Domestic Water Demand During Droughts in Temperate Climates: Synthesising Evidence for an Integrated Framework

In the upcoming years, as the population is growing and ageing, as lifestyle changes create the need for more water and as fewer people live in each household, the UK water sector will have to deal with challenges in the provision of adequate water services. Unless critical action is taken, every area in the UK may face a supply-demand gap by the 2080s. Extreme weather events and variations that alter drought and flood frequency add to these pressures. However, little evidence is available about householders’ response to drought and there are few if any studies incorporating this evidence into models of demand forecasting. The present work lays the groundwork for modelling domestic water demand response under drought conditions in temperate climates. After discussing the current literature on estimating and forecasting domestic water consumption under both ‘normal’ and drought conditions, this paper identifies the limited ability of current domestic demand forecasting techniques to include the many different and evolving factors affecting domestic consumption and it stresses the need for the inclusion of inter and intra household factors as well as water use practices in future demand forecasting models

Representation of cognitive reappraisal goals in frontal gamma oscillations

Recently, numerous efforts have been made to understand the neural mechanisms underlying cognitive regulation of emotion, such as cognitive reappraisal. Many studies have reported that cognitive control of emotion induces increases in neural activity of the control system, including the prefrontal cortex and the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex, and increases or decreases (depending upon the regulation goal) in neural activity of the appraisal system, including the amygdala and the insula. It has been hypothesized that information about regulation goals needs to be processed through interactions between the control and appraisal systems in order to support cognitive reappraisal. However, how this information is represented in the dynamics of cortical activity remains largely unknown. To address this, we investigated temporal changes in gamma band activity (35-55 Hz) in human electroencephalograms during a cognitive reappraisal task that was comprised of three reappraisal goals: To decease, maintain, or increase emotional responses modulated by affect-laden pictures. We examined how the characteristics of gamma oscillations, such as spectral power and large-scale phase synchronization, represented cognitive reappraisal goals. We found that left frontal gamma power decreased, was sustained, or increased when the participants suppressed, maintained, or amplified their emotions, respectively. This change in left frontal gamma power appeared during an interval of 1926 to 2453 ms after stimulus onset. We also found that the number of phase-synchronized pairs of gamma oscillations over the entire brain increased when participants regulated their emotions compared to when they maintained their emotions. These results suggest that left frontal gamma power may reflect cortical representation of emotional states modulated by cognitive reappraisal goals and gamma phase synchronization across whole brain regions may reflect emotional regulatory efforts to achieve these goals. Our study may provide the basis for an electroencephalogram-based neurofeedback system for the cognitive regulation of emotion.open0

Sexual dimorphism in cancer.

The incidence of many types of cancer arising in organs with non-reproductive functions is significantly higher in male populations than in female populations, with associated differences in survival. Occupational and/or behavioural factors are well-known underlying determinants. However, cellular and molecular differences between the two sexes are also likely to be important. In this Opinion article, we focus on the complex interplay that sex hormones and sex chromosomes can have in intrinsic control of cancer-initiating cell populations, the tumour microenvironment and systemic determinants of cancer development, such as the immune system and metabolism. A better appreciation of these differences between the two sexes could be of substantial value for cancer prevention as well as treatment

Rubber-Oil Distillation Bottoms Blends as a New Recycling Solution for Bitumen Extension

Environmental protection is also pursued by promoting the saving of oil reserves and the proper management of waste through a circular economy. Following this objective, the present study encourages the use of recycled and by-product materials for the production of bituminous binders. The powdered rubber (R) from end-of-life tyres and the re-refined engine oil bottom (REOB), i.e. the by-product of refining mineral waste oils, were used to replace a certain amount of standard bitumen. The experimental program aims to characterize the interaction between R and REOB in order to use them as virgin bitumen extenders. The multiple variables of the production process that may affect the R-REOB blends and in turn the binders’ final properties were evaluated. The R-REOB mixes were prepared by varying the type of REOB, the R content and the mixing temperature. The rheological analysis was performed by means of dynamic shear rheometer (DSR) tests with the aim to define the variables that strongly influence the response of the R-REOB compound. As a result of this preliminary study, the second phase will focus on extended bitumens that will be prepared considering some of the studied extenders.Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.Pavement Engineerin

Rubber-Oil Distillation Bottoms Blends as a New Recycling Solution for Bitumen Extension

Environmental protection is also pursued by promoting the saving of oil reserves and the proper management of waste through a circular economy. Following this objective, the present study encourages the use of recycled and by-product materials for the production of bituminous binders. The powdered rubber (R) from end-of-life tyres and the re-refined engine oil bottom (REOB), i.e. the by-product of refining mineral waste oils, were used to replace a certain amount of standard bitumen. The experimental program aims to characterize the interaction between R and REOB in order to use them as virgin bitumen extenders. The multiple variables of the production process that may affect the R-REOB blends and in turn the binders\u2019 final properties were evaluated. The R-REOB mixes were prepared by varying the type of REOB, the R content and the mixing temperature. The rheological analysis was performed by means of dynamic shear rheometer (DSR) tests with the aim to define the variables that strongly influence the response of the R-REOB compound. As a result of this preliminary study, the second phase will focus on extended bitumens that will be prepared considering some of the studied extenders

Evidence for keratinocyte immortalization in high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions of the cervix infected with high-risk human papillomaviruses

In this study, we demonstrate that expression of cyclin B protein is up-regulated and persists into the upper epithelial layers in parallel with cyclin A expression in high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (SIL) infected with human papillomaviruses 16, 31, 33, 51, 58, 66, and 67 (n = 33). In contrast, low-grade SIL infected with human papillomaviruses 16, 18, 31, 33, 39, 51, 52, 56, 58, and 66 (n = 27) show weaker cyclin B expression confined to basal and parabasal cells despite extension of cyclin A and Ki67 expression into superficial cells. Moreover, aneusomy is present in 20% of the high-grade lesions but in none of the low-grade lesions. The persistent expression of cyclin B in high-grade SIL, and the restriction of aneusomy to high-grade SIL suggest that there is cell cycle progression. In combination with in vitro studies, this provides evidence that high-grade SIL lesions have undergone immortalization.</p