Surface-active hollow titanosilicate particles as a Pickering interfacial catalyst for liquid-phase alkene epoxidation reactions

Design of catalyst particles bearing excellent catalytic activity and suitable surface wettability is the key to the successful application of Pickering interfacial catalysis. In this study, the epoxidation of 1-hexene and cyclohexene with aqueous hydrogen peroxide over hollow TS-1 zeolite was studied as probe reactions to investigate the influence of catalyst surface wettability on catalytic activity. Hydrophobized hollow TS-1 particles (HTS-1) were fabricated via a post-synthesis desilication treatment with tetrapropylammonium hydroxide (TPAOH) and a post-synthesis silylation treatment with hexamethyldisiloxane (HMDSO). The successful preparation of HTS-1 particles was verified by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). X-ray diffraction patterns and UV-visible spectra confirmed that hydrophobic modification had no effect on the zeolite structure of HTS-1 particles. Stable Pickering emulsions of aqueous hydrogen peroxide in either 1-hexene or cyclohexene could be prepared using HTS-1 particles as emulsifier and confirmed by cryo-SEM images. The catalytic behaviour in the obtained Pickering emulsions revealed a parabolic distribution of turnover frequency (TOF) values with respect to the hydrophobization degree with 0.2-HMDSO/HTS-1 particles possessing the maximum value of 20.6 h-1 for 1-hexene epoxidation and 8.1 h-1 for cyclohexene epoxidation. In addition, these 0.2-HMDSO/HTS-1 particles showed good re-usability for more than five cycles

Long Short-Term Planning for Conversational Recommendation Systems

In Conversational Recommendation Systems (CRS), the central question is how the conversational agent can naturally ask for user preferences and provide suitable recommendations. Existing works mainly follow the hierarchical architecture, where a higher policy decides whether to invoke the conversation module (to ask questions) or the recommendation module (to make recommendations). This architecture prevents these two components from fully interacting with each other. In contrast, this paper proposes a novel architecture, the long short-term feedback architecture, to connect these two essential components in CRS. Specifically, the recommendation predicts the long-term recommendation target based on the conversational context and the user history. Driven by the targeted recommendation, the conversational model predicts the next topic or attribute to verify if the user preference matches the target. The balance feedback loop continues until the short-term planner output matches the long-term planner output, that is when the system should make the recommendation.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures. Accepted by ICONIP 202

Palmitic acid-modified GnRH-Th epitope peptide immunocastration vaccine (W/O/W adjuvant) can effectively ensure the castration and reduce the smelly smell in boars

IntroductionRecent studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) in inhibiting testicular growth and development in male animals to achieve castration while improving the meat quality of various livestock species, including cattle, sheep, goats, and pigs.MethodsIn this research, a GnRH-Th vaccine was synthesized using the Fmoc solid-phase synthesis technique, and the T helper (Th) antigen was modified with palmitic acid to improve its efficacy. The vaccine was then coated with a water-in-oil-in-water adjuvant to improve stability and safety. After passing safety and stability tests, the vaccine was administered to 13-week-old boars.ResultsThe results showed that it was stable, safe, and effective for up to 15 months. Moreover, the vaccine did not negatively affect the growth rate and body weight of the pigs. The palmitic acid-modified “GnRH-Th epitope peptide immunocastration vaccine (Water-in-Oil-in-Water (W/O/W)) effectively reduced the testosterone concentration and achieved castration. The concentration of androstenone and skatole hormones significantly decreased, leading to improved meat quality in the boars. The boars were then slaughtered at 33 weeks of age, and the results showed that the meat quality of the vaccinated boars was superior to that of the non-vaccinated control group (p < 0.05).DiscussionThis study demonstrated that GnRH can safely and effectively achieve immune castration in boars after coupling T cell epitopes, palmitic acid modification and W-O-W coating. Provide a better method for the further development of GnRH and the realization of animal welfare

The Technology of Mould Steel for Online Pre-hardening

AbstractThis article describes a production method of mould steel pre-hardening, and focus on the advantage of this method, The technical core of method is the variable frequency and variable amplitude pulse uniform high-precision temperature control, which achieved by using strong-medium-weak water cooling, gas-water cooling and gas mist cooling composite cooling control technology. Optimizing the cooling rate path is a good method of optimizing quenched organization and structure

Use of observing system simulation experiments in the United States

Author Posting. © American Meteorological Society, 2020. This article is posted here by permission of American Meteorological Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 101(8), (2020): E1427-E1438, https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-19-0155.1.The NOAA Science Advisory Board appointed a task force to prepare a white paper on the use of observing system simulation experiments (OSSEs). Considering the importance and timeliness of this topic and based on this white paper, here we briefly review the use of OSSEs in the United States, discuss their values and limitations, and develop five recommendations for moving forward: national coordination of relevant research efforts, acceleration of OSSE development for Earth system models, consideration of the potential impact on OSSEs of deficiencies in the current data assimilation and prediction system, innovative and new applications of OSSEs, and extension of OSSEs to societal impacts. OSSEs can be complemented by calculations of forecast sensitivity to observations, which simultaneously evaluate the impact of different observation types in a forecast model system

Association Between Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms in PPARA and EPAS1 Genes and High-Altitude Appetite Loss in Chinese Young Men

Appetite loss is a common symptom that occurs in high altitude (HA) for lowlanders. Previous studies indicated that hypoxia is the initiating vital factor of HA appetite loss. PPARA, EPAS1, EGLN1, HIF1A, HIF1AN, and NFE2L2 play important roles in hypoxic responses. We aimed to explore the association of these hypoxia-related gene polymorphisms with HA appetite loss. In this study, we enrolled 416 young men who rapidly ascended to Lhasa (3700 m) from Chengdu (<500m) by plane. PPARA, EPAS1, EGLN1, HIF1A, HIF1AN, and NFE2L2 were genotyped by MassARRAY. Appetite scores were measured to identify HA appetite loss. Logistic regression and multiple genetic models were tested to evaluate the association between the single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and risk of HA appetite loss in crude and adjusted (age and SaO2) analysis. Subsequently, Haploview software was used to analyze the linkage disequilibrium (LD), haplotype construction and the association of diverse haplotypes with the risk of HA appetite loss. Our results revealed that allele “A” in PPARA rs4253747 was significantly associated with the increased risk of HA appetite loss. Codominant, dominant, recessive, and log-additive models of PPARA rs4253747 showed the increased risk of HA appetite loss in the crude and adjusted analysis. However, only dominant, overdominant, and log-additive models of EPAS1 rs6756667 showed decreased risk of HA appetite loss in the crude and adjusted analysis. Moreover, the results from haplotype-based test showed that the rs7292407-rs6520015 haplotype “AC” was associated with HA appetite loss in the crude analysis rather than the adjusted analysis. In this study, we first established the association of SNPs in PPARA (rs4253747) and EPAS1 (rs6756667) genes with susceptibility to HA appetite loss in Han Chinese young men. These findings provide novel insights into understanding the mechanisms involved in HA appetite loss