New trends in biotechnological processes to increase the environmental protection

A sustainable development can be achieved by deepening into more effective and eco-friendly products and technologies. From this point of view, the development of biotechnological processes to increase the environmental protection could be included in the best available techniques reference documents, the so-called BREFs, that cover, as far as practicable, the industrial activities to achieve an integrated pollution prevention and control. Members of the European Union are required to take these documents into account when determining the best available techniques, generally or in specific cases under the European Commission Directives. In order to include biotechnological processes into the BREFs, for example, for obtaining food and pharmaceutical additives, these products have to be cost competitive with those synthesized by chemical ways. Biotechnological processes are advantageous compared to the chemical ones since various metabolites can be obtained simultaneously in the same process, and these metabolites are more eco-friendly than their chemical counterparts. Additionally, this feature also matches the increasing demand of consumers for natural products, which has intensified the biotechnological production of natural additives. This special issue reports advances in the use of biotechnological processes for the treatment of contaminated soil or water as well as the revalorization of agroindustrial residues through the production of valuable metabolites such as biosurfactants or antioxidants, with applications in biomedicine, food industry, pharmaceutical industry, or environmental bioremediation

Diversity and abundance of weed seeds in cereal crop grain in Western Andalusia, South Spain

Se analizó la presencia de semillas de malas hierbas en muestras de la cosecha de cereal de 2013 correspondientes a 200 campos de las provincias de Huelva y Sevilla. Se identificaron 91 especies de las que 29 mostraron una frecuencia de presencia de al menos el 5%. La especie más frecuente (74%) y abundante fue “Lolium rigidum”. Las especies arvenses del género “Phalaris” también fueron muy frecuentes (66-32%). Especies con frecuencia superior al 20% fueron “Polygonum aviculare”, “Convolvulus arvensis”, “Chrysanthemum coronarium”, “Pulicaria paludosa” y “Centaurea diluta”. En comparación con estudios previos referidos al conjunto del área cerealista española, se observó una frecuencia similar de las especies dominantes “L. rigidum” y “P. aviculare” y una frecuencia muy superior de “Phalaris spp.” En sentido contrario, la frecuencia de especies segetales especialistas fue muy inferior.We examined the weed seeds present in crop grain samples from 2013 from across 200 cereal fields in Huelva and Seville provinces, Andalusia, South-western Spain. Ninety-one weed species were identified of which 29 species were present in at least 5% of samples. “Lolium rigidum” was the most frequent (74%) and abundant species. The weedy species of the genus “Phalaris” were also highly frequent (66-32%). “Polygonum aviculare”, “Convolvulus arvensis”, “Chrysanthemum coronarium”, “Pulicaria paludosa” and “Centaurea diluta” were detected in more than 20% of samples. Compared to available data for the whole cereal crop area in Spain, we found a similar frequency of the dominant weeds “L. rigidum” and “P. aviculare” but a much higher presence of “Phalaris” spp. In an opposite trend, the frequency of specialist segetal species was much lower

Spray-drying microencapsulation of tea extracts using green starch, alginate or carrageenan as carrier materials

Financiado para publicación en acceso aberto: Universidade de Vigo/CISUGTea industry generates many by-products which could be used to produce and incorporate bioactive tea extracts (TE) into nutraceuticals, cosmetics and/or clinical applications. However, sensibility to external factors is a major disadvantage hindering its utilization. This study deals with the implementation and characterization of suitable biopolymer delivery systems based on starch, carrageenan or alginate, as microencapsulation, to stabilize and protect TE through innovative thin-carbohydrate-coated formulations. TE were spray-dried and microencapsulated in recycled carrier materials (alginate, carrageenan or starch). Product yields varied from 55 to 58%. High microencapsulation and loading efficiencies were achieved (60–93% and 65–84%, respectively). Antioxidant capacity varied from 32 to 46 g Trolox/100 g extract, within different carrier-systems; which also showed promising rheological and UV-protective properties when transformed into gels. Total phenolic content, particle-size distribution, HPSEC-analysis, SEM-analysis and FTIR-analysis were also performed. In sum, this paper characterizes and discusses the high potential of these recycled carbohydrate-coated microparticles for future applicationsMinisterio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades | Ref. RYC2018-024454-IXunta de Galicia | Ref. ED431F 2020/01Xunta de Galicia | Ref. ED481B 2018/07

Spatial distribution and statistical properties of small-scale convective vortex-like motions in a quiet Sun region

High-resolution observations of a quiet Sun internetwork region taken with the Solar 1-m Swedish Telescope in La Palma are analyzed. We determine the location of small-scale vortex motions in the solar photospheric region by computing the horizontal proper motions of small-scale structures on time series of images. These plasma convectively-driven swirl motions are associated to: (1) downdrafts (that have been commonly explained as corresponding to sites where the plasma is cooled down and hence returned to the interior below the visible photospheric level), and (2) horizontal velocity vectors converging into a central point. The sink cores are proved to be the final destination of passive floats tracing plasma flows towards the center of each vortex. We establish the occurrence of these events to be 1.4 x 10^(-3) and 1.6 x 10^(-3) vortices Mm^(-2) min^(-1) respectively for two time series analyzed here.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures. Accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Societ

Blue is the fashion in Mediterranean pines: New drought signals from tree-ring density in southern Europe

Identificador de proyecto: Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No 101029581Long-term records of tree-ring width (TRW), latewood maximum density (MXD) and blue intensity (BI) measurements on conifers have been largely used to develop high-resolution temperature reconstructions in cool temperate forests. However, the potential of latewood blue intensity (LWBI), less commonly used earlywood blue intensity (EWBI), and delta (difference between EWBI and LWBI, dBI) blue intensity in Mediterranean tree species is still unexplored. Here we developed BI chronologies in moist-elevation limits of the most southwestern European distribution of Pinus nigra subsp. salzmanii Arnold. We tested whether BI variables derived from tree rings of black pine are better proxies than ring-width variables to reconstruct long-term changes in climatic factors and water availability. For this we applied correlations and regression analyses with daily and monthly climate data, a spatial and temporal drought index (Standardized Precipitation-Evapotranspiration Index-SPEI) and Vapour Pressure Deficit (VPD), as well as atmospheric circulation patterns: North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) and Western Mediterranean Oscillation (WeMO). We found a positive relation between black pine growth (RW) and temperature during the winter preceding the growing season. Among all variables LWBI and dBI were found to be more sensitive than TRW to SPEI at low-elevation site, with EWBI series containing an opposite climatic signal. LWBI and dBI were significantly related to June and September precipitation at high-elevation site. Winter VPD was related with higher EWI and LWI series, whereas dBI and EWBI were related with January SOI and February NAO. We confirm the potential of long-term dBI series to reconstruct climate in drought-prone regions. This novel study in combination with other wood anatomical measurements has wide implications for further use of BI to understand and reconstruct environmental changes in Mediterranean conifer forests.Wageningen University & ResearchUniversidade de Santiago de CompostelaUniversity of Amsterda

Exact-Diagonalization Studies of Inelastic Light Scattering in Self-Assembled Quantum Dots

We report exact diagonalization studies of inelastic light scattering in few-electron quantum dots under the strong confinement regime characteristic of self-assembled dots. We apply the orthodox (second-order) theory for scattering due to electronic excitations, leaving for the future the consideration of higher-order effects in the formalism (phonons, for example), which seem relevant in the theoretical description of available experiments. Our numerical results stress the dominance of monopole peaks in Raman spectra and the breakdown of selection rules in open-shell dots. The dependence of these spectra on the number of electrons in the dot and the incident photon energy is explicitly shown. Qualitative comparisons are made with recent experimental results.Comment: 11 pages, 11 figure