PRODUCTION OF BIOFUEL INTERMEDIATES FROM WOODY FEEDSTOCKS VIA FAST PYROLYSIS AND TORREFACTION

The main objective of this research was to investigate pyrolysis and torrefaction of forest biomass species using a micropyrolysis instrument. It was found that 30-45% of the original sample mass remained as bio-char in the pyrolysis temperature range of 500 - 700˚C for aspen, balsam, and switchgrass. The non-char mass was converted to gaseous and vapor products, of which 10-55% was water and syngas, 2-12% to acetic acid, 2-12% to hydroxypropanone, 1-3% to furaldehyde, and 5-15% to various phenolic compounds. In addition, several general trends in the evolution of gaseous species were indentified when woody feedstocks were pyrolyzed. With increasing temperature it was observed that: (1) the volume of gas produced increased, (2) the volume of CO2 decreased and the volumes of CO and CH4 increased, and (3) the rates of gas evolution increased. In the range of torrefaction temperature (200 - 300˚C), two mechanistic models were developed to predict the rates of CO2 and acetic acid product formation. The models fit the general trend of the experimental data well, but suggestions for future improvement were also noted. Finally, it was observed that using torrefaction as a pre-curser to pyrolysis improves the quality of bio-oil over traditional pyrolysis by reducing the acidity through removal of acetic acid, reducing the O/C ratio by removal of some oxygenated species, and removing a portion of the water

Arsenic Removal from Drinking Water Using Enhanced Biochar

Naturally occurring arsenic, in the soluble form of arsenate, contaminates groundwater resources for millions of people worldwide (WHO, 2018). While there are several technologies available to remediate arsenic contaminated water, the most effective approaches are expensive to implement and maintain, especially for people who are living in poverty. This research studied an inexpensive method for removing arsenate from drinking water by using enhanced biochar. The treatment method was developed by simulating a process that could be adopted by a low-income family. Aspen wood chips were treated with a 10% (by mass) MgCl2 or MgSO4 solution and were then pyrolyzed in low emission cookstoves. Biochar from the MgCl2 and MgSO4 treatments were determined to have arsenic adsorption coefficients (Kd) of 36.7 and 53.2 L/kg, respectively. In column tests, enhanced biochars were able to achieve 95 percent removal of arsenate from 2 mg/L solutions. However, the treated water exceeded the 10 ug/L maximum contaminant level (MCL) for arsenate, and it averaged an unpotable concentration of total dissolved solids

Descending aorta thrombus in a neonate mimicking coarctation of the aorta: Mechanical thrombectomy using the AngioJet ® catheter

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/96745/1/ccd24435.pd

Rapid Prenatal Diagnosis of Down Syndrome Using Quantitative Fluorescent PCR in Uncultured Amniocytes

Rapid prenatal diagnosis of common chromosome aneuploidies have been successful through quantitative fluoresent PCR (QF-PCR) assays and small tandem repeat (STR) markers. The purpose of our study was to investigate the clinical feasibility for rapid prenatal detection of Down syndrome using the quantitative fluorescent PCR in uncultured amniocytes. DNA was extracted from uncultured amniotic fluid of normal karyotype (n=200) and of Down syndrome (n=21). It was amplified using QF-PCR with four STR markers located on chromosome 21. Among normal samples, the ranges of diallelic peaks for at least one STR marker were 1.0-1.3 for D21S11, 1.0-1.4 for D21S1411 and 1.0-1.5 for D21S1270. Down syndrome samples showed trisomic triallelic patterns or trisomic diallelic patterns. The sensitivity, specificity, and efficiency of the assay for detecting Down syndrome were 95.4%, 100%, and 99.5%, respectively. Rapid prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome using QF-PCR is a reliable technique that aids clinical management of pregnancy

Surface‐Reactive Patchy Nanoparticles and Nanodiscs Prepared by Tandem Nanoprecipitation and Internal Phase Separation

Nanoparticles with structural or chemical anisotropy are promising materials in domains as diverse as cellular delivery, photonic materials, or interfacial engineering. The surface chemistry may play a major role in some of these contexts. Introducing reactivity into such polymeric nanomaterials is thus of great potential, yet is still a concept in its infancy. In the current contribution, a simple nanoprecipitation technique leads to nanoparticles with diameters as low as 150 nm and well‐defined reactive surface patches of less than 30 nm in width, as well as surface‐reactive flat, disc‐like nanoparticles with corresponding dimensions, via an additional crosslinking/delamination sequence. To this aim, chemically doped block copolymers (BCPs) are employed. Control over morphology is attained by tuning preparation conditions, such as polymer concentration, solvent mixture composition, and blending with non‐functional BCP. Surface reactivity is demonstrated using a modular ligation method for the site‐selective immobilization of thiol molecules. The current approach constitutes a straightforward methodology requiring minimal engineering to produce nanoparticles with confined surface reactivity and/or shape anisotropy.Nanoparticles with surface‐expressed reactive patches and corresponding nanodiscs are prepared by a simple nanoprecipitation technique with functional block copolymers. The surface pattern formation is controlled by preparation conditions (concentration, solvent, and functionality). Spatially confined functionalization is demonstrated by grafting model thiol compounds. These nanomaterials are structurally approaching biological particles and are interesting building blocks for colloidal assemblies.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/146386/1/adfm201800846_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/146386/2/adfm201800846.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/146386/3/adfm201800846-sup-0001-S1.pd

Patient-Facing Mobile Apps to Treat High-Need, High-Cost Populations: A Scoping Review

BACKGROUND: Self-management is essential to caring for high-need, high-cost (HNHC) populations. Advances in mobile phone technology coupled with increased availability and adoption of health-focused mobile apps have made self-management more achievable, but the extent and quality of the literature supporting their use is not well defined. OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this review was to assess the breadth, quality, bias, and types of outcomes measured in the literature supporting the use of apps targeting HNHC populations. METHODS: Data sources included articles in PubMed and MEDLINE (National Center for Biotechnology Information), EMBASE (Elsevier), the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (EBSCO), Web of Science (Thomson Reuters), and the NTIS (National Technical Information Service) Bibliographic Database (EBSCO) published since 2008. We selected studies involving use of patient-facing iOS or Android mobile health apps. Extraction was performed by 1 reviewer; 40 randomly selected articles were evaluated by 2 reviewers to assess agreement. RESULTS: Our final analysis included 175 studies. The populations most commonly targeted by apps included patients with obesity, physical handicaps, diabetes, older age, and dementia. Only 30.3% (53/175) of the apps studied in the reviewed literature were identifiable and available to the public through app stores. Many of the studies were cross-sectional analyses (42.9%, 75/175), small (median number of participants=31, interquartile range 11.0-207.2, maximum 11,690), or performed by an app\u27s developers (61.1%, 107/175). Of the 175 studies, only 36 (20.6%, 36/175) studies evaluated a clinical outcome. CONCLUSIONS: Most apps described in the literature could not be located on the iOS or Android app stores, and existing research does not robustly evaluate the potential of mobile apps. Whereas apps may be useful in patients with chronic conditions, data do not support this yet. Although we had 2-3 reviewers to screen and assess abstract eligibility, only 1 reviewer abstracted the data. This is one limitation of our study. With respect to the 40 articles (22.9%, 40/175) that were assigned to 2 reviewers (of which 3 articles were excluded), inter-rater agreement was significant on the majority of items (17 of 30) but fair-to-moderate on others

Pacific Decadal Variability and the Subtropical-Tropical Cells

We have analyzed the decadal-scale variability in the Tropical Pacific by means of observations and numerical model simulations. The two leading modes of the sea surface temperature (SST) variability in the central western Pacific are a decadal mode with a period of about 10 years and the ENSO mode with a dominant period of about four years. The SST anomaly pattern of the decadal mode is ENSO-like. The decadal mode, however, explains most variance in the western equatorial Pacific and off the equator. A simulation with an ocean general circulation model (OGCM) forced by reanalysis data is used to explore the origin of the decadal mode. It is found that the variability of the shallow subtropical-tropical overturning cells (STCs) is an important factor in driving the decadal mode. This is supported by results from a multi-century integration with a coupled ocean-atmosphere general circulation model (CGCM) that realistically simulates Tropical Pacific decadal variability. Finally, the sensitivity of the STCs to greenhouse warming is discussed by analyzing the results of a scenario integration with the same CGCM

Parametrization of nonlinear and chaotic oscillations in driven beam-plasma diodes

Nonlinear phenomena in a driven plasma diode are studied using a fluid code and the particle-in-cell simulation code XPDPI. When a uniform electron beam is injected to a bounded diode filled with uniform ion background, the beam is destabilized by the Pierce instability and a perturbation grows to exhibit nonlinear oscillations including chaos. Two standard routes to chaos, period doubling and quasiperiodicity, are observed. Mode lockings of various winding numbers are observed in an ac driven system. A new diagnostic quantity is used to parametrize various nonlinear oscillations.open10

Read-across of 90-day rat oral repeated-dose toxicity: A case study for selected β-olefinic alcohols

There are no in vivo repeated-dose data for the vast majority of β-olefinic alcohols. However, there are robust and consistent ex vivo data suggesting many of these chemicals are metabolically transformed, especially in the liver, to reactive electrophilic toxicants which react in a mechanistically similar manner to acrolein, the reactive metabolite of 2-propen-1-ol. Hence, an evaluation was conducted to determine suitability of 2-propen-1-ol as a read-across analogue for other β-olefinic alcohols. The pivotal issue to applying read-across to the proposed category is the confirmation of the biotransformation to metabolites having the same mechanism of electrophilic reactivity, via the same metabolic pathway, with a rate of transformation sufficient to induce the same in vivo outcome. The applicability domain for this case study was limited to small (C3 to C6) primary and secondary -olefinic alcohols. Mechanistically, these -unsaturated alcohols are considered to be readily metabolised by alcohol dehydrogenase to polarised α, -unsaturated aldehydes and ketones. These metabolites are able to react via the Michael addition reaction mechanism with thiol groups in proteins resulting in cellular apoptosis and/or necrosis. The addition of the non-animal in chemico reactivity data (50% depletion of free glutathione) reduced the uncertainty so the read-across prediction for the straight-chain olefinic -unsaturated alcohols is deemed equivalent to a standard test. Specifically, the rat oral 90-day repeated-dose No Observed Adverse Effect Level (NOAEL) for 2-propen-1-ol of 6 mg/kg body weight bw/d in males based on increase in relative weight of liver and 25 mg/kg bw/d in females based on bile duct hyperplasia and periportal hepatocyte hypertrophy in the liver, is read across to fill data gaps for the straight-chained analogues