Effect of hoop restraint on the degradation behavior of cement paste exposed to sodium sulfate solution

Concrete filled steel tube (CFST) is an effective method to alleviate sulfate attack in saline soil environments. In this study, the effect of hoop restraint on the degradation behavior due to sulfate attack in ordinary Portland cement (OPC) paste and sulfate-resistance Portland cement (SRPC) pastes is studied. The cracking behavior and mass variation are determined to investigate deterioration process of the pastes. EPMA-WDS, nanoindentation and SEM-EDS are performed to analyse the deterioration mechanism of the cement paste under hoop restraint condition. As the results shown: The deterioration behaviors of cement pastes is strongly affected by hoop restraint. Specifically, the hoop restraint inhibited crack formation of the specimens and formation of sulfate products. The average effective sulfate diffusion coefficient is reduced by 30.26% and 5.81% for OPC and SRPC paste during 365 days of exposure, respectively, compared with the reference group. Moreover, the mechanism of deterioration of cement paste under hoop restraint condition is proposed based on change in chemical component of C–S–H phase. The hoop restraint from steel tube can effectively inhibit the sulfate attack on cement composite with important engineering significance

Hybrid palm oil (Elaeis oleifera 7Elaeis guineensis) supplementation improves plasma antioxidant capacity in humans

Hybrid palm oil obtained from interspecific hybrid Elaeis oleifera\u2009 7\u2009Elaeis guineensis palm (HPO) has been recently proved to have a favorable impact on human plasma lipids related to cardiovascular disease risk factors. In the present work, we describe for the first time, the functional effect of crude HPO supplementation on human antioxidant plasma/serum status as assessed by the total phenolic content (Folin\u2013Ciocalteu), ORAC and TEAC assays. One hundred sixty eligible participants (>50 years) were randomized and assigned to one of the two treatments: 25\u2009mL hybrid palm oil (HPO group) or 25\u2009mL extra virgin olive oil (EVOO group) daily for 3 months. This study showed that supplementation of 25\u2009mL of HPO for a period of 3 months significantly increased (p\u2009<\u20090.01) the total phenolic content (19.2%) as well as the antioxidant capacity of human plasma measured by both ORAC (92.1%) and TEAC (42.9%) methods. Furthermore, no significant differences were found between HPO and EVOO groups in a repeated measures analysis of variance for TPC (p\u2009=\u20090.344), TEAC (p\u2009=\u20090.217), and ORAC (p\u2009=\u20090.318) values. These results confirm that HPO can be considered a promising tropical edible oil with potential beneficial health effects