Materials for supercapacitors: When Li-ion battery power is not enough

Supercapacitors, also known as electrochemical capacitors, have witnessed a fast evolution in the recent years, but challenges remain. This review covers the fundamentals and state-of-the-art developments of supercapacitors. Conventional and novel electrode materials, including high surface area porous carbons for electrical double layer capacitors (EDLCs) and transition metal oxides, carbides, nitrides and their various nanocomposites for pseudocapacitors – are described. Latest characterization techniques help to better understand the charge storage mechanisms in such supercapacitors and recognize their current limitations, while recently proposed synthesis approaches enable various breakthroughs in this field

Household mortgage demand: a study of the UK, Australia and Japan

Households combine their personal savings and mortgage debt to finance their home purchases. In developed countries, mortgage debt is the largest debt on a household’s balance sheet and in these countries, the mortgage penetration rates are high. For the stability of the mortgage market and thereby the money market in an economy, it is important to understand households' mortgage demand decisions and riskiness of these borrowers. There are differences in mortgage systems among countries, which play an important role in determining the mortgage decisions that households make. These differences arise from the availability of types of mortgage instrument (adjustable versus fixed rate mortgages), length of fixed period for a fixed rate mortgage contracts, conditions of prepayment, tax treatment, lenders’ constraints related to repayment, loan to value ratio, foreclosure and personal bankruptcy laws etc. These differences impact borrowers' choice of mortgage contract and mortgage demand. This paper analyses the mortgage demand behaviour of households in the UK, Australia and Japan. Specific questions that have been asked relate to the factors that determine household mortgage demand, housing demand and loan to value ratio. Though the homeownership is a preferred tenure and the mortgages are 'recourse' loans, housing markets in these three countries operate in different mortgage market institutional structure. Results indicate that income elasticity of mortgage demand differ despite income elasticity of housing demand being similar. Mortgage institutions that pose constraints for borrowers also determine the extent of mortgage demand. Other factors such as demography, economic conditions have also played an important role in determining mortgage and housing demand

Genetic Spectrum of EYS-associated Retinal Disease in a Large Japanese Cohort: Identification of Disease-associated Variants with Relatively High Allele Frequency

Biallelic variants in the EYS gene are a major cause of autosomal recessive inherited retinal disease (IRD), with a high prevalence in the Asian population. The purpose of this study was to identify pathogenic EYS variants, to determine the clinical/genetic spectrum of EYS-associated retinal disease (EYS-RD), and to discover disease-associated variants with relatively high allele frequency (1%-10%) in a nationwide Japanese cohort. Sixty-six affected subjects from 61 families with biallelic or multiple pathogenic/disease-associated EYS variants were ascertained by whole-exome sequencing. Three phenotype groups were identified in EYS-RD: retinitis pigmentosa (RP; 85.94%), cone-rod dystrophy (CORD; 10.94%), and Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA; 3.12%). Twenty-six pathogenic/disease-associated EYS variants were identified, including seven novel variants. The two most prevalent variants, p.(Gly843Glu) and p.(Thr2465Ser) were found in 26 and twelve families (42.6%, 19.7%), respectively, for which the allele frequency (AF) in the Japanese population was 2.2% and 3.0%, respectively. These results expand the phenotypic and genotypic spectrum of EYS-RD, accounting for a high proportion of EYS-RD both in autosomal recessive RP (23.4%) and autosomal recessive CORD (9.9%) in the Japanese population. The presence of EYS variants with relatively high AF highlights the importance of considering the pathogenicity of non-rare variants in relatively prevalent Mendelian disorders

Polypyrrole-Fe2O3 nanohybrid materials for electrochemical storage

We report on the synthesis and electrochemical characterization of nanohybrid polypyrrole (PPy) (PPy/Fe2O3) materials for electrochemical storage applications. We have shown that the incorporation of nanoparticles inside the PPy notably increases the charge storage capability in comparison to the “pure” conducting polymer. Incorporation of large anions, i.e., paratoluenesulfonate, allows a further improvement in the capacity. These charge storage modifications have been attributed to the morphology of the composite in which the particle sizes and the specific surface area are modified with the incorporation of nanoparticles. High capacity and stability have been obtained in PC/NEt4BF4 (at 20 mV/s), i.e., 47 mAh/g, with only a 3% charge loss after one thousand cyles. The kinetics of charge–discharge is also improved by the hybrid nanocomposite morphology modifications, which increase the rate of insertion–expulsion of counter anions in the bulk of the film. A room temperature ionic liquid such as imidazolium trifluoromethanesulfonimide seems to be a promising electrolyte because it further increases the capacity up to 53 mAh/g with a high stability during charge–discharge processes

Effects of mandrel shape on deformation behavior for hot mandrel bending of elbows

Elbows of steel pipe joints are used in the industrial plants and are mainly manufactured by the hot mandrelbending from raw material of straight steel pipe. Elbows are generally manufactured at elevatedtemperature by means of pushing, expanding and bending of pipes simultaneously, using the innertool of mandrel. Characteristics of mandrel bending strongly depend on the integrated shape anddimensions of the mandrel. We investigate the effects of shape and dimension of mandrel on deformationbehaviors for hot mandrel bending of elbows, conducting experimental test and numerical analysis. Weclarify the effects of bending radius ratio Rout/Dout, expansion ratio Dout/Din, mandrel length ratio L/Doutand other items of mandrel shape. And optimum conditions of mandrel are estimated as conclusion

Seven-plus hours of daily sedentary time and the subsequent risk of breast cancer : Japan Multi-Institutional Collaborative Cohort Study

This study aimed to investigate the association between daily sedentary time and the risk of breast cancer (BC) in a large Japanese population. The participants were 36,023 women aged 35–69 years from the Japan Multi-Institutional Collaborative Cohort Study. Cox proportional hazards analysis was used to estimate adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for BC incidence in relation to time spent sedentarily (categorical variables: <7 and ≥7 hours/day [h/d]). Additionally, the associations of BC incidence to the joint effect of sedentary time with each component of physical activity, such as leisure-time metabolic equivalents (METs), frequency of leisure-time physical activity, and daily walking time, were examined. During 315,189 person-years of follow-up, 554 incident cases of BC were identified. When compared to participants who spent <7 h/d sedentary, those who spent ≥7 h/d sedentary have a significantly higher risk of BC (HR, 1.36; 95% CI, 1.07–1.71). The corresponding HRs among participants who spent ≥7 h/d sedentary with more physical activity, such as ≥1 h/d for leisure-time METs, ≥3 days/week of leisure-time physical activity, and ≥1 h/d of daily walking were 1.58 (95% CI, 1.11–2.25), 1.77 (95% CI, 1.20–2.61), and 1.42 (95% CI, 1.10–1.83), respectively, compared with those who spent <7 h/d sedentary. This study found that spending ≥7 h/d of sedentary time is associated with the risk of BC. Neither leisure-time physical activity nor walking had a BC-preventive effect in those with ≥7 h/d of sedentary time

Inhibition of Apoptosis Blocks Human Motor Neuron Cell Death in a Stem Cell Model of Spinal Muscular Atrophy

Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) is a genetic disorder caused by a deletion of the survival motor neuron 1 gene leading to motor neuron loss, muscle atrophy, paralysis, and death. We show here that induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) lines generated from two Type I SMA subjects–one produced with lentiviral constructs and the second using a virus-free plasmid–based approach–recapitulate the disease phenotype and generate significantly fewer motor neurons at later developmental time periods in culture compared to two separate control subject iPSC lines. During motor neuron development, both SMA lines showed an increase in Fas ligand-mediated apoptosis and increased caspase-8 and-3 activation. Importantly, this could be mitigated by addition of either a Fas blocking antibody or a caspase-3 inhibitor. Together, these data further validate this human stem cell model of SMA, suggesting that specific inhibitors of apoptotic pathways may be beneficial for patients

Ruthenium oxide-carbon-based nanofiller-reinforced conducting polymer nanocomposites and their supercapacitor applications.

In this review article, we have presented for the first time the new applications of supercapacitor technologies and working principles of the family of RuO2-carbon-based nanofiller-reinforced conducting polymer nanocomposites. Our review focuses on pseudocapacitors and symmetric and asymmetric supercapacitors. Over the last years, the supercapacitors as a new technology in energy storage systems have attracted more and more attention. They have some unique characteristics such as fast charge/discharge capability, high energy and power densities, and long stability. However, the need for economic, compatible, and easy synthesis materials for supercapacitors have led to the development of RuO2-carbon-based nanofiller-reinforced conducting polymer nanocomposites with RuO2. Therefore, the aim of this manuscript was to review RuO2-carbon-based nanofiller-reinforced conducting polymer nanocomposites with RuO2 over the last 17 years