Lifetime of Gas Turbines Hot Section Parts in an O&G Environment

TutorialThe main driver to define the time between overhauls of a gas turbine is the life of the hot components. For an Oil&Gas operator, a turbine overhaul represents a major cost and therefore is a key point for performance improvement. This paper reviews the main damaging mechanisms of the hot sections of gas turbines, the available models, and provides orders of magnitudes of the impact of the different factors in the life of components. It also presents the operational experience of Total through cases for which the time between overhauls was successfully extended

Phase II Trial with Carboplatin and Bendamustine in Patients with Extensive Stage Small-Cell Lung Cancer

Background:Bendamustine is an alkylating agent with hybrid activity and proven efficacy in small-cell lung cancer associated with a favorable toxicity rate. This phase II study of carboplatin/bendamustine was conducted to evaluate the efficacy of this combination in patients with extensive disease small-cell lung cancer (ED-SCLC).Methods:Fifty-six untreated patients with ED-SCLC were enrolled. Their median age was 63 years. Sixty-seven percent of patients were male and 18% had a World Health Organization performance status of 2. Bendamustine was administered as a 30- to 60-minute infusion at a dose of 80 mg/m2 on days 1 and 2, and carboplatin was given at an area under the curve of 5 on day 1 of a 21-day cycle.Results:Fifty-five patients were assessable for response and toxicity. The overall response rate was 72.7% (95% confidence interval: 59%–84%), with one complete remission (1.8%). The median time to progression was 5.2 months (95% confidence interval: 4.2–5.6). At the time of evaluation, 71% of the patients had died. The median survival time reached 8.3 months (95% confidence interval: 6.6–9.9). The major toxicity of this regimen was myelosuppression, including grade 3 or 4 neutropenia (46%), thrombopenia (26%), anemia (15%), and infections (11%). Toxic death was recorded in two patients (3.6%).Conclusions:The carboplatin/bendamustine regimen is a well-tolerated cytostatic combination in ED-SCLC with activity comparable with that of other platinum-based regimens. Further investigations, such as a phase III trial, are currently planned

Immune checkpoint inhibitors for advanced non-small cell lung cancer: emerging sequencing for new treatment targets

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the world. Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) stimulate cytotoxic lymphocyte activity against tumour cells. These agents are available for the treatment of nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC) after failure of platinumbased therapy. One recent study has demonstrated that ICI monotherapy was superior to platinum-based chemotherapy for first-line treatment. Nevertheless, this benefit was only for a minority of the population (30%) whose tumour programmed death receptor ligand-1 (PD-L1) expression was above 50%. Therefore, several strategies are under investigation. One option for patients with PD-L1 expression lower than 50% may be the combination of ICI with platinum-based chemotherapy or with ICIs against different targets. However, all of these combinations are at an early stage of investigation and may be very expensive or toxic, producing several harmful adverse events.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Lifetime of Gas Turbines Hot Section Parts in an O&G Environment

TutorialThe main driver to define the time between overhauls of a gas turbine is the life of the hot components. For an Oil&Gas operator, a turbine overhaul represents a major cost and therefore is a key point for performance improvement. This paper reviews the main damaging mechanisms of the hot sections of gas turbines, the available models, and provides orders of magnitudes of the impact of the different factors in the life of components. It also presents the operational experience of Total through cases for which the time between overhauls was successfully extended

Subsynchronous Vibrations On Turboexpanders Equipped With Magnetic Bearings Assessment, Understanding And Solutions

LectureIn most natural gas applications, turboexpanders are operating close to or on the dew point line and a mixture entering the turboexpander impeller is a combination of liquid and gas phases of the natural gas. The presence of the liquid phase may induce rotordynamic instabilities during operation. Special care should be taken in the case of magnetic bearings. This paper will present a revamp of two turboexpander-compressors equipped with active magnetic bearings (AMB). The application is liquid natural gas (LNG) rejection and gas injection on a Floating Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) barge. Prior to upgrade, the turboexpanders had accumulated more than 250 thousand hours in operation. The objective of the upgrade was to adapt to new process conditions and to increase the power of the turboexpanders. After the re-wheeling of turboexpanders, numerous trips due to violent subsynchronous vibrations were experienced. The root-cause analysis revealed that the presence of liquids in the front wheel labyrinth seals caused fluid-induced non-synchronous vibrations (NSV). Methods used in the redesign of the impellers and labyrinth seals that allowed the problem to be solved will be described in detail

Glucose and Pharmacological Modulators of ATP-Sensitive K+ Channels Control [Ca2+]c by Different Mechanisms in Isolated Mouse α-Cells

OBJECTIVE—We studied how glucose and ATP-sensitive K+ (KATP) channel modulators affect α-cell [Ca2+]c

Brain metastases at the time of presentation of non-small cell lung cancer: a multi-centric AERIO analysis of prognostic factors

A multi-centre retrospective study involving 4 French university institutions has been conducted in order to identify routine pre-therapeutic prognostic factors of survival in patients with previously untreated non-small cell lung cancer and brain metastases at the time of presentation. A total of 231 patients were recorded regarding their clinical, radiological and biological characteristics at presentation. The accrual period was January 1991 to December 1998. Prognosis was analysed using both univariate and multivariate (Cox model) statistics. The median survival of the whole population was 28 weeks. Univariate analysis (log-rank), showed that patients affected by one of the following characteristics proved to have a shorter survival in comparison with the opposite status of each variable: male gender, age over 63 years, poor performance status, neurological symptoms, serum neuron-specific enolase (NSE) level higher than 12.5 ng ml−1, high serum alkaline phosphatase level, high serum LDH level and serum sodium level below 132 mmol l−1. In the Cox's model, the following variables were independent determinants of a poor outcome: male gender: hazard ratio (95% confidence interval): 2.29 (1.26–4.16), poor performance status: 1.73 (1.15–2.62), age: 1.02 (1.003–1.043), a high serum NSE level: 1.72 (1.11–2.68), neurological symptoms: 1.63 (1.05–2.54), and a low serum sodium level: 2.99 (1.17–7.62). Apart from 4 prognostic factors shared in common with other stage IV NSCLC patients, whatever the metastatic site (namely sex, age, gender, performance status and serum sodium level) this study discloses 2 determinants specifically resulting from brain metastasis: i.e. the presence of neurological symptoms and a high serum NSE level. The latter factor could be in relationship with the extent of normal brain tissue damage caused by the tumour as has been demonstrated after strokes. Additionally, the observation of a high NSE level as a prognostic determinant in NSCLC might reflect tumour heterogeneity and understimated neuroendocrine differentiation. © 2001 Cancer Research Campaignhttp://www.bjcancer.co

Dry Gas Seals

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