by a misaligned inner disk. A potential substellar companion can cause the misalignment of the inner structures and can be responsible for clearing the detected gap from scattering material. We can not, however, rule out the possibility of a non-detection due to our limited signal to noise ratio, combined with brightness azimuthal asymmetry. From our data, we can exclude companions more massive than 10$M_\mathrm{jup}$ within the gap at a separation of $\sim$230mas ($\approx$35au).Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A (16 pages, 11 figures