Raja Au-Co mineralization in the Paleoproterozoic Peräpohja belt:on the occurrence of tourmaline, anhydrite and gypsum proximal to the mineralization

Abstract. The Raja Au-Co mineralization in the Paleoproterozoic (2.5–1.8 Ga) Peräpohja belt in northern Finland is a part of the wider Rompas-Rajapalot area with several known Au occurrences. The area is characterized by a distinct occurrence of tourmaline, locally spatially associated with the known mineralizations. In addition, recently, an unusual rock unit with bright purple anhydrite and white gypsum veins has been intersected by diamond drilling. While the sulfate-rich unit is non-mineralized, the atypical mineralogy and close spatial association to the Raja mineralization is interesting. In this master’s thesis, the occurrence of tourmaline and sulfates are studied, and their relationship to the Raja mineralization is examined. In-situ geochemical, major and trace elements, and boron isotopic data of tourmaline were obtained by EPMA and LA-ICP-MS from thin section samples prepared from Raja drill core. The analytical data was used to complement the petrographic observations from thin sections, and to quantitatively evaluate tourmaline chemical composition. Additionally, orientations of quartz-tourmaline veins from drill core samples were measured and analyzed with stereographic projections. In-situ sulfur isotope data was obtained for the sulfate phases by LA-ICP-MS. Three texturally different types of tourmaline are identified: 1. Coarse grained euhedral tourmaline as abundant dissemination in metasomatic bands, 2. Tourmaline in quartz-tourmaline veins crosscutting the host rock, and 3. Rare footwall tourmaline in healed microfractures, and associated to ambiguous pegmatitic quarts-felspar-mica veins. All assayed tourmaline belongs to alkali-group and are classified as dravite. They have variable chemical composition that suggests crystallization in reduced and low- to moderate saline conditions. Tourmaline geochemistry together with boron isotope data (δ11B from -11.5 to -0.9 ‰) suggests that tourmaline could have formed from mixed fluid source: from devolatilization of clastic metasedimentary rocks or non-marine evaporites, and granites or pegmatites. Orientation data from the quartz-tourmaline veins outlines a stronglinear trend towards 340° that matches within few degrees with the Raja high-grade mineralization trend. This is seen as evidence of the structural control for theRaja mineralization, which possibly is contained in local shear-zone or hinge region of local higher degree folding. In Raja, anhydrite has δ 34S values in a narrow range from 8.07 to 9.77 ‰. Gypsum has slightly heavier δ 34S from 10.63 to 12.19 ‰. Textural evidence together with isotope fractionation constraints suggests authigenic formation of gypsum with SO4 2- sourced from anhydrite. Significant similarities in sulfur isotope values, and textural evidence (pseudomorphs after evaporite minerals, folded anhydrite bands), to well-known evaporite succession in Onega basin, western Russia, suggest that the sulfates in Raja might represent preserved Paleoproterozoic sulfate evaporites, which, if true, can have important regional metallogenic and scientific implications.Varhaisproterotsooinen Rajan Au-Co mineralisaatio Peräpohjan liuskejaksolla : turmaliinin, anhydriitin ja kipsin esiintyminen mineralisaation läheisyydessä. Tiivistelmä. Rajan kulta-koboltti -mineralisaatio varhaisproterotsooisella (2.5–1.8 miljardia vuotta sitten) Peräpohjan liuskejaksolla on osa laajempaa Rompas-Rajapalojen aluetta, josta tunnetaan useita kultaesiintymiä. Turmaliini on yleinen mineraali alueen esiintymien yhteydessä. Lisäksi viimeaikaisten syväkairausten yhteydessä on löydetty anhydriitti-kipsipitoinen kivilajiyksikkö, joka on mielenkiintoinen alueen geologisen evoluution selvittämiseksi. Tässä pro gradu -tutkielmassa selvitetään turmaliinin ja sulfaattien esiintymistä sekä niiden yhteyttä Rajan mineralisaatioon. Tutkimusta varten Rajan kairasydännäytteistä valmistettiin ohuthieitä, jotka analysoitiin elektronimikroanalysaattorilla sekä LA-ICP-MS -menetelmällä turmaliinin geokemian ja boori-isotooppikoostumuksen selvittämiseksi. Kvantitatiivista analyyttistä dataa käytettiin yhdessä perinteisen mikroskooppisen tutkimuksen kanssa turmaliinien luokitteluun sekä petrologiseen tulkintaan. Lisäksi kairasydännäytteiden kvartsi-turmaliinijuonista tehtiin rakenteellisia suuntamittauksia, joita tulkittiin graafisten kuvaajien avulla. Sulfaattifaaseista määritettiin rikin isotooppikoostumus LA-ICP-MS -menetelmällä. Tutkimuksessa tunnistettiin kolme tekstuuriltaan erilaista turmaliinityyppiä: 1. Karkearakeinen ja omanmuotoinen turmaliini, joka esiintyy runsaina kasaumina metasomaattisissa vyöhykkeissä, 2. Turmaliini isäntäkiveä leikkaavissa kvartsi-turmaliini juonissa, ja 3. Harvemmin esiintyvä turmaliini Rajan mineralisaation jalkapuolella parantuneissa mikroraoissa sekä epämääräisten pegmatiittisten kvartsi-maasälpä-kiille -juonien yhteydessä. Geokemialtaan kaikki analysoidut turmaliinit kuuluvat alkaliryhmään ja luokitellaan draviiteiksi. Turmaliinin kemiallinen koostumus viittaa mineraalin kiteytyneen pelkistävissä ja suolaisuudeltaan matalan tai keskitason olosuhteiden vallitessa. Mitatut booriisotooppiarvot (δ 11B välillä -11.5 ja -0.9 ‰) yhdessä turmaliinin geokemian kanssa viittaavat turmaliinin mahdollisesti kiteytyneen kahden toisistaan eroavan fluidin läsnäollessa, joista ensimmäinen voi olla peräisin klastisista metasedimenteistä tai mantereen sisäisten järvialaiden evaporiiteista, ja toinen graniiteista tai pegmatiiteista. Kvartsiturmaliinijuonista mitattu rakennedata asettuu graafisesti esitettynä noin 340° suuntaisesti, vastaten läheisesti Rajan mineralisaation suuntausta. Mineralisaation ja juonten esiintymistä ohjaa todennäköisesti sama rakenteellinen piirre, joka voi olla paikallinen hiertovyöhyke tai korkeamman asteen poimujen harjavyöhyke. Sulfaateista mitatut δ 34S arvot vaihtelevat kapealla välillä (δ 34Sanhydriitti = 8.07–9.77 ‰, δ 34Skipsi = 10.63–12.19‰). Mikroskooppiset tekstuurit ja isotooppifraktioitumisen rajoitteet viittaavat kipsin kiteytyneen paikallisesti anhydriitistä liuenneesta sulfaatista (SO4 2- ). Merkittävät yhteneväisyydet rikki-isotooppiarvoissa verrattuna Venäjän länsiosan hyvin säilyneisiin evaporiittimuodostumiin, sekä Rajalta havaitut korvautuneita evaporiittimineraaleja mukailevat karbonaattipseudomorfit, viittaavat Rajan sulfaattien edustavan varhaisproterotsooisia sulfaattievaporiitteja. Mikäli tämä pitää paikkansa, evaporiittiesiintymien olemassaololla on merkittäviä tieteellisiä ja alueellisia malmigeologisia seurauksi

Comparative analysis of five protein-protein interaction corpora

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Growing interest in the application of natural language processing methods to biomedical text has led to an increasing number of corpora and methods targeting protein-protein interaction (PPI) extraction. However, there is no general consensus regarding PPI annotation and consequently resources are largely incompatible and methods are difficult to evaluate.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We present the first comparative evaluation of the diverse PPI corpora, performing quantitative evaluation using two separate information extraction methods as well as detailed statistical and qualitative analyses of their properties. For the evaluation, we unify the corpus PPI annotations to a shared level of information, consisting of undirected, untyped binary interactions of non-static types with no identification of the words specifying the interaction, no negations, and no interaction certainty.</p> <p>We find that the F-score performance of a state-of-the-art PPI extraction method varies on average 19 percentage units and in some cases over 30 percentage units between the different evaluated corpora. The differences stemming from the choice of corpus can thus be substantially larger than differences between the performance of PPI extraction methods, which suggests definite limits on the ability to compare methods evaluated on different resources. We analyse a number of potential sources for these differences and identify factors explaining approximately half of the variance. We further suggest ways in which the difficulty of the PPI extraction tasks codified by different corpora can be determined to advance comparability. Our analysis also identifies points of agreement and disagreement in PPI corpus annotation that are rarely explicitly stated by the authors of the corpora.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our comparative analysis uncovers key similarities and differences between the diverse PPI corpora, thus taking an important step towards standardization. In the course of this study we have created a major practical contribution in converting the corpora into a shared format. The conversion software is freely available at <url>http://mars.cs.utu.fi/PPICorpora</url>.</p

BioInfer: a corpus for information extraction in the biomedical domain

BACKGROUND: Lately, there has been a great interest in the application of information extraction methods to the biomedical domain, in particular, to the extraction of relationships of genes, proteins, and RNA from scientific publications. The development and evaluation of such methods requires annotated domain corpora. RESULTS: We present BioInfer (Bio Information Extraction Resource), a new public resource providing an annotated corpus of biomedical English. We describe an annotation scheme capturing named entities and their relationships along with a dependency analysis of sentence syntax. We further present ontologies defining the types of entities and relationships annotated in the corpus. Currently, the corpus contains 1100 sentences from abstracts of biomedical research articles annotated for relationships, named entities, as well as syntactic dependencies. Supporting software is provided with the corpus. The corpus is unique in the domain in combining these annotation types for a single set of sentences, and in the level of detail of the relationship annotation. CONCLUSION: We introduce a corpus targeted at protein, gene, and RNA relationships which serves as a resource for the development of information extraction systems and their components such as parsers and domain analyzers. The corpus will be maintained and further developed with a current version being available at

Hyperspektrikuvantaminen malminetsinnässä

Tiivistelmä. Hyperspektrikuvantaminen eli kuvantamisspektroskopia on fysikaalinen materiaalien tutkimusmenetelmä, jossa erityisellä kuvantamislaitteistolla muodostetaan digitaalinen kuva tutkittavasta kohteesta. Menetelmässä jokainen muodostetun kuvan pikseli sisältää informaation koko käytetyltä aallonpituusalueelta, mikä voidaan esittää graafisesti emissiospektrin avulla, jossa näkyviä absorptiopiirteitä tai kuoppia käytetään tunnistamaan tutkittu materiaali. Geologisessa tutkimuksessa hyperspektrikuvantamisen käyttö ulottuu 80-luvulla Yhdysvaltojen ilmailu- ja avaruushallintoviraston NASA:n kaukokartoitukseen kehittämiin laitteistoihin. Menetelmäkehitys laitteistojen osalta, kerätyn datan käsittelyssä ja tulkitsemisessa sekä tietokoneiden laskentatehon kasvaminen ovat tehneet hyperspektrikuvantamisesta tehokkaan menetelmän malminetsinnässä. Rajapalojen Au-Co esiintymän kairasydämistä tehty hyperspektritutkimus havaitsi mineralisaatiossa esiintyvien vaaleiden kiilteiden olevan 2200 nm piirteen osalta aallonpituudeltaan lyhyempiä kuin mineralisaation sivukivissä esiintyvien vastaavien kiilteiden. Elektronimikroanalysaattorilla (EPMA) tehdyt mineraalikemian analyysit tukevat hyperspektrilaitteistolla tehtyä havaintoa mineraalikemian poikkeavuudesta. Hyperspektrikuvantaminen on nopea ja näytemateriaalia vahingoittamaton menetelmä, joka mahdollistaa lisäinformaation keräämisen geologisista materiaaleista. Tutkimusta voidaan tehdä monessa mittakaavassa aina kaukokartoituksesta yksittäisiin käsinäytteisiin. Menetelmän avulla pystytään esimerkiksi tekemään tulkintoja malmiesiintymien muuttumisvyöhykkeiden laajuudesta ja näin tehokkaasti kartoittamaan malmiesiintymien olemassaoloa sekä kohdistamaan malminetsintätoimia

Paleoproterozoic Rajapalot Au-Co system associated with evaporites:chemical composition and boron isotope geochemistry of tourmaline, and sulfur isotopes of sulfates, Peräpohja belt, northern Finland

Abstract The Raja Au-Co mineralization in the Paleoproterozoic Peräpohja belt in northern Finland is part of the wider Rompas-Rajapalot mineralized area with several known Au-Co occurrences. The area is characterized by distinct tourmaline occurrences, spatially associated with Au-Co mineralization. Four texturally distinct tourmaline types were identified although all analysed tourmalines belong to the alkali-group and are classified as dravite. δ ¹¹B values and fractionation modelling indicates that at least two distinct fluids were responsible for the tourmaline formation with initial end member δ¹¹B values of the fluids at −8‰ and −1‰. Possible sources for boron rich fluids are Svecofennian orogeny related (ca. &lt; 1.9 Ga) metamorphic fluids and magmatic-hydrothermal fluids related to the late-orogenic ca. 1.78 Ga granitoids. Structural data from the quartz-tourmaline veins outlines a strong linear trend towards the Raja high-grade mineralization trend. This is interpreted as evidence for structural control of the Raja mineralization, which possibly is contained in shear-zones or within the hinge regions of local high degree folding. A distinctive rock unit with bright purple anhydrite layers and white gypsum veins has been intersected by drilling. While the sulfate-rich unit is unmineralized, the mineralogy and regional geological setting suggests an evaporitic origin. Anhydrite has δ³⁴S values in a narrow range from 8.1 to 9.8 ‰. Gypsum has slightly heavier δ³⁴S from 10.6 to 12.2 ‰. Together with isotope fractionation constraints, textural evidence suggests the authigenic formation of gypsum with SO₄²⁻ sourced from anhydrite. Significant similarities in textures and sulfur isotope values to well-known evaporite successions of the Onega basin, western Russia, further supports the presence of evaporitic strata within the Peräpohja belt

Replacement of NMP solvent for more sustainable, high-capacity, printed Li-ion battery cathodes

Abstract The production methods of Li-ion batteries need to be adapted for the goals of a more sustainable future. This research focuses on replacing toxic NMP with less harmful solvents, without compromising the batteries’ performance. In this research, the novel NCM88 material has been used to fabricate the cathode layers of Li-ion batteries. Two fabrication methods (blade coating and screen printing) and two different slurry/ink formulations (NMP- and DMF-based) have been analysed. Results indicate that screen-printed cathodes fabricated with DMF-based slurries perform similarly to those fabricated through blade-coating NMP slurries

Fabrication of high-capacity NMC cathodes using spray printing technique

Abstract While current Li-ion liquid electrolyte batteries provide satisfactory performance, there is a growing need for more adaptable and sustainable fabrication methods. Among the available printing methods, spray coating stands out as exceptionally adjustable, enabling easy up- and down-scaling, high-resolution features (down to tens of μm ), 3D compatibility, and the use of a wide range of ink formulations, including those containing large particles (>5 μm). Moreover, spray coating generates little waste, making it a fully sustainable fabrication process that is also suitable for solid-electrolyte deposition. In this study, spray coating was used to fabricate LiNi0.88Mn0.03C00.09O₂ (NMC88) cathodes using dimethylformamide (DMF) ink instead of the toxic N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP). The printed cathodes had a relatively low roughness (Rq 3.4 μm and Ra 2.7 μm) prior to calendering, as revealed by morphological analysis. Coin cells and pouch cells were then prepared using the fabricated cathodes for electrochemical characterization. The pouch cells demonstrated very repeatable behavior and 15 % capacity fade after 1000 cycles

Suitable cathode NMP replacement for efficient sustainable printed Li-Ion batteries

Abstract N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone (NMP) is the most common solvent for manufacturing cathode electrodes in the battery industry; however, it is becoming restricted in several countries due to its negative environmental impact. Taking into account that ∼99% of the solvent used during electrode fabrication is recovered, dimethylformamide (DMF) is a considerable candidate to replace NMP. The lower boiling point and higher ignition temperature of DMF lead to a significant reduction in the energy consumption needed for drying the electrodes and improve the safety of the production process. Additionally, the lower surface tension and viscosity of DMF enable improved current collector wetting and higher concentrations of the solid material in the cathode slurry. To verify the suitability of DMF as a replacement for NMP, we utilized screen printing, a fabrication method that provides roll-to-roll compatibility while allowing controlled deposition and creation of sophisticated patterns. The battery systems utilized NMC (LiNixMnyCozO2) chemistry in two configurations: NMC523 and NMC88. The first, well-established NCM523, was used as a reference, while NMC88 was used to demonstrate the potential of the proposed method with high-capacity materials. The cathodes were used to create coin and pouch cell batteries that were cycled 1000 times. The achieved results indicate that DMF can successfully replace NMP in the NMC cathode fabrication process without compromising battery performance. Specifically, both the NMP blade-coated and DMF screen-printed batteries retained 87 and 90% of their capacity after 1000 (1C/1C) cycles for NMC523 and NMC88, respectively. The modeling results of the drying process indicate that utilizing a low-boiling-point solvent (DMF) instead of NMP can reduce the drying energy consumption fourfold, resulting in a more environmentally friendly battery production process

Urban forest soils harbour distinct and more diverse communities of bacteria and fungi compared to less disturbed forest soils

Anthropogenic changes to land use drive concomitant changes in biodiversity, including that of the soil microbiota. However, it is not clear how increasing intensity of human disturbance is reflected in the soil microbial communities. To address this issue, we used amplicon sequencing to quantify the microbiota (bacteria and fungi) in the soil of forests (n=312) experiencing four different land uses, national parks (set aside for nature conservation), managed (for forestry purposes), suburban (on the border of an urban area) and urban (fully within a town or city), which broadly represent a gradient of anthropogenic disturbance. Alpha diversity of bacteria and fungi increased with increasing levels of anthropogenic disturbance, and was thus highest in urban forest soils and lowest in the national parks. The forest soil microbial communities were structured according to the level of anthropogenic disturbance, with a clear urban signature evident in both bacteria and fungi. Despite notable differences in community composition, there was little change in the predicted functional traits of urban bacteria. By contrast, urban soils exhibited a marked loss of ectomycorrhizal fungi. Soil pH was positively correlated with the level of disturbance, and thus was the strongest predictor of variation in alpha and beta diversity of forest soil communities, indicating a role of soil alkalinity in structuring urban soil microbial communities. Hence, our study shows how the properties of urban forest soils promote an increase in microbial diversity and a change in forest soil microbiota composition.peerReviewe