Assessment of Commonly Used Pesticides in the Ground Water of the Shallow Aquifer Systems in Jericho and Jeftlik areas/ Lower Jordan Valley, Occupied Palestinian Territories

One of the most important pollutants that may reach the groundwater through agricultural return flow combined with abuse and ignorance is pesticides. This study focuses on the examination of the concentration of three pesticides: Abamectin, Imidacloprid, and ß-Cyfluthrin, all of which have been used in large quantities in the Lower Jordan Valley (LJV) for the last three decades. Twenty five groundwater samples were collected from water boreholes where water is abstracted from two phreatic aquifer systems which are the Plio-Plistocene aquifer system in Jericho and Lower Al Jeftlik areas and the Eocene carbonate aquifer system in the Middle of Al Jeftlik. The depth of the boreholes in both aquifer system ranges between 80 and 120 m. Water samples were analyzed for Abamectin, Imidacloprid, and ß-Cyfluthrin using the HPLC-UV method. These samples represent two main agricultural locations (Jericho, and the Al Jeftlik). Of the 25 wells sampled, Abamectin was detected in 11 wells in concentrations ranging between 1.24 ppb and 81.71ppb. Imidacloprid was detected in 24 wells in concentrations ranging between 1.60ppb and 325.0ppb. Finally, ß-Cyfluthrin was detected in 7 wells in concentrations ranging between 1.10 and 24.46ppb. Aquifer lithology, groundwater flow directions, type of agricultural activity are major factors in controlling pesticide concentrations in groundwater. The highest values were measured where the aquifer consists of gravel and sand sediments, combined with intensive agricultural activities, followed by sand-silt aquifer. The lowest concentrations were found in boreholes where carbonate aquifer is the main source of water which indicates that other source of water flow into the system. The results of this study demonstrate that these pesticides are used heavily and in an improper way in the lower Jordan Valley, increasing the risk of adverse environmental and public health effects. Much attention should be given to addressing the potential problem of environmental and groundwater contamination by these pesticides.This study was funded through BARD-project /USDA

Waste sludge from shipping docks as a catalyst to remove amoxicillin in water with hydrogen peroxide and ultrasound

The waste sludge from shipping docks contains important elements that can be used as a catalyst after proper processing. The purpose of this study was to remove of amoxicillin (AMX) from the aquatic environment using waste sludge from shipping docks as catalyst in the presence of hydrogen peroxide/ultrasound waves. The catalyst was produced by treating waste sludge at 400 °C for 2 h. N2 adsorption, SEM, XRD, XRF, and FTIR techniques characterized the structural and physical properties of the catalyst. The BET-specific surface area of the catalyst reduced after AMX removal from 4.4 m2/g to 3.6 m2/g. To determine the optimal removal conditions, the parameters of the design of experiments were pH (5–9), contaminant concentration (5–100 mg/L), catalyst dosage (0.5–6 g/L), and concentration of hydrogen peroxide (10–100 mM). The maximum removal of AMX (98%) was obtained in the catalyst/hydrogen peroxide/ultrasound system at pH 5, catalyst dose of 4.5 g/L, H2O2 concentration of 50 mM, AMX concentration of 5 mg/L, and contact time of 60 min. The kinetics of removal of AMX from urine (k = 0.026 1/min), hospital wastewater (k = 0.021 1/min), and distilled water (k = 0.067 1/min) followed a first-order kinetic model (R2>0.91). The catalyst was reused up to 8 times and the AMX removal decreased to 45% in the last use. The byproducts and reaction pathway of AMX degradation were also investigated. The results clearly show that to achieve high pollutant removal rate the H2O2/ultrasound and catalyst/ultrasound synergy plays a key role

Performance evaluation and ranking of regional primary health care and public health Systems in Iran

Background: The present study has been undertaken with the aim to evaluate performance and ranking of various universities of medical sciences that are responsible for providing public health services and primary health care in Iran. Methods: Four models; Weighted Factor Analysis (WFA), Equal Weighting (EW), Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA), and Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) have been applied for evaluating the performance of universities of medical sciences. This study was commenced based on the statistical reports of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education (MOHME), census data from the Statistical Center of Iran, indicators of Vital Statistics, results of Multiple Indicator of Demographic and Health Survey 2010, and results of the National Survey of Risk Factors of noncommunicable diseases. Results: The average performance scores in WFA, EW, SFA, and DEA methods for the universities were 0.611, 0.663, 0.736 and 0.838, respectively. In all 4 models, the performance scores of universities were different (range from 0.56–1, 0.53–1, 0.73–1 and 0.83–1 in WFA, EW, SFA and DEA models, respectively). Gilan and Rafsanjan universities with the average ranking score of 4.75 and 41 had the highest and lowest rank among universities, respectively. The universities of Gilan, Ardabil and Bojnourd in all four models had the highest performance among the top 15 universities, while the universities of Rafsanjan, Ahvaz, Kerman and Jiroft showed poor performance in all models. Conclusions: The average performance scores have varied based on different measurement methods, so judging the performance of universities based solely on the results of a model can be misleading. In all models, the performance of universities has been different, which indicates the need for planning to balance the performance improvement of universities based on learning from the experiences of well-performing universities

Field Intercomparison of Radiometers Used for Satellite Validation in the 400–900 nm Range

An intercomparison of radiance and irradiance ocean color radiometers (the second laboratory comparison exercise—LCE-2) was organized within the frame of the European Space Agency funded project Fiducial Reference Measurements for Satellite Ocean Color (FRM4SOC) May 8–13, 2017 at Tartu Observatory, Estonia. LCE-2 consisted of three sub-tasks: (1) SI-traceable radiometric calibration of all the participating radiance and irradiance radiometers at the Tartu Observatory just before the comparisons; (2) indoor, laboratory intercomparison using stable radiance and irradiance sources in a controlled environment; (3) outdoor, field intercomparison of natural radiation sources over a natural water surface. The aim of the experiment was to provide a link in the chain of traceability from field measurements of water reflectance to the uniform SI-traceable calibration, and after calibration to verify whether different instruments measuring the same object provide results consistent within the expected uncertainty limits. This paper describes the third phase of LCE-2: The results of the field experiment. The calibration of radiometers and laboratory comparison experiment are presented in a related paper of the same journal issue. Compared to the laboratory comparison, the field intercomparison has demonstrated substantially larger variability between freshly calibrated sensors, because the targets and environmental conditions during radiometric calibration were different, both spectrally and spatially. Major differences were found for radiance sensors measuring a sunlit water target at viewing zenith angle of 139° because of the different fields of view. Major differences were found for irradiance sensors because of imperfect cosine response of diffusers. Variability between individual radiometers did depend significantly also on the type of the sensor and on the specific measurement target. Uniform SI traceable radiometric calibration ensuring fairly good consistency for indoor, laboratory measurements is insufficient for outdoor, field measurements, mainly due to the different angular variability of illumination. More stringent specifications and individual testing of radiometers for all relevant systematic effects (temperature, nonlinearity, spectral stray light, etc.) are needed to reduce biases between instruments and better quantify measurement uncertainties

Laboratory Intercomparison of Radiometers Used for Satellite Validation in the 400–900 nm Range

An intercomparison of radiance and irradiance ocean color radiometers (The Second Laboratory Comparison Exercise—LCE-2) was organized within the frame of the European Space Agency funded project Fiducial Reference Measurements for Satellite Ocean Color (FRM4SOC) May 8–13, 2017 at Tartu Observatory, Estonia. LCE-2 consisted of three sub-tasks: 1) SI-traceable radiometric calibration of all the participating radiance and irradiance radiometers at the Tartu Observatory just before the comparisons; 2) Indoor intercomparison using stable radiance and irradiance sources in controlled environment; and 3) Outdoor intercomparison of natural radiation sources over terrestrial water surface. The aim of the experiment was to provide one link in the chain of traceability from field measurements of water reflectance to the uniform SI-traceable calibration, and after calibration to verify whether different instruments measuring the same object provide results consistent within the expected uncertainty limits. This paper describes the activities and results of the first two phases of LCE-2: the SI-traceable radiometric calibration and indoor intercomparison, the results of outdoor experiment are presented in a related paper of the same journal issue. The indoor experiment of the LCE-2 has proven that uniform calibration just before the use of radiometers is highly effective. Distinct radiometers from different manufacturers operated by different scientists can yield quite close radiance and irradiance results (standard deviation s < 1%) under defined conditions. This holds when measuring stable lamp-based targets under stationary laboratory conditions with all the radiometers uniformly calibrated against the same standards just prior to the experiment. In addition, some unification of measurement and data processing must be settled. Uncertainty of radiance and irradiance measurement under these conditions largely consists of the sensor’s calibration uncertainty and of the spread of results obtained by individual sensors measuring the same object

Non-isothermal Studies on the Thermal Decomposition of C4 Explosive Using the TG/DTA Technique

The thermal behaviour of energetic materials is very important for their safe production, storage, handling and even demilitarization. In this work, the thermal behaviour and decomposition kinetics of conventional C4 plastic explosive has been studied experimentally by a non-isothermal thermogravimetric (TG)/differential thermal analysis (DTA) technique at different heating rates (2, 4, 6 and 8 °C·min-1). The kinetic triplet of activation energy, frequency factor and model of thermal decomposition of this compound has been evaluated via model-fitting and model-free methods. The results show a single thermal decomposition process for C4, with the model of integral function (g(α)) of [(1−α)-1/3 −1]2 and differential function (f(α)) of [(1−α)2/3(3α−3)/2(1−α)1/3−2], indicating a 3-dimensional diffusion mechanism. In addition, Ea values of 207.1 ± 17.3, and 241 kJ·mol-1, by using the isoconversional model-free modified Kissinger-Akahira-Sunose (KAS) and the Kissinger method, respectively, were obtained for the conversion interval of 0.3-0.7. The C4 matrix shows a significant effect on the activation energy distribution of pure RDX

Statistical Optimization and Selective Separation of RDX and HMX Explosives by Using Binary Solvent Mixtures Containing Ethyl Acetate and Water

The present study introduces the application of a binary solvent of ethyl acetate and water for the selective separation of 1,3,5-trinitroperhydro-1,3,5-triazine (RDX) and octahydro-1,3,5,7-tetranitro-1,3,5,7-tetrazocine (HMX). The effect of temperature and weight percent of ethyl acetate in water on the solubility of RDX and HMX over a temperature range of 273.15 K to 363.15 K and 70.0 wt.% to 100.0 wt.% ethyl acetate in water mixtures were modelled and optimized using a central composite design (CCD) and response surface methodology (RSM) in Minitab (ver. 16) software. Multiple regression analysis and analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed that the predicted results were in good agreement with the experimental data. The enthalpies of dissolution and mixing of the materials were determined experimentally from the solubility data. The experimental results showed that the solubility ratio of RDX to HMX can change 6.53- to 16.55-fold, indicating a much lower solubility of HMX in this binary solvent, for a relatively selective separation of RDX and HMX mixtures. Separation experiments under optimized conditions showed that 98.3% of the RDX impurity in HMX was recovered in the first precipitation with an HMX purity of > 99.5% as characterized by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)

Modelling of the Effect of Concentrated Nitration Conditions on the Efficiency of the Production of ,7-Dinitro-1,3,5,7-tetraazabicyclo[3,3,1]nonane (DPT)

3,7-Dinitro-1,3,5,7-tetraazabicyclo[3,3,1]nonane (DPT) is one of the most important intermediates in the synthesis of octahydro-1,3,5,7-tetranitro-1,3,5,7-tetrazocine (HMX). A suitably modified Bachmann process, nitrolysis of solid hexamine in the presence of ammonium nitrate-nitric acid and acetic anhydride on a laboratory scale, is introduced to increase the efficiency, production capacity and purity of the DPT produced. Various quantitative and qualitative analytical methods were used for the identification and quality control of the product. A central composite design (CCD) of experiments was used to optimize the production process, increasing the production capacity, reducing the amount of acetic acid as the reaction medium to a suitable limit, and examining the effects of the main factors impacting on the efficiency of the nitration, e.g. the volume of ammonium nitrate-nitric acid solution, nitration temperature reactor addition time and volume of acetic anhydride. The overall results indicated that DPT was obtained with an efficiency of 64.58% and a production capacity of 20.77 (100 g·mL−1)