Current status of MHI’s CO2 recovery technology and optimization of CO2 recovery plant with a PC fired power plant

AbstractIt is the opinion of the authors that CO2 Capture and Storage (CCS) technology can significantly contribute as an effective countermeasure against climate change, allowing us to continue the utilization of fossil fuels for primary energy production. However for this technology to be widely deployed on a commercial basis there are three key issues that need to be addressed; (1) Reduction in energy consumption, (2) Efficient integration with other environmental control equipment of a PC power plant and (3) Reduction in the decrease of net electrical output.MHI has delivered multiple commercial CO2 recovery plants in the chemical and fertilizer industries, which recover CO2 from natural gas fired flue gas, with four commercial plants in operation and another four under construction, all utilizing the proprietary KM-CDR process.In order to gain experience with CO2 recovery from a coal fired flue gas stream, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI), together with a subsidy from RITE and cooperation from J-POWER, constructed a 10 metric ton per day (T/D) CO2 recovery demonstration plant at the 2×500 MW Matsushima power station in southern Japan. This demonstration plant has subsequently achieved more than 4,000 hours of successful test operation during 2006–2007 with a further 1,000 hours during 2008, and testing continues today. The demonstration testing confirmed that the KM-CDR process is applicable to coal fired flue gas streams. Future research priorities include the improved integration of the CO2 recovery process with the flue gas pre-treatment components and the additional optimization of removal and separation methods for coal based impurities accumulating in the absorbent.An issue of concern for power plant operators is the reduction of the net electrical output due to the demands of CO2 recovery process. MHI has made significant improvements in this area and in the efficiency of absorbents. However, it is necessary to further reduce the adverse impact on the net electrical output of the power plant via astute integration of the energy transferred between the power plant and the Post Combustion CO2 Capture (PCC) plant. MHI is investigating the following concepts; (1) Utilizing the waste heat of the PCC plant for the power plant, (2) Utilizing heat recovery from the flue gas for the CO2 recovery process and (3) Utilizing the compression heat of the CO2 compressor for the CO2 recovery process

日本における精神科入院患者の自殺企図の特徴

Suicide is an adverse event that can occur even when patient are hospitalized in psychiatric facilities. This study delineates the demographic characteristics of suicide attempts in mental hospitals and psychiatric wards of general hospitals in Japan, a country where the suicide rate is remarkably high. Analyses of incident reports on serious suicide attempts in psychiatric inpatients were performed using prefectural incident records between April 1, 2001, and December31, 2012. Suicide reports were included for 35 incidents that occurred over 11years, and demonstrated that 83% of patients (n=29) committed suicide and 17% (n=6) survived their attempt with serious aftereffects, such as cognitive impairment or persistent vegetative state. The male/female ratio of inpatient suicide was 1.5:1. The mean age of the attempters was 50.5 years (SD = 18.2). The most common psychiatric diagnoses for those with suicide incident reports were schizophrenia spectrum disorders (51.4%) and affective disorders (40%). Hanging (60%) was the most common method of suicide attempt, followed by jumping in front of moving objects (14.3%) and jumping from height (11.4%). Fifty-four percent of suicides (n=19) occurred within hospital sites and the remainder (46%; n=16) occurred outside hospital sites (e.g., on medical leave or elopement) while they were still inpatients.博士（医学）・乙第1347号・平成26年12月3日© 2014 Ikeshita Katsumi et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited

Efficacy of fragmin/protamine microparticles containing fibroblast growth factor-2 (F/P MPs/FGF-2) to induce collateral vessels in a rabbit model of hindlimb ischemia

ObjectivesThe localized delivery of exogenous, angiogenic growth factors such as fibroblast growth factor (FGF)-2 has become a promising alternative treatment of peripheral artery disease (PAD) and critical limb ischemia (CLI). The present study describes the efficacy of fragmin/protamine microparticles containing FGF-2 (F/P-MPs/FGF-2) to promote vessel growth in a rabbit model of hindlimb ischemia.MethodsA total of 24 rabbits were used to construct a model of hindlimb ischemia by resection of the left femoral artery. The rabbits were randomly divided into four groups 10 days after surgery (day 0); group A: control (non-treated; 1 mL of phosphate-buffered saline [PBS]); group B: FGF-2 (100 μg FGF-2 in 1 mL PBS)-treated; group C: F/P-MPs (12 mg dried F/P MPs in 1 mL PBS)-treated; and group D; F/P MPs/FGF-2 (100 μg FGF-2 and 12 mg dried F/P MPs in 1 mL PBS)-treated (n = 6 each). The drugs were administered intramuscularly to each group. Blood flow and blood pressure were measured in each group on days 0, 14, and 28. Angiography was performed to assess arteriogenesis on day 28. The number of capillaries on day 28 was determined by direct counting CD31− and α-smooth muscle antibody (α-SMA)-positive vessels.ResultsNeither death nor wound infection was observed throughout the experiment. The F/P MPs/FGF-2-treated group showed marked improvement in the blood flow ratio, blood pressure ratio, and capillary number in comparison to the control group, FGF-2-treated group, and F/P MPs-treated group. The F/P MPs-treated group showed intermediate improvement in blood flow ratio and capillary number in comparison to the control group and FGF-2-treated group.ConclusionsThe F/P MPs/FGF-2-treated group strongly induced functional collateral vessels in the rabbit model of hindlimb ischemia, indicating a possible therapy for PAD.Clinical RelevancePAD due to atherosclerotic vascular disease is a major health problem. Despite recent advances in surgical and radiologic vascular techniques, certain patients with CLI are not suitable for revascularization. A variety of strategies have been tried to promote development of collateral vessels. F/P MPs can act as carriers for controlled release of FGF-2. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of F/P MPs/FGF-2 to induce functional collateral vessels in a rabbit model of hindlimb ischemia. This study will lead to F/P MPs/FGF-2-therapy which is an effective therapeutic strategy for treating PAD patients in clinic

Interfacial Element for Finite Element Modal Analysis of Bolted Joints

Multi-material structures are going to be a main scheme to construct automobiles. For the construction of multi-material structures, techniques to join dissimilar materials are required. The major joining techniques are classified into welding, adhesion and mechanical fastening such as bolted joints and riveting. Especially, bolted joints enable joining of metallic materials (steel and aluminium alloy, etc.) and non-metallic materials (CFRP, etc.) with high joint strength. However, the total stiffness of structures with bolted joints is relatively low because interfaces in bolted joints just contact each other, and its interfacial stiffness is lower than elastic modulus of base materials. Moreover, interfacial stiffness of bolted joints depends on clamping force of bolt and nut. This study has proposed an interfacial element for finite element modal analysis of bolted joints. The interfacial element simulates interfacial stiffness of bolted joints. Contact of interfaces is assumed to be the Hertzian contact of elastic asperities whose peak heights obey the Gaussian distribution. Based on this assumption, the stiffness of the interfacial element is derived from the compressive stress and the surface texture of the interfaces. By using the finite element model with the interfacial element, the modal analysis computes the natural frequency and the vibration mode. Finite element simulations and hammering tests have been conducted with several bolted joints. In general, the natural frequency of the bolted joints in the hammering tests increases with the increase in the clamping force, but it is lower than the calculation results in which the stiffness reduction of the jointed interfaces is ignored. The calculation results by using the proposed interfacial element agree with the hammering tests. Therefore, the proposed interfacial element contributes to improvement of modal analysis of bolted joints by mathematically modelling stiffness reduction of jointed interfaces based on tribology

A 4.8-μVrms-Noise CMOS-Microelectrode Array With Density-Scalable Active Readout Pixels via Disaggregated Differential Amplifier Implementation

We demonstrate a 4.8-μVrms noise microelectrode array (MEA) based on the complementary-metal-oxide-semiconductor active-pixel-sensors readout technique with disaggregated differential amplifier implementation. The circuit elements of the differential amplifier are divided into a readout pixel, a reference pixel, and a column circuit. This disaggregation contributes to the small area of the readout pixel, which is less than 81 μm2. We observed neuron signals around 100 μV with 432 electrodes in a fabricated prototype chip. The implementation has technological feasibility of up to 12-μm-pitch electrode density and 6,912 readout channels for high-spatial resolution mapping of neuron network activity

Examination of Selective Low-pressure Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology Under Ultrasound Guidance

Cytology by fine-needle cytology is indispensable for diagnosing head and neck tumor, especially for thyroid nodule. There are two methods of fine needle cytology; one of fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC and another of fine-needle non-aspiration cytology (FNNAC). These previous procedures has each disadvantage such as the mixing of blood or low yield of cells. We proposed a new technique: selective low-pressure fine needle aspiration cytology (SLOP-FNAC) to overcome the backwards of previous procedures. We used the scoring system by Mair et al. to evaluate smear quality of specimens obtained with FNNAC and SLOP-FNAC. SLOP-FNAC smears exhibited higher scores in amount of cellular material, degree of cellular degeneration and cell yield, and retention of appropriate architecture compared to FNNAC smears. The SLOP-FNAC smears scored significantly higher for amount of cellular material and retention of appropriate architecture evaluated (P = 0.0261 and P = 0.0024, Student’s t-test). SLOP-FNAC may be a useful cell sampling technique that reduces blood contamination while securing a high cell yield with maintaining tissue structure