The surface hydrology and diffuse pollution loading is hypothesized based on the unique characteristics under different rainfall types in watersheds with a subtropical monsoon climate. This study evaluated the effects of different rainfall event intensity on surface runoff and diffuse nitrogen loss in a subtropical watershed located in the latitude range between 22.5° north and 25° north in southern China by adapting the hydrological model SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool). The rainfall events were classified into four categories including light rainfall (LR), moderate rainfall (MR), intense rainfall (IR), and extreme rainfall (ER). Our results showed that the ER events had the lowest occurrences of 7 days per year, but they contributed the most to total surface runoff (54.29%) and TN losses (57.63%) in the subtropical watershed researched. Although forests and pastures had a better effect on reducing diffuse pollution, their surface runoff and nitrogen loss were still proved to be... [more]

Packing products into a pallet or other medium is an unavoidable activity for producing companies. In many cases, packing is based on operator experience and training using packing patterns that have worked before. Automated packing, on the other hand, requires a systematic procedure for devising packing solutions. In the scientific literature, this problem is known as 3D bin packing (3DBP) and many authors have proposed exact and heuristic solutions for many variations of the problem. There is, however, a lack of datasets that can be used to test and validate such solutions. Many of the available datasets use randomly generated products with extremely limited connection to real practice. Furthermore, they contain a reduced number of product configurations and ignore that packing relates to customers’ orders, which have specific relative mixes of products. This paper proposes a software toolbox for generating arbitrarily large datasets for 3DBPP based on real industry data. The toolbox... [more]

The temperature or maturity limit of methane (CH4) cracking is very useful for the determination of the most depth or the highest maturity in natural gas exploration owing to the composition of over mature gas. In this work, three series of CH4 cracking experiments were conducted under different conditions of N2 + CH4, N2 + CH4 + montmorillonite and N2 + CH4 + shale, respectively, in a gold tube system. The experimental results show that some heavy gas with negative carbon isotope composition could be generated in the three series experiments and that shale has more intense catalysis for CH4 cracking than montmorillonite. The catalysis of metal elements distributed in the minerals of shale is attributed to CH4 cracking acceleration. The shale catalysis makes the maturity threshold of CH4 substantial cracking decrease from 6.0%Ro under no catalysis, to 4.5%Ro under a shale system in a geological setting. Nevertheless, we suggest not to lightly practice natural gas exploration in shale w... [more]

Pore and permeability are distributed discontinuously and unevenly in the dominant sedimentary model of the lateral accretion body inside the meandering river point bar of the Fuyang reservoir of the Yushulin oilfield. Based on the water flooding experiments of field core samples, the influence of pore permeability conditions on residual oil distribution type and water cutting rate was studied by using the microscopic visualization technology enabled through a photolithographically fabricated glass model. It is found that the residual oil in samples shows five discontinuous types, which are cluster, columnar, oil droplet, membrane, and blind end. In the stages with low, medium, and high water cutting rates, the proportion of clustered residual oil in the samples with different permeability is high, reflecting the situation that it is difficult for injected water to spread widely in tight oil reservoirs. With the decrease of permeability, the proportion of membrane and blind end residua... [more]

The soft surrounding rock of deep roadways is in the state of “micro-fracture and low permeability”. In order to solve the problem of grouting reinforcement of micro-fractures surrounding rock in deep roadways, the influence characteristics of auxiliary materials and additives on slurry flow were analyzed, and the composition and proportion of superfine cement-based composite grouting materials were determined: superfine cement accounted for 89.4%, superfine coal ash accounted for 5%, ultrafine mineral powder accounted for 5%, naphthalene water reducing agent accounted for 3~5‱, and lignin sulfonate calcium accounted for 1~3‱. The effects of water−cement ratio and water reducer content on slurry viscosity and water bleeding rate were tested by laboratory experiments. Based on the fracture characteristics of surrounding rock and the “Liu Jiacai Formula”, the influence law of fracture opening, grouting pressure and slurry viscosity on the slurry diffusion radius was analyzed. The results... [more]

Cheese whey (CW) is the liquid by-product of cheese and yogurt making. This potential pollutant has high-quality nutrients exploitable through fermentation processes. Using high-intensity ultrasound on dairy products has shown several technological advantages for bioprocesses. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the effect of high-intensity ultrasound (HIUS) on kefir grains biomass increase and specific metabolites in CW kefir. Fresh CW was ultrasonicated at 9.0 ± 2.7 and 18.0 ± 3.0 W/cm2 for 30 and 180 s, inoculated with kefir grains, and fermented for 40 h. Total exopolysaccharide production, kefir grains biomass increase, titratable acidity, pH, and soluble solids were analyzed every 8 h. CW pretreated with 18.0 ± 3.0 W/cm2 for 180 s and fermented for 16 h had significantly higher (p < 0.05) total exopolysaccharide concentration than the control: 212.7 ± 0.0 and 186.6 ± 0.0 mg/L, respectively. Ultrasonicated CW at 18 W/cm2 for 30 and 180 s at 24 h fermentation time had sig... [more]

Denim production wastewater is an industrial wastewater with a high organic pollutant content. The aim of this study was to improve a cost-effective method via solar panel integration to the photo Fenton process (PFP) and photo electrochemical Fenton process (PEFP) for removing high chemical oxygen demand (COD) from denim production wastewater. To determine process parameter values, the double criterial optimization option was used. The results that maximized the COD removal efficiency and minimized the operating cost of two oxidation processes were determined by response surface methodology (RSM). Optimum operation conditions for the PFP process were 3.18 initial pH, 2.3 g/L Fe2+ concentration, and 27 g/L H2O2 concentration while they were 3.00 initial pH, 27.06 A/m2 current density, and 28.16 g/L H2O2 concentration for PEFP. At the optimum conditions, COD and the total organic carbon (TOC) removal efficiency of PFP were 85% and 61%, respectively. They were determined as 90% and 73% i... [more]

Understanding the impact of sintering temperature on the physical and chemical properties of Ni-BaCe0.54Zr0.36Y0.1O3-δ (Ni-BCZY) composite anode is worthy of being investigated as this anode is the potential for protonic ceramic fuel cell (PCFC) application. Initially, NiO−BCZY composite powder with 50 wt% of NiO and 50 wt% of BCZY is prepared by the sol−gel method using citric acid as the chelating agent. Thermogravimetric analysis indicates that the optimum calcination temperature of the synthesised powder is 1100 °C. XRD result shows that the calcined powder exists as a single cubic phase without any secondary phase with the lattice parameter (a) of 4.332 Å. FESEM analysis confirms that the powder is homogeneous and uniform, with an average particle size of 51 ± 16 nm. The specific surface area of the calcined powder measured by the Brunauer−Emmett−Teller (BET) technique is 6.25 m2/g. The thickness, porosity, electrical conductivity and electrochemical performance of the screen-prin... [more]

Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are aliphatic polyesters synthesized intracellularly by microorganisms as a carbon-storage substance. Among the various PHAs, 3-hydroxybutyrate (3HB)-based copolymers are crystalline polymers widely used as biodegradable plastics. Recently, PHAs containing α-carbon-methylated monomers, such as 3-hydroxy-2-methylbutyrate (3H2MB) and 3-hydroxy-2-methylvalerate (3H2MV), have been synthesized and characterized. However, a binary copolymer of 3HB and 3H2MV, P(3HB-co-3H2MV), had not yet been synthesized, and its material properties had not been investigated. In this study, P(3HB-co-11 mol% 3H2MV) (PHBMV11) was synthesized with recombinant Escherichia coli LSBJ, using trans-2-methyl-2-pentenoic acid as the 3H2MV precursor. The thermal properties of PHBMV11 were characterized using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and the results were compared with those of P(3HB-co-12 mol% 3-hydroxyvalerate) (PHBV12) to explore the effect of α-carbon methylation in the com... [more]

The heritage of ancient buildings is an important part of the world’s history and culture, which has extremely rich historical−cultural value and artistic research value. Beijing has a large number of ancient palace buildings, and because of the age of their construction, many of them have problems with varying degrees of peeling and molding on the inner surfaces of the envelope. To solve the problems of damp interiors of palace buildings, a mathematical model of indoor heat and moisture transfer was established based on an ancient wooden palace building in Beijing. The model was validated by fitting the measured and simulated data. And the effects of outdoor relative humidity, soil moisture, wall moisture, and other factors on indoor heat and moisture transfer of ancient buildings were simulated and analyzed via the control variables method. The results showed that the measured and simulated data are within the error range, which verifies the accuracy of the model. And the simulation... [more]

The Anaerobic Digestion Model 1 is the quasi-industry standard for modelling anaerobic digestion, and it has seen several new implementations in recent years. It is assumed that these implementations would give the same results; however, a thorough comparison of these implementations has never been reported. This paper considers four different implementations of ADM1: one in Julia, one in Java, and two in Python. The Julia code is a de novo implementation of the ODE formulation of ADM1 that is reported here for the first time. The existing Java and Python codes implement the more common DAE formulation. Therefore, this paper also examines how DAE implementations compare to ODE implementations in terms of computational speed as well as solutions returned. As expected, the ODE and DAE forms both return comparable solutions. However, contrary to popular belief, the Julia ODE implementation is faster than the DAE implementations, namely by one to three orders of magnitude of compute time,... [more]

A large number of CO2 emissions caused a serious greenhouse effect, aggravating global warming and climate change. Therefore, CO2 utilization has been a research hotspot, especially after the Paris Agreement, and among the various CO2 utilization technologies, the power-to-gas (PTG) and power-to-liquid (PTL) processes have recently attracted significant attention because they can transform CO2 into fuels and/or chemicals. Considering the lack of detailed information in the literature with regard to process design and economic analysis, we have critically and comprehensively summarized the recent research progresses concerning the PTG and PTL processes. Herein, we mainly focus on the power-to-methane in the case of PTG and the power-to-syncrude, power-to-methanol, and power-to-ethers in the case of PTL. From the technical point of view, the bottleneck problem of PTG and PTL processes is the low system efficiency, which can be improved by heat integration and/or process integration. Mean... [more]

Valves are important components in controlling the amount of fluid going to devices. One of these types is the butterfly valve (BFV) that adjusts the amount of flow by rotating the valve disk by means of its shafts which is usually located in the middle of the flow. Despite its common usage in various applications, the BFV is known to cause a high-pressure drop. Conversely, the pinch valve is another type of flow control device that uses a pinching mechanism to open and close the inner tube by pinching at different degrees. The absence of flow-controlling mechanisms in the flow path, such as the valve disk and its shaft, contribute to the minimal pressure drop in pinch valves. The high-pressure drop in BFVs and the minimal pressure drop in pinch valve flow make it worthwhile to investigate and compare their flow at all opening positions of the two valves. Therefore, this work numerically explores the potential of using the pinch valve as an alternative to the BFV in terms of its abilit... [more]

China has focused on the exploration and development of shale gas resources to reduce its reliance on coal and shift to cleaner energy sources. While significant progress has been made in the Sichuan Basin, unlocking the shale gas potential in other regions of South China has proven challenging due to the complex geology and mountainous terrain. In 2021, Well QSD-1 was deployed in southwestern Guizhou and achieved a daily shale gas flow of 11,011 m3 in the Dawuba Formation, marking the first time an industrial gas flow had been obtained from shale gas drilling in the marine strata of the Upper Paleozoic in China. This breakthrough has deepened the understanding of the southern China Carboniferous marine strata and highlighted key aspects of the formation: (1) Sedimentation occurred in alternating platforms and basins, with most organic-rich shale developed in sloping and basin areas; (2) the formation exhibits favorable static indicators, with a relatively thick section (over 200 m), a... [more]

Current performance analysis processes for drag-dominant tidal turbines are unsuitable as disk actuator theory lacks support for varying swept blockage area, bypass flow downstream interaction, and parasitic rotor drag, whereas blade element momentum theory is computably effective for three-blade lift-dominated aerofoil. This study proposes a novel technique to calculate the optimal turbine tip speed ratio (TSR) with a cost-effective and user-friendly moment balancing algorithm. A reliable dynamic TSR matrix was developed with varying rotational speeds and fluid velocities, unlike previous works simulated at a fixed fluid velocity. Thrust and idle moments are introduced as functions of inlet fluid velocity and rotational speed, respectively. The quadratic relationships are verified through regression analysis, and net moment equations are established. Rotational speed was a reliable predictor for Pinwheel’s idle moment, while inlet velocity was a reliable predictor for thrust moment fo... [more]

Ship-to-shore connection is an important technological element that reduces air pollution in ports. Therefore, ports install facilities that allow mooring ships to connect to the port distribution network. By 2025, this will be mandatory for all ports in Europe. This can be a challenging task in most ports due to the different frequency of the network and ship frequency. This problem can be solved by the use of grid-forming static frequency converters. This solution also brings some other advantages: The ship is not threatened by high shore short-circuit currents, and the port distribution network is not affected by the character of the ship load. However, frequency converter software must include a droop control algorithm to ensure that voltage deviations do not exceed the allowed limits during transients. Typical frequency converters used for shore connection are those developed as static frequency converters (SFCs). However, those converters were not developed for large power output... [more]

A series of mesoporous NiO catalysts with high specific surface area were prepared by a simple hydrothermal method and modified by cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) as the crystal structure directing regent. The characterization with SEM, XRD, BET, and H2-TPR results demonstrated that the introduction of CTAB effectively improved the dispersion, specific surface area, and pore volume and redox ability of NiO, and thus exposed more active sites. Meanwhile, the NiO catalyst with a CTAB/NiSO4·6H2O molar ratio of 2/3 exhibited the better catalytic ozonation performance of toluene, formaldehyde, methanol, and ethyl acetate than NiO. The in-situ DRIFTS elucidated the reaction path of catalytic ozonation of toluene and indicated that the introduction of CTAB facilitated the complete oxidation of by-products into CO2 and H2O.

Mixotrophic microalgal cultivation can utilize CO2 and organic carbon sources. This study optimized the cultivation nitrogen source (peptone, urea, yeast extract, NH4Cl, (NH4)2SO4, NH4NO3, NaNO3 and KNO3), carbon combination (glucose, glycerol, sucrose), (NH4)2SO4 nitrogen source and pH (6−11) in a local microalgae species with three characteristics (high pH-resistant, high growth rate and high lipid content). Chlorella sp. G3H3-1-2 biomass production and lipid accumulation were estimated using the fatty acid methyl esters (FAMEs) concentration. The Chlorella sp. G3H3-1-2 FAME content was strongly influenced by the carbon, nitrogen sources and pH variations. The pH ranged from 6.0 to 8.0, which produced the highest specific growth rate of 1.22 day−1 for Chlorella sp. G3H3-1-2 while using glucose as the single carbon source. However, the highest total FAMEs content of 59% in the Chlorella sp. G3H3-1-2 biomass of 1.75 g/L was obtained while using the combination of 1 g-glucose/L as the c... [more]

The natural hydrophilic property of leather makes it a possible growing substrate for microorganisms. Microorganisms such as bacteria, yeasts, and molds frequently grow on shoe lining leather, causing skin diseases, unpleasant odors, and discomfort for the wearers. To address these issues, herein, bio-synthesized silver nanoparticles from Piper betle L. leaf extract were applied as an antimicrobial agent to pig leather via the exhaustion method. The characterization of nanosilver-treated pig leather was performed using colorimetry, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS), and FTIR techniques. Evaluation of antimicrobial efficacy of the nanosilver-treated leather was both qualitatively and quantitatively assessed against two bacteria (Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus) and two fungi (a yeast Candida albicans and a mold Aspergillus niger) in accordance with AATCC TM90, AATCC TM30, and ISO 16187:2013 sta... [more]

The present study explored anti-tubercular pyrrole derivatives against cancer targets using different in silico and in vitro approaches. Initially, nineteen anti-tubercular pyrrolyl benzohydrazide derivatives were screened against a potent cancer target PLK1 using an AutoDock Vina approach. Out of the nineteen derivatives, the two most potent derivatives C8 [N′-(4-(1H-pyrrol-1-yl) benzoyl)-3-chlorobenzohydrazide] and C18 [N′-(4-(1H-pyrrol-1-yl) benzoyl)-4-nitrobenzohydrazide], were subjected to molecular simulation analysis for a 100 ns trajectory. Further, these two derivatives were tested against A549, MCF-7, and HepG2 cell lines using an MTT proliferation assay. Apoptotic cell cycle and DAPI assays were also performed for C8 on A549 cell lines. Molecular dynamic analysis revealed that the stability of the C8−PLK1 protein complex during the 100 ns trajectory run was better than that of the C18−PLK1 protein complex. In addition, C8 showed lower IC50 values against the tested cell line... [more]

In view of the problem that the formation of deepwater wells in the study area leak easily, the mechanism of loss-circulation was studied in depth, and the loss-circulation plugging material SmartGel was developed with guar gum and its derivatives as the main synthetic raw materials. The gel process could be controlled by adjusting the dosage and temperature of gel accelerators. In order to adjust the gelling speed of SmartGel, GelRetarder and GelAccelerant were developed. The extrusion strength of SmartGel increased with the increase in SmartGel dose and decreased with the increase in temperature. As for the plugging performance of SmartGel, the sand bed test confirmed that the pressure capacity of SmartGel in the 80 °C sand bed can reach at least 7 MPa, which can meet the requirements of site construction. The PPT sand tray test and core flow meter simulation pore test showed that SmartGel has good bearing performance. As for the gel-breaking of SmartGel, low-temperature gel-breaking... [more]

Two novel separation methods have been presented for the concurrent assessment of flumethasone pivalate (FP) and clioquinol (CL) in their combinations in ear drop formulations or in the presence of phenoxyethanol preservative (PEP) in their cream formulations. The first method is an innovative thin-layer chromatographic (TLC) method. The optimal separation was accomplished via silica gel aluminum plates F254, with a mixture of benzene, ethyl acetate and formic acid (5:5:0.2, in volumes) as the mobile system. In Method II, a new ultra-high-performance liquid chromatographic method (UHPLC) with a photodiode array detector (PDA) was presented. A reversed-phase inertsil ODS 5 µm C 18 packed column (100 Å, 4.6 mm internal diameter (I.D.) × 50 mm) at 30 °C was employed. Elution was completed in 3 min. Unfortunately, greener solvents were tested as a mobile phase, but an asymmetric peak for CL was noted. In addition, the new UHPLC method has a priority over the old HPLC one by Sayed et al., 2... [more]

Periodontal diseases are highly prevalent oral conditions associated with severe complications in the oral cavity. These inflammatory diseases are caused by the oral microbiome and are influenced by several factors, such as aging, tobacco usage, systemic illness and inadequate oral hygiene. Plant-derived phytochemicals are extensively utilized in managing various periodontal diseases due to the presence of antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and antibacterial activities. Plant materials have shifted attention from conventional medicine to indigenous medicine. Solanum xanthocarpum is a medicinal herb found in India. It exhibits various pharmacological properties essential for periodontal disease prevention and management. The current work analyzes various pharmacological properties of S. xanthocarpum aqueous extract. The S. xanthocarpum extracts’ antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-microbial properties were ascertained by DPPH assay, HRBC membrane stabilization assay and disk diffusion a... [more]

Core−shell nanoparticles are functional materials with tailored properties, able to improve the requirements of various applications. Both core and shell components can be inorganic or organic, and there are numerous studies in this field regarding their synthesis methods, properties, and applications. This review aims to study core−shell nanostructures with Fe3O4 cores and different shell types, observing their antibacterial and anticancer properties. By the type of coating, Fe3O4 core−shell nanoparticles (NPs) are classified into four categories: metal-coated NPs, metal-organic framework (MOF) coated NPs, metal oxide coated NPs, and polymer-coated NPs. Each category is briefly presented, emphasizing anticancer or antibacterial properties and specific applications (cancer diagnosis or therapy, drug carrier). Moreover, synthesis methods and particle size for both core and shell nanostructures, as well as the magnetic properties of the final core−shell material, are summarized in this r... [more]

Uncertain variables, such as electric power system parameters, have significant impacts on dynamic simulations of power systems. As traditional uncertainty analysis methods for power system dynamic simulations, both the simulation method and the approximation methods are difficult to balance the model complexity, computational efficiency, and simulation accuracy. In order to balance the model complexity, computational efficiency, and simulation accuracy, this paper proposes a method for uncertainty analysis for power system dynamic simulation based on the Nataf transformation and Gaussian-Hermite quadrature. Firstly, the samples on the normal distribution space are determined according to the Gaussian-Hermite quadrature points and the Nataf transformation. Secondly, obtain the simulation samples by inverse Nataf transformation, and perform power system dynamic simulation. Thirdly, the random output is approximated as a linear combination of a single random input, and the mean and stand... [more]