A review of food and nutrition communication and promotion in Ghana

Dietary perception, behavior, and nutritional status can all be influenced by exposure to information. Behavior change communication that is appropriately designed and implemented is critical for motivating optimal dietary behavior. On the other hand, inadvertent or deliberate misinformation can drive unhealthy dietary behaviors. As part of the process to develop food-based dietary guidelines (FBDGs) for Ghana, this rapidevidence review examined the nature, extent, sources, and medium of food and nutrition information dissemination and promotion in Ghana.  PubMed, Cochrane, Google Scholar, and Open Access Theses Dissertations (OATD) databases were searched systematically using keywords to  identify relevant peer-reviewed and grey literature. The review included 31 documents, after excluding 1,302 documents for ineligibility (based on  irrelevant title, abstract, and duplicates). Limited reporting of undernutrition was found in print and electronic media. Unhealthy foods, including sugar-sweetened beverages, snacks, yogurt, instant noodles, candy/chocolate, and ice cream were frequently advertised through various  communication media. Children are highly exposed to food advertisements, which target them. Promotional characters, animation, billboards, and  front-of-store displays; product-branded books, and toys are common strategies for food marketing and advertisement in Ghana. The most frequently reported sources of health and nutrition information were television, radio, social media, health professionals, families, and friends.  Children and adults experienced changes in food preferences and choices as a result of exposure to food advertised on television. The commonly  used traditional media were radio and television; printed newspaper use has declined tremendously in the past decade. Social media use  (particularly WhatsApp, Facebook, and YouTube) is highest in urban areas, and is growing rapidly; young adults are the most active users of social  media platforms. Experts recommend regulation as a mitigation for nutrition miscommunication and inaccurate promotion. The current review  highlights the need for regulation of food marketing, and advertisement to safeguard a healthy food environment in Ghana. &nbsp

Electrospinning as a route to advanced carbon fibre materials for selected low-temperature electrochemical devices: a review

Electrospinning has been proven as a highly versatile fabrication method for producing nano-structured fibres with controllable morphology, of both the fibres themselves and the void structure of the mats. Additionally, it is possible to use heteroatom doped polymers or to include catalytic precursors in the electrospinning solution to control the surface properties of the fibres. These factors make it an ideal method for the production of electrodes and flow media for a variety of electrochemical devices, enabling reduction in mass transport and activation overpotentials and therefore increasing efficiency. Moreover, the use of biomass as a polymer source has recently gained attention for the ability to embed sustainable principles in the materials of electrochemical devices, complementing their ability to allow an increase in the use of renewable electricity via their application. In this review, the historical and recent developments of electrospun materials for application in redox flow batteries, fuel cells, metal air batteries and supercapacitors are thoroughly reviewed, including an overview of the electrospinning process and a guide to best practice. Finally, we provide an outlook for the emerging use of this process in the field of electrochemical energy devices with the hope that the combination of tailored microstructure, surface functionality and computer modelling will herald a new era of bespoke functional materials that can significantly improve the performance of the devices in which they are used

A review of food and nutrition communication and promotion in Ghana

Dietary perception, behavior, and nutritional status can all be influenced by exposure to information. Behavior change communication that is appropriately designed and implemented is critical for motivating optimal dietary behavior. On the other hand, inadvertent or deliberate misinformation can drive unhealthy dietary behaviors. As part of the process to develop food-based dietary guidelines (FBDGs) for Ghana, this rapid evidence review examined the nature, extent, sources, and medium of food and nutrition information dissemination and promotion in Ghana. PubMed, Cochrane, Google Scholar, and Open Access Theses Dissertations (OATD) databases were searched systematically using keywords to identify relevant peer-reviewed and grey literature. The review included 31 documents, after excluding 1,302 documents for ineligibility (based on irrelevant title, abstract, and duplicates). Limited reporting of undernutrition was found in print and electronic media. Unhealthy foods, including sugar-sweetened beverages, snacks, yogurt, instant noodles, candy/chocolate, and ice cream were frequently advertised through various communication media. Children are highly exposed to food advertisements, which target them. Promotional characters, animation, billboards, and front-of-store displays; product-branded books, and toys are common strategies for food marketing and advertisement in Ghana. The most frequently reported sources of health and nutrition information were television, radio, social media, health professionals, families, and friends. Children and adults experienced changes in food preferences and choices as a result of exposure to food advertised on television. The commonly used traditional media were radio and television; printed newspaper use has declined tremendously in the past decade. Social media use (particularly WhatsApp, Facebook, and YouTube) is highest in urban areas, and is growing rapidly; young adults are the most active users of social media platforms. Experts recommend regulation as a mitigation for nutrition miscommunication and inaccurate promotion. The current review highlights the need for regulation of food marketing, and advertisement to safeguard a healthy food environment in Ghana

Effect of biodiesel production parameters on viscosity and yield of methyl esters: Jatropha curcas, Elaeis guineensis and Cocos nucifera

In this study, the effect of H2SO4 on viscosity of methyl esters from Jatropha oil (JCME), palm kernel oil (PKOME) from Elaeis guineensis species, and coconut oil (COME) has been studied. Effect of methanol to oil molar mass ratio on yield of the three feedstocks has also been studied. Methyl ester yield was decreased by esterification process using sulphuric acid anhydrous (H2SO4). Jatropha methyl ester experienced a viscosity reduction of 24% (4.1–3.1 mm2/s) with the addition of 1% sulphuric acid. In this work palm kernel oil (PKOME), coconut oil (COME) and Jatropha oil (JCME) were used as feedstocks for the production of biodiesel to investigate optimum parameters to obtain high yield. For each of the feedstock, the biodiesel yield increased with increase in NaOH concentration. The highest yield was obtained with 1% NaOH concentration for all. The effect of methanol in the range of 4:1–8:1 (molar ratio) was investigated, keeping other process parameters fixed. Optimum ratios of palm kernel oil and coconut oil biodiesels yielded 98% each at methanol:oil molar ratio of 8:1. The physiochemical properties obtained for each methyl showed superior properties compared with those reported in published data

Thermal stress analysis of solid oxide fuel cells with chromium poisoning cathodes

Chromium(Cr) poisoning of the traditional LSM cathode is one of the most critical issues that accounts for instability of solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs). The poisoning course will introduce alien species in the cathode active regions and it causes phase change and structure deformation, reducing the sites for electrochemical reactions. A 3D model is thus developed by coupling the computational fluid dynamics (CFD) approach with the finite element method to unravel the involved electrochemical processes in chromium poisoning of SOFCs. A function is proposed based on the experimental results to describe the distribution of Cr-related compounds in cathode. The results indicate that chromium poisoning can induce a dramatic decrease in the electric current density, which can also lead to increase of activation polarizations and lower the temperature. Three kinds of thermal stresses are strongly affected by the invasion of chromium into cathodes, which are all significantly reduced with the poisoning extent. The resulting conclusions are beneficial to deeply understand the Cr poisoning of SOFCs and also to material design to prevent cathodes from Cr-based interconnect attack

Thermal stress analysis of sulfur deactivated solid oxide fuel cells

Hydrogen sulfide in fuels can deactivate catalyst for solid oxide fuel cells, which has become one of the most critical challenges to stability. The reactions between sulfur and catalyst will cause phase changes, leading to increase in cell polarization and mechanical mismatch. A three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) approach based on the finite element method (FEM) is thus used to investigate the polarization, temperature and thermal stress in a sulfur deactivated SOFC by coupling equations for gas-phase species, heat, momentum, ion and electron transport. The results indicate that sulfur in fuels can strongly affect the cell polarization and thermal stresses, which shows a sharp decrease in the vicinity of electrolyte when 10% nickel in the functional layer is poisoned, but they remain almost unchanged even when the poisoned Ni content was increased to 90%. This investigation is helpful to deeply understand the sulfur poisoning effects and also benefit the material design and optimization of electrode structure to enhance cell performance and lifetimes in various hydrocarbon fuels containing impurities

Effect of the electrochemical active site on thermal stress in solid oxide fuel cells

A 3D model is developed by coupling the equations for momentum, gas-phase species, heat, electron and ion transport to analyze cell polarization, current density and temperature in solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs). The increase of active sites is beneficial to improve efficiency of electrochemical reactions, but it can be also detrimental to SOFCs’ stability as it will induce changes in strength and distribution of the thermal stresses. The variation of thermal stresses is systematically studied by grading the active site along the main flow direction. The results indicate that the first principle stress increases with the active site at the interface of electrolyte and electrode, but the shear stress mainly appears in the vicinity of gas inlets, which both suffer from a dramatic change when the active site is enhanced from the initial state to 1.5 times. Moreover, the electrolyte is subjected to large contrary tensile stresses, and the first principle stress is responsible for crack possibly occurring to the electrolyte. We also confirm that the sharp fluctuation of stress caused by the active sites can be relieved through adjusting thickness of the anode active layer