Extraction and separation of hexavalent molybdenum from acidic sulfate solutions using Alamine 336 as an extractant

Extraction and separation of hexavalent molybdenum from acidic sulfate solutions using Alamine 336 as an extractant and kerosene as diluent is described. Variation of acid concentration influences the percentage of extraction of hexavalent molybdenum indicating the ion exchange type mechanism. Effect of concentration of Alamine 336 on the extraction of hexavalent molybdenum in the presence of divalent copper and trivalent iron is also presented. The upper limit of concentration of extractant for extraction of hexavalent molybdenum free from divalent copper and trivalent iron is observed with 0.1 mol/L of Alamine 336. However, when the concentration of Alamine 336 is increased to 1.0 mol/L, about 48% of copper is extracted along with molybdenum but without any iron. The method is suitable for the separation of molybdenum from copper and iron contained leach liquor. The optimized experimental parameters such as phase contact time, effect of extractant, metal, loading capacity of extractant and followed by strip ping studies with ammonia, hydrogen peroxide, sodium hydroxide, sodium thiosulfate and thiourea is presented. From the above experimental data we proposed the aqueous mechanism for hexavalent molybdenum extraction processes

Scrap computer keyboards a sustainable resource for silver (Ag) and low density oil (L D Oil)

Most neglected part of the scrap computers are the keyboards, which are generally incinerated by the informal recycling sectors creating environmental pollution and leads to the wastage of precious metallic contents present in it. Present paper is focused on a novel chemical processing technique developed to recover silver (Ag) as value added product and low density oil (L D Oil) from the computer keyboards. Initially, scrap keyboards were manually dismantled to separate Mylar sheets and the same were pyrolysed at 300 ◦C for 2 h to recover L D Oil. The obtained pyrolysed Mylar sheets was further crushed, milled and homogenized to reduce particle size (− 100 mesh). The crushed sample was leached using 2 M HNO3 at 60 ◦C in mixing time of 20 min and pulp density of 100 g/L to achieve maximum dissolution of Ag. The leaching kinetics for Ag dissolution well fitted with chemical reaction control dense constant size cylindrical particles, 1-(1-X)1/2 = kct. The obtained leach liquor was put to cementation process using metallic copper (Cu). Almost 99% of Ag gets cemented as Ag powder in 15 min at a constant solution temperature of 60 ◦C and pH 1.1. The developed bench scale process has application orientation to the industry after piloting the process

Trends in Selected Heart Diseases Among Below Poverty Line Population From Karnataka State, South India

Objective: The study aims to reveal the most common heart diseases found among the below-the-poverty-line (BPL) population in Karnataka State (South India) using SAST data. Method: This study has been done using the data found in the Suvarna Arogya Suraksha Trust on below-the-poverty line (BPL) categories Results and Discussion: It is found that the coronary artery disease, myocardial infarction, Bradycardia, pericarditis. Arrhythmia was found common among BPL section Conclusion: Poverty, material deprivation, social exclusion, health disparity, and poor social cohesion throughout the life course among the BPL community are the key reasons for poor cardiac care and related outcomes

Trends in Selected Birth Defects Among Parents from Below Poverty Line Population in Karnataka During 2010–2020

The aim of the study is to reveal the common birth defects among parents of newborns belonging to the below poverty line (BPL) category in Karnataka state (South India) by analyzing Suvarna Arogya Suraksha Trust data. In the last 10 years, 3672 kids in BPL families have been born with various birth abnormalities. It is found that 50.3% of newborns have anorectal malformations, 33.1% have hypospadias, 6.0% have diaphragmatic hernia, 5.1% have esophageal atresia, and 2.8% have intestinal atresia and obstruct. As a parent's age rises, the likelihood of having a child with birth abnormalities raise as well, particularly anorectal malformations than diaphragmatic hernia. Male newborns have a higher risk of birth defects. We hypothesized that poverty, material deprivation, and low socioeconomic profile throughout the life course among the BPL community could be some of the key reasons for poor maternal health care and related neonatal outcomes

AI is a viable alternative to high throughput screening: a 318-target study

: High throughput screening (HTS) is routinely used to identify bioactive small molecules. This requires physical compounds, which limits coverage of accessible chemical space. Computational approaches combined with vast on-demand chemical libraries can access far greater chemical space, provided that the predictive accuracy is sufficient to identify useful molecules. Through the largest and most diverse virtual HTS campaign reported to date, comprising 318 individual projects, we demonstrate that our AtomNet® convolutional neural network successfully finds novel hits across every major therapeutic area and protein class. We address historical limitations of computational screening by demonstrating success for target proteins without known binders, high-quality X-ray crystal structures, or manual cherry-picking of compounds. We show that the molecules selected by the AtomNet® model are novel drug-like scaffolds rather than minor modifications to known bioactive compounds. Our empirical results suggest that computational methods can substantially replace HTS as the first step of small-molecule drug discovery

Global burden of 288 causes of death and life expectancy decomposition in 204 countries and territories and 811 subnational locations, 1990–2021: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021

BACKGROUND Regular, detailed reporting on population health by underlying cause of death is fundamental for public health decision making. Cause-specific estimates of mortality and the subsequent effects on life expectancy worldwide are valuable metrics to gauge progress in reducing mortality rates. These estimates are particularly important following large-scale mortality spikes, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. When systematically analysed, mortality rates and life expectancy allow comparisons of the consequences of causes of death globally and over time, providing a nuanced understanding of the effect of these causes on global populations. METHODS The Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2021 cause-of-death analysis estimated mortality and years of life lost (YLLs) from 288 causes of death by age-sex-location-year in 204 countries and territories and 811 subnational locations for each year from 1990 until 2021. The analysis used 56 604 data sources, including data from vital registration and verbal autopsy as well as surveys, censuses, surveillance systems, and cancer registries, among others. As with previous GBD rounds, cause-specific death rates for most causes were estimated using the Cause of Death Ensemble model-a modelling tool developed for GBD to assess the out-of-sample predictive validity of different statistical models and covariate permutations and combine those results to produce cause-specific mortality estimates-with alternative strategies adapted to model causes with insufficient data, substantial changes in reporting over the study period, or unusual epidemiology. YLLs were computed as the product of the number of deaths for each cause-age-sex-location-year and the standard life expectancy at each age. As part of the modelling process, uncertainty intervals (UIs) were generated using the 2·5th and 97·5th percentiles from a 1000-draw distribution for each metric. We decomposed life expectancy by cause of death, location, and year to show cause-specific effects on life expectancy from 1990 to 2021. We also used the coefficient of variation and the fraction of population affected by 90% of deaths to highlight concentrations of mortality. Findings are reported in counts and age-standardised rates. Methodological improvements for cause-of-death estimates in GBD 2021 include the expansion of under-5-years age group to include four new age groups, enhanced methods to account for stochastic variation of sparse data, and the inclusion of COVID-19 and other pandemic-related mortality-which includes excess mortality associated with the pandemic, excluding COVID-19, lower respiratory infections, measles, malaria, and pertussis. For this analysis, 199 new country-years of vital registration cause-of-death data, 5 country-years of surveillance data, 21 country-years of verbal autopsy data, and 94 country-years of other data types were added to those used in previous GBD rounds. FINDINGS The leading causes of age-standardised deaths globally were the same in 2019 as they were in 1990; in descending order, these were, ischaemic heart disease, stroke, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and lower respiratory infections. In 2021, however, COVID-19 replaced stroke as the second-leading age-standardised cause of death, with 94·0 deaths (95% UI 89·2-100·0) per 100 000 population. The COVID-19 pandemic shifted the rankings of the leading five causes, lowering stroke to the third-leading and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease to the fourth-leading position. In 2021, the highest age-standardised death rates from COVID-19 occurred in sub-Saharan Africa (271·0 deaths [250·1-290·7] per 100 000 population) and Latin America and the Caribbean (195·4 deaths [182·1-211·4] per 100 000 population). The lowest age-standardised death rates from COVID-19 were in the high-income super-region (48·1 deaths [47·4-48·8] per 100 000 population) and southeast Asia, east Asia, and Oceania (23·2 deaths [16·3-37·2] per 100 000 population). Globally, life expectancy steadily improved between 1990 and 2019 for 18 of the 22 investigated causes. Decomposition of global and regional life expectancy showed the positive effect that reductions in deaths from enteric infections, lower respiratory infections, stroke, and neonatal deaths, among others have contributed to improved survival over the study period. However, a net reduction of 1·6 years occurred in global life expectancy between 2019 and 2021, primarily due to increased death rates from COVID-19 and other pandemic-related mortality. Life expectancy was highly variable between super-regions over the study period, with southeast Asia, east Asia, and Oceania gaining 8·3 years (6·7-9·9) overall, while having the smallest reduction in life expectancy due to COVID-19 (0·4 years). The largest reduction in life expectancy due to COVID-19 occurred in Latin America and the Caribbean (3·6 years). Additionally, 53 of the 288 causes of death were highly concentrated in locations with less than 50% of the global population as of 2021, and these causes of death became progressively more concentrated since 1990, when only 44 causes showed this pattern. The concentration phenomenon is discussed heuristically with respect to enteric and lower respiratory infections, malaria, HIV/AIDS, neonatal disorders, tuberculosis, and measles. INTERPRETATION Long-standing gains in life expectancy and reductions in many of the leading causes of death have been disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, the adverse effects of which were spread unevenly among populations. Despite the pandemic, there has been continued progress in combatting several notable causes of death, leading to improved global life expectancy over the study period. Each of the seven GBD super-regions showed an overall improvement from 1990 and 2021, obscuring the negative effect in the years of the pandemic. Additionally, our findings regarding regional variation in causes of death driving increases in life expectancy hold clear policy utility. Analyses of shifting mortality trends reveal that several causes, once widespread globally, are now increasingly concentrated geographically. These changes in mortality concentration, alongside further investigation of changing risks, interventions, and relevant policy, present an important opportunity to deepen our understanding of mortality-reduction strategies. Examining patterns in mortality concentration might reveal areas where successful public health interventions have been implemented. Translating these successes to locations where certain causes of death remain entrenched can inform policies that work to improve life expectancy for people everywhere. FUNDING Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Development of Hydrometallurgical Process for Recovery of Rare Earth Metals (Nd, Pr, and Dy) from Nd-Fe-B Magnets

Non-availability of rich primary resources of rare earth metals (REMs) and the generation of huge amounts of discarded magnets containing REMs, compelled the researchers to explore the possibilities for the recovery of REMs from discarded magnets. Therefore, the present paper reports the recovery of REMs (Nd, Pr, and Dy) from discarded Nd-Fe-B magnets. The process consists of demagnetization, pre-treatment, and hydrometallurgical processing to recover REMs as salt. Leaching studies indicate that 95.5% Nd, 99.9% Pr, and 99.9% Dy were found to be dissolved at the optimized experimental condition i.e., acid concentration 2 M H2SO4, temperature 75 °C, pulp density 100 g/L, and mixing time 60 min. Solvent extraction technique was tried for the selective extraction/separation of REMs and Fe. The result indicates that 99.1% (24.42 g/L) of Nd along with 90% (1.08 g/L) of Pr and total Fe were co-extracted using 35% Cyanex 272 at organic to aqueous (O/A) ratio 1/1, eq. pH 3.5 in 10 min of mixing time. It requires multistage separation and therefore, not feasible in view of economics. Thus, direct precipitation of REMs salt and iron oxide as pigment was studied using two stages of precipitation at different pH. The obtained precipitate of REMs and Fe hydroxides were dried separately to remove the moisture and further treated at elevated temperature to get pure REMs oxide and red oxide

Recovery of Rare Earth Metals (REMs) from Nickel Metal Hydride Batteries of Electric Vehicles

Nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries are extensively used in the manufacturing of portable electronic devices as well as electric vehicles due to their specific properties including high energy density, precise volume, resistance to overcharge, etc. These NiMH batteries contain significant amounts of rare earth metals (REMs) along with Co and Ni which are discarded due to illegal dumping and improper recycling practices. In view of their strategic, economic, and industrial importance, and to mitigate the demand and supply gap of REMs and the limited availability of natural resources, it is necessary to explore secondary resources of REMs. Therefore, the present paper reports a feasible hydrometallurgical process flowsheet for the recovery of REMs and valuable metals from spent NiMH batteries. More than 90% dissolution of REMs (Nd, Ce and La) was achieved using 2 M H2SO4 at 75 degrees C in 60 min in the presence of 10% H2O2 (v/v). From the obtained leach liquor, the REMs, such as Nd and Ce, were recovered using 10% PC88A diluted in kerosene at eq. pH 1.5 and O/A ratio 1/1 in two stages of counter current extraction. La of 99% purity was selectively precipitated from the leach liquor in the pH range of 1.5 to 2.0, leaving Cu, Ni and Co in the filtrate. Further, Cu and Ni were extracted with LIX 84 at equilibrium pH 2.5 and 5, leaving Co in the raffinate. The developed process flow sheet is feasible and has potential for industrial exploitation after scale-up/pilot trails