Measurement of the active width in Sr-doped lanthanum manganate Sofc Cathodes using Nano-ct, impedance spectroscopy and Bayesian calibration

Bayesian model-based analysis (BMA) is a method for producing quantitative models of complex physical systems through the comparison between models and experimental data. A model of a porous LSM cathode (symmetrical cell) was applied to impedance data and its parameters estimated via Bayesian calibration. X-ray computed tomography provided microstructural information for the model. The combination of model calibration and microstructural characterization enabled an estimate of the active thickness for a porous LSM electrode. The active width extended only a few nanometers from the surface, strongly suggesting that future models should explicitly resolve the space-charge region

Coherent Tunneling of Atoms from Bose-condensed Gases at Finite Temperatures

Tunneling of atoms between two trapped Bose-condensed gases at finite temperatures is explored using a many-body linear response tunneling formalism similar to that used in superconductors. To lowest order, the tunneling currents can be expressed quite generally in terms of the single-particle Green's functions of the isolated Bose gases. A coherent first-order tunneling Josephson current between two atomic Bose-condensates is found, in addition to coherent and dissipative contributions from second-order condensate-noncondensate and noncondensate-noncondensate tunneling. Our work is a generalization of Meier and Zwerger, who recently treated tunneling between uniform atomic Bose gases. We apply our formalism to the analysis of an out-coupling experiment induced by light wave fields, using a simple Bogoliubov-Popov quasiparticle approximation for the trapped Bose gas. For tunneling into the vacuum, we recover the results of Japha, Choi, Burnett and Band, who recently pointed out the usefulness of studying the spectrum of out-coupled atoms. In particular, we show that the small tunneling current of noncondensate atoms from a trapped Bose gas has a broad spectrum of energies, with a characteristic structure associated with the Bogoliubov quasiparticle u^2 and v^2 amplitudes.Comment: 26 pages, 5 figures, minor changes, to appear in PR

Biochemical characterization of a cyanobactin arginine-N-prenylase from the autumnalamide biosynthetic pathway

Cyanobactins are linear and cyclic post-translationally modified peptides. Here we show that the prenyl-D-Arg-containing autum-nalamide A is a member of the cyanobactin family. Biochemical assays demonstrate that the AutF prenyltransferase targets the guanidinium moiety in arginine and homoarginine and is a useful tool for biotechnological applications.Peer reviewe

Late-Onset Hepatic Veno-Occlusive Disease after Allografting: Report of Two Cases with Atypical Clinical Features Successfully Treated with Defibrotide

Hepatic Veno-occlusive disease (VOD) is a potentially severe complication of hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). Here we report two patients receiving an allogeneic HSCT  who developed late onset VOD with atypical clinical features. The two  patients presented with only few risk factors, namely, advanced acute leukemia, a myeloablative busulphan-containing regimen and received grafts from an unrelated donor. The first patient did not experience painful hepatomegaly and weight gain and both  patients showed only a mild elevation in total serum bilirubin level. Most importantly, the two patients developed clinical signs beyond day 21 post-HSCT. Hepatic transjugular biopsy confirmed the diagnosis of VOD. Intravenous defibrotide was promptly started leading to a marked clinical improvement. Based on our experience, liver biopsy may represent a useful diagnostic tool when the clinical features of VOD are ambiguous. Early therapeutic intervention with defibrotide  represents a crucial issue for the successful outcome of patients with VOD

Education and health knowledge: Evidence from UK compulsory schooling reform

We investigate if there is a causal link between education and health knowledge using data from the 1984/85 and 1991/92 waves of the UK Health and Lifestyle Survey (HALS). Uniquely, the survey asks respondents what they think are the main causes of ten common health conditions, and we compare these answers to those given by medical professionals to form an index of health knowledge. For causal identification we use increases in the UK minimum school leaving age in 1947 (from 14 to 15) and 1972 (from 15 to 16) to provide exogenous variation in education. These reforms predominantly induced adolescents who would have left school to stay for one additionally mandated year. OLS estimates suggest that education significantly increases health knowledge, with a one-year increase in schooling increasing the health knowledge index by 15% of a standard deviation. In contrast, estimates from instrumental-variable models show that increased schooling due to the education reforms did not significantly affect health knowledge. This main result is robust to numerous specification tests and alternative formulations of the health knowledge index. Further research is required to determine whether there is also no causal link between higher levels of education – such as post-school qualifications – and health knowledge

Synthesis of the natural product descurainolide and cyclic peptides from lignin-derived aromatics

The authors acknowledge the EPSRC UK National Mass Spectrometry Facility at Swansea University for mass spectrometry analysis. Financial support from: the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (grant EP/J018139/1, EP/K00445X/1 (NJW, ADS, OSO), the doctoral training grant (ARN) and the CRITICAT Centre for Doctoral Training [Ph.D. studentship to SFM; Grant code: EP/L016419/1]), the Leverhulme Trust (JET), European Research Council (ERC-2013-ADG (JHN))Alternative sources of potential feedstock chemicals are of increasing importance as the availability of oil decreases. The biopolymer lignin is viewed as a source of useful mono-aromatic compounds as exemplified by the industrial scale production of vanillin from this biomass. Alternative lignin-derived aromatics are available in pure form but to date examples of the use of these types of compounds are rare. Here we address this issue by reporting the conversion of an aromatic keto-alcohol to the anti- and syn-isomers of Descurainolide A. The key step involves a rhodium-catalyzed allylic substitution reaction. Enantioenriched allylic alcohols were generated via an isothiourea-catalyzed kinetic resolution enabling access to both the (2R,3R) and (2S,3S) enantiomers of anti-Descurainolide A. In addition we show that the ligninderived keto-alcohols can be converted into unnatural amino acid derivatives of tyrosine. Finally, these amino acids were incorporated into cyclic peptide scaffolds through the use of both chemical and an enzyme-mediated macrocylisation.PostprintPeer reviewe

Empirical Analysis of National Income and So2 Emissions in Selected European Countries

Data on GDP per capita and sulfur emissions for twelve European countries were analyzed to determine the relationship between emissions and income in these countries. As a whole, the relationship between sulfur emissions and per capita income is a fourth order polynomial and not a quadratic one as found in most studies. When countries were examined individually, seven out of the twelve countries depicted the same relationship. Looking closely at the regulations restricting sulfur emissions in the UK, the impact of all regulations supported the inverted U-shaped Kuznets curve. Individually, however, it is found that only two regulations have statistically significant impacts: Smoke Abatement Act in 1926 (reduced the amount of sulfur associated with a given level of GDP); and Clean Air Act in 1956 (increased the amount of sulfur emissions associated with a given level of GDP)