CO₂ Hydrogenation to Methanol on CuO-ZnO/SiO₂ and CuO-ZnO/CeO₂-SiO₂ Catalysts Synthesized with β-Cyclodextrin Template

A series of mixed copper (II)—zinc oxide catalysts supported on unmodified and ceria-modified silica supports were synthesized using β-cyclodextrin as a template. The novelty of this work lies in the use of cyclosextrins for the template synthesis of catalyst supports. The obtained samples were analyzed by XRD, SEM-EDX, low-temperature nitrogen physisorption, XPS, and EPR. The magnetic properties of the catalysts were also measured. The thermal decomposition of precursors was analyzed by TGA combined with mass-spectrometric analysis of the evolved gases. The effects of the support pore size, the nature of the active phase and its loading, as well as the sequence of component deposition on the catalyst performance in the CO2 conversion to methanol were studied. The catalysts with cerium added at the gelation stage demonstrated the best performance. The selectivity of these samples reaches values of more than 90% over a fairly ide temperature range, with the productivity reaching 480 g/kg cat·h at 300 °C

Virtual Herbarium ALTB: collection of vascular plants of the Altai Mountain Country

Background The herbarium of the South-Siberian Botanical Garden of Altai State University (ALTB) houses the largest collection of plants from the Altai Mountain Country (AMC), an area that extends across Russia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and China. The collection of ALTB includes more than 450,00 specimens, making it the seventh largest in Russia and the fourth largest amongst Russian university herbaria. Altai State University (ASU), the home of ALTB, is one of the most important centres of academic education and research in Siberia and the Russian Far East. It is a sociocultural centre that provides a distinguished learning environment for undergraduate and graduate students in many scholarly and professional fields, meeting the needs of today's knowledge-based post-industrial society and contributing to regional development. It actively promotes international cooperation and strategic collaboration amongst countries of the AMC in the fields of science, education and culture. In particular, the activities of the South-Siberian Botanical Garden include: development of measures to protect rare and endangered plant species, research on the flora and vegetation of the AMC, preparation and publication of a multi-volume work "Flora Altaica", monographic study of individual plant groups, conducting laboratory classes, summer practicals and special courses. The main purpose of this article is to attract the attention of the scientific community to the botanical research of transboundary territory of the Altai Mountain Country (Russia, Kazakhstan, China and Mongolia) and to the future development of digital plant collections in partnership with Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). New information The Virtual Herbarium ALTB (Russian interface - altb.asu.ru) is the largest digital collection of plants from the transboundary territory of the Altai Mountain Country and the main source of primary material for the "Flora Altaica" project (http://altaiflora.asu.ru/en/). Since 2017, when Altai State University became a GBIF data publisher, data from the Virtual Herbarium ALTB has been exported to the dataset "Virtual Herbarium ALTB (South-Siberian Botanical Garden)" in GBIF. Currently, it includes images and data from 22,466 vascular plants, of which 67% have geographic coordinates (accessed on 30.03.2021). Most of the specimens have been collected since 1977, with the most intensive collecting years being 1995-2008. In 2019, the label-data table of the Virtual Herbarium ALTB was modified to bring it into conformity with the Darwin Core specification (http://altb.asu.ru/). This effectively solved the major impediment to sharing plant diversity data from the AMC and adjacent regions in a multilingual environment

Inhalation of an Ethanol-Based Zileuton Formulation Provides a Reduction of Pulmonary Adenomas in the A/J Mouse Model

Potential efficacy of zileuton, a 5-LOX inhibitor, was evaluated for the reduction of pulmonary adenomas in the A/J murine model when administered via nose-only inhalation. Development of pulmonary adenomas was induced with benzo(a)pyrene. Animals were treated with a zileuton solution (5 mg/mL in 85:15 ethanol/water) either twice weekly or five times a week via nose-only inhalation; The placebo solution (85:15 EtOH/H2O, no active) was also evaluated. Dose delivered was calculated to be 1.2 mg/kg per exposure for each zileuton group. After 20 weeks of treatment, surface tumors were enumerated and histologically assessed. A significant reduction in tumor count was noted for both the twice weekly administration (40%) and the five times a week administration (59%). The data also showed a significant reduction for the group, which received the placebo (approximately 58%). The treatment groups were also found to have an impact on the histological stages of adenoma development