120 research outputs found
Recent Advances in Graphene Based TiO2 Nanocomposites (GTiO2Ns) for Photocatalytic Degradation of Synthetic Dyes
Synthetic dyes are widely used in textile, paper, food, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical industries. During industrial processes, some of these dyes are released into the wastewater and their successive release into rivers and lakes produces serious environmental problems. TiO2 is one of the most widely studied and used photocatalysts for environmental remediation. However, it is mainly active under UV-light irradiation due to its band gap of 3.2 eV, while it shows low efficiency under the visible light spectrum. Regarding the exploration of TiO2 activation in the visible light region of the total solar spectrum, the incorporation of carbon nanomaterials, such as graphene, in order to form carbon-TiO2 composites is a promising area. Graphene, in fact, has a large surface area which makes it a good adsorbent for organic pollutants removal through the combination of electrostatic attraction and π-π interaction. Furthermore, it has a high electron mobility and therefore it reduces the electron-hole pair recombination, improving the photocatalytic activity of the semiconductor. In recent years, there was an increasing interest in the preparation of graphene-based TiO2 photocatalysts. The present short review describes the recent advances in TiO2 photocatalyst coupling with graphene materials with the aim of extending the light absorption of TiO2 from UV wavelengths into the visible region, focusing on recent progress in the design and applications in the photocatalytic degradation of synthetic dyes
Recent Advances in N-Heterocyclic Carbene Coinage Metal Complexes in A3-Coupling and Carboxylation Reaction
Owing of their accessibility and wide range of reactivities, alkynes make for fascinating
building blocks. Either a selective alkyne carbon-carbon triple bond reaction or activation of the
terminal alkyne C-H bond may be employed to functionalize them. Monocationic coinage metal
complexes with a d10 electronic configuration are effective catalysts for alkyne activation. Silver(I)
and gold(I) N-heterocyclic (NHC) systems are emerging as promising catalysts in multicomponent
alkyne activation reactions; this review paper focuses on A3 (aldehyde-amine-alkyne)-coupling
reaction and carbon dioxide fixation, furnishing a systematic overview of the scientific advances
achieved during the last two decades. This study will carefully compare the corresponding silver
and gold complexes employed in the two processes. The differences in reaction routes brought about
by the catalyst ligand structure will be investigated with an emphasis on evaluating the benefits
provided by the easily tuneable NHC backbone, in terms of chemo- and stereo-selectivit
Dynamics of the Fermentation Process and Chemical Profiling of Pomegranate (Punica granatum L.) Wines Obtained by Different Cultivar×Yeast Combinations
Pomegranate (Punica granatum L.) is one of the historical tree crops in the Mediterranean region and is nowadays commercialized for its beneficial properties in the form of fruits, juice, jams and, in some East countries, as fermented juice (pomegranate wine). However, pomegranate wines are not established as a common beverage in Western countries. In this work, we produced pomegranate wines using two cultivars and two yeasts (Saccharomyces cerevisiae strain Clos and S. cerevisiae ex-bayanus strain EC1118) with contrasting characteristics. A comprehensive chemical profile of the wines was obtained. Notable differences were observed in the function of the cultivars and the yeasts. Different cultivar×yeast combinations provided wines with clearly different chemical profiles and specific features in the patterns of organic acids, phenolics, and volatile compounds. This highlights the opportunity to obtain tailored pomegranate wines with desired chemical profiles and, consequently, sensory properties, through management optimization of pomegranate winemaking. In this view, pomegranate wines have the potential to become an established beverage in Western countries
A pilot study to assess the effects of combining fluticasone propionate/salmeterol and tiotropium on the airflow obstruction of patients with severe-to-very severe COPD
International audienc
Combining Asian and European genome-wide association studies of colorectal cancer improves risk prediction across racial and ethnic populations
Polygenic risk scores (PRS) have great potential to guide precision colorectal cancer (CRC) prevention by identifying those at higher risk to undertake targeted screening. However, current PRS using European ancestry data have sub-optimal performance in non-European ancestry populations, limiting their utility among these populations. Towards addressing this deficiency, we expand PRS development for CRC by incorporating Asian ancestry data (21,731 cases; 47,444 controls) into European ancestry training datasets (78,473 cases; 107,143 controls). The AUC estimates (95% CI) of PRS are 0.63(0.62-0.64), 0.59(0.57-0.61), 0.62(0.60-0.63), and 0.65(0.63-0.66) in independent datasets including 1681-3651 cases and 8696-115,105 controls of Asian, Black/African American, Latinx/Hispanic, and non-Hispanic White, respectively. They are significantly better than the European-centric PRS in all four major US racial and ethnic groups (p-values < 0.05). Further inclusion of non-European ancestry populations, especially Black/African American and Latinx/Hispanic, is needed to improve the risk prediction and enhance equity in applying PRS in clinical practice
Detailed stratified GWAS analysis for severe COVID-19 in four European populations
Given the highly variable clinical phenotype of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a deeper analysis of the host genetic contribution to severe COVID-19 is important to improve our understanding of underlying disease mechanisms. Here, we describe an extended genome-wide association meta-analysis of a well-characterized cohort of 3255 COVID-19 patients with respiratory failure and 12 488 population controls from Italy, Spain, Norway and Germany/Austria, including stratified analyses based on age, sex and disease severity, as well as targeted analyses of chromosome Y haplotypes, the human leukocyte antigen region and the SARS-CoV-2 peptidome. By inversion imputation, we traced a reported association at 17q21.31 to a ~0.9-Mb inversion polymorphism that creates two highly differentiated haplotypes and characterized the potential effects of the inversion in detail. Our data, together with the 5th release of summary statistics from the COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative including non-Caucasian individuals, also identified a new locus at 19q13.33, including NAPSA, a gene which is expressed primarily in alveolar cells responsible for gas exchange in the lung.S.E.H. and C.A.S. partially supported genotyping through a philanthropic donation. A.F. and D.E. were supported by a grant from the German Federal Ministry of Education and COVID-19 grant Research (BMBF; ID:01KI20197); A.F., D.E. and F.D. were supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft Cluster of Excellence ‘Precision Medicine in Chronic Inflammation’ (EXC2167). D.E. was supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) within the framework of the Computational Life Sciences funding concept (CompLS grant 031L0165). D.E., K.B. and S.B. acknowledge the Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF14CC0001 and NNF17OC0027594). T.L.L., A.T. and O.Ö. were funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation), project numbers 279645989; 433116033; 437857095. M.W. and H.E. are supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG) through the Research Training Group 1743, ‘Genes, Environment and Inflammation’. L.V. received funding from: Ricerca Finalizzata Ministero della Salute (RF-2016-02364358), Italian Ministry of Health ‘CV PREVITAL’—strategie di prevenzione primaria cardiovascolare primaria nella popolazione italiana; The European Union (EU) Programme Horizon 2020 (under grant agreement No. 777377) for the project LITMUS- and for the project ‘REVEAL’; Fondazione IRCCS Ca’ Granda ‘Ricerca corrente’, Fondazione Sviluppo Ca’ Granda ‘Liver-BIBLE’ (PR-0391), Fondazione IRCCS Ca’ Granda ‘5permille’ ‘COVID-19 Biobank’ (RC100017A). A.B. was supported by a grant from Fondazione Cariplo to Fondazione Tettamanti: ‘Bio-banking of Covid-19 patient samples to support national and international research (Covid-Bank). This research was partly funded by an MIUR grant to the Department of Medical Sciences, under the program ‘Dipartimenti di Eccellenza 2018–2022’. This study makes use of data generated by the GCAT-Genomes for Life. Cohort study of the Genomes of Catalonia, Fundació IGTP (The Institute for Health Science Research Germans Trias i Pujol) IGTP is part of the CERCA Program/Generalitat de Catalunya. GCAT is supported by Acción de Dinamización del ISCIII-MINECO and the Ministry of Health of the Generalitat of Catalunya (ADE 10/00026); the Agència de Gestió d’Ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca (AGAUR) (2017-SGR 529). M.M. received research funding from grant PI19/00335 Acción Estratégica en Salud, integrated in the Spanish National RDI Plan and financed by ISCIII-Subdirección General de Evaluación and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (European Regional Development Fund (FEDER)-Una manera de hacer Europa’). B.C. is supported by national grants PI18/01512. X.F. is supported by the VEIS project (001-P-001647) (co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), ‘A way to build Europe’). Additional data included in this study were obtained in part by the COVICAT Study Group (Cohort Covid de Catalunya) supported by IsGlobal and IGTP, European Institute of Innovation & Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union, COVID-19 Rapid Response activity 73A and SR20-01024 La Caixa Foundation. A.J. and S.M. were supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (grant numbers: PSE-010000-2006-6 and IPT-010000-2010-36). A.J. was also supported by national grant PI17/00019 from the Acción Estratégica en Salud (ISCIII) and the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER). The Basque Biobank, a hospital-related platform that also involves all Osakidetza health centres, the Basque government’s Department of Health and Onkologikoa, is operated by the Basque Foundation for Health Innovation and Research-BIOEF. M.C. received Grants BFU2016-77244-R and PID2019-107836RB-I00 funded by the Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI, Spain) and the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER, EU). M.R.G., J.A.H., R.G.D. and D.M.M. are supported by the ‘Spanish Ministry of Economy, Innovation and Competition, the Instituto de Salud Carlos III’ (PI19/01404, PI16/01842, PI19/00589, PI17/00535 and GLD19/00100) and by the Andalussian government (Proyectos Estratégicos-Fondos Feder PE-0451-2018, COVID-Premed, COVID GWAs). The position held by Itziar de Rojas Salarich is funded by grant FI20/00215, PFIS Contratos Predoctorales de Formación en Investigación en Salud. Enrique Calderón’s team is supported by CIBER of Epidemiology and Public Health (CIBERESP), ‘Instituto de Salud Carlos III’. J.C.H. reports grants from Research Council of Norway grant no 312780 during the conduct of the study. E.S. reports grants from Research Council of Norway grant no. 312769. The BioMaterialBank Nord is supported by the German Center for Lung Research (DZL), Airway Research Center North (ARCN). The BioMaterialBank Nord is member of popgen 2.0 network (P2N). P.K. Bergisch Gladbach, Germany and the Cologne Excellence Cluster on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-Associated Diseases, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany. He is supported by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). O.A.C. is supported by the German Federal Ministry of Research and Education and is funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy—CECAD, EXC 2030–390661388. The COMRI cohort is funded by Technical University of Munich, Munich, Germany. This work was supported by grants of the Rolf M. Schwiete Stiftung, the Saarland University, BMBF and The States of Saarland and Lower Saxony. K.U.L. is supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG, LU-1944/3-1). Genotyping for the BoSCO study is funded by the Institute of Human Genetics, University Hospital Bonn. F.H. was supported by the Bavarian State Ministry for Science and Arts. Part of the genotyping was supported by a grant to A.R. from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF, grant: 01ED1619A, European Alzheimer DNA BioBank, EADB) within the context of the EU Joint Programme—Neurodegenerative Disease Research (JPND). Additional funding was derived from the German Research Foundation (DFG) grant: RA 1971/6-1 to A.R. P.R. is supported by the DFG (CCGA Sequencing Centre and DFG ExC2167 PMI and by SH state funds for COVID19 research). F.T. is supported by the Clinician Scientist Program of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft Cluster of Excellence ‘Precision Medicine in Chronic Inflammation’ (EXC2167). C.L. and J.H. are supported by the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF). T.B., M.M.B., O.W. und A.H. are supported by the Stiftung Universitätsmedizin Essen. M.A.-H. was supported by Juan de la Cierva Incorporacion program, grant IJC2018-035131-I funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033. E.C.S. is supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG; SCHU 2419/2-1).Peer reviewe
Detailed stratified GWAS analysis for severe COVID-19 in four European populations
Given the highly variable clinical phenotype of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a deeper analysis of the host genetic contribution to severe COVID-19 is important to improve our understanding of underlying disease mechanisms. Here, we describe an extended GWAS meta-analysis of a well-characterized cohort of 3,260 COVID-19 patients with respiratory failure and 12,483 population controls from Italy, Spain, Norway and Germany/Austria, including stratified analyses based on age, sex and disease severity, as well as targeted analyses of chromosome Y haplotypes, the human leukocyte antigen (HLA) region and the SARS-CoV-2 peptidome. By inversion imputation, we traced a reported association at 17q21.31 to a highly pleiotropic ∼0.9-Mb inversion polymorphism and characterized the potential effects of the inversion in detail. Our data, together with the 5th release of summary statistics from the COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative, also identified a new locus at 19q13.33, including NAPSA, a gene which is expressed primarily in alveolar cells responsible for gas exchange in the lung.Andre Franke and David Ellinghaus were supported by a grant from the German
Federal Ministry of Education and Research (01KI20197), Andre Franke, David
Ellinghaus and Frauke Degenhardt were supported by the Deutsche
Forschungsgemeinschaft Cluster of Excellence “Precision Medicine in Chronic
Inflammation” (EXC2167). David Ellinghaus was supported by the German Federal
Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) within the framework of the
Computational Life Sciences funding concept (CompLS grant 031L0165). David
Ellinghaus, Karina Banasik and Søren Brunak acknowledge the Novo Nordisk
Foundation (grant NNF14CC0001 and NNF17OC0027594). Tobias L. Lenz, Ana
Teles and Onur Özer were funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG,
German Research Foundation), project numbers 279645989; 433116033; 437857095. Mareike Wendorff and Hesham ElAbd are supported by the German
Research Foundation (DFG) through the Research Training Group 1743, "Genes,
Environment and Inflammation". This project was supported by a Covid-19 grant from
the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF; ID: 01KI20197).
Luca Valenti received funding from: Ricerca Finalizzata Ministero della Salute RF2016-02364358, Italian Ministry of Health ""CV PREVITAL – strategie di prevenzione
primaria cardiovascolare primaria nella popolazione italiana; The European Union
(EU) Programme Horizon 2020 (under grant agreement No. 777377) for the project
LITMUS- and for the project ""REVEAL""; Fondazione IRCCS Ca' Granda ""Ricerca
corrente"", Fondazione Sviluppo Ca' Granda ""Liver-BIBLE"" (PR-0391), Fondazione
IRCCS Ca' Granda ""5permille"" ""COVID-19 Biobank"" (RC100017A). Andrea Biondi
was supported by the grant from Fondazione Cariplo to Fondazione Tettamanti: "Biobanking of Covid-19 patient samples to support national and international research
(Covid-Bank). This research was partly funded by a MIUR grant to the Department of
Medical Sciences, under the program "Dipartimenti di Eccellenza 2018–2022". This
study makes use of data generated by the GCAT-Genomes for Life. Cohort study of
the Genomes of Catalonia, Fundació IGTP. IGTP is part of the CERCA Program /
Generalitat de Catalunya. GCAT is supported by Acción de Dinamización del ISCIIIMINECO and the Ministry of Health of the Generalitat of Catalunya (ADE 10/00026);
the Agència de Gestió d’Ajuts Universitaris i de Recerca (AGAUR) (2017-SGR 529).
Marta Marquié received research funding from ant PI19/00335 Acción Estratégica en
Salud, integrated in the Spanish National RDI Plan and financed by ISCIIISubdirección General de Evaluación and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional
(FEDER-Una manera de hacer Europa").Beatriz Cortes is supported by national
grants PI18/01512. Xavier Farre is supported by VEIS project (001-P-001647) (cofunded by European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), “A way to build Europe”).
Additional data included in this study was obtained in part by the COVICAT Study
Group (Cohort Covid de Catalunya) supported by IsGlobal and IGTP, EIT COVID-19
Rapid Response activity 73A and SR20-01024 La Caixa Foundation. Antonio Julià
and Sara Marsal were supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and
Competitiveness (grant numbers: PSE-010000-2006-6 and IPT-010000-2010-36).
Antonio Julià was also supported the by national grant PI17/00019 from the Acción
Estratégica en Salud (ISCIII) and the FEDER. The Basque Biobank is a hospitalrelated platform that also involves all Osakidetza health centres, the Basque government's Department of Health and Onkologikoa, is operated by the Basque
Foundation for Health Innovation and Research-BIOEF. Mario Cáceres received
Grants BFU2016-77244-R and PID2019-107836RB-I00 funded by the Agencia Estatal
de Investigación (AEI, Spain) and the European Regional Development Fund
(FEDER, EU). Manuel Romero Gómez, Javier Ampuero Herrojo, Rocío Gallego Durán
and Douglas Maya Miles are supported by the “Spanish Ministry of Economy,
Innovation and Competition, the Instituto de Salud Carlos III” (PI19/01404,
PI16/01842, PI19/00589, PI17/00535 and GLD19/00100), and by the Andalussian
government (Proyectos Estratégicos-Fondos Feder PE-0451-2018, COVID-Premed,
COVID GWAs). The position held by Itziar de Rojas Salarich is funded by grant
FI20/00215, PFIS Contratos Predoctorales de Formación en Investigación en Salud.
Enrique Calderón's team is supported by CIBER of Epidemiology and Public Health
(CIBERESP), "Instituto de Salud Carlos III". Jan Cato Holter reports grants from
Research Council of Norway grant no 312780 during the conduct of the study. Dr.
Solligård: reports grants from Research Council of Norway grant no 312769. The
BioMaterialBank Nord is supported by the German Center for Lung Research (DZL),
Airway Research Center North (ARCN). The BioMaterialBank Nord is member of
popgen 2.0 network (P2N). Philipp Koehler has received non-financial scientific grants
from Miltenyi Biotec GmbH, Bergisch Gladbach, Germany, and the Cologne
Excellence Cluster on Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-Associated Diseases,
University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany. He is supported by the German Federal
Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).Oliver A. Cornely is supported by the
German Federal Ministry of Research and Education and is funded by the Deutsche
Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany's
Excellence Strategy – CECAD, EXC 2030 – 390661388. The COMRI cohort is funded
by Technical University of Munich, Munich, Germany. Genotyping was performed by
the Genotyping laboratory of Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland FIMM
Technology Centre, University of Helsinki. This work was supported by grants of the
Rolf M. Schwiete Stiftung, the Saarland University, BMBF and The States of Saarland
and Lower Saxony. Kerstin U. Ludwig is supported by the German Research
Foundation (DFG, LU-1944/3-1). Genotyping for the BoSCO study is funded by the
Institute of Human Genetics, University Hospital Bonn. Frank Hanses was supported
by the Bavarian State Ministry for Science and Arts. Part of the genotyping was
supported by a grant to Alfredo Ramirez from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF, grant: 01ED1619A, European Alzheimer DNA
BioBank, EADB) within the context of the EU Joint Programme – Neurodegenerative
Disease Research (JPND). Additional funding was derived from the German Research
Foundation (DFG) grant: RA 1971/6-1 to Alfredo Ramirez. Philip Rosenstiel is
supported by the DFG (CCGA Sequencing Centre and DFG ExC2167 PMI and by SH
state funds for COVID19 research). Florian Tran is supported by the Clinician Scientist
Program of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft Cluster of Excellence “Precision
Medicine in Chronic Inflammation” (EXC2167). Christoph Lange and Jan Heyckendorf
are supported by the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF). Thorsen Brenner,
Marc M Berger, Oliver Witzke und Anke Hinney are supported by the Stiftung
Universitätsmedizin Essen. Marialbert Acosta-Herrera was supported by Juan de la
Cierva Incorporacion program, grant IJC2018-035131-I funded by
MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033. Eva C Schulte is supported by the Deutsche
Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG; SCHU 2419/2-1).N
On Iso-octane Combustion with Ozone Addition under HCCI Engine-Like Conditions
Numerical simulations were carried out to study the influence of ozone on the Ignition
Delay Time (IDT) of iso-octane/air mixtures under typical operating conditions of HCCI
engines. 0-D and 2-D CFD simulations were carried out to compute IDT and to characterize
compression, combustion, and expansion in an HCCI engine, respectively. A kinetic model was
developed by merging a mechanism for iso-octane, a sub-mechanism for nitrogen oxides, and a
sub-mechanism for ozone. The model was used to investigate iso-octane/air/ozone mixtures
under typical operating conditions of HCCI engines running with very lean mixtures
(equivalence ratio equal to 0.3). Parametric analyses were carried out considering different
values of temperature (500 to 1200 K), pressure (15 to 40 bar) and ozone concentration (0 to 50
ppm). The results show that as ozone concentration increases IDT decreases, with a greater
impact at low temperatures, and the NTC (Negative Temperature Coefficient) effect decreases.
However, the reduction of IDT with ozone addition is less as ozone concentration increases,
especially at low temperatures. An increased pressure, on the other hand, generally promotes
faster ozone decomposition and enhances ozone effect on IDT reduction for all temperatures
except in the range 760-840 K, where the opposite effect occurs due to NTC phenomenon.
Finally, when temperature is very high, i.e. 1200 K, both ozone and pressure have little influence on the percentage reduction of IDT
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