Current Development and Prospect of Turbine in OTEC

This chapter mainly introduces the development and prospect of turbines utilized in ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC), including brief introduction, aerodynamic design, mechanical and electric control system, problems, and prospect of the turbine in OTEC. At the beginning, the first section mainly introduces compositions and types of turbine in OTEC systems, different working fluids in the turbine, status of OTEC turbine currently in the world, and so on. After that, the aerodynamic design of turbine has the greatest impact on the efficiency of the turbine and is the most important process during the turbine development. Therefore, the second section focuses on turbine aerodynamic design. Furthermore, the third section mainly introduces the mechanical system and the electric control system of the turbine. Finally, the problems in the turbine currently are listed, and the prospects for the development of the turbine in OTEC are discussed in the fourth section

Dynamics of RNA localization to nuclear speckles are connected to splicing efficiency

Nuclear speckles are nuclear membraneless organelles in higher eukaryotic cells playing a vital role in gene expression. Using an in situ reverse transcription–based sequencing method, we study nuclear speckle–associated human transcripts. Our data indicate the existence of three gene groups whose transcripts demonstrate different speckle localization properties: stably enriched in nuclear speckles, transiently enriched in speckles at the pre–messenger RNA stage, and not enriched. We find that stably enriched transcripts contain inefficiently excised introns and that disruption of nuclear speckles specifically affects splicing of speckle-enriched transcripts. We further reveal RNA sequence features contributing to transcript speckle localization, indicating a tight interplay between transcript speckle enrichment, genome organization, and splicing efficiency. Collectively, our data highlight a role of nuclear speckles in both co- and posttranscriptional splicing regulation. Last, we show that genes with stably enriched transcripts are over-represented among genes with heat shock–up-regulated intron retention, hinting at a connection between speckle localization and cellular stress response

(5S*,6R*,7R*)-6-Formyl-5-phenyl-7-propyl­perhydro­pyrazolo[1,2-a]pyrazol-1-one

The title compound, C16H20N2O2, was obtained by catalytic asymmetric cyclo­addition of trans-3-propyl­acrolein with 1-benzyl­idenepyrazolid-3-one betaine. There are two symmetry-independent mol­ecules in the asymmetric unit. In both mol­ecules, the two five-membered heterocyclic rings adopt envelope conformations

Simulation and research of chip-level micromixer with T-type based on ANSYS

A T-shaped chip-scale micromixer with built-in baffles is simulated and investigated based on ANSYS. This paper highlights on a comparative analysis of the effect of different numbers, rows, positions, angles and different Reynolds numbers (Re) of baffles on the mixing efficiency within a chip-scale micromixer. The simulation results demonstrate that: increase in the amount of baffles improved mixing of two fluids; the double rows of baffles significantly improve the mixing efficiency compared with the single rows of baffles; the position of the baffles relocates a certain distance to the outlet, which accelerates mixing of fluids in the chip-scale mixer; the mixing efficiency of baffle angle of 120° is also superior to that of 60°; the Re is between 0.1 and 2, which results in a high mixing efficiency; and the mixing efficiency slowly becomes lower when the Re is between 2 and higher mixing efficiencies with Re values between 0.1 and 2; Re between 2 and 40, the mixing efficiency slowly becomes lower; Re between 40 and 100, the mixing efficiency gradually rises

On “Officer Professional Military Education Policy” and its enlightenment

"Officer Professional Military Education Policy" is an important guide for M army. This paper aims to deeply explore the core content of its military education and its development trend, and draw useful experience from it, so as to promote the innovation of military education and provide reference for training new military talents with international competitiveness

Performance analysis of a novel small-scale radial turbine with adjustable nozzle for ocean thermal energy conversion

Ocean thermal energy is acknowledged as one of the most promising ocean renewable energy sources in low latitude sea areas. In the ocean thermal energy conversion system, the turbine plays a significant role, and it is responsible for converting the working medium enthalpy into the shaft output power. The present study is focused on the performance analysis of a novel radial inflow turbine with an adjustable nozzle in the OTEC system in order to adapt to the changing operating conditions of the turbine, which vary with the change in seawater temperature. At the design point, the predicted overall isentropic efficiency is 86.5%, and the shaft output power is 15.3 kW, slightly higher than the expected 15 kW. Furthermore, a parametric study is performed, respectively, for the nozzle vane stagger angle and the nozzle-impeller radial clearance to explore the favorable geometric parameters for different conditions. The turbine’s overall efficiency increases slightly with deceasing nozzle-impeller radial clearance, and the variation of the nozzle vane stagger angle is much more influential on the turbine shaft power and overall efficiency. The optimum stagger angle point moves from 32° to 36° gradually with the increase in nozzle-impeller clearance. Finally, the feasibility of an adjustable nozzle for the turbine under off-design conditions was verified by combining the radial clearance and nozzle stagger angle

Polystyrene nanoplastics exposure causes erectile dysfunction in rats

Polystyrene nanoplastics (PS-NPs), emerging and increasingly pervasive environmental contaminants, have the potential to cause persistent harm to organisms. Although previous reports have documented local accumulation and adverse effects in a variety of major organs after PS-NPs exposure, the impact of PS-NPs exposure on erectile function remains unexplored. Herein, we established a rat model of oral exposure to 100 nm PS-NPs for 28 days. To determine the best dose range of PS-NPs, we designed both low-dose and high-dose PS-NPs groups, which correspond to the minimum and maximum human intake doses, respectively. The findings indicated that PS-NPs could accumulate within the corpus cavernosum and high dose but not low dose of PS-NPs triggered erectile dysfunction. Moreover, the toxicological effects of PS-NPs on erectile function include fibrosis in the corpus cavernous, endothelial dysfunction, reduction in testosterone levels, elevated oxidative stress and apoptosis. Overall, this study revealed that PS-NPs exposure can cause erectile dysfunction via multiple ways, which provided new insights into the toxicity of PS-NPs

Hydroxyapatite reinforced inorganic-organic hybrid nanocomposite as high-performance adsorbents for bilirubin removal in vitro and in pig models

Highly efficient removal of bilirubin from whole blood directly by hemoperfusion for liver failure therapy remains a challenge in the clinical field due to the low adsorption capacity, poor mechanical strength and low biocompatibility of adsorbents. In this work, a new class of nanocomposite adsorbents was constructed through an inorganic-organic co-crosslinked nanocomposite network between vinyltriethoxysilane (VTES)-functionalized hydroxyapatite nanoparticles (V-Hap) and non-ionic styrene-divinylbenzene (PS-DVB) resins (PS-DVB/V-Hap) using suspension polymerization. Notably, our adsorbent demonstrated substantially improved mechanical performance compared to the pure polymer, with the hardness and modulus increasing by nearly 3 and 2.5 times, respectively. Moreover, due to the development of a mesoporous structure, the prepared PS-DVB/V-Hap3 exhibited an ideal adsorption capacity of 40.27 mg g−1. More importantly, the obtained adsorbent beads showed outstanding blood compatibility and biocompatibility. Furthermore, in vivo extracorporeal hemoperfusion verified the efficacy and biosafety of the adsorbent for directly removing bilirubin from whole blood in pig models, and this material could potentially prevent liver damage and improve clinical outcomes. Taken together, the results suggest that PS-DVB/V-Hap3 beads can be used in commercial adsorption columns to threat hyperbilirubinemia patients through hemoperfusion, thus replacing the existing techniques where plasma separation is initially required