Maximizing furfural concentration from wheat straw and Eucalyptus globulus by nonisothermal autohydrolysis

The autohydrolysis process as a method for selective extraction of hemicelluloses and conversion to furfural was proposed for lignocellulosic raw materials. Samples of wheat straw (WS) and Eucalyptus globulus (EG) were subjected to nonisothermal autohydrolysis, defined by temperature 180–240°C. Within a biorefinery scheme for the selected materials, the aim of this study is both (a) to optimize furfural processing technology to enable higher yields and improved productivity from EG and WS by autohydrolysis and (b) to not excessively degrade the remaining polymeric constituents (glucan) in solid to facilitate a potential later use. Differences in the rate of the dehydration reaction of xylose to furfural have been observed, and it is faster in the case of WS with respect to that observed for eucalyptus. In that form, 4.25 g/100 g raw material (26% of the initial xylan in WS) could be found at 220°C, and an increase in the temperature (240°C) yielded 4.54 g/100 g raw material, 28% of the initial xylan. In EG, the increase in the hydrolysis temperature (240°C) yielded liquor with higher contents of furfural (4.45 g/100 g raw material, 25% of the initial xylan) and acetic acid (4.49 g/100 g raw material) and smaller contents of arabinose and xylan. In WS, a faster dehydration is found

Sustained high serum malondialdehyde levels are associated with severity and mortality in septic patients

This book digs into an area of international migration studies that has gained prominence in the past couple of decades: migrant smuggling. The regional focus is southern Europe, which receives immigrants from many African and Asian countries. Migrant smuggling is discussed in relation to EU and national policies, aimed at combating irregular migration, including increased surveillance and border controls.The authors are no newcomers to the field. Anna Triandafyllidou is a leading scholar in migration studies, having published extensively on various topics dealing with migration in Europe, and with a special interest in Greece and southern Europe. Thanos Maroukis, on the other hand, is an early career academic whose publications have focused specifically on migration in Greece. It is, therefore, not surprising that the authors approached this topic of migrant smuggling from Africa and Asia to Europe by focusing mainly on the situation in Greece and the Turkish-Greek route. The book is based on fieldwork, participant observation and interviews conducted in Athens. The empirical material is extensive, covering a broad range of actors.peer-reviewe

Glycans are not necessary to maintain the pathobiological features of bovine spongiform encephalopathy

The role of the glycosylation status of PrPC in the conversion to its pathological counterpart and on cross-species transmission of prion strains has been widely discussed. Here, we assessed the effect on strain characteristics of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) isolates with different transmission histories upon propagation on a model expressing a non-glycosylated human PrPC. Bovine, ovine and porcine-passaged BSE, and variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) isolates were used as seeds/inocula in both in vitro and in vivo propagation assays using the non-glycosylated human PrPC-expressing mouse model (TgNN6h). After protein misfolding cyclic amplification (PMCA), all isolates maintained the biochemical characteristics of BSE. On bioassay, all PMCA-propagated BSE prions were readily transmitted to TgNN6h mice, in agreement with our previous in vitro results. TgNN6h mice reproduced the characteristic neuropathological and biochemical hallmarks of BSE, suggesting that the absence of glycans did not alter the pathobiological features of BSE prions. Moreover, back-passage of TgNN6h-adapted BSE prions to BoTg110 mice recovered the full BSE phenotype, confirming that the glycosylation of human PrPC is not essential for the preservation of the human transmission barrier for BSE prions or for the maintenance of BSE strain properties

Search for optimum conditions of wheat straw hemicelluloses cold alkaline extraction process

A method for the selective extraction of hemicellulose from wheat straw involving cold alkaline extraction and subsequent separation by precipitation with ethanol is proposed. Wheat straw affords selective separation of the hemicellulose fraction from the cellulose and lignin fractions with the proposed method. The hemicellulose yield was optimized by using a 2n factor design to examine the influence of temperatures (temperature was designed between 20 and 40 ◦C), operation times (operation time was designed between 30 and 60 min) and alkali concentrations (alkali concentration was designed between 80 and 120 g L−1). These conditions allowed 56.1% of all hemicellulose initially present in the raw material, and 59.1% of the lignin, to be extracted. Subsequent separation of hemicellulose in the liquid phase from the cold alkaline extraction by precipitation with ethanol provided a fraction containing 39.4% of all hemicellulose (45.2% hemicellulose in extract/total extract) and only 12% of all lignin in the raw material.The authors are grateful for the FPU grant from the Spanish Ministry of Education. Also they thank to Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (former Ministry of Science and Innovation) contracts. The authors acknowledge financial support for this investigation has been provided by CDTI (CENIT-E-CDTI-BioSos-CEN-2009-1040) and supported by Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, "Local Investment fund for employment". Government of Spain, Junta de Andalucia, CICYT-FEDER (Science and Technology Inter Ministerial Commission, Spanish Government - European Regional Development Fund), project number AGL2009-13113 and the business group ACCIONA INFRAESTRUCTURAS, S.A

The First Galaxy Cluster Discovered by the VISTA Variables in the Vía Láctea Survey

We report the first confirmed detection of the galaxy cluster VVV-J144321-611754 at very low latitudes (l = 315.°836, b = -1.°650) located in the tile d015 of the VISTA Variables in the Vía Láctea (VVV) survey. We defined the region of 30 ×30 arcmin 2 centered in the brightest galaxy finding 25 galaxies. For these objects, extinction-corrected median colors of (H-K s ) = 0.34 ± 0.05 mag, (J-H) = 0.57 ± 0.08 mag, and (J-K s ) = 0.87 ± 0.06 mag; R 1/2 = 1.59 ± 0.″16; C = 3.01 ± 0.08; and Sérsic index n = 4.63 ± 0.39 were estimated. They were visually confirmed showing characteristics of early-type galaxies in the near-IR images. An automatic clustering analysis performed in the whole tile found that the concentration of galaxies VVV-J144321-611754 is a real, compact concentration of early-type galaxies. Assuming a typical galaxy cluster with low X-ray luminosity, the photometric redshift of the brightest galaxy is z = 0.196 ± 0.025. Follow-up near-IR spectroscopy with FLAMINGOS-2 at the Gemini-South telescope revealed that the two brighter cluster galaxies have typical spectra of early-type galaxies and the estimated redshift for the brightest galaxy VVV-J144321.06-611753.9 is z = 0.234 ± 0.022 and that for VVV-J144319.02-611746.1 is z = 0.232 ± 0.019. Finally, these galaxies clearly follow the cluster red sequence in the rest-frame near-IR color-magnitude diagram with a slope similar to a galaxy cluster at a redshift of 0.2. These results are consistent with the presence of a bona fide galaxy cluster beyond the Milky Way disk.Fil: Baravalle, Laura Daniela. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Nilo Castellón, José Luis. Universidad de La Serena; ChileFil: Alonso, Maria Victoria. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Díaz Tello, J.. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile; Chile. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México; MéxicoFil: Damke, G.. Universidad de La Serena; ChileFil: Valotto, Carlos Alberto. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Cuevas Larenas, H.. Universidad de La Serena; ChileFil: Sánchez, Bruno Orlando. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Ríos, M. de los. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Minniti, D.. Universidad Andrés Bello; ChileFil: Domínguez, M.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Gurovich, Sebastian. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Observatorio Astronómico de Córdoba. Instituto de Astronomía Teórica y Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Barbá, R.. Universidad de La Serena; ChileFil: Soto, M.. Universidad de Atacama; ChileFil: Castro, F. Milla. Universidad de La Serena; Chil

GW150914: First search for the electromagnetic counterpart of a gravitational-wave event by the TOROS collaboration

We present the results of the optical follow-up conducted by the TOROS collaboration of the first gravitational-wave event GW150914. We conducted unfiltered CCD observations (0.35-1 micron) with the 1.5-m telescope at Bosque Alegre starting ~2.5 days after the alarm. Given our limited field of view (~100 square arcmin), we targeted 14 nearby galaxies that were observable from the site and were located within the area of higher localization probability. We analyzed the observations using two independent implementations of difference-imaging algorithms, followed by a Random-Forest-based algorithm to discriminate between real and bogus transients. We did not find any bona fide transient event in the surveyed area down to a 5-sigma limiting magnitude of r=21.7 mag (AB). Our result is consistent with the LIGO detection of a binary black hole merger, for which no electromagnetic counterparts are expected, and with the expected rates of other astrophysical transients.Comment: ApJ Letters, in pres

Atherosclerotic plaque development in mice is enhanced by myeloid ZEB1 downregulation.

Accumulation of lipid-laden macrophages within the arterial neointima is a critical step in atherosclerotic plaque formation. Here, we show that reduced levels of the cellular plasticity factor ZEB1 in macrophages increase atherosclerotic plaque formation and the chance of cardiovascular events. Compared to control counterparts (Zeb1WT/ApoeKO), male mice with Zeb1 ablation in their myeloid cells (Zeb1∆M/ApoeKO) have larger atherosclerotic plaques and higher lipid accumulation in their macrophages due to delayed lipid traffic and deficient cholesterol efflux. Zeb1∆M/ApoeKO mice display more pronounced systemic metabolic alterations than Zeb1WT/ApoeKO mice, with higher serum levels of low-density lipoproteins and inflammatory cytokines and larger ectopic fat deposits. Higher lipid accumulation in Zeb1∆M macrophages is reverted by the exogenous expression of Zeb1 through macrophage-targeted nanoparticles. In vivo administration of these nanoparticles reduces atherosclerotic plaque formation in Zeb1∆M/ApoeKO mice. Finally, low ZEB1 expression in human endarterectomies is associated with plaque rupture and cardiovascular events. These results set ZEB1 in macrophages as a potential target in the treatment of atherosclerosis.S

XI CIDU. La transformación digital de la universidad Congreso Iberoamericano de Docencia Universitaria

Nesta comunicação apresenta-se uma experiência de gamificação realizada numa turma online, numa Universidade Virtual. Foram utilizados como elementos de jogo pontos, badges, leadboard, avatares e desafios. Do ponto de vista do desenho da unidade curricular, foi proposto um desafio global, sob a forma de roleplaying, que percorreu todo o semestre. Para este desafio global contribuíram três outros desafios, nos quais os estudantes deveriam dinamizar discussões, sendo atribuídos pontos e badges em função da sua prestação. No que se refere à metodologia, tratou-se de uma investigação exploratória, com carácter qualitativo. Como técnicas de recolha de dados, privilegiou-se a observação, realizada durante toda a unidade curricular, complementada por um questionário aos estudantes no final do semestre. Constatou-se que a estratégia adotada incentivou a participação ativa dos estudantes, tendo estes gostado da experiência. Verificaram-se, contudo, algumas limitações, pelo facto de os estudantes desta amostra serem adultos trabalhadores a frequentar uma licenciatura online, com outros compromissos profissionais e familiares. Com efeito, verificou-se que vários deles mencionaram ter dificuldade na gestão do tempo, limitando a possibilidade de adesão a um percurso exigente em termos de participação ativa.In this paper, we present a gamification experiment that took place in an online class at a virtual university. The game elements were points, badges, leaderboard, avatars and challenges. Taking into account the curricular unit design, a global challenge was proposed, in the form of roleplaying, and took place along the whole semester. Three other challenges contributed to this global challenge: the students had to dynamize debates, and received points and badges, according to their performance. In terms of methodology, it consisted in an exploratory research of a qualitative character. Observation, complemented by a questionnaire made available to the students at the end of the semester, were the chosen techniques for data collection. It was observed that the adopted strategy motivated the students’ active participation, who really enjoyed the experience. However, some limitations were also observed, once these students, attending an online First Cycle Degree, are adults who have professional and family responsibilities and commitments. Actually, several of them mentioned that the difficulty in organizing their time did limit the possibility of participating in the challenge, which was indeed demanding in terms of active participation.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio