Health Effects of Airborne Exposures from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations

Toxic gases, vapors, and particles are emitted from concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) into the general environment. These include ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, carbon dioxide, malodorous vapors, and particles contaminated with a wide range of microorganisms. Little is known about the health risks of exposure to these agents for people living in the surrounding areas. Malodor is one of the predominant concerns, and there is evidence that psychophysiologic changes may occur as a result of exposure to malodorous compounds. There is a paucity of data regarding community adverse health effects related to low-level gas and particulate emissions. Most information comes from studies among workers in CAFO installations. Research over the last decades has shown that microbial exposures, especially endotoxin exposure, are related to deleterious respiratory health effects, of which cross-shift lung function decline and accelerated decline over time are the most pronounced effects. Studies in naïve subjects and workers have shown respiratory inflammatory responses related to the microbial load. This working group, which was part of the Conference on Environmental Health Impacts of Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations: Anticipating Hazards—Searching for Solutions, concluded that there is a great need to evaluate health effects from exposures to the toxic gases, vapors, and particles emitted into the general environment by CAFOs. Research should focus not only on nuisance and odors but also on potential health effects from microbial exposures, concentrating on susceptible subgroups, especially asthmatic children and the elderly, since these exposures have been shown to be related to respiratory health effects among workers in CAFOs

Multi-decadal changes in tundra environments and ecosystems: Synthesis of the International Polar Year-Back to the Future Project (IPY-BTF).

Understanding the responses of tundra systems to global change has global implications. Most tundra regions lack sustained environmental monitoring and one of the only ways to document multi-decadal change is to resample historic research sites. The International Polar Year (IPY) provided a unique opportunity for such research through the Back to the Future (BTF) project (IPY project #512). This article synthesizes the results from 13 papers within this Ambio Special Issue. Abiotic changes include glacial recession in the Altai Mountains, Russia; increased snow depth and hardness, permafrost warming, and increased growing season length in sub-arctic Sweden; drying of ponds in Greenland; increased nutrient availability in Alaskan tundra ponds, and warming at most locations studied. Biotic changes ranged from relatively minor plant community change at two sites in Greenland to moderate change in the Yukon, and to dramatic increases in shrub and tree density on Herschel Island, and in sub-arctic Sweden. The population of geese tripled at one site in northeast Greenland where biomass in non-grazed plots doubled. A model parameterized using results from a BTF study forecasts substantial declines in all snowbeds and increases in shrub tundra on Niwot Ridge, Colorado over the next century. In general, results support and provide improved capacities for validating experimental manipulation, remote sensing, and modeling studies

Deuterium-carbon multiple-quantum NMR in liquid crystals: polarization transfer and off-magic-angle spinning

The polarization transfer dynamics in a recently introduced deuterium-carbon NMR correlation method is studied, both theoretically and experimentally. The technique, which exploits heteronuclear multiple-quantum coherences, is useful for measuring and assigning 2H quadrupolar couplings in ordered media. It is also shown that the experiment is suitable for implementation under off-magic-angle spinning conditions. The approach is demonstrated on a perdeuterated liquid crystal

Local and translational dynamics in DNA–lipid assemblies monitored by solid-state and diffusion NMR

AbstractThe influence of electrostatic interactions on the dynamic properties of complexes containing DNA and mixtures of cationic- (DDA) and zwitterionic (DLPC) lipids are studied by means of NMR. The systems are arranged in lamellar membrane stacks intercalated by DNA molecules. This is confirmed by 31P-NMR, where a superposition of an axially symmetric powder pattern arising from the phospholipid membrane and an asymmetric tensor due to DNA can be fitted to the experimentally observed lineshape. The local mobility and order is assessed using two solid-state NMR techniques applicable to samples with natural isotopic abundance: WIdeline SEparation (WISE) and Separated Local Field (SLF) spectroscopy. Both experiments yield highly resolved 13C spectra in the direct dimension. The indirect dimension contains information about molecular dynamics through the 1H dipolar linewidth (WISE) or the 1H–13C dipolar coupling constant (SLF). The experiments suggest that DNA is static while it induces an increased disorder in the hydrocarbon chains as compared to the parent lipid case. DDA chain order is more affected than DLPC due to the attractive electrostatic interaction between DNA and the cationic lipid. Translational dynamics of the lipids and the water was measured with the Pulsed Field Gradient STimulated Echo (PFG STE) technique. The influence of lamellar domain size and the angular dependence of the diffusion coefficients and nuclear relaxation times on the results of the PFG STE experiments are discussed. The local water diffusion coefficient is reduced by a factor four from the value of bulk water, and increases as the DLPC content is increased. We observe two lipid components with an order of magnitude difference in diffusion coefficients in the DNA:DDA:DLPC precipitate and these are assigned to DLPC (fast) and DDA (slow). Cationic lipid (DDA) diffusion is decreasing a factor of 2 when DLPC is added to the pure DNA:DDA system, indicating DNA-induced lipid segregation within the bilayer and the transition from locally 2D to 1D diffusion of the DDA. The results show that DNA–lipid electrostatic interactions reduce the long-range lipid mobility but locally enhance the hydrocarbon chain dynamics by perturbing the preferred lipid packing

Deuterium NMR Investigation of a Discotic Mesogen Based on Hexasubstituted Truxene

We report a 2H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) investigation of 2,3,7,8,12,13−hexakis(octadecanoyloxy)− truxene (TxHA17) specifically labeled in the a−position of the alkyl chain. Results from these measurements, together with polarizing microscopy, show that the substance is in a crystalline state up to 9

Heteronuclear dipolar recoupling in liquid crystals and solids by PISEMA-type pulse sequences

A pulse sequence is described for the recoupling of heteronuclear dipolar interactions under MAS. The method is similar to the PISEMA experiment, but employs a well-defined amplitude modulation of one of the two radio-frequency fields. The technique is used for measurements of 1H–13C dipolar couplings in unoriented solid and liquid-crystalline samples

Separated local field spectroscopy of columnar and nematic liquid crystals

We are in this work comparing the efficiencies of various 1H–13C separated local field (SLF) experiments when applied to columnar and nematic liquid crystals. In particular, the performances of the conventional SLF, proton-detected local field (PDLF), and polarization inversion spin exchange at the magic angle (PISEMA) methods in terms of spectral resolution, robustness, and ability to measure long-range couplings are investigated. The PDLF sequence provides in most cases the best dipolar resolution. This is especially obvious for weakly coupled 1H–13C spin pairs

Molecular structure and order of hexaoctyloxy-rufigallol in the solid and columnar phases: Analysis of 2H-13C dipolar and 13C chemical-shift interactions

We report a 13C NMR investigation of 1,2,3,5,6,7-hexaoctyloxy-rufigallol in the solid and columnar phases using various 2H- and 13C-labeled isotopomers. The measurements were performed under both static and magic-angle spinning conditions. The conformations of the aliphatic side chains were derived from an analysis of 2H–13C dipolar and 13C chemical-shift interactions. The nonequivalent chains exhibit significantly different structural behavior in both solid and columnar phase. It emerged that one of the side chains adopts an in-plane structure, while the other two chains prefer antiparallel out-of-plane conformations. Quantum-chemical calculations of the 13C chemical-shift tensors were also carried out. These calculations support the experimental findings