Thermodynamic insights and assessment of the ‘circular economy’

This study analyses the effect on energy use of applying a wide range of circular economy approaches. By collating evidence on specific quantifiable approaches and then calculating and analyzing their combined full supply chain impacts through input-output analysis, it provides a more complete assessment of the overall potential scope for energy savings that these approaches might deliver than provided elsewhere. Assessment is conducted globally, across the EU-27 and in the UK. Overall, the identified opportunities have the potential to save 6%–11% of energy used to support economic activity, worldwide and in the EU, and 5%–8% in the UK. Their potential is equivalent to the total scope for other industrial energy efficiency savings. The potential savings are further divided into those due to sets of approaches relating to food waste, steel production, other materials production, product refurbishment, vehicle provision, construction and other equipment manufacture. Each of these sets of approaches can make a key contribution to the total savings that are possible. Complementary use of energy and exergy metrics illustrates the way in which energy use might change and for the first time provides indication that in most cases other energy efficiency measures are unlikely to be adversely affected by the circular economy approaches. Potential for savings in the energy embodied in each key product input to each major sector is assessed, enabling prioritization of the areas in which the circular economy approaches have the greatest scope for impact and identification of supply chains for which they are underrepresented

Thermodynamic insights and assessment of the ‘circular economy’

This study analyses the effect on energy use of applying a wide range of circular economy approaches. By collating evidence on specific quantifiable approaches and then calculating and analyzing their combined full supply chain impacts through input-output analysis, it provides a more complete assessment of the overall potential scope for energy savings that these approaches might deliver than provided elsewhere. Assessment is conducted globally, across the EU-27 and in the UK. Overall, the identified opportunities have the potential to save 6%–11% of energy used to support economic activity, worldwide and in the EU, and 5%–8% in the UK. Their potential is equivalent to the total scope for other industrial energy efficiency savings. The potential savings are further divided into those due to sets of approaches relating to food waste, steel production, other materials production, product refurbishment, vehicle provision, construction and other equipment manufacture. Each of these sets of approaches can make a key contribution to the total savings that are possible. Complementary use of energy and exergy metrics illustrates the way in which energy use might change and for the first time provides indication that in most cases other energy efficiency measures are unlikely to be adversely affected by the circular economy approaches. Potential for savings in the energy embodied in each key product input to each major sector is assessed, enabling prioritization of the areas in which the circular economy approaches have the greatest scope for impact and identification of supply chains for which they are underrepresented

Mitigating agency risk between investors and ventures’ managers

The general management literature has long focused on the agency risks involved in the relationship between general managers and shareholders. Shareholders can deploy contractual and non-contractual mechanisms to reduce these inefficiencies. This study examines - based on a broad international sample of investment contracts - how the use of contractual and non-contractual mechanisms is related to the degree of risks associated with the venture’s development stage as well as how these practices differ across countries. Hypotheses are tested using a proprietary dataset of 265 hand-collected investment contracts associated with ventures in the U.S., Israel and nine European countries. Findings suggest that the use of mitigating contractual and non-contractual mechanisms is related to the degree of agency risks, and that these practices vary across countries. This study draws implications for how investors can best deploy their capital in different institutional settings whilst nurturing their relationships with managers and entrepreneurs

The ORthopaedic Trauma Hospital Outcomes - Patient Operative Delays (ORTHOPOD) study

Aims: This is a multicentre, prospective assessment of a proportion of the overall orthopaedic trauma caseload of the UK. It investigates theatre capacity, cancellations, and time to surgery in a group of hospitals that is representative of the wider population. It identifies barriers to effective practice and will inform system improvements. Methods: Data capture was by collaborative approach. Patients undergoing procedures from 22 August 2022 and operated on before 31 October 2022 were included. Arm one captured weekly caseload and theatre capacity. Arm two concerned patient and injury demographics, and time to surgery for specific injury groups. Results: Data was available from 90 hospitals across 86 data access groups (70 in England, two in Wales, ten in Scotland, and four in Northern Ireland). After exclusions, 709 weeks' of data on theatre capacity and 23,138 operations were analyzed. The average number of cases per operating session was 1.73. Only 5.8% of all theatre sessions were dedicated day surgery sessions, despite 29% of general trauma patients being eligible for such pathways. In addition, 12.3% of patients experienced at least one cancellation. Delays to surgery were longest in Northern Ireland and shortest in England and Scotland. There was marked variance across all fracture types. Open fractures and fragility hip fractures, influenced by guidelines and performance renumeration, had short waits, and varied least. In all, nine hospitals had 40 or more patients waiting for surgery every week, while seven had less than five. Conclusion: There is great variability in operative demand and list provision seen in this study of 90 UK hospitals. There is marked variation in nearly all injuries apart from those associated with performance monitoring. There is no evidence of local network level coordination of care for orthopaedic trauma patients. Day case operating and pathways of care are underused and are an important area for service improvement

Current and Future Remote Sensing of Harmful Algal Blooms in the Chesapeake Bay to Support the Shellfish Industry

Harmful algal bloom (HAB) species in the Chesapeake Bay can negatively impact fish, shellfish, and human health via the production of toxins and the degradation of water quality. Due to the deleterious effects of HAB species on economically and environmentally important resources, such as oyster reef systems, Bay area resource managers are seeking ways to monitor HABs and water quality at large spatial and fine temporal scales. The use of satellite ocean color imagery has proven to be a beneficial tool for resource management in other locations around the world where high-biomass, nearly monospecific HABs occur. However, remotely monitoring HABs in the Chesapeake Bay is complicated by the presence of multiple, often co-occurring, species and optically complex waters. Here we present a summary of common marine and estuarine HAB species found in the Chesapeake Bay, Alexandrium monilatum, Karlodinium veneficum, Margalefidinium polykrikoides, and Prorocentrum minimum, that have been detected from space using multispectral data products from the Ocean and Land Colour Imager (OLCI) sensor on the Sentinel-3 satellites and identified based on in situ phytoplankton data and ecological associations. We review how future hyperspectral instruments will improve discrimination of potentially harmful species from other phytoplankton communities and present a framework in which satellite data products could aid Chesapeake Bay resource managers with monitoring water quality and protecting shellfish resources

Computing Fresnel integrals via modified trapezium rules

In this paper we propose methods for computing Fresnel integrals based on truncated trapezium rule approximations to integrals on the real line, these trapezium rules modified to take into account poles of the integrand near the real axis. Our starting point is a method for computation of the error function of complex argument due to Matta and Reichel (J Math Phys 34:298–307, 1956) and Hunter and Regan (Math Comp 26:539–541, 1972). We construct approximations which we prove are exponentially convergent as a function of N , the number of quadrature points, obtaining explicit error bounds which show that accuracies of 10−15 uniformly on the real line are achieved with N=12 , this confirmed by computations. The approximations we obtain are attractive, additionally, in that they maintain small relative errors for small and large argument, are analytic on the real axis (echoing the analyticity of the Fresnel integrals), and are straightforward to implement

Uncovering Blind Spots in Urban Carbon Management: The Role of Consumption-Based Carbon Accounting in Bristol, UK

The rapid urbanisation of the twentieth century, along with the spread of high-consumption urban lifestyles, has led to cities becoming the dominant drivers of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Reducing these impacts is crucial, but production-based frameworks of carbon measurement and mitigation—which encompass only a limited part of cities’ carbon footprints—are much more developed and widely applied than consumption-based approaches that consider the embedded carbon effectively imported into a city. Frequently, therefore, cities are left blind to the importance of their wider consumption-related climate impacts, while at the same time left lacking effective tools to reduce them. To explore the relevance of these issues, we implement methodologies for assessing production- and consumption-based emissions at the city-level and estimate the associated emissions trajectories for Bristol, a major UK city, from 2000 to 2035. We develop mitigation scenarios targeted at reducing the former, considering potential energy, carbon and financial savings in each case. We then compare these mitigation potentials with local government ambitions and Bristol’s consumption-based emissions trajectory. Our results suggest that the city’s consumption-based emissions are three times the production-based emissions, largely due to the impacts of imported food and drink. We find that low-carbon investments of circa £3 billion could reduce production-based emissions by 25% in 2035. However, we also find that this represents <10% of Bristol’s forecast consumption-based emissions for 2035 and is approximately equal to the mitigation achievable by eliminating the city’s current levels of food waste. Such observations suggest that incorporating consumption-based emission statistics into cities’ accounting and decision-making processes could uncover largely unrecognised opportunities for mitigation that are likely to be essential for achieving deep decarbonisation

MIMOX: a web tool for phage display based epitope mapping

BACKGROUND: Phage display is widely used in basic research such as the exploration of protein-protein interaction sites and networks, and applied research such as the development of new drugs, vaccines, and diagnostics. It has also become a promising method for epitope mapping. Research on new algorithms that assist and automate phage display based epitope mapping has attracted many groups. Most of the existing tools have not been implemented as an online service until now however, making it less convenient for the community to access, utilize, and evaluate them. RESULTS: We present MIMOX, a free web tool that helps to map the native epitope of an antibody based on one or more user supplied mimotopes and the antigen structure. MIMOX was coded in Perl using modules from the Bioperl project. It has two sections. In the first section, MIMOX provides a simple interface for ClustalW to align a set of mimotopes. It also provides a simple statistical method to derive the consensus sequence and embeds JalView as a Java applet to view and manage the alignment. In the second section, MIMOX can map a single mimotope or a consensus sequence of a set of mimotopes, on to the corresponding antigen structure and search for all of the clusters of residues that could represent the native epitope. NACCESS is used to evaluate the surface accessibility of the candidate clusters; and Jmol is embedded to view them interactively in their 3D context. Initial case studies show that MIMOX can reproduce mappings from existing tools such as FINDMAP and 3DEX, as well as providing novel, rational results. CONCLUSION: A web-based tool called MIMOX has been developed for phage display based epitope mapping. As a publicly available online service in this area, it is convenient for the community to access, utilize, and evaluate, complementing other existing programs. MIMOX is freely available at

Influence of hyper-energetic, high-fat feeding on circulating hepatokines in healthy men: a randomised crossover study [Abstract]

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