Preparation of new composite membranes for water desalination using electrodialysis

The use of polyethersulfone (PES), an excellent but highly hydrophobic thermoplastic, as a matrix material for ion-exchange membranes was investigated. To make PES ion-exchangeable, sulfonate groups were introduced to the polymer chains by sulfonation reaction with chlorosulfonic acid. The degree of sulfonation of sPES was estimated to be 21%. Preliminary experiments investigated the effect of polyethylene glycol (PEG) and Pluronic F127 as fillers to improve the hydrophilicity of the membranes. Moreover, a lab scale electrodialysis cell has been designed and set up to evaluate the performance of these novel membranes compared to the benchmark of commercial membranes. The results show promising properties of ion-exchange capacity, water uptake, conductivity and hydophilicity from blended membranes, comparable to commercial membranes, though the performance of the prepared membranes did not exceed the commercial one. Further characterization of the transport properties of ion-exchange membranes need to be investigated to be able to understand the effects of the fillers on the performance of the membranes in ED application

Standards for midwife Practitioners of external cephalic version: A Delphi study

IntroductionExpansion of advanced and specialist midwifery practitioner roles across professional boundaries requires an evidence-based framework to evaluate achievement and maintenance of competency. In order to develop the role of Breech Specialist Midwife to include the autonomous performance of external cephalic version within one hospital, guidance was required on standards of training and skill development, particularly in the use of ultrasound

Search for dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks in √s = 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for weakly interacting massive particle dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks is presented. Final states containing third-generation quarks and miss- ing transverse momentum are considered. The analysis uses 36.1 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at √s = 13 TeV in 2015 and 2016. No significant excess of events above the estimated backgrounds is observed. The results are in- terpreted in the framework of simplified models of spin-0 dark-matter mediators. For colour- neutral spin-0 mediators produced in association with top quarks and decaying into a pair of dark-matter particles, mediator masses below 50 GeV are excluded assuming a dark-matter candidate mass of 1 GeV and unitary couplings. For scalar and pseudoscalar mediators produced in association with bottom quarks, the search sets limits on the production cross- section of 300 times the predicted rate for mediators with masses between 10 and 50 GeV and assuming a dark-matter mass of 1 GeV and unitary coupling. Constraints on colour- charged scalar simplified models are also presented. Assuming a dark-matter particle mass of 35 GeV, mediator particles with mass below 1.1 TeV are excluded for couplings yielding a dark-matter relic density consistent with measurements