Potential of microalgae biomass for the sustainable production of bio-commodities

Human activities are causing major negative environmental impacts, and the development of sustainable processes for production of commodities is a major urgency. Plant biomass represents a valuable alternative to produce energy and materials, but exploiting present crops for commodities production would however require massive resources (i.e. land, water and nutrients), raising serious sustainability concerns. In addition to efforts to improve plant, land and resource use efficiency, it is thus fundamental to look for alternative sources of biomass to complement crops. Microalgae are unicellular photosynthetic organisms that show a huge, yet untapped, potential in this context. Microalgae metabolism is powered by photosynthesis and thus uses sunlight, a renewable energy source, and the exploitation of microalgae-based products has the potential to provide a beneficial environmental impact. These microorganisms have the ability to synthesize a wide spectrum of bioactive compounds, with many different potential applications (e.g. nutraceutics/pharmaceutics and biofuels). Several, still unresolved, challenges are however present such as the lack of cost-effective cultivation platforms and biomass-harvesting technologies. Moreover, the natural metabolic plasticity of microalgae is not optimized for a production at scale, and low biomass productivity and product yields affect competitiveness. Tuning microalgae metabolism to maximize productivity thus represents an unavoidable challenge to reach the theoretical potential of such organisms

The impact of surgical delay on resectability of colorectal cancer: An international prospective cohort study

AimThe SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has provided a unique opportunity to explore the impact of surgical delays on cancer resectability. This study aimed to compare resectability for colorectal cancer patients undergoing delayed versus non-delayed surgery.MethodsThis was an international prospective cohort study of consecutive colorectal cancer patients with a decision for curative surgery (January-April 2020). Surgical delay was defined as an operation taking place more than 4 weeks after treatment decision, in a patient who did not receive neoadjuvant therapy. A subgroup analysis explored the effects of delay in elective patients only. The impact of longer delays was explored in a sensitivity analysis. The primary outcome was complete resection, defined as curative resection with an R0 margin.ResultsOverall, 5453 patients from 304 hospitals in 47 countries were included, of whom 6.6% (358/5453) did not receive their planned operation. Of the 4304 operated patients without neoadjuvant therapy, 40.5% (1744/4304) were delayed beyond 4 weeks. Delayed patients were more likely to be older, men, more comorbid, have higher body mass index and have rectal cancer and early stage disease. Delayed patients had higher unadjusted rates of complete resection (93.7% vs. 91.9%, P = 0.032) and lower rates of emergency surgery (4.5% vs. 22.5%, P ConclusionOne in 15 colorectal cancer patients did not receive their planned operation during the first wave of COVID-19. Surgical delay did not appear to compromise resectability, raising the hypothesis that any reduction in long-term survival attributable to delays is likely to be due to micro-metastatic disease