Effects of short-chain fructooligosaccharides and galactooligosaccharides, individually and in combination, on nutrient digestibility, fecal fermentative metabolite concentrations, and large bowel microbial ecology of healthy adult cats

Short-chain fructooligosaccharides (scFOS) and galactooligosaccharides (GOS) are non-digestible oligosaccharides that result in a prebiotic effect in some animal species; however, the cat has not been well studied in this regard. This experiment evaluated scFOS and GOS supplementation on nutrient digestibility, fermentative end-product production, and fecal microbial ecology of cats. Eight healthy adult cats were fed diets containing no prebiotic, 0.5% scFOS, 0.5% GOS, or 0.5% scFOS + 0.5% GOS (scFOS+GOS) in a replicated 4x4 Latin square design. Apparent total tract crude protein digestibility was decreased (P < 0.05) when cats were fed a diet containing scFOS + GOS compared to the other treatments. Dry matter, OM, acid hydrolyzed fat, and GE digestibilities were not different among treatments. Cats fed scFOS-, GOS-, and scFOS+GOS-supplemented diets had greater (P < 0.05) fecal Bifidobacterium spp. populations compared to cats fed the control diet. Fecal pH was lower (P < 0.05) for cats fed the scFOS+GOS-supplemented diet compared to the control. Butyrate (P = 0.05) and valerate (P < 0.05) concentrations were higher when cats consumed the scFOS+GOS diet. Acetate tended to be greater (P = 0.10) when cats were fed the scFOS+GOS diet. Total SCFA (P = 0.06) and total BCFA (P = 0.06) concentrations also tended to be greater when cats consumed the scFOS+GOS treatment. Fecal protein catabolites, including ammonia, 4-methylphenol, indole, and biogenic amines, did not differ among treatments, nor did blood lymphocytes, neutrophils, or total white blood cell counts, or fecal DM concentration and output. Low level supplementation of scFOS, GOS, and their combination exert positive effects on select indices of gut health in cats

Removal of Nitrate by Bimetallic Copper-nanoscale Zero-valent Iron (Cu-nZVI): Using 2k Full Factorial Design

Enhanced nitrate reduction of nanoscale zero valent iron (nZVI) by Cu prepared by impregnation method was studied in this work. Using a full factorial design, the performance of nZVI with and without Cu on surface in acidic and neutral conditions was investigated. Static batch reactor was selected in this study to investigate the effects of the independent variables such as catalysts (nZVI with and without Cu), initial pH of solutions (3, 7), and reaction times (10, 30 min). The results found that nitrate removal over Cu-nZVI was greater than that of nZVI by about 37 % and 36 % at pH 3 and pH 7 for 30 min, respectively. Both catalysts were effective in removing nitrate under acidic conditions (pH 3). Thus, this study concludes that nZVI can enhance the performance by Cu in nitrate removal. Moreover, acidic conditions were more effective than neutral conditions in removing nitrate

The role of hydrogen and fuel cells in the global energy system

Hydrogen technologies have experienced cycles of excessive expectations followed by disillusion. Nonetheless, a growing body of evidence suggests these technologies form an attractive option for the deep decarb onisation of global energy systems, and that recent improvements in their cost and performance point towards economic viability as well. This paper is a comprehensive review of the potential role that hydrogen could play in the provision of electricity, h eat, industry, transport and energy storage in a low - carbon energy system, and an assessment of the status of hydrogen in being able to fulfil that potential. The picture that emerges is one of qualified promise: hydrogen is well established in certain nic hes such as forklift trucks, while mainstream applications are now forthcoming. Hydrogen vehicles are available commercially in several countries, and 225,000 fuel cell home heating systems have been sold. This represents a step change from the situation of only five years ago. This review shows that challenges around cost and performance remain, and considerable improvements are still required for hydrogen to become truly competitive. But such competitiveness in the medium - term future no longer seems an unrealistic prospect, which fully justifies the growing interest and policy support for these technologies around the world

Rural health care in Thailand : an assessment and strategies for the future

ThesisThesis, 1981Thesis, University of Columbia, 1981Presents a series of descriptive analyses of primary health care needs as perceived by villagers and health personnel in 33 villages sampled

Efficient Hydrogen Liquefaction Processes

The problem is that today every H2 liquefaction plant has low exergy efficiency of just between 20–30%. It is based on the pre-cooled Claude system, which is still the same as 50 years ago with littleimprovement. Method to resolve the challenges of the future plants is finding a completely newconfiguration with more efficient system. For this dissertation, a multi-component refrigerant (MR)refrigeration cycle is proposed to solve the problem. The work is divided into four parts: a literaturereview, a design and simulation of a small-scale laboratory plant, an experiment with the smallplant, and a design and simulation of a proposed large-scale plant. First, this study investigated thesimulation of a newly proposed small-scale laboratory liquid hydrogen plant with the new,innovative MR refrigeration system. The simulated test rig was capable of liquefying a feed of 2kg/h of normal hydrogen gas at 21 bar and 25 oC to normal liquid hydrogen at 2 bar and −250 oC.The simulated power consumption for pre-cooling the hydrogen from 25 oC to −198 oC with thisnew MR compressor was 2.07 kWh/kgGH2. This was the lowest power consumption available whencompared to today’s conventional hydrogen liquefaction cycles, which are approximately 4.00kWh/kgGH2. Exergy analysis of the test rig’s cycle, which is required to find the losses and optimize the proposed MR system, was evaluated for each component using the simulation data. It was foundthat the majority of the losses were from the compressors, heat exchangers, and expansion valves.Then, a small-scale laboratory hydrogen liquefaction plant that contains the new innovative MRrefrigeration system was constructed to verify the simulation of this system. Initial experimentsindicated that the rig was able to adequately cool normal hydrogen gas from 25 oC to −158 oC at aflow rate of 0.6 kg/h using a simplified 5-component MR composition refrigeration system. Thepower consumption of pre-cooling from the MR compressor was 1.76 kWh per kilogram of feedhydrogen gas. After two weeks, the lowest attained temperature was about −180 oC when a fewadditional grams of nitrogen gas were charged into the rig. There were some differences, but mostof all, the simulation and experimental data were in good agreement. The primary conclusion wasthat pre-cooling hydrogen gas with the MR refrigeration system resulted in a lower energyconsumption per kilogram of feed hydrogen gas compared to conventional refrigeration systems.Finally, a liquid hydrogen plant based on the MR refrigeration system is proposed. A cycle that iscapable of producing 100 tons of liquid hydrogen per day is simulated. The MR system can be usedto cool feed normal hydrogen gas from 25 oC to the equilibrium temperature of −193 oC with a highefficiency. In addition, for the transition from the equilibrium temperature of the hydrogen gas from−193 oC to −253 oC, a new proposed four H2 Joule-Brayton cycle refrigeration system withoptimization is recommended. The overall power consumption of the proposed plant for the basedcase is 6.35 kWh/kgLH2. The current plant in Ingolstadt is used as a reference, which has an energyconsumption of 13.58 kWh/kgLH2 and an efficiency of 21.28%. The efficiency of the proposedsystem is around 45% or more, where this depends on the assumed efficiency values for thecompressors and expanders, together with effectiveness of heat exchangers. Importantly, thevariables and constraints are preliminary studied together with how to adjust these to achieveoptimal steady-state operation. The optimization problem has 23 variables and 26 constraints. Asimplified 5-component composition of refrigerant suggested for the plant is found. The plantoptimization was also conducted with two more pinch temperatures (1 and 3 oC). Power saving isincreased with a pinch temperature of 1 oC as compared to 3 oC. This figure can have a significantimpact on plants selection. In addition, pressure drops in heat exchangers are also employed in thesimulation for the study, however it is shown that they don’t have much significant impact on theoverall plant total power consumption. The proposed system has smaller compressor motors andsmaller crankcase compressors; thus, it could represent a plant with the lowest construction costwith respect to the amount of liquid hydrogen produced in comparison to today’s plants, e.g., in Ingolstadt and Leuna. Therefore, the proposed system has many improvements that serves as anexample for future hydrogen liquefaction plants

Green Sharing: The Proposed Criteria in Green Building Standards to Promote the Usage of Natural Handicrafts in Building Materials

Sustainable development has been a great challenge to the building and construction industry for decades. There have been many initiatives and attempts to create sustainability for the industry through the concept of the Green Building certificate in order to reduce the impact to environment and society while promoting better living conditions of the people involved in the project. This paper aims to examine all three aspects of sustainability; economy, environment and society, in the building and construction industry by proposing new criteria for the green building certificate. This will create opportunities for the community based handicraft building products to be specified and purchased to be used in the modern building and construction industry and share the economic value to the community

Protein and water recovery from tuna defrosting wastewater

The objective of this research was to recover protein and water from tuna defrosting wastewater. Tuna defrosting wastewater (TDW) was concentrated, and salt protein residue (PR) was separated from concentrate TDW (cTDW). Protein in the cTDW was precipitated (PP). Salt was removed from PR and PP by using hot water (60 °C). PR and PP were dried at 50 °C before analysis for total protein, amino acid profile and salt content. Salty protein solution (PS) following salt removal from the precipitate was collected and concentrated. Then salt cPS was desalted by Sephadex G-25, and the elution was collected and concentrated. The resulting cPS was analyzed for pH, total protein, salt content, amino acid profile and antioxidant properties. Water from the protein recovery procedure was collected and analyzed for biological qualities (heterotrophic plate count, coliform bacteria, E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Salmonella spp. and Clostridium perfringens), physical qualities (apparent color, turbidity, pH) and chemical qualities (total dissolved solids, total hardness and sulfate).The results showed that cTDW contained 11.57 ± 0.03 % protein and 3.36 ± 0.03% NaCl. After salt was removed, the dried PR and PP contained 33.10 ± 0.16% and 6.92 ± 0.13% protein, respectively, and 0.23 ± 0.00% and 0.05 ± 0.00% NaCl, respectively. Dried PR contained 9 essential amino acids at higher concentrations than in PP. Concentrated PS contained 3.15 ± 0.12% protein and no NaCl. Histidine (254.15 mg/100 g) was the dominant amino acid in cPS. Antioxidant properties are shown by values for DPPH, ABTS and FRAP. The physical, chemical and bacterial parameters of recovered water met the guidelines for drinking water quality. These results indicate that recovery of protein and water is possible in fish processing, which could reduce costs for processors and benefit the environment