Detecting Gold Biomineralization by Delftia acidovorans Biofilms on a Quartz Crystal Microbalance

© 2019 American Chemical Society. The extensive use of gold in sensing, diagnostics, and electronics has led to major concerns in solid waste management since gold and other heavy metals are nonbiodegradable and can easily accumulate in the environment. Moreover, gold ions are extremely reactive and potentially harmful for humans. Thus, there is an urgent need to develop reliable methodologies to detect and possibly neutralize ionic gold in aqueous solutions and industrial wastes. In this work, by using complementary measurement techniques such as quartz crystal microbalance (QCM), atomic force microscopy, crystal violet staining, and optical microscopy, we investigate a promising biologically induced gold biomineralization process accomplished by biofilms of bacterium Delftia acidovorans. When stressed by Au3+ ions, D. acidovorans is able to neutralize toxic soluble gold by excreting a nonribosomal peptide, which forms extracellular gold nanonuggets via complexation with metal ions. Specifically, QCM, a surface-sensitive transducer, is employed to quantify the production of these gold complexes directly on the D. acidovorans biofilm in real time. Detailed kinetics obtained by QCM captures the condition for maximized biomineralization yield and offers new insights underlying the biomineralization process. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study providing an extensive characterization of the gold biomineralization process by a model bacterial biofilm. We also demonstrate QCM as a cheap, user-friendly sensing platform and alternative to standard analytical techniques for studies requiring high-resolution quantitative details, which offers promising opportunities in heavy-metal sensing, gold recovery, and industrial waste treatment

Urban mining of municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI) residues with emphasis on bioleaching technologies: a critical review

Metals are essential in our daily lives and have a finite supply, being simultaneously contaminants of concern. The current carbon emissions and environmental impact of mining are untenable. We need to reclaim metals sustainably from secondary resources, like waste. Biotechnology can be applied in metal recovery from waste streams like fly ashes and bottom ashes of municipal solid waste incineration (MSWI). They represent substantial substance flows, with roughly 46 million tons of MSWI ashes produced annually globally, equivalent in elemental richness to low-grade ores for metal recovery. Next-generation methods for resource recovery, as in particular bioleaching, give the opportunity to recover critical materials and metals, appropriately purified for noble applications, in waste treatment chains inspired by circular economy thinking. In this critical review, we can identify three main lines of discussion: (1) MSWI material characterization and related environmental issues; (2) currently available processes for recycling and metal recovery; and (3) microbially assisted processes for potential recycling and metal recovery. Research trends are chiefly oriented to the potential exploitation of bioprocesses in the industry. Biotechnology for resource recovery shows increasing effectiveness especially downstream the production chains, i.e., in the waste management sector. Therefore, this critical discussion will help assessing the industrial potential of biotechnology for urban mining of municipal, post-combustion waste

THU0618-HPR PSYCHOSOCIAL CHANGES IN RHEUMATIC DISEASE: A NURSING LED CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Background:Nursing management in Rheumatic Diseases (RD) is focused on global patient care. Starting from basic knowledge of diagnostic and therapeutic management, nurses can assess the impact of RD on patients' quality of life not only at the physical level, but also at the psychological, social, and emotional levels.Objectives:To evaluate psycosocial changes in RD patients through nursing-led Patient-Reported OutcomesMethods:We performed a cross-sectional study of 100 RD patients compared with 100 healthy volunteers matched for age, sex and BMI. Specialist nurses invited patients and volunteers to complete questionnaires on quality of life through seven domains (anxiety, depression, fatigue, sleep disturbance, pain interference, physical functions and satisfaction with participation in social roles) of the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS).Results:Among 100 RD patients, 52 (52%) had a diagnosis of Rheumatoid Arthritis; 17 (17%) had a diagnosis of axial spondylorthritis (Ankylosing Spondylitis and Psoriatic Artritis); 25 (25%) had connectivitis (i.e. Lupus, Systemic Sclerosis, Sjögren Syndrome), and finally 6 (6%) had vasculitis. Median disease duration was 7±5 years. Just under half (43%) of RD patients had active disease measured by specific disease activity index. As shown in table 1, no significant difference highlight between the two groups with regard to anthropompetric and demographic characteristics. We found that patients report significantly greater psychosocial changes than healthy controls. More specifically, as shown in figure 1A, mean T score for anxiety, depression, fatigue and sleep disturbances were significantly higher in the RD patients than in healthy controls (56 ± 9 vs 48 ± 8 p<0.001; 52 ± 9 vs 46 ± 8 p <0.001; 58 ± 8vs 48 ± 8 p <0.001; 52 ± 10 vs 44 ± 8 p <0.001) respectively. Moreover, also in the social dimension in terms of pain interference, physical functions and satisfaction with participation in social roles, patients showed a median T score worse than healthy controls (Fig.1B).Table 1Patients(N=100)Healthy(N=100)pDemographic and AnthropometricAge (years)52.5±1151±18nsGender n male (%)43 (43)47 (47)nsBMI (Kg/m2)25.1±427.8±4nsSmoke n (%)52 (52)46 (46)nsMarital Status n not married (%)42(42)41 (41)nsOccupation n yes (%)31 (31)35 (35)nsEducation level n degree (%)54 (54)64 (64)nsRheumatoid Arthritis52 (52)-Axial Spondylorthritis17 (17)-Connectivitis25 (25)-Vasculitis6 (6)-Disease duration (years)7.1±5.18-Disease Activity n yes (%)43 (43)-Medications n (% patients)-NSAID7 (7)-Steroids26 (26)-Biological Treatment54 (54)-Methotrexate34 (34)-Continuous variables are shown as mean ± standard deviation. Categorical variables are presented as number and proportion. The overall p-value was calculated by the Mann–Whitney non-parametric test for independent samples and by Chi-square test as appropriateFigure 1.Median T Score stratified by study group. Data are shown as mean and standard deviation. The overall p-value wascalculated by the Mann–Whitney non-parametric test for independent samples.Conclusion:This exploratory study highlights the need to adopt validated questionnaires in clinical practice, and demonstrates that PROMIS is a valid, objective, and standardized instrument that can help nursing staff to better define the consequences of the disease in a patient's daily life.References:[1]Minnock P, McKee G, Kelly A, et al. Nursing sensitive outcomes in patients with rheumatoid arthritis: a systematic literature review.Int. J. Nurs. Stud., 77 (2017), pp. 115-129[2]Bartlett SJ, Orbai AM, Duncan T, et al. Reliability and validity of selected PROMIS measures in people with rheumatoid arthritis. PloS One. 2015Disclosure of Interests:None declare

An evolutionary approach to preference disaggregation in a MURAME-based credit scoring problem

In this paper we use an evolutionary approach in order to infer the values of the parameters (weights of criteria, preference, indifference and veto thresholds) for developing the multicriteria method MURAME. According to the logic of preference disaggregation, the problem consists in finding the parameters that minimize the inconsistency between the model obtained with those parameters and that one connected with a given reference set of decisions revealed by the decision maker; in particular, two kinds of functions are considered in this analysis, representing a measure of the model inconsistency compared to the actual preferential system. In order to find a numerical solution of the mathematical programming problem involved, we adopt an evolutionary algorithm based on the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) method, which is an iterative heuristics grounded on swarm intelligence. The proposed approach is finally applied to a creditworthiness evaluation problem in order to test the methodology on a real data set provided by an Italian bank

Effects of pollen collection on colony development and in the bromatological composition Apis mellifera L. pupae

Africanized bees (Apis mellifera L.) were studied in the Botucatu region (São Paulo State), Brazil, from August to November, 1996, with the objective of quantifying pollen trapping and its effects on colony development and composition of worker bee pupae. Mean trapped pollen yield was 1.47 kg/beehive. Trapping had little effect on brood production, causing only a 9.7% reduction in total worker brood area and a 4.0% reduction in drone brood area, as compared to the treatment without pollen types. Pollen harvest did not affect the bromatological composition of worker pupae (white bodies and slightly pigmented eyes), mean values obtained for both treatments being 18.87% dry matter, 48.07% crude protein, 18.52% ether extract and 3.72% ash

Bromatological and mineral compositions of collected pollen for africanized honeybees (Apis mellifera L.) in Botucatu, São Paulo State

The bromatological and mineral compositions of pollen collected by Africanized honeybees (Apis mellifera L.) in the Botucatu region, São Paulo State, Brazil, from August to November, 1966, were investigated. The pollen collections from six beehives, at weekly intervals, lasted for seven consecutive days. Mean fresh pollen composition was: 75.9% dry matter, 26.2% crude protein (CP), 5.1% ether extract (EE), 2.6% ash, 1.1% crude fiber, 3.58% nitrogen, 0.43% phosphorus, 0.67% potassium, 0.26% calcium, 0.08% magnesium, 0.21% sulfur, 114.2 ppm iron, 88.4 ppm zinc, 15.0 ppm copper, 32.4 ppm manganese, and 9.9 ppm boron. Statistical analysis showed that pollen collected in October had the highest contents of CP, and of the elements P, S and Mn compared to the other months. According to cluster and principal components analyses for bromatological composition, the variables with most and least discriminatory power were the percentages of CP and EE, respectively. As to mineral composition, the most discriminatory variables were S, Mn, and N, while the least discriminatory were Mg, B, and K

Rheology of the Electric Double Layer in Electrolyte Solutions

Electric double layers (EDLs) are ionic structures formed on charged surfaces and play an important role in various biological and industrial processes. An extensive study in the past decade has revealed the structure of the EDL in concentrated electrolyte solutions of both ordinary salts and ionic liquids. However, how the EDL structure affects their material properties remains a challenging topic due to technical difficulties of these measurements at nanoscale. In this work, we report the first detailed characterization of the viscoelasticity of the EDL formed over a wide range of ion concentrations, including concentrated electrolyte solutions. Specifically, we investigate the complex shear modulus of the EDL by measuring the resonant frequency and the energy dissipation of a quartz crystal microbalance (QCM), a surface-sensitive device, immersed in aqueous solutions containing three types of solutes: an ionic liquid, 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride (BmimCl); an ordinary salt, sodium chloride (NaCl); and a nonelectrolyte, ethylene glycol (EG). For the two electrolyte solutions, we observe a monotonic decrease in the resonant frequency and a monotonic increase in the energy dissipation with increasing ion concentrations due to the presence of the EDL. The complex shear modulus of the EDL is estimated through a wave propagation model in which the density and shear modulus of the EDL decay exponentially toward those of the bulk solution. Our results show that both the storage and the loss modulus of the EDL increase rapidly with increasing ion concentrations in the low ion concentration regime (<1 M) but reach saturation values with similar magnitude at a sufficiently high ion concentration. The shear viscosity of the EDL near the charged QCM surface is approximately 50 times for NaCl solutions and 500 times for BmimCl solutions of the bulk solution value at the saturation concentration. We also demonstrate that QCM can be utilized for analyzing the rheological properties of the EDL, thus providing a complementary, low-cost, and portable alternative to conventional laboratory instruments such as the surface force apparatus. Our results elucidate new perspectives on the viscoelastic properties of the EDL and can potentially guide device optimization for applications such as biosensing and fast charging of batteries

Targeted massively parallel sequencing panel to diagnose genetic endocrine disorders in a tertiary hospital

Objectives: To analyze the efficiency of a multigenic targeted massively parallel sequencing panel related to endocrine disorders for molecular diagnosis of patients assisted in a tertiary hospital involved in the training of medical faculty. Material and methods: Retrospective analysis of the clinical diagnosis and genotype obtained from&nbsp;272&nbsp;patients in the Endocrine unit of a tertiary hospital was performed using a custom panel designed with&nbsp;653&nbsp;genes, most of them already associated with the phenotype (OMIM) and some candidate genes that englobes developmental, metabolic and adrenal diseases. The enriched DNA libraries were sequenced in NextSeq&nbsp;500. Variants found were then classified according to ACMG/AMP criteria, with Varsome and InterVar. Results: Three runs were performed; the mean coverage depth of the targeted regions in panel sequencing data was&nbsp;249×, with at least&nbsp;96.3% of the sequenced bases being covered more than&nbsp;20-fold. The authors identified&nbsp;66&nbsp;LP/P variants&nbsp;(24%) and 27&nbsp;VUS&nbsp;(10%). Considering the solved cases, 49&nbsp;have developmental diseases, 12&nbsp;have metabolic and 5&nbsp;have adrenal diseases. Conclusion: The application of a multigenic panel aids the training of medical faculty in an academic hospital by showing the picture of the molecular pathways behind each disorder. This may be particularly helpful in developmental disease cases. A precise genetic etiology provides an improvement in understanding the disease, guides decisions about prevention or treatment, and allows genetic counseling