“RETRO-,” AN EMERGING PREFIX FOR FUTURE TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT?

It is proposed that the prefix “retro” can serve as an irreverent, but timely buzzword for the development of new technology to meet human needs. Society has carried out experiments at a very large scale for the last century or so to meet our collective needs though the use of fossil-based fuels and synthetic materials. Those experiments have seemed successful in the short term, feeding more of us and supplying a lot of us with rising standards of living. But the experiments often have failed us in terms of sustainability. A health crisis, global warming, and resource depletion are urgent problems caused by careless use of fossil fuels and related synthetic organic chemicals. The prefix “retro,” as in “retrotechology,” signals a disciplined return to a reliance on nature-based products, as well as a respect for the beauty, but also the fragile character of our natural environment

Critical links governing performance of self-binding and natural binders for hot-pressed reconstituted lignocellulosic board without added formaldehyde: a review

The production of fiberboard, particleboard, and related hot-pressed biomass products can convert small, relatively low-valued pieces of wood into valuable products. There is strong interest in being able to manufacture such products without the addition of formaldehyde, which is a health hazard during both production and use. This article reviews literature describing various challenges that need to be faced in order to achieve satisfactory bonding properties in hot-pressed bio-based board products without the addition of formaldehyde. Bonding mechanisms are examined in the form of a hypothesis, in which the strength development is represented by a chain with four links. Failure of a board is expected to occur at the weakest of these mechanistic links, which include mechanical contact, molecular-scale wetting and contact, various chemical-based linkages, and structural integrity. The most promising technologies for environmentally friendly production of hot-pressed board with use of lignocellulosic materials tend to be those that favor success in the development of at least three of the mechanistic links in the hypothetical chain

Dissolved and colloidal substances (DCS) and the charge demand of papermaking process waters and suspensions: A Review

Dissolved and colloidal substances (DCS) in the process waters of paper machine systems can interfere with the retention of fine particles, retard the drainage of water from the wet web, and generally hurt the intended functions of various polyelectrolytes that are added to the process. This review considers publications that have attempted to characterize the nature and effects of different DCS fractions, in addition to some of the ways that paper technologists have attempted to overcome related problems. The consequences of DCS in a paper machine system can be traced to their ability to form complexes with various polyelectrolytes. Such tendencies can be understood based on a relatively strong complexing ability of multivalent materials, depending on the macromolecular size and charge density. Continuing research is needed to more fully understand the different contributions to cationic demand in various paper machine systems and to find more efficient means of dealing with DCS

THE GREEN OCEAN AMAZON EXPERIMENT (GOAMAZON2014/5) OBSERVES POLLUTION AFFECTING GASES, AEROSOLS, CLOUDS, AND RAINFALL OVER THE RAIN FOREST

The susceptibility of air quality, weather, terrestrial ecosystems, and climate to human activities was investigated in a tropical environment.Peer reviewe

Energy Efficiency – A Particular Challenge for the Cellulose-based Products Industries

Wood-processing facilities, including pulp, paper, lumber, and engineered wood facilities, use large amounts of energy for such purposes as evaporative drying and the curing of adhesives. Much of that energy is already being supplied by the incineration of biomass, and there is opportunity to increase the proportion of renewable energy that is used. Specific changes can be made within such factories that allow them to come closer to what is thermodynamically possible in terms of avoiding the wastage of exergy, which can be defined as useful energy. Savings in exergy are often obtained by optimization of a network of heat exchangers within an integrated system. No steam should be allowed to leak to the atmosphere; rather the latent heat (due to phase transitions) and sensible heat (due to temperature changes) are recovered during the heating up of incoming air and water, ideally at a similar range of temperatures. Thus, by a combination of process integration and full utilization of cellulosic residues generated from the process, even bio-based industries can be made greener

Recycling Paper Recycling

What do you do after a product has served its function and is no longer needed? Ideally, you recycle it. What do you do if people have neglected or forgotten so much of what has been learned in recent years about paper recycling? Well, one of the things that someone can do is to write a book. Very little of the contents of such a book may be new. But the book itself can be highly valuable, representing a lot of effort to select and organized material that will be helpful for the current and upcoming generations of papermaking technologists. This editorial describes a new book by Dr. Pratima Bajpai entitled Recycling and Deinking of Recovered Paper. Readers who deal with the recycling of paper will probably want to have a copy of it on a handy shelf

THE IMPLEMENTATION OF FINDINGS PUBLISHED IN SCHOLARLY ARTICLES

Articles published in scholarly journals, such as this one, tend to be mainly addressed to researchers at universities. Industrial follow-up and implementation of results from a scholarly article appears to be the exception, rather than the rule. Research grant specifications, as well as university policies, favor the generation of new knowledge, rather than the implementation of good ideas. But without patent protection, corporations have low motivation to expend the considerable effort to reduce ideas to practice after they have been openly published. The author speculates that the situation could be much more dynamic if there were a system of priority of implementation. According to such a system, the first company to successfully implement an idea that first appears in a peer-reviewed journal article, as validated by its debut in the marketplace, would have a grace period during which competitors would have to pay them a fee to sell a generic version of the same thing

Why I Don’t Do Academic Social Media… or Do I?

A communications scholar at our university asked me recently whether I would take part in a debate about academic social media services such as ResearchGate. Yes, I responded, as long as I don’t have to argue the affirmative – that such online systems are necessarily a good thing. Personally I do not count myself as a user of academic social media, but I can easily understand why others could make an opposite decision. Academic social media can provide a way to get copies of full-length published articles, to pose questions to other researchers, to get various questions answered, and in general to foster relationships with well-networked and possibly influential people within one’s academic field. Or, like me, you might just enjoy having something mildly annoying that is fun to complain about