Iron Behaving Badly: Inappropriate Iron Chelation as a Major Contributor to the Aetiology of Vascular and Other Progressive Inflammatory and Degenerative Diseases

The production of peroxide and superoxide is an inevitable consequence of aerobic metabolism, and while these particular "reactive oxygen species" (ROSs) can exhibit a number of biological effects, they are not of themselves excessively reactive and thus they are not especially damaging at physiological concentrations. However, their reactions with poorly liganded iron species can lead to the catalytic production of the very reactive and dangerous hydroxyl radical, which is exceptionally damaging, and a major cause of chronic inflammation. We review the considerable and wide-ranging evidence for the involvement of this combination of (su)peroxide and poorly liganded iron in a large number of physiological and indeed pathological processes and inflammatory disorders, especially those involving the progressive degradation of cellular and organismal performance. These diseases share a great many similarities and thus might be considered to have a common cause (i.e. iron-catalysed free radical and especially hydroxyl radical generation). The studies reviewed include those focused on a series of cardiovascular, metabolic and neurological diseases, where iron can be found at the sites of plaques and lesions, as well as studies showing the significance of iron to aging and longevity. The effective chelation of iron by natural or synthetic ligands is thus of major physiological (and potentially therapeutic) importance. As systems properties, we need to recognise that physiological observables have multiple molecular causes, and studying them in isolation leads to inconsistent patterns of apparent causality when it is the simultaneous combination of multiple factors that is responsible. This explains, for instance, the decidedly mixed effects of antioxidants that have been observed, etc...Comment: 159 pages, including 9 Figs and 2184 reference

Role of Smart Cities in Creating Sustainable Cities and Communities: A Systematic Literature Review

YesSmart cities can help in achieving UN SDG. This research carries out a comprehensive analysis of the role of smart cities on creating sustainable cities and communities, which is one of 17 UN sustainable goals. Current research focuses on number of aspect of sustainable environment such as renewable and green energy, energy efficiency, environmental monitoring, air quality, and water quality. This study provides a valuable synthesis of the relevant literature on smart cities by analysing and discussing the key findings from existing research on issues of smart cities in creating sustainable cities and communities. The findings of this study can provide an informative framework for research on smart cities for academics and practitioners

Big Energy Data Management for Smart Grids—Issues, Challenges and Recent Developments

Urban areas suffer from tremendous pressure to cope with increasing population in a city. A smart city is a technological solution that integrates engineering and information systems to assist in managing these scarce resources. A smart city comprises several intelligent services such as smart grids, smart education, smart transportation, smart buildings, smart waste management and so on. Among all these, smart grids are the nucleus of all the facilities because these provide sustainable electrical supply for other smart services to operate seamlessly. Smart grids integrate information and communication technologies (ICT) into traditional energy grids, thereby capturing massive amounts of data from several devices like smart meters, sensors, and other electrical infrastructuresSCADA. The data collected in smart grids are heterogeneous and require data analytic techniques to extract meaningful information to make informed decisions. We term this enormous amount of data as big energy data. This book chapter discusses progress in the field of big energy data by enlisting different studies that cover several data management aspects such as data collection, data preprocessing, data integration, data storage, data analytics, data visualisation and decision-making. We also discuss various challenges in data management and report recent progress in this field. Finally, we present open research areas in big data managementBig data management especially in relation to smart grids