The efficacy of a brief intervention in reducing hazardous drinking in working age men in Russia: the HIM (Health for Izhevsk men) individually randomised parallel group exploratory trial

BACKGROUND: Russia has particularly low life expectancy for an industrialised country, with mortality at working ages having fluctuated dramatically over the past few decades, particularly among men. Alcohol has been identified as the most likely cause of these temporal variations. One approach to reducing the alcohol problem in Russia is 'brief interventions' which seek to change views of the personal acceptability of excessive drinking and to encourage self-directed behaviour change. Very few studies to evaluate the efficacy of brief interventions in Russia have been conducted. Motivational Interviewing (MI) is a person-centred counselling style which can be adapted to brief interventions in which help is offered in thinking through behaviour in the context of values and goals, to decide whether change is needed, and if so, how it may best be achieved. METHODS: This paper reports on an individually randomised two-armed parallel group exploratory trial. The primary hypothesis is that a brief adaptation of MI will be effective in reducing self-reported hazardous and harmful drinking at 3 months. Participants were drawn from the Izhevsk Family Study II, with eligibility determined based on proxy reports of hazardous and harmful drinking in the past year. All participants underwent a health check, with MI subsequently delivered to those in the intervention arm. Signed consent was obtained from those in the intervention arm only at this point. Both groups were then invited for 3 and 12 month follow ups. The control group did not receive any additional intervention. RESULTS: 441 men were randomised. Of these 61 did not have a health check leaving 190 in each trial arm. Follow up at 3 months was high (97% of those having a health check), and very similar in the two trial arms (183 in the intervention and 187 in the control). No significant differences were detected between the randomised groups in either the primary or the secondary outcomes at three months in the intention to treat analyses. The unadjusted odds ratio (95% CI) for the effect of MI on hazardous and harmful drinking was 0.77 (0.51, 1.16). An adjusted odds ratio of 0.52 (0.28, 0.94) was obtained in the pre-specified per protocol analysis. CONCLUSIONS: This trial demonstrates that it is possible to engage Russian men who drink hazardously in a brief intervention aimed at reducing alcohol related harm. However the results with respect to the efficacy are equivocal and further, larger-scale trials are warranted. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN: ISRCTN82405938

ZEOLITE-CONTAINING TRIPOLI OF KHOTYNETS DEPOSIT (OREL REGION): MINERAL COMPOSITION, SORPTION PROPERTIES AND FORMATION CONDITIONS

Link for citation: Belousov P.E., Karelina N.D., Morozov I.A., Rudmin M.A., Milyutin V.V., Nekrasova N.A.,  Rumyantseva  A.O., Zakusina O.V., Krupskaya  V.V. Zeolite-containing tripoli of Khotynets deposit (Orel region): mineral composition, sorption properties and formation conditions. Bulletin of the Tomsk Polytechnic University. Geo Аssets Engineering, 2023, vol. 334, no. 5, рр.70-84.In Rus. The relevance of the work is caused by the need to develop the mineral resource base of high-quality sorption materials in Russia, as well as to study the properties of natural sorbents with a view to their further application in practice. The aim of the work is to study the features of the geological structure, conditions of formation, mineral composition and sorption properties of zeolite-containing tripoli from the Khotynets deposit. The object of the study is the Khotynets deposit of zeolite-containing tripoli, studied by the field team of the Institute of Geology of Ore Deposits, Petrography, Mineralogy and Geochemistry of Sciences RAS in 2019–2020. Methods: XRD, XRF, FTIR, optical and scanning electron microscopy, determination of SSA and pore size distribution, CEC, experiments on the sorption of cesium, strontium and copper. The paleotectonic reconstruction was carried out as well. Results. The productive strata of the Khotynets deposit consists of three benches, the main useful components of which are minerals of the zeolite, opal-cristobalite and smectite group. Their total content reaches 80 %. The formation of the deposit occurred in three stages and is associated with the primary accumulation of biochemogenic silica in coastal sea waters, the removal of terrigenous clay material from the nearby land, their further compaction, and processing of the accumulated material at the diagenesis stage. The formation of clinoptillolite is associated with an increase in pH and the dissolution of the opal-cristobalite and clay material as a result of the secondary impact of low-temperature deep solutions. The performed experiments showed that this mineral material has high sorption characteristics with respect to cesium and copper and can be used as a component of sorption mixtures for the purification of polluted waters

Understanding your support system: the design of a stable MOF/polyazoamine support for biomass conversion

Introducing oligomeric or polymeric units into metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) can result in composites that have significantly improved properties when compared to the individual MOF or polymer building blocks. With such synergy in mind, this work presents the design of a novel MOF/polyazoamine support that is used to stabilize Pd NPs. The resulting composite catalyst, tested in the reductive amination of levulinic acid, is found to have a markedly improved lifetime when compared to just the MOF or polymer support containing Pd. It is demonstrated, for the first time, that the lifetime enhancement stems directly from the polymer, which plays a dual role: i) the oligomer stabilizes the MOF support through the elimination of certain vibrational modes associated with the framework ligand and likely pore-filling effects in the largest MOF pore, and ii) the Lewis base functionality on the oligomer backbone binds to the surface of the Pd NPs, thus, increasing their activity and inhibiting their aggregation. Several complementary spectroscopic (IR, XPS, Raman spectroscopy) and computational tools (pore space and topology analysis, molecular mechanics, and density functional theory simulations) were used to describe the nature of the MOF-oligomer interaction and identify the most likely location of the polymer within the MOF pore