Foam as a Vehicle for Nanoparticle Delivery in Unsaturated Porous Media

Accidental releases, spills, and leaks of petroleum hydrocarbons (PHCs), such as gasoline and jet fuel, can result in subsurface contamination. PHCs that become entrapped as a residual light non-aqueous phase liquid (LNAPL) in the unsaturated zone often serve as a long-term source to groundwater contamination depending on the composition. Technologies used to remediate these residuals are categorized according to where the treatment occurs (in situ vs ex situ). In situ treatment technologies are preferred by the remediation community since they are typically more economical, efficient, and environmentally friendly. Nanoremediation is an emerging in situ treatment technology that has received attention since it has the potential to reduce both the cost and the time to clean-up contaminated sites. Nanoremediation obtains its advantage from the use of nanoparticles that have higher reactivity owing to their increased surface area. Appropriate delivery of engineered nanoparticles (ENPs) into the contaminated sites is crucial for effective treatment. Liquid-based delivery of ENPs to the unsaturated zone is a challenge due to the limited lateral transport and restricted contact between ENPs and contaminants. Foam is potentially capable of overcoming some of the challenges associated with liquid-based delivery of ENPs. This thesis focuses on the investigation of foam capability as a vehicle to deliver Pluronic coated iron oxide core nanoparticles in unsaturated porous media. A multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) was used to select foaming agents (surfactants) which were then screened to determine foam properties, and used in a column transport study to investigate the capability of foam to transport ENPs in unsaturated media. Based on the MCDA results, five surfactants (Steol CS-460, Bioterge AS-40, SDS, Ammonyx LO, and Rhamnolipids) were selected. These surfactants were added to Milli-Q water or synthetic groundwater to prepare foaming solutions, and the foamability and foam stability of the generated foams were determined. Steol CS-460 and Bioterge AS-40 were shown to have the highest foamability and foam stability and therefore, were selected for the subsequent experimental efforts. Ammonyx LO was also used for comparison purposes. The three surfactants enhanced the foamabilitiy of the ENPs. Steol CS-460 and Bioterge AS-40 increased the foam stability of the ENPs, whereas Ammonyx LO did not noticeably change it. Foams generated by Steol CS-460, Bioterge AS-40, or Ammonyx LO were able to support the ENPs. It was demonstrated that for foam generation, the ENPs were compatible with the foamability of the surfactants and the foam stability of Bioterge AS-40, and Ammonyx LO. However, the stability of the foam generated by Steol CS-460 slightly decreased from 99.2% ± 0.9% to 90.5% ± 0.7% in the presence of the ENPs. The column experiments were designed and conducted to evaluate the capability of foam generated by Steol CS-460, Bioterge AS-40, and Ammonyx LO to transport the ENPs in unsaturated media. The impact of surfactant type and concentration, and initial volumetric water content of the unsaturated porous medium on the capability of foam to transport the ENPs were investigated. The surfactant type was found to affect the capability of foam to transport the ENPs as the ENP mass recovery by the Steol CS-460 foam (101%) and Bioterge AS-40 foam (93%) were significantly higher than the ENP mass recovery by the Ammonyx LO foam (54%), and the ratio of foam outflow rate to the average foam inflow rate was the lowest for Ammonyx LO. The ENP mass recovery remained essentially unchanged as the Steol CS-460 concentration decreased from 0.3 to 0.1 wt%. Furthermore, as the initial volumetric water content of the porous medium decreased from 0.2 to dry condition, the ENP and tracer mass recoveries by the Steol CS-460 foam slightly decreased. Overall, the results of the column experiments indicate that the foam generated by Steol CS-460 was successfully capable to deliver Pluronic coated iron oxide core nanoparticles in unsaturated porous media, and thus foam has the potential to deliver the ENPs in situ

Association of insertion/deletion mutations in angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) gene and effectiveness of Glibenclamide therapy in Iranian type 2 diabetic patients

Abstract Introduction: Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) is an expanding global health problem, closely linked to the epidemic of obesity. The incidence of diabetes is increasing because of aging, changing ethnic mix of the population and worsening obesity. Glibenclamide is used for the treatment of patients with type II diabetes mellitus. Some patients respond well to this therapy while others need to use higher doses along with other medications. Since polymorphisms in ACE gene has been associated with type 2 diabetes mellitus, in the present study we investigated the association of insertion/deletion mutations of this gene with the effectiveness of Glibenclamide in treating Iranian type 2 diabetic patients.   Methods and Results: In this experimental study, blood samples from type II diabetic patients were collected (n=99) and their genomic DNA was isolated. Specific primers for the detection of insertion/deletion mutation were used and polymerase chain reactions (PCR) were conducted using specific thermal cycles. The amplified DNA samples were detected by electrophoresis of these samples on a 0.7% agarose gel. Statistical analysis of the obtained data was performed using t-test and chi-square test. A total of 99 patients were enrolled to the study. The frequency distribution of DD, ID, and II polymorphisms were 72%, 20%, and 8%, respectively. There were no differences among genotypic groups (P = 0.146). In terms of cholesterol, there was a significant difference between DD and DI (P = 0.012). There was a significant difference between the two DD and II genotypes in terms of creatinine (P = 0.034)   Conclusions: Although the results of our study indicated no association of ACE I/D polymorphisms and Effectiveness of Glibenclamide therapy, DD genotype may play a role on effectiveness of Glibenclamide Therapy

Evolutionary Augmentation Policy Optimization for Self-supervised Learning

Self-supervised Learning (SSL) is a machine learning algorithm for pretraining Deep Neural Networks (DNNs) without requiring manually labeled data. The central idea of this learning technique is based on an auxiliary stage aka pretext task in which labeled data are created automatically through data augmentation and exploited for pretraining the DNN. However, the effect of each pretext task is not well studied or compared in the literature. In this paper, we study the contribution of augmentation operators on the performance of self supervised learning algorithms in a constrained settings. We propose an evolutionary search method for optimization of data augmentation pipeline in pretext tasks and measure the impact of augmentation operators in several SOTA SSL algorithms. By encoding different combination of augmentation operators in chromosomes we seek the optimal augmentation policies through an evolutionary optimization mechanism. We further introduce methods for analyzing and explaining the performance of optimized SSL algorithms. Our results indicate that our proposed method can find solutions that outperform the accuracy of classification of SSL algorithms which confirms the influence of augmentation policy choice on the overall performance of SSL algorithms. We also compare optimal SSL solutions found by our evolutionary search mechanism and show the effect of batch size in the pretext task on two visual datasets

The seizure recurrence rate in epileptic patients following universal health coverage: A time-series study

Background: Epileptic patients (EP) should be free of seizure recurrence (SR). Universal Health Coverage (UHC) was implemented in 2005 in Iran, aiming to tackle obstacles in front of health services’ utilization. This study was done in order to assess the SR rate in EP after UHC implementation.   Methods: This study was a prospective time series that was done in rural areas of Falavarjan district in Isfahan province in central Iran from March 2016 to March 2017. 245 patients who suffering from any type of epilepsy and whom epilepsy confirmed by a neurologist, registered. All epileptic patients monitored continuously every month through the study, and the signs or symptoms attributed to the suspected seizure were assessed and referred to a physician for additional assessment and consultation to improve treatment compliance.  The patients’ data about their demographic characteristics, type of epilepsy, any SR attack, and their risk factors were gathered from their self-files based on the checklists.   Results: Despite treatment schedules that were carried out for all EPs, during one year follow up, however, 37 (15.1%) patients displayed SR attacks. 19 (7.75%) patients who suffered RS were male with the mean age of 40 ± 13.5 years, without gender statistical difference (P=0.810). In patients who had RS, the main causes of lacking adherence to their treatment were forgetting to take medicines in 10 (55.6%), poverty in 3 (16.7%), and lacking motivation in 2 (11.1%) EPs.   Conclusion: Following UHC implementation in the primary health delivery system, that neuropsychiatric health packages were integrated, the incidence rate of SR attack in EPs was low

The impact of social approval and respect model criteria on social relations

Background: Social relations are a complex process and originate from the interaction of a person with the environment. People have an inherent need to establish social relations to have the approval and respect of the others. The current study was conducted to design a model of approval and respect in the social relations of the people of Quchan. Methods: The research philosophy was in the realm of pragmatism and the research method was mixed. Also, the research strategy in the qualitative part was foundational data theorizing, and in the quantitative part, the survey. To analyze the data of this research, in the qualitative part, MAXQDA software was used, and in the quantitative part, SPSS software (version 22) and PLS software were used. Results: The results obtained from the analysis of qualitative data show that the model of approval and respect in the social relations of the people of Quchan includes 19 open codes, of which 5 codes are related to the category of causal factors, 2 codes are related to the central category, 2 codes related to the strategy category, 4 codes related to the consequences category, 3 codes related to the context category, and 3 codes related to the intervention category. Also, in the quantitative part, the results of the data showed that the mentioned model has the required validity. Conclusion: It can be concluded that social relations imply desirable learned behaviors that enable people to have effective relationships with others and avoid unreasonable social reactions

Reading Through Emotions: An Affective Narratolological Approach to Alice Munro's Short Stories

The emergence of fields of study like emotionology, affective narratology, and psychonarratology in recent decades evidences a dramatic rise in research done on the meaning and interpretation of emotions. Affective Narratology as one of the recent fields in emotion studies attempts to identify and account for the figuration of emotions in works of literature. Focusing on three basic emotions (shame, jealousy and love) figuring in Alice Munro’s selected short stories this paper probes the significance of emotional registers in the writer's depiction of daily life. Examined is the way the stories' sincere tone and their comprehensible, ordinary language, contribute to the emotional identification of readers with characters. Applying affective narratological theories, the objective is to show how emotions contribute to plot development and characterization in these stories. Central to the analysis is interpreting emotional moments experienced by characters, especially female character

DNA as an enzyme: The effect of imidazole derivatives as cofactors and metal ions as activators or inhibitors

Objective: a highly sensitive spectrofluorometric method using dichlorofluorescin (LDCF) was employed to study the rate of electron transfer reaction in presence of DNA and some imidazole derivatives. Results: in our experiments, DNA possessed a unique enzyme like catalytic function in oxidative conversion of nonfluorescent LDCF to fluorescent dichlorofluorescein (DCF). The rate enhancement was associated with the turn over constant: kp � 10 s1 for DNA and cinnamoyl imidazole as a cofactor. A biphasic saturation curve was observed when the reaction velocities were measured at fixed concentrations of DNA and variable amounts of carnosine. Each of the biphasic trends gave the Scatchard values of Vm1/Km1 � 3.1 105 and Vm2/Km2 � 5.1 106 with Km1 � 2.7 105 M and Km2 � 4.2 104 M for carnosine. Although Ni (II) and Pb (II) induced inhibition in the rate of electron transfer reaction in presence of DNA and cinnamoyl imidazole or carnosine, metal ions such as Mg (II), Cd (II), Zn (II) and Fe (II) caused activation of DNA. The rates of the reactions showed strong dependency on electronegativity and conductivity of metal ions, namely the increase in activity of DNA in presence of each metal ion correlated inversely with the electronegativities of the metal and was also related directly to the conductivities of individual metal. These effects were observed both in activation and also inhibition of DNA reaction. Imidazole compounds, e.g., Histidine, N-trans cinnamoyl imidazole and imidazole along with Cd (II) produced further rate enhancement. The increase was several times greater with N-trans cinnamoyl imidazole. Conclusions: this effect could provide additional evidence for the importance of an intermediary cofactor that could facilitate the transfer of the electron from the reaction site to the DNA conductive chord. This was most guaranteed by the conjugated system provided by a compound such as N-trans cinnamoyl imidazole. © 2003 The Canadian Society of Clinical Chemists. All rights reserved. Keywor

Three-Level Reduced Switch AC/DC/AC Power Conversion System for High Voltage Electric Vehicles

Two of the main challenges of recent electric vehicles (EVs) are the charging time and high initial cost. To solve the problem associated with long charging time, the car manufacturers are moving from 400 V battery EV (BEV) to 800 V BEV, which enables the utilization of multi-level converters in EV applications. This paper presents a power conversion system consisting of a Vienna rectifier and a two/three level hybrid inverter as a machine-side inverter to drive a permanent-magnet synchronous motor (PMSM). The Vienna rectifier improves the quality of the grid-side current and provides a regulated DC-link voltage. The proposed inverter, known as a 10-switch inverter, offers high output current quality with a lower number of active switches, making it compact and cost-effective. The field-oriented control (FOC), along with the SPWM modulation, is implemented to control the system. A reliable and cost-effective PMSM drive system demands sensorless control; therefore, a sliding mode observer (SMO) is used to estimate the rotor position and velocity. The accuracy of the proposed system was proved through the simulation results from MATLAB/Simulink.© 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).fi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed