Spatial Pricing Patterns of Cellulosic Biomass under Oligopsony – A Multi-agent Simulation Model

Agribusiness, Industrial Organization, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Choice of optimum feedstock portfolio for a cellulosic ethanol plant – A dynamic linear programming solution

When the lignocellulosic biofuels industry reaches maturity and many types of biomass sources become economically viable, management of multiple feedstock supplies – that vary in their yields, density (tons per unit area), harvest window, storage and seasonal costs, storage losses, transport distance to the production plant – will become increasingly important for the success of individual enterprises. The manager’s feedstock procurement problem is modeled as a multi-period sequence problem to account for dynamic management over time. The case is illustrated with a hypothetical 53 million annual US gallon cellulosic ethanol plant located in south west Kansas that requires approximately 700,000 metric dry tons of biomass. The problem is framed over 40 quarters (10 years), where the production manager minimizes cumulative costs by choosing the land acreage that has to be contracted with for corn stover collection, or dedicated energy production and the amount of biomass stored for off-season. The sensitivity of feedstock costs to changes in yield patterns, harvesting and transport costs, seasonal costs and the extent of area available for feedstock procurement are studied. The outputs of the model include expected feedstock cost and optimal mix of feedstocks used by the cellulosic ethanol plant every year. The problem is coded and solved using GAMS software. The analysis demonstrates how the feedstock choice affects the resulting raw material cost for cellulosic ethanol production, and how the optimal combination varies with two types of feedstocks (annual and perennial).Cellulosic ethanol, feedstock, switchgrass, miscanthus, corn stover, optimization, biofuels, biomass, energy, renewable, Agribusiness,

Testing for Speculative Behavior in US Corn Ethanol Investments

Crude oil price speculation during 2000s could have increased installed capacity in corn ethanol plants beyond what was warranted by the market factors. We use Muth’s commodity pricing model and Flood and Garber’s tests to test for speculative investment in US corn ethanol industry. The ethanol price expectations are derived using a system of supply-demand-inventory describing US ethanol markets under rational expectations (perfect foresight). These price expectations can help differentiate the installed capacity into two: capacity supported by the market fundamentals and the probable capacity that is installed based on speculation. Econometric estimation procedures and functional form approximations are discussed.ethanol, speculation, commodity prices, investment, Agricultural Finance, Financial Economics, Q14, Q41, D8, L71,

A3 & OBEYA

USNH 2022 Virtual Lean Summit Presentation

Malay-language stemmer

Stemming is the removal of affixes (prefixes and suffixes) in a word in order to generate its root word. The objectives of this research were to build a software stemmer that can stem any given Malay word, and to develop a standard stemming algorithm for the Malay language. The Malay language was chosen because a complete stemmer for this language is unavailable. Stemmers have a wide variety of applications, such as in information retrieval and machine translation. It is expected that when this system is fully developed, it will benefit users and customers tremendously

The influence of cbr value on the cost of optimal flexible pavement design.

Road transport would be arteries for the economy pulse. As a developing nation, India focuses on connecting all parts of the country through this road network. Flexible pavement is generally preferred for the road with low to medium traffic conditions. The flexible pavement design depends on the CBR of subgrade soil and design traffic for the selected road specified in IRC 37-2018. The study is limited to the road link at Tirunelveli City paved with a bituminous surface course with a granular base and sub-base between South Bypass road Junction near New bus stand – NH 44 service road intersection. Effective subgrade CBR value considered from 9% to 15% in the study area. The traffic volume detail and vehicle classification were collected with the help of an automatic vehicle classifier called MetroCount. The design starts with selecting a trial profile by considering CBR and MSA from the appropriate catalog. The stress and strain were estimated at critical locations of pavement by performing Structural Analysis in IITPAVE software. The optimal design is achieved by altering the layer thickness to minimize the gap between actual and allowable strain. An increase in CBR value decreases the thickness of the functional layer of pavement. Cost estimation has arrived from rate analysis for various work items as per IRC specification and schedule of rates. Similar studies were identified in evaluating the construction cost corresponding to different design methods. This study concluded that improvement in 1 % CBR saves about 1 to 2% of overall construction cost in optimal design.   Keyword-- CBR (California bearing ratio); MSA (Million standard axles); Optimal flexible pavement; IITPAVE; MetroCoun

SAT-495 1-α-Hydroxylase Activity-Mediated Hypercalcemia Associated with Ovarian Dysgerminoma

Background: Humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy is classically associated with increased tumor production of parathyroid hormone-related peptide (PTHrP). While 1,25 dihydroxy vitamin D (1,25D) mediated hypercalcemia has been demonstrated with a range of granulomatous disorders and lymphomas, there have only been 11 cases reported in ovarian dysgerminomas, of which only 2 were in adults. Ovarian dysgerminoma is the most common ovarian malignancy in childhood but is much more infrequent in adults. We present a case of a rare ovarian malignancy in an adult woman with an even more rare presentation of 1,25D mediated hypercalcemia. Case: A 23 year old African American female with a history of intravenous drug abuse was admitted for dilation and curettage for suspected molar pregnancy. Her operative course was complicated by uterine perforation requiring diagnostic laparoscopy which revealed a large, firm, irregular left ovarian mass concerning for malignancy. Laboratory findings were pertinent for calcium 13.4mg/dl (8.5-10.5), albumin 3.5g/dl (3.5-5.0), creatinine 1.61mg/dl (0.6-1.2), phosphorus 4.0mg/dl (2.5-4.5), alkaline phosphatase elevated at 170 Units/L (25-125) and appropriately suppressed PTH of 4 pg/ml (10-65). Previous calcium levels were all normal. Additional work-up revealed normal PTHrP, 25-OH Vitamin D 14.2 mg/dl (20-50) and high-normal 1,25 dihydroxy vitamin D at 76pg/ml (19.9-79.3). Tumor markers β-hCG, LDH, α-fetoprotein, and CA 19-9 were all elevated. CT scan of the abdomen and pelvis characterized the lesion to be a heterogenous 16.5 x 10.0 x 18.3 cm pelvic mass. The patient was initially given intravenous isotonic fluids and 4mg of intravenous zoledronic acid which decreased calcium to 10mg/dl. Biopsy of the mass performed during initial laparoscopy confirmed the suspected diagnosis of ovarian dysgerminoma. A left salpingo-oophorectomy was performed and the patient developed mild hypocalcemia post-operatively to a nadir of 6.7mg/dl (adjusted for albumin: 7.7) requiring calcium supplementation. The 1,25D level on post-operative day 2 was low at 9.1 pg/ml. Surgical pathology demonstrated metastatic ovarian dysgerminoma with para-aortic lymph node involvement. Conclusion: Our case demonstrates an unusual case of humoral hypercalcemia of malignancy. Exogenous 1-α-hydroxylase expression has been reported exceedingly rarely in solid tumors other than lymphomas. While we were unable to stain the tumor for 1-α-hydroxylase, the abrupt drop in 1,25D and calcium levels post resection strongly support our diagnosis. To our knowledge, our patient is the second oldest patient reported in literature to have 1,25D mediated hypercalcemia associated with an ovarian dysgerminoma

Evaluation of detoxifying activity of ORGCHP against acetaminophen induced hepatotoxicity in Sprague Dawley rats

Background: Accumulation of toxins in the body over a period of time interferes with the normal body functioning. The removal of toxins from the body is called ‘detoxification’. The liver is the main organ involved in detoxification and damage to the liver may impede the removal of toxins. The present study assessed the hepatoprotective activity of an organic Chlorella vulgaris in acetaminophen-induced liver damage model.Methods: A total of 35 animals were randomized to five groups with seven animals in each group. The test drug, organic Chlorella vulgaris (ORGCHP; 350 mg/kg and 700 mg/kg) was compared with a reference standard (200 mg/kg). The positive control group and the vehicle control group were administered 0.5% w/v carboxy methyl cellulose. All groups received dose volume of 10 ml/kg for 10 days. Acetaminophen was given on day 8 and day 9. Blood collections were done at baseline day 1, day 8 and day 10. Outcome measures were the change in body weight, oxidation biomarkers, histopathological evaluation, gross pathological evaluation and relative body weight.Results: Test drug ORGCHP Chlorella vulgaris showed dose dependent reduction in hepatoxicity with high reduction in aspartate transaminase (AST) and modest lowering of alanine transaminase (ALT) (350 mg/kg; p.o.); while at high dose (700 mg/kg; p.o.) there was significant reduction in alkaline phosphatase (p<0.05), ALT (p<0.001) and AST (p<0.001) levels. No pathological or histopathological abnormality was seen in control group. In drug group, one animal showed minimal necrosis, while mild and moderate necrosis was seen in three animals each respectively.Conclusions: The test drug exhibits detoxifying and hepatoprotective activity against acetaminophen induced hepatotoxicity

Stakeholder Analysis Framework for IT Enabled Healthcare Outsourcing: Critical Success Factors

In the past decade, we have seen that information technology (IT) played an important role as an enabler for healthcare outsourcing. Healthcare services at various levels (support, clinical, etc.) are now being outsourced to countries such as India, Philippines and China. While IT outsourcing is at an all time high, healthcare outsourcing has been slowly and steadily increasing. However, there is no clear document in the literature that actually explains what is really going on in healthcare outsourcing. The purpose of this paper is to provide a current picture of healthcare outsourcing while focusing on the role of IT as an enabler. We develop and present a framework that helps stakeholders to understand the opportunities, critical success factors (CSFs), threats, and weaknesses of the business model that drives IT-based healthcare services offshore

Biomass Supply for Biofuel Production: Estimates for the United States and Canada

Published in BioResources, Volume 4, Number 3, 2009, Pages 1070-1087.Biomass Supply, Resource Assessment, Lignocellulosic Biomass, Crop Production/Industries, Demand and Price Analysis, Production Economics, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy, Q42, Q11, Q2, Q20, Q29,